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General Discussion => Beer and Queso => Topic started by: Nate Colbert on September 24, 2016, 03:35:35 pm
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Excellent piece in the New Yorker (http://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/my-nineteenth-presidential-election-and-the-most-important) by the 96-year old baseball writer.
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Also in the New Yorker:
Trump encountered a U.S. nuclear-arms negotiator at a reception in 1990 and offered advice on how to cut a “terrific” deal with a Soviet counterpart. Trump told him to arrive late, stand over the Soviet negotiator, stick his finger in his chest, and say, “Fuck you!”
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I still think Trump will win, god help us all.
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I still think Trump will win, god help us all.
How about now?
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How about now?
I doubt that debate changed anyone's mind. Trump supporters are thumping their chests this morning about how he knocked that debate out of the park and how he proved he's exactly the kind of no-planning, ready-fire-aim, political novice we need running the country.
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I doubt that debate changed anyone's mind. Trump supporters are thumping their chests this morning about how he knocked that debate out of the park and how he proved he's exactly the kind of no-planning, ready-fire-aim, political novice we need running the country.
It was never about existing Trump supporters, it was about those who are (amazingly) still undecided. A CNN poll of likely voters had Clinton "winning" 62% to 27% and another poll of Florida "undecideds" had Clinton over Trump 90/10 (albeit a small sample of 20 people).
Trump had an incredibly low bar for success last night, and he came up short. If all that happened is that independent and some reluctant Trump voters got turned off him, then job done Clinton.
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It was never about existing Trump supporters, it was about those who are (amazingly) still undecided. A CNN poll of likely voters had Clinton "winning" 62% to 27% and another poll of Florida "undecideds" had Clinton over Trump 90/10 (albeit a small sample of 20 people).
Trump had an incredibly low bar for success last night, and he came up short. If all that happened is that independent and some reluctant Trump voters got turned off him, then job done Clinton.
I guess I just refuse to believe there is a significant number of "undecided" in this one.
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I guess I just refuse to believe there is a significant number of "undecided" in this one.
North Carolina: group of undecided voters "gasped" when Trump said not paying taxes made him "smart".
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/a-lean-toward-clinton-among-one-group-of-undecided-north-carolina-voters/2016/09/27/ff271b2e-8469-11e6-92c2-14b64f3d453f_story.html?postshare=7421474992141601&tid=ss_tw
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North Carolina: group of undecided voters "gasped" when Trump said not paying taxes made him "smart".
The told-to-be-quiet audience laughed when he claimed his temperament was his best trait.
He is a zombie-candidate. Dead, but won't die.
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I guess I just refuse to believe there is a significant number of "undecided" in this one.
Hard to imagine.
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I think there a lot of people on the "Well, I don't really like a lot of things about Hillary, but Jesus Christ, that other guy is a gasoline drenched trainwreck" bandwagon.
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I think there a lot of people on the "Well, I don't really like a lot of things about Hillary, but Jesus Christ, that other guy is a gasoline drenched trainwreck" bandwagon.
Don't underestimate how many people think she is a vile, contemptible, corrupt human being and politician. And they won't vote for a politician.
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Don't underestimate how many people think she is a vile, contemptible, corrupt human being and politician. And they won't vote for a politician.
Believe me, I wasn't. Trump is just that horrible of a choice.
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Don't underestimate how many people think she is a vile, contemptible, corrupt human being and politician. And they won't vote for a politician.
This gets repeated so often that no one ever feels like they have to justify it. Has there ever been a more effective job of character assassination than's been pulled on Hillary?
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This gets repeated so often that no one ever feels like they have to justify it. Has there ever been a more effective job of character assassination than's been pulled on Hillary?
She is a turd sandwich. He is a giant douche. Once again, South Park nails it.
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This gets repeated so often that no one ever feels like they have to justify it. Has there ever been a more effective job of character assassination than's been pulled on Hillary?
It doesn't take much to find out how horrible she is. But my point was people will vote against her because she's part of the establishment, i.e. a politician.
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It doesn't take much to find out how horrible she is. But my point was people will vote against her because she's part of the establishment, i.e. a politician.
These are common people, salt of the earth. You know... morons.
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It doesn't take much to find out how horrible she is. But my point was people will vote against her because she's part of the establishment, i.e. a politician.
Voters of both parties re-nominated almost every congressional incumbent in the primaries. One of the few reps to lose was Tim Huelskamp, an anti-establishment Republican who got ousted by a more mainstream challenger. Obama's approval rating is sitting in the low fifties; he'd waltz to a third term if such a thing were still permitted. There's a lot of talk about "backlash," but there's precious little evidence that it actually exists. There are much better explanations for people's distaste for Clinton.
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It doesn't take much to find out how horrible she is. But my point was people will vote against her because she's part of the establishment, i.e. a politician.
Anyone running for political office is by definition a politician, engaged in the practice of politics.
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These are common people, salt of the earth. You know... morons.
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That clip has been running on an auto-loop in my head for the last year.
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How about now?
I still think so.
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2016/president/2016_elections_electoral_college_map.html
She's been dropping like a stone in the Electoral Vote map, down 10 just from Friday. This is all pre-debate stuff, but I don't think Trump has any downside in the debates. Those that support him won't care if he fucks up. The only ones watching that haven't decided are trying to see if Clinton will fuck up.
I'm also curious how accurate polling is any more. I won't answer a call if the caller ID isn't in my contact list; my voice mail says to leave a message. I will call them back if it's a legit caller I didn't have in my contact list yet. I know that's got to be very common these days, so the people the pollsters talk to are a small segment of the population. Are they actually representative of the rest of us? That's difficult to know.
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From what I've read about Secretary Clinton from Secret Service agents who worked for her when President Clinton was in office, the term "high maintenance" would be an understatement. She's going to win, so I don't understand what all the hubbub is about.
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From what I've read about Secretary Clinton from Secret Service agents who worked for her when President Clinton was in office, the term "high maintenance" would be an understatement. She's going to win, so I don't understand what all the hubbub is about.
Because these 2 candidates bring more entertainment than we may ever see again.
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Because these 2 candidates bring more entertainment than we may ever see again.
In the same way that the lions vs the Christians was "entertainment".
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In the same way that the lions vs the Christians was "entertainment".
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Um, no.
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In the same way that the lions vs the Christians was "entertainment".
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No, more of a Theater of the Absurd kind of way. It's low brow performance art.
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No, more of a Theater of the Absurd kind of way. It's low brow performance art.
Professional rasslin'.
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Professional rasslin'.
I'm actually a fan of rasslin', for a variety of reasons.
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I'm actually a fan of rasslin', for a variety of reasons.
Another closet NXT fan, huh?
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So, just this week, Trump put on a derisory debate performance (worthy of a long list of gaffes and missteps of its own), doubled down on his defense of fat-shaming a pageant winner, tripled down on that at 5am this morning with a trademarked Twitter rant (alleging a non-existent sex tape) - seriously, that's what was on his mind at 5am? - has been outed for his company violating the Cuban embargo and has had the Trump Foundation outed for operating without the necessary licenses for a charitable organization (because it works with money raised from people who are not Trump). And it's still early on Friday.
SMFH
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You don't understand, none of that matters. He said he is "going to lower taxes, big league. She is going to raise taxes, big league. End of story."
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You don't understand, none of that matters. He said he is "going to lower taxes, big league. She is going to raise taxes, big league. End of story."
Point of order, the word he uses is "bigly" not "big league."
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So, just this week, Trump put on a derisory debate performance (worthy of a long list of gaffes and missteps of its own), doubled down on his defense of fat-shaming a pageant winner, tripled down on that at 5am this morning with a trademarked Twitter rant (alleging a non-existent sex tape) - seriously, that's what was on his mind at 5am? - has been outed for his company violating the Cuban embargo and has had the Trump Foundation outed for operating without the necessary licenses for a charitable organization (because it works with money raised from people who are not Trump). And it's still early on Friday.
SMFH
All of the polling post debate that I've seen has her with a small lead now. Shocking to me coming out of the debate. She should be in double digits. The level of hate for her is strong in this country.
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Point of order, the word he uses is "bigly" not "big league."
At the risk of breaking an impressive streak and actually defending Trump; he does say "big league". It's just that his speech patterns are odd, to say the least, such that it sounds like "bigly".
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I suspect he's already reached his high water mark.
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All of the polling post debate that I've seen has her with a small lead now. Shocking to me coming out of the debate. She should be in double digits. The level of hate for her is strong in this country.
I want to believe that there's a time-lag involved in the polls moving. There's been such an avalanche of shit* coming his way since the debate that it's hard to take it all in.
* How, with all his shady business practices and personal baggage, he thought he could pass running-for-president level scrutiny is beyond me. Speaks to the arrogance of the man, and/or poor/sycophantic counsel.
Also, the polling samples may be broadly representative, but that doesn't tell the whole story. This week has pushed him further the wrong way with women and Latinos but, for example, any Republican who wants to win Florida is going to have to win the Cuban vote in Miami-Dade Co. Polling from July showed him winning that group by only 4 points (37/33), and his company's apparent violation of the embargo is going to be as popular with them as a fart in a spacesuit.
Similarly, his inaccurate slamming of Ford in the debate for moving jobs to Mexico - live fact-checked by Ford's CEO - might not play well in the swing states of Michigan and Ohio. Showing him to be out of touch with what's actually going on where those voters live.
We don't vote nationally for President (why, I don't know), so national polls are poor indicators. You have to look at the internals to get a proper picture. Like the PPP poll this week that ask "Who do you think pays more in taxes, you or Donald Trump?"; Trump lost that by 10 points (46/36) - so nearly half the sample think they pay more in taxes than he does. Ouch!
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All of the polling post debate that I've seen has her with a small lead now. Shocking to me coming out of the debate. She should be in double digits. The level of hate for her is strong in this country.
Even A Small Post-Debate Bounce Could Make A Big Difference For Clinton (http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/election-update-even-a-small-post-debate-bounce-could-make-a-big-difference-for-clinton/)
To generalize this a bit further, with a 3-to-5-point lead nationally for Clinton, we’d expect to see the following in the swing states:
A 4-to-8-point lead in Pennsylvania, New Hampshire, Colorado, Virginia, Wisconsin and Michigan, which have been slightly bluer than the national average this cycle.
Somewhere between a tie and a 4-point Clinton lead in Florida and North Carolina, which have been slightly redder than the national average.
A roughly tied race in Ohio and Iowa, which have been significantly redder than the national average.
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The only poll I pay attention to is the Five Thirty Eight poll and right now it has her at 66 to 33. She is in fact pulling away, at least for the moment.
By the way, I don't think Trump's support always and necessarily equates to a hatred of Hillary. Obviously forty something percent of voters will vote for the Republican regardless of who he or she is. Some similar percentage of voters will support the Democrat. I don't think the polarization has anything to do in particular with either candidate.
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The only poll I pay attention to is the Five Thirty Eight poll and right now it has her at 66 to 33. She is in fact pulling away, at least for the moment.
By the way, I don't think Trump's support always and necessarily equates to a hatred of Hillary. Obviously forty something percent of voters will vote for the Republican regardless of who he or she is. Some similar percentage of voters will support the Democrat. I don't think the polarization has anything to do in particular with either candidate.
One of the underrated features of this election is the unprecedented amount of bipartisanship. Both George HW Bush and Bernie Sanders are on the same side.
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At the risk of breaking an impressive streak and actually defending Trump; he does say "big league". It's just that his speech patterns are odd, to say the least, such that it sounds like "bigly".
Wow. That's even more nonsensical than bigly.
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Wow. That's even more nonsensical than bigly.
Correct. See also "second amendment people" and "very against police judge".
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"I have a son. He's 10 years old. He has computers. He is so good with these computers, it's unbelievable. The security aspect of cyber is very, very tough. And maybe it's hardly doable. But I will say, we are not doing the job we should be doing. But that's true throughout our whole governmental society. We have so many things that we have to do better, Lester, and certainly cyber is one of them."
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"I have a son. He's 10 years old. He has computers. He is so good with these computers, it's unbelievable. The security aspect of cyber is very, very tough. And maybe it's hardly doable. But I will say, we are not doing the job we should be doing. But that's true throughout our whole governmental society. We have so many things that we have to do better, Lester, and certainly cyber is one of them."
Now who can argue with that. I think we all owe a debt of gratitude to Donald Trump Johnson for clearly stating what needed to be said. Not only was it authentic frontier gibberish, it exhibited a courage seldom seen in this day and age.
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The only poll I pay attention to is the Five Thirty Eight poll and right now it has her at 66 to 33. She is in fact pulling away, at least for the moment.
By the way, I don't think Trump's support always and necessarily equates to a hatred of Hillary. Obviously forty something percent of voters will vote for the Republican regardless of who he or she is. Some similar percentage of voters will support the Democrat. I don't think the polarization has anything to do in particular with either candidate.
There's a gulf between "Trump supporters" and "Trump voters", just like there is between "Clinton supporters" and "Clinton voters." This election has a large amount of "My guy/gal sucks, but yours sucks worse" to it. There won't be a whole lot of people happy with who they vote for on election day.
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There's a gulf between "Trump supporters" and "Trump voters", just like there is between "Clinton supporters" and "Clinton voters." This election has a large amount of "My guy/gal sucks, but yours sucks worse" to it. There won't be a whole lot of people happy with who they vote for on election day.
I'll be curious to see the numbers after the election of the college Bernie supporters voting. Right now I'm hearing utter apathy and disregard for the election.
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There's a gulf between "Trump supporters" and "Trump voters", just like there is between "Clinton supporters" and "Clinton voters." This election has a large amount of "My guy/gal sucks, but yours sucks worse" to it. There won't be a whole lot of people happy with who they vote for on election day.
That's been the case for a very long time, the gulf between voters and supporters. You'd have to go back to maybe Bill Clinton's first election to find voters and supporters in more or less equal measure. I guess Obama's first election, too. There was a different feel eight years ago, certainly. But I've been hearing the lesser of two evils talk for almost fifty years. You might argue that it's more pronounced this time around and you might be right, but I don't necessarily think so. I know lots of conservatives were unhappy with Romney and I know lots of progressives were unhappy with Obama four years ago.
I suppose my point, in so far as I have one, is that this is a fairly normal election in most respects other than one candidate has been under public scrutiny for almost thirty years and the other candidate attracts media attention like a giant turd attracts horse flies.
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I'll be curious to see the numbers after the election of the college Bernie supporters voting. Right now I'm hearing utter apathy and disregard for the election.
A giant part of life is simply showing up and doing your work. Sanders and Trump both engaged a lot of people who are eligible to vote, but don't normally vote. You recall both did much better in open primary states than in closed (only people previously declared to the party) or caucus states. Turnout is always a key factor, but more so this year.
A quick google shows % of eligible voters that voted for president was 49% in 1996, 50.3% in 2000, 55.7% in 2004, 57.1% in 2008 and 54.9% in 2012. When you consider how slim the margins are, anyone that can tap into that 40-45% of people that don't normally vote would have a huge advantage. However, if they have a history of not voting, they won't be as likely this time either. Even getting one in ten of those to show up and vote for you would be 4-5% more on election day, and that's enough to push over almost all swing states.
The 538 site gives Trump a 91% chance of winning Texas, so what any of us decide is moot. There are far more elections pending than just president, of course. I've voted libertarian for president since 1988, but Johnson's a bigger idiot than the idiots they usually run so I'm planning to vote for a buddy in NC that joked he was running for president. I told him I trust him enough that if he fucked me he'd at least give me flowers, and that's not true of the major candidates.
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Johnson seems like a good, honest guy, but...
I read weeks ago where he took time away from weed, so as to be at the "top of his game." Then came his latest gaffes, making me wonder what his normal game is.
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A giant part of life is simply showing up and doing your work. Sanders and Trump both engaged a lot of people who are eligible to vote, but don't normally vote. You recall both did much better in open primary states that in closed (only people previously declared to the party) or caucus states. Turnout is always a key factor, but more so this year.
A quick google shows % of eligible voters that voted for president was 49% in 1996, 50.3% in 2000, 55.7% in 2004, 57.1% in 2008 and 54.9% in 2012. When you consider how slim the margins are, anyone that can tap into that 40-45% of people that don't normally vote would have a huge advantage. However, if they have a history of not voting, they won't be as likely this time either. Even getting one in ten of those to show up and vote for you would be 4-5% more on election day, and that's enough to push over almost all swing states.
The 538 site gives Trump a 91% chance of winning Texas, so what any of us decide is moot. There are far more elections pending than just president, of course. I've voted libertarian for president since 1988, but Johnson's a bigger idiot than the idiots they usually run so I'm planning to vote for a buddy in NC that joked he was running for president. I told him I trust him enough that if he fucked me he'd at least give me flowers, and that's not true of the major candidates.
The DNC has pushed a lot of college students to third party candidates or not voting at all.
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The candidate whose credentials are based almost entirely on his business acumen, lost $1bn in a single year during one of the largest sustained economic booms this country has seen...on casinos.
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The candidate whose credentials are based almost entirely on his business acumen, lost $1bn in a single year during one of the largest sustained economic booms this country has seen...on casinos.
Do you have a point?
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Do you have a point?
Nah. Just joining in the 2016 trend of free range word salad.
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Nah. Just joining in the 2016 trend of free range word salad.
How about some Benghazi dressing topped with a handful of Parkinson's croutons?
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How about some Benghazi dressing topped with a handful of Parkinson's croutons?
Sure. And a nice, clear glass of white water, or maybe soda water as it's better at getting stains out of dresses.
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Sure. And a nice, clear glass of white water, or maybe soda water as it's better at getting stains out of dresses.
I like what you did there!!!
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I like what you did there!!!
That's not what she said.
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Collin McHugh responds (https://www.instagram.com/p/BLZYm_1Bou2/) to Trump's characterization of his
sexual braggadocio admitting to sexual assault as "locker room talk".
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FWI, don't
Google do a generic web search for, "hand on the pussy in locker room." Fair warning.
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FWI, don't Google do a generic web search for, "hand on the pussy in locker room." Fair warning.
I've been on the interwebs long enough to know when someone says "don't search on this" I take them at their word. Some things can not be unseen.
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FWI, don't Google do a generic web search for, "hand on the pussy in locker room." Fair warning.
I am still trying to recover from a Google search on a tropical storm when I typed in "TS Maria".
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This (http://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/14/us/politics/trump-election-rigging.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&clickSource=story-heading&module=first-column-region®ion=top-news&WT.nav=top-news) is so depressing.
Against my better judgment I enlisted in a forum the other day about the election instigated by an email from Kiplingers--that's half a day's work down the drain. The level of self-delusion among the Trumpistas is staggering, and the unanimous contempt in which they hold the "liberal media" gives them carte blanche to assemble their own reality wholesale.
What is this country going to look like on November 9th?
Say the G.O.P. manages to hang on to the House: their ranks will likely be thinned only of the quote-unquote moderates, making for an even more unruly, combative majority. Does Ryan maintain his Speakership? Do they condemn President Clinton as illegitimate? Are they chastened at all?
If he does keep his job, the only laws passed in Clinton's first term will be (as has been the case for the past six years) done with the help of the democratic minority over the objections of his caucus. Which...that situation can't last. How long until they're in open revolt against him? How long until a Blake Farenthold ("Sometimes I don't agree with everything I say!") is speaker, calling for impeachment?
Interesting discussion on fivethirtyeight (http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/is-this-what-it-looks-like-when-a-party-falls-apart/) about how the white nationalist segment of the G.O.P. is now their primary constituency: cultural conservatives rather than social or fiscal conservatives. After the election, could we see this arrangement formally recognized in the formation of a new party?
Finally--as I try to stifle terrified laughter--what are the odds Trump goes gracefully? (here (http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2016/10/donald-trump-2016-biographers-214350) is a disturbing and fascinating conversation with several of his biographers about that topic, and others. ["He doesn't think," says one.]) And what does it mean for us if he doesn't?
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Finally--as I try to stifle terrified laughter--what are the odds Trump goes gracefully? (here (http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2016/10/donald-trump-2016-biographers-214350) is a disturbing and fascinating conversation with several of his biographers about that topic, and others. ["He doesn't think," says one.]) And what does it mean for us if he doesn't?
It means he'll continue to stir up the tinfoil hat wearing, John Birchers out there. And they'll wail. And talk show radio hosts will get rich egging them on. The rest of us will continue on with our lives.
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It means he'll continue to stir up the tinfoil hat wearing, John Birchers out there. And they'll wail. And talk show radio hosts will get rich egging them on. The rest of us will continue on with our lives.
Right now Trump is aiming his message directly towards his most fervent tin foil hat wearing John Bircher and I'll add alt-white supporters. And if he can just get 5 million of them to subscribe to the Trump News Network (the conservative alternative!) streaming service for $7.99 a month he'll do a hell of a lot better than he has in any of his real estate deals.
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Right now Trump is aiming his message directly towards his most fervent tin foil hat wearing John Bircher and I'll add alt-white supporters. And if he can just get 5 million of them to subscribe to the Trump News Network (the conservative alternative!) streaming service for $7.99 a month he'll do a hell of a lot better than he has in any of his real estate deals.
I've often wondered if this whole run for President shtick was nothing but an excuse to start his own TV network, but he then won the nomination and went "oh shit, what do I do now?"
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I don't know if Trump can charge Netflix prices when Alex Jones' youtube channel is free.
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I've often wondered if this whole run for President shtick was nothing but an excuse to start his own TV network, but he then won the nomination and went "oh shit, what do I do now?"
Y'all are ascribing chess moves to a guy who would be utterly flummoxed by the strategy of Candy Land.
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Y'all are ascribing chess moves to a guy who would be utterly flummoxed by the strategy of Candy Land.
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I don't think "Enter race; raise profile; profit" are any more chess moves than "collect underpants; _____; profit."
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Interesting discussion on fivethirtyeight (http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/is-this-what-it-looks-like-when-a-party-falls-apart/) about how the white nationalist segment of the G.O.P. is now their primary constituency: cultural conservatives rather than social or fiscal conservatives. After the election, could we see this arrangement formally recognized in the formation of a new party?
Steve Schmidt (Woody Harrelson in the Palin movie) has opined that the Republican Party will split into a center-right party and an alt-right party. The latter being monetized by Breitbart / Ailes and being a disruptive voting bloc along the lines of the UKIP. Oh goody.
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I've often wondered if this whole run for President shtick was nothing but an excuse to start his own TV network, but he then won the nomination and went "oh shit, what do I do now?"
Trump's business for over a decade now has not been real estate, it's been promoting and living off the Trump brand. He hasn't built shit since about 2008; instead he has been licensing his name to be splashed across other people's developments in giant, gaudy lettering. That, and his TV show. That's it.
Well the TV show is gone, pretty much before he got to the caveat "...and some, I assume, are good people." Now this dumpster fire of a campaign has destroyed his brand name. For example, the new, lavish hotel in DC that bears his name was half-empty during the IMF summit, while every other hotel was sold out; why? Because delegates could not countenance staying in a Trump-branded hotel.
His business, and maybe his personal life, may never recover from this.
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His business, and maybe his personal life, may never recover from this.
Every business he's tried to run he's run into the ground. He's famous for inheriting money. He's the skanky version of Paris Hilton. He needs headlines. This has given it to him.
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Just in case you didn't think this God forsaken election couldn't get worse, Trump supporters are now yelling "lock her up" when he mentions the women he assaulted.
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Just in case you didn't think this God forsaken election couldn't get worse, Trump supporters are now yelling "lock her up" when he mentions the women he assaulted.
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No, they were yelling "lock her up" when Trump exposed the crimes of Hillary Clinton.
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No, they were yelling "lock her up" when Trump exposed the crimes of Hillary Clinton.
You mean the non existent crimes that everyone has painstakingly looked for but have never been able to find? The non existent crimes for which Trump promises to use political power to imprison her anyway? The non existent crimes for which Trump has called for her assassination should she win?
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No, they were yelling "lock her up" when Trump exposed the crimes of Hillary Clinton.
No, I'm clear on which is which.
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No, I'm clear on which is which.
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Well, you're going to have to give a reference to where you heard what you think you heard.. my reference is here:
https://youtu.be/mFMUZ7xvQfc
(https://youtu.be/mFMUZ7xvQfc)
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I don't think "Enter race; raise profile; profit" are any more chess moves than "collect underpants; _____; profit."
http://static6.businessinsider.com/image/5457c9ae6bb3f7d33da1a6bb-1200-800/cartman.png
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Well, you're going to have to give a reference to where you heard what you think you heard.. my reference is here:
https://youtu.be/mFMUZ7xvQfc
(https://youtu.be/mFMUZ7xvQfc)
You have to provide a time stamp. 49 minutes (or seconds) of that piece of crap is far too much.
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You have to provide a time stamp. 49 minutes (or seconds) of that piece of crap is far too much.
No can do
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No, they were yelling "lock her up" when Trump exposed the crimes of Hillary Clinton.
You should it write it "crimes" since you are clearly not talking about any relevant or applicable criminal statutes.
And what the fuck has Trump "exposed" (referring to any actions taken by Clinton, not as in "We wait, miserably, for the dong shot." (http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/features/the-fury-and-failure-of-donald-trump-w444943))
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Well, you're going to have to give a reference to where you heard what you think you heard.. my reference is here:
https://youtu.be/mFMUZ7xvQfc
(https://youtu.be/mFMUZ7xvQfc)
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/10/15/donald-trump-and-his-supporters-turn-on-sexual-harassment-accuse/
Mr Trump continued his belligerence in the face of the accusations and his supporters followed his cue, chanting “lock her up” at a rally in North Carolina as the Republican nominee disparaged Natasha Stoynoff, a former People Magazine reporter who claims he pushed her up against a wall and forcibly kissed her in 2005.
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http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/10/15/donald-trump-and-his-supporters-turn-on-sexual-harassment-accuse/
Mr Trump continued his belligerence in the face of the accusations and his supporters followed his cue, chanting “lock her up” at a rally in North Carolina as the Republican nominee disparaged Natasha Stoynoff, a former People Magazine reporter who claims he pushed her up against a wall and forcibly kissed her in 2005.
Cue Trump -
"I never said that."
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And what the fuck has Trump "exposed" (referring to any actions taken by Clinton, not as in "We wait, miserably, for the dong shot." (http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/features/the-fury-and-failure-of-donald-trump-w444943))
This is how out of touch I am - I read the guy complaining about small ball Ryan and I immediately assumed it was some sort of baseball metaphor.
Plus my new favorite thing: They're lying. AND they're ugly.
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You should it write it "crimes" since you are clearly not talking about any relevant or applicable criminal statutes.
And what the fuck has Trump "exposed" (referring to any actions taken by Clinton, not as in "We wait, miserably, for the dong shot." (http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/features/the-fury-and-failure-of-donald-trump-w444943))
And on cue the recent re-release of the supposed 2008 Obama dong shot: http://www.snopes.com/presidential-erection/
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Cue Trump -
"I never said that."
At some point in the not too distant future Trump is going to look a reporter squarely in the eye and say, "I never ran for president."
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At some point in the not too distant future Trump is going to look a reporter squarely in the eye and say, "I never ran for president."
And in certain respects it will be one of the truer things he'll say.
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And in certain respects it will be one of the truer things he'll say.
He lobbed that one right down the pipe for you, Chuckster.
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And what the fuck has Trump "exposed" (referring to any actions taken by Clinton, not as in "We wait, miserably, for the dong shot." (http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/features/the-fury-and-failure-of-donald-trump-w444943))
The full quote was:
There are not many places left for this thing to go that don't involve kids or cannibalism. We wait, miserably, for the dong shot.
Taibbi is clearly suffering from campaign PTSD if he's forgotten that Trump is due in court in mid-December to answer an accusation of child molestation.
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He lobbed that one right down the pipe for you, Chuckster.
Bigly.
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Bigly.
You really grabbed it by the pussy.
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Texas early voting numbers up bigly (https://twitter.com/PatrickSvitek/status/790772883450568704/photo/1?ref_src=twsrc^tfw).
With Texas polling within the margin of error, and a high turnout typically favoring Democrats, things could get very interesting come election day.
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Hi
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The power of Scott Baio.
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The power of Scott Baio.
Now that he's done helping Trump maybe he can get back to helping the Astros.
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Judging from the reports this morning, sounds as if all the inflammatory rhetoric was just a means to Donald's end. He doesn't really plan to build a wall, deport Mexicans or ban Muslims, but instead is mainly interested in the old time republican values of cutting taxes for the wealthy and removing pesky regulations impeding corporate interests. There might be some rubes who eventually realize they were conned by one of the best and ask "Hey, why is that dark guy still here and why am I still without a high paying job," but they will be brushed aside til next election cycle.
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Sometimes you get what you ask.
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Canadian citizenship Web site amazingly slow right now.
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Judging from the reports this morning, sounds as if all the inflammatory rhetoric was just a means to Donald's end. He doesn't really plan to build a wall, deport Mexicans or ban Muslims, but instead is mainly interested in the old time republican values of cutting taxes for the wealthy and removing pesky regulations impeding corporate interests. There might be some rubes who eventually realize they were conned by one of the best and ask "Hey, why is that dark guy still here and why am I still without a high paying job," but they will be brushed aside til next election cycle.
none of this surprises me at all. I still am in shock, however.
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He doesn't really plan to build a wall, deport Mexicans or ban Muslims, but instead is mainly interested in the old time republican values of cutting taxes for the wealthy and removing pesky regulations impeding corporate interests.
And yet from everything I've heard the overwhelming reasons for voting for him were: "Never Hillary" and "I hate politicians/I want someone who's completely different".
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My favorites from this thread:
Has there ever been a more effective job of character assassination than's been pulled on Hillary?
This (http://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/14/us/politics/trump-election-rigging.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&clickSource=story-heading&module=first-column-region®ion=top-news&WT.nav=top-news) is so depressing.
Against my better judgment I enlisted in a forum the other day about the election instigated by an email from Kiplingers--that's half a day's work down the drain. The level of self-delusion among the Trumpistas is staggering, and the unanimous contempt in which they hold the "liberal media" gives them carte blanche to assemble their own reality wholesale.
What is this country going to look like on November 9th?
Say the G.O.P. manages to hang on to the House: their ranks will likely be thinned only of the quote-unquote moderates, making for an even more unruly, combative majority. Does Ryan maintain his Speakership? Do they condemn President Clinton as illegitimate? Are they chastened at all?
If he does keep his job, the only laws passed in Clinton's first term will be (as has been the case for the past six years) done with the help of the democratic minority over the objections of his caucus. Which...that situation can't last. How long until they're in open revolt against him? How long until a Blake Farenthold ("Sometimes I don't agree with everything I say!") is speaker, calling for impeachment?
Interesting discussion on fivethirtyeight (http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/is-this-what-it-looks-like-when-a-party-falls-apart/) about how the white nationalist segment of the G.O.P. is now their primary constituency: cultural conservatives rather than social or fiscal conservatives. After the election, could we see this arrangement formally recognized in the formation of a new party?
Finally--as I try to stifle terrified laughter--what are the odds Trump goes gracefully? (here (http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2016/10/donald-trump-2016-biographers-214350) is a disturbing and fascinating conversation with several of his biographers about that topic, and others. ["He doesn't think," says one.]) And what does it mean for us if he doesn't?
It means he'll continue to stir up the tinfoil hat wearing, John Birchers out there. And they'll wail. And talk show radio hosts will get rich egging them on. The rest of us will continue on with our lives.
I've often wondered if this whole run for President shtick was nothing but an excuse to start his own TV network, but he then won the nomination and went "oh shit, what do I do now?"
Trump's business for over a decade now has not been real estate, it's been promoting and living off the Trump brand. He hasn't built shit since about 2008; instead he has been licensing his name to be splashed across other people's developments in giant, gaudy lettering. That, and his TV show. That's it.
Well the TV show is gone, pretty much before he got to the caveat "...and some, I assume, are good people." Now this dumpster fire of a campaign has destroyed his brand name. For example, the new, lavish hotel in DC that bears his name was half-empty during the IMF summit, while every other hotel was sold out; why? Because delegates could not countenance staying in a Trump-branded hotel.
His business, and maybe his personal life, may never recover from this.
At some point in the not too distant future Trump is going to look a reporter squarely in the eye and say, "I never ran for president."
Texas early voting numbers up bigly (https://twitter.com/PatrickSvitek/status/790772883450568704/photo/1?ref_src=twsrc^tfw).
With Texas polling within the margin of error, and a high turnout typically favoring Democrats, things could get very interesting come election day.
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Judging from the reports this morning, sounds as if all the inflammatory rhetoric was just a means to Donald's end. He doesn't really plan to build a wall, deport Mexicans or ban Muslims, but instead is mainly interested in the old time republican values of cutting taxes for the wealthy and removing pesky regulations impeding corporate interests. There might be some rubes who eventually realize they were conned by one of the best and ask "Hey, why is that dark guy still here and why am I still without a high paying job," but they will be brushed aside til next election cycle.
Dismissing Trump as just another republican and his followers as driven by racist motives on the day after the election is based in ignorance. I have been following this... closely... and have yet to find any "reports" of anything you discuss.
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Dismissing Trump as just another republican and his followers as driven by racist motives on the day after the election is based in ignorance. I have been following this... closely... and have yet to find any "reports" of anything you discuss.
Any reports of racism amongst many of his followers? I assume/hope you are not serious.
As to not doing what he said he was going to do (wall, immigrants and Muslims), that came from the RNC chairman while I was listening to MSNBC on the drive in. The tax cut and eliminate regulation thing is basically his platform, which he didn't talk about much as he didn't have time between the talk about the wall, immigrants, Muslims and Hillary.
Trade? Sure, I'll give you that, especially the day after he repeals NAFTA.
Here's an article: http://www.politico.com/story/2016/11/who-is-in-president-trump-cabinet-231071
Look at those folks, pretty much all traditional republican actors: Gingrich for SoS, a Goldman exec for Treasury (remember when he hated "Wall Street bankers), republican senators for defense, Giuliani for AG, an oil exec for Interior, a climate change denier for EPA. You might not be able to (or want to) see it for what it is, but that looks like about every Republican administration in my lifetime.
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Any reports of racism amongst many of his followers? I assume/hope you are not serious.
As to not doing what he said he was going to do (wall, immigrants and Muslims), that came from the RNC chairman while I was listening to MSNBC on the drive in. The tax cut and eliminate regulation thing is basically his platform, which he didn't talk about much as he didn't have time between the talk about the wall, immigrants, Muslims and Hillary.
Trade? Sure, I'll give you that, especially the day after he repeals NAFTA.
Here's an article: http://www.politico.com/story/2016/11/who-is-in-president-trump-cabinet-231071
Look at those folks, pretty much all traditional republican actors: Gingrich for SoS, a Goldman exec for Treasury (remember when he hated "Wall Street bankers), republican senators for defense, Giuliani for AG, an oil exec for Interior, a climate change denier for EPA. You might not be able to (or want to) see it for what it is, but that looks like about every Republican administration in my lifetime.
I don't think I'm going to expect anything based on that article. There's a ton of speculation in there without much, "Trump said he will look at these people..." This election cycle should have taught everyone that other peoples' speculation means little with Trump's actions.
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I was totally surprised by the outcome. I knew she was unpopular but still figured she'd win in a landslide because Trump is such a megalomaniacal kook. I think maybe Hillary lost because of the cumulative effect of a multitude of circumstances going as far back as Bill's presidential peccadilloes, the Bengazi tragedy, the damning content of the hacked emails, the deception and manipulation of the DNC, the pay for play scandal, the $250,000.00 speeches to Wall Street bankers... etc., finally took it's toll. Then the party fractured, die hard establishment democrats who live in a an echo chamber disregarded the progressive cries of the Bernie supporters. But not because she was a woman.
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I was totally surprised by the outcome. I knew she was unpopular but still figured she'd win in a landslide because Trump is such a megalomaniacal kook. I think maybe Hillary lost because of the cumulative effect of a multitude of circumstances going as far back as Bill's presidential peccadilloes, the Bengazi tragedy, the damning content of the hacked emails, the deception and manipulation of the DNC, the pay for play scandal, the $250,000.00 speeches to Wall Street bankers... etc., finally took it's toll. Then the party fractured, die hard establishment democrats who live in a an echo chamber disregarded the progressive cries of the Bernie supporters. But not because she was a woman.
I agree. She was an awful candidate, but it was her turn to bat. I was pleasantly surprised by the result. Trump successfully painted Hillary as the establishment candidate, when the public was anti-establishment. His "drain the swamp" message resonated.
The onus is now on the Republicans to govern. We need some real leadership in the worst way and to facilitate more economic development and to spread that to the middle class. The beauty of this situation is Trump is really not beholden to any major special interest groups, and he will be as much a thorn in the establishment Republicans' sides as anyone else.
I'm very much looking forward to his first 100 days to see what he can accomplish.
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A beauty pageant MC runs against America's most visible feminist, but yeah, gender didn't have anything to do with the results. Y'all crazy. In my work, I routinely come across young women who are virulently anti-feminist. Sexism isn't strictly within the purview of men.
She's going to win the popular vote, by the way. At the end of the day, the GOP will have lost their sixth popular vote out of seven, will have lost seats in the House and the Senate, and will claim a massive mandate. Those same bozos were preemptively claiming that a narrow Clinton victory wouldn't convey one.
What makes me angriest is that Mitch McConnell's transparently cynical Supreme Court gambit is going to pay off enormously. He and his caucus disenfranchised the 60 million voters who supported Obama in 2012, will disenfranchise the majority that voted for Hillary this time around, and they're never going to pay for it, because conservative voters evidently don't give a shit. Piss on the constitution all you want as long as it brings a W.
18% of voters who believed he was unqualified to be president pulled the lever for him anyway (thanks!), and now we all get to watch the Democrats be the sort of graceful losers their opponents--as they're currently constituted--could never be. Suddenly thick on the ground are lefty pundits gritting their teeth and saying give him a chance to lead, we're all on the same team, our highest priority is to make sure he loses in four years...oh wait, right, that was McConnell re: Obama.
The party the majority of the country disagrees with on taxes, climate change, gun control, entitlements, abortion and gay marriage is going to enjoy more power than any other party in 80 years. We are F-U-C-K-E-D fucked.
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... is going to enjoy more power than any other party in 80 years. We are F-U-C-K-E-D fucked.
Your entire rant is invalidated by this phrase. You have forgotten the super-majority, we can do anything we want, republicans can go sit at the back of the bus, democrat federal government of 2009-10. They literally did whatever they wanted including passing a massive, what was then a generally unpopular, health care bill.
A party controlling the House, Senate, and Presidency tend to lose the House and Senate quickly. I expect a majority democrat House and Senate after the 2018 elections.
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Your entire response to my entire rant is invalidated by your critical omission of the Supreme Court. They invalidated much of what Obama and the brief democratic majority accomplished. That will not be the case now.
ETA: to say nothing of Republican control of statehouses and governorships, which currently ties a 94-year-old record.
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Your entire response to my entire rant is invalidated by your critical omission of the Supreme Court. They invalidated much of what Obama and the brief democratic majority accomplished. That will not be the case now.
Invalidated what? The most important decision for ACA was Roberts siding with Obama and sending republicans into seizure.
Too how republican is Trump? It wasn't long ago he was a pro-choice, pro-Clinton democrat. I'm not convinced you'll see a very conservative nominee to the Supreme Court.
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They invalidated much of what Obama and the brief democratic majority accomplished.
You'll have to explain this in greater detail.
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Your entire response to my entire rant is invalidated by your critical omission of the Supreme Court. They invalidated much of what Obama and the brief democratic majority accomplished. That will not be the case now.
I have said this before, but I'll say it again: The Senate should have given the SCOTUS nominee a hearing. Don't be surprised if they still do so, because there are a lot of R's who are scared about who Trump might nominate.
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The two years of democratic executive and legislative control resulted in the ACA, another round of TARP investment, and Dodd Frank. The hallmark legislation, the ACA, was handicapped right out of the gates by the Supreme Court's allowing states to opt out of Medicaid expansion. Dodd Frank will likely be maimed or erased in Trump's first 100 days.
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"The country's most visible feminist" is an opportunist who you likely wouldn't be aware of if she had 't married Bill. Camille Paglia even thinks so. And how is feminism not sexist. And what the fuck does any of that have to do with being a president of the people?
I admire her graciousness in defeat.
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"The country's most visible feminist" is an opportunist who you likely wouldn't be aware of if she had 't married Bill. Camille Paglia even thinks so. And how is feminism not sexist. And what the fuck does any of that have to do with being a president of the people?
I have no idea how to respond to any of that.
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Invalidated what? The most important decision for ACA was Roberts siding with Obama and sending republicans into seizure.
Too how republican is Trump? It wasn't long ago he was a pro-choice, pro-Clinton democrat. I'm not convinced you'll see a very conservative nominee to the Supreme Court.
Besides crippling the ACA, they blocked him on his immigration efforts and a pivotal plank of his environmental program. The Court was a qualified ally of the right wing block until Scalia's death, became a compromised ally of it after, and will likely be a much stronger ally for the next thirty or forty years.
And if the nominee's not conservative enough, what chance do you think s/he has of making it through confirmation? Why on earth would Republicans consent to anything but another Scalia?
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I agree. She was an awful candidate, but it was her turn to bat. I was pleasantly surprised by the result. Trump successfully painted Hillary as the establishment candidate, when the public was anti-establishment. His "drain the swamp" message resonated.
What exactly is his "drain the swamp" message? I couldn't stomach listening to him, so I honestly don't know. I heard term limits. Is that true? Was there more? Lobbyists? Corporate welfare (think drug companies)? Or was the swamp just Democrats/Obama?
At any rate, if the swamp was more than Obama, I'm looking forward to just what he proposes.
My hope is as follows with Trump: I've already said that he appears to be, and will certainly start as a run of the mill republican, but I'm pretty confident he cares more about adulation than actual principles. So, he will at first rubber stamp the Republican's agenda, but I suspect the public's taste for a lot of that agenda is less than then the 50/50 vote split might indicate. Polls will show this, public demonstrations will easily materialize, and he will hear a shifting cry from the people. Trump, who at his core only wants to be loved, will abide the shifting cries of the people and break from core Republican orthodoxy and be something unique. Maybe he actually will address things like term limits. My hope at least.
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I have no idea how to respond to any of that.
Maybe you should read more.
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What exactly is his "drain the swamp" message? I couldn't stomach listening to him, so I honestly don't know. I heard term limits. Is that true? Was there more? Lobbyists? Corporate welfare (think drug companies)? Or was the swamp just Democrats/Obama?
At any rate, if the swamp was more than Obama, I'm looking forward to just what he proposes.
My hope is as follows with Trump: I've already said that he appears to be, and will certainly start as a run of the mill republican, but I'm pretty confident he cares more about adulation than actual principles. So, he will at first rubber stamp the Republican's agenda, but I suspect the public's taste for a lot of that agenda is less than then the 50/50 vote split might indicate. Polls will show this, public demonstrations will easily materialize, and he will hear a shifting cry from the people. Trump, who at his core only wants to be loved, will abide the shifting cries of the people and break from core Republican orthodoxy and be something unique. Maybe he actually will address things like term limits. My hope at least.
I love this. No one, especially on the left, has gotten it right on Trump. Trump the politician has never existed. For all anyone knows he'll end his inauguration address with, "Screw it. It's all your's Pence. I'm out." I have no idea if he'll run right, center, or left. Or if he'll move in any direction over 4 years. Or if he'll run again in 4 years.
For the record, I wrote my own name in.
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With regard to "drain the swamp", his announced 100 day agenda includes term limits and prohibitions on former members of Congress/White House staff serving as lobbyists for some number of years after they leave office. Both will be hard sells in front of any Congress, but we've all be very surprised lately.
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With regard to "drain the swamp", his announced 100 day agenda includes term limits and prohibitions on former members of Congress/White House staff serving as lobbyists for some number of years after they leave office. Both will be hard sells in front of any Congress, but we've all be very surprised lately.
Term limits requires a Constitutional amendment. That sure ain't happening by April.
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Besides crippling the ACA, they blocked him on his immigration efforts and a pivotal plank of his environmental program. The Court was a qualified ally of the right wing block until Scalia's death, became a compromised ally of it after, and will likely be a much stronger ally for the next thirty or forty years.
And if the nominee's not conservative enough, what chance do you think s/he has of making it through confirmation? Why on earth would Republicans consent to anything but another Scalia?
It's pretty clear that we disagree on the function of the Supreme Court. As Jacksonian point out, their decisions put republicans of all types into seizure- it seems, as though, if you are also this unhappy with them they are doing a better job than I thought.
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I love this. No one, especially on the left, has gotten it right on Trump. Trump the politician has never existed. For all anyone knows he'll end his inauguration address with, "Screw it. It's all your's Pence. I'm out." I have no idea if he'll run right, center, or left. Or if he'll move in any direction over 4 years. Or if he'll run again in 4 years.
For the record, I wrote my own name in.
there is no way this man can govern a country. I am certain the outcome surprised him as much as it did me. the throwing his hands up and quitting scenario also occurred to me.
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there is no way this man can govern a country. I am certain the outcome surprised him as much as it did me. the throwing his hands up and quitting scenario also occurred to me.
I think it's unlikely that he'll quit, but he may take the same approach to running the country that Clyde Drexler took to coaching, which is to say only showing up when absolutely necessary to maintain the appearance that he is actually doing something.
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I think it's unlikely that he'll quit, but he may take the same approach to running the country that Clyde Drexler took to coaching, which is to say only showing up when absolutely necessary to maintain the appearance that he is actually doing something.
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I'll be cabinet-appointee watching.
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I love this. No one, especially on the left, has gotten it right on Trump.
I don't know what "it" is, but seems to me the foremost objection among people like me is that he is an (at best) amoral cynical opportunist and con-man, probably with narcissistic personality disorder, someone who is proud of his ignorance, probably delusional, and a bully. The "it" with Trump has never been about issues or ideology because there's no there there: he's covered most sides of every issue at one time or another. "It" has always been a question of character.
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I don't know what "it" is, but seems to me the foremost objection among people like me is that he is an (at best) amoral cynical opportunist and con-man, probably with narcissistic personality disorder, someone who is proud of his ignorance, probably delusional, and a bully. The "it" with Trump has never been about issues or ideology because there's no there there: he's covered most sides of every issue at one time or another. "It" has always been a question of character.
I think the "it" Jacksonian is referring to is the appeal of Trump. Which is far more complex than anyone in either party seemed willing to grasp.
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I don't know what "it" is, but seems to me the foremost objection among people like me is that he is an (at best) amoral cynical opportunist and con-man, probably with narcissistic personality disorder, someone who is proud of his ignorance, probably delusional, and a bully. The "it" with Trump has never been about issues or ideology because there's no there there: he's covered most sides of every issue at one time or another. "It" has always been a question of character.
And Mrs. Clinton's character?
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And Mrs. Clinton's character?
Assassinated.
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Assassinated.
It was a series of self-inflicted wounds.
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I agree. She was an awful candidate, but it was her turn to bat. I was pleasantly surprised by the result. Trump successfully painted Hillary as the establishment candidate, when the public was anti-establishment. His "drain the swamp" message resonated.
The onus is now on the Republicans to govern. We need some real leadership in the worst way and to facilitate more economic development and to spread that to the middle class. The beauty of this situation is Trump is really not beholden to any major special interest groups, and he will be as much a thorn in the establishment Republicans' sides as anyone else.
I'm very much looking forward to his first 100 days to see what he can accomplish.
I'm confused. I thought you told us you were voting for Clinton.
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I'll be cabinet-appointee watching.
It's going to be an odd mix.
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there is no way this man can govern a country. I am certain the outcome surprised him as much as it did me. the throwing his hands up and quitting scenario also occurred to me.
I wonder how many frantic phone calls he had to make to postpone Trump TV.
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I'm confused. I thought you told us you were voting for Clinton.
I just couldn't do it. My experience with her back in the 80's with the Rose Law Firm was just too much to ignore. I thought that she'd win for sure.
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I just couldn't do it. My experience with her back in the 80's with the Rose Law Firm was just too much to ignore. I thought that she'd win for sure.
Did you come home to Trump or did you write in John Kasich?
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And how is feminism not sexist.
Feminism = "Everyone should be treated equally regardless of gender."
Sexism = "No they shouldn't."
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Feminism = "Everyone should be treated equally regardless of gender."
Sexism = "No they shouldn't."
Sphinxism = "Get off my lawn!"
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Feminism = "Everyone should be treated equally regardless of gender."
Thanks for straightening that out. I guess that trumps simply treating everyone equally. That's why they gave it a name.
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Sphinxism = "Get off my lawn!"
Right. Unless you're there to rake leaves.
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Right. Unless you're there to rake leaves.
Or brought beer.
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Did you come home to Trump or did you write in John Kasich?
Kasich is a tool. I voted for Trump, primarily for his anti-establishment message.
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Aaaaaaand........ we're off. Christie out as transition head. Pence in.
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Sweet a guy who wants the government to spend money on curing gay.
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Kasich is a tool. I voted for Trump, primarily for his anti-establishment message.
I'm curious to see just how much anti-establishment you get.
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I'm curious to see just how much anti-establishment you get.
Probably not much, but it was more than I would have expected from Hillary.
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Probably not much, but it was more than I would have expected from Hillary.
None of the anti-establishment, but all of the racism and xenophobia. What a grand bargain.
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None of the anti-establishment, but all of the racism and xenophobia. What a grand bargain.
My vote was an anti-Hillary gesture. I believe her to be a threat to freedom and national security.
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Sweet a guy who wants the government to spend money on curing gay.
Let's be clear: by "curing", we're talking about "electrocuting".
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My vote was an anti-Hillary gesture. I believe her to be a threat to freedom and national security.
I can understand that. But a candidate who coordinates with foreign powers during the campaign and openly discusses using nuclear weapons on a first strike basis is a fairly big threat to national security.
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I can understand that. But a candidate who coordinates with foreign powers during the campaign and openly discusses using nuclear weapons on a first strike basis is a fairly big threat to national security.
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Don't forget wanting to start a war if rude gestures are made towards US armed forces, compared to a former senator and secretary of state who is liked and respected by the majority of world leaders.
Happy - I'm curious when you made up your mind and whether the Comey letter had much of anything to do with that.
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None of the anti-establishment, but all of the racism and xenophobia. What a grand bargain.
All of the idiots are coming out of the woodwork now. I'm trying not to get too alarmed because most of the stories I've seen have come from Facebook posts and there's no telling how real they are. I'm hoping that some genuine news outlets will look into what we're hearing about and determine if it's real.
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And now not even in office and he's reportedly open to preserving at least part of ACA.
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All of the idiots are coming out of the woodwork now. I'm trying not to get too alarmed because most of the stories I've seen have come from Facebook posts and there's no telling how real they are. I'm hoping that some genuine news outlets will look into what we're hearing about and determine if it's real.
The Wellesley and Penn incidents are reported and verified. I'm sure there's a lot of bs but reports I get from the ADL confirm a lot of the anecdotal incidents. Hell, the KKK applied for a celebratory parade in North Carolina. Awful people feel very emboldened.
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The Wellesley and Penn incidents are reported and verified. I'm sure there's a lot of bs but reports I get from the ADL confirm a lot of the anecdotal incidents. Hell, the KKK applied for a celebratory parade in North Carolina. Awful people feel very emboldened.
It will be interesting to see if all of the people who are so adamant about Muslim leaders denouncing terrorism will be quick to stand up and denounce this behavior.
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Awful people feel very emboldened.
Rioters caused $1MM in damage in Portland last night. Seems to me there are awful people everywhere.
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Those on both sides who are more interested in hate, anger, and intolerance are making themselves known.
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Don't forget wanting to start a war if rude gestures are made towards US armed forces, compared to a former senator and secretary of state who is liked and respected by the majority of world leaders.
Happy - I'm curious when you made up your mind and whether the Comey letter had much of anything to do with that.
The second Comey letter had nothing to do with it, although I laughed at Comey's second no evidence letter that came out the sunday before the election, which was obviously the product of severe political pressure from the White House.
The Justice Department has seriously hampered those investigations in a partisan way. Can you imagine doing an investigation without subpoena power? That's what they were working with. I believe that a nonpartisan prosecutor with a nonpartisan FBI would find enough evidence against Clinton in both the pay-to-play and private server issues to try and convict her.
In the end, it was just too much baggage for Clinton for me to vote for her. Again, I believe that it goes back to that contempt order back in the 1980's. Had there been an ethics intervention back then, she might have suffered some consequences and learned a valuable lesson. But her husband was governor of Arkansas, so nothing happened. When she skated by with the firm paying the $5,000 contempt fine by the court, she was emboldened to take additional and increasingly larger liberties for lo these many years, leading all the way up to the present.
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The second Comey letter had nothing to do with it, although I laughed at Comey's second no evidence letter that came out the sunday before the election, which was obviously the product of severe political pressure from the White House.
The Justice Department has seriously hampered those investigations in a partisan way. Can you imagine doing an investigation without subpoena power? That's what they were working with. I believe that a nonpartisan prosecutor with a nonpartisan FBI would find enough evidence against Clinton in both the pay-to-play and private server issues to try and convict her.
In the end, it was just too much baggage for Clinton for me to vote for her. Again, I believe that it goes back to that contempt order back in the 1980's. Had there been an ethics intervention back then, she might have suffered some consequences and learned a valuable lesson. But her husband was governor of Arkansas, so nothing happened. When she skated by with the firm paying the $5,000 contempt fine by the court, she was emboldened to take additional and increasingly larger liberties for lo these many years, leading all the way up to the present.
Putting aside the merits of the email and foundation issues (which hardly seem to me like an open and shut case of anything), I cannot imagine the mental gymnastics that result in voting for Donald Trump out of ethical concerns. Even without the explicit racism and misogyny of his campaign, the Trump University fraud case, his long history of stiffing contractors and lack of transparency, we are about to get a master class in modern presidential conflicts of interest.
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Not that this is really earth-shattering, but I found it interesting in that it lays bare what has been happening for quite a while: http://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/11/opinion/identity-over-ideology.html?_r=0
The trick for progressives will be to enlist some of "them" to advocate for change (or at least not upheaval) in policies where is might be achievable. Health care and banking regulation come to mind. Climate change might be a possibility but a long shot.
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I just couldn't do it. My experience with her back in the 80's with the Rose Law Firm was just too much to ignore. I thought that she'd win for sure.
a 30 year prejudice? wow.
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a 30 year prejudice? wow.
That does not surprise me. Most of Republicans have hated her since Bill was in office.
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If you were born in a sweet spot between 1978 and 1982, 40% of the presidential elections you've been able to vote in have gone to the loser of the popular vote.
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Rioters caused $1MM in damage in Portland last night. Seems to me there are awful people everywhere.
We have an issue with thugs turning up at legitimate protests to prey on the protestors and to incite mayhem so they can loot. That's a serious issue and I don't see a simple way around it. You can 10,000 people protesting - very emotionally heated but peaceful. One thug tosses a molotov and the riot is on.
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a 30 year prejudice? wow.
I can't respect people who knowingly lied in writing to a federal judge. Call me crazy (which would neither be the first nor last time), but I just can't. Had there been a personal consequence right then and there, a bar sanction or suspension, it might have spared us all a career of living on the edge of criminality. Trump was far from a perfect candidate, but I respect his continued ability to get things done, which iOS what we sorely need right now. I hope that he's as much a thorn in the asses of the mainstream Republican Party as he is the Democrats.
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I can't respect people who knowingly lied in writing to a federal judge. Call me crazy (which would neither be the first nor last time), but I just can't. Had there been a personal consequence right then and there, a bar sanction or suspension, it might have spared us all a career of living on the edge of criminality. Trump was far from a perfect candidate, but I respect his continued ability to get things done, which iOS what we sorely need right now. I hope that he's as much a thorn in the asses of the mainstream Republican Party as he is the Democrats.
I agree with that last statement very much.
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We have an issue with thugs turning up at legitimate protests to prey on the protestors and to incite mayhem so they can loot. That's a serious issue and I don't see a simple way around it. You can 10,000 people protesting - very emotionally heated but peaceful. One thug tosses a molotov and the riot is on.
You don't think this is all spontaneous do you?
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You don't think this is all spontaneous do you?
No, the demonstrations are planned events. That's legitimate to do. I do think people that want to take part in mayhem and looting use the demonstrations as a springboard. You get a crowd all hopped up, get the cops all on edge, and it doesn't take much to set it off. The Portland folks are claiming it was anarchists, and we certainly have nihilistic folks that just want to burn things, but there are opportunistic people looking for a quick theft that show up at these too.
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No, the demonstrations are planned events. That's legitimate to do. I do think people that want to take part in mayhem and looting use the demonstrations as a springboard. You get a crowd all hopped up, get the cops all on edge, and it doesn't take much to set it off. The Portland folks are claiming it was anarchists, and we certainly have nihilistic folks that just want to burn things, but there are opportunistic people looking for a quick theft that show up at these too.
What of the notion that one goal of some of the protesters is to incite violence in others, to throw gasoline on the flames until they lose control? Nonsense? Legitimate concern? Real?
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What of the notion that one goal of some of the protesters is to incite violence in others, to throw gasoline on the flames until they lose control? Nonsense? Legitimate concern? Real?
That's real too. I was just looking at some video from Portland of them smashing up a car with a pregnant young woman inside. They had baseball bats - you don't bring a bat to a protest if you're planning to be peaceful.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nJkjLoZuxbQ
This has been a grown trend for a couple decades. First I recall it was at the WTO Riots in Seattle. You have agitated crowds with things that are legitimate to protest about, get the police agitated, and it takes a very small spark to ignite it. You can see she's on the phone - reports are she was calling 911, but was told they police were keeping a 'low profile' and would not respond quickly. Keeping the police in low profile during a riot is another current trend, as just having them there agitate some groups. However, combine low police presence with people who want to cause mayhem (either from pure nihilism or for profit) and things get ugly very quickly.
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That's real too. I was just looking at some video from Portland of them smashing up a car with a pregnant young woman inside. They had baseball bats - you don't bring a bat to a protest if you're planning to be peaceful.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nJkjLoZuxbQ
This has been a grown trend for a couple decades. First I recall it was at the WTO Riots in Seattle. You have agitated crowds with things that are legitimate to protest about, get the police agitated, and it takes a very small spark to ignite it. You can see she's on the phone - reports are she was calling 911, but was told they police were keeping a 'low profile' and would not respond quickly. Keeping the police in low profile during a riot is another current trend, as just having them there agitate some groups. However, combine low police presence with people who want to cause mayhem (either from pure nihilism or for profit) and things get ugly very quickly.
I'm confident that if we followed the thread it would lead to Soros or some such Alinsky-ite.
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I'm confident that if we followed the thread it would lead to Soros or some such Alinsky-ite.
Having paid agitators provoke large peaceful riots is classic guerrilla theory, from Mao's Red Book and modified by Che in Guerrilla Warfare. However, those books are classic because the method is often successful, and those are widely used and adapted by groups with much different worldviews. They're required reading for military officers in nearly every nation, and the Islamic terrorists have made good use of them despite being religious in nature rather than atheistic like the communists. Alinsky isn't as well known, but his Rules for Radicals is good source material no matter what your ideology.
To take the point someone is funding this on a national scale, the next question would be 'to what end?' These groups do not have popular support. Getting more violent will result in a police crackdown (as intended, per Mao and Che) but without the popular support the movement won't endure the pressure. About a quarter of the nation voted for Mrs. Clinton, but very few of them support this violence. So, accepting the point someone is driving this, what is the end result they desire? A popular uprising in support of these people isn't happening. Per Mao and Che, the ensuing police brutality would push more people to the cause, but in this case most would see the crack down as justified. People are tired of this shit and want it to stop. You could argue the opposite - that getting the provocateurs in place is to enable an increased police state, but people are tired of that shit too. I am not saying that some person or group isn't driving this, but it's difficult to see the end game.
Of course, there's the saying "if you think someone smart is acting stupid, you might not know what game he's playing." So maybe there's an achievable goal and I don't see it.
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Having paid agitators provoke large peaceful riots is classic guerrilla theory, from Mao's Red Book and modified by Che in Guerrilla Warfare. However, those books are classic because the method is often successful, and those are widely used and adapted by groups with much different worldviews. They're required reading for military officers in nearly every nation, and the Islamic terrorists have made good use of them despite being religious in nature rather than atheistic like the communists. Alinsky isn't as well known, but his Rules for Radicals is good source material no matter what your ideology.
To take the point someone is funding this on a national scale, the next question would be 'to what end?' These groups do not have popular support. Getting more violent will result in a police crackdown (as intended, per Mao and Che) but without the popular support the movement won't endure the pressure. About a quarter of the nation voted for Mrs. Clinton, but very few of them support this violence. So, accepting the point someone is driving this, what is the end result they desire? A popular uprising in support of these people isn't happening. Per Mao and Che, the ensuing police brutality would push more people to the cause, but in this case most would see the crack down as justified. People are tired of this shit and want it to stop. You could argue the opposite - that getting the provocateurs in place is to enable an increased police state, but people are tired of that shit too. I am not saying that some person or group isn't driving this, but it's difficult to see the end game.
Of course, there's the saying "if you think someone smart is acting stupid, you might not know what game he's playing." So maybe there's an achievable goal and I don't see it.
Goal: Electors breaking and voting in Clinton next month.
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There's always a boogie man.
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Goal: Electors breaking and voting in Clinton next month.
That's as nutty as secession. Though at least it's Constitutional, I suppose.
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Goal: Electors breaking and voting in Clinton next month.
That's technically possible but not likely. The rioting is making the Trump electors more convinced, not less.
This is interesting, from a Portland TV station. More than half the people arrested in the demonstration did not vote.
http://www.wcnc.com/mb/news/more-than-half-of-arrested-anti-trump-protesters-didnt-vote/351988279
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That's technically possible but not likely. The rioting is making the Trump electors more convinced, not less.
This is interesting, from a Portland TV station. More than half the people arrested in the demonstration did not vote.
http://www.wcnc.com/mb/news/more-than-half-of-arrested-anti-trump-protesters-didnt-vote/351988279
That is what I would have expected about the non-voting demonstrators. Garden-variety thugs.
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I'm very much looking forward to his first 100 days to see what he can accomplish.
If it's anything like his first 7 days as President-Elect...
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If it's anything like his first 7 days as President-Elect...
You're drinking the lame stream media koolaid. It would be unwise to underestimate him.
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You're drinking the lame stream media koolaid.
Hap, I love you man, but this is the dumbest phrase in the history of dumb phrases.
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Hap, I love you man, but this is the dumbest phrase in the history of dumb phrases.
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But if he's only getting his news from the lame stream media, how is he supposed to protect himself from immigrants and fluoridated water? America was a better place in 1950. Buy gold.
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You're drinking the lame stream media koolaid. It would be unwise to underestimate him.
As opposed to getting my news from @RealDonaldTrump?
As a lawyer, what do you think about the significant conflicts of interests created by a Trump presidency?
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Hap, I love you man, but this is the dumbest phrase in the history of dumb phrases.
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More Great Moments in Condescension.
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More Great Moments in Condescension.
I see what you did there...
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As opposed to getting my news from @RealDonaldTrump?
As a lawyer, what do you think about the significant conflicts of interests created by a Trump presidency?
Anybody who voted for him ignored or disregarded the fact that at various times in his campaign he impugned the independent judiciary, the freedom of the press and the freedom of worship. They also chose to ignore or disregard that he refused to release his tax returns (something required of every cabinet-level officer) and that he threatened to use the office of the president to exact revenge on his political opponents. He also promised to order his underlings to break the law by bringing back torture--torture "a lot worse" than waterboarding.
If you're able to overlook all that, I imagine a few penny ante ethical conflicts won't make much of a difference.
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Hap, I love you man, but this is the dumbest phrase in the history of dumb phrases.
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ditto to that.
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Hap, I love you man, but this is the dumbest phrase in the history of dumb phrases.
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I disagree, if we're talking HISTORY of dumb phrases, I don't think it is even in the top 25. Maybe top 40... 37th???
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Anybody who voted for him ignored or disregarded the fact that at various times in his campaign he impugned the independent judiciary, the freedom of the press and the freedom of worship. They also chose to ignore or disregard that he refused to release his tax returns (something required of every cabinet-level officer) and that he threatened to use the office of the president to exact revenge on his political opponents. He also promised to order his underlings to break the law by bringing back torture--torture "a lot worse" than waterboarding.
If you're able to overlook all that, I imagine a few penny ante ethical conflicts won't make much of a difference.
Both the President and candidate have been very gracious in wishing the winner congratulations and good luck. Maybe it is time for voters to do the same?
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Both the President and candidate have been very gracious in wishing the winner congratulations and good luck. Maybe it is time for voters to do the same?
Yeah, that is not even remotely close to how politics in this country have worked any longer. See Obama, Bush, Clinton...
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Both the President and candidate have been very gracious in wishing the winner congratulations and good luck. Maybe it is time for voters to do the same?
Nah. POTUS has a duty to ensure a smooth transition and protect the integrity of the office. Kudos to him for carrying it out.
Me? Trump can kiss my ass.
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Has Trump appointed any more white supremacists to his cabinet or does he take a break from that on Sunday to sit around with his family and read his favorite passages from Two Corinthians?
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So I snagged me three copies of the recalled Newsweek HIllary Commemorative Edition. I will start the bidding at 1 million dollars.
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Has Trump appointed any more white supremacists to his cabinet or does he take a break from that on Sunday to sit around with his family and read his favorite passages from Two Corinthians?
I always thought of Trump as more of an Old Testament guy...you know, stoning homosexuals and impregnating your sister-in-law.
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Welcome to the supercilious poseur sweepstakes.
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Has Trump appointed any more white supremacists to his cabinet or does he take a break from that on Sunday to sit around with his family and read his favorite passages from Two Corinthians?
If only. The "team" uses Sunday's to talk super tough about torture.
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If only. The "team" uses Sunday's to talk super tough about torture.
Of terror suspects, or gay people?
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Of terror suspects, or gay people?
You just had to ask.
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Of terror suspects, or gay people?
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Legitimate question.
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Legitimate question.
I think torture is abhorrent but the answer to the question is, probably only the gay terrorist suspects.
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Welp, this orange buffoon is our president now. Pretty surreal.
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Of all the unpleasant things Trump could have done with his first executive orders I did not expect raising mortgage insurance premiums for low-income and first-time home buyers. (https://www.bloomberg.com/politics/articles/2017-01-20/trump-administration-overturns-obama-s-fha-mortgage-fee-cut)
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Of all the unpleasant things Trump could have done with his first executive orders I did not expect raising mortgage insurance premiums for low-income and first-time home buyers. (https://www.bloomberg.com/politics/articles/2017-01-20/trump-administration-overturns-obama-s-fha-mortgage-fee-cut)
The immediate actions Trump can take - basically undoing all of Obama's executive orders - are going to have deep and instant impacts upon low-income families, aka Trump voters. If the GOP follows through on its quixotic goal of repealing ObamaCare, the 2018 election cycle is going to be a dumpster fire for them (remember 2010?).
When healthcare renewal rolls around next October, those same Trump voters are going to be harshly reminded of what an unregulated, market-driven health insurance looks like. They, in turn, will let their GOP representatives know what they think; it's already started, in fact, and it's not going well (http://time.com/4635551/mike-coffman-aca-obamacare-repeal-meeting/).
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The immediate actions Trump can take - basically undoing all of Obama's executive orders - are going to have deep and instant impacts upon low-income families, aka Trump voters. If the GOP follows through on its quixotic goal of repealing ObamaCare, the 2018 election cycle is going to be a dumpster fire for them (remember 2010?).
When healthcare renewal rolls around next October, those same Trump voters are going to be harshly reminded of what an unregulated, market-driven health insurance looks like. They, in turn, will let their GOP representatives know what they think; it's already started, in fact, and it's not going well (http://time.com/4635551/mike-coffman-aca-obamacare-repeal-meeting/).
Mister Voter, which do you prefer - a fucked up Pink Floyd nightmare fantasy expertly designed to appeal to racists and idiots or a guarantee that you will be able to continue to purchase health insurance? Hm?
You d-bag. Your making America great again by killing affordable healthcare? Regretting that I voted for you already.
Say It AINT SO, Repealing the 26 year old rule and pre existing condition. I voted for you you said you were keeping laws
Well. Fantasy it is. Carry on.
https://twitter.com/ultprivacy/status/819757093339168768?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw
https://twitter.com/flippy0001/status/819656548465147909?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw
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Mister Voter, which do you prefer - a fucked up Pink Floyd nightmare fantasy expertly designed to appeal to racists and idiots or a guarantee that you will be able to continue to purchase health insurance? Hm?
You d-bag. Your making America great again by killing affordable healthcare? Regretting that I voted for you already.
Say It AINT SO, Repealing the 26 year old rule and pre existing condition. I voted for you you said you were keeping laws
Well. Fantasy it is. Carry on.
https://twitter.com/ultprivacy/status/819757093339168768?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw
https://twitter.com/flippy0001/status/819656548465147909?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw
You know, I can kind of understand young people who voted for him because they believed what he said. They're naive, and they haven't been burned yet, and they'll just have to learn the hard way. But middle-aged people who fell for the shtick and think he has their backs are just deluded and ought to know better. The guy has a long track record that indicates that he cares only about himself and the other privileged few that share his orbit. Everybody else is going to get fucked bigly.
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Mister Voter, which do you prefer - a fucked up Pink Floyd nightmare fantasy expertly designed to appeal to racists and idiots or a guarantee that you will be able to continue to purchase health insurance? Hm?
You d-bag. Your making America great again by killing affordable healthcare? Regretting that I voted for you already.
Say It AINT SO, Repealing the 26 year old rule and pre existing condition. I voted for you you said you were keeping laws
Well. Fantasy it is. Carry on.
https://twitter.com/ultprivacy/status/819757093339168768?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw
https://twitter.com/flippy0001/status/819656548465147909?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw
Trump also vowed not to cut a single dollar from Medicare and Medicaid, and that his replacement healthcare plan will cover everyone, be cheaper and have lower deductibles. Of course, he has already broken so many promises that another couple won't matter to him.
The ability of Trump voters to be gaslit into believing anything he says (Putin's approval rating is increasing with Trump voters, for example) will mean he will keep his base. But he won by a slim margin, lost the popular vote, is unpopular generally, and desperately so for an incoming, first term President. He may actually drain the swamp in the same way that Vader brought balance to the Force: by collecting up all the nut jobs in Washington and marching them into the Delaware.
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As I cast my eye over the country in ruins and contemplate the grim prospects of its inhabitants, I take some small solace in my moral and intellectual superiority to the sixty million or so racist cretins who brought us to this state of affairs.
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The ability of Trump voters to be gaslit into believing anything he says (Putin's approval rating is increasing with Trump voters, for example) will mean he will keep his base.
Trump specializes in this, but it is by no means restricted to his followers. Studies consistently show that people adopt the policies of leaders they like - they don't choose leaders that share their policies.
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Trump specializes in this, but it is by no means restricted to his followers. Studies consistently show that people adopt the policies of leaders they like - they don't choose leaders that share their policies.
Humans are weird. It's a bit of a wonder we've lasted as long as we have. The next few hundred years will be a serious test of our adaptability.
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Let the record reflect that the first official act of the White House Press Secretary was to lie about size.
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Let the record reflect that the first official act of the White House Press Secretary was to lie about
Baghdad Bob has resurfaced!
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Let the record reflect that the first official act of the White House Press Secretary was to lie about size.
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Between the outright angry lie to the press and the delusional incoherent self-aggrandizing address to the CIA (along with a fake laugh track and all), the trump administration began with no surprises.
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Between the outright angry lie to the press and the delusional incoherent self-aggrandizing address to the CIA (along with a fake laugh track and all), the trump administration began with no surprises.
Actually, one pleasant one: the Women's march on Saturday, which was then (predictably) dismissed by Trump.
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Justin Trudeau @JustinTrudeau 4 hours ago
To those fleeing persecution, terror & war, Canadians will welcome you, regardless of your faith. Diversity is our strength #WelcomeToCanada
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Justin Trudeau @JustinTrudeau 4 hours ago
To those fleeing persecution, terror & war, Canadians will welcome you, regardless of your faith. Diversity is our strength #WelcomeToCanada
I should really consider the offer.
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Canada has refused to give me a visa.
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Our president is a complete nutcase. YAY USA?
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All would do well to heed PM Trudeau. His rich wisdom in general and his compassionate concern for refugees in particular is demonstrated by his deep admiration for long time family friend, Fidel Castro, Cuba's gentle and enlightened steward. Who better to instruct us on the plight of those fleeing tyranny, murder and torture?
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Who better to instruct us on the plight of those fleeing tyranny, murder and torture?
It sure as shit isn't that fuckstick Bannon.
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It sure as shit isn't that fuckstick Bannon.
That toxic piece of shit is writing all these "executive orders" and sits on the NSC in place of the joint chiefs. Politically, Trump is an empty vessel which Bannon is filling with all of the evils that lurk in the spider-infested corners of his fevered brain.
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Thank goodness we have men of principle like Paul Ryan in power to stand up to hahahahahaha kill me
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Thank goodness we have men of principle like Paul Ryan in power to stand up to hahahahahaha kill me
Trump is making it easy for the Democrats to have a "blue wave" in 2018 akin to the Republican success in 2010 (although I'm sure they can find a way to fuck it up). The real test is whether Republicans will do the right thing, even if it's for the wrong reasons.
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Trump is making it easy for the Democrats to have a "blue wave" in 2018 akin to the Republican success in 2010 (although I'm sure they can find a way to fuck it up). The real test is whether Republicans will do the right thing, even if it's for the wrong reasons.
I say this with a straight face:
Having appointed Bannon to the NSC, what makes you think he will allow 2018 elections to take place?
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I say this with a straight face:
Having appointed Bannon to the NSC, what makes you think he will allow 2018 elections to take place?
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Saying this with my head slightly cocked to one side:
What makes you think he wont allow the 2018 elections to take place?
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Saying this with my head slightly cocked to one side:
What makes you think he wont allow the 2018 elections to take place?
Well, Bannon had explicitly stated that he wants to "collapse the state". He now sits on the NSC, in place of the Joint Chiefs.
President Trump has already demonstrated that he does not believe election results. If that's the case, why bother with them?
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I say this with a straight face:
Having appointed Bannon to the NSC, what makes you think he will allow 2018 elections to take place?
Oh, they'll happen. However, I am not convinced that the results won't be a Saddamesque 99% vote for Trump.
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I'd be lying if I said that I wasn't enjoying all the weeping and gnashing of teeth in here over Trump. He's actually only doing what he said that he'd do. For modern day pols, that's really saying something. /ducks/
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I'd be lying if I said that I wasn't enjoying all the weeping and gnashing of teeth in here over Trump. He's actually only doing what he said that he'd do. For modern day pols, that's really saying something. /ducks/
Very true, but that doesn't not mean that he isn't going to get a yuuuge negative reaction when he tries to push through any number of his other ill-conceived, amateurish, hateful and illegal campaign promises.
What's interesting here is those who came out strongly against the Muslim ban at the time it was first mooted, like McConnell, Ryan and Mattis, but who are staring at their shoes and shuffling their feet right now. Except Mattis, he was part of the set decoration for the signing ceremony.
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I suspect the heat will get so strong reasonably soon that Bannon will be removed and placed at somewhat of a distance.
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I suspect the heat will get so strong reasonably soon that Bannon will be removed and placed at somewhat of a distance.
I'm not so sure of that. Trump would view that as failure. I expect that he'll double down at that point.
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Oh, I think he'll double down, all right. He'll go as far as he can, but he's going to continue to be met with massive levels of resistance and sacrificing the face of these misfires may buy him some public relief.
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Interesting article--A Clarifying Moment in American History (https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2017/01/a-clarifying-moment-in-american-history/514868/)--written by a Republican neocon examining Trump's first week in office which then led me down the rabbit hole regards Section 4 of the 25th Amendment.
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He's actually only doing what he said that he'd do.
That's a bug, not a feature.
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I wonder if he will quit before he gets impeached. He might conclude that ruling is no fun anymore, or more likely that ruling is hurting his bottom line.
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What's interesting here is those who came out strongly against the Muslim ban at the time it was first mooted, like McConnell, Ryan and Mattis, but who are staring at their shoes and shuffling their feet right now.
What's interesting about political flip-flopping other than it's one of the things about politicians that helped get Trump elected?
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What's interesting about political flip-flopping other than it's one of the things about politicians that helped get Trump elected?
Well, if they don't reverse course, it will get them all thrown out. Trump may not give a shit about the polls and the protests, but rank and file Republicans in the House and Senate should; it's their jobs on the line next year.
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Well, if they don't reverse course, it will get them all thrown out. Trump may not give a shit about the polls and the protests, but rank and file Republicans in the House and Senate should; it's their jobs on the line next year.
They're politicians. You can be sure they're doing what they think will get themselves re-elected.
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He managed to piss off Australia. AUSTRALIA.
It's like we ordered a President with Richard Nixon's foreign diplomacy skill, and Jimmy Carter's core human decency - and the waiter switched the order.
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He managed to piss off Australia. AUSTRALIA.
It's like we ordered a President with Richard Nixon's foreign diplomacy skill, and Jimmy Carter's core human decency - and the waiter switched the order.
Australia, along with Iraq (who he has supremely pissed off), are two of our biggest allies actually fighting against ISIS. What a fucking lunatic.
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Yeah, who cares though, LIBRUL TEARS are more important that anything to the AmericaLast lunatics that back this nutcase.
I love their bitching about the millions of protesters against this orange idiot. too. Weird, was only a few years ago they all thought protesting was very patriotic when the Tea party was doing it....really strange.
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Turnbull is what in Australia passes for a rightwing nutcase so you'd think there might be some simpatico there somewhere.
I also like how the people most offended by objections to the ban don't seem to have any idea what the ban actually does.
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Turnbull is what in Australia passes for a rightwing nutcase so you'd think there might be some simpatico there somewhere.
I also like how the people most offended by objections to the ban don't seem to have any idea what the ban actually does.
According to Trump it keeps "illegal aliens" away.
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According to Trump it keeps "illegal aliens" away.
If that's what he thinks then he doesn't know what it does, either. Which I do not doubt.
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If that's what he thinks then he doesn't know what it does, either. Which I do not doubt.
Donald J. Trump ✔ @realDonaldTrump
Do you believe it? The Obama Administration agreed to take thousands of illegal immigrants from Australia. Why? I will study this dumb deal! (http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-02-02/trump-slams-dumb-refugee-deal/8235820)
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I'm convinced that when he encouraged McConnell to "go nuclear", he thought that meant actually using nuclear weapons on Democrats.
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I'm convinced that when he encouraged McConnell to "go nuclear", he thought that meant actually using nuclear weapons on Democrats.
Secretary Perry, put down that corn dog and get over here!
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I'm convinced that when he encouraged McConnell to "go nuclear", he thought that meant actually using nuclear weapons on Democrats.
Or maybe his brain is simply being controlled by communistic alien robot slugs with poor impulse control and an odd case of Tourette's
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Or maybe his brain is simply being controlled by communistic alien robot slugs with poor impulse control and an odd case of Tourette's
That would be an improvement.
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Or maybe his brain is simply being controlled by communistic alien robot slugs with poor impulse control and an odd case of Tourette's
That's been Bloom County's storyline for a couple weeks.
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So, when the nth court in a row rules against Trump's Muslim ban, he tweets - in all caps - "see you in court."
I have a number of opinions about Trump: how he's not a good businessman; how he's a sociopath and a narcissist; how he's an abuser. But I never considered him flat-out stupid. Well, now I do.
It all fits. The lazy intellect, the 5th grade vocabulary, the lack of focus and concentration, the inability to articulate thoughts and concepts coherently. All of it. His White House leaks like a sieve, which many attribute to the horror being induced in career civil servants when they see Trump in action. Everything is being dumbed down for him. Memos cannot be more than one page; they must have bullet points, but no more than 9; he will change the subject when he realizes he's asked a stupid question of a staffer and prefers to lean on Bannon and Kushner to give him answers. He put Putin on hold because he had to ask what START was (even though he's previously condemned it as being terrible).
He's a hateful, arrogant Chauncey Gardiner.
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So, when the nth court in a row rules against Trump's Muslim ban, he tweets - in all caps - "see you in court."
I have a number of opinions about Trump: how he's not a good businessman; how he's a sociopath and a narcissist; how he's an abuser. But I never considered him flat-out stupid. Well, now I do.
It all fits. The lazy intellect, the 5th grade vocabulary, the lack of focus and concentration, the inability to articulate thoughts and concepts coherently. All of it. His White House leaks like a sieve, which many attribute to the horror being induced in career civil servants when they see Trump in action. Everything is being dumbed down for him. Memos cannot be more than one page; they must have bullet points, but no more than 9; he will change the subject when he realizes he's asked a stupid question of a staffer and prefers to lean on Bannon and Kushner to give him answers. He put Putin on hold because he had to ask what START was (even though he's previously condemned it as being terrible).
He's a hateful, arrogant Chauncey Gardiner.
And yet, he turned a nice sized family real estate business into an empire and himself into a billionaire. Built himself a massive media presence. And then became President of the United States. Say what you want or think what you want, he's figured out how to get everything he's wanted. No matter what I think of him or what he does I don't doubt he'll continue to get what he wants.
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And yet, he turned a nice sized family real estate business into an empire and himself into a billionaire. Built himself a massive media presence. And then became President of the United States. Say what you want or think what you want, he's figured out how to get everything he's wanted. No matter what I think of him or what he does I don't doubt he'll continue to get what he wants.
Do you really think he's got what he wants? Does he seem like a happy, satisfied person? As a real estate "mogul", he's toxic to Wall Street such that he is in hock up to his eyeballs to unsavory characters, including numerous Russian oligarchs - this is why he won't let anyone see his tax returns and cannot divest his business - even if he wanted to - as there'd be nothing to take out. Why did he start Trump University to rip of students for a few thousand dollars a time? He's underwater, living on cash flow.
His business, of late, has been in franchising the brand name "Trump". But now he's in the process of destroying the value of that brand (and derivatives thereof). How is that good business? He starts a Twitter spat with Nordstrom and their stock price goes up while people flock to the store to show their support with consumer dollars.
He ran for President as the ultimate grift, but he is way out of his depth. There are real things to do and real consequences for getting them wrong.
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So, when the nth court in a row rules against Trump's Muslim ban, he tweets - in all caps - "see you in court."
I don't think any of the court decisions have been on the merits of what he's wanted, rather the way he went about implementing it. The real meat of the case is going to come later and will take a while to get through the system.
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And yet, he turned a nice sized family real estate business into an empire and himself into a billionaire. Built himself a massive media presence. And then became President of the United States. Say what you want or think what you want, he's figured out how to get everything he's wanted. No matter what I think of him or what he does I don't doubt he'll continue to get what he wants.
Kinda like Bruce Jenner, except she can't use the ladies room in North Carolina.
Trump is a fucking disaster and beyond an embarrassment, I'm not sure how any sane person can't see that.
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And yet, he turned a nice sized family real estate business into an empire and himself into a billionaire. Built himself a massive media presence. And then became President of the United States. Say what you want or think what you want, he's figured out how to get everything he's wanted. No matter what I think of him or what he does I don't doubt he'll continue to get what he wants.
As a self-promoter and bullshit artist, he is indeed quite talented.
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And yet, he turned a nice sized family real estate business into an empire and himself into a billionaire. Built himself a massive media presence. And then became President of the United States. Say what you want or think what you want, he's figured out how to get everything he's wanted. No matter what I think of him or what he does I don't doubt he'll continue to get what he wants.
He's a billionaire? Seems like it'd be really easy for him to prove that. And yet.
He's nothing but a petty, entitled, spoiled brat. The sad fools who voted for him are in for a rude awakening. He'll fuck you over just like he's done to everyone else in his life.
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I don't think any of the court decisions have been on the merits of what he's wanted, rather the way he went about implementing it. The real meat of the case is going to come later and will take a while to get through the system.
Of course, which is one of the reasons why pre-blaming Judge Robart for a future terror attack is so evil. The ban was so amateurish, and the grandstanding about it so blatant, that the order was never going to pass a constitutional challenge. If the threat is so real and present, then the Trump administration needed to take more seriously the job of crafting the order.
But the TRO and its upholding on appeal is based, partly, on the courts' belief that the case itself has merit. Still a long way to go, but that's a strong indicator that it will lose in the end. And we get the comedy theater of depositions in the meantime.
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He's a billionaire? Seems like it'd be really easy for him to prove that. And yet.
He's nothing but a petty, entitled, spoiled brat. The sad fools who voted for him are in for a rude awakening. He'll fuck you over just like he's done to everyone else in his life.
He already has. His very first executive order was to roll back a rate reduction on mortgage insurance that will make buying lower valued houses more expensive. That, of course, means that more low/middle income families will have to stay in rental accommodation, which is a boon for real estate magnates.
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Virtue preening rapidly approaching critical mass.
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It's getting very serious. After the election, and after all the intelligence agencies fingered Russia for trying to affect the election, Obama imposed sanctions by way of kicking out a bunch of diplomats. Everybody waited for a response by Russia but, after a couple of days, Putin announced that there would be no response. Trump's then campaign employee and future National Security Advisor, Mike Flynn, was known to have communicated with the Russian Ambassador during those intervening days. Flynn, Spicer and, notably, Pence, have all gone on record as denying that the sanctions were discussed by the two.
Ironically, NSA Flynn didn't realize that the U.S. monitors communications made by Russian officials. It's now being reported, by the Washington Post and NY Times with both claiming multiple strong sources, that the sanctions were most definitely discussed by the two. Flynn wasn't representing the U.S. at that time, so any such discussions were illegal. So he definitely lied about something very serious, and either duped Spicer and Pence or they lied too. So Flynn committed a crime and it's possible that the Trump administration tried to cover it up (which is always worse).
Perhaps more disturbingly, though, Flynn is also known to have had communications with the Russian Ambassador during the campaign, before the election. No reporting yet about what was the nature of those exchanges, but we now know that the campaign that was the intended beneficiary of Russia's meddling was communicating with Russia in a manner that was intended to be secret.
I don't know the formal definition of what constitutes a "high crime", but this would seem to be the sort of thing that should fit. #WhatDidHeKnow #WhenDidHeKnowIt
Here's a [trigger warning] Rachel Maddow piece (http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow/watch/magnitude-of-trump-adviser-flynn-s-russia-scandal-gains-clarity-874908739801) on the subject. IMHO, this is Rachel at her best*, consolidating and condensing disparate news down to its core meaning.
* It also shows Rachel at her worst: trying to draw a tortured analogy to a spillway sinkhole in CA because she wanted to get both stories in.
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So Flynn's gone, not because he did anything illegal (he did), but because there was an erosion of trust. Well, considering former Acting AG Sally Yates (the one Trump fired for upholding the constitution) told the White House in January that Flynn had lied about not discussing sanctions and that he was now compromised and open to blackmail by the Russians because, of course, they knew he was lying because they were on the other side of the calls.
Despite the seriousness of this situation, Trump did nothing. He only pushed out Flynn once the story broke in the press, and then went on a twitter rant about the leaks from the intelligence community and how that's the real problem. He even referenced North Korea as something he has to deal with, apparently failing to see the irony given his impromptu, open-air situation room meeting about the missile launch surrounded by various high-paying guests and unvetted foreign workers at Mar a Lago that was Facebook Lived while the guests posed with the guy carrying the nuclear football, posting his picture and name online for all to see.
Oh, and one of his choices for Solicitor General just bailed, as did his choice for Labor Secretary. And he completely capitulated to China, accepting our "one China" policy without any sort of deal whatsoever, let alone the tremendous deal he promised to extract. And the wall will cost twice as much and no one knows how it will be paid for. And an Israeli journalist called him out for racism and xenophobia in a press conference. And now it seems that his campaign had multiple contacts with Russian intelligence officials during the campaign. Oh, and his Muslim ban seems to be dying a quiet death now that it's 0-for-everything in court, despite Trump vowing to take the courts to court over their court decisions (try doing that without a Solicitor General).
Honestly, if this is "winning" then Trump was right, I am already sick of it.
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Not only did an Israeli journalist call him out about anti-Semitism, but he "answered" the question by bragging about his Electoral College victory.
He then went on to establish the US position as "one state, two state, whatever makes me happy." Seriously.
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Reports today say scumbag owner Jeffrey Loria (with the rumored deal to sell the Marlins to the Kushners) is up for ambassador to France.
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Reports today say scumbag owner Jeffrey Loria (with the rumored deal to sell the Marlins to the Kushners) is up for ambassador to France.
Naturally. Because he showed so much love for French culture in Montreal.
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Not only did an Israeli journalist call him out about anti-Semitism, but he "answered" the question by bragging about his Electoral College victory.
He then went on to establish the US position as "one state, two state, whatever makes me happy." Seriously.
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Thanks Donald. I can't wait to explain to my kids next time they have to wait out a bomb threat at the JCC that they should take comfort in the fact he won the 10th lowest electoral college victory in history. To be fair, the existence of the electoral college is probably the reason that 60 or so JCCs around the country have received bomb threats since the inauguration, but it's certainly not helping anything.
He then ended his rambling "non-sense" with his version of "some of my best friends are Jews." What a disgusting idiot.
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And of course he's kicking off his re-election campaign - four weeks into the second worst start to a presidency in US History* - with a rally in Florida on Saturday. (http://www.politico.com/story/2017/02/trump-rally-melbourne-florida-235061)
*Credit to Trump for not spending his first month in office dying from pneumonia. William Henry Harrison really set a low floor for presidential debuts.
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Thanks Donald. I can't wait to explain to my kids next time they have to wait out a bomb threat at the JCC that they should take comfort in the fact he won the 10th lowest electoral college victory in history. To be fair, the existence of the electoral college is probably the reason that 60 or so JCCs around the country have received bomb threats since the inauguration, but it's certainly not helping anything.
He then ended his rambling "non-sense" with his version of "some of my best friends are Jews." What a disgusting idiot.
When asked about North Korea, Trump responded "have you seen my penis? It's tremendous...loved by millions of people...all over the country. Not every man has what I have...it's very, very unfair really. But I don't know, what can I say, it's impressive. Ask Ivanka."
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Reports today say scumbag owner Jeffrey Loria (with the rumored deal to sell the Marlins to the Kushners) is up for ambassador to France.
The Kushners have clarified that there is no impropriety here. They have said that they won't buy the Marlins until after Loria is confirmed as Ambassador. Because then it's all ok, right?
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Kushners are apparently out of the running to buy the Fish, but Loria is still talking to other potential buyers. Marlins fans should be excited.
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Kushners are apparently out of the running to buy the Fish, but Loria is still talking to other potential buyers. Marlins fans should be excited.
If they think it can't get any worse they're fooling themselves.
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Here's Maddow again (http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow/watch/new-commerce-secretary-at-nexus-of-lucrative-trump-russian-deal-886220355575), with one of her patented dot-joining pieces.
1. Trump buys a Florida ego-palace out of foreclosure for $41mm
2. Russian oligarch buys same property from Trump for $95mm
Oh, that was easy; a Russian oligarch with close ties to Putin stuffed $54mm into Trump's sky-rocket in plain sight.
But it gets worse: the oligarch never went to the property before, during or after the purchase; the transaction happened while Trump was in desperate trouble over default on payments on loans he had from Deutsche Bank; and that bank has been found guilty and fined heavily for laundering Russian oligarch money. So Trump owes Russian laundromat Deutsche Bank, he gets a $54mm windfall profit from a Russian for a property neither want and pays off Deutsche.
Legal? Probably. Chin-scratchingly suspicious? Bigly.
But what did the Russians buy with that money? Well, other than Trump's very public undying love and affection, they bought the man. Paul Manafort was a big man in Russian politics but anonymous over here, yet he became Trump's campaign chairman even though he and Trump had never met before that appointment. Carter Page was a big man in Russian politics but anonymous over here, yet he became Trump's foreign policy advisor even though he and Trump had never met before that appointment. Michael Flynn was considered toxic because of his ties to Russia, Turkey and his very embarrassing ouster from the DIA, yet Trump took him on as NSA anyway only for him to flame out in less than a month. Rex Tillerson was a big man in Russia (friend of Putin (http://static5.businessinsider.com/image/58505c97ca7f0c8c018b5678-1190-625/a-timeline-of-rex-tillersons-relationship-with-russian-president-vladimir-putin.jpg) and Order of Friendship recipient) but not in politics over here, yet he became Trump's Secretary of State even though he and Trump had never met before that nomination.
Want more? The chairman of Deutsche Bank was ousted over the whole money laundering thing. Of course, he didn't go to jail, he got a cushy job at the Bank of Cypress. Cypress being the place where Russians stash their laundered money. There's a lot of Russians and their friends in the management hierarchy of that bank, but only one American: a guy called Wilbur Ross. Sound familiar? He's the new Commerce Secretary.
When all this ends, the Venn diagram of Russian entanglements will just be a symmetrical stack of rings.
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Even if everything was above board (which is entirely possible), the optics are terrible and they should be doing everything they can to distance themselves from the negative image. Unless, of course, it wasn't above board.
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Even if everything was above board (which is entirely possible), the optics are terrible and they should be doing everything they can to distance themselves from the negative image. Unless, of course, it wasn't above board.
Nothing to see here... (https://youtu.be/5NNOrp_83RU)
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I saw the Maddow bit and although it is essentially a cluster or disparate matters, when you couple them with Trump's unwavering affection for Vlad, it's hard for me to imagine there isn't something there.
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Also, the show brought up the possibility that if Vlad can't get any sweet deals from Donald, due to American politics, he might be predisposed to spill some beans. In other words, door #1 is easing sanctions, etc. and door #2 is the consolation prize of showing that he fucked with the election and had influence over the winner.
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Also, the show brought up the possibility that if Vlad can't get any sweet deals from Donald, due to American politics, he might be predisposed to spill some beans. In other words, door #1 is easing sanctions, etc. and door #2 is the consolation prize of showing that he fucked with the election and had influence over the winner.
Yep. Later in the show it was discussed that the Russians were just trying to hobble the presumptive winner so that she would come into office weakened on the domestic and world stage. That Trump won was hilarious at first (confirmed by gleeful communications among Russian intelligence folks), but that's since been replaced with a strong case of buyer's remorse as the realization dawns that their Manchurian Candidate is a dangerously unstable, ill-informed, walking bag of orange garbage.
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Yep. Later in the show it was discussed that the Russians were just trying to hobble the presumptive winner so that she would come into office weakened on the domestic and world stage. That Trump won was hilarious at first (confirmed by gleeful communications among Russian intelligence folks), but that's since been replaced with a strong case of buyer's remorse as the realization dawns that their Manchurian Candidate is a dangerously unstable, ill-informed, walking bag of orange garbage.
So you're saying that Russian intelligence catches on faster than Trump's base.
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Here's the thing that struck me about Trump's "talent-based" immigration system: if we allow in only skilled workers, they will become instant competition for existing skilled workers in America. At the same time, if he denies entry to unskilled workers, who will take on unskilled work? The sons and daughters of unskilled parents will aspire to upward mobility that could be denied to them because Trump has cut off the flow of replacement unskilled immigrant labor that has fueled the economy for centuries (yes, immigrants stimulate the economy).
Basically, last night, Trump announced the end of the American Dream.
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Basically, last night, Trump announced the end of the American Dream.
He didn't announce it. the Electoral College did back in November.
I personally seem to be in a state of apathy over things right now. As a moderate Democrat, I am having a hard time being optimistic about the future, especially when the future I see seems to be the complete opposite of many in power. And that is on a federal and state level. I don't think people know what they truly want, they listen to some talking ahead and think, yeah, I agree with that. Half the time they don't even know what they are talking about.
I had one friend ask me, "Aren't you tired of paying for everyone?" I told her, I guess not since I think people still need help. Not much of response from her after that.
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Basically, last night, Trump announced the end of the American Dream.
But he used his inside voice!
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I had one friend ask me, "Aren't you tired of paying for everyone?" I told her, I guess not since I think people still need help. Not much of response from her after that.
I'll bite. We're not doing people on welfare any favors by killing their will to earn on their own. The welfare state has emasculated western Europe, and we're on the precipice of it. I'm all for helping those who are truly incapable of doing for themselves. But we've let too many freeloaders and grifters into that system.
We destroy their self-preservation instinct, and make them dependent upon that government handout, which is exactly where many Democrats want them. In my opinion, this is immoral and wrong. I know that most of you disagree with that, and I'll be attacked for saying it out loud here.
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I had one friend ask me, "Aren't you tired of paying for everyone?" I told her, I guess not since I think people still need help. Not much of response from her after that.
You should start associating with people who possess some basic grasp of economics.
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I'll bite. We're not doing people on welfare any favors by killing their will to earn on their own. The welfare state has emasculated western Europe, and we're on the precipice of it. I'm all for helping those who are truly incapable of doing for themselves. But we've let too many freeloaders and grifters into that system.
We destroy their self-preservation instinct, and make them dependent upon that government handout, which is exactly where many Democrats want them. In my opinion, this is immoral and wrong. I know that most of you disagree with that, and I'll be attacked for saying it out loud here.
Attacked? What are you, a snowflake?
Seriously, isn't this the same argument made in the 80s and 90s, before welfare reform? Are there still really a lot of people who aspire to remain on welfare?
Also, saying that having people dependent on the government is what Democrats want is so weak: I know lots of Democrats and have never heard that sentiment expressed. Not once actually.
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Attacked? What are you, a snowflake?
Seriously, isn't this the same argument made in the 80s and 90s, before welfare reform? Are there still really a lot of people who aspire to remain on welfare?
Also, saying that having people dependent on the government is what Democrats want is so weak: I know lots of Democrats and have never heard that sentiment expressed. Not once actually.
People too often become complacent and accept the status quo. There's nothing better than a little personal motivation.
Democrats frequently fight that argument because it makes them look badly. However, their actions belie the truth, which is that most of their legislative efforts are designed to do exactly that. So it really isn't weak. I'm no snowflake either. I just know you people and how you are going to respond. You'd be surprised at the private messages I get from people who agree with me but who are too frightened of being attacked by you all to express their support. They see how you treat me and others who deign to disagree with you all.
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People too often become complacent and accept the status quo. There's nothing better than a little personal motivation.
Democrats frequently fight that argument because it makes them look badly. However, their actions belie the truth, which is that most of their legislative efforts are designed to do exactly that. So it really isn't weak. I'm no snowflake either. I just know you people and how you are going to respond. You'd be surprised at the private messages I get from people who agree with me but who are too frightened of being attacked by you all to express their support. They see how you treat me and others who deign to disagree with you all.
And Republicans just want to help big business. Too big to fail. My ass. The greedy bastards take advantage of what they can and then the little guy pays for it. That bail out of banks and whatnot by W pissed me off because they were too big to fail and would hurt the economy. Well, guess what, it did hurt the economy. Where's your reform for that?
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You'd be surprised at the private messages I get from people who agree with me but who are too frightened of being attacked by you all to express their support. They see how you treat me and others who deign to disagree with you all.
Weren't you the one who first started throwing out the snowflake label? So who exactly is attacking whom?
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In my opinion, this is immoral and wrong.
I agree that your opinion is wrong, as in it is not based on actual facts.
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Weren't you the one who first started throwing out the snowflake label? So who exactly is attacking whom?
I did toss out the snowflake label because I love to have fun with you knuckleheads! I can take it, but there are some folks out there who are scared of you folks and simply stay silent.
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Weren't you the one who first started throwing out the snowflake label? So who exactly is attacking whom?
One of my favorite tactics, it is the Democrats fault, even when a Republican is the one doing it.
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And Republicans just want to help big business. Too big to fail. My ass. The greedy bastards take advantage of what they can and then the little guy pays for it. That bail out of banks and whatnot by W pissed me off because they were too big to fail and would hurt the economy. Well, guess what, it did hurt the economy. Where's your reform for that?
I didn't like the bailout as much as you didn't. I would have allowed some of those poorly run banks to fail. Remember that I'm not a Republican; I am a constitutional conservative. Believe it or not, I was disappointed in President Trump's big government embrace in the SOTU last night. I don't think that's why he got elected. In my opinion, he got elected to change how the government is run, which includes shrinking the size of government and restoring some personal liberty.
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I agree that your opinion is wrong, as in it is not based on actual facts.
We'll have to agree to disagree. The facts are clear and immutable. Democrats created the welfare state and practically every expansion of it save the Medicare prescription drug addition that the scourge President Bush 43 championed.
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I didn't like the bailout as much as you didn't. I would have allowed some of those poorly run banks to fail. Remember that I'm not a Republican; I am a constitutional conservative. Believe it or not, I was disappointed in President Trump's big government embrace in the SOTU last night. I don't think that's why he got elected. In my opinion, he got elected to change how the government is run, which includes shrinking the size of government and restoring some personal liberty.
This is what confuses me... because nothing the President said last night was one iota different than the positions he campaigned on.
You are a constitutional conservative championing a President who believes in neither the Constitution nor conservatism.
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I'll bite. We're not doing people on welfare any favors by killing their will to earn on their own. The welfare state has emasculated western Europe, and we're on the precipice of it. I'm all for helping those who are truly incapable of doing for themselves. But we've let too many freeloaders and grifters into that system.
We destroy their self-preservation instinct, and make them dependent upon that government handout, which is exactly where many Democrats want them. In my opinion, this is immoral and wrong. I know that most of you disagree with that, and I'll be attacked for saying it out loud here.
When conservative politicians refer to welfare recipients as freeloaders and grifters, I assume it's entirely projection. Over 60% of food stamp recipients are working (and over 40% are white). Paul Ryan received social security survivor benefits that allowed him to go to college (back when it was affordable).
Reagan's welfare queen was a myth. Widespread welfare abuse is a myth. People choosing welfare over employment is a myth. Yes, there may be isolated cases, but the very, very few anecdotal examples is statistically irrelevant and by no means something on which to base social policy.
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When conservative politicians refer to welfare recipients as freeloaders and grifters, I assume it's entirely projection. Over 60% of food stamp recipients are working (and over 40% are white). Paul Ryan received social security survivor benefits that allowed him to go to college (back when it was affordable).
Reagan's welfare queen was a myth. Widespread welfare abuse is a myth. People choosing welfare over employment is a myth. Yes, there may be isolated cases, but the very, very few anecdotal examples is statistically irrelevant and by no means something on which to base social policy.
Right. This notion that people are lazy and are happy to be on welfare is a myth. The percentage of people who receive welfare while working is closer to 70-75%. The other obvious false projection is that people somehow thrive on welfare when in reality they barely survive. I highly doubt that any of these conservatives (who aren't on welfare themselves, and yes the "red" states receive a disproportionately greater amount of federal benefits than the "blue" states) would trade financial statements with these so called free-loaders who are somehow living high on the hog from welfare. Hell, TANF by its own terms doesn't allow benefits for more than 5 years out of someone's entire life, and is predicated on the notion that the working poor sometimes need some temporary assistance to be financially stable. Finally, safety net programs are only 10% of the federal budget. BG's friend complaining about taxes "paying for everyone else" is just completely insane, and obviously ignores the plethora of benefits that person receives from the federal government simply by virtue of being an American.
Finally, what any of this has to do with "personal liberty" is completely beyond me. People who are working their asses off just to feed their children and need a little help to get that done are not sacrificing their liberty in order to stay alive. They are just staying alive. Any conservatives want to complain about a self-preservation instinct? Shit, I'm sure you wouldn't be happy with their self-preservation instinct if they had to turn to crime to make up the shortfall left by taking away the meager welfare benefits they can get.
Mr. Happy - your views on welfare are not based upon anyone's reality, especially the people whose reality requires those problems simply to keep themselves and their children alive. The only "immoral" view being presented here is that people who need welfare to survive are simply not worthy of existence. Nobody on welfare wants to be on welfare.
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Nobody on welfare wants to be on welfare.
Unless you're a multi-billion-dollar corporation.
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This weekend I read the goddamn son-of-a-bitch ordered his steak well-done, and then ate it doused with catsup! Fuck him. Some shit just ain't right!
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This weekend I read the goddamn son-of-a-bitch ordered his steak well-done, and then ate it doused with catsup! Fuck him. Some shit just ain't right!
"No... hell no. A man could get his ass kicked, sayin' something like that."
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"I did not have international relations with that country" - Jefferson Beauregard Sessions
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"I did not have international relations with that country" - Jefferson Beauregard Sessions
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It takes a lot of wordsmithing to get his testimony out of outright perjury and into the general realm of misleading.
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It takes a lot of wordsmithing to get his testimony out of outright perjury and into the general realm of misleading.
“I have no doubt that perjury qualifies under the Constitution as a high crime. It goes to the heart of the judicial system” - Jeff Sessions.
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The only "immoral" view being presented here is that people who need welfare to survive are simply not worthy of existence. Nobody on welfare wants to be on welfare.
"I've been on food stamps. I've been on welfare. Did anyone help me out? No!"
- Craig T. Nelson (https://youtu.be/yTwpBLzxe4U), missing the point by a country mile.
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It takes a lot of wordsmithing to get his testimony out of outright perjury and into the general realm of misleading.
As I read what he testified and read his response, he sounded like Bill Clinton parsing what the definition of "is" is.
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"I've been on food stamps. I've been on welfare. Did anyone help me out? No!"
- Craig T. Nelson (https://youtu.be/yTwpBLzxe4U), missing the point by a country mile.
That's up there with:
"Flat Earth Society...we have members around the globe!"
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So, the week in which our President was hailed as presidential because he managed to read a ghost-written speech using his inside voice, that said all the same things he's been saying for years while ignoring all the things he's been ignoring for years - plus using a combat widow as a human shield against the scandal of the botched raid in which her husband was killed - we ended up with him accusing the outgoing President of violating the Constitution. It was done in perhaps the most Trumpian way possible: he tweeted out an unsubstantiated, right-wing conspiracy theory from Breitbart regarding said constitutional violation, then tweeted an insult to Arnold Schwartzeneggar, then went golfing. Because...leadership?
Back-chatter from his sieve-like White House reported that Trump was spitting mad that Sessions had recused himself from the barest minimum of an investigation that he is in the thick of. So mad, it seems, that Trump kicked Bannon and Priebus off Air Force One - taking its 6th, $3mm tax payer funded trip to Mar a Lago of Trump's less than two month old term of office - so that they both had to make their own way to Florida (at additional expense to tax payers). This was a bad idea, because there's a slight possibility that one of them may have saved Trump from the giant train coming down the tracks at him from the moment he tapped "Tweet" on his ancient, security-free Android phone.
You see, Obama had no authority to wiretap (only one "p" Donald) a U.S. citizen on American soil. There is no evidence that he did, and it's kind of hard to think that he may have done this when you consider that, two months before the election, he had evidence that the Russians were trying to throw the game for Trump and decided to sit on it as it was too politically inflammatory. That leaves Obama's motivation for tapping Trump to be for his own personal shits and giggles. Conversely, if there was a tap of Trump, or his campaign, it was because a Federal judge had been presented with evidence of wrongdoing strong enough to suggest that a wiretap was justified. If that's true, the actual story is that we now all want to know WTF the Feds have on Trump!
So, either there's sufficient evidence to justify a wiretap of Trump, or he's suffering a epic public meltdown. Good times!
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Drumpf going to Florida to work doesn't bother me nearly as much as the fact that he is using tax money to fund his hotel. That and the fact that Trump was tirggered over and over and over about Obama playing golf, and now he is playing 20 times more golf than BO. Of course every day and round he spends at Mar Lago, is lining his pockets. DRAIN THE SWAMP is so 2016.
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Drumpf going to Florida to work doesn't bother me nearly as much as the fact that he is using tax money to fund his hotel. That and the fact that Trump was tirggered over and over and over about Obama playing golf, and now he is playing 20 times more golf than BO. Of course every day and round he spends at Mar Lago, is lining his pockets. DRAIN THE SWAMP is so 2016.
The cost of travel for the Obamas over 8 years was just under $100mm. The cost of moving just Trump - i.e. not including the costs incurred when Melania or the kids travel - was $10mm for his first month in office.
The hypocrisy is staggering, but not out of character. However, at some point, a fiscally conservative Congress has to take issue with it...right?
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Is it cathartic for you to drag the left wing talking points into a personal summary each week? Are the 'attaboys' from MM, Bench, and the rest of the gang what gets you through the week?
Also, how is that you take these talking points and overall narrative at face value without even a hint of skepticism? Why would you rely on the same people that lied to you about Trump's doomed campaign and certain humiliating defeat?
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Why would you rely on the same people that lied to you about Trump's doomed campaign and certain humiliating defeat?
1. Reporters are different than commentators.
2. Even if they were the same, I don't understand this perspective. If a play by play announcer got his season predictions wrong, would that me he could not accurately tell you what is occurring on the field?
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In unrelated news, David Duke has been banned from Twitter.
I'm old enough to remember when Duke would win in March.
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2. Even if they were the same, I don't understand this perspective. If a play by play announcer got his season predictions wrong, would that me he could not accurately tell you what is occurring on the field?
I deny the premise that the media (any of them, in any form, from any outlet, regarding any topic) is similar to a 'play by play' announcer.
Regardless, whether it's Heyman or Ashby, or anyone in between, OWA doesn't always (ever?) trust them to accurately represent even the very thing they are looking at. The regulars on OWA apply the highest order of scrutiny for every word uttered about the Astros. It's like 90% of what goes on at this site.
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Regardless, whether it's Heyman or Ashby, or anyone in between, OWA doesn't always (ever?) trust them to accurately represent even the very thing they are looking at. The regulars on OWA apply the highest order of scrutiny for every word uttered about the Astros. It's like 90% of what goes on at this site.
Actually closer to 87%.
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Actually closer to 87%.
Fucking statgeeks.
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Is it cathartic for you to drag the left wing talking points into a personal summary each week? Are the 'attaboys' from MM, Bench, and the rest of the gang what gets you through the week?
Also, how is that you take these talking points and overall narrative at face value without even a hint of skepticism? Why would you rely on the same people that lied to you about Trump's doomed campaign and certain humiliating defeat?
Trump was doomed to certain and humiliating defeat; Clinton was polling at a national average of +6% which historically translates to Reaganesque landslides. Then, 10 days before the election, Director Comey said he'd found more emails. Clinton dropped 4% overnight and never recovered. Trump said nothing but the word "emails" for the next 10 days. Comey said there's nothing there, there on the Sunday night before the election, and Clinton won the national vote by about +2%. The polls were accurate.
Meanwhile, the "left-wing talking points" are actually corroborated news items from multiple sources in the mainstream media. I know that the MSM is mistrusted by many on the right as it challenges the carefully crafted right wing narrative that America is "The Purge" and only Muslims are allowed guns, but that does not mean that facts aren't facts.
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The MSM is mistrusted because they are not trustworthy. This has been demonstrated over, and over, and over again- long before whatever 'carefully crafted right wing narrative' you are referring to.
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The MSM is mistrusted because they are not trustworthy. This has been demonstrated over, and over, and over again- long before whatever 'carefully crafted right wing narrative' you are referring to.
Chicken - Egg.
The MSM is like the dog in "Up" (they spent the weekend chasing Trump's wiretap squirrel, for example), but that does not mean that everything they all do is wrong/biased. You (and many other people) are conflating factual journalism with op-eds; just because you disagree with the latter does not mean that the former becomes discounted.
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"Factual journalism" is a misnomer. There's journalism and then there's everything else.
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"Factual journalism" is a misnomer. There's journalism and then there's everything else.
And journalism is a competitive industry that is shape shifting as new media outlets develop, it is driven by sales/ratings/circulations and any purity is corupted by editing and points of view. Mass Communications 101.
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Is it really that hard to sift facts out? Do people still struggle with crowd size, illegal voters, bussed-in voters, crime by immigrants, the Bowling Green terrorist, the "wires tapped" by Obama, and on and on and fucking on. He's a disgrace and people who'd rather question the press/MSM to defend his pervasive bullshitting are just as guilty. Talking points my ass, this dumbshit writes the script.
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Also, how is that you take these talking points and overall narrative at face value without even a hint of skepticism? Why would you rely on the same people that lied to you about Trump's doomed campaign and certain humiliating defeat?
What specific items are you disputing?
Also "lie" is a bit rich for a wrong prediction, and paints with far too broadly a brush. A lie is, oh, jbm just did a nice list of examples in the post immediately before this.
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Also "lie" is a bit rich for a wrong prediction
Speak for yourself. I'm looking forward to a big fat "FAKE NEWS" banner on all of my Wild Ass Guesses in the previews.
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Speak for yourself. I'm looking forward to a big fat "FAKE NEWS" banner on all of my Wild Ass Guesses in the previews.
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That makes me want to write a recap just to call you a liar (if wrong, if right I'll just ignore you).
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The only poll I pay attention to is the Five Thirty Eight poll and right now it has her at 66 to 33. She is in fact pulling away, at least for the moment.
By the way, I don't think Trump's support always and necessarily equates to a hatred of Hillary. Obviously forty something percent of voters will vote for the Republican regardless of who he or she is. Some similar percentage of voters will support the Democrat. I don't think the polarization has anything to do in particular with either candidate.
To his credit, Nate Silver of Five Thirty Eight has been doing an excellent review of why they got it so very wrong. Here is the most recent article, "There really was a Liberal Media Bubble" the 9th in the series. https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/there-really-was-a-liberal-media-bubble/
The entire series is worth a read.
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Thanks for the link. I've only had time to read this one and enjoyed the "Wisdom of the Crowds" discussion. With regard to that, I suspect it is nearly impossible to modify the independence factor, at least with the simple call to contrarianism that Silver mentions. Too many people are lazy thinkers, mainly because there are no consequences for their lazy thinking. I'm not sure how society changes that. I know I spent years gambling at the horsetrack and putting your money where your lazy ass mind is, is a sure way to address the issue while bailing out banks who lost big on their bets is a sure way to perpetuate lazy thinking.
At any rate, while all the discussion about the press is interesting and insightful, predicting the outcome of the election is basically a mathematical issue and a complicated one for the brain to adequately capture. Both the press and mathematically bent pollsters had trouble with the prediction. Their mistake was related to modelling passion, or lack thereof in certain states, which made the made the models suspect in those states, which in turn made the national models suspect.
The press might have biases, but I'm not holding the election predictions against them; I'm holding it against the modelers/predictors. In other words, if the modelers had been giving Trump a better chance (if their state models had predicted turnout in the Midwest differently), then the press would have reported it as such, even while possessing the structural failings mentioned in the article.
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Here's a graphic (http://election.princeton.edu/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/comey_effect_relabeled3.jpg) of the "Comey Effect" on the national polls. That one act wiped out Clinton's lead at a stroke and, while there was a marginal recovery prior to election day, there was a ton of early voting going on during that period. The retraction by Comey on the Sunday night before the election was pointless (as so much damage had been done already) and timed to be as invisible as possible.
It's also important to note that, at the time Comey released his statement about the nothing that was emails on Huma Abedin's laptop, he was also in possession of evidence showing that Russia was attempting to influence the election in Trump's favor and that Trump's people had been in contact with Russian officials. Of those two bits of inflammatory news, he decided to release only one - the infinitely less real and important one.
There was so much wrong with the campaigns and so much wrong with the coverage of the campaigns; but this one act by the FBI Director was completely unnecessary and completely devastating to the Clinton campaign.
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One thing I've not had explained to me well is how they can still get an accurate representative sample when everyone has caller ID and few will take calls from unknown callers. There's obviously a way to do it - Silver points out that the polls were in general accurate if you look at the late ones (during the voting period). Where they were wrong they were within the margin of error. I had enough stats in college 35 years ago to understand how that's calculated, but the key to a poll is to get a sample that represents the full population. That was easier to understand when random people would answer the phone and talk to whoever called, but that's no longer the case.
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One thing I've not had explained to me well is how they can still get an accurate representative sample when everyone has caller ID and few will take calls from unknown callers. There's obviously a way to do it - Silver points out that the polls were in general accurate if you look at the late ones (during the voting period). Where they were wrong they were within the margin of error. I had enough stats in college 35 years ago to understand how that's calculated, but the key to a poll is to get a sample that represents the full population. That was easier to understand when random people would answer the phone and talk to whoever called, but that's no longer the case.
Old people still answer phones and old people vote. The under 35s will screen calls and were - as usual - mostly absent in the last election. Ironically, the under 35s is one of the few groups to benefit from the AHCA; them and the 1%ers.
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Old people still answer phones and old people vote. The under 35s will screen calls and were - as usual - mostly absent in the last election. Ironically, the under 35s is one of the few groups to benefit from the AHCA; them and the 1%ers.
I guess, but the key thing is that the sample must be representative of the whole, and the old folks will vote differently that the young. That seemed to be the pattern in the Brexit vote for sure. Your use of "under 35s" as a cut off is wrong. I'm 53 and there's no way I'm taking an unknown caller. They're managing the problem somehow - the better run polls were accurate to within the margin of error. Silver's main complaint is that while the polls showed it very tight and breaking for Trump late, the media would still pushing the "She's a lock" narrative. That might have hampered Clinton's turnout and helped Trump's. Hard to know what all was happening. As humans, we tend to look for "an" easy answer and the reality is usually dozens of small partial answers.
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House GOP cancels vote on repeal/replace. (http://www.politico.com/story/2017/03/trump-freedom-caucus-health-care-236418) The dicksteppery is blinding.
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I haven't really been following this, but the Freedom Caucus, whoever they are, their main complaint with this wealth redistribution bill masquerading as a health care act is that it doesn't suck nearly enough? They're hell bent on doing away with the preexisting conditions protection? Really?
I know that Republicans have been disinclined of late to participate in town hall meetings in their respective districts but surely they already know that the toothless pigfuckers they represent are fairly likely to come up against a preexisting condition.
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Here in Iowa we have had town hall meetings with our Republican representatives. The people have been generally antagonistic but respectful so there is a good sense that we are getting back to representative democracy. I believe the election has done more to get people energized than most would care to admit. Trump is merely the harbinger of getting us back to states rights as above the federal monstrosity. He will not be able to drain the swamp but it remains to be seen whether he can back fill it.
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House GOP cancels vote on repeal/replace. (http://www.politico.com/story/2017/03/trump-freedom-caucus-health-care-236418) The dicksteppery is blinding.
Apparently late last night, Trump ordered the House to go ahead and hold the vote, so naturally the House sheepishly lowered their heads and said "yes sir." They'll go ahead with the vote today. Trump wants it, so I can't imagine the GOP sacking up and the bill not passing.
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Apparently late last night, Trump ordered the House to go ahead and hold the vote, so naturally the House sheepishly lowered their heads and said "yes sir." They'll go ahead with the vote today. Trump wants it, so I can't imagine the GOP sacking up and the bill not passing.
Even if they have it, the bill as it currently stands is doomed in the Senate. And whatever the Senate comes up with will be doomed in the House. A governing party they ain't.
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Even if they have it, the bill as it currently stands is doomed in the Senate. And whatever the Senate comes up with will be doomed in the House. A governing party they ain't.
Trump has now said he will not sign any other form of repeal or replacement bill. This is the GOPs one shot at repealing the ACA, either pass this one, or else nothing. Master negotiator, that one is.
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And now the GOP has about faced again and completely pulled the bill from consideration. Amateur hour.
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And now the GOP has about faced again and completely pulled the bill from consideration. Amateur hour.
The one saving grace of this government is its abject incompetence.
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The one saving grace of this government is its abject incompetence.
That government is best which spends the least possible energy governing.
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And to top it off, the Master Negotiator now says that he never said he was going to get rid of Obamacare immediately. Now, with somebody who wasn't a total dick, I'd cut some slack and say that even if you get it done within a year, that would probably qualify as "immediately", given all of the challenges involved. But he's a total dick, so he doesn't get any slack. And his enablers in the Republican Party don't get any slack either, considering that they've been walking around for six years saying they have the replacement ready in their back pocket, just waiting for a Republican president.
Who knew healthcare could be so complicated? Any thinking individual who's paid attention during the last twenty years, that's who.
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...considering that they've been walking around for six years saying they have the replacement ready in their back pocket, just waiting for a Republican president.
This.
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Quite simply, the federal government should have nothing to do with healthcare. Leave it to the states. Federalism 101.
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Quite simply, the insurance industry should have nothing to do with health care.
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Quite simply, the insurance industry should have nothing to do with health care.
Insurance indrustry = A "death panel"
Sarah Palin was only describing what's already in place. Not only do people grossly profit off of health insurance they become million and billionaires. Can someone explain to me why this makes any sense? I'm all ears.
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Can someone explain to me why this makes any sense?
You're looking for a logical answer.The only logic in business is profit. Profitable industries write legislation and get it passed.
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Quite simply, the federal government should have nothing to do with healthcare. Leave it to the states. Federalism 101.
Quite simply that's an absurd statement. The availability of healthcare in the United States in this day and age should not be arbitrary or dependent on geography.
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Quite simply that's an absurd statement. The availability of healthcare in the United States in this day and age should not be arbitrary or dependent on geography.
If you don't like the healthcare options in your state, feel free to just move to another one. The free market trumps societal needs. The same also holds true for environmental regulations, education, worker safety, etc... [/libertarianism]
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Quite simply that's an absurd statement. The availability of healthcare in the United States in this day and age should not be arbitrary or dependent on geography.
This presumes no one would want to provide good health care because why? Geography has nothing to do with it. In a free market, health care would be provided that met the needs of the community just fine whether someone else in another state thought that was good or not. And without stealing from anyone to accomplish it.
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This presumes no one would want to provide good health care because why? Geography has nothing to do with it. In a free market, health care would be provided that met the needs of the community just fine whether someone else in another state thought that was good or not. And without stealing from anyone to accomplish it.
If geography has nothing to do with it why is it confined to state lines?
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If geography has nothing to do with it why is it confined to state lines?
Because states, man!
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This presumes no one would want to provide good health care because why?
Insurance isn't about providing healthcare, it's about paying for it. And quite simply, no one wants to insure poor people.
Geography has nothing to do with it. In a free market, health care would be provided that met the needs of the community just fine whether someone else in another state thought that was good or not. And without stealing from anyone to accomplish it.
If you define it by the physical boundaries of states, you've made it entirely geographically dependent. And you're under either the incorrect assumption or delusion that all states are financially equal.
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We need a lively climate change discussion in here! I'm sure many minds will be changed and new discoveries made. A couple kumbaya's later and we'll all be friends again!
Until my great state of West by god Virginia decides to take a giant coal coated and frakking waste filled SHIT in the Monongahela River and decimates the drinking water for a few tens of millions of people. Sorry, but State RIGHTS! Maybe a lawsuit of 20 will make things right!
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Do you live in Morgantown?
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Insurance isn't about providing healthcare, it's about paying for it. And quite simply, no one wants to insure poor people.
If you define it by the physical boundaries of states, you've made it entirely geographically dependent. And you're under either the incorrect assumption or delusion that all states are financially equal.
Insurance companies can handle property exposures countrywide, including earthquake in California. But they won't write flood in Houston and windstorm in Galveston. They pass on that and let the Federal (not state) government take care of it. There are some things which a for-profit entity cannot insure because it cannot be underwritten with any degree of certainty of making a profit on any timeline. So insurance companies bail and people buy insurance from FEMA without fuss (and pretty cheaply). The FEMA insurance programs are single-payer programs.
Medicare is a single payer program. The VA is a single payer program. Trump and Ryan took a run at those and got their balls stomped. This whole chaos is not about private vs. public insurance; it's about not fucking with people's lives. Obamacare moved the needle so now pre-exiting conditions coverage, adult kids on parents' programs, no lifetime caps, "essential" health benefits coverage and many, many more things in the Act are now deemed sacrosanct by the public - and they'll fuck up your town hall meeting if you so much as look sideways at them.
Obamacare is a bastard step-child of private insurance supported by government engineering, and it is not sustainable. It's legacy, though, will be that it catapulted health insurance in this country dramatically forward from where it will never be allowed to slide backwards.
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“Five people around [Clinton] have had, have been given immunity, to include her former Chief of Staff. When you are given immunity, that means that you have probably committed a crime,” Flynn told “Meet the Press” host Chuck Todd
Read more: http://dailycaller.com/2017/03/30/flashback-michael-flynn-said-people-who-receive-immunity-are-probably-criminals-video/#ixzz4csAmOuF9
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“Five people around [Clinton] have had, have been given immunity, to include her former Chief of Staff. When you are given immunity, that means that you have probably committed a crime,” Flynn told “Meet the Press” host Chuck Todd
Read more: http://dailycaller.com/2017/03/30/flashback-michael-flynn-said-people-who-receive-immunity-are-probably-criminals-video/#ixzz4csAmOuF9
LOCK HIM UP!!! LOCK HIM UP!!!
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Mike Pence, an adult who is grown,
Cannot sit with women alone.
However, he can
Stand by an old man
Whose fondness for groping is known.
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Mike Pence, an adult who is grown,
Cannot sit with women alone.
However, he can
Stand by an old man
Whose fondness for groping is known.
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http://www.theonion.com/article/mike-pence-asks-waiter-remove-mrs-butterworth-tabl-55661
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“Five people around [Clinton] have had, have been given immunity, to include her former Chief of Staff. When you are given immunity, that means that you have probably committed a crime,” Flynn told “Meet the Press” host Chuck Todd
Read more: http://dailycaller.com/2017/03/30/flashback-michael-flynn-said-people-who-receive-immunity-are-probably-criminals-video/#ixzz4csAmOuF9
Hillary's a bitch; but so is karma.
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So
President Bannon threatened to quit over being removed from the National Security Council's principles committee, and was removed anyway. The White House said he was there only to keep an eye on Flynn, who they didn't trust and, with Flynn gone, he could step down. Ignoring the irony of threating to resign over the principles committee and then not doing so, there's a couple of things of interest here:
1) Bannon's elevation to that committee actually required him to go through congressional approval, which would've caused a worldwide shortage of popcorn;
2) The White House's explanation is moronic. If Flynn was untrustworthy, WTF was he doing on the committee and being NSA in the first place? Also, Flynn was ousted 5 weeks ago, why did this take so long?
As usual, the White House is doing weird stuff without a credible explanation. It would be funny, except that real stuff is happening and these clowns have no clue. Rex "Don't look at me" Tillerson said a couple of days ago that the U.S' position on Assad was "meh" and a day later he dropped chemicals on civilians. Trump's response was to say "Assad bad". Elsewhere Trump has threatened unilateral war with North Korea, which may be the only thing that he hasn't put Jared Kushner in charge of.
Seriously, Kushner's to do list is insane (literally and figuratively) and included - for a man with zero diplomatic qualifications - preparations for the trade talks with China at the weekend. He was in charge of this while also attending high-level talks in Bagdad this week - accompanied by Trump's former bodyguard who was there as advisor, in the meetings with a name plate and everything, not security. WTF?
And the China talks are at Mar-a-fucking-Lago! So there's a giant security bill for us, a giant security risk in general - being that the resort is staffed by unvetted foreign workers - and a giant payday for it's owner.
AND, after failing to come even close to adequately firewalling himself from his personal businesses, Trump went back and undid some of the paper-thin walls he established prior to taking office. He can now draw money out of his business at will, and we'll never know. So it's now even easier for Russia foreign entities to stuff money directly into Trump's back pocket through any one of his businesses at home or around the world.
And I'm still scratching the surface of the dangerous insanity swirling around this administration. There is so much going on that it's impossible to keep it all in one head at the same time.
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Has he preemptively announced his 2017/18/19 taxes are under audit yet. This fucking clown couldn't be a bigger charlatan. I get voting for him in protest of Hillary, but I absolutely can't fathom the people who thought he'd be a good/great President. Mind-boggling.
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So, after 4 years of heckling Obama (via Twitter, natch) to stay out of Syria and not do anything without congressional approval (yes, Donald actually understood this element of the separation of powers), Trump ups and bombs a Syrian airfield. And now...what?
Sales of George Orwell's "1984" skyrocketed after Trump's election, and it does seem a lot of the time that it's being used as a blueprint. Even Trump's limited vocabulary is akin to NewSpeak; "tremendous" being TrumpSpeak for "doubleplusgood". But this attack may be the most Orwellian trick yet. I have seen speculation that this is weird - even for Trump - because Assad is an ally of Russia, Trump is an ally of Russia, so why is one Russian ally bombing another? Answer: because we've always been at war with EastAsia.
In "1984", Orwell wrote of a regime that was in cahoots with its supposed foe - who would change regularly while reports on the previous foe would disappear down the memory hole - the mutual goal being perpetual war. Such an arrangement allowed both sides to subjugate their populations with destruction and poverty, leaving them too "stupefied" by the onslaught of fake news to take back control of their own lives. Am I being paranoid? Or did we just find out why Trump's budget proposed slashing spending on everything except the military.
We have always been at war with Russyria.
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I wondered how you would square the Syrian attack with the Russian puppet narrative. I guess going further into the recesses of your imagination is one way to cope.
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I wondered how you would square the Syrian attack with the Russian puppet narrative. I guess going further into the recesses of your imagination is one way to cope.
It's hardly a "narrative" when there are multiple investigations into ties between Russia and the Trump campaign and multiple Trump associates getting caught lying about meetings with Russians (Jared being the latest). Everyone around Trump is linked to Russia - and only Russia. Trump himself has lied about knowing Putin, not knowing Putin, having Russian investors, not having Russian investors, having dealings with Russians and - shockingly - not having dealings with Russians. The Trump dossier published by Buzzfeed - the non-salacious elements of it, at least - are steadily being confirmed as accurate while nothing in it has been confirmed as not true.
Drop! Drip! Drip! Russia! Russia! Russia!
It's not a narrative, it's a billowing pall of smoke that's engulfed Washington.
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The attack was revealed to the Russians ahead of time, and the Russians obviously alerted the Syrians. Despite having the most capable and advanced military in the history of the world the US could not manage to drop a single missle on any runway, and indeed Syrian fighters flew attack missions from that very base today.
How anyone can see this as anything other than elaborate theater designed to demonstrate that Russia does not in fact hold the note on Trump I can't imagine.
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In the tall buildings
Sit the head of our nations
Worthy men from Spain and Siam
All day discussions with the Russians
But they still went ahead
And vetoed the plan
Now up jumped the U.S. representative
He's the one with the tired eyes
747 for the midnight condition
Flyin' back from a peace keepin' mission
And so it goes and so it goes
And so it goes and so it goes
But where it's goin' no one knows
And so it goes and so it goes
And so it goes and so it goes
But where it's goin' no one knows
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I saw a small part of Tillerson on the TV this morning. He was getting schooled on his bullshit talking points by the Face the Nation host. Tillerson was saying that we need to step back and let the Syrian people decide their own fate and, when it was pointed out that there are simply no mechanisms left standing for them to do this, he had nothing.
Bombing the Syrians to get them to stop bombing Syrians is nonsense. Removing Assad before ISIS/L is gone is nonsense. Bombing Syrians to protect Syrian children who we then refuse to offer save haven to is nonsense. Deliberately missing the runways (confirmed by a Trump tweet this morning) because they're easily fixed (his excuse) is nonsense.
This is a distraction, pure and simple. There is no plan for after the distraction. It was "fire and forget" in literal form.
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If geography has nothing to do with it why is it confined to state lines?
My Charlotte, NC employer arranges for me, a Texas-based employee, health insurance from BCBS of Rhode Island. Healthcare isn't federally blocked from crossing state lines; insurers just like to keep thing compartmentalized.
Of course, if they do open it up:
(1) Umm...states rights?
(b) You know how every single credit card company is based in Delaware...
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Mike Pence, an adult who is grown,
Cannot sit with women alone.
However, he can
Stand by an old man
Whose fondness for groping is known.
Bill Maher absolutely nailed this by saying "it's so Christian, it's Muslim!"
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"Can you imagine a worse PR blunder than United this week?"
Sean Spicer: "Hold my beer."
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In case you missed it: Carter Page, a foreign affairs advisor to the Trump campaign, was one of many Trump campaign advisors with ties to Russia. For example, while on the campaign's payroll, and in the thick of the revelations about the Russian interference in the election on behalf of Trump, Page took a trip to Russia to meet with contacts there. But his ties go deeper.
In 2013, he was caught up in a spy ring (https://www.buzzfeed.com/alimwatkins/a-former-trump-adviser-met-with-a-russian-spy?utm_term=.khgbweb6V#.pszp5dpmK). The FBI busted some Russian spies and, included in the testimony in the successful prosecution of said spies, were details of a US individual - referred to as "Man-1" - who had been recruited by the Russian spies and handed over documents to them. It appears that Man-1 was an unwitting participant; the Russians described him as being "in love with Gazprom" and "an idiot". Carter Page has himself confirmed to the press that he is "Man-1".
In order to wiretapp (sic) a US person, the FBI needs a warrant from the FISA court. These are not given lightly as they involve setting aside a US person's constitutional rights; the FBI has to show strong probable cause. So, it was no small matter when , in 2016, the FBI sought and obtained a FISA warrant on a US person who they suspected of being an agent of a foreign power - Russia, in fact. Guess who it was they were investigating? Bingo! Carter Page (https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/fbi-obtained-fisa-warrant-to-monitor-former-trump-adviser-carter-page/2017/04/11/620192ea-1e0e-11e7-ad74-3a742a6e93a7_story.html).
Now, an investigation is no proof of any wrongdoing. The FISA warrant was set to expire after 90 days and the FBI had to show the court that there was some "there" there, in order to continue the surveillance. The warrant was extended. At least twice.
Drip! Drip! Drip! Russia! Russia! Russia!
Meanwhile, WH Press Secretary Sean Spalin has been gobbling up news time with his ongoing inability to connect his brain to his mouth (and I think I'm being generous here crediting him with a brain), while Trump tweets threats at North Korea as he sends a carrier group north towards the Korean peninsula. Trump even appended his threatening tweet (https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/851767718248361986?ref_src=twsrc^tfw&ref_url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.foxnews.com%2Fpolitics%2F2017%2F04%2F11%2Fus-navy-carrier-strike-group-sets-its-sights-on-north-korea.html) with "U.S.A.", as if this was the fucking Ryder Cup of wars. But, sure, let's focus on Spalin.
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A pessimistic sort might doubt that he could top the Hitler didn't use chemical weapons routine but I feel sure he'll surprise me somehow.
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A pessimistic sort might doubt that he could top the Hitler didn't use chemical weapons routine but I feel sure he'll surprise me somehow.
I thought his apology that he didn't want to distract from the administration's "efforts to destabilize the region" was pretty strong.
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I thought his apology that he didn't want to distract from the administration's "efforts to destabilize the region" was pretty strong.
Yeah, well, see what I mean?
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I thought his apology that he didn't want to distract from the administration's "efforts to destabilize the region" was pretty strong.
Trump continuing to live up to his pledge to bring in the "best people".
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I'll say this: all of the "Holocaust center" and ensuing gaffes were effective in distracting from the fundamental point he was so terribly making (inadvertently):
If Assad is worse than Hitler, why are we just lobbing a few missiles?
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I'll say this: all of the "Holocaust center" and ensuing gaffes were effective in distracting from the fundamental point he was so terribly making (inadvertently):
If Assad is worse than Hitler, why are we just lobbing a few missiles?
Saddam was supposed to be worse than Hitler too. The key element here, like with Pol Pot and many others, is that they killed their own people, so we can stand on the sidelines because...self-determination (the exact argument used by Tillerson just on Sunday after Friday's bombings). Hitler started killing other people's people; which is where we draw the line. Mostly.
The Guardian has an unhelpful quiz (https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/apr/12/50-shades-of-trumps-foreign-policy-handy-quiz) as to Trump's foreign policy. With regard to Ashad Assar Assad, after spending years "warning" President Obama to stay out of Syria as it's not our fight, Trump's administration staked out at least 5 positions on Syria in the space of a week. This included Spicer adding the use of barrel bombs on civilians - which Assad has been doing for about six years - to the wrong side of the red line, before this was instantly walked back by other administration officials.
With all this chaos going on, it's very much worth remembering that there are hundreds of US troops on the ground in Syria. How do they even have a chance of doing their job over there without any semblance of policy or guidance from Washington? How much more peril are they in as a result of these randomly shifting positions? Is anybody in the White House talking to anyone else in the White House? Did Ivanka really have the swaying argument in the decision to attack Syria as Eric has stated? Did Marvel really see all this coming when the wrote the "OppositeLand" plot for Agents of Shield Hydra?
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Saddam was supposed to be worse than Hitler too. The key element here, like with Pol Pot and many others, is that they killed their own people, so we can stand on the sidelines because...self-determination (the exact argument used by Tillerson just on Sunday after Friday's bombings). Hitler started killing other people's people; which is where we draw the line. Mostly.
The Guardian has an unhelpful quiz (https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/apr/12/50-shades-of-trumps-foreign-policy-handy-quiz) as to Trump's foreign policy. With regard to Ashad Assar Assad, after spending years "warning" President Obama to stay out of Syria as it's not our fight, Trump's administration staked out at least 5 positions on Syria in the space of a week. This included Spicer adding the use of barrel bombs on civilians - which Assad has been doing for about six years - to the wrong side of the red line, before this was instantly walked back by other administration officials.
With all this chaos going on, it's very much worth remembering that there are hundreds of US troops on the ground in Syria. How do they even have a chance of doing their job over there without any semblance of policy or guidance from Washington? How much more peril are they in as a result of these randomly shifting positions? Is anybody in the White House talking to anyone else in the White House? Did Ivanka really have the swaying argument in the decision to attack Syria as Eric has stated? Did Marvel really see all this coming when the wrote the "OppositeLand" plot for Agents of Shield Hydra?
It's easy to play war when your kids aren't the ones going.
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Some stats from a Washington Post poll (https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/powerpost/paloma/daily-202/2017/04/11/daily-202-reflexive-partisanship-drives-polling-lurch-on-syria-strikes/58ec27d4e9b69b3a72331e6e/?utm_term=.567b8b0e5065):
In 2013, 38% of Democrats supported strikes against Syria while just 22% of Republicans did. If you recall, Obama asked the Republican-lead Congress to authorize military action - as is their constitutional role - and they declined even to discuss the matter. Fast forward to 2017, 37% of Democrats support Trump's strike against Syria; remarkably consistent. Republican support? 86%.
Now what on earth could have changed between 2013 and 2017 to quadruple support for strikes against Syria among Republicans?
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Some stats from a Washington Post poll (https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/powerpost/paloma/daily-202/2017/04/11/daily-202-reflexive-partisanship-drives-polling-lurch-on-syria-strikes/58ec27d4e9b69b3a72331e6e/?utm_term=.567b8b0e5065):
In 2013, 38% of Democrats supported strikes against Syria while just 22% of Republicans did. If you recall, Obama asked the Republican-lead Congress to authorize military action - as is their constitutional role - and they declined even to discuss the matter. Fast forward to 2017, 37% of Democrats support Trump's strike against Syria; remarkably consistent. Republican support? 86%.
Now what on earth could have changed between 2013 and 2017 to quadruple support for strikes against Syria among Republicans?
That tells you all you need to know about today's Republican Party which incidentally is the most dangerous organization in the history of the world.
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That tells you all you need to know about today's Republican Party which incidentally is the most dangerous organization in the history of the world.
Please, they don't even make the top 5.
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Please, they don't even make the top 5.
I do put Fox news above them.
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That tells you all you need to know about today's Republican Party which incidentally is the most dangerous organization in the history of the world.
The Nazi Party would like a word.
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Please, they don't even make the top 5.
1. MLB.
2 .KAOS.
3. United Airlines.
4. ...
It starts to get a bit tricky from here.
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I do put Fox news above them.
Fox in general. They cancelled Firefly.
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The Nazi Party would like a word.
6,000,000 < 7,500,000,000
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1. MLB.
2 .KAOS.
3. United Airlines.
4. ...
It starts to get a bit tricky from here.
I've got
1. The Illuminati
2. The Trilateral Commission
3. The Church of the SubGenius
4. The Disciples of Noam Chomsky's Fevered Brain
5. The Knights Templar
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I've got
1. The Illuminati
2. The Trilateral Commission
3. The Church of the SubGenius
4. The Disciples of Noam Chomsky's Fevered Brain
5. The Knights Templar
I'd move Cardinals fans into the 3 spot.
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6,000,000 < 7,500,000,000
From The Guardian (http://After his U-turns at home and Dr Strangelove-style antics abroad, markets and investors are supposing that the president is making it up as he goes along):
After his U-turns at home and Dr Strangelove-style antics abroad, markets and investors are supposing that the president is making it up as he goes along
Financial markets are starting to have doubts about Donald Trump. The euphoria that sent share prices on Wall Street to record levels has quickly dissipated amid fears that the new president is dangerously unpredictable. Evidence that Trump does not really have a clue about what he is doing is mounting by the day.
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After listening for 10 minutes, I realized it's not so easy.
This quote perfectly encapsulates everything that's going wrong with the Trump presidency.
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Last one for the day (I hope). Paul Manafort - Trump's campaign chairman through his push for the nomination and through the convention - will be the second Trump associate (after former NSA Flynn) to retroactively file as a foreign agent (https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/manafort-is-expected-to-register-as-a-foreign-agent/2017/04/12/6c7cdd58-1fb0-11e7-ad74-3a742a6e93a7_story.html?utm_term=.6046f616afc0).
#AmericaFirst
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This quote perfectly encapsulates everything that's going wrong with the Trump presidency.
I hope all of his supporters who are capable of reflection have given up on the idea that he is a "master negotiator," or "will transform government as only a super-successful businessman can," or demonstrate how genius it is to pit all of your employees against each other.
He's a complete moron. Today's example is his health care negotiating ploy to get dems on board: "I'll scrap the ACA subsidy program, thereby collapsing the ACA if you don't go along with me in repealing the ACA." He is so fucking stupid.
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I hope all of his supporters who are capable of reflection have given up on the idea that he is a "master negotiator," or "will transform government as only a super-successful businessman can," or demonstrate how genius it is to pit all of your employees against each other.
He's a complete moron. Today's example is his health care negotiating ploy to get dems on board: "I'll scrap the ACA subsidy program, thereby collapsing the ACA if you don't go along with me in repealing the ACA." He is so fucking stupid.
That's a nice healthcare act you've got there. Shame if something happened to it...
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I'd move Cardinals fans into the 3 spot.
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Where does PAGAN rank?
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Where does PAGAN rank?
I'll have to ask the Virgin Connie Swail
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I'd move Cardinals fans into the 3 spot.
There has to be some room for LucasFilm. Yes, they (he) made Star Wars and Empire and Jedi. But they (he) also made the prequels and then went back and smeared poo on the originals leaving no unsullied copies. That's some evil shit.
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There has to be some room for LucasFilm. Yes, they (he) made Star Wars and Empire and Jedi. But they (he) also made the prequels and then went back and smeared poo on the originals leaving no unsullied copies. That's some evil shit.
But they made Force Awakens and Rogue One. Not to mention TIE Fighter, which is underrated on any "best video games of all time" list.
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But they made Force Awakens and Rogue One. Not to mention TIE Fighter, which is underrated on any "best video games of all time" list.
I know. It's just so confusing.
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...leaving no unsullied copies.
If you haven't already, google "Harmy's"
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China warns that conflict with North Korea could break out at "any moment" (http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/china-warns-of-n-korea-conflict-at-any-moment/ar-BBzPBno?li=BBnb7Kz). They cite Trump's sabre-rattling as a major cause of the escalation of tensions. Trump, if you recall, has threatened to sort out North Korea if China doesn't (something he now knows that China can't do) and has threatened military action if North Korea goes ahead with a nuclear test. He also sent a carrier fleet that way and then went golfing.
For reference, the Trump administration is less than 3 months old (https://youtu.be/15YgdrhrCM8).
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China warns that conflict with North Korea could break out at "any moment" (http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/china-warns-of-n-korea-conflict-at-any-moment/ar-BBzPBno?li=BBnb7Kz). They cite Trump's sabre-rattling as a major cause of the escalation of tensions. Trump, if you recall, has threatened to sort out North Korea if China doesn't (something he now knows that China can't do) and has threatened military action if North Korea goes ahead with a nuclear test. He also sent a carrier fleet that way and then went golfing.
For reference, the Trump administration is less than 3 months old (https://youtu.be/15YgdrhrCM8).
I don't mind the sabre rattling if he's prepared to use it. But now he's rattled himself into a corner. He now has to punk the DPRK or he's just shown the world he has neither a clue nor any balls. You don't pull your piece unless your ready, willing and able to empty the clip.
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If you haven't already, google "Harmy's"
Thanks for this--I had no idea!
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You don't pull your piece unless your ready, willing and able to empty the clip.
TWSS
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I don't mind the sabre rattling if he's prepared to use it. But now he's rattled himself into a corner. He now has to punk the DPRK or he's just shown the world he has neither a clue nor any balls. You don't pull your piece unless your ready, willing and able to empty the clip.
It's impossible to negotiate with an isolated, narcissistic, unstable, know-nothing with a dodgy haircut in charge of a significant military.
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It's impossible to negotiate with an isolated, narcissistic, unstable, know-nothing with a dodgy haircut in charge of a significant military.
Personally, I don't think the Fat Kid is as dumb as he looks. The general populace there in DPRK is pretty ill informed, but he's not. He's lived in the west. He went to school in the west. He watches the NBA and Swedish porn. He knows he can't win that fight, he just has to find a way to back down and tell his people he won. China will help him do that.
Of course I could be wrong.
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Personally, I don't think the Fat Kid is as dumb as he looks. The general populace there in DPRK is pretty ill informed, but he's not. He's lived in the west. He went to school in the west. He watches the NBA and Swedish porn. He knows he can't win that fight, he just has to find a way to back down and tell his people he won. China will help him do that.
Of course I could be wrong.
I think Limey was talking about the other isolated, narcissistic, unstable, know-nothing with a dodgy haircut in charge of a significant military.
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I think Limey was talking about the other isolated, narcissistic, unstable, know-nothing with a dodgy haircut in charge of a significant military.
A little from column A; a little from column B.
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I think Limey was talking about the other isolated, narcissistic, unstable, know-nothing with a dodgy haircut in charge of a significant military.
Ohhhh....I see now...
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I don't mind the sabre rattling if he's prepared to use it. But now he's rattled himself into a corner. He now has to punk the DPRK or he's just shown the world he has neither a clue nor any balls. You don't pull your piece unless your ready, willing and able to empty the clip.
I hope this was sarcastic and I'm making a mistake....
You don't mind "saber rattling"? Are we still childish enough to think solutions to actual problems that effect MILLIONS of people might only require "balls" to solve? I would hope that we as a species don't need silly gun analogies to describe what would be a truly horrific outcome.
I spent a weekend in a hotel over the weekend that Trump "wagged the dog in Syria". I don't have cable and never want to again. The absolute frothy mouthed enthusiasm for WAR was disgusting on every freaking channel. I can't stand this warmongering attitude that somehow is now acceptable
I very much mind the "saber rattling" if "he's prepared to use it". That outcome sucks for all of us.
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I spent a weekend in a hotel over the weekend that Trump "wagged the dog in Syria". I don't have cable and never want to again. The absolute frothy mouthed enthusiasm for WAR was disgusting on every freaking channel. I can't stand this warmongering attitude that somehow is now acceptable.
It was beyond disgusting. Even the networks that nutcases love to mock as 'liberal' frothed themselves into an onanistic frenzy.
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I hope this was sarcastic and I'm making a mistake....
It was not sarcastic, but you are making a mistake, namely not knowing what an analogy is. I don't really think Trump has a physical sabre that he's literally rattling, like in a garbage can or something. What I mean is he shouldn't talk tough unless he's willing to actually be tough. The world is a rough and tumble place. Not everyone out there in it shares your warm fuzzies. You have to deal with those people too, particularly when they possess nuclear weapons. Don't confront them unless you are prepared to act.
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It was not sarcastic, but you are making a mistake, namely not knowing what an analogy is. I don't really think Trump has a physical sabre that he's literally rattling, like in a garbage can or something. What I mean is he shouldn't talk tough unless he's willing to actually be tough. The world is a rough and tumble place. Not everyone out there in it shares your warm fuzzies. You have to deal with those people too, particularly when they possess nuclear weapons. Don't confront them unless you are prepared to act.
He threatened military action if NK went ahead with its missile test. It did (it was a failure, but they still pressed the start button). Trump's response...a tweet saying that NK "gotta behave". WTF? Or else timeout?
We are lucky that missile blew up on launch, as it gives both sides an out. If it had flown, then what? Are we in a new war in southeast Asia? With nukes this time? Buh-bye Soeul?
This will get out of control and we'll be lucky to live through it.
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This will get out of control and we'll be lucky to live through it.
This is what I fear for the future!
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This will get out of control and we'll be lucky to live through it.
Great reference.
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He threatened military action if NK went ahead with its missile test. It did (it was a failure, but they still pressed the start button). Trump's response...a tweet saying that NK "gotta behave". WTF? Or else timeout?
We are lucky that missile blew up on launch, as it gives both sides an out. If it had flown, then what? Are we in a new war in southeast Asia? With nukes this time? Buh-bye Soeul?
This will get out of control and we'll be lucky to live through it.
What should he do?
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What should he do?
At the weekend, he talked about how “the gentleman” in charge of North Korea had "outplayed" his predecessors going all the way back to Bill Clinton.
I hope things work out well. I hope there’s going to be peace, but you know, they’ve been talking with this gentleman for a long time. You read Clinton’s book, he said, ‘Oh we made such a great peace deal,’ and it was a joke.
You look at different things over the years with President Obama. Everybody’s been outplayed, they’ve all been outplayed by this gentleman and we’ll see what happens.
He referenced “the gentleman” a number of times making it clear that: (1) he couldn’t remember Kim Jong-Un’s name; and (b) that he didn’t realise “the gentleman” was actually three people. It's not like North Korea was a gotcha question.
Also, the carrier strike force armada that Trump sent into the Sea of Japan – a move that was confirmed by his NSA, Press Secretary and Defense Secretary – was actually heading in the opposite direction (https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/despite-talk-of-a-military-strike-trumps-armada-was-a-long-way-from-korea/2017/04/18/e8ef4237-e26a-4cfc-b5e9-526c3a17bd41_story.html?utm_term=.50246488d9ac) to enjoin war games with your navy down under. So all the bluster, chest-puffing and dick-measuring of such a bold show of force was simply a lie. Either that or an entire carrier strike group just mutinied.
To recap, in just the last few days he forgot the name of the country he'd just bombed, lost a carrier strike group - or forget he sent it somewhere or forgot he didn't send it somewhere - and failed as completely as possible to know who is currently in charge of the most deadly threat to humanity.
He’s the one who wanted this job, not me. He needs to do it. It’s important, because his clear and present incompetence could get us all killed.
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So, the new dawn of conservative dominance has seen:
- A faceplant on healthcare reform
- A delay to tax reform (maybe until healthcare is done, but that story keeps changing)
- An inability to get the wall started because Mexico won't pay for it
- Two Federal court injunctions against the Muslim ban
- The National Security Advisor fired after 24 days
- 6 other White House staffers walked off the premises for failing to pass a background check
- A Supreme Court nominee confirmed only after blowing up Senate procedural rules
- Multiple investigations into the administration
- AG Sessions recusing himself from investigations
- House Intelligence Committee Chair Nunes sidelined after punching himself in the face on live TV
- House Oversight Committee Chair Chafitz quitting (because no Hillary)
- Roger Ailes fired
- Bill O'Reilly fired
- Maddow now beating Fox News in 9pm (ET) slot
- Tomi Lahren fired
- and suing Glenn Beck
- Alex Jones outed as a fraud by his own lawyer
This is starting to remind me of Brexit on steroids; where the dogs who caught the car winners all imploded within moments of their victory.
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I'm betting that Alex Jones is actually crazy
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I'm betting that Alex Jones is actually crazy
I wouldn't take that bet. You know you're desperate when you'd rather be painted as a clown performance artist than have your words and deeds taken literally.
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I'm betting that Alex Jones is actually crazy
I thought this trial reported that he was diagnosed with narcissistic personality disorder.
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I thought this trial reported that he was diagnosed with narcissistic personality disorder.
More likely arsessistic personality disorder.
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So, Flynn - with his "underlying conduct" - is completely fucked. The question now is, to everyone in the Trump administration: "What did you know about Flynn and when did you know it?"
Pence is already on record lying about when he knew. I'm not sure there's enough substance in Trump's endless word salad to catch him in a straight lie like Pence's, but Trump was warned off Flynn by Obama about 3 days after the election. Also, Spicer told the press corps in mid-February that Trump had been told about the DOJ "heads up" on Flynn. That "heads up", of course, was in actuality a complete download of what the FBI and DOJ had uncovered about Flynn, his "underlying conduct" and his lies about all of the above such that he was now deemed compromised by the Russians.
Flynn is (obviously) the key here. Why was he hired in the first place and why did they keep him on for so long after the game was up? The administration either failed to vet Flynn, or vetted him and didn't care that he'd been an undeclared foreign agent on the payroll of Turkey - really Russia by proxy - and Russia directly. When confronted with this exclusionary information, they pressed ahead appointing Flynn to the most sensitive national security position in the government and then left him there despite being told again and again and again that he was in a position to be blackmailed by the Russians.
As an aside, the firing of Acting AG Yates has taken on a new hue. Initially, the rationale was that she was fired for failing to uphold Trump's Muslim ban because it was unconstitutional (and the pressing of her on this subject by the gentlemen from Texas turned into a hilariously viscous spanking of the two). The timing fits this narrative. However, her firing also came on the first working day after the two meetings she had at the White House where she warned them about ticking time bomb that was their NSA.
Flynn has been after immunity for weeks. People will go to jail over this. We're only 109 days into this Presidency.
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Seems like the explanation that fits best is: Trump and all his top dogs knew that Flynn had talked to the Russians. After all, do you really think Flynn would make promises to the Russians without Trump's assent, or that the Russians would base their actions on some rogue employee? They all knew the score. So, the Yates reveal actually revealed nothing to them and there was no threat of blackmail to worry about. That's why McGahn was only interested in why DOJ cared, whether they would prosecute and what evidence they had. At that point, Trump thought it was contained within the DOJ (which he could soon fix) and there was no need to deal with Flynn. Then the Wapo story came out and Trump had to act.
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Seems like the explanation that fits best is: Trump and all his top dogs knew that Flynn had talked to the Russians. After all, do you really think Flynn would make promises to the Russians without Trump's assent, or that the Russians would base their actions on some rogue employee? They all knew the score. So, the Yates reveal actually revealed nothing to them and there was no threat of blackmail to worry about. That's why McGahn was only interested in why DOJ cared, whether they would prosecute and what evidence they had. At that point, Trump thought it was contained within the DOJ (which he could soon fix) and there was no need to deal with Flynn. Then the Wapo story came out and Trump had to act.
* Golf clap*
Exactly. And - as Al Franken pointed out - Trump didn't want to have to fire Flynn over ties to Russia because, if he did, he'd end up having to fire everyone up to and including First Son-in-Law Jared. Actually, everyone up to and including himself, leaving Pence to turn the White House into the town council from Footloose.
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council
I see what you did there.
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Looks like Comey was making people uncomfortable. I imagine that the next person that's installed will demand oaths of fealty to the king.
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Looks like Comey was making people uncomfortable. I imagine that the next person that's installed will demand oaths of fealty to the king.
If Trump had ever read a book, he'd know that things don't work out well for the President who fires the man investigating the President. Trump probably thinks Archibald Cox is one of Antony Weiner's online noms de plume.
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In all seriousness, this is nuts. There is no justification for the timing of the firing of Comey; if it was about the Clinton emails, it should have been done long before now or after the DOJ completed its investigation into Comey's handling of the affair if deemed appropriate. Claiming that it was on the recommendation of the AG - based on a memo (dated the same day as the termination letter) written by the Deputy G in which he fails to actually recommend firing Comey - is such a thin veil of fabricated cover that it engenders nothing but derision.
Trump has been trying to move on from Russia - White House spokesperson Sarah Sanders said exactly this on TV yesterday. But whatever happens - bombing Syria, bombing Afghanistan, passing a healthcare bill, and even threatening to re-invade Afghanistan as he did on Monday trying to drown out the Clapper/Yates testimony - it always comes back to Russia. He was tweet-yelling at the news this morning because its more about Russia than ever.
Sean Spicer was hiding in the bushes last night - literally, I shit you not - refusing to talk to reporters until they turned their cameras off. He is awol today, with Sarah Sanders once again taking her talking points and dim wit to the podium to try and fend off the press.
Trump has accelerated his own demise, as did Nixon before him. It won't be the "failing" NY Times or the Washington Post that gets him, it won't be Jake Tapper or Rachael Maddow either. It will be the Republicans turning on him - just as they did Nixon - because they don't want to be dragging behind them the stinking carcass of a dead President into the next round of elections.
In the meantime, though, to paraphrase Rear Admiral Painter, this is already out of control and we'll be lucky to live through it. How long before Trump decides that, to get the news off Russia, he needs to nuke North Korea?
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According to Politico's lead article, Trump believed firing Comey would be received as a "win-win."
There are Shakespearean levels of delusion going on in the Oval Office right now.
This isn't going to end well.
http://www.politico.com/story/2017/05/10/comey-firing-trump-russia-238192
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If Trump had ever read a book, he'd know that things don't work out well for the President who fires the man investigating the President. Trump probably thinks Archibald Cox is one of Antony Weiner's online noms de plume.
Archie Bald Cocks?
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All of this talk about James Comey getting fired is making me want a chili dog.
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A few days ago Comey asked the justice department for more resources to pursue the Russia investigation. (https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/10/us/politics/comey-russia-investigation-fbi.html?_r=0).
The request went to Deputy AG Rosenstein, who is supervising the investigation while Sessions is recused. Both of whom sent the letters Trump used as an obvious pretext to fire Comey. It seems odd to me that despite being recused from anything to do with the investigation Sessions can still have the authority to recommend removing the person leading the investigation, but these are odd times. Rosenstein should be recused at this point as well. Ethically, the new FBI director selected by Trump should be entirely isolated from the continuing investigation due to the obvious conflict of being hired by the person close to the subject of the investigation (if not the actual subject of the investigation).
It is amazing to me that under these circumstances congressional and senate republicans are even attempting to resist the appointment of a special prosecutor, which is the obvious and only solution to the situation Trump and his administration have created.
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It is amazing to me that under these circumstances congressional and senate republicans are even attempting to resist the appointment of a special prosecutor, which is the obvious and only solution to the situation Trump and his administration have created.
I am well beyond being amazed by anything congressional republicans do. They long ago lost all sense of perspective when it comes to duty to country versus duty to party.
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I am well beyond being amazed by anything congressional republicans do. They long ago lost all sense of perspective when it comes to duty to country versus duty to party.
Spineless, feckless, and utterly unprincipled.
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Meanwhile, today Trump met with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov. He did this behind closed doors, excluding the press from the meeting.
He's either that dumb, or he's "like a smart person" and just fucking with us.
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Sean Spicer was hiding in the bushes last night - literally, I shit you not - refusing to talk to reporters until they turned their cameras off. He is awol today, with Sarah Sanders once again taking her talking points and dim wit to the podium to try and fend off the press.
SNL doesn't even need to create a satirical plot line as Spicer did it for them. I hear he is out for the rest of the week. He's probably gone.
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According to Politico's lead article, Trump believed firing Comey would be received as a "win-win."
There are Shakespearean levels of delusion going on in the Oval Office right now.
This isn't going to end well.
http://www.politico.com/story/2017/05/10/comey-firing-trump-russia-238192
Comey found out about it when his colleagues saw it on a news crawl and pointed it out to him. He thought it was a prank. Trump sent his former body guard, now head Oval Office Operations, to FBI headquarters with the "Dear James" letter at the same time it was announced publicly, because...class? Professionalism? 21st century communication?
Even when doing his evil deeds, he's a complete fuck-up.
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SNL doesn't even need to create a satirical plot line as Spicer did it for them. I hear he is out for the rest of the week. He's probably gone.
He's been shit at his job since Day #1. His deputy is Sarah Sanders, and she's worse (but nowhere near as funny). What will be great is when SNL retires Melissa McCarthy's Spicer and replaces him/her with Bobby Moynihan's Sanders...just to blow Trump's mind.
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Comey found out about it when his colleagues saw it on a news crawl and pointed it out to him. He thought it was a prank. Trump sent his former body guard, now head Oval Office Operations, to FBI headquarters with the "Dear James" letter at the same time it was announced publicly, because...class? Professionalism? 21st century communication?
Because he's a complete coward. "I'm going to send my bodyguard to tell that large man that he is fired."
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Meanwhile, today Trump met with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov. He did this behind closed doors, excluding the press from the meeting.
He's either that dumb, or he's "like a smart person" and just fucking with us.
He didn't exclude the press. He excluded the American press. Russian press was allowed in.
Seriously.
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All of this talk about James Comey getting fired is making me want a chili dog.
Nixon liked chili dogs. Coincidence?
I think that Hitler did too, but I'm not sure.
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He didn't exclude the press. He excluded the American press. Russian press was allowed in.
Seriously.
Very true. The Russians tweeted photos of Trump shaking hands with Lavrov and the Trump administration's favorite Rooskie, Sergei Kislyak. That's some world-class trolling right there!
Yes, Trump met also with Kislyak today (of all days, although, any day is likely to be a day with news relating to improper connections to Kislyak).
They're taking a victory lap while laughing at us.
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Interesting aside: the Russian press were allowed to bring their cameras, camera bags and a raft of electronic equipment into the Oval Office to shoot the overly-happy handshakes between Trump, Lavrov and Kislyak.
So that's the Oval bugged to shit, then.
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It will be the Republicans turning on him - just as they did Nixon - because they don't want to be dragging behind them the stinking carcass of a dead President into the next round of elections.
I'm not holding my breath for this. Their actions seem to run along the lines of "wait long enough and the electorate will forget." Every interview I've heard, except for McCain, is "Well, it's really not that bad. Let's see how the congressional hearings play out."
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I'm not holding my breath for this. Their actions seem to run along the lines of "wait long enough and the electorate will forget." Every interview I've heard, except for McCain, is "Well, it's really not that bad. Let's see how the congressional hearings play out."
This is now. Wait until next year, when the polls are showing a consistent swing in one direction and they're getting savaged at town halls and debates. They will wrap Trumpcare around Donald's neck ("we didn't want to...he made us do it!") and then lob him into the Potomac.
The Saturday Night Massacre was in October 1973. Nixon wasn't forced out until August 1974, just ahead of the midterms...
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This is now. Wait until next year, when the polls are showing a consistent swing in one direction and they're getting savaged at town halls and debates. They will wrap Trumpcare around Donald's neck ("we didn't want to...he made us do it!") and then lob him into the Potomac.
The Saturday Night Massacre was in October 1973. Nixon wasn't forced out until August 1974, just ahead of the midterms...
I think last November proved it is not wise to assume the American public will do what you are thinking it will do
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I think last November proved it is not wise to assume the American public will do what you are thinking it will do
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Or that the American public is thinking.
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I think last November proved it is not wise to assume the American public will do what you are thinking it will do
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The Trump supporters simply don't care. They don't care if he's passing nuclear secrets to the Russians, Hillary used a private email server. Mexicans are taking their jobs (well not *their* jobs, but I'm sure someone has had their job stolen by a Mexican). And most importantly, Trump is rich, he doesn't need the Presidential salary.
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The Trump supporters simply don't care. They don't care if he's passing nuclear secrets to the Russians, Hillary used a private email server. Mexicans are taking their jobs (well not *their* jobs, but I'm sure someone has had their job stolen by a Mexican). And most importantly, Trump is rich, he doesn't need the Presidential salary.
That seems to be the thoughts of his supporters. I've seen the line that Trump is still cleaning house of all the bad people. Trump is making American something again.
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Interesting aside: the Russian press were allowed to bring their cameras, camera bags and a raft of electronic equipment into the Oval Office to shoot the overly-happy handshakes between Trump, Lavrov and Kislyak.
So that's the Oval bugged to shit, then.
And now the White House is complaining that the Russians "tricked" them by releasing the photos to their state media. What a bunch of buffoons.
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I think last November proved it is not wise to assume the American public will do what you are thinking it will do
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Obama "fucked" with people's healthcare (by giving them greater and cheaper access to it), and was rewarded with a red wave against him that was historic.
Republicans are now actually fucking with people's healthcare and, if they get this bill passed, the public will notice the change in 2018. Plenty of time to work themselves into a 2010-style lather about if before the next elections.
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And now the White House is complaining that the Russians "tricked" them by releasing the photos to their state media. What a bunch of buffoons.
Also, the unprecedented move of giving Lavrov - the Foreign Minister - the privilege of an Oval Office audience with the President (he would normally meet only with his counterpart - the Secretary of State) was granted because Putin asked for it.
So Putin asked Trump to grant Lavrov an audience in the Oval Office specifically, and Lavrov brought in his personal photographer, who brought in all his electronic photographic equipment. If this was in a Mission: Impossible movie, you'd laugh at the stupidity.
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The Trump supporters simply don't care. They don't care if he's passing nuclear secrets to the Russians, Hillary used a private email server. Mexicans are taking their jobs (well not *their* jobs, but I'm sure someone has had their job stolen by a Mexican). And most importantly, Trump is rich, he doesn't need the Presidential salary.
They will notice when they're kicked off Medicare and/or have their premiums jacked to the stratosphere. Trump die-hards are only about 25-35% of the population. They are also the same 25-35% who would be worst hit by the AHCA. The AARP sent out a missive to its 38 million members, telling them which Congresspeople voted for it, so they'd know who to blame.
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Obama "fucked" with people's healthcare (by giving them greater and cheaper access to it), and was rewarded with a red wave against him that was historic.
Republicans are now actually fucking with people's healthcare and, if they get this bill passed, the public will notice the change in 2018. Plenty of time to work themselves into a 2010-style lather about if before the next elections.
Not for nothing, but a lot of the rage over the ACA is that prices went up. Telling people they got cheaper and greater access to health care where I live is a quick way to get laughed out of the room.
Now, it could certainly be that their insurance is of a superior quality than it was previously, and it could be that they live in a state that has intentionally done everything it could to cripple the ACA, but those are hard arguments to make persuasively to hard-working people who are struggling to make ends meet.
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Not for nothing, but a lot of the rage over the ACA is that prices went up. Telling people they got cheaper and greater access to health care where I live is a quick way to get laughed out of the room.
Yeah, let's not pretend that the ACA was roses for everybody. My deductibles skyrocketed and other benefits decreased because they were too expensive for my employer.
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I'm one of those who did not benefit from the ACA and in fact, only saw my premiums rise about 35%. However, the fact that my girlfriend, brother and many friends who either could not get or afford to get health insurance-but under the ACA were able to, made me realize that it's a positive worth paying for. Once they have that ability taken away, those who decided that was a good idea will realize what they have done.
Of course, we all know why insurance rates went up and it had nothing to do with the ACA.
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Not for nothing, but a lot of the rage over the ACA is that prices went up. Telling people they got cheaper and greater access to health care where I live is a quick way to get laughed out of the room.
Now, it could certainly be that their insurance is of a superior quality than it was previously, and it could be that they live in a state that has intentionally done everything it could to cripple the ACA, but those are hard arguments to make persuasively to hard-working people who are struggling to make ends meet.
Well if you weren't on a large employer's program, and you had a pre-existing condition, you had nothing before and something afterwards. The messaging around the ACA was horrible, but it was also twisted by the opposition who also lied brazenly ("death panels"?). Of course, saying that "everybody who has something is going to pay more so that people who have nothing can get something" is not going to work because that makes us simultaneously communists and fascists or something.
The red states - ironically the ones with the most to gain from the ACA - mostly opted out. It wasn't an option in the original bill, but Texas sued and won the ability for red states to double-fuck their citizens purely for party political reasons. Still, even in Texas, I was out of work for 6 months recently and my ACA plan was with the same carrier and same deductible as my prior employer's plan, but was notably cheaper than my employer's plan even before I got a subsidy. So Texas, at least, has a decent exchange available through healthcare.gov. At least for now...
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Of course, we all know why insurance rates went up and it had nothing to do with the ACA.
Muslims?
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Muslims?
The terrorists won.
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So...
"When I decided to just do it [fire Comey], I said to myself, I said you know, this Russia thing with Trump and Russia is a made up story." - Donald J. Trump
“We want this to come to its conclusion, we want it to come to its conclusion with integrity. And we think that we’ve actually, by removing Director Comey, taken steps to make that happen.” - Deputy Press Secretary Sarah Sanders
Isn't firing an investigator who's investigating you to end the investigation into you the classic definition of obstruction of justice? You know, the thing that was the 1st article of impeachment against Nixon and the 3rd against Clinton? Day #113.
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So...
"When I decided to just do it [fire Comey], I said to myself, I said you know, this Russia thing with Trump and Russia is a made up story." - Donald J. Trump
“We want this to come to its conclusion, we want it to come to its conclusion with integrity. And we think that we’ve actually, by removing Director Comey, taken steps to make that happen.” - Deputy Press Secretary Sarah Sanders
Isn't firing an investigator who's investigating you to end the investigation into you the classic definition of obstruction of justice? You know, the thing that was the 1st article of impeachment against Nixon and the 3rd against Clinton? Day #113.
It's also the third person he's fired that was supervising an investigation into him.
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It's also the third person he's fired that was supervising an investigation into him.
Trump threatened Comey on Twitter this morning. He said that Comey better think twice about leaking anything if there are "tapes" of their conversation. (1) That's more obstruction of justice; and (b) there are tapes...? Tapes that can be subpoenaed? Interesting.
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This (https://twitter.com/ChrisMurphyCT/status/863064487808708608) is awesome!
Law firm @POTUS used to show he has no ties to Russia was named Russia Law Firm of the Year for their extensive ties to Russia. Unreal.
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Excellent piece in the New Yorker (http://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/my-nineteenth-presidential-election-and-the-most-important) by the 96-year old baseball writer.
Harkening back to the impetus for this thread, Popovich with some strong comments to the press before today's game: https://www.google.com/amp/www.mercurynews.com/2017/05/14/an-hour-before-tipoff-against-warriors-spurs-gregg-popovich-takes-donald-trump-to-the-rack/amp/
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Trump revealed highly classified information to Russian foreign minister and ambassador (https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/trump-revealed-highly-classified-information-to-russian-foreign-minister-and-ambassador/2017/05/15/530c172a-3960-11e7-9e48-c4f199710b69_story.html?tid=sm_tw&tid=sm_tw&tid=sm_tw&tid=sm_tw&utm_term=.e4c694de249a)
But he didn't do it by email, so it's all good.
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Trump revealed highly classified information to Russian foreign minister and ambassador (https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/trump-revealed-highly-classified-information-to-russian-foreign-minister-and-ambassador/2017/05/15/530c172a-3960-11e7-9e48-c4f199710b69_story.html?tid=sm_tw&tid=sm_tw&tid=sm_tw&tid=sm_tw&utm_term=.e4c694de249a)
But he didn't do it by email, so it's all good.
Of all the ridiculous twists and turns this administration has taken this was the most predictable.
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Of all the ridiculous twists and turns this administration has taken this was the most predictable.
Well said. It didn't even matter that it was the Russians. Dude just doesn't have a filter. And his is probably the one job in the world for which a finely-calibrated filter is most necessary.
Thanks, electoral college!
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Well said. It didn't even matter that it was the Russians. Dude just doesn't have a filter. And his is probably the one job in the world for which a finely-calibrated filter is most necessary.
Thanks, electoral college!
Don't blame the electoral college. It's express purpose is to reduce the chances of electing a populist yahoo with no skill to be President. Blame the idiots who voted for him. I'm still gobsmacked that Trump got more than one vote.
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Don't blame the electoral college. It's express purpose is to reduce the chances of electing a populist yahoo with no skill to be President. Blame the idiots who voted for him. I'm still gobsmacked that Trump got more than one vote.
Yes, and it expressly failed its express purpose. I can blame it. There's blame enough to go around.
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Yes, and it expressly failed its express purpose. I can blame it. There's blame enough to go around.
Yeah but was a problem with execution, not a design flaw. Operator error.
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Yeah but was a problem with execution, not a design flaw. Operator error.
In this case, I was laying the blame on the electors who together comprise the electoral college; the operators, not the design.
That said, it is increasingly difficult for me to make a case for the design.
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The EC gets more and more "broken" the smaller the House is. Increase the number of House seats to the Constitutional limit and there'll be less disparity between PV and EC results. It's politically impossible, sure, but maybe slightly less impossible than an amendment to do away with the EC entirely.
Edit: the Constitutional limit would be madness. Not that big.
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Of all the ridiculous twists and turns this administration has taken this was the most predictable.
There is a non-zero chance of President Trump telling someone the nuclear codes just to show he knows them.
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There is a non-zero chance of President Trump telling someone the nuclear codes just to show he knows them.
"Come here, let me show you this suitcase."
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There is a non-zero chance of President Trump telling someone the nuclear codes just to show he knows them.
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It's the perfect marriage of narcissism, incompetence, vengefulness and inherited privilege. The trump wheelhouse.
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I bet Trump farts in the presence of women and then says, "you're welcome."
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and then says, "you're welcome."
right after five lackeys rushed out there to deny he did it
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He has really ugly feet but he still has his lackeys clip his toenails.
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Don't blame the electoral college. It's express purpose is to reduce the chances of electing a populist yahoo with no skill to be President. Blame the idiots who voted for him. I'm still gobsmacked that Trump got more than one vote.
Well the electors are supposed to sit back and take a good, long look at the candidate and decide whether it's a good idea to confirm him or her for the job. Now that the electors are all partisan loyalists, it's abandoned its function of being a check against the stupidity of the masses.
So, yes, the electoral college is to blame. If it were gone, the popular vote would be the simple test and Trump would be left tweeting from the crapper about Chafetz' latest kangaroo court investigation into President Clinton.
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There is a non-zero chance of President Trump telling someone the nuclear codes just to show he knows them.
After which Spicer will tweet them out. And again the next day.
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"Come here, let me show you this suitcase."
Patrons at Mar-a-Fiasco were allowed to take photos with the serviceman holding the nuclear football. They also were allowed to share these photos on social media, along with the serviceman's name.
Whatever insanely fucked-up scenario you can imagine, this administration has already beaten you to it.
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The EC gets more and more "broken" the smaller the House is. Increase the number of House seats to the Constitutional limit and there'll be less disparity between PV and EC results. It's politically impossible, sure, but maybe slightly less impossible than an amendment to do away with the EC entirely.
Edit: the Constitutional limit would be madness. Not that big.
Trump wants to get rid of some of the archaic practices of government, like the filibuster. Cool, let's do the Electoral College too while we're at it! The small states already have an exaggerated representation in government by dint of having 2 Senators; they do not need a thumb on the scale of the Presidency too. It's a national office, it should be a national popular vote*.
* If nothing else, it would've avoided the whole Bush v. Gore debacle as Gore won the popular vote regardless to Florida's questionable results. We're just lucky that there wasn't anything cataclysmic that occurred in the first year of Bush's first term for him to mess up that would've been handled completely differently if Gore had been put in the Oval. Thanks Electoral College!
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Comey wrote a memo detailing that President Trump asked him to drop the investigation into Flynn.
I'm no lawyer, but I believe FBI agents' contemporaneous notes are considered admissible in court.
What I do know is that President Trump is too stupid to understand that a lifelong FBI man would know how to cover his ass.
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Comey wrote a memo detailing that President Trump asked him to drop the investigation into Flynn.
I'm no lawyer, but I believe FBI agents' contemporaneous notes are considered admissible in court.
What I do know is that President Trump is too stupid to understand that a lifelong FBI man would know how to cover his ass.
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The problem isn't the admissibility it's the court, which is congress. You are counting on Republicans in congress to suddenly develop morals, ethics, and principles.
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I think the most fascinating part of these past few months (could easily substitute horrifying for fascinating) is how hard it is to get any republican politician - or voter for that matter - to admit that there just might be something amiss. I'm genuinely curious what it will actually take.
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I think the most fascinating part of these past few months (could easily substitute horrifying for fascinating) is how hard it is to get any republican politician - or voter for that matter - to admit that there just might be something amiss. I'm genuinely curious what it will actually take.
Ironically, possibly the most egregious thing he could do - nuke someone - would strengthen his position with supporters (and some neutrals.
He joked that he could shoot someone on 5th Avenue and his poll numbers would go up. He's not wrong.
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I think the most fascinating part of these past few months (could easily substitute horrifying for fascinating) is how hard it is to get any republican politician - or voter for that matter - to admit that there just might be something amiss. I'm genuinely curious what it will actually take.
I'm working from memory, so forgive me if I'm slightly off on the numbers, but I thought I heard that 58% of republicans still believed that the media had focused too much on Watergate the day Nixon resigned.
As our founders predicted, parties have proven a poison to democracy.
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He joked that he could shoot someone on 5th Avenue and his poll numbers would go up. He's not wrong.
Someone far cleverer than me joked that from a Chekhovian point of view this has to end with him shooting someone.
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Someone far cleverer than me joked that from a Chekhovian point of view this has to end with him shooting someone.
I can't laugh at this. Nixon stepped down voluntarily. I just don't see this President doing the same.
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Someone far cleverer than me joked that from a Chekhovian point of view this has to end with him shooting someone.
I might argue that a Chekhovian reading would not specify exactly who gets shot, simply that someone inevitably will.
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I might argue that a Chekhovian reading would not specify exactly who gets shot, simply that someone inevitably will.
Probably that poor sap who provided the intel about the laptop bombs.
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Someone far cleverer than me joked that from a Chekhovian point of view this has to end with him shooting someone.
I vote Bannon
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How about a new contest?
The person that calls the correct number of pages in this thread before the inevitable impeachment gets a MAGA hat.
We can call it "Race for the Imp."
I call 57.
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These people pushing for a Trump impeachment must really like Pence. Or Ryan, or Hatch...
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The problem isn't the admissibility it's the court, which is congress. You are counting on Republicans in congress to suddenly develop morals, ethics, and principles.
Unfortunately, I am not counting on them doing that.
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Unfortunately, I am not counting on them doing that.
The 25th Amendment solution seems much more likely. And maybe more likely than that, a duck out the back from the principal screwball a'la Nixon.
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The problem isn't the admissibility it's the court, which is congress. You are counting on Republicans in congress to suddenly develop morals, ethics, and principles.
"I think we could do with a little less drama from the White House on a lot of things so we can focus on our agenda, which is deregulation, tax reform, repealing and replacing Obamacare," - Mitch McConnell
This tells you all you need to know. They want the monkey in the Oval to stop flinging faeces long enough to pass their pet agenda items. After that, they'll turn on him so fast it'll turn him white.
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These people pushing for a Trump impeachment must really like Pence. Or Ryan, or Hatch...
I don't like Pence. But I don't think he'll destroy the country and/or world.
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I don't like Pence. But I don't think he'll destroy the country and/or world.
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Obviously you haven't been watching Handmaiden's Tale
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Obviously you haven't been watching Handmaiden's Tale
No, I've been watching baseball.
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The 25th Amendment solution seems much more likely. And maybe more likely than that, a duck out the back from the principal screwball a'la Nixon.
The 25th amendment requires Pence, a majority of the cabinet and 290 congressmen (which is 97 Republicans plus all 193 Democrats) to all declare Trump "incapacitated." Not only is that never going to happen, it probably shouldn't happen absent an actual physical incapacity. It's basically a paper coup.
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I don't like Pence. But I don't think he'll destroy the country and/or world.
Only the gay and female and non-evangelical christian parts.
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Only the gay and female and non-evangelical christian parts.
I just can't go to Opening Day anymore if Pence becomes President. And some may like that. But if I can't go then I'm not organizing.
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Tumescent pygophile.
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I assumed President Trump would be horrific, he has lived up to my expectations and then some.
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Tumescent pygophile.
Far too much equality and open-mindedness in pygophilia for that creep.
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Former FBI director Robert Mueller appointed as special prosecutor to lead Trump-Russia probe. (https://apnews.com/324cc49ac17c431682cb496f1e7e85c4/Former-FBI-Director-Mueller-to-lead-Trump-Russia-probe?utm_campaign=SocialFlow&utm_source=Twitter&utm_medium=AP)
The appointment gives Mueller, who led the FBI through the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks and served under presidential administrations of both parties, sweeping powers to investigate whether Trump campaign associates colluded with the Kremlin to influence the outcome in his behalf, as well as the authority to prosecute any crimes uncovered during the probe. The broad mandate, beyond any specific Trump-Russia connection, also covers “any matters that arose or may arise directly from the investigation.”
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Former FBI director Robert Mueller appointed as special prosecutor to lead Trump-Russia probe. (https://apnews.com/324cc49ac17c431682cb496f1e7e85c4/Former-FBI-Director-Mueller-to-lead-Trump-Russia-probe?utm_campaign=SocialFlow&utm_source=Twitter&utm_medium=AP)
The appointment gives Mueller, who led the FBI through the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks and served under presidential administrations of both parties, sweeping powers to investigate whether Trump campaign associates colluded with the Kremlin to influence the outcome in his behalf, as well as the authority to prosecute any crimes uncovered during the probe. The broad mandate, beyond any specific Trump-Russia connection, also covers “any matters that arose or may arise directly from the investigation.”
I read that last sentence to mean that if he gets even the slightest whiff of anything on Hillary, the DNC, or Seth Rich he's to go after it.
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Tumescent pygophile.
They call me Rumptrump man
'Cause that's my name
I'm a butt connoisseur and I have no shame
I rate 'em on size and shape and such
But the final test is the test of touch
I'm a true blue pro no average joe
I keep my eyes open everywhere I go
So if you're talkin' 'bout chicks and what they got down below
Just ask 'ole Trump 'cause I'm in the know
When butts are headed in my direction
I slip around back for a closer inspection
I size them all up with no sign of detection
And I swoop on in and I make a selection
Some big some small some ain't quite round
Some as big as me nearly pound for pound
Some smooth as silk with no sign of wear
And some got pimples and some got hair
Let me tell you 'bout my trip to the south of France
The women down there they never wear pants
By hook by crook or happenstance
I'll be headed back just give me half a chance
When I'm lying on the beach I couldn't help but stare
At all the merchandise the girls had laid bare
Lying on my front so no one could see
Those bare bottom bitches put a boner on me
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The 25th amendment requires Pence, a majority of the cabinet and 290 congressmen (which is 97 Republicans plus all 193 Democrats) to all declare Trump "incapacitated." Not only is that never going to happen, it probably shouldn't happen absent an actual physical incapacity. It's basically a paper coup.
I was just saying it's more likely than a Republican congress impeaching him.
I share your skepticism, but I wouldn't say "never." And while I agree in principle that it shouldn't be used under circumstances approaching normal, these aren't those circumstances. How much more incompetent flailing about will it take before the president is broadly and legitimately viewed as a clear and present danger to the country and the world?
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I was just saying it's more likely than a Republican congress impeaching him.
I share your skepticism, but I wouldn't say "never." And while I agree in principle that it shouldn't be used under circumstances approaching normal, these aren't those circumstances. How much more incompetent flailing about will it take before the president is broadly and legitimately viewed as a clear and present danger to the country and the world?
You all really need to understand there are people in this country that do not view him as a clear and present danger. Those people voted him into the office. Seriously, remember that. I honestly do not know what it will take for them to believe the truth because they now think everything is fake news. It's a pretty messed up world.
Case in point, I know someone that posted crap about there being an abortion performed in the White House under the Obama administration. I do not for a second believe it to be true. And if it were true, someone should go to jail because that is a serious violation of HIPAA laws. These people will believe anything and everything they are hearing that is negative about the Clintons, Obamas, and Democrats in general. It is insane.
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That is the saddest thing, these morons decrying FAKE NEWS, live, eat and breath a constant stream of actual fake news. See the latest with the Seth Rich BS. People realized about 20 years ago you could get really rich pushing boogeyman stories.
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You all really need to understand there are people in this country that do not view him as a clear and present danger. Those people voted him into the office. Seriously, remember that. I honestly do not know what it will take for them to believe the truth because they now think everything is fake news. It's a pretty messed up world.
Case in point, I know someone that posted crap about there being an abortion performed in the White House under the Obama administration. I do not for a second believe it to be true. And if it were true, someone should go to jail because that is a serious violation of HIPAA laws. These people will believe anything and everything they are hearing that is negative about the Clintons, Obamas, and Democrats in general. It is insane.
Oh I have no illusions on that score. I'm not talking about his electorate. I'm talking about the Washington GOP.
They'll face a choice soon where they have to either stay on the scandal treadmill, not accomplishing anything their donor class wants them to accomplish before quite probably losing their advantage in the midterms, or exit Trump stage right and at least get something done first.
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That is the saddest thing, these morons decrying FAKE NEWS, live, eat and breath a constant stream of actual fake news. See the latest with the Seth Rich BS.
I've leaned on this observation in trying to decode trump or at least figure out what the truth is: focus on what he accuses other of as that is what he is likely guilty of.
As to Budgirl's observation, I am more optimistic. I thankfully don't know a lot of folks who peddle shit stories, and if they do, it is only to get a rise from me. Most of the support I know of Trump is about an inch deep. These people will throw his election and his clownshit in my face, but they don't actually care, or identify with him. They didn't put signs in their yards, or bumper stickers on their cars. Below the surface, they know he is a turd and they won't squawk too much when he is finally put down.
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You all really need to understand there are people in this country that do not view him as a clear and present danger. Those people voted him into the office. Seriously, remember that. I honestly do not know what it will take for them to believe the truth because they now think everything is fake news. It's a pretty messed up world.
Case in point, I know someone that posted crap about there being an abortion performed in the White House under the Obama administration. I do not for a second believe it to be true. And if it were true, someone should go to jail because that is a serious violation of HIPAA laws. These people will believe anything and everything they are hearing that is negative about the Clintons, Obamas, and Democrats in general. It is insane.
Two words: Pizza Gate
The looney right - including Michael Flynn and his son - pushed this insane theory that Hillary was connected to a child sex ring that operated out of a pizza joint in NYC. People believed it, as ridiculous as it may sound. They believed it to the point that a man invaded that pizza joint and shot up the place demanding answers and trying to free the child sex slaves being held in the back.
It's funny until someone gets shot.
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Yesterday Trump gave a commencement speech that was all about him. Also, it was reported that Trump World knew that Flynn was under investigation before he was nominated to the NSA position. Also, we found out that the Trump campaign had at least 18 separate communications with Russian officials during the campaign. And we found out that the FBI has appointed former director Mueller to oversee the Trump investigation prompting the orange one to have a hissy fit on Twitter.
Yesterday.
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Yesterday Trump gave a commencement speech that was all about him.
It wasn't mostly about him. I watched most of it, waiting for the other shoe to drop, but he kept to the script until I guess the very end. Still, there's no need to exaggerate. He's pretty much got that market cornered.
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Action: Trump tweets that Comey better hope there are no tapes
Reaction: Comey leaks memo to Times
Action: Trump's "nut job" story confirmed by WH
Reaction: Comey agrees to testify in open session
Comey is playing chess. Trump is sticking the checkers pieces up his nose.
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Trump is the United States' Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, an idiot, a laughable lunatic, that sinister, reactionary forces are only all too happy to wind up and let go.
This foreign trip is going to be great. NATO, Israel, Saudi Arabia. The Vatican. What could go wrong?
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This foreign trip is going to be great. NATO, Israel, Saudi Arabia. The Vatican. What could go wrong?
I was talking about this with my wife. I wonder if they're going to let him appear in any situations where he might have to answer questions extemporaneously. That could be extremely amusing.
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This foreign trip is going to be great. NATO, Israel, Saudi Arabia. The Vatican. What could go wrong?
They could name Jared as a person of interest in the criminal,inal investigation into Russian election hacking?
Oh wait, that already happened.
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I was talking about this with my wife. I wonder if they're going to let him appear in any situations where he might have to answer questions extemporaneously. That could be extremely amusing.
The other countries have already taken steps to keep presentations short and use lots of pictures. I am not joking.
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The other countries have already taken steps to keep presentations short and use lots of pictures. I am not joking.
Oh, I'm aware of that (and aware of how embarrassing it is for our country). But I'm still hoping for some Q&A sessions.
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Mr Bad Ass USA USA USA. Refuses to say radical Islam while in Saudi, and his wife doesn't wear a scarf. My god foxnews and the other idiots who support this oaf must be pissed......nope. Pathetic.
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President Trump today, to the Israeli press, made clear that "I never said Israel" in his meeting with the Russians.
So the President denied something that nobody said he had done, and in doing so confirmed the source of the classified information that he disclosed.
Just unreal.
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Not really, he is an idiot.
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Watergate played out over a long time because there was no "smoking gun" to show that Nixon himself was in on the cover up. That was until the White House tapes were finally coughed up and there he was, Nixon instructing HR Halderman to tell the CIA to get the FBI to back off the Watergate investigation. As well as being a smoking gun, it was the straw that broke the back of Republican support for Nixon, and he resigned days later.
So now strong reporting (https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/trump-asked-intelligence-chiefs-to-push-back-against-fbi-collusion-probe-after-comey-revealed-its-existence/2017/05/22/394933bc-3f10-11e7-9869-bac8b446820a_story.html) claims that Trump asked the Director of National Intelligence and the Director of the NSA to intervene with the FBI to shut down the investigation into Mike "5th Amendment" Flynn.
Seriously, this is one of the only scandals in Washington not to get a "...gate" nickname, and it's basically a shitty remake of the original. The Nixon era Republicans were right on top of a mid-term election, which may have stiffened their spines, whereas this generation may not yet be feeling the pressure of impending unemployment. But we have an exact precedent here, so the ending is known, just not the timeline.
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Watergate played out over a long time because there was no "smoking gun" to show that Nixon himself was in on the cover up. That was until the White House tapes were finally coughed up and there he was, Nixon instructing HR Halderman to tell the CIA to get the FBI to back off the Watergate investigation. As well as being a smoking gun, it was the straw that broke the back of Republican support for Nixon, and he resigned days later.
So now strong reporting (https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/trump-asked-intelligence-chiefs-to-push-back-against-fbi-collusion-probe-after-comey-revealed-its-existence/2017/05/22/394933bc-3f10-11e7-9869-bac8b446820a_story.html) claims that Trump asked the Director of National Intelligence and the Director of the NSA to intervene with the FBI to shut down the investigation into Mike "5th Amendment" Flynn.
Seriously, this is one of the only scandals in Washington not to get a "...gate" nickname, and it's basically a shitty remake of the original. The Nixon era Republicans were right on top of a mid-term election, which may have stiffened their spines, whereas this generation may not yet be feeling the pressure of impending unemployment. But we have an exact precedent here, so the ending is known, just not the timeline.
Trump has already stipulated to firing Comey to stop the investigation. He gave the smoking gun directly to Lester Holt.
Obviously admitting to an established "high crime and misdemeanor" is not enough for current republicans to suddenly develop backbone or principle. It's going to have to get a lot worse, and fortunately I think we can count on Trump and his legion of buffoons to continue to stumble across many more legal lines. The Ryans and McConnells and McCarthys and Rubios deserve to be dragged down with him.
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Seriously, this is one of the only scandals in Washington not to get a "...gate" nickname, and it's basically a shitty remake of the original.
I'm hoping future scandals are all (subject)"-a-Lago"
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Trump has already stipulated to firing Comey to stop the investigation. He gave the smoking gun directly to Lester Holt.
Obviously admitting to an established "high crime and misdemeanor" is not enough for current republicans to suddenly develop backbone or principle. It's going to have to get a lot worse, and fortunately I think we can count on Trump and his legion of buffoons to continue to stumble across many more legal lines. The Ryans and McConnells and McCarthys and Rubios deserve to be dragged down with him.
Yes they do. Right now, they're letting a criminal enterprise operate out of the Oval Office just to give them enough time to pass deregulation, health reform and tax cuts. It's about as craven as politics gets, which is pretty damning and - yes - they all deserve to suffer the vicious punishment of a high paid job in the private sector come next November.
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Oh FFS!
When Obama visited the Israel's Holocaust Memorial in 2013, he wrote a note - as is tradition - in the book of remembrance:
I am grateful to Yad Vashem and all of those responsible for this remarkable institution. At a time of great peril and promise, war and strife, we are blessed to have such a powerful reminder of man’s potential for great evil, but also our own capacity to rise up from the tragedy and remake our world, Let our children come here, and know their history, so that they can add their voices to proclaim ‘never again.’ And may we remember those who perished, not only as victims, but also as individuals who hoped and loved and dreamed like us, and who have become symbols for the human spirit. It is humbling and inspiring to visit and remember the visionary who began the remarkable establishment of the State of Israel. May our two countries possess the same vision and will to secure peace and prosperity for future generations.
Trump was there earlier today, and also left a note in the book:
It is a great honor to be here with all of my friends. So amazing + will never forget!
Basically, Trump just tweeted the Holocaust Memorial in Israel. Yes, it's under 140 characters. Yes, he was too lazy to spell out "and".
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I'm hoping future scandals are all (subject)"-a-Lago"
Oh Lord let this happen.
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I'm hoping future scandals are all (subject)"-a-Lago"
Meanwhile, God is trying to erase that STD factory (https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2017/05/22/sinkhole-forms-in-front-of-mar-a-lago-metaphors-pour-in/?utm_term=.b2c4d193630b) from His good, green earth.
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"I encountered and am aware of information and intelligence that revealed contacts and interactions between Russian officials and U.S. persons involved in the Trump campaign."
- Former CIA Director John Brennan
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Meanwhile, God is trying to erase that STD factory (https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2017/05/22/sinkhole-forms-in-front-of-mar-a-lago-metaphors-pour-in/?utm_term=.b2c4d193630b) from His good, green earth.
That strikes me more as the work of The Guy Downstairs trying to claim what's rightfully his.
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Basically, Trump just tweeted the Holocaust Memorial in Israel. Yes, it's under 140 characters. Yes, he was too lazy to spell out "and".
Did he add "have a great summer...Westdale High Football Roolz!"?
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And now for a different opinion (https://www.jerrypournelle.com/chaosmanor/recovery-opinionanalysis-on-comey-and-draining-the-swamp-a-note-on-education/)...
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Jesus. Don't you people take responsibility for anything? This line of crap (yes, I didn't read the whole thing) and that stupid fucking murder story. When I was a kid, conservatives at least had some balls, now they are emasculated, grievance-filled parodies of what they used to decry.
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And now for a different opinion (https://www.jerrypournelle.com/chaosmanor/recovery-opinionanalysis-on-comey-and-draining-the-swamp-a-note-on-education/)...
Serious question: why would you link to psychotic ramblings that get basic facts wrong?
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And now for a different opinion (https://www.jerrypournelle.com/chaosmanor/recovery-opinionanalysis-on-comey-and-draining-the-swamp-a-note-on-education/)...
I don't think paranoid delusional ramblings that have no legitimate basis in fact qualifies as an "opinion." But thank you for a peek into the window of crazy.
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I didn't think he was being serious. I thought it was more of a "and now for a look into the loony-bin" offering.
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I didn't think he was being serious. I thought it was more of a "and now for a look into the loony-bin" offering.
That's how I took it as well.
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I knew you guys would zone in on his statement at the beginning of the article. Facts seem to be hard to come by these days don't they.
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And now for a different opinion (https://www.jerrypournelle.com/chaosmanor/recovery-opinionanalysis-on-comey-and-draining-the-swamp-a-note-on-education/)...
This is the problem with much of Trumpville - they're operating under a separate, completely flexible, set of "facts". This assertion, for example: "Don’t believe the media narrative from the left that it was an attempt to silence Comey from some investigation into Trump." No, I don't believe "the left" in the case, I believe Trump, and what he said to Lester Holt on camera and what Trump's White House released that he said to the Russians in the Oval Office.
This is the legacy of Roger Ailes.
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Facts seem to be hard to come by these days don't they.
Nope.
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I knew you guys would zone in on his statement at the beginning of the article. Facts seem to be hard to come by these days don't they.
Facts are only hard to come by if you willfully ignore them, like the idiot that you linked to. Putting aside the substance, what's the format supposed to be? "I am heavily medicated and literally beset by fever dreams and don't trust my own thoughts, but allow me to copy and paste an unidentified email full of paranoid ramblings."
A year ago I would have just assumed it was a parody.
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Back in the world of real news, the Trump budget, released yesterday, relies upon a $2 trillion math/logic error to work. That's trillion with a "T". Times two.
This is not normal.
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Back in the world of real news, the Trump budget, released yesterday, relies upon a $2 trillion math/logic error to work. That's trillion with a "T". Times two.
This is not normal.
Arithmetical errors are just different opinions, snowflake.
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Back in the world of real news, the Trump budget, released yesterday, relies upon a $2 trillion math/logic error to work. That's trillion with a "T". Times two.
This is not normal.
That's bad even by Bobby Jindal's standards (http://www.salon.com/2015/06/15/bobby_jindals_dishonest_scheme_even_fellow_republicans_are_embarrassed_by_this_one/). (Warning: Grover Norquist sighting)
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Arithmetical errors are just different opinions, snowflake.
Alternative math.
I bet Stephen Miller finds a way to pin this on Common Core.
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Alternative math.
We can't even make cynical jokes anymore. Trump Team Stands by Budget’s $2 Trillion Math Error (http://www.nbcnews.com/business/economy/trump-team-stands-budget-s-2-trillion-math-error-n763996)
White House budget director Mick Mulvaney didn't deny the math, saying it was done "on purpose," during a press briefing Tuesday.
"I'm aware of the criticisms and would simply come back and say there's other places where we were probably overly conservative in our accounting," he said. "We stand by the numbers."
Of course, people who use actual math say things like this:
Former Treasury Secretary Larry Summers put it another way, writing in his blog, "It appears to be the most egregious accounting error in a presidential budget in the nearly 40 years I have been tracking them."
I think Summers is being overly generous when he describes it as "an error."
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I think Summers is being overly generous when he describes it as "an error."
They double-counted $2 trillion to make work numbers already predicated on a pie-in-the-sky 3% growth rate (currently 1.9%) because...underpants? When this nonsense is pointed out, the response is "The fuck you gonna do about it?!"
This is not normal.
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"I am heavily medicated and literally beset by fever dreams and don't trust my own thoughts, but allow me to copy and paste an unidentified email full of paranoid ramblings."
A year ago I would have just assumed it was a parody.
Nowadays it's a successful White House applicant's resume.
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And the CBO score is in. (https://www.cbo.gov/publication/52752) 23 million more uninsured, lower premiums for less coverage under AHCA 2.0. And it manages to basically obliterate pre-existing condition coverage for one-sixth of the population and cause 14 million people to lose Medicaid benefits.
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...and now the Post is reporting that the memo that set Comey in motion to investigate Clinton's emails - purporting to be from Loretta Lynch saying that she's going to gloss over the server thing - was planted by the Russians. Literally fake news.
Comey's unwitting, "Dudley Do Right" amplification of the email investigation during the election - and then again right on top of it - clearly tipped the balance to Trump. So, now, when we talk about the Russians "hacking" our election, it's actually the Russians fixing our election.
The Russians won.
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And the CBO score is in. (https://www.cbo.gov/publication/52752) 23 million more uninsured, lower premiums for less coverage under AHCA 2.0. And it manages to basically obliterate pre-existing condition coverage for one-sixth of the population and cause 14 million people to lose Medicaid benefits.
That'll show those takers.
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And the CBO score is in. (https://www.cbo.gov/publication/52752) 23 million more uninsured, lower premiums for less coverage under AHCA 2.0. And it manages to basically obliterate pre-existing condition coverage for one-sixth of the population and cause 14 million people to lose Medicaid benefits.
Reporter gets beaten up for having the temerity to ask a Republican candidate about the CBO report. (http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2017/05/24/greg-gianforte-fox-news-team-witnesses-gop-house-candidate-body-slam-reporter.html)
Read the bottom of that Fox News article for how the candidate tries to spin the encounter.
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Reporter gets beaten up for having the temerity to ask a Republican candidate about the CBO report. (http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2017/05/24/greg-gianforte-fox-news-team-witnesses-gop-house-candidate-body-slam-reporter.html)
Read the bottom of that Fox News article for how the candidate tries to spin the encounter.
That's just normal, day to day, alternate body slamming.
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Throwing a shoe seems tame by comparison.
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Today's damage report:
Brits refusing to share any more intel on the Manchester bombings with US counterparts because of incessant leaks that hamper the investigation. Earlier this week it was reported that the Israelis had rewritten the guidelines on what, when and how they share intel with the US after Trump's blabbing to Russians about Israeli intel and then blurting out confirmation of what he did while standing next to Netanyahu.
It has also been confirmed, by the White House, that Trump blabbed to the Prime Minster Rodrigo Duterte of the Philippines (thanks Knox) that he had two nuclear subs off the coast of North Korea. This was during the same call when he congratulated Duterte on his "handling" of the drug problem in his country (which is to send out death squads to kill suspected dealers). FWIW, Duterte has also likened himself to Hitler, and boasted of committing killings and rape. Trump invited him to the White House.
Jeff Sessions joined Mike Flynn and Jared Kushner as having been caught lying (by omission) about contacts with Russian officials on his security clearance application. Pretty much everyone around Trump has ties to Russia, and pretty much all of them have lied about it.
The Democrats have already flipped two previously safe Republican seats in Congress via special election since Trump's victory in November. They are likely to flip a third today - Montana's statewide seat - given that the Republican candidate Greg Gianforte was running a little behind in the polls, the election is today and yesterday he physically attacked a journalist and was charged with assault. The attack was on audio tape and in front of other journalists. Apropos nothing, Gianforte also has ties to businesses funded by shady Russian financiers.
It's 8:33am CDT.
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What seats have they flipped?
Also Duterte heads up the Philippines, not Indonesia.
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And the CBO score is in. (https://www.cbo.gov/publication/52752) 23 million more uninsured, lower premiums for less coverage under AHCA 2.0. And it manages to basically obliterate pre-existing condition coverage for one-sixth of the population and cause 14 million people to lose Medicaid benefits.
The CBO also pointed out that, in states that opt out of pre-existing coverage mandates, the high-risk insurance markets for those otherwise excluded by dint of a pre-existing condition will collapse. Meanwhile, Trump's dithering on whether to honor the ACA's cost-sharing payments to insurers is already causing enough instability that premiums are expected to rise by 20% next year for this reason alone.
This is how Republicans roll: they campaign on the premise that government doesn't work and, once elected, set about proving themselves right.
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What seats have they flipped?
Also Duterte heads up the Philippines, not Indonesia.
Thanks for the correction on Duterte. The seats I was referring to are state seats, not US Congress - including one in New Hampshire (http://www.wmur.com/article/incredible-tornado-footage-out-of-north-carolina-1495669230/9926533). The Democrats came close to flipping a US Congressional seat in Kansas of all places, and may well pick up the one in Montana today. There's one coming up in early June in Georgia, where the Democrat is leading in the polls.
While not being pivotal to national governance, the state elections are bellwethers as to rapid deterioration in the Republican brand, even in previously solid red districts. Trump is bringing balance to politics in the same way that Anakin Skywalker brought balance to the Force - by taking one side so far to the edge that it falls off.
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What seats have they flipped?
Also Duterte heads up the Philippines, not Indonesia.
I presume Limey is referencing the Democrat candidates winning special elections for state representative seats in a New Hampshire district (http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/democrats-flip-state-legislature-seats-trump-districts/story?id=47612725) that had never been won by a Democrat before and a very conservative New York district. (https://www.newsday.com/long-island/politics/in-upset-democrat-pellegrino-wins-9th-district-assembly-seat-1.13656477?firstfree=yes#)
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That's good news about those state seats. I hadn't heard that.
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Reporter gets beaten up for having the temerity to ask a Republican candidate about the CBO report. (http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2017/05/24/greg-gianforte-fox-news-team-witnesses-gop-house-candidate-body-slam-reporter.html)
Read the bottom of that Fox News article for how the candidate tries to spin the encounter.
Even more disgusting than the outright falsity of the candidate's statement is that is seeks to excuse the assault because it the victim was "a liberal journalist."
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Even more disgusting than the outright falsity of the candidate's statement is that is seeks to excuse the assault because it the victim was "a liberal journalist."
Not sure if it's been mentioned here among the litany of high crimes committed by Trump but, according to the Comey memos (which may well supplant the Watergate tapes in political infamy), Trump asked him to arrest certain journalists.
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What's nuts is all the people out there still saying, "Well, it's better than the Democrats having power."
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Fun with Photoshop (https://scontent.cdninstagram.com/t51.2885-15/s480x480/e35/18580819_1699402670359808_2908147339946360832_n.jpg).
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What's nuts is all the people out there still saying, "Well, it's better than the Democrats having power."
It's only as nuts as Hillary's campaign was inept. I know it's not popular around here but I still lay a large part of the blame on the Democrats inability to defeat a genuine megalomaniac in the traditionally Democrat strongholds of Ohio, Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin. I don't think the Russians made people vote they way they did in those states. Maybe they did in Maine. For sure, Iowa. Which brings us to now.
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Fun with Photoshop (https://scontent.cdninstagram.com/t51.2885-15/s480x480/e35/18580819_1699402670359808_2908147339946360832_n.jpg).
I like the one I saw with Elvis.
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It's only as nuts as Hillary's campaign was inept. I know it's not popular around here but I still lay a large part of the blame on the Democrats inability to defeat a genuine megalomaniac in the traditionally Democrat strongholds of Ohio, Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin. I don't think the Russians made people vote they way they did in those states. Maybe they did in Maine. For sure, Iowa. Which brings us to now.
The winning margin in those swing states was about 70,000 in total. Yes, Clinton ran a bad campaign - ignoring those states late on because she thought they were in the bag being a big mistake - but she too had high unfavorable polling numbers. I heard it described as a contest between two people who could only lose to each other.
I think the Dems were going to push for Clinton no matter what, but if Biden had been the nominee he would've cleaned Trump's clock in those same swing states and thus in the electoral college.
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The Muslim ban - remember that? It just lost again in court - continuing its impressive oh-for-everything streak - when the 4th circuit upheld a Maryland district court ruling that the ban violated the equal protection clause.
The 9th circuit is still chewing on the broader decision that came out of Hawaii that prompted hilariously ignorant comments from AG Sessions that suggested that he didn't know (or didn't care) that Hawaii was a state; wondering out loud why a judge "on an island in the middle of the ocean" had the power to block Federal government.
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Reporter gets beaten up for having the temerity to ask a Republican candidate about the CBO report. (http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2017/05/24/greg-gianforte-fox-news-team-witnesses-gop-house-candidate-body-slam-reporter.html)
Read the bottom of that Fox News article for how the candidate tries to spin the encounter.
Gianforte was charged with misdemeanor assault today.
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The Muslim ban - remember that? It just lost again in court - continuing its impressive oh-for-everything streak - when the 4th circuit upheld a Maryland district court ruling that the ban violated the equal protection clause.
The 9th circuit is still chewing on the broader decision that came out of Hawaii that prompted hilariously ignorant comments from AG Sessions that suggested that he didn't know (or didn't care) that Hawaii was a state; wondering out loud why a judge "on an island in the middle of the ocean" had the power to block Federal government.
The en banc 4th Circuit opinion nicely summarizes (http://coop.ca4.uscourts.gov/171351.P.pdf) the travel ban as "an Executive Order that in text speaks with vague words of national security, but in context drips with religious intolerance, animus, and discrimination."
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Gianforte was charged with misdemeanor assault today.
Republicans have been on the whole "violence is bad, but..." train all day. There is no "but" here. Gianforte dragged the guy to the floor and punched him repeatedly - in a normal world he'd have withdrawn his candidacy there and then (or never made it that far in the first place).
Paul Ryan - his usual profile in courage - declined to comment and said it's up to the people of Montana to decide. WTF? When pressed, he said that violence is bad and Gianforte should apologise. What a sad sack of mushy shit.
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A Washington Post article entitled "How a Russia-friendly adviser found his way into the Trump campaign" describes how Carter Page became a "foreign policy expert" of the Trump Team. If you have seen Mr. page interviewed, you realize that he's not the brightest bulb around. Anyways:
So when Carter Page, an international businessman with an office near Trump Tower, turned up at campaign headquarters, former officials recall, Trump aides were quick to make him feel welcome.
A top Trump adviser, Sam Clovis, employed what campaign aides now acknowledge was their go-to vetting process — a quick Google search — to check out the newcomer. He seemed to have the right qualifications, according to former campaign officials — head of an energy investment firm, business degree from New York University, doctorate from the University of London.
Page was in. He joined a new Trump campaign national security advisory group, and, in late March 2016, the candidate pointed to Page, among others, as evidence of a foreign policy team with gravitas.
But what the Google search had not shown was that Page had been on the FBI’s radar since at least 2013, when Russian officials allegedly attempted to use him to get information about the energy business.
So, the emerging defense for the Trump campaign is: We are too incompetent to be guilty.
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So, the emerging defense for the Trump campaign is: We are too incompetent to be guilty.
The Russian spies who were grooming Page described him as "an idiot". I have seen him speak; how anyone could come up with any other opinion is beyond me.
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What is the basis in modern American conservatism for undermining NATO? Is it a marriage of isolationism and Trump's weird desire to make Putin happy? How does subverting the most successful and stabilizing alliance in the modern era serve American interests?
Putting aside Trump's typical boorishness today (shoving the PM of Montenegro aside to be first in a photo op, awkwardly calling for a moment of silence for the victims of the Manchester attack, calling Germany "evil" or "bad" because of their auto sales, etc...), I just don't understand the policy motivation for insulting our closest allies, falsely accusing them owing us money, and not re-affirming our commitment to the alliance. It's all so bizarre.
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What is the basis in modern American conservatism for undermining NATO? Is it a marriage of isolationism and Trump's weird desire to make Putin happy? How does subverting the most successful and stabilizing alliance in the modern era serve American interests?
Putting aside Trump's typical boorishness today (shoving the PM of Montenegro aside to be first in a photo op, awkwardly calling for a moment of silence for the victims of the Manchester attack, calling Germany "evil" or "bad" because of their auto sales, etc...), I just don't understand the policy motivation for insulting our closest allies, falsely accusing them owing us money, and not re-affirming our commitment to the alliance. It's all so bizarre.
Ignorance. No knowledge of history. No understanding of economics. Placating to a base that seeks easy answers for complicated issues that have led to feelings of isolation, relative loss of economic standing, and fear.
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The Democrats have already flipped two previously safe Republican seats in Congress via special election since Trump's victory in November. They are likely to flip a third today - Montana's statewide seat - given that the Republican candidate Greg Gianforte was running a little behind in the polls, the election is today and yesterday he physically attacked a journalist and was charged with assault. The attack was on audio tape and in front of other journalists. Apropos nothing, Gianforte also has ties to businesses funded by shady Russian financiers.
No such luck. Looks like Gianforte's assault will be rewarded with a trip to Congress. So either Montana voters didn't care, or they viewed it as a positive. Of course, 70% of the ballots having already been cast prior to the assault probably had more to do with it.
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There was a lot at work in MT, but two additional factors: Quist had real vulnerabilities (shady tax history), and Gianforte absolutely crushed him in outside donations.
Dems need to run better candidates, and they need to spend money on them. No more excuses.
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Gianforte absolutely crushed him
I see what you did there.
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No such luck. Looks like Gianforte's assault will be rewarded with a trip to Congress. So either Montana voters didn't care, or they viewed it as a positive. Of course, 70% of the ballots having already been cast prior to the assault probably had more to do with it.
The Chairman of the State Republican party had called for the party to oppose mail-in ballots (something done often in Montana) as it increases turnout, which favours Democrats. The individual counties wanted a mail-in option as it makes elections much cheaper to run (especially somewhere like Montana) and they prevailed.
I will be interested to see the split between the mail-in and election day ballots. All three major newspapers in the state endorsed Gianforte, but all three rescinded their endorsement on election day after the assault. It will be truly ironic if his campaign was saved by the mail-in ballots they feared gave their opponent an advantage.
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There was a lot at work in MT, but two additional factors: Quist had real vulnerabilities (shady tax history), and Gianforte absolutely crushed him in outside donations.
Dems need to run better candidates, and they need to spend money on them. No more excuses.
This is true, but it's hard to recruit candidates to run in a race where the opposition has a 20+ point head start. Also, the outside money came in for Gianforte because he was struggling, it's going to be very tough for the Republicans in 2018 if they have to spend millions just to defend ultra-safe seats.
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This is true, but it's hard to recruit candidates to run in a race where the opposition has a 20+ point head start. Also, the outside money came in for Gianforte because he was struggling, it's going to be very tough for the Republicans in 2018 if they have to spend millions just to defend ultra-safe seats.
The four special elections for congressional seats this year show an average +16 point trend (https://twitter.com/ForecasterEnten/status/868091934925086720) for the democrats. They need to keep that trend going in order to take the house next year.
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The four special elections for congressional seats this year show an average +16 point trend (https://twitter.com/ForecasterEnten/status/868091934925086720) for the democrats. They need to keep that trend going in order to take the house next year.
Nate Silver has pontificated that the swing to the Democrats seen thus far is what it needs to be to take back the House and Senate.
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So, it's been confirmed that the person of interest in the White House is Kushner. Apparently, he met with Russian officials (which he then later failed to disclose) just before the hacking attack started. After the election he met with Kislyak (who on Trump's team didn't?) as well as a Russian bank that was/is under US sanctions. Kushner, Flynn and Sessions all met with Kislyak and others - Flynn known to have specifically discussed sanctions - while campaign aides Paul Manaforte and Roger Stone also had multiple contacts with Russian officials.
As an aside, Flynn is also known to have caused the postponement of an attack on ISIS by the US in concert with Kurdish forces. The objection to this mission coming from Turkey, for whom - at the time - Flynn was an unregistered foreign agent.
Basically, we're through the smoke and at the fire her people. During and after the campaign, Trump's people were in contact with Russian officials and those Russians suffering under US sanctions. Right after the election, Flynn spoke with Kislyak about lifting the sanctions. There's your motive, means and opportunity.
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The problem is that "those for whom this is new information" and "those who would be moved to do something about it" are Venn circles that do not intersect.
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The times in which we can fully count on others are somewhat over, as I have experienced in the past few days. And that is why I can only say: We Europeans must really take our destiny into our own hands, of course in friendship with the United States, in friendship with Great Britain, with good neighborly relations wherever possible – also with Russia and other countries – but we have to know that we will fight for our future and our fate ourselves as Europeans.
Less than 3 months in, and the United States is no longer a world leader.
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Less than 3 months in, and the United States is no longer a world leader.
One of the great ironies of the twentieth century is that just one-sixth of the way into the twenty-first century a unified German is the leader of the free world and foremost champion of liberal democracy. Francis Fukuyama must be so confused.
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What is the basis in modern American conservatism for undermining NATO? Is it a marriage of isolationism and Trump's weird desire to make Putin happy? How does subverting the most successful and stabilizing alliance in the modern era serve American interests?
Putting aside Trump's typical boorishness today (shoving the PM of Montenegro aside to be first in a photo op, awkwardly calling for a moment of silence for the victims of the Manchester attack, calling Germany "evil" or "bad" because of their auto sales, etc...), I just don't understand the policy motivation for insulting our closest allies, falsely accusing them owing us money, and not re-affirming our commitment to the alliance. It's all so bizarre.
I think you nailed it with your first guess. NATO is his best friend's worst enemy. His "weird" affinity for Russia has been the lone thing he's been consistent about pretty much the whole time.
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I think you nailed it with your first guess. NATO is his best friend's worst enemy. His "weird" affinity for Russia has been the lone thing he's been consistent about pretty much the whole time.
I blame it on the Pussy Riot fiasco.
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I think you nailed it with your first guess. NATO is his best friend's worst enemy. His "weird" affinity for Russia has been the lone thing he's been consistent about pretty much the whole time.
I'm starting to wonder if Russia isn't Trump's ally; he's just the annoying wannabe friend that follows Russia around.
Think about it; we know the election hacking was done initially to leave Clinton so hobbled as a leader that she'd be ineffective in the world, leaving a vacuum for Putin and his oligarchs. Right up until about 11pm on election night, almost everyone (except Mrs Limey) expected Trump to lose. All the Russia stuff in his campaign was one way; there was no reciprocal love other than the ongoing hacking which they were doing anyway.
Then Trump wins, and there's still very little by way of overt support to or about Trump from Russia. Trump's people have been bothering the shit out of Kislyak - because he's the only one here - and a couple of bankers. And herein lies the rub: I think that Trump is trying to use the Presidency to alleviate the substantial debt he has in Russia. He's been loving up to Russia and all of its friends while giving Russia's enemies (NATO) the cold shoulder. But none of it is eliciting any kind of reaction from Putin.
It's important to remember that - in the bombshell story that Kushner was trying to set up a back channel to the Kremlin through the Russian embassy - Ambassador Kislyak was completely shocked at the request (in what he thought was secure communication - not in a Captain Renault kind of way).
I think Trump wants desperately to be a Putin stooge in return for debt relief (and some more incontinent hookers). He's got something to sell - America - but right now Russia isn't buying because they don't need to. If they'd put in a Manchurian Candidate, it's hard to imagine such a person doing such overt damage to the U.S. at home and abroad. Where he's failing is that Putin doesn't need to do anything for Trump to get what he wants, so Trump keeps giving him free shit trying to win his affection.
This is the ultimate irony. Trump isn't Putin's lackey, but he really, really wants to be.
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I think that Trump is trying to use the Presidency to alleviate the substantial debt he has in Russia.
This could be the ending to this pathetic tale. His fealty to Russia is undeniable. The only question is why?
Possible explanations:
Reset relations as part of some grand global strategy? Does Trump really strike anyone as able to embrace such a concept, and even if he did, why go to such underhanded means to achieve it? Just do it out in the open. This explanation seems badly wanting, to me at least.
As payback for help in the election? Possible
Cause they have dirt on him? Possible
To make a buck or cut his debt? I normally wouldn't even consider this from someone I detested, as it is so despicable. However, with Trump, I'm really starting to wonder: is he simply selling out America for personal gain. Even though it seems outrageous and cynical, it also seems to be the most likely reason.
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To make a buck or cut his debt? I normally wouldn't even consider this from someone I detested, as it is so despicable. However, with Trump, I'm really starting to wonder: is he simply selling out America for personal gain. Even though it seems outrageous and cynical, it also seems to be the most likely reason.
I agree. I think, too, that it's far from unlikely that at some low point during the campaign they decided to throw a Hail Mary with some Ruskie help. What they had to lose they were probably going to lose anyway, and what they had to gain was the White House. There's certainly nothing in Trump's history to suggest he would suddenly exhibit prudence or restraint when the chips were down.
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I agree. I think, too, that it's far from unlikely that at some low point during the campaign they decided to throw a Hail Mary with some Ruskie help. What they had to lose they were probably going to lose anyway, and what they had to gain was the White House. There's certainly nothing in Trump's history to suggest he would suddenly exhibit prudence or restraint when the chips were down.
His track record in business shows that he's not subtle, strategic or even ethical. It was the same on the campaign trail and it is the same in office. We're aghast at the brazen violation of ethical - or even behavioral - standards, but this is how he's been his whole life.
He's also suffered multiple setbacks because he's so bad at what he does; his entire business just prior to being President was licensing the brand name "Trump" (which he has now destroyed) and hosting a reality TV show. Trump sued a journalist (for $5bn) who suggested that Trump wasn't a billionaire - because he's so leveraged that his net worth was closer to $250mm. Trump lost because he couldn't show that he was a billionaire. That ill-conceived lawsuit (by the same lawyer behind the Trump University defense and who he's now retained to defend criminal charges from being in office) also gave us a hilarious but disturbing deposition by Trump in which, for example, he explained how his valuation of his net worth changes based on his current mood.
He is surrounded by chancers and grifters. But Trump himself is simply a delusional old man (he forgot Justin Trudeau's last name while speaking recently, giving us the "Justin from Canada" meme) with no moral compass (thanks Trump Sr!) who will never understand that he's doing anything wrong.
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The lawyer who Trump has retained as counsel with regard to the ongoing Trump-Russia investigation, is involved in the Trump-Russia investigation (http://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/congressional-russia-probe-now-includes-trump-lawyer-michael-cohen-n766231).
President Donald Trump's personal attorney, Michael Cohen, confirmed to NBC News that he has received requests for information from the Senate and House intelligence committees as part of their probes into Russian interference in the U.S. election.
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Supreme Leader Kim Jong Un has a magnetic personality and exudes positive energy, which is infectious to those around him. He has an unparalleled ability to communicate with people, whether he is speaking to a room of three or an arena of 30,000. He has built great relationships throughout his life and treats everyone with respect. He is brilliant with a great sense of humor … and an amazing ability to make people feel special and aspire to be more than even they thought possible.
What complete tosh. Oh, but it wasn't about Kim, it's actually White House spokeswoman Hope Hicks, in a press release about Donald Trump. Then only thing I changed was "President Trump" to "Supreme Leader Kim Jong Un". Everything else is verbatim.
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According to the Urban Dictionary:
Covfefe - when you try to type "coverage" but your hands are too small to reach the correct keys on your phone.
Oh, and Russia and Paris Climate Accords and communications director and asking world leaders to call your unsecured, ancient Android phone etc. etc., blah blah Wednesday.
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So he did it: the US has joined Nicaragua and Syria as the only non-signatories to the Paris Climate Accords. Despite it being supported by 70% of Americans, including former Exxon CEO and current Secretary of State Rex
DrTillerson along with many, many more fossil fuel CEOs. But not the coal industry or the Koch Brothers, so that's fair then.
Maybe this is what "covfefe" means.
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Maybe this is what "covfefe" means.
If covfefe means spite, then, yes. Trump isn't interested in leading. He is incapable of leading since he has no ideas, no principles, no morality, no vision. In short, if there's something Obama did that he can un-do, he will. If he catches wind of something that Obama was (or is) for, he's against it.
I'm not really all that worked up about today's predictable turn of events. I mean, it's horrible and embarrassing and all that, sure. But it's only one more in what will be a long series of these things. Private enterprise and key US states will lead the way towards carbon reduction and the further development of renewable technologies. And he can't fully exit the agreement before he gets bounced the fuck out of there anyway. But what does concern me is what's going to happen as the television inevitably tells him that Obama is getting more and more popular and he is getting less and less. Will he manufacture something terrible with Iran or North Korea? It will be terrifyingly fascinating to watch since the guys who hold the note on Trump are basically fine with the status quo in both places. But he may get to a point where he feels like he has no choice.
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Ordinarily I would think it would be fucking stupid to pay attention to anyone that tweets shit in the middle of the night. But he is the president so I get the attraction.
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Ordinarily I would think it would be fucking stupid to pay attention to anyone that tweets shit in the middle of the night. But he is the president so I get the attraction.
What he says is mostly bullshit that he will contradict soon enough - sometimes within the confines of the same sentence. I try to follow what he does, not what he says. But the "covfefe" meme is pretty fucking funny...until Clinton jumped on it and killed it (she tweeted "People in covfefe houses shouldn't throw covfefe"...like on the second day. That's the best she had?).
So, if you look at what Trump has actually achieved as far as policy...still...it was only the nomination of a Supreme Court Justice (which the Republicans had to blow up Senate rules to ram through) and now this withdrawal from the Paris climate accords. That's it. Healthcare reform won't pass the Senate (or if it does their watered down version won't pass the House); his "budget" is DOA; his wall isn't happening. Everything else has been sound and fury signifying nothing.
Now, he has been able to turn elements of the Federal government into his angry pack dogs, so the DOJ is locking up pot smokers for as long as possible and ICE is deporting all the low hanging fruit they can lay their hands on - all of which is simple cruelty - but all of these things can be undone by a wave of the hand of the person who follows him. Less so the diplomatic damage he's doing to our world standing - that's going to take some Jedi mind trick shit to sort out.
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He was elected to represent Pittsburg, not Paris...I kind of like that.
We are and have been the most ecology friendly industrial nation on the planet. This Paris deal was so skewed against the U.S. and frankly we can't afford anymore to be the world's military and ecology policeman and pay for everything. Maybe if we ask others to pay their share on world/planet issues...we can start taking care of and PAYING FOR our domestic issues. (poverty, crime, education, infrastructure...these are expensive issues that take tax dollars).
P.S. Fuck the Rangers !
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He was elected to represent Pittsburg, not Paris...I kind of like that.
Enter Pittsburgh's mayor:
The United States joins Syria, Nicaragua & Russia in deciding not to participate with world's Paris Agreement. It's now up to cities to lead ... As the Mayor of Pittsburgh, I can assure you that we will follow the guidelines of the Paris Agreement for our people, our economy & future.
https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2017/6/1/15726656/pittsburgh-mayor-trump-paris
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Pittsburg, not Paris...I kind of like that.
Lot of folks like that. It fits right the fuck on a standard-sized bumper sticker.
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He was elected to represent Pittsburg, not Paris...I kind of like that.
We are and have been the most ecology friendly industrial nation on the planet. This Paris deal was so skewed against the U.S. and frankly we can't afford anymore to be the world's military and ecology policeman and pay for everything. Maybe if we ask others to pay their share on world/planet issues...we can start taking care of and PAYING FOR our domestic issues. (poverty, crime, education, infrastructure...these are expensive issues that take tax dollars).
P.S. Fuck the Rangers !
Last year, as has been the trend for many years now, more new jobs were created in "green" energy than exist in total in the coal industry. Three times as many, in fact.
Climate change accords are not hurting the coal industry; cheaper energy alternatives are.
Climate change accords are not hurting the oil and gas industry; suppressed commodity prices are (and they're still over-producing at a rate that keeps prices down).
Meanwhile, Trump's efforts to drag American energy policy back to the 1970s will mean that China and the EU will steal a march on us in the green technologies that will dominate world demand over our lifetimes. If he has his way, we'll be trying to sell surreys in the smog outside of Tesla dealerships while coughing up a lung and trying to quell the convulsions with brown water from the tap.
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Lot of folks like that. It fits right the fuck on a standard-sized bumper sticker.
What about Paris, Texas; Paris, Tennessee; Paris, Kentucky? I'm sure they voted Trump.
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What about Paris, Texas; Paris, Tennessee; Paris, Kentucky? I'm sure they voted Trump.
Trump is working on a Lone State solution for Lebanon, TX.
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So Trump has decided that it's a good idea to reiterate in public that his Muslim ban is a Muslim ban - for which the ACLU and others interested in the pending Federal case have thanked him - while doubling down on his insult of the Mayor of London. All this while making spectacularly dumb statements about gun regulation (for which he was accused of being "genetically engineered to be stupid"), promising to work on the issue here (before heading off for a weekend of golfing) all the while leaving the Federal agency responsible for seeking out and ending those who plot such terrorist acts - the FBI - leaderless for going on a third week.
As an aside, hurricane season started last week, yet there's no one in charge at either FEMA or NOAA. Trump has also proposed massive cuts to both agencies.
There are 559 Senate-confirmable positions in the Federal government. At this point, only 39 have been confirmed, only 63 nominations have been offered by Trump's administration, leaving 442 posts simply in limbo (https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/politics/trump-administration-appointee-tracker/database/), without even a nominee for consideration. This is 137 days in, not counting the 75 days Trump had in transition after the election. I see a lot of contracts where indemnities are given with exceptions for "gross negligence and willful misconduct"; the discussion usually being that GN/WM is such a high bar to prove that it's not worth worrying about. I think we're seeing, in this administration, what gross negligence and willful misconduct looks like.
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Lot of folks like that. It fits right the fuck on a standard-sized bumper sticker.
Also, it represents a fake symbol that has nothing to do with reality. Pittsburgh's economy is driven by the medical, education, and tech industries.
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But what does concern me is what's going to happen as the television inevitably tells him that Obama is getting more and more popular and he is getting less and less. Will he manufacture something terrible with Iran or North Korea? It will be terrifyingly fascinating to watch since the guys who hold the note on Trump are basically fine with the status quo in both places. But he may get to a point where he feels like he has no choice.
Eventually there will be a terrorist attack by ISIS or some similarly motivated group in the US and his reaction will be horrifying.
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There are 559 Senate-confirmable positions in the Federal government. At this point, only 39 have been confirmed, only 63 nominations have been offered by Trump's administration, leaving 442 posts simply in limbo (https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/politics/trump-administration-appointee-tracker/database/), without even a nominee for consideration. This is 137 days in, not counting the 75 days Trump had in transition after the election. I see a lot of contracts where indemnities are given with exceptions for "gross negligence and willful misconduct"; the discussion usually being that GN/WM is such a high bar to prove that it's not worth worrying about. I think we're seeing, in this administration, what gross negligence and willful misconduct looks like.
By leaving those positions unfilled, couldn't this be viewed as the White House consolidating its power/influence by destabilizing those agencies? Maybe I'm giving them too much credit but many of the administration's actions thus far (e.g. attempted Muslim ban) don't smack of egregious incompetence to me. In many ways I think they know exactly what they're doing.
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As unfilled positions go, sounds more like the pool of acceptable candidates has totally dwindled. How many respectable Republicans want to work for him? Of those, how many will he tolerate? So, we are left with Republican dregs like the Milwaukee sheriff who are crazy and popular enough to appeal to Trump, but not so popular that they might overshadow him.
If it is intentional, it will surely backfire. Using Limey's example, we will have a natural disaster, and the non-government government won't be able to respond, yielding public calls for more government.
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By leaving those positions unfilled, couldn't this be viewed as the White House consolidating its power/influence by destabilizing those agencies?
This is precisely what they're doing.
Also, as a point of mild interest given the happenings over the weekend, the ambassadorial post to the United Kingdom is currently unfilled. I'm hearing that it's taking so long because the White House can't decide between Ted Nugent and Kid Rock.
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By leaving those positions unfilled, couldn't this be viewed as the White House consolidating its power/influence by destabilizing those agencies? Maybe I'm giving them too much credit but many of the administration's actions thus far (e.g. attempted Muslim ban) don't smack of egregious incompetence to me. In many ways I think they know exactly what they're doing.
Most of this administration, especially the Muslim ban, is malevolence tempered by incompetence.
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Most of this administration, especially the Muslim ban, is malevolence tempered by incompetence.
Bingo. They inflict cruelty wherever possible through existing structures (e.g. ICE deporting all the low hanging fruit - ironically leaving no one to pick fruit hanging at any height), but in all other areas their cruelty is aspirational. In no area are they anything other than cruel.
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By leaving those positions unfilled, couldn't this be viewed as the White House consolidating its power/influence by destabilizing those agencies? Maybe I'm giving them too much credit but many of the administration's actions thus far (e.g. attempted Muslim ban) don't smack of egregious incompetence to me. In many ways I think they know exactly what they're doing.
Sitting pretty in the middle of Trump's basket of personality disorders is his paranoia. His inner circle comprises immediate family members and a handful of deplorables who've pledged fealty to him. Yet, despite such pledges, the non-family members drift in and out of favor with regularity, suggesting that only blood relations and their spouses are truly trusted...and maybe not even the latter.
Example: his NATO speech was twice appended by McMasters, Mattis and Tillerson to pledge support for Article V, only for Trump to remove such a pledge three times - including the final version which MM&T didn't see. The alleged grown ups in the room aren't in the room when he makes his final choices. This is terrifying.
Trump claims that many of the unfilled positions are that way on purpose; claiming that the positions are irrelevant/wasteful. But many are pivotal, must-fill positions and he cannot find even unsuitable candidates to offer up for his lap-dog Senate to ram through. Was the barrel scraped dry when he scooped up Betsy Devos?
Word is that he wants to fire Priebus, who would then become Ambassador to Greece, but can't find a replacement. Various names have been floated for FBI Director, including John Cornyn and Joe Lieberman, only for each to quickly disavow any suggestion that they're interested. Trump is toxic and, as a result, his administration will continue to spiral out of control and further into delusional, paranoid chaos.
If the Mueller investigation gets to Kushner, I fully expect him to nuke someone. I am serious. All he has been able to achieve, which is virtually fuck-all, is what he can achieve by fiat, and that's nominate Gorsuch, cancel the Paris agreement and bomb Iraq Syria. He can send the nukes flying on his own whim, and has already shown that he'll take action to move Russi-a-lago off the front page. He will nuke someone; he won't be able to sop himself because it is the ultimate expression of the power he has as President. There's no way he leaves office without pressing that button.
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Luckily he literally can't nuke anyone all by himself. 'Cause, yeah, that would be, in the immortal words of the recently departed Private Hudson, "Game over, man! Game over!"
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It is like someone's goofy retired uncle, who believes every ridiculous, over the top, forwarded email and kooky Foxnews conspiracy is running the country. Wait, that is actually what is going on. Our idiot in charge's world view is formed by Breibart, Fox & Friends and InfoWars. None of what is happening is the least bit surprising.
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If the Mueller investigation gets to Kushner, I fully expect him to nuke someone. I am serious.
I don't think he cares enough about Kushner (or anyone else) to do anything suicidal should they get taken down. Sadly, the old Nixonian adage 'when the president does it that means it's not illegal' is largely true. So there's not very much that can touch Trump right now other than impeachment, and we all know that this congress isn't going to impeach Trump regardless of what may be found down the line or of what he does in between now and then. And I feel like it is very unlikely that the Democrats recapture the house in 2018.
Which is why previously I mentioned the one and only thing Trump does care about, which is himself and his image. If the television tells Trump that his own popularity is tanking while Obama's is skyrocketing, well, that's when I think you can start worrying about something extreme and irreparable happening.
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It is like someone's goofy retired uncle, who believes every ridiculous, over the top, forwarded email and kooky Foxnews conspiracy is running the country. Wait, that is actually what is going on. Our idiot in charge's world view is formed by Breibart, Fox & Friends and InfoWars. None of what is happening is the least bit surprising.
His first tweet about London was a retweet of Drudge. Think about that. He has the entire US intel service at his beck and call, and he goes with info from a bullshit website.
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Europe finally to start paying their share...the Cold War is over folks. We are a trillion dollars in debt.
America first...about time.
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Europe finally to start paying their share...the Cold War is over folks. We are a trillion dollars in debt.
America first...about time.
You understand that they aren't paying us, right?
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Europe finally to start paying their share...the Cold War is over folks. We are a trillion dollars in debt.
America first...about time.
Pay their share for what? What ledger are you looking at?
And that "America First" slogan has a very specific history that is being invoked that's not a good thing at all.
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Europe finally to start paying their share...the Cold War is over folks. We are a trillion dollars in debt.
America first...about time.
More like Trump first, it is unbelievable that anyone was stupid enough to think it would be any other way. Sad!
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Paying for what ?
How about the vast majority of NATO...weapons, bases.
Not to mention the thousands of troops...
And yes I know they are not paying us...we are just paying their defense bills.
We went to Eorope and spilled our blood...more than once. And then protected them from the Russian bear. We can't afford it any longer and the threat from the East has deminished with the fall and breakup of the U.S.S.R.
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Reality Winner.
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Paying for what ?
How about the vast majority of NATO...weapons, bases.
Not to mention the thousands of troops...
And yes I know they are not paying us...we are just paying their defense bills.
We went to Eorope and spilled our blood...more than once. And then protected them from the Russian bear. We can't afford it any longer and the threat from the East has deminished with the fall and breakup of the U.S.S.R.
I think you misunderstand. The point is that they are *not* paying us. You act as if Trump, in some fit of High Noon-inspired leadership, somehow calmly waltzed into Europe, smacked around Germany and Luxembourg, and took their lunch money.
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I'd bet 2/3rds of Trump voters would believe that, if they got a forwarded email claiming it happened
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And our presence in Europe isn't something they are begging for. A lot of the reasons NATO has lasted so long is that it is in our best interest.
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And our presence in Europe isn't something they are begging for. A lot of the reasons NATO has lasted so long is that it is in our best interest.
Can't be emphasized enough. The 'US as victim' narrative is so appealing to Trump voters, but so at odds with reality.
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Paying for what ?
How about the vast majority of NATO...weapons, bases.
Not to mention the thousands of troops...
And yes I know they are not paying us...we are just paying their defense bills.
We went to Eorope and spilled our blood...more than once. And then protected them from the Russian bear. We can't afford it any longer and the threat from the East has deminished with the fall and breakup of the U.S.S.R.
We are paying our own defense bills. None of the criticisms you identified makes any sense or is based in fact, unless your position is that the US spends too much money on defense overall (which I would agree with, but that spending has little to do with NATO).
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We are paying our own defense bills. None of the criticisms you identified makes any sense or is based in fact, unless your position is that the US spends too much money on defense overall (which I would agree with, but that spending has little to do with NATO).
And President Trump's fantasy budget cuts all spending BUT defense, which increases dramatically.
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I think you misunderstand. The point is that they are *not* paying us. You act as if Trump, in some fit of High Noon-inspired leadership, somehow calmly waltzed into Europe, smacked around Germany and Luxembourg, and took their lunch money.
Not so...but our President let them know that the role of NATO needs to change, and the enormous amount of US tax dollars being expended needs to stop. Of course NATO has been a great help to US foreign policy...and we have treated it as such. But the post cold war world is a different animal. Russia is not the Soviet Union. Germany has been reunified.
Europe needs to take care of it's own house. THE U.S. TREASURY IS BROKE...WE CAN'T AFFORD. We have our own domestic problems to solve and pay for.
We have another seemingly endless war to fight. It's been 16 years since 9/11. Things are not going well in Libya, Syria, Iraq, Yemen...the Taliban has resurged in Afghanistan. Isis is spreading through Europe. We have had to think past our own sovereignty. We have had to empower domestic surveillance, international police, and intelligence agencies...organizations that our founding fathers told us to be wary of.
Perhaps NATO needs to turn it's attention to this war against ISIS... with all members contributing equally.
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The US does spend the highest GDP percentage (>3%) while many NATO countries are below the 2% target.
http://www.economist.com/blogs/graphicdetail/2017/02/daily-chart-11
Maybe that's what AstroNut is talking about? I don't know a lot about the subject, but my reading of the situation is that there is no NATO "fund" that countries pay into, it's just a commitment to spend a certain percentage of their GDP on their own defense.
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Not so...but our President let them know
I do not think our President knows anything to let anyone know something. But, I like that you have faith in him.
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Not so...but our President let them know that the role of NATO needs to change, and the enormous amount of US tax dollars being expended needs to stop. Of course NATO has been a great help to US foreign policy...and we have treated it as such. But the post cold war world is a different animal. Russia is not the Soviet Union. Germany has been reunified.
Europe needs to take care of it's own house. THE U.S. TREASURY IS BROKE...WE CAN'T AFFORD. We have our own domestic problems to solve and pay for.
We have another seemingly endless war to fight. It's been 16 years since 9/11. Things are not going well in Libya, Syria, Iraq, Yemen...the Taliban has resurged in Afghanistan. Isis is spreading through Europe. We have had to think past our own sovereignty. We have had to empower domestic surveillance, international police, and intelligence agencies...organizations that our founding fathers told us to be wary of.
Perhaps NATO needs to turn it's attention to this war against ISIS... with all members contributing equally.
So you want to cut defense spending. Fair enough. But that has zero to do with the fact that other NATO members aren't going to give us squat.
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Isn't Europe our largest trading partner (at least before Brexit and Trump pissing them off)? Not everyone buys into the idea that Russia has been tamed and is no threat. I'd be surprised if the Baltics and most of Europe would subscribe to this idea, not to mention Ukraine. So, if NATO is emasculated and Europe is destabilized, it hurts the American and world economy. The debate should at least address this fundamental aspect. Who should pay how much is certainly worthy of debate, but I'm not sure that the idea that the bear has been tamed and we are simply bailing out the sponging Europeans is worthy. Particularly given recent events.
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The US does spend the highest GDP percentage (>3%) while many NATO countries are below the 2% target.
http://www.economist.com/blogs/graphicdetail/2017/02/daily-chart-11
Maybe that's what AstroNut is talking about? I don't know a lot about the subject, but my reading of the situation is that there is no NATO "fund" that countries pay into, it's just a commitment to spend a certain percentage of their GDP on their own defense.
The 2% is a goal everyone agreed to a couple of years ago. The commitment is mutual defense, which is the cornerstone of the alliance since the 1940s.
In fact, the only time Article 5 (the mutual defense commitment that Trump became the first president not to verbally reaffirm) has been invoked was in response to 9/11. Our NATO allies supplied air defense over the US and sent troops to Afghanistan (where they still are).
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Perhaps NATO needs to turn it's attention to this war against ISIS... with all members contributing equally.
Not really up on current events, are you?
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Not so...but our President let them know that the role of NATO needs to change, and the enormous amount of US tax dollars being expended needs to stop.
Let's just make this as black and white as possible: All members of NATO are paying their share of the joint bills of NATO. However, each member is required to spend 2% of its GDP on its own military, to support the mutual defense element of the treaty. BUT, the 2% mark does not have to be reached until 2020 (I think), so no one is currently delinquent on this.
So when Trump says that NATO members are not paying their bills, he is lying. And when he says that "money is pouring in" to NATO, he is lying. The money doesn't come in to NATO, it goes to the companies that supply military hardware. The Federal government won't see a dime of that spending.
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So, yesterday, Rogers and Coats - the two Trump administration officials who, according to well-sourced press reports, were asked by Trump to pressure Comey into dropping the Russia investigation - flatly refused to answer questions about any such conversation while under oath in front of the Senate Intelligence Committee yesterday. They were pressed and pressed and pressed by Republicans and Democrats alike, and simply stonewalled.
Let's be clear on this: these two gentlemen are the NSA Director and Director of National Intelligence respectively, so this committee is the one that has oversight of them. And they weren't just being a bit shifty; in one exchange, Coats was asked for the legal basis upon which he was relying to refuse to answer a direct question, and he said that he was not aware of any. Essentially, their boss asked them what they've been doing at work, and they said "Nunya!"
One Senator summed it up perfectly, saying that they were working very hard not to answer a yes/no question when a "no" answer would be so easy. Which means the answer isn't "no".
To put this in perspective, the first article of impeachment against Nixon was the obstruction of justice charge that stemmed from his taped conversation with HR Haldeman in which he discussed the strategy of having the CIA tell the FBI to back off the Watergate investigation. He never actually did this (that we know of), but planning to do it was enough. Here, the DNI and NSA Director are both refusing to say that Trump did not have a conversation with them about dropping the Flynn investigation and, meanwhile, as I type, Comey will be reading his statement to the Senate Intelligence Committee - under oath - in which he will state that Trump personally told him to drop the investigation into Mike Flynn.
Nixon was ousted just for musing about doing what Trump appears to have done - ask others to obstruct justice on his behalf - and thereafter he went and did it himself. This is not comparable to Watergate, it's so far beyond Watergate now it's ridiculous that the Trump administration hasn't already been burned to the ground to prevent further infection.
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Nixon was ousted just for musing about doing what Trump appears to have done - ask others to obstruct justice on his behalf - and thereafter he went and did it himself. This is not comparable to Watergate, it's so far beyond Watergate now it's ridiculous that the Trump administration hasn't already been burned to the ground to prevent further infection.
It took a very long time for the Republicans to finally turn on Nixon. It will take even longer with Trump, if ever at all. There are simply way more wingnut constituents out there now than there were 43 years ago.
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It took a very long time for the Republicans to finally turn on Nixon. It will take even longer with Trump, if ever at all. There are simply way more wingnut constituents out there now than there were 43 years ago.
And Nixon wasn't ousted, he quit. It will be extremely difficult to get Trump to do that.
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And Nixon wasn't ousted, he quit. It will be extremely difficult to get Trump to do that.
Nixon resigned because he was told by leaders from the House and Senate - including Republicans - that he was going to be impeached. Trump won't quit and this Congress won't impeach, or even threaten to do so...
...until their own political heads are on the chopping block - which is what drove Republicans to turn against Nixon. They did not want to drag his dead carcass through the upcoming midterms. Still, the Republicans lost 49 seats in the House and 4 in the Senate that year. Such a wave would easily flip the House and Senate majorities to the Democrats in 2018, which would put them all in very serious legal peril.
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The problem is, Trump will go nuclear on the Republicans if they tried to do anything, and his (not insubstantial) group of diehard supporters could destroy the Rs at midterms.
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Comey: "Lordy, I hope there are tapes." Classic.
Interestingly, it is the 21st century so "tapes" aren't physical things. If the recordings were made, and were electronic, and get deleted, then a computer specialist will be able to find a record of the deletions if not recover the files themselves.
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GOP senators telling Comey that he should have stood up to Trump sooner, and more forcefully, are destroying any remaining sense of irony that was left.
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GOP senators telling Comey that he should have stood up to Trump sooner, and more forcefully, are destroying any remaining sense of irony that was left.
Not Texas' John Cornyn! No, he asked about Clinton's emails.
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Not Texas' John Cornyn! No, he asked about Clinton's emails.
McCain also discussed the FBI's investigation into "Mr Clinton's" emails, and then referred to his witness as "President Comey".
Also, there are too many states, please eliminate three.
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McCain was lost.
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On the other side of the things I thought Comey's slap at Lynch was more than insignificant.
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Not Texas' John Cornyn! No, he asked about Clinton's emails.
Headline on foxnews.com right now:
Comey says he considered calling for a special counsel for Clinton server probe
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McCain was lost.
I just heard it, but it was sad to hear him that way.
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He's a straight-shooter. No wonder no one likes him.
It's tragicomic that Bill Clinton's tarmac chat with Lynch probably led to Comey's initial testimony re: the meritless email scandal, which led to his duty to correct, which led to the Anthony Weiner-related bombshell just prior to the election, which led to this disastrous presidency. It took a singularly ugly Rube Goldberg device to get where we are today.
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I just heard it, but it was sad to hear him that way.
Agreed.
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He's a straight-shooter. No wonder no one likes him.
It's tragicomic that Bill Clinton's tarmac chat with Lynch probably led to Comey's initial testimony re: the meritless email scandal, which led to his duty to correct, which led to the Anthony Weiner-related bombshell just prior to the election, which led to this disastrous presidency. It took a singularly ugly Rube Goldberg device to get where we are today.
It wasn't just the tarmac chat. She also tried to direct his narrative regarding the server. Both of which were completely unnecessary. And there's no probably about his testimony. He said both of those things were why he came out publicly. It looks to me like the unnecessary dick-stepping in the previous administration may have directly led to Hillary's loss. Which then leads to the current dick-stepping in this administration. But it also makes me think that if Hillary had been elected the same Obama admin dick-steppers would still be there dick-stepping and we'd still be sitting here watching congressional investigations into said dick-stepping. In other words we had two bad candidates for president.
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It wasn't just the tarmac chat. She also tried to direct his narrative regarding the server. Both of which were completely unnecessary. And there's no probably about his testimony. He said both of those things were why he came out publicly. It looks to me like the unnecessary dick-stepping in the previous administration may have directly led to Hillary's loss. Which then leads to the current dick-stepping in this administration. But it also makes me think that if Hillary had been elected the same Obama admin dick-steppers would still be there dick-stepping and we'd still be sitting here watching congressional investigations into said dick-stepping. In other words we had two bad candidates for president.
Dick-stepping about having an unsecured email server on which you may have stored two or three confidential emails out of tens of thousands doesn't even come close to the President carrying around an ancient (by technology standards), unsecured Android phone on which he tweets, calls other world leaders and which can have the camera and microphone turned on by a 10-year old (or a Russian or ISIS). And that's one of the more minor problems with the Trump presidency.
Clinton was a horrible candidate. But there is no equivalency to what would've been her ongoing email scandal and the multiple scandals, corruption and crimes perpetrated by the Trump administration.
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But what about all the people she murdered?
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Dick-stepping about having an unsecured email server on which you may have stored two or three confidential emails out of tens of thousands doesn't even come close to the President carrying around an ancient (by technology standards), unsecured Android phone on which he tweets, calls other world leaders and which can have the camera and microphone turned on by a 10-year old (or a Russian or ISIS). And that's one of the more minor problems with the Trump presidency.
Clinton was a horrible candidate. But there is no equivalency to what would've been her ongoing email scandal and the multiple scandals, corruption and crimes perpetrated by the Trump administration.
Right, but with a Clinton presidency and a GOP house and Senate we would have non-stop investigations and hearings about the White House. Chaffetz promised as much before the election, only (along with the rest of the GOP congressmen) to suddenly get disinterested in congressional oversight after Trump won.
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Dick-stepping about having an unsecured email server on which you may have stored two or three confidential emails out of tens of thousands doesn't even come close to the President carrying around an ancient (by technology standards), unsecured Android phone on which he tweets, calls other world leaders and which can have the camera and microphone turned on by a 10-year old (or a Russian or ISIS). And that's one of the more minor problems with the Trump presidency.
Clinton was a horrible candidate. But there is no equivalency to what would've been her ongoing email scandal and the multiple scandals, corruption and crimes perpetrated by the Trump administration.
Step out of your anti-Trump fervor for a moment. You missed the point. Bench got part of it. The other part is Hillary is in part blaming Comey for losing. The reality is it was Obama's people who screwed her, and she and they didn't even know it.
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Right, but with a Clinton presidency and a GOP house and Senate we would have non-stop investigations and hearings about the White House. Chaffetz promised as much before the election, only (along with the rest of the GOP congressmen) to suddenly get disinterested in congressional oversight after Trump won.
Yes, it would have been a massive distraction and congress would've been completely dysfunctional. I.e. exactly as it was for the last 6 years of the Obama administration. The difference being that the topics of the investigations would've been minor, at best, transgressions. In the meantime, we would have had a boringly competent administration.
With Trump, we have rampant self-dealing, staggering incompetence, security breaches that are on a level wholly more serious than Clinton's server, and the stench of corruption that would make New Jersey wonder what that smell is. Also, we're now going through a whole series of congressional investigations into Trump, so we got all the congressional-Kabuki down side anyway, to go along with this monkey-shit-fight of an administration.
#winning
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Having Trump's attorney give a news conference, without taking questions just makes him look guilty. It would have been better to just have Spicer or Huckabee get up there and bullshit for twenty minutes.
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Step out of your anti-Trump fervor for a moment. You missed the point. Bench got part of it. The other part is Hillary is in part blaming Comey for losing. The reality is it was Obama's people who screwed her, and she and they didn't even know it.
If you want to follow the thread back to the true proximate cause, it was Anthony Weiner's dick pics.
But it was madness to nominate Clinton when they knew that she was one email revelation away from disaster. Ironically, it turned out that she was zero email revelations away from disaster, just the word "emails" (along with her 1980s style campaign and lack of charisma) was enough to do her in.
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Having Trump's attorney give a news conference, without taking questions just makes him look guilty. It would have been better to just have Spicer or Huckabee get up there and bullshit for twenty minutes.
That bad, huh?
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In my mind, yes. It never looks good for someone to be represented by their criminal attorney. Especially an attorney who refuses to take questions, but is comfortable with claiming that the witnesses against his client (Comey) is lying about key facts and has committed a crime by "leaking" conversations with his client. Spicer and Huckabee are familiar, and the listener can just assume it is more of the comically incompetent administration; instead, it looks like an attorney ginning up arguments for a trial against his client.
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Comey should have kept his mouth shut concerning the Clinton investigation. His mistake was holding a news conference both exonerating her and then another one to announce the reopening, after the dickwagger's wife's email revelation, a few days before the election. What was that all about...say nothing until indictment. The best thing that has happened to the FBI was him getting the boot.
"He's a nut job"...did someone already say that ?
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and has committed a crime by "leaking" conversations with his client.
Is he claiming that releasing information regarding unclassified conversations is somehow a crime or is he implying something else?
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Is he claiming that releasing information regarding unclassified conversations is somehow a crime or is he implying something else?
My impression is that your characterization is correct: that Comey releasing his memos on his conversations is a crime. Remember, he is from the Trump camp, so don't apply logic or rigor.
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Chris Matthews take on Comey testimony...
http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/chris-matthews-trump-russia-collusion-theory-came-apart-with-comey-testimony/article/2625372
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Comey should have kept his mouth shut concerning the Clinton investigation. His mistake was holding a news conference both exonerating her and then another one to announce the reopening, after the dickwagger's wife's email revelation, a few days before the election. What was that all about...say nothing until indictment. The best thing that has happened to the FBI was him getting the boot.
"He's a nut job"...did someone already say that ?
Comey said he felt it necessary to clear the air vis a vis Clinton's emails because it was so politically sensitive. Unfortunately, that created what he described as a "duty to disclose" when they re-opened the investigation because of Weiner's laptop. It was that action that caused an immediate and irredeemable drop in the polls for Clinton, but it was set in motion by the earlier air-clearing statements.
He isn't a nut job, he's Dudley Do-Right. He was trying to be as upstanding as possible, but ended up boxing himself in by accident.
FYI, Trump's comments about Comey, both on Twitter and to the Russian delegation he received in the Oval Office, mean that he's S.O.L. on pushing for privilege or confidentiality on this topic. You can't run your mouth and then claim that it's a secret.
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In the words of Hillary Clinton, this whole thing is a "NOTHING-BURGER"
No need for privilege or confidentiality on this topic
"Trump lawyer says James Comey made ‘unauthorized disclosures’ of privileged talks"
Lock him up....lock him up...lock him up.
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Chris Matthews take on Comey testimony...
http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/chris-matthews-trump-russia-collusion-theory-came-apart-with-comey-testimony/article/2625372
Looking at the specific quotes from Matthews, the fact that Trump wasn't / isn't under investigation personally is a distraction. Nevertheless, he still - according to Comey's sworn testimony - told Comey to drop the investigation into Mike Flynn. Trump then fired Comey and said that he did it because of the Russia investigation (to Lester Holt on live TV) and that it relieved the pressure on him (to the Russians, as documented in a White House transcript). All of that is grounds for an obstruction of justice charge whether or not Flynn is important to the Russia investigation.
The fact that Flynn isn't central to the Russia investigation is also irrelevant to Trump's actions. We have no idea why Trump was trying to get Flynn off the FBI's radar, but just because it might not have been to stop Flynn rolling over on him doesn't mean that things didn't happen the way Comey said it did. Also, Flynn's lawyer has stated publicly that Flynn has a story to tell and will tell it in return for immunity. The fact that he doesn't (yet) have immunity to testify means either they don't think his story is worth it, or that they don't need to give him immunity because they have enough evidence from elsewhere, or that there is no "there" there. The latter seemingly highly unlikely given Trump's extreme action to relieve the pressure of the investigation from himself.
In the end, that's a very cherry-picked set of quotes from Matthews, in which he muses that Comey's testimony means that there isn't any collusion between Trump and Russia. Well, that's what Director Mueller is now charged with pursuing, so that investigation remains ongoing. That's the thing about investigations, you keep going until you get to the end of the line. That's why, for example, mafia investigations start by nailing a low level goon for some shit, and then getting him to roll over on the next guy up the chain. Rinse, repeat until you reach the top.
As an interesting aside, Mueller has been adding prosecutors to his team. Prosecutors with experience of going after organized crime.
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It wasn't just the tarmac chat. She also tried to direct his narrative regarding the server. Both of which were completely unnecessary. And there's no probably about his testimony. He said both of those things were why he came out publicly. It looks to me like the unnecessary dick-stepping in the previous administration may have directly led to Hillary's loss. Which then leads to the current dick-stepping in this administration. But it also makes me think that if Hillary had been elected the same Obama admin dick-steppers would still be there dick-stepping and we'd still be sitting here watching congressional investigations into said dick-stepping. In other words we had two bad candidates for president.
I can certainly understand the motivation, but when millions of ordinary Republican voters pulled the lever for someone they themselves deemed unfit to serve, it's at best spurious to blame Trump's victory on the democrats. If nothing else, it condescends to those voters to imagine that they lack the agency to make good decisions independent of tribal dynamics.
Trump is happening because regular Republicans voted for him en masse. Just own it.
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Going rather farther afield here, I've recently been really enjoying this new "writings from left, right and center" feature on NYT's Web site. Last week they posted a piece about never-Trumpers (http://www.dennisprager.com/why-conservatives-still-attack-trump/) from a talk show host named Dennis Prager. His essay begins:
"When people you know well, admire, and who share your values do something you strongly oppose, you have two options:
1) Cease admiring them or 2) try to understand them and change their minds."
I was stunned that nowhere did he acknowledge or even hint at the third option, which is to re-examine one's own beliefs and allow for a little doubt! I wonder how widespread this way of thinking is and if it is distinctly more a trend among right-leaning than left-leaning minds, (And I wonder honestly: When I brought this up among a group of similarly left family and friends the other day, no one immediately shared my reaction.)
Either way, it certainly seems to me like a fine crystallization of one of our Big Problems as a Society: that we inflexibly assume our rectitude, and our most instinctive strategies are to scorn or persuade rather than engage with doubt.
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Going rather farther afield here, I've recently been really enjoying this new "writings from left, right and center" feature on NYT's Web site. Last week they posted a piece about never-Trumpers (http://www.dennisprager.com/why-conservatives-still-attack-trump/) from a talk show host named Dennis Prager. His essay begins:
"When people you know well, admire, and who share your values do something you strongly oppose, you have two options:
1) Cease admiring them or 2) try to understand them and change their minds."
I was stunned that nowhere did he acknowledge or even hint at the third option, which is to re-examine one's own beliefs and allow for a little doubt! I wonder how widespread this way of thinking is and if it is distinctly more a trend among right-leaning than left-leaning minds, (And I wonder honestly: When I brought this up among a group of similarly left family and friends the other day, no one immediately shared my reaction.)
Either way, it certainly seems to me like a fine crystallization of one of our Big Problems as a Society: that we inflexibly assume our rectitude, and our most instinctive strategies are to scorn or persuade rather than engage with doubt.
I would think it has less to do with right or left but how far out on the extreme of either end you are. You get out to the extreme in large part because of the heavy strength of faith you put in your own position regardless of how well or poorly reasoned.
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Meanwhile in the UK... that backfired.
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Meanwhile in the UK... that backfired.
Jonah Keri nailed it:
If you call a Snap election, someone will say I've Got the Power
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Meanwhile in the UK... that backfired.
Jonah Keri nailed it:
If you call a Snap election, someone will say I've Got the Power
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Meanwhile in the UK... that backfired.
May's position is untenable, so she'll likely go soon. In the meantime, the Tories are partnering with the DUP, effectively handing control of government to 10 anti-same sex marriage, anti-abortion, climate deniers (https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2017/jun/09/from-climate-denial-to-abortion-heres-six-dup-policies-you-should-know-about).
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May's position is untenable, so she'll likely go soon. In the meantime, the Tories are partnering with the DUP, effectively handing control of government to 10 anti-same sex marriage, anti-abortion, climate deniers (https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2017/jun/09/from-climate-denial-to-abortion-heres-six-dup-policies-you-should-know-about).
Just like us!
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Trump today emphatically contradicted Comey's sworn testimony, even offering to repeat his version of events under oath.
So now we know: there are no tapes.
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Just like us!
Putting the "special" in special relationship.
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Trump today emphatically contradicted Comey's sworn testimony, even offering to repeat his version of events under oath.
So now we know: there are no tapes.
Update on the tapes. Trump is spinning out a thread; proclaiming that he'll make an announcement about the tapes very soon. Because...sweeps week? Anyway, there's a delicious irony here: Trump is using the possibility of recordings of his conversations with Comey as support for his innocence, whereas the non-existence of tapes means that his false claims on the subject could be construed as additional interference with Comey, adding more layers to potential obstruction of justice charges. Pressuring a witness against you into silence is classic obstruction.
The first rule, when in a hole, is stop digging...
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May's position is untenable, so she'll likely go soon. In the meantime, the Tories are partnering with the DUP, effectively handing control of government to 10 anti-same sex marriage, anti-abortion, climate deniers (https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2017/jun/09/from-climate-denial-to-abortion-heres-six-dup-policies-you-should-know-about).
It occurred to me over the weekend: May's election failure was the result of an attempt by her to shore up her position as PM by increasing her party's majority; while the Brexit debacle came about because May's predecessor - Cameron - wanted to throw some red meat to the extremities of his party in order to shore up his position as PM.
Cameron resigned; May will do so soon. Hoist on their own petards.
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So do you guys see an impeachment ahead for Trump?
Indictment for obstruction of justice?
Treason for talking with the Russians?
Election tampering in Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Ohio (something illegal must have happened)? Trump carries 2600 counties to Clinton 500…something fishy? Are the ignorant voters that spread out ? 84% of geographic U.S. ?
Illegal harassment of Illegal aliens?
Failure to support a constitutional amendment to outlaw an, ‘America First’, agenda, because it will hurt the feelings of other nations around the globe.
Unfair treatment of trading partner countries for demanding fair trade, as well as free trade?
Proposing a budget that will cut hundreds of billions of dollars in federal spending, just because we don't want to burden future generations with our debt?
Disregarding the global climate crisis and not looking to China as the model of good climate behavior ?
For labeling these worldwide terrorist attacks as, Radical Islamic Terrorism, and not just ignoring it until it goes away. Or at the very least, consider it isolated instances of unorganized, lone wolf attacks.
More charges are currently being debated on all the news/media outlets, Washington political halls, and foreign capitals around the world (except Moscow)…stay tuned.
We could set it up like the Nuremburg trails and have Nancy Pelosi officiate…include the Trump kids as defendants…greedy little spoiled brats. Have CNN and MCNBC bid for exclusive rights, with all proceeds going to fund Planned Parenthood ?
There is much work to be done… waiting for Mueller and the investigation to bear fruit.
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So do you guys see an impeachment ahead for Trump?
Indictment for obstruction of justice?
Treason for talking with the Russians?
Election tampering in Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Ohio (something illegal must have happened)? Trump carries 2600 counties to Clinton 500…something fishy? Are the ignorant voters that spread out ? 84% of geographic U.S. ?
Illegal harassment of Illegal aliens?
Failure to support a constitutional amendment to outlaw an, ‘America First’, agenda, because it will hurt the feelings of other nations around the globe.
Unfair treatment of trading partner countries for demanding fair trade, as well as free trade?
Proposing a budget that will cut hundreds of billions of dollars in federal spending, just because we don't want to burden future generations with our debt?
Disregarding the global climate crisis and not looking to China as the model of good climate behavior ?
For labeling these worldwide terrorist attacks as, Radical Islamic Terrorism, and not just ignoring it until it goes away. Or at the very least, consider it isolated instances of unorganized, lone wolf attacks.
More charges are currently being debated on all the news/media outlets, Washington political halls, and foreign capitals around the world (except Moscow)…stay tuned.
We could set it up like the Nuremburg trails and have Nancy Pelosi officiate…include the Trump kids as defendants…greedy little spoiled brats. Have CNN and MCNBC bid for exclusive rights, with all proceeds going to fund Planned Parenthood ?
There is much work to be done… waiting for Mueller and the investigation to bear fruit.
Quoting this for posterity the next time you want to call someone a snowflake. To call this a straw man would be an insult to straw men.
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Well, can't say your username didn't warn us.
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Quoting this for posterity the next time you want to call someone a snowflake. To call this a straw man would be an insult to straw men.
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Snowflake?
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So do you guys see an impeachment ahead for Trump?
Not unless the House and Senate get flipped next election. As far as high crimes or misdemeanors go, obstruction of justice worked for Nixon and Clinton. The question is whether what Trump has done rises to the level. There's certainly a litany of dumb-ass things he's said that would create grounds for such a charge. According to Comey, Director Mueller is looking into whether there's an act or acts that rises to the level of criminal obstruction. I'll let him make that call, and we'll see what Congress does with it thereafter.
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These are common people, salt of the earth. You know... morons.
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Quoting this for posterity the next time you want to call someone a snowflake. To call this a straw man would be an insult to straw men.
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Why all the name calling...sorry if my comments upset you...not all of morons are as smart and all knowing as you.
Try to accept the election results and get a grip on that anger.
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Why all the name calling...sorry if my comments upset you...not all of morons are as smart and all knowing as you.
Try to accept the election results and get a grip on that anger.
You are trying way too hard.
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Why all the name calling...sorry if my comments upset you...not all of morons are as smart and all knowing as you.
I see that quoting one movie line is now "name calling", given that in your second quote, I did not call you a name. I merely pointed out your pathetic whining.
I'm far from all knowing. Knowing what you don't know is a major part of life. But given that, I'm 100% confident that I'm smarter than the President. Given what little grasp of facts you have shown, I'm equally confident I'm smarter than you.
Try to accept the election results and get a grip on that anger.
Trolls that are far smarter and more talented than you have made me angry. You haven't come close to making me angry.
I understand the election results quite well. That doesn't mean hat I sit back and sip cocktails while I watch a buffoon destroy the presidency.
I disagree with Mike Pence on many things, but at least I don't wake up at night thinking he will accidentally start a war.
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I disagree with Mike Pence on many things, but at least I don't wake up at night thinking he will accidentally start a war.
Trump has contradicted Tillerson twice now on Qatar, siding with the Saudis rather than with his Secretary of State. It has been speculated (by reasonable people) that, after he accused Qatar of being a state sponsor of terror, Trump did not know that the U.S. has 10,000 troops stationed there.
He will get people killed before this is over. The only question is how many: a lot, or apocalyptic numbers?
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Try to accept the election results and get a grip on that anger.
This is the attitude that drives me nuts the most... like this election was a sporting event and there was a winner and a loser and every fucking person has to just stfu and deal with it. It literally ignores every presidency ever before this one.
I won't "try to accept" this election... why the hell should I not be angry? Can we only protest an election if we bastardize the Boston Tea Party for everything that event was against?
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MusicMan...upon hindsight, I am the one who got too emotional. MusicMan I apologize for the pointed comments.
This past election demanded a change in Washington D.C. Too bad we could not have just unelected the entire congress with one referendum vote...Congress would have lost. I think we need term limits. That may have been enough to satisfy the blood thirst.
Instead we had a choice between the two flawed candidates for POTUS. A steep price to pay for the sake of change.
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MusicMan...upon hindsight, I am the one who got too emotional. MusicMan I apologize for the pointed comments.
Good man. Apology accepted.
Now, let's Make the Astros Rotation Healthy Again
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Yesterday's cabinet meeting (https://youtu.be/eLx0i1vuBWs).
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Trump has contradicted Tillerson twice now on Qatar, siding with the Saudis rather than with his Secretary of State. It has been speculated (by reasonable people) that, after he accused Qatar of being a state sponsor of terror, Trump did not know that the U.S. has 10,000 troops stationed there.
He will get people killed before this is over. The only question is how many: a lot, or apocalyptic numbers?
Today, the US govt sold $12 billion of F-15s to Qatar. Because...MAGA?
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The Washington Post reported that Mueller is definitely investigating Trump for potential criminal obstruction arising out of the whole "Flynn thing".
Meanwhile, Mike Pence - who has been getting overlooked in all the noise around Trump, but has been caught repeatedly lying about what he knew and when he knew it - just lawyered up.
Sessions yesterday denied having had any meetings with lobbyists working on behalf of Russian interests. At least, he said he didn't recall any. Today, a lobbyist who worked on behalf of Russian interests claimed to have had multiple meetings with Sessions in that capacity during the campaign.
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Witch hunt...what a waste of taxpayer money. It is unbelievable the ends that the establishment will go to see that Trump fails...sad.
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Sessions yesterday denied having had any meetings with lobbyists working on behalf of Russian interests. At least, he said he didn't recall any. Today, a lobbyist who worked on behalf of Russian interests claimed to have had multiple meetings with Sessions in that capacity during the campaign.
Trump's little garden gnome is obviously none too bright. None of them seems to be, really. But that doesn't strike me as all that unusual. What I have been wondering about and what I may never discover once this is all over is what the fuck were these people thinking? I assume they thought that Trump would never win and as a result none of this would ever really come to light, and that anything untoward that was happening would embarrass and weaken Clinton so it was in some way justifiable.
The Obama White House told GOP leadership that Russia was fucking with the election and the GOP said, Right on! That I get. I don't see how inaction or disinterest is necessarily criminal in that case. But collusion? Mueller seems among many other things to be looking at money laundering which would point to collusion. Did these guys really think this would never surface?
And the constant lying about meeting with various people? Hey, Beauregard, people film everything these days. If you say you didn't meet with someone (under oath, by the way) but seven people have film or pictures of it, I mean, really, what are you doing?
Trump is an simple manchild and he thinks, quite correctly, given his history, that he can do whatever he wants and nothing will touch him. And for now he's secure knowing that the House won't do anything about any obstruction charges which will inevitably emerge. The obstruction part of this is the least interesting piece to me, partly because it's so obvious, so plain, and partly because in Trump's case nothing will come of it, at least not until he's had plenty of time to do god knows what kind of stupid shit. But the obstruction piece may well end up being the lynchpin to all of this because all sorts of fuckwit underlings will end up being charged with obstruction, too, and to save their own skin those cocksuckers will roll over faster than you can sneeze.
They'll serve three years in a white collar prison and then get their own show on redneck radio. It'll be great.
But really, what were these guys thinking? Did they think that Clinton would win and none of this would get exposed because no one would be interested?
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Witch hunt...what a waste of taxpayer money. It is unbelievable the ends that the establishment will go to see that Trump fails...sad.
People who still support this orange turd.....SAD! The opposite of MAGA.
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Trump's little garden gnome is obviously none too bright. None of them seems to be, really.
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Trump is an simple manchild and he thinks, quite correctly, given his history, that he can do whatever he wants and nothing will touch him.
.........
But really, what were these guys thinking? Did they think that Clinton would win and none of this would get exposed because no one would be interested?
I constantly struggle with my understanding of this crew. It seems like every week, they reveal themselves as stupider than the week before. They have expanding my conception of the black swan phenomenon: the mixing of very low-probabilities of stupidity, arrogance, and luck in an environment ruled by angry tribal supporters.
However, I'm not willing to give them enough credit to conclude that they could even contemplate that Trump would lose and this would never be uncovered. To me, it seems like your observation of the leader is spot on, and they, being really fucking stupid and insecure, just follow along. Foresight isn't in their DNA.
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Witch hunt...what a waste of taxpayer money. It is unbelievable the ends that the establishment will go to see that Trump fails...sad.
Still trying to decide if you're being ironic or not, but it's a fraction under 140 characters so...golf clap!
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Last night, DAG Rosenstein issued a bizarre written public statement, basically telling us to ignore what we read in the press if the sources are anonymous. It was an odd statement in and of itself, made even more curious by admonishing us to also consider the country of origin of the anonymous source. It's almost as if Trump wrote it himself. Is he worried that there may be
tapes reports coming out of, say, Russia, that may or may not have yellow stains on them?
It's also laughable on its face because just the day before, the NTY and WaPo published overlapping reports - sourced anonymously - about Trump now being under investigation for criminal obstruction, which Trump then confirmed the following morning in a tweet. It's hard to disregard anonymous sources when Trump himself confirms their validity.
Lastly, and this is a good one, how is Rosenstein still involved in the Trump investigation? Given his role in trying to put a fig leaf over Trump's firing of Comey (which Trump blew away a day or two later), Rosenstein is now a material witness in the obstruction case. Doesn't he now have to recuse himself from oversight of an investigation in which he's a witness? Especially given his memo about anonymous sources, which sounds a little obstructiony itself.
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Meanwhile, Mike Pence - who has been getting overlooked in all the noise around Trump, but has been caught repeatedly lying about what he knew and when he knew it - just lawyered up.
As an aside, this explains Pence's unusual move - never done before by a sitting VP - of creating his own reelection SuperPAC. He did this a few weeks ago and has been fundraising ever since, including a $5000-a-plate shindig last night. Pence can pay his personal attorneys from SuperPAC money*.
* SuperPACs are such a scam. They do plenty of damage to the political discourse, but they're mostly there to pay for lawyers, jets and fat salaries for the fund executives. Trump's PAC spent most of its money through Trump-owned businesses, so it really was just a large vacuum cleaner sucking up money into his back pocket.
As to the identity of Pence's lawyer? Unlike Trump - who was black-balled by the major Washington law firms due to his track record of not paying lawyers' (or anyone else's) bills - Pence got a guy who at least knows the playing field he's on as he was on the government's (losing) side in both Watergate and Iran-Contra. Trump's guy was on the losing side in the Trump University and many other failed Trump ego-suits.
They're bringing blasters to a fight with Darth Vader.
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Last one on this topic (until the next major bombshell development...i.e. 10 - 15 minutes).
Trump tweeted this morning:
“I am being investigated for firing the FBI Director by the man who told me to fire the FBI Director! Witch Hunt.”
Think about this: Trump is attacking the guy who followed orders to write a memo justifying Trump's firing of Director Comey, which Trump then said was irrelevant because he was going to fire Comey anyway because of the "Trump-Russia thing". That statement, reportedly, was the catalyst for Director Mueller to turn his attention to possible criminal obstruction by Trump. And now it's somehow Rosenstein's fault? Trump in this complaint is somehow trying to turn the clock back to before the time he opened his fat mouth to Lester Holt when there was at least a semblance of pretext about the reason for Comey's termination. Maybe he doesn't realise that the rest of us have an attention span longer than a goldfish.
Oh, and First Son-in-Law Kushner's business dealings are being investigated as to possible connections to Russian money laundering activities. Mueller has been further beefing up his investigation and prosecution teams people highly respected in the fields of money laundering and organized crime; so that's a pretty strong signal as to where this investigation is now going.
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Last night, DAG Rosenstein issued a bizarre written public statement, basically telling us to ignore what we read in the press if the sources are anonymous. It was an odd statement in and of itself, made even more curious by admonishing us to also consider the country of origin of the anonymous source. It's almost as if Trump wrote it himself. Is he worried that there may be tapes reports coming out of, say, Russia, that may or may not have yellow stains on them?
It's also laughable on its face because just the day before, the NTY and WaPo published overlapping reports - sourced anonymously - about Trump now being under investigation for criminal obstruction, which Trump then confirmed the following morning in a tweet. It's hard to disregard anonymous sources when Trump himself confirms their validity.
Lastly, and this is a good one, how is Rosenstein still involved in the Trump investigation? Given his role in trying to put a fig leaf over Trump's firing of Comey (which Trump blew away a day or two later), Rosenstein is now a material witness in the obstruction case. Doesn't he now have to recuse himself from oversight of an investigation in which he's a witness? Especially given his memo about anonymous sources, which sounds a little obstructiony itself.
But the Times harms its credibility when it publishes an editorial based on a lie. It certainly should make readers wonder what is true and what isn't as it's published there. When readers laugh that they'll have to wait a day or two to see if they offer a retraction the Times has a real problem. Too it gives ammo to the right who question their motives and credibility.
HTF does that shooting editorial get through the process?
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Trump tweeted this morning:
“I am being investigated for firing the FBI Director by the man who told me to fire the FBI Director! Witch Hunt.”
Trump is being investigated by that little man inside his head? An investigation sure to lead nowhere.
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But the Times harms its credibility when it publishes an editorial based on a lie. It certainly should make readers wonder what is true and what isn't as it's published there. When readers laugh that they'll have to wait a day or two to see if they offer a retraction the Times has a real problem. Too it gives ammo to the right who question their motives and credibility.
HTF does that shooting editorial get through the process?
Which editorial?
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Which editorial?
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/14/opinion/steve-scalise-congress-shot-alexandria-virginia.html
Their retraction is at the bottom.
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Which editorial?
The one that decries gun violence in general and political gun violence in particular. It made the mistake of associating one right wing nutcase's actions with the objectionable political propaganda of a different right wing idiot. Apparently the two simply share sensibilities rather than causal links.
The editorial was not "based" on this misapprehension, and any attempts to portray institutions such as the Times or the Post as anything other than standardly reliable journalistic outlets (that rush to correct their errors) are comical.
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The one that decries gun violence in general and political gun violence in particular. It made the mistake of associating one right wing nutcase's actions with the objectionable political propaganda of a different right wing idiot. Apparently the two simply share sensibilities rather than causal links.
The editorial was not "based" on this misapprehension, and any attempts to portray institutions such as the Times or the Post as anything other than standardly reliable journalistic outlets (that rush to correct their errors) are comical.
WTF? They specifically linked the politically related shooting this week with the Gabby Giffords shooting claiming it was right-wing politically motivated when it was not. That type of motivation is the foundation of the editorial. And how the hell did they get the old Palin thing wrong? It reads like the editors rushed the hell out of it; thought what they wrote was accurate and so didn't bother to fact check themselves. If they had that entire editorial would read completely different or not exist at all.
This may not harm the Times general sense of reliability, but it certainly makes the editorial board look partisan. And what they'll get for all of this is right-wingers using it to question the integrity of every other story rather than what they intended which was to further the case for gun control.
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The Times editorial board is absolutely partisan. As is the WSJ's. As is every other editorial board.
People, in general, need to differentiate between editorial boards and news reporters.
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The Times editorial board is absolutely partisan. As is the WSJ's. As is every other editorial board.
People, in general, need to differentiate between editorial boards and news reporters.
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Fair enough. So did they just get lazy or willfully lie? Either way it looks bad. But worse it gives ammo to those who don't like them. They dickstepped and we'll see if there's any real fallout.
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WTF? They specifically linked the politically related shooting this week with the Gabby Giffords shooting claiming it was right-wing politically motivated when it was not. That type of motivation is the foundation of the editorial. And how the hell did they get the old Palin thing wrong? It reads like the editors rushed the hell out of it; thought what they wrote was accurate and so didn't bother to fact check themselves. If they had that entire editorial would read completely different or not exist at all.
This may not harm the Times general sense of reliability, but it certainly makes the editorial board look partisan. And what they'll get for all of this is right-wingers using it to question the integrity of every other story rather than what they intended which was to further the case for gun control.
The editorial board is allowed to be partisan, if it wants, because it's opinion, not reportage. This is the exact distinction that Fox News uses when their morning muppets and evening spittal generators promote long-debunked falsehoods and outrageous conspiracies. The TImes article appeared in the opinion section and even has "opinion" in the URL. This is why they corrected their factual error but left the article up.
Trump has talked about "second amendment people" being able to stop Hillary if the political process couldn't; famed nutjob Sharron Angle also talked about people resorting to "second amendment remedies" if they didn't like election results. These people are flicking matches in a gasoline depot; just because you don't see their match ignite the explosion doesn't mean that it was ok to be doing so.
And, yes, it's not accurate to say that Sarah Palin's crosshairs were on Giffords herself; it was just on her district... that she represents...
I realize that this is imagery and not a direct call for assassination, but the problem is that - instead of accepting that such imagery was ill-advised even though not directly responsible for the action of a mentally unstable individual - the response is to attack the messenger and call people idiots for thinking there is a connection between increasingly violent rhetoric and imagery in politics and increasingly violent behavior in the political arena. So, the Times stands by it's opinion, while correcting a technical error in the support for their argument.
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Fair enough. So did they just get lazy or willfully lie? Either way it looks bad. But worse it gives ammo to those who don't like them. They dickstepped and we'll see if there's any real fallout.
I'd say lazy. Lazy explains a great many mistakes.
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I'd say lazy. Lazy explains a great many mistakes.
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I agree. This is what bothers me though. The left wasn't their target audience. The hard lefties here and elsewhere saying don't mind it aren't helping. Their target are those in the middle who don't feel strongly either way. This kind of stupid mistake doesn't help win them over. The Times HAS to be better to win them over. I know they've lost readers so maybe all of this is for nothing if they don't reach their target audience anyway.
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Fair enough. So did they just get lazy or willfully lie? Either way it looks bad. But worse it gives ammo to those who don't like them. They dickstepped and we'll see if there's any real fallout.
It'll be the rationale for decrying every damaging report as "fake news!" Then, 2 hours later, Trump will blurt out something that confirms that the news wasn't fake. This is a consistent pattern.
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I agree. This is what bothers me though. The left wasn't their target audience. The hard lefties here and elsewhere saying don't mind it aren't helping. Their target are those in the middle who don't feel strongly either way. This kind of stupid mistake doesn't help win them over. The Times HAS to be better to win them over. I know they've lost readers so maybe all of this is for nothing if they don't reach their target audience anyway.
Who don't feel strongly either way about what?
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Who don't feel strongly either way about what?
Trump hit a 60% disapproval rating this week. Only one other President has ever plumbed that depth since they started polling such things, and that was W. Bush when he was well into his 2nd term, after Iraq and Katrina. Trump got there in 144 days.
Trump is also only the 3rd President ever to be under criminal investigation while in office; the others being Nixon and Clinton. Both those others got there well into their 2nd terms, being Watergate and BlowJobGate respectively. Trump got there, for Flynn-a-Lago (h/t MusicMan), in 144 days.
Today, Trump appointed his family's event planner to be the head of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development's Region II, which includes New York and New Jersey. She has no experience of any kind to justify this position. However, in addition to planning events for the Trumps, she also helps run Eric Trump's charity - the one that's just been accused of skimming hundreds of thousands of dollars from kids with cancer. HUD's Region II's budget runs to the billions, so there's nothing to worry about here.
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Still trying to decide if you're being ironic or not, but it's a fraction under 140 characters so...golf clap!
No irony intended...
The best political interview I heard recently was when Megan Kelly inquired to Putin about the Russians affecting the U.S. election and Russian influence on Trump...response..."I never met the man...have you people lost your minds over there "... fortunately not 85% of the country...geographically.
The establishment is still crying a river...
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fortunately not 85% of the country...geographically.
I enjoy this line of reasoning particularly, the one that posits that there is some outsized meaning in the three inbreds that live in a Brewster-sized county in East Asslick, Wyoming, that they get off their sister long enough to figure out how to vote for President Pussy Grabber and that somehow has greater value than the 100,000 people who vote in urban zip codes where people usually put on their pants to go to Walmart.
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No irony intended...
The best political interview I heard recently was when Megan Kelly inquired to Putin about the Russians affecting the U.S. election and Russian influence on Trump...response..."I never met the man...have you people lost your minds over there "... fortunately not 85% of the country...geographically.
The establishment is still crying a river...
This right here is the problem: you are taking the word of a mass-murderer over the findings of the US intelligence services.
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Reports say that Trump has mostly abdicated his responsibilities as Commander-in-Chief to his Secretary of Defense and "the Generals". Well, in recent days, we've had a collision between a US Destroyer and a container ship in the Sea of Japan that cost the lives of 7 US sailors - a tragic accident the aftermath of which might have been more appropriately handled if we had an Ambassador to Japan and/or a Secretary of the Navy. I do believe the CiC tweeted out his condolences, however.
Also, we shot down a Syrian fighter over Syria; prompting the Russians to say they will shoot down any US planes that stray west of the Euphrates. This is what happens when you elect a lazy, entitled man-child to the most powerful job on the planet. Fucking chaos. Without any coherent or even expressed policy on almost everything, the government departments - including the military - are left to make it up as they go along.
This will get is already out of control and we'll be lucky to live through it.
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Unfilled positions
Anyone have a link to compare Trump unfilled positions to where Obama, Bush, Clinton were at this time into their presidencies? It seems like Trump is way behind on this, but I don't know for sure.
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Unfilled positions
Anyone have a link to compare Trump unfilled positions to where Obama, Bush, Clinton were at this time into their presidencies? It seems like Trump is way behind on this, but I don't know for sure.
I saw the other day that, by this stage in their first terms, Bush and Obama had circa 150 positions filled each while Trump is in the low-40s. Last I saw, he's only put up an nominee for just over 100 of the 559 jobs that are Senate-confirmed positions; Trump is massively behind in filling positions that don't require confirmation too. Presumably because he's run out of sons-in-law.
The big(ly) problem is that people do not want to work for Trump's administration (http://www.politico.com/story/2017/05/31/russia-investigation-trump-appointees-238954), perhaps because they don't want to end up in jail. When your lawyers are hiring lawyers, it's not a good look for prospective employees.
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Unfilled positions
Anyone have a link to compare Trump unfilled positions to where Obama, Bush, Clinton were at this time into their presidencies? It seems like Trump is way behind on this, but I don't know for sure.
The Link (http://money.cnn.com/2017/06/07/news/economy/trump-staffing-vacancies/index.html)
President Trump has roughly 1,100 top-tier positions to fill across his administration.
So far, he's nominated only 111 of them.
No president in modern history has fallen so far behind in naming heads of agencies, assistant secretaries, ambassadors and other critical leadership roles that require Senate approval.
As of Tuesday, only 41 of Trump's 111 nominees have cleared the Senate, according to data compiled by the Partnership for Public Service, a nonpartisan, nonprofit that has tracked presidential appointments since 1989.
In the first four months of their administrations, former presidents Barack Obama and George W. Bush each named more than 200 nominees, with more than half of them approved by the Senate.
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Well, that's not good. Maybe they need to add a iPad with LinkedIn to his golf cart.
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President Trump has roughly 1,100 top-tier positions to fill across his administration.
It doesn't help when he fires all 50 US Attorneys. It's not unusual for a new administration to replace most or all of the USA's, but typically they have a fucking clue as to who will take over those jobs. Trump kicked them all out in one day, without warning, without a plan to replace them and without any opportunity to effect any kind of transition to the next person.
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It doesn't help when he fires all 50 US Attorneys. It's not unusual for a new administration to replace most or all of the USA's, but typically they have a fucking clue as to who will take over those jobs. Trump kicked them all out in one day, without warning, without a plan to replace them and without any opportunity to effect any kind of transition to the next person.
Same thing with the non-career ambassadors.
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Same thing with the non-career ambassadors.
Yep. I think we are without Ambassadors to Canada and Britain, and without Ambassadors to Japan and South Korea - which is important given the crap going on with North Korea at the moment. Japan's PM isn't always going to be at dinner on the patio at Mar-a-Lago when the shit goes down, but at least he has Trump's unsecured cell phone number.
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It doesn't help when he fires all 50 US Attorneys. It's not unusual for a new administration to replace most or all of the USA's, but typically they have a fucking clue as to who will take over those jobs. Trump kicked them all out in one day, without warning, without a plan to replace them and without any opportunity to effect any kind of transition to the next person.
He drained the drinking water reservoir and left the swamp.
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Yep. I think we are without Ambassadors to Canada and Britain, and without Ambassadors to Japan and South Korea - which is important given the crap going on with North Korea at the moment. Japan's PM isn't always going to be at dinner on the patio at Mar-a-Lago when the shit goes down, but at least he has Trump's unsecured cell phone number.
According to the American Foreign Service Association (http://www.afsa.org/list-ambassadorial-appointments) there are 57 countries with no current ambassador.
Significantly: Afghanistan, Australia, every major European nation including the EU and NATO, South Korea, Japan, Quatar, Saudi Arabia, 7 of 10 UN ambassadors.
But none of these sins of omission are as appalling as the sin of commission McConnell and Co. are committing with the massive tax cut to the very wealthy "healthcare" bill. A fucking appalling insult to democracy and fundamental human decency.
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Two more elections hacked by the Russians:
S. Carolina 5th
Georgia 6th...$50 million in California money could not pull it off...must have been the Ruskies. Jimmy Carter needs to look into this. Did Newt have any contact with the Russians ?
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Georgia 6th...$50 million in California money could not pull it off...must have been the Ruskies. Jimmy Carter needs to look into this. Did Newt have any contact with the Russians ?
Yeah, nothing to see here, nothing for the R's to worry about. A district that has traditionally been so red that nobody even thought about it is now a toss-up because Trump is so toxic. Just keep on whistling past that graveyard. Maybe they can enact some more ridiculous disenfranchisement policies.
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Two more elections hacked by the Russians:
S. Carolina 5th
Georgia 6th...$50 million in California money could not pull it off...must have been the Ruskies. Jimmy Carter needs to look into this. Did Newt have any contact with the Russians ?
Have you always been such an insufferable dick?
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Have you always been such an insufferable dick?
He likes Donald fucking Trump, so the odds are pretty good.
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Yeah, nothing to see here, nothing for the R's to worry about. A district that has traditionally been so red that nobody even thought about it is now a toss-up because Trump is so toxic. Just keep on whistling past that graveyard. Maybe they can enact some more ridiculous disenfranchisement policies.
I understand what happens in East Asslick, but I'm amazed that in a predominantly high income area full of reasonably successful professionals that there would be 150,000 of them who'd watch six months of this shitshow and decide, Yep, this seems great, let's have us some more of it.
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I understand what happens in East Asslick, but I'm amazed that in a predominantly high income area full of reasonably successful professionals that there would be 150,000 of them who'd watch six months of this shitshow and decide, Yep, this seems great, let's have us some more of it.
They're gonna get them some tax cuts!
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I understand what happens in East Asslick, but I'm amazed that in a predominantly high income area full of reasonably successful professionals that there would be 150,000 of them who'd watch six months of this shitshow and decide, Yep, this seems great, let's have us some more of it.
Perhaps a vast majority of those 150,000 think someone else is responsible for,"this shitshow"...maybe the swamp dwellers who have fucked things up for so long.
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Perhaps a vast majority of those 150,000 think someone else is responsible for,"this shitshow"...maybe the swamp dwellers who have fucked things up for so long.
They probably do believe that, but their team is the one that flat out refused to do anything for eight years. It's not an admirable record.
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Democrats should not be encouraged by Ossoff's performance. He didn't even match Clinton's margin in the district. The takeaway should be that most Republicans who don't like Trump still vote Republican. Winning back Obama-Trump voters is more achievable than flipping the "Panera Bread" southern suburban white vote.
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Democrats should not be encouraged by Ossoff's performance. He didn't even match Clinton's margin in the district. The takeaway should be that most Republicans who don't like Trump still vote Republican. Winning back Obama-Trump voters is more achievable than flipping the "Panera Bread" southern suburban white vote.
Where are you getting your info? Last I read Ossoff got 48.1%, compared to Clinton's 46.8%. The Dem challenger got 38.3% last November. Obama got 37.5% in 2012. Both sides will spin it how they will...the Republicans will say "see, we still won", Democrats will say "we came damn close to winning a seat that seven months ago was impossible". Trump will continue to be Trump and America will continue to lose.
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Where are you getting your info? Last I read Ossoff got 48.1%, compared to Clinton's 46.8%. The Dem challenger got 38.3% last November. Obama got 37.5% in 2012. Both sides will spin it how they will...the Republicans will say "see, we still won", Democrats will say "we came damn close to winning a seat that seven months ago was impossible". Trump will continue to be Trump and America will continue to lose.
...and Karen Handel is a truly awful person to be an elected official.
At the end of the day, the Democrats do need to reflect on the fact that they've gone 0-4 in these special elections. I have no confidence that the Republicans won't be able to spin all the shit that has and will happen into a scary story for which they are the only security blanket, and middle America will fall for it again.
If the UK elections have shown anything, the antidote to conservatives saying "Boo!" is to have a definitive and distinctive set of policies that demonstrate a credible contrast to the incumbent government. The Labour Party was meant to be crushed into oblivion by the snap election, but instead came within a whisker of flipping the government. Democrats don't need a vanilla, establishment candidate (Clinton), they need a contrasting, crusading candidate (Sanders).
Sanders missed his window; they need to find his understudy and get him ready. If they think that they will win in 2018 by being "not Trump", they will merely repeat Hillary's failure.
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What many fail to realize is that irregardless of your opinion of Trump...many in middle America just want the old politics to go away....the drain the swamp mentality...it's not a republican vs democrat thing...they want all the career politicians, lobbyist, and Washington leeches gone...Sanders and Trump were anti status quo.
Much of the onslaught and over the top barrage of Trump hate is from the power brokers who are scared shitless to lose their power...Rep, Dem, Corporate...power that they have garnered without the blessing of the American people.
Congress was suppose to be a part time service where you went to try to solve the issues facing the people...it has become a career where one caters to the special interest for personal gain without regard to the constiuents.
Time for a new party...I don't care if you call it Tea Party, Trumpster (Trump is neither Rep or Dem), Socialist(Sanders)...the people just want their tax dollars to stop being stolen. THE TREASURY IS BROKE.
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Oddly enough, I can agree with most of those goals, but I'd never conclude that Trump has made one single stride towards those goals, not would I ever believe he intended to. It's more "same as the old boss," just a stupider, vainer and less coherent one.
If the swamp is powerful men catering to their self interest, Trump is truly King of the Swamp.
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Time for a new party...I don't care if you call it Tea Party, Trumpster (Trump is neither Rep or Dem), Socialist(Sanders)...the people just want their tax dollars to stop being stolen. THE TREASURY IS BROKE.
This is what Trump promised, and it's 180 degrees from what he's delivering. And by stacking the courts with his toadie nominees, he'll ensure the swamp endures and thrives for a generation.
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What many fail to realize is that irregardless of your opinion of Trump...many in middle America just want the old politics to go away....the drain the swamp mentality...it's not a republican vs democrat thing...they want all the career politicians, lobbyist, and Washington leeches gone...Sanders and Trump were anti status quo.
Much of the onslaught and over the top barrage of Trump hate is from the power brokers who are scared shitless to lose their power...Rep, Dem, Corporate...power that they have garnered without the blessing of the American people.
Congress was suppose to be a part time service where you went to try to solve the issues facing the people...it has become a career where one caters to the special interest for personal gain without regard to the constiuents.
Time for a new party...I don't care if you call it Tea Party, Trumpster (Trump is neither Rep or Dem), Socialist(Sanders)...the people just want their tax dollars to stop being stolen. THE TREASURY IS BROKE.
I'm all about getting rid of career politicians. I'm all for term-limits. I don't think many of those elected officials represent the people, but represent businesses. But, I in no way think Trump is going to do any of the things you think he is going to do. I also think too many people pick their party and don't vote for anyone else.
You want to get people out of Washington, don't vote for an incumbent.
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Unfilled positions
Anyone have a link to compare Trump unfilled positions to where Obama, Bush, Clinton were at this time into their presidencies? It seems like Trump is way behind on this, but I don't know for sure.
Late to the party here but Washington Post has a good running summary of this. Haven't seen it posted yet.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/politics/trump-administration-appointee-tracker/database/
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Late to the party here but Washington Post has a good running summary of this. Haven't seen it posted yet.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/politics/trump-administration-appointee-tracker/database/
Somewhat apt that the number of posts missing a nominee is "404".
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I'm all about getting rid of career politicians. I'm all for term-limits. I don't think many of those elected officials represent the people, but represent businesses. But, I in no way think Trump is going to do any of the things you think he is going to do. I also think too many people pick their party and don't vote for anyone else.
You want to get people out of Washington, don't vote for an incumbent.
It is amazing that anyone could take even a passing look at Trump and see a reformer rather than a grifter. Here's how his "reforms" work: (https://www.washingtonpost.com/investigations/trump-seeks-sharp-cuts-to-housing-aid-except-for-program-that-brings-him-millions/2017/06/20/bf1fb2b8-5531-11e7-ba90-f5875b7d1876_story.html?utm_term=.cc40c0596135)
President Trump’s budget calls for sharply reducing funding for programs that shelter the poor and combat homelessness — with a notable exception: It leaves intact a type of federal housing subsidy that is paid directly to private landlords.
One of those landlords is Trump himself, who earns millions of dollars each year as a part-owner of Starrett City, the nation’s largest subsidized housing complex.
***
Trump once called Starrett City “one of the best investments I ever made,” but it was his father who was an investor in its construction, according to a representative of Starrett City.
I totally get the "throw out the bums" mentality, but generally the next step is not to replace them with a bigger bum. None of Trump's proposed policies make government more transparent or accountable. The unifying theme to them, whether it be healthcare/taxes, the budget, the Muslim ban, the massive deportations, are cruelty to those without with a massive transfer of wealth to the pockets of the ultra-rich.
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I totally get the "throw out the bums" mentality, but generally the next step is not to replace them with a bigger bum. None of Trump's proposed policies make government more transparent or accountable. The unifying theme to them, whether it be healthcare/taxes, the budget, the Muslim ban, the massive deportations, are cruelty to those without with a massive transfer of wealth to the pockets of the ultra-rich.
He's not even bright enough to cover his tracks. He and his family are already directly benefiting from Federal dollars, and those of foreign governments, being channeled directly into Trump family owned businesses; Mar-a-Lago summit meetings and weekend visits, the Secret Service taking a floor in Trump Tower, the DC hotel, Ivanka getting retail licenses in Japan the day after she sat in on the meeting with the Japanese Prime Minister, Jared's sister selling investment visas for $500k a go...etc. etc. ad nauseam.
Even the one year of Trump's taxes that we've seen - after the summary page was leaked by, many believe, Trump himself - was an own goal. It showed that he paid circa $30mm in taxes on circa $150mm of income, which is a chunky rate. But the summary showed that the $30mm was almost entirely due under AMT rules, and he would otherwise have paid about $1.5mm in taxes. Guess what he wants to go away under his new tax laws: AMT. He also wants to slash corporate rates and eliminate the estate tax. All of which will cut his and his family's tax bills dramatically.
They are leaches. They were attached in an effort to make us better but the reality is that they're just sucking out our lifeblood.
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It is amazing that anyone could take even a passing look at Trump and see a reformer rather than a grifter. Here's how his "reforms" work: (https://www.washingtonpost.com/investigations/trump-seeks-sharp-cuts-to-housing-aid-except-for-program-that-brings-him-millions/2017/06/20/bf1fb2b8-5531-11e7-ba90-f5875b7d1876_story.html?utm_term=.cc40c0596135)
President Trump’s budget calls for sharply reducing funding for programs that shelter the poor and combat homelessness — with a notable exception: It leaves intact a type of federal housing subsidy that is paid directly to private landlords.
One of those landlords is Trump himself, who earns millions of dollars each year as a part-owner of Starrett City, the nation’s largest subsidized housing complex.
***
Trump once called Starrett City “one of the best investments I ever made,” but it was his father who was an investor in its construction, according to a representative of Starrett City.
I totally get the "throw out the bums" mentality, but generally the next step is not to replace them with a bigger bum. None of Trump's proposed policies make government more transparent or accountable. The unifying theme to them, whether it be healthcare/taxes, the budget, the Muslim ban, the massive deportations, are cruelty to those without with a massive transfer of wealth to the pockets of the ultra-rich.
There are so many, but one of the most galling to me is the continuation, after the election of "Invest in my business for 500K, and I'll give you a Visa." As of the date of this article, the "family" had already raised 50 mil for Trump branded properties.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/in-a-beijing-ballroom-kushner-family-flogs-500000-investor-visa-to-wealthy-chinese/2017/05/06/cf711e53-eb49-4f9a-8dea-3cd836fcf287_story.html?utm_term=.9c30ac75af3b
The poster child of naked corruption. I know it involves many more scumbags than Trump, but the idea that Trump supporters characterize him as draining the swamp is so fucking weak.
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I think for a lot of drain the swamp types 'reform' to them simply signifies 'not Hillary.'
This administration can sell the nation (and its pride) to for-profit prisons, predatory student loan jackals and their for-profit charter school charlatans, to the cronies who'll take huge subsidies and build toll roads, to Russian steel companies and to Rosneft, to select, despicable Middle Eastern kleptocracies, to Glaxo, Merck and Pfizer, and these idiots will not stir at all so long as Trump continues to succeed at not being Hillary.
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There are so many, but one of the most galling to me is the continuation, after the election of "Invest in my business for 500K, and I'll give you a Visa." As of the date of this article, the "family" had already raised 50 mil for Trump branded properties.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/in-a-beijing-ballroom-kushner-family-flogs-500000-investor-visa-to-wealthy-chinese/2017/05/06/cf711e53-eb49-4f9a-8dea-3cd836fcf287_story.html?utm_term=.9c30ac75af3b
The poster child of naked corruption. I know it involves many more scumbags than Trump, but the idea that Trump supporters characterize him as draining the swamp is so fucking weak.
Mueller is also now looking into Trump's dodgy financial dealings (https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2017-06-21/trump-russia-and-those-shadowy-sater-deals-at-bayrock), specifically possible involvement in Russian money laundering. I mean, it's not like it's hard to find (http://www.miamiherald.com/news/business/article135187364.html) - Trump bought a Florida ego palace for $40mm, did nothing to it, and one of Putin's best bud's bought it a couple of years later for $100mm. He never saw it in person, never moved in and it's since been demolished.
People buy property using LLCs for a variety of legitimate reasons; one of the effects of this, though, is to shield the identity of the purchaser from the public. In 2015, 4% of the Trump Organization's property sales were to LLCs; in 2016...70%. Maybe people didn't want to be seen doing business with a walking bag of garbage like Trump, or...
Anyhoo, this element of the investigation is very interesting. Mueller has been adding money-laundering experts and Russian-speaking bankers to his team. This puts in peril not just Trump, but his whole grifter gang including Ivanka, Jared and Jr. Meanwhile, Eric's charity is being looked at for skimming money from kids with cancer (http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/eric-trump-funneled-cancer-charity-money-businesses-associates/story?id=47878610).
Once anyone starts digging here, they're going to unearth a bottomless pit of shit.
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Where are you getting your info? Last I read Ossoff got 48.1%, compared to Clinton's 46.8%. The Dem challenger got 38.3% last November. Obama got 37.5% in 2012. Both sides will spin it how they will...the Republicans will say "see, we still won", Democrats will say "we came damn close to winning a seat that seven months ago was impossible". Trump will continue to be Trump and America will continue to lose.
To dig this up from yesterday—I referred to the R minus D margin, which was closer in the '16 presidential race than it was in round 2 of the special. Clinton and Trump had a lower combined percentage due to the third party vote share.
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Trump suggests creating law enacted in 1996 (http://thehill.com/homenews/administration/338901-trumps-suggests-creating-law-that-has-been-enacted-since-1996). The statement was in his teleprompter text - not off the cuff. This, after claiming credit for building the Panama Canal. What's next, claiming that signature isn't actually John Hancock's but Donald J. Trump?
Also, at the same campaign rally (seriously, a campaign rally) he was cheered by the drain the swamp crowd for not wanting poor people running the economy; only the rich can do it. Their minds must be twisted like a pair of Apple earbuds that have been in your pocket for 0.02 seconds.
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Trump has tweeted today that he doesn't have any tapes of his meetings with Comey. So, ignoring the reality show bullshit stringing along, how is the original threat - that he might have tapes of those meetings so COmey should be careful what he says - not an effort at witness intimidation? I.e. obstruction of justice?
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What's a little witness tampering among friends?
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C'mon guys. He's new at this.
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C'mon guys. He's new at this.
Well, sure. If you want the leadership of a visionary reformist you're goimg to get a few of these hiccups. I just breathe a sigh of relief knowing he's surrounded himself with top-flight policy experts.
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Well, sure. If you want the leadership of a visionary reformist you're goimg to get a few of these hiccups. I just breathe a sigh of relief knowing he's surrounded himself with top-flight policy experts.
OK, this does it! At the weekend...you'll never believe this...I can't believe this...unconscionable doesn't come close to describing it...
He drove his golf cart over a green.
LOCK HIM UP! LOCK HIM UP! LOCK HIM UP!
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There are certain privileges to being POTUS
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OK, this does it! At the weekend...you'll never believe this...I can't believe this...unconscionable doesn't come close to describing it...
He drove his golf cart over a green.
LOCK HIM UP! LOCK HIM UP! LOCK HIM UP!
screw you, that's creating jobs.
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screw you, that's creating jobs.
Only for Mexicans.
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Only for Mexicans.
Now, I'm sure that all of the groundskeepers and dishwashers at his golf properties are fully documented US Americans.
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Now, I'm sure that all of the groundskeepers and dishwashers at his golf properties are fully documented US Americans.
Not so much at Mar-a-Lugey (http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2017/03/20/the-foreign-workers-of-mar-a-lago).
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Only for Mexicans.
they won't be taking the other better jobs!
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Not so much at Mar-a-Lugey (http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2017/03/20/the-foreign-workers-of-mar-a-lago).
Nor at the demolition of the structure that pre-dated Trump Tower.
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Every single lie by the Orange One since being elected. (https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/06/23/opinion/trumps-lies.html?smid=tw-nytopinion&smtyp=cur&_r=0)
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Every single lie by the Orange One since being elected. (https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/06/23/opinion/trumps-lies.html?smid=tw-nytopinion&smtyp=cur&_r=0)
Seems like tremendous hubris, doesn't it, to proclaim that they have listed all of them?
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Trump's been tweeting himself into trouble again. Having consistently denied that the Russian hack of the election never took place - maybe it was some 400lb guy in his parents' basement - Trump tweeted over the weekend that Obama knew about the Russian hack and did nothing, so he should be investigated, not "T".
Let's just drive right past the bit where he's now referring to himself in the third person simply as an initial, and enjoy the fact that he's just confirmed that he believes the Russians hacked the election. This is a topic about which he, and his administration, have declined to be curious since day one. As he now believes it to be real, shouldn't he start looking into that so that it doesn't happen again next time? Maybe the Russians won't want him back in 2020...
In other news, it looks like the Gorsuch vote on SCOTUS is going to get Trump his 90-day travel ban; parts of it, anyway. Interestingly, he wanted that 90-day travel ban so that they could "figure out what's going on". He first tried to institute his 90-day ban on January 27; i.e. 150 days ago. Presuming that the "figuring out of what's going on" has been going on in the meantime regardless of the ban, shouldn't it be irrelevant by now?
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At least they've made a priority of staffing up the State Department with top people to figure out what's going on.
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The CBO score on the Senate's
tax cut healthcare bill is in, and it's appalling. They project that it will kick 18 million off health insurance in 2018 and 22 million by 2026 (https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/UWDiWSyYl_dukzvZoLqa6OvmbkU=/800x0/filters:no_upscale()/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/8756001/uninsured__1_.png). Oh, and just because the bill wasn't "mean" enough, the GOP's death panel healthcare team have added a poison pill that if you drop insurance for 60+ days, you have to wait 6 months before getting back on.
Meanwhile, the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities has calculated (http://www.cbpp.org/research/health/harsh-tradeoff-at-core-of-gop-health-bill-keep-medicaid-expansion-or-cut-taxes-for) that the tax savings for the richest 400 families is the equivalent of the cost of Medicaid for 750,000 people.
This is torches a pitchforks stuff, folks. I saw a clip of one person speaking at a Senator's town hall where they said that the battle was no longer between left and right, but between top and bottom. He was optimistic, because he had 300 million people on his side; sadly, I don't think he's correct there.
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At 10pm EDT last night, Spicer dropped a playground threat on Syria who he claims is planning another chemical attack. News agencies have been trying to source confirmation for this intel but no one outside (and many inside) the White House have no idea what he's talking about. Usually, such overt threats are at least discussed across the various services because they're the ones in harms way.
So, this means:
(1) It's bullshit sabre-rattling to distract from any one of a hundred things; or
(b) It's real, but this administration is too incompetent to coordinate this correctly with those who need to be looped in.
I'm not sure which one is more scary.
Oh, and Jared's lawyered up while one of Trump's Keystone Kop lawyers has been caught driving charitable donations into his own firms coffers (Eric would be proud). Plus, I got an offer on Facebook this morning to buy a photo of the President that has been signed by the orange one himself. I may need to watch Idiocracy to get some sense of reality.
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TrumpCare vote delayed. Too many vulnerable Republican senators up in 2018 and in fear of their jobs. God love 'em!
I guess this means the air strike against Syria is postponed too.
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Paul Manafort - Trump's campaign chairman during the crucial period running up to and including the RNC convention - just filed retroactively as a foreign agent (https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/former-trump-campaign-chairman-paul-manafort-files-as-foreign-agent-for-ukraine-work/2017/06/27/8322b6ac-5b7b-11e7-9fc6-c7ef4bc58d13_story.html?utm_term=.bb489200d153). He's the second senior Trumpster to do this; the other being Flynn. In 2012 - 2014, Manafort worked as an agent of the since-ousted, Putin-puppet, dictator of Ukraine: Viktor Yanukovych.
Seriously, has anything like this ever happened before? All these people surrounding Trump with ties to Russia that they fail to disclose until they get found out and then they say "oh yeah, well I admit that." Flynn, Manafort, Sessions, Kushner.
On his security disclosures, first Son-in-Law Jared: failed to declare $100 million he has in accounts in the Caribbean; failed to mention meetings with Russian officials, including those from VEB which isn't a bank but a thinly disguised money vehicle for Putin (https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/08/opinion/jared-kushner-russia-veb.html); and just this week we found out that he failed to disclose a loan from the up-to-its-neck-in-Russian-money-laundering Deutsche Bank. That would be a loan he took out late last year...for $285 meeeelion (https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/kushner-firms-285-million-deutsche-bank-loan-came-just-before-election-day/2017/06/25/984f3acc-4f88-11e7-b064-828ba60fbb98_story.html?utm_term=.45e37f717208)...that he had to personally guarantee. How does that slip your mind?
Deutsche Bank is the largest (known) lender to the Trump organization too. Even Trump's bank is balls deep in the Russia scandal (http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2016/08/29/deutsche-banks-10-billion-scandal).
Back to Manafort. When Yanukovych was deposed, the Ukrainians were very respectful of the property that Viktor left behind as he fled into the protective arms of Putin. Very sensibly, they preserved all documents they found in his dictator-Neverland (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/ukraine/10656023/In-pictures-Inside-the-palace-Yanukovych-didnt-want-Ukraine-to-see.html?frame=2834866) (are all these guys somehow related to Liberace?). Part of that cache was a ledger in which meticulous handwritten accounts had been kept of cash payments made to numerous individuals. Manafort's name was in there multiple times (https://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/15/us/politics/paul-manafort-ukraine-donald-trump.html) as having received payments totalling $12.7 million.
This is not normal.
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Smoking gun? Getting closer to it, at least.
The Murdoch Street Journal reports (https://www.wsj.com/articles/gop-operative-sought-clinton-emails-from-hackers-implied-a-connection-to-flynn-1498770851) that a GOP opposition researcher, reporting to Mike Flynn, worked with Russian hackers to try and recover the deleted Clinton emails.
That link requires an honorarium to Murdoch to read it, but here's an article about the article (http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2017/06/stop-assuming-trump-is-innocent-of-russian-collusion.html) from NY Magazine.
One of the oddities of the investigation into Donald Trump’s relations with Russia is the degree to which he has largely enjoyed a presumption of innocence in the court of public opinion....That line of defense is likely to disappear now that The Wall Street Journal has reported that Peter Smith, a Republican opposition researcher who said he was working for Michael Flynn, colluded with Russian hackers to try to obtain stolen emails from Hillary Clinton.
The Trump team's defense is that Smith didn't work for the campaign and, though Flynn did, he must've been doing this on his own time. They also asked if we'd like to buy a bridge.
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Smoking gun? Getting closer to it, at least.
The Murdoch Street Journal reports (https://www.wsj.com/articles/gop-operative-sought-clinton-emails-from-hackers-implied-a-connection-to-flynn-1498770851) that a GOP opposition researcher, reporting to Mike Flynn, worked with Russian hackers to try and recover the deleted Clinton emails.
That link requires an honorarium to Murdoch to read it, but here's an article about the article (http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2017/06/stop-assuming-trump-is-innocent-of-russian-collusion.html) from NY Magazine.
The Trump team's defense is that Smith didn't work for the campaign and, though Flynn did, he must've been doing this on his own time. They also asked if we'd like to buy a bridge.
It's hard enough to distance the campaign from Flynn, who was obviously an important adviser to Trump (to the point that Trump fired Comey in an effort to protect Flynn), but candidate Trump literally asked for this to happen on camera: (http://www.politico.com/story/2016/07/trump-putin-no-relationship-226282)
“I will tell you this, Russia: If you’re listening, I hope you’re able to find the 30,000 emails that are missing,” the Republican nominee said at a news conference in Florida. “I think you will probably be rewarded mightily by our press.”
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It's hard enough to distance the campaign from Flynn, who was obviously an important adviser to Trump (to the point that Trump fired Comey in an effort to protect Flynn), but candidate Trump literally asked for this to happen on camera: (http://www.politico.com/story/2016/07/trump-putin-no-relationship-226282)
“I will tell you this, Russia: If you’re listening, I hope you’re able to find the 30,000 emails that are missing,” the Republican nominee said at a news conference in Florida. “I think you will probably be rewarded mightily by our press.”
Rewarded by "our press", or by "our Pres."?
The funny thing is, Trump has a long and storied history of reneging on deals and promises. If Russia thought he'd actually follow through on what they wanted, they were a little naive. Right now, he's struggling even to give them back the spy compounds residences that Obama took away as part of the punishment for hacking, let alone relaxing the sanctions over the invasion of Ukraine.
Republicans in Congress appear to be done with him after he proved to be no use to anyone over the healthcare debacle. He's poisoning the brand and is completely ineffectual as a leader. It won't be long before they turn on him because his only use will be as a scapegoat. Same, with Russia; they'll torch him once they're sure he cannot be of use, just to fuck with us (which was the point in the first place). You know what that means... PeeTape-a-Lago!
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Republicans in Congress appear to be done with him after he proved to be no use to anyone over the healthcare debacle. He's poisoning the brand and is completely ineffectual as a leader. It won't be long before they turn on him because his only use will be as a scapegoat.
The unanimous vote in the appropriations committee yesterday approving Barbara Lee's annual and heretofore perfunctory amendment ending the blank check authorization for the use of military force giving the president near-blanket authority to deploy the military following 9/11 is a pretty strong sign that Republican legislators are at least interested in limiting some of Trump's authority. I doubt it will ever actually get anywhere, but it's a rare sign of backbone and basic legislative oversight.
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Republicans in Congress appear to be done with him after he proved to be no use to anyone over the healthcare debacle. He's poisoning the brand and is completely ineffectual as a leader. It won't be long before they turn on him because his only use will be as a scapegoat. Same, with Russia; they'll torch him once they're sure he cannot be of use, just to fuck with us (which was the point in the first place). You know what that means... PeeTape-a-Lago!
There are plenty of people out there who disapprove of the Republicans in Congress but are giving Trump a pass. My aunt, for instance, thinks congressional Republicans have betrayed her and are now too liberal to pass a health care bill she'd be proud of, but she's not worried because she's confident that "Trump will fix it". The cognitive dissonance is strong with them. (This is the part where I mention my aunt is Type I diabetic and quite literally would not have survived the last 25 years without Medicaid and later Medicare.)
The damage to the brand may already be done. The GOP has really painted themselves into a corner, and they may be past the point where turning on Trump could benefit them. From here on out it may very well be a zero-sum game (or worse) with their supporters.
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The damage to the brand may already be done. The GOP has really painted themselves into a corner, and they may be past the point where turning on Trump could benefit them. From here on out it may very well be a zero-sum game (or worse) with their supporters.
No way. None of those folks think that *their* guy sucks. It's all of the *other* Congress-critters who suck. Consequently, all of those guys will keep coming back.
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Smoking gun? Getting closer to it, at least.
The Murdoch Street Journal reports (https://www.wsj.com/articles/gop-operative-sought-clinton-emails-from-hackers-implied-a-connection-to-flynn-1498770851) that a GOP opposition researcher, reporting to Mike Flynn, worked with Russian hackers to try and recover the deleted Clinton emails.
That link requires an honorarium to Murdoch to read it, but here's an article about the article (http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2017/06/stop-assuming-trump-is-innocent-of-russian-collusion.html) from NY Magazine.
The Trump team's defense is that Smith didn't work for the campaign and, though Flynn did, he must've been doing this on his own time. They also asked if we'd like to buy a bridge.
The Washington Post picked up this ball and ran with it. In an article (behind a pay-wall) (https://www.wsj.com/articles/gop-activist-who-sought-clinton-emails-cited-trump-campaign-officials-1498872923), the Post reports that recently deceased Republican operative Peter Smith - who was working with Russian hackers to resurrect the 30,000 deleted Clinton emails - had another string to his bow. He had a file in which he detailed contacts with representatives of the Trump Campaign; the file was clandestinely named "Trump Campaign".
The Trump Campaign staffers appearing in the file include Steve Bannon, Kellyanne Conway, Sam Clovis (a policy adviser to the Trump campaign and now a senior adviser at the Agriculture Department) and, of course, retired Lt. Gen. Mike Flynn. So now we have a connection from Russian hackers, through Peter Smith, right up to the people sitting right next to Trump...sometimes with their feet on the furniture.
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Declaration of Independence, NPR, and Twitter (https://www.yahoo.com/news/npr-tweeted-declaration-independence-trump-065239684.html)
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Declaration of Independence, NPR, and Twitter (https://www.yahoo.com/news/npr-tweeted-declaration-independence-trump-065239684.html)
That's awesome...literally. I am in awe of these snowflake reactionaries and their ability to hold multiple competing beliefs in their heads at the same time.
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That's awesome...literally. I am in awe of these snowflake reactionaries and their ability to hold multiple competing beliefs in their heads at the same time.
When the Declaration of Independence reads like a direct commentary on your guy, perhaps it's time to re-examine your guy.
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Trump is in Poland - another country with a right-wing nationalist government installed, in part, with the help of Russian interference in an election. Apparently, he feels at home because he thought it appropriate - in a foreign venue - to deny the Russian hacking of our election, shit all over the US intelligence agencies for getting this - and WMDs in Iraq - wrong. At the same time, he criticized Obama for not doing anything about the election hacking.
Ignoring the fact that the mouth-breathing caucus of the Republican Party owes the Dixie Chicks a giant apology (once they're done with lynching NPR for tweeting the Declaration of Independence on July 4th)...WTF?
I actually agree that Obama deserves criticism for not outing the Russian hacking before the election. He kept quiet because (a) he didn't want to appear partisan; and (2) because Mitch McTurtle threatened to scream bloody murder if Obama whispered a word about it. I'm sure everyone was of the notion that Clinton would win and so there'd be no harm/foul, but now we're here. President Walkabout (https://youtu.be/nAjE1e8FG18) (seriously, it's getting bad (https://youtu.be/5fumChF0Skg), remember when he couldn't find Rudy Giuliani who was sitting directly across the table from him (https://youtu.be/2lpui1fTayI)?) is defending Russia against our intel services and former President, while contradicting himself over that very subject. How does nobody see this? I feel like I've taken crazy pills!
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How does nobody see this? I feel like I've taken crazy pills!
Sometimes I feel like I'm in an episode of The Munsters, and I'm Marilyn, the normal one.
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How does nobody see this? I feel like I've taken crazy pills!
Seriously, people see it but many think the "white man" has been put at a disadvantage because people tried to level the playing field. You may be surprised at how many white males will say how hard it is to get a job, because of companies trying to diversify.
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It is maddening. The Russians weren't involved and Obama is a pussy for not addressing the Russian involvement. Queue the raucous applause from his supporters.
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Seriously, people see it but many think the "white man" has been put at a disadvantage because people tried to level the playing field. You may be surprised at how many white males will say how hard it is to get a job, because of companies trying to diversify.
I've seen this in a number of people. Most are friends, and gigantic snowflakes.
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Sometimes I feel like I'm in an episode of The Munsters, and I'm Marilyn, the normal one.
When all of our political infrastructure is currently predicated on catering to the fringes of their particular constituencies the 90% of us in the middle are going to feel disenfranchised and bewildered. Also, you'd look hot in a Pat Priest blonde wig and a baby-doll dress.
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When all of our political infrastructure is currently predicated on catering to the fringes of their particular constituencies the 90% of us in the middle are going to feel disenfranchised and bewildered. Also, you'd look hot in a Pat Priest blonde wig and a baby-doll dress.
Don't do that. I look good in baby-doll dresses and you are ruining them.
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Don't do that. I look good in baby-doll dresses and you are ruining them.
Matt, like all catchers, have fantastic calves.
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Matt, like all catchers, have fantastic calves.
I once won a "best legs" contest in college.
Now on behalf of everyone...something no one would ever thought they'd hear...can we please get back to the political rants.
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When all of our political infrastructure is currently predicated on catering to the fringes of their particular constituencies the 90% of us in the middle are going to feel disenfranchised and bewildered.
I've come to the conclusion that if I could change one thing in politics, it would be requiring all states to draw district lines (for state and national legislative seats) according to a computer program that sets equal population with the minimum length of boundary lines.
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Seriously, people see it but many think the "white man" has been put at a disadvantage because people tried to level the playing field. You may be surprised at how many white males will say how hard it is to get a job, because of companies trying to diversify.
Mrs Limey belongs to a couple of women's business groups (currently President of NAWBO in Houston), and feels oddly guilty about supporting other women's businesses over businesses in general. I explain to her every time that white men have been propping up each other in the workplace for centuries, specifically to the exclusion of women and minorities, so a little payback is due. She used to work in oil & gas where she was given the biggest role in her department, and a corner office in which to do it, but was denied the title and pay rise that went with the job. She had to report to a fleet of useless "managers"; white men all.
Here's Louis CK's classic take on white male privilege (very NSFW (https://youtu.be/1cuQTGKD01M)).
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I've seen this in a number of people. Most are friends, and gigantic snowflakes.
The right-wing noise machine is 99% projection.
Just think about the bleating and carping about how "Obamacare" was forced through in the dead of night...after 14 months of debate; numerous, raucous town halls; weeks of hearings; hundreds of amendments considered from Republicans (many of which were taken up); and passing the 60-vote threshold in the Senate. Those same complainants just forced through the House their "please don't call it 'Trumpcare'" bill, without any debate, any hearings or even waiting for the CBO score. The Senate effort never came up for a vote, but it bypassed the committee process, would've been brought to vote without debate/hearings/amendments and was designed to be passed by only 50 votes. After that, the plan was to skip the reconciliation process and have the House vote on the Senate bill as is, to be signed into law in a flourish by Trump.
And that's how it is on something serious. There's also Newton's Trump's First Law which states that "for every tweet, there is an equal and opposite tweet sometime in the past". Many are presciently specific (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/donald-trump-tweets_us_5923522ee4b03b485cb42379).
OK. 100% projection.
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I've come to the conclusion that if I could change one thing in politics, it would be requiring all states to draw district lines (for state and national legislative seats) according to a computer program that sets equal population with the minimum length of boundary lines.
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I've seen some pretty persuasive evidence that this action wouldn't move the needle very much owing to the "self-sorting" Americans have been doing over the past couple decades. Thus the sociocultural split between, as the magnificent essayist and cartoonist Tim Kreider put it, the "Got-outs" vs. the "Stayed put."
Gerrymandering for ideological parity would require shapes just as fucked up as they are now.
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I've come to the conclusion that if I could change one thing in politics, it would be requiring all states to draw district lines (for state and national legislative seats) according to a computer program that sets equal population with the minimum length of boundary lines.
Gerrymandering is the Kevin Bacon of politics: you can trace every problem back to it within 6 moves...usually only 1.
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I've seen some pretty persuasive evidence that this action wouldn't move the needle very much owing to the "self-sorting" Americans have been doing over the past couple decades. Thus the sociocultural split between, as the magnificent essayist and cartoonist Tim Kreider put it, the "Got-outs" vs. the "Stayed put."
Gerrymandering for ideological parity would require shapes just as fucked up as they are now.
It's not about ideological anything; it's about forming districts that make geographical sense (https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/5/55/How_to_Steal_an_Election_-_Gerrymandering.svg/300px-How_to_Steal_an_Election_-_Gerrymandering.svg.png), and letting the ideology fall where it may.
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I've seen some pretty persuasive evidence that this action wouldn't move the needle very much owing to the "self-sorting" Americans have been doing over the past couple decades. Thus the sociocultural split between, as the magnificent essayist and cartoonist Tim Kreider put it, the "Got-outs" vs. the "Stayed put."
Gerrymandering for ideological parity would require shapes just as fucked up as they are now.
I haven't seen any studies on this (I'll look, and if you have links to anything feel free to share), but I have a hard time believing that what MM proposes via the shortest possible lines to achieve populational balance or literally just lines drawn at random would not be a significant improvement over the current Republican construction which is clearly meant to disenfranchise as many urban voters as possible.
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It's not about ideological anything; it's about forming districts that make geographical sense (https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/5/55/How_to_Steal_an_Election_-_Gerrymandering.svg/300px-How_to_Steal_an_Election_-_Gerrymandering.svg.png), and letting the ideology fall where it may.
Except that blues congregate in cities, and reds sprawl. "[L]etting the ideology fall where it may" is insufficient to the task of making legislatures more representative if ideology falls unevenly.
Unless--I see this now--as per MusicMan's suggestion, an urban center contained, say, five districts to the one rural district of equal population. Yes, that does make sense. I'm for it. Where do I sign?
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Except that blues congregate in cities, and reds sprawl. "[L]etting the ideology fall where it may" is insufficient to the task of making legislatures more representative if ideology falls unevenly.
Unless--I see this now--as per MusicMan's suggestion, an urban center contained, say, five districts to the one rural district of equal population. Yes, that does make sense. I'm for it. Where do I sign?
Blue cities are surrounded by red suburbs; rural districts with their sparse populations really don't tilt the scale. Montana has two Senators but a single House seat. It's when gerrymandering dilutes blue voters by creating blue vote "ghettos" while spreading the red votes around that we end up with what we have.
I live in Montrose, and my Congressman is Ted Fucking Poe. Here's a map of his district (http://poe.house.gov/index.cfm?a=Files.Serve&File_id=B19FEE2F-68A0-4FE4-8160-C46DFD4AD159). It's the perfect example of taking a concentrated slice of blue votes and burying them in a wraparound of suburban red votes. I do not see how any non-partisan redistricting would create something as fucked up as this. I'm not sure Poe has even come inside the loop in a decade - he can just ignore all his urban constituents because we carry no weight. Representative democracy?
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Unless--I see this now--as per MusicMan's suggestion, an urban center contained, say, five districts to the one rural district of equal population. Yes, that does make sense. I'm for it. Where do I sign?
It would have to be based on an equal population per district. People vote and are represented by government in a democracy, not acreage.
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Yes, I understood that--just didn't word it well. Each of the five urban districts (in my example) would be equal in population to the one rural.
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Blue cities are surrounded by red suburbs; rural districts with their sparse populations really don't tilt the scale. Montana has two Senators but a single House seat. It's when gerrymandering dilutes blue voters by creating blue vote "ghettos" while spreading the red votes around that we end up with what we have.
I live in Montrose, and my Congressman is Ted Fucking Poe. Here's a map of his district (http://poe.house.gov/index.cfm?a=Files.Serve&File_id=B19FEE2F-68A0-4FE4-8160-C46DFD4AD159). It's the perfect example of taking a concentrated slice of blue votes and burying them in a wraparound of suburban red votes. I do not see how any non-partisan redistricting would create something as fucked up as this. I'm not sure Poe has even come inside the loop in a decade - he can just ignore all his urban constituents because we carry no weight. Representative democracy?
SJL doesn't want you messing with this.
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Yes, I understood that--just didn't word it well. Each of the five urban districts (in my example) would be equal in population to the one rural.
Here's what happened in Minnesota (https://www.dailykos.com/story/2016/12/8/1604093/-Minnesota-s-2016-elections-show-both-the-promise-and-limits-of-nonpartisan-redistricting-reform), when the courts stepped in to resolve an argument that partisan politicians couldn't. They redrew the districts purely based on geography, to create 8 districts of equal population.
Interestingly, Clinton carried the state by 1.5%, but Republicans took 5 of the 8 Congressional seats. However, the underlying benefit is that most of the races in the state were competitive, meaning that more moderate candidates (of either stripe) will be the product of these elections. This is far more preferable - and representative - than having ever-more partisan and ideologically pure candidates who are more endangered by a primary challenge from their outside than they are by their opposite number.
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Blue cities are surrounded by red suburbs; rural districts with their sparse populations really don't tilt the scale. Montana has two Senators but a single House seat. It's when gerrymandering dilutes blue voters by creating blue vote "ghettos" while spreading the red votes around that we end up with what we have.
I live in Montrose, and my Congressman is Ted Fucking Poe. Here's a map of his district (http://poe.house.gov/index.cfm?a=Files.Serve&File_id=B19FEE2F-68A0-4FE4-8160-C46DFD4AD159). It's the perfect example of taking a concentrated slice of blue votes and burying them in a wraparound of suburban red votes. I do not see how any non-partisan redistricting would create something as fucked up as this. I'm not sure Poe has even come inside the loop in a decade - he can just ignore all his urban constituents because we carry no weight. Representative democracy?
Same situation here. The bulk of Asheville's population (among the bluest in all the land) is represented by Patrick McHenry. The map looks a little like a cartoon dog farting, with our town in the choice location you'd expect from such an arrangement (https://mchenry.house.gov/district/map.htm). Asheville comprises the single largest population center in his district, but we never see him. He doesn't even have an office here.
Like the man said: ratfucked.
I'm cautiously optimistic that the case the Supremes are taking up next year will improve things a bit.
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Same situation here. The bulk of Asheville's population (among the bluest in all the land) is represented by Patrick McHenry. The map looks a little like a cartoon dog farting, with our town in the choice location you'd expect from such an arrangement (https://mchenry.house.gov/district/map.htm). Asheville comprises the single largest population center in his district, but we never see him. He doesn't even have an office here.
Like the man said: ratfucked.
I'm cautiously optimistic that the case the Supremes are taking up next year will improve things a bit.
I'd say "don't hold your breath" but, given your location, that might be advisable.
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In non-gerrymandering news, Rick Perry announced at a coal plant that we need to increase the coal supply, because that creates increased demand.
This man is so stupid that I won't even hold A&M responsible for him.
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I'm cautiously optimistic that the case the Supremes are taking up next year will improve things a bit.
AHHHHH HAHAHAHAHA HAAAA AHHHHH HAHAHAHA HAHA.
HA. ha.
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AHHHHH HAHAHAHAHA HAAAA AHHHHH HAHAHAHA HAHA.
HA. ha.
If it came down to a neat divide, there's a non-zero chance that the new metric for wasted votes could sway Kennedy.
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I once won a "best legs" contest in college.
I actually believe you. (http://orangewhoopass.com/graphics/softball04/HudsonHawk_Dropping_Trou.jpg)
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If it came down to a neat divide, there's a non-zero chance that the new metric for wasted votes could sway Kennedy.
I think the absolute best case scenario is Kennedy kicks the can down the road again. But I'm not all that optimistic.
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I actually believe you. (http://orangewhoopass.com/graphics/softball04/HudsonHawk_Dropping_Trou.jpg)
Pantsed.
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I think the absolute best case scenario is Kennedy kicks the can down the road again. But I'm not all that optimistic.
If Kennedy and/or Ginsberg can't hang on, then Trump gets to set the political agenda for a generation. Still, there were emails...
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In non-gerrymandering news, Rick Perry announced at a coal plant that we need to increase the coal supply, because that creates increased demand.
This man is so stupid that I won't even hold A&M responsible for him.
He once said that a broken clock is right once a day...which is one time more than Perry.
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Jess Dweck @TheDweck 32m ago
I can't believe the President of the United States met for over two hours with Donald Trump.
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@ZeddRebel:
Putin insisted on watching the tape again with director's commentary on.
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Trump just zoned out in public again. He really is just a tired old man. That's the wander off after coming down from AF1, the standing around on stage after his speech in Poland and today, he was asleep as all the leaders were asked to turn for a photo and he was the only one not aware of the move. Teresa May had to poke him back into reality.
Remember when Hillary was too sick to be President and Jeb had low energy? Projection. See also, Little Marco and Lyin' Ted.
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My guy Lloyd Dogget's current map (http://www.texasobserver.org/wp-content/legacy/images/stories/Redistricting_20120229_interimCD35map.jpg) is pretty fucked up but not as bad as his previous district map (http://www.wrhammons.com/TX25_109.gif).
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So
Uday Butthead Don Jr. met with a Russian attorney with ties to the Kremlin to discuss Clinton's deleted emails. This meeting also included Trump's campaign chairman and self-designated foreign agent Paul Manafort, along with Jared "I do everything" Kushner. Ignoring the fact that this is yet another meeting that Kushner should have disclosed but failed to do so, Don Sr. has denied any knowledge of the meeting or of what was discussed.
By complete coincidence, Trump's first tweet after this meeting occurred referenced 33,000 deleted Clinton emails. Also completely coincidentally, it was the first time Trump had ever mentioned the subject. I'm sure that there's no "here" here, because Trump doesn't involve his family in his sacred duties of being the President (https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/7dc616fd2314623d083ca715900cf3a77ae9ee2c/142_512_2884_1731/master/2884.jpg?w=300&q=55&auto=format&usm=12&fit=max&s=6cfc088eca7c6781651e7dff02894682).
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He gave up on the adoption story pretty quickly, and now is claiming that the Russian lady said that the Russians were financing the DNC (and that the Trump campaign did not find this interesting). These guys are comically incompetent.
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He gave up on the adoption story pretty quickly, and now is claiming that the Russian lady said that the Russians were financing the DNC (and that the Trump campaign did not find this interesting). These guys are comically incompetent.
Don Jr.'s denials basically confirmed the substance of the NYT story. Also, because Manafort was there, the meeting may actually have been illegal under campaign laws; you can't solicit help from foreigners.
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Also, because Manafort was there, the meeting may actually have been illegal under campaign laws; you can't solicit help from foreigners.
Is that true? What rule prohibits assistance from foreigners?
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Is that true? What rule prohibits assistance from foreigners?
Here ya go (https://www.law.cornell.edu/cfr/text/11/110.20), in all its legalese glory for you.
(b) A foreign national shall not, directly or indirectly, make a contribution or a donation of money or other thing of value, or expressly or impliedly promise to make a contribution or a donation, in connection with any Federal, State, or local election.
...
(g) No person shall knowingly solicit, accept, or receive from a foreign national any contribution or donation prohibited by paragraphs (b) through (d) of this section.
I presume that the doubt around this is whether intel on Clinton counts as a "thing of value". If it does then it's pretty clear that Trump Jr. was soliciting a thing of value from someone known to him to be a foreign national.
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It is hopefully addressed by other statutes, but if one payed a foreign national for dirt on Clinton, is it no longer a contribution (which is apparently undefined) or a donation?
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It is hopefully addressed by other statutes, but if one payed a foreign national for dirt on Clinton, is it no longer a contribution (which is apparently undefined) or a donation?
The statute I linked seems to be clear that you can't ask for or be given stuff for free by foreigners. I'm assuming that buying stuff is ok, because how would you differentiate buying opposition research from, say, paper clips or laptops?
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Aaaaand done. The NYT reported last night (https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/10/us/politics/donald-trump-jr-russia-email-candidacy.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&clickSource=story-heading&module=span-ab-top-region®ion=top-news&WT.nav=top-news) that Trump Jr. had been told in an email - before taking the meeting with the Russian attorney offering dirt on Clinton - that the dirt was the product of a Russian government hacking operation. And he still went. And he took his brother-in-law and Trump campaign manager with him.
Before arranging a meeting with a Kremlin-connected Russian lawyer he believed would offer him compromising information about Hillary Clinton, Donald Trump Jr. was informed in an email that the material was part of a Russian government effort to aid his father’s candidacy, according to three people with knowledge of the email.
That, right there, is a smoking gun.
Let's not forget that the Trump campaign has denied and denied and denied, in the press, in security disclosures and under oath, that any meetings took place between the campaign and Russian officials. That still-ongoing lie has been systematically torn apart over time, and as each layer of this stinking onion is peeled back, they admit to just that, and deny anything further. Until the next layer is peeled back, and then they admit to just that. Rinse. Repeat.
Trump Jr., Kushner and Manafort are three of the highest ranking members of the Trump campaign. As of yesterday, they had corroborated not only that this meeting took place, but also that it was taken with the expectation of being given some dirt on their general election opponent. But now the Times has layered on the fact that they knew going in to that meeting that the dirt was the work product of a foreign government's hack attack. That puts a whole nother sinister spin on it entirely. They heard that the Russian government has been hacking into - perhaps - Secretary of State Clinton's infamous private email server, and their reaction was to immediately take a meeting to see if they could get their hands on it.
Today's spin from TrumpWorld is "where's the crime?" Well, there's the violation of the election statute prohibiting receiving or soliciting "things of value" from foreign nationals - which they have already copped to by confirming they took the meeting specifically to get dirt on Clinton. But the fact that they knew in advance that it was the Russian government dangling the carrots, I think this rises to the level of a criminal conspiracy. All the hacking was illegal, and the Trumps got involved after the fact. No wonder Mueller has added experts in RICO prosecutions to his team, because that is what this is now - a criminal enterprise.
Ranking Member Schiff added some chronological context to this last night. The Russian hacks were mostly complete prior to the June meeting in question. After the June meeting:
(1) Trump tweets - for the first time - about the 33,000 deleted emails;
(b) Trump openly calls for Russia to find and release those emails at a campaign rally;
(iii) The Trump campaign demands (and gets) only one change to the GOP platform - the removal of language supporting sanctions against Russia over their invasion of Ukraine; and
(4) Russia starts drip-feeding damaging information about Hillary Clinton.
I mean, it's almost as if they planned it or something.
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As of last night, Trump Jr. lawyered-up (http://www.nbcnews.com/politics/donald-trump/senate-intel-committee-wants-talk-donald-trump-jr-source-says-n781381).
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People wishing to get Trump ousted, and there are many on both sides of the aisle, should not get caught up in whether each specific act is illegal or whether the whole enterprise is illegal. Impeachment is political, not legal. Therefore, IMO, they should focus on the idea that he was in cahoots with an enemy and most importantly, is now compromised by it. That might be persuasive to some Republicanss that will be needed for impeachment. Basically, they won't have to agree that Trump is a crook, they just have to agree that his presence as commander in chief is too risky for the nation.
Additionally, the NYT article on how Kushner and Bannon were planning, behinds the scenes, to use a Blackwater mercenary force for Afghanistan will further support this growing concern among Republicans. K and B approached the generals last weekend with the idea, and it was promptly shot down and must have raised a few "What the fuck are these guys doing" questions.
So, while criminal prosecutions may or may not be in the Trump circle's future, the argument for his ouster should be placed elsewhere.
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So, while criminal prosecutions may or may not be in the Trump circle's future, the argument for his ouster should be placed elsewhere.
Absolutely. However, I have no faith at this point that a Republican-lead Congress will do anything other than stall and stammer on this. Then, if ousted in 2018, they will scream 'PARTISANSHIP!" about any efforts to investigate or impeach anyone in the Trump administration. And, even then, Trump can pre-pardon anyone he wants and President Pence can pre-pardon citizen Trump from any prosecutions to which he would then be open.
But, regarding 2018, let's not overlook the fact that we know that the Russians went after specific districts in specific states to try and derail voting in pivotal Democratic-leaning districts to suppress Clinton votes. I think the combined margin of victory in the three crucial states of MI, PA, WI was about 70,000 so, with the electoral college still in place, it's not like they have to do much to tip the balance. Of course, Trump's budget defunds entirely the federal department tasked with overseeing anti-hacking efforts in elections. Trump's administration is doing nothing at all about discovering how the hacking was done and ensuring it won't happen in the future, and we now know that they're ok with colluding with Russians to help them win elections. If 2018 is a clean election, I'll eat my hat.
So, something has to give here. I just do not see how it gets done using the existing checks and balances. Congress will protect this President, who in turn will make sure - by hook or by crook - that they keep their majority in the next mid-terms. The Supreme Court will split 5/4 in favor of the administration in most cases, and have a insurmountable Republican-bias for decades if Kennedy and/or Ginsberg steps down. Only the 4th estate is working to shin a light on this rock, but its reputation has being damaged by its own greed for ratings and by elected officials all happy to scream "Fake News!" at any damaging, factual, reports.
Is this how democracy dies?
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Is this how democracy dies?
I, for one, welcome our incompetent kleptocrat overlords.
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I, for one, welcome our incompetent kleptocrat overlords.
It's the blatant incompetency that's perhaps the most galling. These are truly dumb people, and they're stealing our democracy in plain sight while brazenly enriching themselves in the process.
Putin is believed to be the richest person in the world, by no small margin. Now, he is well on his way to adding the United States to his stable of riches; Trump being Loki to his Thanos.
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I... I just can't even put this into words. Donald Trump, Jr. posted the emails in question to Twitter.
https://twitter.com/DonaldJTrumpJr/status/884789839522140166/photo/1
Let's just point out the most relevant sentence:
This is obviously very high level and sensitive information but is part of Russia and its government's support for Mr. Trump
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How dumb are they? Trump Jr. just released what he claims to be the entire email exchange setting up the meeting with the Russian attorney. Not only does it confirm the accuracy of the Times' reporting, It reads like a smoking machine gun (https://twitter.com/DonaldJTrumpJr/status/884789418455953413/photo/1?ref_src=twsrc^tfw&ref_url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.rawstory.com%2F2017%2F07%2Fdon-jr-just-released-the-full-russia-emails-and-they-contain-a-potential-smoking-gun-read-them-here%2F).
I wonder who has jurisdiction here? It happened in New York, so maybe the US Attorney for the Southern District... oh (https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation-now/2017/03/11/new-york-us-attorney-refusing-step-down/99055128/).
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All this makes me highly suspicious of a setup. The brazen stupidity of Trump Jr. (even for him) and the fact that five administrative folks apparently ratted him out when they knew it would be huge. Really, there are five people who both knew about this and are willing to throw Trump's son under the bus?
The setup might be Trump Jr. as the fall guy, trying to make it appear that he was the rogue guy on the inner circle. Later, daddy will pardon him while saying that we just shouldn't be concerned about this any more. You know, no need to relitigate this in Tillerson speak.
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All this makes me highly suspicious of a setup. The brazen stupidity of Trump Jr. (even for him) and the fact that five administrative folks apparently ratted him out when they knew it would be huge. Really, there are five people who both knew about this and are willing to throw Trump's son under the bus?
The setup might be Trump Jr. as the fall guy, trying to make it appear that he was the rogue guy on the inner circle. Later, daddy will pardon him while saying that we just shouldn't be concerned about this any more. You know, no need to relitigate this in Tillerson speak.
This would be the smart thing to do, knowing that the noose was tightening anyway. It's a tried and trusted strategy - to self-leak damning evidence ahead of a more damning reveal - so as to lessen the impact of the full story. For example, now, if anyone goes after Trump or his family / administration about Russia, they can say that they've come clean and everyone knows what it is. It's a very effective smokescreen against all future revelations on this subject.
Or...Don Jr. could just be that fucking dumb.
Or both.
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Don Jr. makes Fredo look like Michael.
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Don Jr. makes Fredo look like Michael.
And Manafort is no Tom Hagen.
Meanwhile, Kushner risked his family's entire, considerable, wealth, on a single piece of real estate...in 2007. This, after buying a newspaper in 2006. I am thinking about offering him a bet on last night's HR Derby; he might just take it.
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Don Jr. makes Fredo look like Michael.
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"I can do things. I'm smart"
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Jr. forwarded the entire email string to Manafort and Kushner, including the attribution that they were meeting a "Russian government attorney". So that's them fucked too, then. Gone is any plausible deniability that they went into the meeting in ignorance of the subject matter to be discussed.
Also, just for what it's worth, this is yet another meeting with Russians that Kushner failed to disclose.
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Seeing commentary that Don Jr. released the email thread because the Times had it and said it was going to publish.
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Putin is believed to be the richest person in the world, by no small margin. Now, he is well on his way to adding the United States to his stable of riches; Trump being Loki to his Thanos.
Not too long ago I got an annoying, borderline offensive lowball offer on an apartment I'm selling in Colombia. The story that the agent told me about the buyer didn't make any sense to me and although on one hand it doesn't really matter who the buyer is I don't suppose, I'm an inquisitive sort of fellow. I did a little poking around and came to the conclusion that the actual buyer was Mariya Putin, Vladimir's elder daughter. Her husband/boyfriend of many years, a Dutch guy, was the person actually on the ground in Colombia at the time.
Now, why a family with untold billions of dollars is concerning itself shaving $50k or whatever it was off some jerky apartment in Medellin rather than negotiating to purchase the port of Cartagena, well, I have no idea. I happened to talk to the agent the other day and learned that they never did buy anything.
Who's leaking all of this recent stuff? Initially I assumed it was Kushner but I've had a chance to rethink that and now I'm not so sure.
The only thing that is truly surprising to me in all this is that DJ apparently knows how to use email. I assumed he'd honor the grand Trump tradition of scribbling on a printed copy of a message with a colored marker and having that document faxed back to the sender. It's good to see him blaze new trails.
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Not too long ago I got an annoying, borderline offensive lowball offer on an apartment I'm selling in Colombia. The story that the agent told me about the buyer didn't make any sense to me and although on one hand it doesn't really matter who the buyer is I don't suppose, I'm an inquisitive sort of fellow. I did a little poking around and came to the conclusion that the actual buyer was Mariya Putin, Vladimir's elder daughter. Her husband/boyfriend of many years, a Dutch guy, was the person actually on the ground in Colombia at the time.
Now, why a family with untold billions of dollars is concerning itself shaving $50k or whatever it was off some jerky apartment in Medellin rather than negotiating to purchase the port of Cartagena, well, I have no idea. I happened to talk to the agent the other day and learned that they never did buy anything.
The Russian oligarchs use property to stash wealth and/or launder money. Maybe they found a better vehicle elsewhere.
Who's leaking all of this recent stuff? Initially I assumed it was Kushner but I've had a chance to rethink that and now I'm not so sure.
I have a theory (that is mine). Trump, other than taking a wrecking ball to the U.S' position as a world leader, has delivered almost nothing of value to the Russians. He hasn't lifted a single sanction and, with the scrutiny on him at an excruciating level, he's very unlikely to get anything done in the short term. Now, from my extensive experience of the mob - from movies and TV - they really don't care that it's going to fuck you over to do their bidding. So, maybe this whole Don Jr. mess is a shot across Sr's bows.
The only thing that is truly surprising to me in all this is that DJ apparently knows how to use email. I assumed he'd honor the grand Trump tradition of scribbling on a printed copy of a message with a colored marker and having that document faxed back to the sender. It's good to see him blaze new trails.
I found it amusing that, in 2017, someone is still using the ">" to designate forwarded text. Anyway, Trump Sr. will let you have his ancient Android phone when you can pry it out of his tiny, dead hands. It's safe to assume that he's, at best, no more tech savvy than the level of competence demonstrated by Jr in this published exchange. So, there's no way the Russians don't have hard copy evidence of Sr's complicity and/or collusion.
First, Jr. gets whacked (https://youtu.be/sJU2cz9ytPQ). Who's next, Jared? Then Ivanka? That would be the progression of affection in the Trump family. When that fails...it's peepee time. The Russians will burn down the whole family and its administration by the time this is over.
Meanwhile, Vice-President Pence's on the record comment about all this is that he wasn't involved because it was before he joined the campaign. That's damning with no praise whatsoever.
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One other tidbit: Trump Sr. was in the building the day of the meeting.
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Think about this: he fired Comey because "this whole Russia thing, with Trump-Russia, is fake news." It was Kushner who strongly pushed for Trump to fire Comey. Kushner was on the emails and in the meeting when Russia's assistance to the Trump campaign was raised. So Kushner knew it wasn't fake; which means he either lied to his boss/father-in-law or his boss/father-in-law knew it was real and the "fake news" is (gasp) an attempt at laying down smoke.
Either way, how is Kushner still allowed with 100 yards of the White House or a Chuckie Cheese?
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> One other tidbit: Trump Sr. was in the building the day of the meeting.
The following day saw his first tweet regarding the Clinton email server.
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> One other tidbit: Trump Sr. was in the building the day of the meeting.
The following day saw his first tweet regarding the Clinton email server.
ISWYDT
Exactly. The timeline of events subsequent to this meeting - the initiation of the tweets and stumping about Clinton's emails; the single, Russia-friendly change to the GOP platform; and the beginning of the drip feed of damaging information about Team Clinton from Russia - is incredibly damning. In the emails we've seen, Trump Jr. expresses glee at the potential for dirt on Clinton and that he would love it if it came out, especially later in the summer - which it did.
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Exactly. The timeline of events subsequent to this meeting - the initiation of the tweets and stumping about Clinton's emails; the single, Russia-friendly change to the GOP platform; and the beginning of the drip feed of damaging information about Team Clinton from Russia - is incredibly damning. In the emails we've seen, Trump Jr. expresses glee at the potential for dirt on Clinton and that he would love it if it came out, especially later in the summer - which it did.
Also, the FBI's investigation into these fuckwits began in June of 2016 or July at the latest, and I sort of doubt that the timing is coincidental. When a mobbed up Russian lawyer who's previously had her visa revoked swans into Trump Tower to meet directly with high level campaign staff and Trump family members to discuss potentially damning information on Clinton that the Russian government may wish to share with the Trump campaign in exchange for sanctions relief, all of which these geniuses have been freely discussing via MOTHERFUCKING EMAIL, I mean, yeah, it doesn't surprise me that someone at the FBI would get curious about just what the hell is going on.
You know, deep state and that.
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Excellent - and scary - analysis (https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2017/7/11/15953440/trump-russia-emails-watergate):
And so we are faced with a crisis that leaves vast swaths of American politics stained. The election is tainted. The White House is tainted. Our foreign policy is tainted. If impeachment seems impossible, it is only because we believe that Republicans in Congress would sooner protect a criminal administration than risk their legislative agenda to uphold the rule of law — which is all to say, Congress is tainted, too.
The actors in this drama are often comic, pathetic, and incompetent. But the damage they have done, and are doing, is almost beyond imagining. As often as this looks like farce, we should not forget it’s a tragedy.
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The following day saw his first tweet regarding the Clinton email server.
It's worse than that. The meeting was in Trump Tower at 4pm and reportedly lasted about 30 minutes. Trump was in residence at Trump Tower that day. The first ever tweet about Clinton emails came at...4:40pm. Same day.
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It's worse than that. The meeting was in Trump Tower at 4pm and reportedly lasted about 30 minutes. Trump was in residence at Trump Tower that day. The first ever tweet about Clinton emails came at...4:40pm. Same day.
On June 7, Fredo Trump confirmed the meeting.
That night, Papa Trump promised he would have "a major speech with all he information on the Clintons, probably next week."
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As to my Sonny Corleone theory, Rachel Maddow - who is much smarter than me (and most other people) - last night explained exactly how Russia is getting what Russia wants (http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow/watch/russia-enjoying-great-success-with-trump-in-white-house-993315395858). That blows my theory out of the water.
This mess appears to have been the NY Times flushing this rat out of the drainpipe with good, ol' fashioned investigative journalism.
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With an amazing piece of coincidental timing, Christopher Wray is now sitting in front of the Senate for his confirmation hearing to be the replacement for James Comey. I wonder what they'll ask him about.
Meanwhile, Trump Sr. is off on a trip to France, where he'll meet with noted Putin-botherer Emmanuel Macron. I wonder what they'll talk about.
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An interesting aside: the Jr. emails have just given flesh to the motive for Sr's obstruction of justice accusation. His defense has been that "nobody knows" if Russia actually hacked the election. Well, now we know that Jr., Kushner and Manafort - at least - knew. If Trump fired Comey merely to stop the investigation getting to these emails, then that's obstruction of justice.
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Pretty crazy how fast we went from TrumpCo screaming that anything Russian related was a hoax and manufactured by the media to...well anyone would collude if given the chance. Sad!
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Pretty crazy how fast we went from TrumpCo screaming that anything Russian related was a hoax and manufactured by the media to...well anyone would collude if given the chance. Sad!
At least we can now rest assured that nothing came of the meeting...because they said so.
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At least we can now rest assured that nothing came of the meeting...because they said so.
They are all so believable.
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They are all so believable.
Exactly, there isnt a better example of projection than Trump's constant blathering about Fake News.
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They are all so believable.
"I'm not a crook"
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Exactly, there isnt a better example of projection than Trump's constant blathering about Fake News.
He reiterated today that he is a dumb (https://www.bostonglobe.com/news/politics/2017/07/13/trump-thinks-lot-people-don-know-forget-that-france-america-oldest-ally/beNUzVc4v8JswsoruZOlgJ/story.html) creep (http://www.businessinsider.com/president-trump-tells-brigitte-macron-good-shape-france-2017-7)
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Exactly, there isnt a better example of projection than Trump's constant blathering about Fake News.
I caught a bit of Katy Tur (but not the bits I'd like to catch) at lunch. She was interviewing a Republican Congressman who was steadfast in his belief that nothing happened in the meeting because there are no facts to suggest anything else. Katy tried to point out that it's a fact that the Trumps have lied multiple times about the meeting, so he pivoted to the shooting to Steve Scalia. I shit you not.
Watching NBC, it seems to me that Kacie Hunt has the demeanor of one's S.O. when you've just got in late from a night out with the lads, while Katy Tur has the demeanor of your S.O. when she's rolling in late from a night out with the gals. See also Oil, Wesson.
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He reiterated today that he is a dumb (https://www.bostonglobe.com/news/politics/2017/07/13/trump-thinks-lot-people-don-know-forget-that-france-america-oldest-ally/beNUzVc4v8JswsoruZOlgJ/story.html) creep (http://www.businessinsider.com/president-trump-tells-brigitte-macron-good-shape-france-2017-7)
The France trip was arranged hastily as Trump only agreed to go once Macron promised him a parade with tanks 'n' shit (https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trump-loves-a-military-parade--its-one-reason-hes-heading-to-paris/2017/07/12/ccd46894-66df-11e7-8eb5-cbccc2e7bfbf_story.html?utm_term=.05731bb125a5). What's "man-child" in French?
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I suppose you could say he's a bit of an enfant terrible.
I'm still laughing at one of the things he said in the interview with Pat Robertson, who apparently is still alive somehow: Just got back from G20, amazing meeting, we had 20 counties there, you know.
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I suppose you could say he's a bit of an enfant terrible.
I'm still laughing at one of the things he said in the interview with Pat Robertson, who apparently is still alive somehow: Just got back from G20, amazing meeting, we had 20 counties there, you know.
What's SAD! is that I bet Trump was going on what he was told and didn't actually count the twenty countries himself.
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What's SAD! is that I bet Trump was going on what he was told and didn't actually count the twenty countries himself.
"There are twenty countries in the world...not many people know this."
"Sir. There are 196 countries."
"FAKE NEWS!"
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They are all so believable.
To wit, NBC is reporting that there was another attendee at the June meeting: an, as yet unnamed, ex-Soviet agent (https://youtu.be/5NNOrp_83RU).
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To wit, NBC is reporting that there was another attendee at the June meeting: an, as yet unnamed, ex-Soviet agent (https://youtu.be/5NNOrp_83RU).
The press isn't very sharp. This Russian lady has been interviewed numerous times, always through an interpreter, at least from what I've seen. So, one logical question to Dumbass Jr., or at least to opine about, would be "Did this Russian attorney speak English to you." "If not, do you speak Russian." "If not, does Kushner or Manafort." "If not, how the fuck did y'all communicate." I've heard reporters say that there was interpreter in the meeting, but that doesn't square with the sudden newsflash that there was at least a fifth person in the room.
I realize that a shit-ton of stuff has been dropped on the press and they are not trained investigators, but I sure hope Mueller is fifty steps ahead of the press, on this matter and the numerous ones we will learn about in the coming weeks and months.
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He reiterated today that he is a dumb (https://www.bostonglobe.com/news/politics/2017/07/13/trump-thinks-lot-people-don-know-forget-that-france-america-oldest-ally/beNUzVc4v8JswsoruZOlgJ/story.html) creep (http://www.businessinsider.com/president-trump-tells-brigitte-macron-good-shape-france-2017-7)
Here's video (https://www.facebook.com/InTheKnowByAOL/videos/870511629771286/) of Trump refusing to release Brigitte Macron's hand from his tiny, vice-grip; and later complimenting her body right in front of his own wife (who she pulls in front of her for protection). He is a horror of a man.
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The press isn't very sharp. This Russian lady has been interviewed numerous times, always through an interpreter, at least from what I've seen. So, one logical question to Dumbass Jr., or at least to opine about, would be "Did this Russian attorney speak English to you." "If not, do you speak Russian." "If not, does Kushner or Manafort." "If not, how the fuck did y'all communicate." I've heard reporters say that there was interpreter in the meeting, but that doesn't square with the sudden newsflash that there was at least a fifth person in the room.
I realize that a shit-ton of stuff has been dropped on the press and they are not trained investigators, but I sure hope Mueller is fifty steps ahead of the press, on this matter and the numerous ones we will learn about in the coming weeks and months.
Kinda like when Sr. let the Russian Ambassador and Russian Foreign Minister into the Oval Office with their own camera crew. No security threat there, having some unknown Russians in there with a bunch of electronic equipment...
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Here's video (https://www.facebook.com/InTheKnowByAOL/videos/870511629771286/) of Trump refusing to release Brigitte Macron's hand from his tiny, vice-grip; and later complimenting her body right in front of his own wife (who she pulls in front of her for protection). He is a horror of a man.
I'm just glad he didn't grab her by the pussy.
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Meanwhile, back at The Wall, Trump wants it to be solar and physically (though certainly not financially) transparent: (http://www.cnbc.com/2017/07/13/trump-explains-why-he-wants-to-be-able-to-see-through-his-border-wall.html)
Question: You were joking about solar, right?
Trump: No, not joking, no. There is a chance that we can do a solar wall. We have major companies looking at that. Look, there's no better place for solar than the Mexico border -- the southern border. And there is a very good chance we can do a solar wall, which would actually look good. But there is a very good chance we could do a solar wall.
One of the things with the wall is you need transparency. You have to be able to see through it. In other words, if you can't see through that wall — so it could be a steel wall with openings, but you have to have openings because you have to see what's on the other side of the wall.
And I'll give you an example. As horrible as it sounds, when they throw the large sacks of drugs over, and if you have people on the other side of the wall, you don't see them -- they hit you on the head with 60 pounds of stuff? It's over. As cray as that sounds, you need transparency through that wall. But we have some incredible designs.
And he did actually say "cray" instead of "crazy." Frankly, I'm a little impressed with his vision. If you're going to build something as stupid as a 2,000 mile wall, you might as well lean into it.
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Well, that is the first time this fucking imbecile has made me laugh out loud. I'm imagining some poor sap standing around in the shade in Presidio, Texas, minding his own business when suddenly, WHOMP, crushed like a June bug by one of those archetypal 60-pound bags of cocaine the bad hombres are forever heaving over the border.
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Well, that is the first time this fucking imbecile has made me laugh out loud. I'm imagining some poor sap standing around in the shade in Presidio, Texas, minding his own business when suddenly, WHOMP, crushed like a June bug by one of those archetypal 60-pound bags of cocaine the bad hombres are forever heaving over the border.
"The large sacks of drugs." It's like he views the world solely in terms of bugs bunny cartoons.
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And he did actually say "cray" instead of "crazy." Frankly, I'm a little impressed with his vision. If you're going to build something as stupid as a 2,000 mile wall, you might as well lean into it.
There is so much stupid here it's hard to know where to begin. Is he saying that we need openings in the wall so we can see people trying to throw sacks of drugs over it? Won't they just push drugs through the openings in the wall? Won't they just keep tunneling like they do now? Don't solar panels have to be not-vertical to catch the sun? Won't putting solar panels on 2,000 miles of wall be cray-expensive? Won't all that energy production kill coal jobs? WHO IS GOING TO PAY FOR THE FUCKING THING?
I now understand why he watches back recordings of his TV appearances with the volume down: listening to what he says destroys brain cells.
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Well, that is the first time this fucking imbecile has made me laugh out loud. I'm imagining some poor sap standing around in the shade in Presidio, Texas, minding his own business when suddenly, WHOMP, crushed like a June bug by one of those archetypal 60-pound bags of cocaine the bad hombres are forever heaving over the border.
I am reminded of this parody (https://youtu.be/o-vtFZAaTDY) of the classic British comedy "Whisky Galore".
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"The large sacks of drugs." It's like he views the world solely in terms of bugs bunny cartoons.
What's Spanish for "Acme"?
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"The large sacks of drugs." It's like he views the world solely in terms of bugs bunny cartoons.
Speedy Gonzales was a bad hombre.
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Speedy Gonzales was a bad hombre.
The DEA has already unearthed equipment being built by the cartels (http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_96uP6vDZMT8/S_qX8wdyoBI/AAAAAAAAMTw/dxJDLTyJxxA/s400/COYOTE2+-+BEEP+BEEP+%2852%292.png) to bypass Trump's wall.
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"The large sacks of drugs." It's like he views the world solely in terms of bugs bunny cartoons.
Maybe they should paint gaps in the wall on the Mexican side; that way the drug runners will crash into the wall thinking there's a gap, thus foiling their plan. The unfortunate downside is that a number of cats may end up with a stripe of white paint down their backs, and get raped by illegal alien skunks.
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Maybe they should paint gaps in the wall on the Mexican side; that way the drug runners will crash into the wall thinking there's a gap, thus foiling their plan. The unfortunate downside is that a number of cats may end up with a stripe of white paint down their backs, and get raped by illegal alien skunks.
90% of the time, the cats and skunks were drunk, so the cats had it coming.
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Seriously, if his wall can be defeated as easily as a burly Mexican lobbing sacks over it, why the fuck are we bothering to build it?
We haven't even started getting into high tech solutions like ropes and ladders, which have been around for tens of thousands of years.
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The DEA has already unearthed equipment being built by the cartels (http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_96uP6vDZMT8/S_qX8wdyoBI/AAAAAAAAMTw/dxJDLTyJxxA/s400/COYOTE2+-+BEEP+BEEP+%2852%292.png) to bypass Trump's wall.
Vicente Fox made a mocking video recently in which he displayed a "schematic downloaded from the dark web" of a special device designed to thwart the wall. It was of course a ladder.
There's a surf town here called Santa Catalina. It's a pretty cool place, all in all. I usually do my dive trips from there. I almost always stay at the same place, a place run by a Portuguese surfer who's been there for, I don't know, 25 years at least. He knows every last thing about the place, of course. He was telling me about a time not that long ago when a large shipment of cocaine washed up on the town's beaches. The local youth are in general none too bright. Probably a lot like the local youth anywhere. These guys snatched up the various packages and set about moving their weight. Well, obviously, the client list for kilos of cocaine in the greater Santa Catalina - Soná area is limited, and since it apparently never occurred to any of these budding Tony Montanas to head to the capital and look up some real gangsters, they did the best they could with the gringo surfers and the like that would roll through town.
It didn't take long before the local police figured out what was going on. The ringleader of this operation was a guy named Ponky. Ponky worked out of the town's main store, part (very) small grocery, part miscellaneous items. There's a phone booth just outside. The main police station for the area is in Soná, which is maybe an hour away depending on the condition of the road that day. Apparently the police weren't interested in driving down to Santa Catalina to make the bust, so one of them had a nice idea. They ring the phone booth.
- Yello!
- Ponky, that you?!
- Yo!
- Hey, heard you got some product!
- Sure do! Whaddaya need?!
- Oh, I don't know, as much as you got!
- You bet!
- Say, why don't you hop the next bus outta there and meet me in Soná? I'll be the guy waiting at the bus station!
- On the way!
So, yes, Ponky got on a bus and literally delivered the drugs (and himself) directly to the police who were too lazy to come down and arrest him.
The only thing that's really surprising is that this doesn't happen all the time, drugs washing up on the beach. I can't imagine the quantity of drugs that find their way into the country through the Pacific coast. Why this doesn't happen every week I just can't imagine.
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The idea of securing the southern border, in certain places is a good idea. Obama was for, Clinton was for it, anyone with any sense is for it. The idea of building a 3000 mile long 60ft high wall on the other hand, is singularly one of the stupidest things I have ever heard of. Of course Trump and most the simpletons that adore him think it is brilliant. It is so dumb it is hard to wrap my head around the idea that there are living breathing people that think it makes sense....but here we are.
To Trump's credit, it sound like he is at least listening to the people that actually understand the border. One of their biggest complaints behind his idiotic idea was that they need to be able to see the other side. Up until now, everything I read was that he was unwilling to budge on an "wall" vs some sort of fence, so that LEO could see what was happening on the other side.
It appears that simply explaining that to our rube of a President didn't work, instead they tricked him with the idea of people being killed by Mexicans randomly lobbing over huge sacks of drugs. What the actual Fuck. Cray Times!
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And remember this, it’s a 2,000 mile border, but you don’t need 2,000 miles of wall because you have a lot of natural barriers. You have mountains. You have some rivers that are violent and vicious. You have some areas that are so far away that you don’t really have people crossing.
Mexicans are notoriously afraid of mountains. And by 'some rivers,' I assume he means 'a' river. A lot of people don't know this, but it's only one river that forms a border. Anyway, it's a good thing it's too violent and vicious for anyone to ever think of crossing it.
And then all those areas that are too far away. We can forget about those places, thank heavens. Who in his right mind would want to lug 60-pound sacks of drugs through a remote desert? AND, we're currently repairing parts of the existing wall, so in reality you can accurately say that we have in fact begun the wall.
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It appears that simply explaining that to our rube of a President didn't work, instead they tricked him with the idea of people being killed by Mexicans randomly lobbing over huge sacks of drugs. What the actual Fuck. Cray Times!
As funny as it was, when SNL had Trump sit at the kid's desk playing with a toy while Bannon ran the country, the truth is actually way more scary. Nobody is running anything, and Trump is as in charge as anyone can be in this Blazing Saddles pie fight (https://youtu.be/_AOeSrLCD-U) of an administration.
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Mexicans are notoriously afraid of mountains. And by 'some rivers,' I assume he means 'a' river. A lot of people don't know this, but it's only one river that forms a border. Anyway, it's a good thing it's too violent and vicious for anyone to ever think of crossing it.
I wonder if anyone has managed to build a bridge (https://youtu.be/Wpx6XnankZ8) over this raging horror of a waterway?
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Former Russian counter-intelligence operative turned lobbyist has admitted attending the June 2016 meeting (https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/jul/14/donald-trump-jr-meeting-russian-lobbyist-rinat-akhmetshin). So, let's call the roll shall we:
Russian, Kremlin-connected lawyer
Russian Interpreter
Russian counter-intelligence agent
Manafort
Kushner
Trump Jr.
Topic: babies.
Totally credible.
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The idea of securing the southern border, in certain places is a good idea. Obama was for, Clinton was for it, anyone with any sense is for it. The idea of building a 3000 mile long 60ft high wall on the other hand, is singularly one of the stupidest things I have ever heard of. Of course Trump and most the simpletons that adore him think it is brilliant. It is so dumb it is hard to wrap my head around the idea that there are living breathing people that think it makes sense....but here we are.
To Trump's credit, it sound like he is at least listening to the people that actually understand the border. One of their biggest complaints behind his idiotic idea was that they need to be able to see the other side. Up until now, everything I read was that he was unwilling to budge on an "wall" vs some sort of fence, so that LEO could see what was happening on the other side.
It appears that simply explaining that to our rube of a President didn't work, instead they tricked him with the idea of people being killed by Mexicans randomly lobbing over huge sacks of drugs. What the actual Fuck. Cray Times!
People keep talking about the wall with Mexico, but it's the Canadians we should be worried about. They're the ones who gave us Ted Cruz.
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People keep talking about the wall with Mexico, but it's the Canadians we should be worried about. They're the ones who gave us Ted Cruz.
...and Bryan Adams.
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And Maryland. They are the ones who gave us that shitstain Dan Patrick.
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And all the blue states...losers.
The Russians are coming...The Russians are coming...The sky is falling...The sky is falling.
Go 'Stros...let get this second half started....before the Russians take over.
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And all the blue states...losers.
The Russians are coming...The Russians are coming...The sky is falling...The sky is falling.
Go 'Stros...let get this second half started....before the Russians take over.
Before? Too late.
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And all the blue states...losers.
The Russians are coming...The Russians are coming...The sky is falling...The sky is falling.
Go 'Stros...let get this second half started....before the Russians take over.
Why do you trust the Russians?
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And all the blue states...losers.
The Russians are coming...The Russians are coming...The sky is falling...The sky is falling.
Go 'Stros...let get this second half started....before the Russians take over.
Plenty of wonderful folks in Blue states, Dan Patrick aint one of them. I mean Dan Goeb, which is he real name. Everything about Dan is fake.
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Former Russian counter-intelligence operative turned lobbyist has admitted attending the June 2016 meeting (https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/jul/14/donald-trump-jr-meeting-russian-lobbyist-rinat-akhmetshin). So, let's call the roll shall we:
Russian, Kremlin-connected lawyer
Russian Interpreter
Russian counter-intelligence agent
Manafort
Kushner
Trump Jr.
Topic: babies.
Totally credible.
The translator apparently was not a Russian but instead a fellow named John Barron.
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The translator apparently was not a Russian but instead a fellow named John Barron.
Jim couldn't make it because he was still in Paris freaking out about brown people.
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90% of the time, the cats and skunks were drunk, so the cats had it coming.
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Did these cats attend Baylor?
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The cats at Baylor get killed by the baseball players.
http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/sports/bbw/2001-04-11/2001-04-11-colleges.htm
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Funny how all these people ostensibly up in arms over the idea of HRC meeting secretly with international swells to conspire an end to American sovereignty couldn't care less that their guy was actively courting a foreign country's aid in the election, and has been demonstrably lying about it the whole time.
I know it doesn't do any good to point out hypocrisy, but Jesus Christ...
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To Trump's credit, it sound like he is at least listening to the people that actually understand the border.
Not so fast. (https://www.texasobserver.org/trump-border-wall-texas-wildlife-refuge-breaking/)
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Why do you trust the Russians?
I neither trust them or fear them...fuck them....but they have a couple thousand nuclear, deplorable
weapons...so I respect them. No need to piss them off if we can find common ground. It's a different bear these days.
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Funny how all these people ostensibly up in arms over the idea of HRC meeting secretly with international swells to conspire an end to American sovereignty couldn't care less that their guy was actively courting a foreign country's aid in the election, and has been demonstrably lying about it the whole time.
I know it doesn't do any good to point out hypocrisy, but Jesus Christ...
From an ABC/WaPo Poll:
% of GOP who believe Russia sought to interfere in the 2016 election...
April: 18%
July: 9%
Also, 58% of GOP poll respondents believe colleges and universities have a negative impact on the country.
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Also, 58% of GOP poll respondents believe colleges and universities have a negative impact on the country.
That result makes me question the validity of a lot of things.
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That result makes me question the validity of a lot of things.
It's honestly depressing to think about.
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I saw recently where some Democratic strategists were looking at polling numbers in a purple congressional district and they were shocked to discover that among Republicans Trump is more popular now than he was when he was elected or sworn in or whatever it was. It didn't surprise me at all. Of course, I'm not a highly paid operative tasked with discovering new and fucked up ways to lose every election ever held.
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Some of that increase is probably due to Trump-skeptical GOP voters no longer identifying as Republican. Not that it makes a difference as long as they continue to *vote* Republican, as they almost certainly will.
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I neither trust them or fear them...fuck them....but they have a couple thousand nuclear, deplorable
weapons...so I respect them. No need to piss them off if we can find common ground. It's a different bear these days.
What's the common ground? Ending NATO or embracing authoritarianism?
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What's the common ground? Ending NATO or embracing authoritarianism?
Hate for "the gays".
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Hate for "the gays".
It always gets back to Pussy Riot.
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Also, 58% of GOP poll respondents believe colleges and universities have a negative impact on the country.
Except for Trump U. Trump U does nothing but churn out motherfuckin' winners. Big time.
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Of course, I'm not a highly paid operative tasked with discovering new and fucked up ways to lose every election ever held.
Why the fuck not? You can telecommute to that gig.
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The translator apparently was not a Russian but instead a fellow named John Barron.
The Hill is reporting (http://thehill.com/homenews/administration/342200-meet-the-people-in-the-room-during-trump-jrs-russia-meeting) that the translator was a Russian, that Limey-Weirdo Rob Goldstone was there too and an, as yet unidentified, 8th person, most likely a representative of the oligarch Agalarov.
#Transparency
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I neither trust them or fear them...fuck them....but they have a couple thousand nuclear, deplorable
weapons...so I respect them. No need to piss them off if we can find common ground. It's a different bear these days.
Different than through the 50s, 60s, 70s and much of the 80s, when there was a real threat of global thermo nuclear war?
They cyber-attacked us. Just because there isn't (yet) a giant smoking hole in the ground doesn't mean it didn't happen and/or it's ok because it was just Hillary.
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From an ABC/WaPo Poll:
% of GOP who believe Russia sought to interfere in the 2016 election...
April: 18%
July: 9%
Also, 58% of GOP poll respondents believe colleges and universities have a negative impact on the country.
Hard core conservative voters are a lost cause. Good news, they're only about 30% of the electorate. Among the rest of us, Trump is plumbing historically new lows with each new poll (https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/jul/16/trump-campaign-paid-50000-to-trump-jrs-lawyer-before-emails-released).
This hard core conservative agenda is easily beaten by a moderate/progressive coalition, but good fucking luck getting all of them on the same page. Such a coalition has a very high crossover in the Venn, but will continue to lose if it continues to fuss over the minutiae. Meanwhile, conservatives continue to show that they will vote in lockstep for "their guy" even it it's a giant orange piece of shit like Trump.
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Spicey's back!!!! Asked about Trump Jr's big Russia meeting, Spicer couldn't understand why everyone was so bent out of shape over a meeting about adoptions. Way to keep up with current events (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/sean-spicer-donald-trump-jr-eeting_us_596d0765e4b0b95f893d4e5e)!
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Tuesday:
Trumpcare is dead in the Senate. Now they're returning to a simply repeal of Obamacare to put us back where we were before the ACA, because that was great! Not sure if they can do this with reconciliation, for which they remain on the same knife edge as Trumpcare, but they sure as shit don't have 60 votes if that's what's needed. Assuming they can do this, it'll mean that the 20-or-so million people who got insurance under the ACA - either through Medicaid expansion or simply the protections against excluding pre-existing conditions - will return to the world of the uninsured, along with anyone else diagnosed with any serious illness in the meantime.
The WSJ has scolded Trump and his family for lying and stonewalling over Russia (no link as behind a paywall), comparing it to the Clinton scandals. They called for the whole of TrumpWorld to put its Russia cards on the table - including business dealings and taxes - take the short-term hit and let us all get on with life thereafter. Sound advice, assuming that there's not more evidence of illegal activity on those cards. Naive advice if you're the head of a crime family that's up to its eyeballs in real estate money laundering, tax avoidance, international cyber crime and election fraud.
The WSJ also reports (no link as behind the same paywall) that Paul Manafort - Trump's former campaign chairman and Russian adoption expert - took out personal loans from a bank just after the election. Nothing to see here, right? Well the bank is owned by a former Trump campaign advisor who overlapped in service to the campaign with Manafort. Still nothing to see? Well the loan was for $16mm, which is about 25% of that bank's equity capital. New York investigators have asked to see the documents. No shit.
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They called for the whole of TrumpWorld to put its Russia cards on the table - including business dealings and taxes - take the short-term hit and let us all get on with life thereafter. Sound advice, assuming that there's not more evidence of illegal activity on those cards. Naive advice if you're the head of a crime family that's up to its eyeballs in real estate money laundering, tax avoidance, international cyber crime and election fraud.
Been hearing the bolded point from pundits for awhile now. The naivete embedded in this belief that makes me wonder about the media. They really can't be this stupid; they have to know that he doesn't just come clean cause he is dirty. This also runs counter to the idea that the media is some liberal, anti-Trump group. Bullshit. They are bending over backwards to give this crook the benefit of the doubt and be way on his side of neutral.
Let me break it to them: he isn't coming clean and he isn't going to fucking pivot. Stop acting like he is capable of anything other than what he is, an egotistical boob.
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Been hearing the bolded point from pundits for awhile now. The naivete embedded in this belief that makes me wonder about the media. They really can't be this stupid; they have to know that he doesn't just come clean cause he is dirty. This also runs counter to the idea that the media is some liberal, anti-Trump group. Bullshit. They are bending over backwards to give this crook the benefit of the doubt and be way on his side of neutral.
Let me break it to them: he isn't coming clean and he isn't going to fucking pivot. Stop acting like he is capable of anything other than what he is, an egotistical boob.
Trump is also hamstrung by his rampant nepotism; he's put his entire family in serious jeopardy by using them as proxies for himself. Nixon progressively threw his inner circle under the Watergate bus until there was no one left. Trump can't do that because there'd be no one at the table at Thanksgiving if he did.
I think the only way he gets out of it is to pardon the whole lot - himself included (it's woolly as to whether that's allowed or not) - and then quit en masse. He can issue pardons for crimes not yet prosecuted, but he can't forgive crimes not yet committed.
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Let me break it to them: he isn't coming clean and he isn't going to fucking pivot. Stop acting like he is capable of anything other than what he is, an egotistical boob.
It seems evident to me that television current events entertainment networks, all of them, however you arrange them along the axis, all of them are interested in stringing this out as long as possible. And why wouldn't they be? There is no journalism done on television. I don't know if there ever was but there certainly isn't now. So a fucked up goat rodeo like this is a total goldmine for everyone involved.
As for the various newspapers of record, I think it will take some perspective that we are a long way yet from having to know if they are playing this the right way. There has been some disclosure, sure, and some pushback against the constant deluge of complete fabrication - lies - but not enough to be satisfying to a guy like me. Of course I may not be the best possible benchmark. It seems to me like the Times and the Post are largely playing this very cautiously, and at the end of the day that's surely the best way to go.
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Been hearing the bolded point from pundits for awhile now. The naivete embedded in this belief that makes me wonder about the media.
Generally speaking, when you get to stories like this and it's the most major, storied entities of the press, these folks are sharp as hell and are buried in reams of information that require technique and experience in order to get the truth, discard the fiction, and stay on the right side of the law. That's part of why these things progress slowly. I suspect that asking these questions in this manner is an attempt to frame this in the light of what Everyman would like to know and either get Trump to deny or lie some more, drawing the noose tighter. They know he'll never come clean, but it's a way of adding negative pressure to him.
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Generally speaking, when you get to stories like this and it's the most major, storied entities of the press, these folks are sharp as hell and are buried in reams of information that require technique and experience in order to get the truth, discard the fiction, and stay on the right side of the law.
The blizzard of shit is not a bug, it's a feature. We're supposed to be stupified by Trumpian distractions while the Republicans set about their agenda - which includes voter suppression - so that, by the time the next election rolls around, there's no way they can be removed from power. Also, we have always been at war with Eastasia.
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Also, we have always been at war with Eastasia.
Reading that I reflexively conjured up from absolutely nowhere a little refrain, 'Put the paper in the slot,' sung to the tune of Borat's 'Throw the Jew Down the Well.'
I believe I may be losing my mind.
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At the G20, in addition to the 30-minute meeting between Trump and Putin that went on for 2 hours, they had another, undisclosed, hour-long meeting that evening. I guess Donald was feeling left out as being the only one with undisclosed meetings with a Russian.
The meeting was just Trump, Putin and Putin's interpreter. There is no official record (at least on the US side) of what was discussed. He knows he works for us, right?
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An interesting observation on the repeal and delay effort: it failed, almost instantly after the replacement effort failed, because three women Republican senators killed it. The women who were excluded from the boys' club who crafted the replacement legislation in their secret, no girls allowed treehouse.
Payback's a bitch.
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Now Trump is ending a covert CIA program (https://www.reuters.com/article/us-mideast-crisis-usa-syria-idUSKBN1A42KC) to equip and train rebel groups fighting against noted human rights-abuser (and the target of Trump's theater warfare) Assad. Of course, this is a move that has been sought by Russia.
The U.S. decision, said one of the officials, is part of an effort by the administration to improve relations with Russia, which along with Iranian-supported groups has largely succeeded in preserving Assad's government in the six-year-civil war.
Not a puppet!
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His puppitude is undeniable by any honest person. It's gotten past embarrassing that the Republicans are silent; it's now dangerous.
Just heard that that Trump said looking into his family finances is a red line for Mueller. Gee, I wonder if there's anything there?
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And in an interview with the NYT, he says he would have never appointed Sessions if he had known that Sessions would recuse himself, calling it "very unfair to the President."
In other words, the AG's job is to cover for the President, not to lead the Justice Department.
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His puppitude is undeniable by any honest person. It's gotten past embarrassing that the Republicans are silent; it's now dangerous.
I always knew that Republicans were totally fucking full of shit but I never properly recognized that they are irredeemably depraved. I mean, they're enabling an at best treasonous know-nothing to bull through the china shop - as you say, dangerous - and for what? Their legislative agenda? They don't have one, not beyond the vague idea of debilitating the federal government and giving tax breaks to the richest people they can find. It ain't like they're trying to pass the Civil Rights Act.
They're a party completely bereft of ideas. They've had who the fuck knows how long to come up with some healthcare plan, since Bush, at least, so the better part of 20 years, and the best they can do now is try to dismantle Medicaid in order to execute a massive wealth transfer from the people who need it most to the people who need it least. And these dickfaces can't even do that with a Republican president, a Republican House, a Republican Senate and a motherfucking Republican Supreme Court.
And of course when you get 45% of Republicans saying that they simply do not believe that Trump Jr met with a Russian lawyer when the motherfucker publicly admitted to it, well, it doesn't take Magellan to see that you necks are in some turbulent waters.
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And of course when you get 45% of Republicans saying that they simply do not believe that Trump Jr met with a Russian lawyer when the motherfucker publicly admitted to it, well, it doesn't take Magellan to see that you necks are in some turbulent waters.
They're going to do damage that won't be undone in my lifetime. It's very depressing. And in 20 years, or maybe even only 10, we're really going to regret getting distracted by all of this shit instead of figuring out how to accelerate a transition off of fossil fuel and mitigate the consequences that are already baked in.
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They're going to do damage that won't be undone in my lifetime. It's very depressing. And in 20 years, or maybe even only 10, we're really going to regret getting distracted by all of this shit instead of figuring out how to accelerate a transition off of fossil fuel and mitigate the consequences that are already baked in.
I'm a great believer in technology and I like to hope that there will be a technological solution to the catastrophe that we're creating. But it is a real testament to the Republicans' total lack of imagination (and total subservience to fear) that they send Scott Pruitt and Rick Perry out dressed up like Broadway extras to do the Petro Hustle instead of saying, Hey, you know, we invented or effectively commercialized the steam engine, the internal combustion engine, the jet engine, the silicon chip, you know, why the hell can't we figure out how to commercialize the fuck out of renewables and lead the world in the next (and inevitable) economic revolution?
But nope.
Imagine if in the early 70's the fucking typewriter ribbon lobby was like, Hey, hey HEY! Now wait a goddamn minute, here!
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This is a
They're going to do damage that won't be undone in my lifetime. It's very depressing. And in 20 years, or maybe even only 10, we're really going to regret getting distracted by all of this shit instead of figuring out how to accelerate a transition off of fossil fuel and mitigate the consequences that are already baked in.
I agree and it is sad. It is probably the only reason I am glad I don't have kids.
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I'm a great believer in technology and I like to hope that there will be a technological solution to the catastrophe that we're creating. But it is a real testament to the Republicans' total lack of imagination (and total subservience to fear) that they send Scott Pruitt and Rick Perry out dressed up like Broadway extras to do the Petro Hustle instead of saying, Hey, you know, we invented or effectively commercialized the steam engine, the internal combustion engine, the jet engine, the silicon chip, you know, why the hell can't we figure out how to commercialize the fuck out of renewables and lead the world in the next (and inevitable) economic revolution?
But nope.
Imagine if in the early 70's the fucking typewriter ribbon lobby was like, Hey, hey HEY! Now wait a goddamn minute, here!
I totally agree but I still like the analog sound of vinyl better than the digital sound of mp3 and I prefer tube amps to solid state.
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His puppitude is undeniable by any honest person. It's gotten past embarrassing that the Republicans are silent; it's now dangerous.
Just heard that that Trump said looking into his family finances is a red line for Mueller. Gee, I wonder if there's anything there?
There's an saying that I heard the other day (from the middle east, I believe) being applied to Congressional Republicans:
"You can wake someone who's sleeping, but you can never wake someone who's pretending to be asleep."
Mean while, in the unhinged NYT interview, Trump said he would fire Mueller if he went after his family's finances, which is exactly what Mueller is now doing. Also, he said that he has secret tapes information on serious conflicts of interest with Mueller, and that he just might start releasing it soon. So Trump is trying to unduly influence the Special Prosecutor who is investigating him for unduly influencing the FBI Director. A very large part of all the things that make Trump a truly terrible person, is that he's incredibly dumb and thinks he's incredibly smart.
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They're going to do damage that won't be undone in my lifetime. It's very depressing. And in 20 years, or maybe even only 10, we're really going to regret getting distracted by all of this shit instead of figuring out how to accelerate a transition off of fossil fuel and mitigate the consequences that are already baked in.
We'll be buying lots of shit from furriners, because we spent the second decade of the 21st century focusing on "clean" coal technology.
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I totally agree but I still like the analog sound of vinyl better than the digital sound of mp3 and I prefer tube amps to solid state.
The difference is, you're not trying to legislate that digital music isn't real.
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I always knew that Republicans were totally fucking full of shit but I never properly recognized that they are irredeemably depraved. I mean, they're enabling an at best treasonous know-nothing to bull through the china shop - as you say, dangerous - and for what? Their legislative agenda? They don't have one, not beyond the vague idea of debilitating the federal government and giving tax breaks to the richest people they can find. It ain't like they're trying to pass the Civil Rights Act.
They're a party completely bereft of ideas. They've had who the fuck knows how long to come up with some healthcare plan, since Bush, at least, so the better part of 20 years, and the best they can do now is try to dismantle Medicaid in order to execute a massive wealth transfer from the people who need it most to the people who need it least. And these dickfaces can't even do that with a Republican president, a Republican House, a Republican Senate and a motherfucking Republican Supreme Court.
And of course when you get 45% of Republicans saying that they simply do not believe that Trump Jr met with a Russian lawyer when the motherfucker publicly admitted to it, well, it doesn't take Magellan to see that you necks are in some turbulent waters.
Republicans built their entire modern-day existence on being in opposition. It's was tons of fun holding 50, 60, 70 Obamacare repeal votes in the House, knowing that they would die in the Senate or, failing that, Obama would veto it. When it came to actually repealing it, they shit all over themselves in public. You're absolutely right that they have no ideas other than tax cuts work because...well...because...and don't look at every single time that tax cuts have tanked the economy and every single time that tax increases have stimulated the economy.
They yearn to make America great again, while failing to actually specify what they mean. If they want to go back to the heyday of the middle class - which seems to be the nebulous concept they espouse - that's great. In the 50s and 60s a working class family could buy a house, two cars and put their kids through college on a single income. America made stuff and innovated like no one else. Also, the top tax rate was 95%.
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July 26: Trump Jr. and Manafort will testify in front of the Senate Judiciary Committee. The hearing will be live on TV.
Buy the popcorn and book your time off now!
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July 26: Trump Jr. and Manafort will testify in front of the Senate Judiciary Committee. The hearing will be live on TV.
Buy the popcorn and book your time off now!
No, they've been "invited" to testify. Whether they will is an open question.
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No, they've been "invited" to testify. Whether they will is an open question.
Ah, hadn't seen that. Yeah, no way he goes, he's too stupid not to vomit incriminating word salad all over himself.
Kushner is supposedly going to testify in closed session to the Senate Intelligence Committee. No idea if that's voluntary or not but, as a White House job-holder, he may not have a choice.
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July 26: Trump Jr. and Manafort will testify in front of the Senate Judiciary Committee. The hearing will be live on TV.
Buy the popcorn and book your time off now!
The sad truth is more Americans will tune in to see the OJ parole hearings.
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Trump thinks health insurance costs $12. A year. Seriously (https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2017/7/20/16002764/trump-health-costs). Further, as stated in the linked article, he thinks it's down 20% since May, when he estimated it cost $15.
How can you solve a problem when you are completely clueless as to what it is? How can you be this clueless?
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Trump thinks health insurance costs $12. A year. Seriously (https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2017/7/20/16002764/trump-health-costs). Further, as stated in the linked article, he thinks it's down 20% since May, when he estimated it cost $15.
How can you solve a problem when you are completely clueless as to what it is? How can you be this clueless?
Here's the transcript (https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/19/us/politics/trump-interview-transcript.html) of the interview that article quotes. It's got some gems.
My favorite passage:
HABERMAN: [In Paris], I don’t think I’ve seen you look like you were enjoying yourself that much since the convention, really.
TRUMP: I have had the best reviews on foreign land. So I go to Poland and make a speech. Enemies of mine in the media, enemies of mine are saying it was the greatest speech ever made on foreign soil by a president. I’m saying, man, they cover [garbled]. You saw the reviews I got on that speech. Poland was beautiful and wonderful, and the reception was incredible.
And then, went to France the following week, because it was the 100th year. [inaudible] The Paris Accord — I wasn’t going to get along with France for a little while, because people forget, because it is a very unfair agreement to us. China doesn’t get [garbled] until 2030. Russia goes back to 1994 as a standard — a much, much lower standard. India has things that are [garbled]. I want to do the same thing as everyone else. We can’t do that? We can’t do that? That’s O.K. Let me get out. Frankly, the people that like me, love that I got out.
After that, it was fairly surprising. He [President Emmanuel Macron of France] called me and said, “I’d love to have you there and honor you in France,” having to do with Bastille Day. Plus, it’s the 100th year of the First World War. That’s big. And I said yes. I mean, I have a great relationship with him. He’s a great guy.
HABERMAN: He was very deferential to you. Very.
TRUMP: He’s a great guy. Smart. Strong. Loves holding my hand.
HABERMAN: I’ve noticed.
TRUMP: People don’t realize he loves holding my hand. And that’s good, as far as that goes.
_________
TRUMP: I mean, really. He’s a very good person. And a tough guy, but look, he has to be. I think he is going to be a terrific president of France. But he does love holding my hand.
One can love, hate, or be indifferent regarding the president but no one can honestly say the guy isn't just a wee bit crazy.
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One can love, hate, or be indifferent regarding the president but no one can honestly say the guy isn't just a wee bit crazy.
I think you spelled "bat shit" wrong.
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I think you spelled "bat shit" wrong.
I guano the correct spelling.
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I guano the correct spelling.
Honestly, this is Crazy King George stuff (http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-22122407).
They have discovered that during his [George III] episodes of illness, his sentences were much longer than when he was well.
A sentence containing 400 words and eight verbs was not unusual. George III, when ill, often repeated himself, and at the same time his vocabulary became much more complex, creative and colourful.
These are features that can be seen today in the writing and speech of patients experiencing the manic phase of psychiatric illnesses such as bipolar disorder.
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Enemies of mine in the media, enemies of mine are saying it was the greatest speech ever made on foreign soil by a president.
At least he can still make me laugh.
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Trump thinks health insurance costs $12. A year. Seriously (https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2017/7/20/16002764/trump-health-costs). Further, as stated in the linked article, he thinks it's down 20% since May, when he estimated it cost $15.
How can you solve a problem when you are completely clueless as to what it is? How can you be this clueless?
He doesn't know the difference between life insurance and health insurance. OutSTANding.
I remember when George Bush the elder went to a supermarket in Frederick, Maryland, or somewhere similar and was entranced by the scanner at the check-out. Why, I never! And then, conversely, during the campaign for the 1992 election someone asked Clinton about the prices of everyday items, a gallon of milk, a pair of Levis, whatever, and he knew (better than I did) what it all cost.
I don't really know how any of that applies to PPG. But I guess we can see with hindsight that HW, a sort of amorphous coffee ring on the flyleaf of American history, that dude looks like Winston fucking Churchill right about now.
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I don't really know how any of that applies to PPG. But I guess we can see with hindsight that HW, a sort of amorphous coffee ring on the flyleaf of American history, that dude looks like Winston fucking Churchill right about now.
W. must be chuckling his shoulders off! First, Jeb completely dispels the widely held belief that he's the smart one, and then Trump gets in and plumbs new depths of ignorance and detachment. Bush Jr. still has the Iraq war, but Trump's only been in office 6 months (yes, it's only been 6 months). Trump already has us in Syria (https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/09/world/middleeast/us-troops-syria.html), but it won't be until he gets us into Iran and/or North Korea that W's legacy will be comprehensively trounced.
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Some Trumpanzees in the West Wing are starting to wonder whether their fealty to their lord might be only a one-way thing (http://www.cnn.com/2017/07/20/politics/trump-loyalty-sessions-white-house/index.html).
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This is an excerpt from a Houston-based and highly-reputable oil and gas investment bank and research firm's morning note. Basically, it is not exactly "left wing fake news." If you want to skim for the gist of it, check out the parts I highlighted in bold.
Trump Administration officials have fired a warning shot across the bow of Venezuela this week, stating that the US may proceed with economic sanctions in response to President Nicolas Maduro’s apparent push to rewrite the country’s constitution and dismantle its democracy. These sanctions could importantly include a ban on Venezuelan crude imports into the US. . . . President Trump has declared that the US “will take strong and swift economic actions” should the Maduro regime impose its Constitutional Assembly on the country. There are likely two primary reverberating consequences for US oil markets and the domestic refining industry should the Administration implement a Venezuelan crude oil import ban: (1) heavy crude oil supply would almost certainly tighten further for US refiners, and (2) Citgo’s US refining and midstream assets could fall into the hands of Russia.
It continues . . .
An extended US oil import ban against Venezuela could cripple the country’s economy and cause PDVSA to default on its bonds that were restructured last year. In exchange for a loan from Russian state-owned oil company Rosneft PDVSA offered up a 49.9% interest in Citgo (PDVSA’s wholly-owned US downstream entity) as collateral. A default on those bonds would give Rosneft a sizeable interest in Citgo, and it’s not too hard to imagine that the company could easily gain a controlling 50% interest. Citgo owns and operates three US refineries (Lake Charles, LA; Corpus Christi, TX; Lemont, IL) totaling approximately 750mbd of capacity and other midstream assets including terminals, storage tanks and pipelines. The alarm bells already sounded in Congress on this potential issue earlier this year in April ’17 as hotly worded letters were sent from bipartisan groups of Senators and Representatives to the Trump Administration warning of serious national security issues should Russia gain control of Citgo. Thus, there is no doubt that the Administration is clearly aware of the consequences of potentially driving PDVSA to default through onerous sanctions against Venezuela’s oil industry, yet President Trump appears to be positioning to play the import ban card depending on the outcome of the upcoming July 30 election. So yet another layer may soon be added to the Trump/Russia saga should the US proceed with Venezuelan sanctions as currently being advertised – you can’t make this stuff up.
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I would have thought Trump would look with admiration towards Maduro if he moved further away from democracy. Kind of like the rest of his buddies Putin, Erdogan, Assad, El-Sisi and Duterte. However, I guess he just falls for the dictators Putin allows him to.
This is probably the maxim our old allies use to predict his foreign policy: just look towards what Vlad would want.
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President Camacho!
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=W9FN36iAN0g
Maybe electrolytes will fix our $12-15 a year healthcare system.
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Sean Spicer's gone. Second shortest tenure for a Press Secretary.
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Sean Spicer's gone. Second shortest tenure for a Press Secretary.
No, look, I'll happily work for a serial liar and lunatic who makes me marionette in front of the global press and say shit that makes me into a worldwide laughingstock and underscores my complete lack of personal integrity. But you hire a communications director?! THAT'S A LINE TOO FAR!
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No, look, I'll happily work for a serial liar and lunatic who makes me marionette in front of the global press and say shit that makes me into a worldwide laughingstock and underscores my complete lack of personal integrity. But you hire a communications director?! THAT'S A LINE TOO FAR!
Petty careerism is the only true principle these frauds have.
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Mueller is all over Trump's real estate dealings including the Palm Beach property that he bought in 2004 and sold to a Russian oligarch in 2008, just as Florida real estate prices were crashing, for twice what he'd paid for it. Anyway, Mueller is all up in Trump's shit and Trump is, apparently, freaking the fuck out about it all. But Trump can't fire Mueller, only the AG can. But AG Sessions can't because he's recused from all matters pertaining to the investigation of the campaign, of which he was part, so Trump needs a new AG.
Firing the AG would be controversial so soon into his tenure, so Trump really needs Sessions to resign. This may explain, then, why he used the NYT to drag Sessions over the coals to the point that his resignation was expected forthwith. That didn't happen, though, as Sessions decided to stay on and so we can expect another round of house elf-bashing shortly.
Meanwhile, the AG cannot simply fire a Special Prosecutor on a whim. The AG needs cause, one form of which is a conflict of interest. The blizzard of reporting in recent days includes the fact that Trump has unleashed his flying monkeys on Mueller's team to dig up as much dirt as possible such that it could be molded in an argument for there being a conflict. Then, with his shiny new AG installed, there's be a fig leaf of cover over the removal of Mueller.
There are many, many strings to this bow, but it is clear that Mueller is heading in the exact right direction: Trump's financial dealings with Russians. He's going after records of Trump's loan dealings with Deutschedramat; he may go after Trump's tax records; he's all over Manafort's incredibly sketchy dealings with Russia and pro-Putin Ukrainians. He knows what's there and he's going after it.
There's is absolutely no doubt that we are heading for a constitutional crisis of galactic proportions. Trump is already taking counsel on who he can pardon, up to and including himself. Even Nixon didn't go there, but you know Trump will. If he can't fire Mueller, he'll neuter him by pre-pardoning everyone involved, and then the fight will be about the power of the executive branch rather than whether he's a crook and a traitor. On which side of the argument do you think the Republican congress and the Supreme Court will fall...?
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On which side of the argument do you think the Republican congress and the Supreme Court will fall...?
That's the real constitutional crisis. It's one thing to have the executive branch running amok, but when the other branches of government fail to check or balance the whole system falls apart.
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Leaks confirm Sessions talked to Kiskyac about the campaign. We know it's genuine because Trump, instead of calling it "FAKE NEWS" actually retweeted the story. So now we know that Trump is definitely trying to push out Sessions, and we also know who authorized the leak.
This is all happening so fast.
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If Trump pushes out Sessions, what are the odds Abbott becomes AG?
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If Trump pushes out Sessions, what are the odds Abbott becomes AG?
Hopefully he wheels in that fucking jackass, fake Texan, Dan Patrick with him.
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If Trump pushes out Sessions, what are the odds Abbott becomes AG?
Can he dance?
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I see where Trump has nominated former talk show host and Trump campaign bootlick Sam Clovis to be the lead scientist at the USDA. Though Clovis has absolutely zero scientific pedigree, and the specific Congressional requirements are "a distinguished scientist", Trump says Clovis is from Iowa, so that oughtta do it. No confirmation on the rumor that Trump plans to replace the Air Force One pilot with a pipefitter from Toledo because "he's from Ohio, and that's 'the birthplace of aviation'".
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If Trump pushes out Sessions, what are the odds Abbott becomes AG?
The first time Trump mocks his affliction will be equal parts abhorrent and hilarious. Every time after that it will just be depressing.
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Doesn't Trump use some ex- NYC cop as his bodyguard and all-around confidante. You know, they guy he made deliver the letter to Comey. Trump will likely nominate him for AG.
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Doesn't Trump use some ex- NYC cop as his bodyguard and all-around confidante. You know, they guy he made deliver the letter to Comey. Trump will likely nominate him for AG.
His former bodyguard, Keith Schiller, is now the Director of Oval Office Operations - whatever the fuck that is - with an office in the White House, a salary, awesome tax-payer-funded healthcare and everything.
You are correct that he was the one who delivered the letter firing Comey to the place Comey wasn't - missing him by about 3,000 miles - and is also up to his neck in the Russia scandal (http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/house-russia-probe-eyes-longtime-trump-bodyguard-turned/story?id=48341329).
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So who saw this coming: Jefferson Beauregard Sessions III is the firewall between Trump and a constitutional crisis (https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/trump-leaves-sessions-twisting-in-the-wind-while-berating-him-publicly/2017/07/24/ce3bf142-708b-11e7-9eac-d56bd5568db8_story.html).
Basically, Trump wants Sessions gone forthwith but doesn't want to fire him. So he's running down Sessions in front of anyone who'll listen in the hopes Sessions will quit. Then, with Congress in recess, Trump gets to pick whomever the fuck he wants to be AG, who can then serve without Senate confirmation through to 2019. Obviously, Job #1 for the new AG would be to fire Mueller on whatever conflict of interest smears they can invent.
At that point, the spotlight will fall full force onto Congressional Republicans who will, of course, yield to the whim of their Boy King.
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Meanwhile, Kushner - the smartest man on the planet tasked with fixing everything - gave a hilarious statement to the Senate yesterday in which he excused his failure to disclose over 100 contacts with foreigners and dozens of investments because...he's crap at this and his assistant did it and sorry and everything but he new at this and he didn't know any better. Basically, the dog ate his homework.
Also, despite Trump's unfailing confidence in Kushner's so far hidden talents, he's one of the least impressive individuals I've ever seen behind a microphone.
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Last update this morning: it's also kill Obamacare (and a few hundred thousand Americans) Day! The Senate will vote to proceed on the House bill and, if successful, will then vote to replace it in its entirety, and then vote on a Senate bill that has yet to be seen by anyone outside McConnell's office. Even the #2 and #3 Republicans in the Senate - as of last night - were ignorant as to what was going to be in the Senate bill today.
They've even dragged an ailing John McCain out of hospital - fresh from life-saving, tax-payer funded treatment - to help them reach the 50 votes they need to take health insurance away from either 22, 23 or 32 million Americans, depending on which horror story McConnell drops on the Senate floor.
Whichever bill they go with, the House bill, the Senate bill or the straight repeal and go home bill, they all have a ticking time bomb built in. Insurance works by pooling the premiums of the many to pay for the losses of the few so, if you don't force healthy people to buy insurance, the pool is filled only with people making claims so premiums spike, deductibles spike, limits and coverage shrink and insurers go bust or flee the market (the sensationally dubbed "death spiral"). Obamacare dealt with this by taking the Heritage Foundation's idea of an individual mandate. Republicans now hate this (because...Kenya?) so their solution was the nasty idea that if you'd lost coverage and want it back, you'd have to wait 6 months before you got it (that'll teach you for being poor and/or sick). Well the Parliamentarian has told them that they cannot put this in a reconciliation bill, so both it and the individual mandate will be gone if they pass anything today. Death spiral here we come!
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I'd encourage anyone interested to read about his speech at the annual Boy Scout Jamboree. "Inappropriate" doesn't even begin to describe it. It's sad, embarrassing, hilarious, disgusting and unsurprising all at the same time.
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I'd encourage anyone interested to read about his speech at the annual Boy Scout Jamboree. "Inappropriate" doesn't even begin to describe it. It's sad, embarrassing, hilarious, disgusting and unsurprising all at the same time.
I liked the part where he debated with himself whether to tell a bunch of boy scouts what his rich friend got up to on his yacht (wink wink). Mahjong, maybe? Or the (mild) swearing. Or the bitching about Washington. Or the cries for loyalty. Or the calls for the non-voting age kids to call a particular Senator over the healthcare bill.
All in all, a tour de force.
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I'd encourage anyone interested to read about his speech at the annual Boy Scout Jamboree. "Inappropriate" doesn't even begin to describe it. It's sad, embarrassing, hilarious, disgusting and unsurprising all at the same time.
And don't forget the time that Trump apparently used his charity to pay for his kids' boy scout registration: (https://www.washingtonpost.com/amphtml/politics/trump-boasts-of-his-philanthropy-but-his-giving-falls-short-of-his-words/2016/10/29/b3c03106-9ac7-11e6-a0ed-ab0774c1eaa5_story.html)
[The Trump Foundation's] smallest-ever gift, for $7, was paid to the Boy Scouts in 1989, at a time when it cost $7 to register a new Scout. Trump’s oldest son was 11 at the time.
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Insurance works by pooling the premiums of the many to pay for the losses of the few so, if you don't force healthy people to buy insurance, the pool is filled only with people making claims so premiums spike, deductibles spike, limits and coverage shrink and insurers go bust or flee the market (the sensationally dubbed "death spiral").
While I generally support the democrats, they are absolutely inept. This debate should be much more sophisticated, and I maintain it would be if the democrats were good at their job. It's been seven years and the average Joe still doesn't understand the basic tradeoffs of health care. Similarly, the idea of trickle down economics (30 years with this idea) is deeply intertwined in this debate and still discussed by people with a straight face. That is a another huge failure of the democrats.
If the republicans want to repeal the ACA and take away insurance, just be honest about it. Publicly write a law that states: "If you don't have insurance and thus haven't received any scheduled health care, and your health deteriorates to the point where you seek emergency care, don't go to the hospital as we will ensure that you don't get treatment. That is the law." Otherwise, we are right back to where we were: an inefficient system where the those with money and/or the foresight to purchase insurance subsidize health care. And due to the tax repeal, the subsidy will fall less on the super wealthy. We will also return to society where many folks go broke if someone in the family gets sick. But people apparently don't get this; otherwise, it would be at the core of this debate.
In the simplest terms, either the nation provides health care or it doesn't and if we do, who pays? Basically, the ACA said that the nation will provide health care and it will be paid mostly by the super wealthy. Now, the super-wealthy republican donors are pissed at footing the bill. The argument they still use is trickle down theory: If the government doesn't take their money, then they will create jobs and the middle class and poor will then have enough money to pay for their own health care. This theory has proven to be complete crap for thirty years and yet, it is still routinely used. That is a massive failing by the democrats.
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And don't forget the time that Trump apparently used his charity to pay for his kids' boy scout registration: (https://www.washingtonpost.com/amphtml/politics/trump-boasts-of-his-philanthropy-but-his-giving-falls-short-of-his-words/2016/10/29/b3c03106-9ac7-11e6-a0ed-ab0774c1eaa5_story.html)
[The Trump Foundation's] smallest-ever gift, for $7, was paid to the Boy Scouts in 1989, at a time when it cost $7 to register a new Scout. Trump’s oldest son was 11 at the time.
Grifters gotta grift.
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While I generally support the democrats, they are absolutely inept. This debate should be much more sophisticated, and I maintain it would be if the democrats were good at their job. It's been seven years and the average Joe still doesn't understand the basic tradeoffs of health care. Similarly, the idea of trickle down economics (30 years with this idea) is deeply intertwined in this debate and still discussed by people with a straight face. That is a another huge failure of the democrats.
If the republicans want to repeal the ACA and take away insurance, just be honest about it. Publicly write a law that states: "If you don't have insurance and thus haven't received any scheduled health care, and your health deteriorates to the point where you seek emergency care, don't go to the hospital as we will ensure that you don't get treatment. That is the law." Otherwise, we are right back to where we were: an inefficient system where the those with money and/or the foresight to purchase insurance subsidize health care. And due to the tax repeal, the subsidy will fall less on the super wealthy. We will also return to society where many folks go broke if someone in the family gets sick. But people apparently don't get this; otherwise, it would be at the core of this debate.
In the simplest terms, either the nation provides health care or it doesn't and if we do, who pays? Basically, the ACA said that the nation will provide health care and it will be paid mostly by the super wealthy. Now, the super-wealthy republican donors are pissed at footing the bill. The argument they still use is trickle down theory: If the government doesn't take their money, then they will create jobs and the middle class and poor will then have enough money to pay for their own health care. This theory has proven to be complete crap for thirty years and yet, it is still routinely used. That is a massive failing by the democrats.
You are absolutely right about the failure of Democrats to get their message across; the poster child for this malaise being Pelosi's "we've got to pass the bill so you can see what's in it" labia-stomp. Obama was the best at messaging but he was - for the chunk of the country who benefited the most from the ACA - the wrong messenger. They need to get better, and job #1 is to gracefully retire Pelosi as House Leader. Nothing personal here, but they just got their hat handed to them by the worst candidate ever because they backed a party establishment septuagenarian with sizable negative polling.
They need a new face to lead the party into the mid-terms or they'll lose to the same hackneyed arguments of the last 20 years.
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While I generally support the democrats, they are absolutely inept.
I can't imagine there is anything a Republican could do that would surprise me with respect to his or her amoral, craven depravity and, well, just basic cruelty. But for some reason I continue to be amazed at the Democrats' near complete political incompetence. I suppose that must be a personal failing of mine.
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And don't forget the time that Trump apparently used his charity to pay for his kids' boy scout registration: (https://www.washingtonpost.com/amphtml/politics/trump-boasts-of-his-philanthropy-but-his-giving-falls-short-of-his-words/2016/10/29/b3c03106-9ac7-11e6-a0ed-ab0774c1eaa5_story.html)
[The Trump Foundation's] smallest-ever gift, for $7, was paid to the Boy Scouts in 1989, at a time when it cost $7 to register a new Scout. Trump’s oldest son was 11 at the time.
Beyond parody.
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Bench, I hadn't heard that one before, that's great. All you can do is shake your head sometimes.
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Trump: "We ended up with 51 votes, 51 to...whatever. I don't know what it is."
Not a joke. This is the actual President.
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Trump: "We ended up with 51 votes, 51 to...whatever. I don't know what it is."
Not a joke. This is the actual President.
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Wait, what's the context of this? The Boy Scouts speech? Wow.
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Hey it's tough to do math like that in your cabeza. Rick Perry couldn't either.
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Trump: "We ended up with 51 votes, 51 to...whatever. I don't know what it is."
Not a joke. This is the actual President.
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Even if he thought about it he would still probably come up with 49, which is incorrect.
And hey, Mr. Happy? This is what you've been saying "we have to pass the bill to see what's in it" actually looks like.
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Wait, what's the context of this? The Boy Scouts speech? Wow.
No, he was at a press conference with Lebanese PM Hariri.
The same press conference where he said that Lebanon is "on the front lines of the fight against ISIS, Al-Qaeda, and Hezbollah."
Hariri is allied with Hezbollah.
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You can't make it up.
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No, he was at a press conference with Lebanese PM Hariri.
The same press conference where he said that Lebanon is "on the front lines of the fight against ISIS, Al-Qaeda, and Hezbollah."
Hariri is allied with Hezbollah.
I haven't seen news since this AM. Good to know the grownups are in charge of ME policy.
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I haven't seen news since this AM. Good to know the grownups are in charge of ME policy.
Yes, it's Jared.
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So, John McCain. *Sigh*
In the movies, the ailing Senator rises from his sick bed, gives a barn-burning speech excoriating his miscreant colleagues and then casts the pivotal "No" vote to stop an outrage from being perpetrated. This ain't the movies. McCain's speech, righteous as it was, came just after he'd cast the pivotal "Yes" vote that allowed this fiasco to continue.
In his speech he decried the current partisanship where neither party will work with the other and demanded a return to "regular order" where bills are vetted through committees and hearings, and have debates on the floor. He said he'd voted to allow debate here but would not vote for the bill; a curious stance because voting "No" would've forced his party's leadership to return to "regular order" if it wanted to continue to tilt against the ACA.
Then the BCRA came to the floor for a vote mere hours later - having bypassed the committees and hearings and debate - and McCain voted "Yes". WTF?
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So, John McCain. *Sigh*
In the movies, the ailing Senator rises from his sick bed, gives a barn-burning speech excoriating his miscreant colleagues and then casts the pivotal "No" vote to stop an outrage from being perpetrated. This ain't the movies. McCain's speech, righteous as it was, came just after he'd cast the pivotal "Yes" vote that allowed this fiasco to continue.
In his speech he decried the current partisanship where neither party will work with the other and demanded a return to "regular order" where bills are vetted through committees and hearings, and have debates on the floor. He said he'd voted to allow debate here but would not vote for the bill; a curious stance because voting "No" would've forced his party's leadership to return to "regular order" if it wanted to continue to tilt against the ACA.
Then the BCRA came to the floor for a vote mere hours later - having bypassed the committees and hearings and debate - and McCain voted "Yes". WTF?
Am I understanding this, a politician lied?
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Am I understanding this, a politician lied?
McCain has a storied past, but he's in danger of burying that legacy under the pile of crap he's laying in the present.
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John McCain could give a stirring speech on the evils of adultery, while he was fucking another man's wife, and the media would celebrate his family values.
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And hey, Mr. Happy? This is what you've been saying "we have to pass the bill to see what's in it" actually looks like.
Republicans continue to prove that all of their criticisms of Obama, Democrats and their policies were simply projection. They are doing everything that they said their opponents were doing (but mostly weren't). Their behavior around healthcare is the most egregious example (to date).
The Pelosi quote was her speaking to the public trying to explain that the benefits of the ACA would become clear to them once enacted, because there was so much smoke being blown about it in Washington that it was impossible for the public to see the truth. This was then taken completely out of context by conservatives who presented it as if she'd said this on the House floor (see also "build that, you didn't"). The ACA went through 14 months of debate, committees (remember the Gang of Six?), hearings and amendments, which then passed the Senate with 60 votes.
Contrast that to this Republican effort - like Medicare Part D before it - which is being rammed home in the manner they imagined the ACA was. Also, remember how Obama was a traitor to our values, wanted to yield sovereignty to a foreign power, played too much golf, went on too many tax-payer funded vacations and had a wife who'd bare her arms? Yeah, exactly.
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Meanwhile Trump issued a twitter policy statement summarily banning transgender people from the military. (http://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2017/07/26/539470211/trump-says-transgender-people-cant-serve-in-military) It also happens to be the anniversary of the day Truman desegregated the military.
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It also happens to be the anniversary of the day Truman desegregated the military.
I often wonder whether a guy like Bannon or Miller knows this and that accounts for the timing or if things are so haywire over there that you'll just inevitably find interesting intersections with respect to their gratuitous cruelty.
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I often wonder whether a guy like Bannon or Miller knows this and that accounts for the timing or if things are so haywire over there that you'll just inevitably find interesting intersections with respect to their gratuitous cruelty.
It's hard to know. A functional White House would be on top of such things, and not make such announcements against starkly contradictory historical events; so it could be just incompetence. But then Bannon, particularly, is a horrific individual who gets his rocks off being such a monstrous dick; so it could be just a big "fuck you" to Truman.
Miller, I suspect, would have to Google "Truman".
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Miller, I suspect, would have to Google "Truman".
...and then rant for hours about what a cuck Jim Carrey is.
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...and then rant for hours about what a cuck Jim Carrey is.
No dude, that was Philip Seymour Hoffman. I liked, In Cold Blood.
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Straight repeal just went down 45-55. For the record, McCain was one of the Republicans voting against it.
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I often wonder whether a guy like Bannon or Miller knows this and that accounts for the timing or if things are so haywire over there that you'll just inevitably find interesting intersections with respect to their gratuitous cruelty.
Comical ineptitude or outright maliciousness? Unfortunately there's no Option C.
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Straight repeal just went down 45-55. For the record, McCain was one of the Republicans voting against it.
Why would MM force this vote? Seems to give Thor's hammer to primary challengers.
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Why would MM force this vote? Seems to give Thor's hammer to primary challengers.
Don't drag me into this shitshow!
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Why would MM force this vote? Seems to give Thor's hammer to primary challengers.
They've been campaigning on repealing the ACA "root and branch" for 7 years. The base and the President are holding their feet to the fire to get it done. That cacophony of flapping and clucking you hear is millions of chickens coming home to roost.
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That's a nice state you have there. Be a shame if something were to happen to it (https://www.adn.com/politics/2017/07/26/trump-administration-signals-that-murkowskis-health-care-vote-could-have-energy-repercussions-for-alaska/).
President Donald Trump isn't going to just let go of Sen. Lisa Murkowski's no vote on Tuesday's health care. Early Wednesday, Trump took to Twitter to express displeasure with Murkowski's vote. By that afternoon, each of Alaska's two Republican senators had received a phone call from Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke letting them know the vote had put Alaska's future with the administration in jeopardy.
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That's a nice state you have there. Be a shame if something were to happen to it (https://www.adn.com/politics/2017/07/26/trump-administration-signals-that-murkowskis-health-care-vote-could-have-energy-repercussions-for-alaska/).
It's telling that of the 13 GOP senators (10 men, 3 women) who have voted no on the straight repeal and/or the BRCA, only the women are catching their colleagues' vitriol.
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They've been campaigning on repealing the ACA "root and branch" for 7 years. The base and the President are holding their feet to the fire to get it done. That cacophony of flapping and clucking you hear is millions of chickens coming home to roost.
And they've had 7 years to actually come up with a policy but instead are spending their lunch today writing a bill that will dramatically affect 1/6 of the nation's economy.
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I'm confused:
Are transgender individuals so violent that I should fear them in the bathroom, or so incapable of violence that I should fear them in my military?
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Edited because I'm a dummy.
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The BLS estimates the total US workforce is 160,145,000.
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That's a nice state you have there. Be a shame if something were to happen to it (https://www.adn.com/politics/2017/07/26/trump-administration-signals-that-murkowskis-health-care-vote-could-have-energy-repercussions-for-alaska/).
The Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee abruptly cancelled the confirmation hearings of 6 Trump appointees (http://thehill.com/policy/energy-environment/344142-murkowskis-committee-postpones-trump-nominees-confirmation-vote) this morning. The nominees are for positions in the Depts of the Interior and Energy. Interior is Ryan Zinke's department. The committee is led by Lisa Murkowski of Alaska.
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The Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee abruptly cancelled the confirmation hearings of 6 Trump appointees (http://thehill.com/policy/energy-environment/344142-murkowskis-committee-postpones-trump-nominees-confirmation-vote) this morning. The nominees are for positions in the Depts of the Interior and Energy. Interior is Ryan Zinke's department. The committee is led by Lisa Murkowski of Alaska.
Donald's not used to dealing with women who fight back.
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Donald's not used to dealing with women who fight back.
He has yet to learn that he's the administrator, not the boss.
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Here's where I start getting nervous. Cornyn is now insisting - despite no public or private assurances from Speaker Ryan - that the Senate bill is destined for conference committee. Given the rampant and effortless lying that's been going on about this process, I have no confidence that the Senate leadership won't reassure the Republican opposition that this bill will go to conference so it's safe to vote "yes", and then have Ryan promptly put it to a vote in the House and rush it thereafter to Trump's desk for the smuggest, most gut-wrenchingly self-congratulatory signing ceremony in the history of the planet.
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Here's where I start getting nervous. Cornyn is now insisting - despite no public or private assurances from Speaker Ryan - that the Senate bill is destined for conference committee. Given the rampant and effortless lying that's been going on about this process, I have no confidence that the Senate leadership won't reassure the Republican opposition that this bill will go to conference so it's safe to vote "yes", and then have Ryan promptly put it to a vote in the House and rush it thereafter to Trump's desk for the smuggest, most gut-wrenchingly self-congratulatory signing ceremony in the history of the planet.
That's clearly what is going to happen. A bunch of Republicans complaining about the process and substance of the bill, but keeping voting it along "in order to have a frank discussion" about it (McCain being the crowning hypocrite) and then, voila, it's on Trump's desk.
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Don't they still have to pass something to send to conference?
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Don't they still have to pass something to send to conference?
Right. But if they convince the current "no" voters that this is just a procedural / placeholder bill to get to conference, then they might get to 50 votes + Pence. But - forgive me if I'm wrong - once passed in the Senate, it becomes Ryan's choice whether to go to conference or simply to put the bill on the floor of the House for a vote.
Do you trust Ryan not to ram this through the House tomorrow night?
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That's clearly what is going to happen. A bunch of Republicans complaining about the process and substance of the bill, but keeping voting it along "in order to have a frank discussion" about it (McCain being the crowning hypocrite) and then, voila, it's on Trump's desk.
Lindsey Graham is starting to earn a tiny space in my heart. First there was the joke about murdering Ted Cruz, and now...
The worst possible outcome is to pass something that most of us believe is a placeholder and it becomes the final product. Trying to fix it later is a nonstarter because this placeholder concept - the skinny bill - would destroy insurance markets and not even remotely replace Obamacare.
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Lindsey Graham is McCain Lite. He'll complain about this and then do nothing to stop it.
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Lindsey Graham is McCain Lite. He'll complain about this and then do nothing to stop it.
Exactly. Worthless until proven otherwise.
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Lindsey Graham is McCain Lite. He'll complain about this and then do nothing to stop it.
He's certainly voted yes at every opportunity.
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Exactly. Worthless until proven otherwise.
These morons are literally saying they will vote for the bill only if they are assured it doesn't become law. Gee, if one there were a way for them to have say in it!
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These morons are literally saying they will vote for the bill only if they are assured it doesn't become law. Gee, if one there were a way for them to have say in it!
This is perfectly representative of their behavior in office the whole time. What a gas!
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FWIW... the skinny bill did not pass. McCain was the deciding vote.
In the spirit of the "wooo":
http://screengrabber.deadspin.com/bah-gawd-its-the-rattlesnake-1797324485
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FWIW... the skinny bill did not pass. McCain was the deciding vote.
By one fucking vote. And then the CBO score came out which said the Healthcare Freedom and Newspeak Act would throw 16 million off insurance and raise premiums an average of 20%, while the elimination of the individual mandate was widely expected the implode the private insurance market.
One fucking vote.
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FWIW... the skinny bill did not pass. McCain was the deciding vote.
In the spirit of the "wooo":
http://screengrabber.deadspin.com/bah-gawd-its-the-rattlesnake-1797324485
That's a great video. I'm not going to heap praise on McCain for his vote (what do you want, a cookie?), but he embarrassed Mitch McConnell and Mike Pence in the most dramatic way possible, and I do applaud that.
Not to mention that by letting McConnell think he could get the votes, McCain caused multiple vulnerable Republicans on the '18 ballot to cast unnecessary votes in favor of a terrible and deeply unpopular bill that was brought to the floor under the shadiest process possible. So kudos for that as well.
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Not to mention that by letting McConnell think he could get the votes, McCain caused multiple vulnerable Republicans on the '18 ballot to cast unnecessary votes in favor of a terrible and deeply unpopular bill that was brought to the floor under the shadiest process possible. So kudos for that as well.
Ditto Ryan in the House. The campaign ads are writing themselves, which is a good thing because if Democrats write them they'll fuck them up.
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Ditto Ryan in the House. The campaign ads are writing themselves, which is a good thing because if Democrats write them they'll fuck them up.
You guys are too hard on the Dems. They just haven't updated their playbook for Batshit World yet.
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That's a great video. I'm not going to heap praise on McCain for his vote (what do you want, a cookie?), but he embarrassed Mitch McConnell and Mike Pence in the most dramatic way possible, and I do applaud that.
It's also best not to forget that defeat of the bill also required "nay" votes from Murkowski and Collins, who have been consistent in their opposition to this entire process. McCain swept in, made an impassioned speech objecting to what was going on, but then split his votes with two "yays" and two "nays". Not entirely a profile in courage but very effective in hoovering up the kudos.
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It's also best not to forget that defeat of the bill also required "nay" votes from Murkowski and Collins, who have been consistent in their opposition to this entire process. McCain swept in, made an impassioned speech objecting to what was going on, but then split his votes with two "yays" and two "nays". Not entirely a profile in courage but very effective in hoovering up the kudos.
Also credit to the senate dems led by Schumer. Even red state democratic senators like Manchin were never in play. A rare showing of organized solidarity from that group.
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Trump tweeted this morning that the filibuster has to go. smh
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Nothing Trump says will ever ruin my day as much as seeing this did. Presidential portrait (https://goo.gl/images/M4YMGz)
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Trump tweeted this morning that the filibuster has to go. smh
He probably thinks that's what happened.
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Nothing Trump says will ever ruin my day as much as seeing this did. Presidential portrait (https://goo.gl/images/M4YMGz)
According to Scaramucci, Trump is an amazing athlete who can swish jumpers from the key in a suit and tie, knock a baseball out of the park and never misses a 3-foot putt. Yes, he said these things. With a straight face and without any f-bombs.
Seth Meyer said of that photo "Trump is his own doubles partner" and of Scaramucci "he's the human embodiment of a double-parked BMW."
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He probably thinks that's what happened.
He subsequently (but not contemporaneously) tweeted that it has to go for other legislation to come later. I think someone explained it to him, or had him watch Schoolhouse Rock.
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According to Scaramucci, Trump is an amazing athlete who can swish jumpers from the key in a suit and tie, knock a baseball out of the park and never misses a 3-foot putt. Yes, he said these things. With a straight face and without any f-bombs.
Seth Meyer said of that photo "Trump is his own doubles partner" and of Scaramucci "he's the human embodiment of a double-parked BMW."
He's just gross.
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He's just gross.
He's a rarity; a human being with exactly zero redeeming qualities. Even Hitler was a poet and an artist.
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According to Scaramucci, Trump is an amazing athlete who can swish jumpers from the key in a suit and tie, knock a baseball out of the park and never misses a 3-foot putt. Yes, he said these things. With a straight face and without any f-bombs.
Seth Meyer said of that photo "Trump is his own doubles partner" and of Scaramucci "he's the human embodiment of a double-parked BMW."
Deadspin reported that the official transcript was altered to read that he sinks 30 ft putts, not 3 foot putts (which is what moochie said) because trump apparently thought those gimmes weren't representative of his phenomenal golf skills. Phenomenal.
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You are not alone in your admiration for Der Fuhrer. No less than Franz Liebkin touted another of his manifold talents. "He could paint an entire apartment in one afternoon - two coats."
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Uncle Joe Stalin had a great mustache, never mind a fantastic head of hair.
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Not only was he cuddly, but Pol Pot made a
killer scintillating sticky rice.
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Priebus fired as Chief of Staff. Who saw that coming?
The list of senior staff leaving or getting fired is impressive for only the first six months. I'm sure there's more but here's a sample list:
National Security Adviser (Flynn)
FBI Director (Comey)
Press Secretary (Spicer)
Assistant Press Secretary
Acting AG (Yates)
Communications Director
Deputy Chief of Staff
Chief of Staff
48 US Attorneys
In fact, he's already fired three people directly involved with the investigations into himself: Comey, Yates and Bharaha. Meanwhile, he's been threatening AG Sessions, HHS Secretary Price, Acting FBI Director McCabe and, of course, Special Prosecutor Mueller. Tillerson is also thought to be on the bubble, but no one has seen that fucker for weeks now. Can't fire him if you can't see him, right?
Also today Trump instructed ICE and law enforcement to be deliberately rough with suspects in custody. He did it in a speech in front of a audience of NY cops, and got a loud cheer / applause for it. Because the problem today is cops being too delicate with people they interact with?
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You left out Scaramucci's wife saying "enough!" and filing for divorce and walking out with the kids.
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You left out Scaramucci's wife saying "enough!" and filing for divorce and walking out with the kids.
I can't decide what I like best about this guy. It could be that sweet cornicello necklace that you can see when he leaves his silk shirt open down to the fourth button. It could be that he's the first guy to wear see-through socks on Air Force One since the Johnson administration. Or it could be that his name sort of rhymes with douchey.
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I can't decide what I like best about this guy. It could be that sweet cornicello necklace that you can see when he leaves his silk shirt open down to the fourth button. It could be that he's the first guy to wear see-through socks on Air Force One since the Johnson administration. Or it could be that his name sort of rhymes with douchey.
You know that he's just itching to break out his Joe Pesci: "You mean, let me understand this cause, ya know maybe it's me, I'm a little fucked up maybe, but I'm funny how, I mean funny like I'm a clown, I amuse you? I make you laugh, I'm here to fuckin' amuse you? What do you mean funny, funny how? How am I funny?"
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NYT WH Correspondent reporting that "The Mooch" is out as Communications Director. But it was working so well...
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NYT WH Correspondent reporting that "The Mooch" is out as Communications Director. But it was working so well...
I didn't think Kelly and Scaramucci were going to mix very well. My big worry right now is that Kelly might very well be able to get everybody to heel and start implementing all of these ill-thought-out policies.
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I didn't think Kelly and Scaramucci were going to mix very well. My big worry right now is that Kelly might very well be able to get everybody to heel and start implementing all of these ill-thought-out policies.
Until Kelly points out the obvious and tells Donald that his daughter and son-in-law need to get real jobs.
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Until Kelly points out the obvious and tells Donald that his daughter and son-in-law need to get real jobs.
Trump doesn't like anyone threatening or even appearing to threaten his dominance. That's why he arranged for Ivanka to marry Jared.
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Just wanted to point out a few encouraging signs in this dismal Trump/Republican base era. Maybe the fever is beginning to break:
http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2017/07/31/my-party-is-in-denial-about-donald-trump-215442 (http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2017/07/31/my-party-is-in-denial-about-donald-trump-215442)
Meanwhile, the strange specter of an American president’s seeming affection for strongmen and authoritarians created such a cognitive dissonance among my generation of conservatives—who had come of age under existential threat from the Soviet Union—that it was almost impossible to believe. Even as our own government was documenting a concerted attack against our democratic processes by an enemy foreign power, our own White House was rejecting the authority of its own intelligence agencies, disclaiming their findings as a Democratic ruse and a hoax. Conduct that would have had conservatives up in arms had it been exhibited by our political opponents now had us dumbstruck.
In addition, the quote from Orrin Hatch. Orrin Hatch
I don’t think we should be discriminating against anyone. Transgender people are people, and deserve the best we can do for them.
And finally, Houston business execs standing up to the piece of crap Dan Patrick and his bathroom bill:
"We support diversity and inclusion, and we believe that any such bill risks harming Texas' reputation and impacting the state;s economic growth and ability to create new jobs," the letter states.
"Innovative companies are driven by their people, and winning the talent recruitment battle is key. Any bill that harms our ability to attract top talent to Houston will inhibit our growth and continued success — and ultimately the success of our great state."
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NYT WH Correspondent reporting that "The Mooch" is out as Communications Director. But it was working so well...
So how do you feel if you're Spicey? Get run out of town because you told the boss that hiring the Mooch was a bad idea. 10 days later, Mooch gets canned. Spicey: "Why the fuck doesn't anyone listen to me..."
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So how do you feel if you're Spicey? Get run out of town because you told the boss that hiring the Mooch was a bad idea. 10 days later, Mooch gets canned. Spicey: "Why the fuck doesn't anyone listen to me..."
I think he actually comes out of this looking pretty good (if that's possible, given his previous 180 days of dissembling and outright lying). He's out of the insane asylum, he got to resign for believable reasons (unlike Priebus), and Mooch flamed out in spectacular fashion. That's about the best Spicer could have hoped for.
ETA: Now I'm waiting to see what happens with Conway.
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Are they trolling their own readers?
The Federalist (posted this morning): Why Anthony Scaramucci Is The Man Trump And America Need (http://thefederalist.com/2017/07/31/anthony-scaramucci-man-trump-america-need/)
The Federalist (posted this evening): Why Scaramucci’s Firing Might Be Good News For Donald Trump (http://thefederalist.com/2017/07/31/scaramuccis-firing-might-good-news-donald-trump/)
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Are they trolling their own readers?
The Federalist (posted this morning): Why Anthony Scaramucci Is The Man Trump And America Need (http://thefederalist.com/2017/07/31/anthony-scaramucci-man-trump-america-need/)
The Federalist (posted this evening): Why Scaramucci’s Firing Might Be Good News For Donald Trump (http://thefederalist.com/2017/07/31/scaramuccis-firing-might-good-news-donald-trump/)
They're not thinking anymore, just cheerleading.
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Saw this somewhere...
Scaramucci...get hired, gets divorced, has a kid, and gets fired...in 10 days. Like a house fly.
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So how do you feel if you're Spicey? Get run out of town because you told the boss that hiring the Mooch was a bad idea. 10 days later, Mooch gets canned. Spicey: "Why the fuck doesn't anyone listen to me..."
Met a long-time business acquaintance last night. HIs theory is that the "Mooch" was just living up to his name, and using a stint at the White House as a tax dodge. When joining the White House, one is expected to divest personal business assets* but, because this is a somewhat forced divestiture, the IRS will forgive any otherwise applicable capital gains taxes...
* Unless you're the President, apparently.
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WaPo says that Trump Sr. personally dictated the original statement (https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trump-dictated-sons-misleading-statement-on-meeting-with-russian-lawyer/2017/07/31/04c94f96-73ae-11e7-8f39-eeb7d3a2d304_story.html) about Jr et al's meeting with the Russians, that falsely claimed it was about adoptions. In fact, the panel of advisors wanted to come clean completely about the meeting to get ahead of the story, but Trump Sr. overruled that advice preferring to make up a lie.
They're really, really bad at this.
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Jeff Flake lets the Trump enablers have it (http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2017/07/31/my-party-is-in-denial-about-donald-trump-215442) with both, perfectly tanned and coiffed barrels.
It was we conservatives who, upon Obama’s election, stated that our No. 1 priority was not advancing a conservative policy agenda but making Obama a one-term president—the corollary to this binary thinking being that his failure would be our success and the fortunes of the citizenry would presumably be sorted out in the meantime. It was we conservatives who were largely silent when the most egregious and sustained attacks on Obama’s legitimacy were leveled by marginal figures who would later be embraced and legitimized by far too many of us. It was we conservatives who rightly and robustly asserted our constitutional prerogatives as a co-equal branch of government when a Democrat was in the White House but who, despite solemn vows to do the same in the event of a Trump presidency, have maintained an unnerving silence as instability has ensued. To carry on in the spring of 2017 as if what was happening was anything approaching normalcy required a determined suspension of critical faculties. And tremendous powers of denial.
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Jeff Flake lets the Trump enablers have it (http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2017/07/31/my-party-is-in-denial-about-donald-trump-215442) with both, perfectly tanned and coiffed barrels.
Cabrera'd.
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Cabrera'd.
Arrrgh! FAKE NEWS!
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Cabrera'd.
When do you have time to read politics with all the baseball you follow? Quite impressive.
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When do you have time to read politics with all the baseball you follow? Quite impressive.
Twitter for me has made a huge difference on being able to keep up with baseball and other news. Saves me a ton of time.
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Met a long-time business acquaintance last night. HIs theory is that the "Mooch" was just living up to his name, and using a stint at the White House as a tax dodge. When joining the White House, one is expected to divest personal business assets* but, because this is a somewhat forced divestiture, the IRS will forgive any otherwise applicable capital gains taxes...
* Unless you're the President, apparently.
Sacaramucci has come out and said that he's going to pay the CG tax on his divestitures. I'll believe that when I see it, which I won't, because his tax returns are private.
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So, despite repeated denials from all and sundry, not only did Trump Sr. see the statement released in the name of Trump Jr. stating that the June 2016 Russia meeting was about adoptions...he wrote it! Reportedly, his advisers were in favor of complete candor about the meeting - because it will all come out anyway (which it did) - but Trump Sr. overruled them and dictated the - at best - misleading statement.
Also, the Fox News story about the death of DNC staffer Seth Rich - which claimed that he was behind the leaks of DNC emails, not the Russians - was concocted by Fox News and wealthy Trump supporter Ed Butowsky...with the knowledge of the White House. Fox and the wealthy booster had meetings with Sean Spicer to brief him of the upcoming story, presumably so that Spicer could be ready to boost the story once it was released.
The story quickly fell apart - because it was literally "fake news" - and Fox ended up deleting it from its website. Of course, like almost all of these things, it's a zombie lie that won't die; you'll get a Trump supporter to let go of the fact that Hillary had Rich killed when you can pry it out of their cold, dead hand.
The sweeping dishonesty of the Trump campaign / administration is overwhelming.
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When Trump and his flying monkeys talk about adoptions with Russians, what they're really talking about is sanctions - specifically, the Magnitsky Act. Last week Bill Browder was scheduled to give testimony to the Senate Judiciary Committee about the reason why this act exists and Russia's ongoing efforts to have it ended. Trump blew up the news media that day with his tweet about trangender service personnel, but Browder's testimony was postponed a day. The next day, when Browder testified, the news media was distracted by the Mooch's phone call rant about Priebus being a " fucking paranoiac" and Bannon "sucking his own cock".
Regardless, Browder's testimony exists, is on the record (https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2017/07/bill-browders-testimony-to-the-senate-judiciary-committee/534864/), and is stunning. He joins the dots from the horrific death in a Russian prison of Sergei Magnitsky to a "Russian government attorney" working in the U.S. to stem the spread of the Magnitsky Act to other countries and towards its repeal it here - said attorney being one Natalia Veselnitskaya...
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Trump signed the Russia sanctions bill, despite his best efforts to avoid doing so. I can hear him now though...
"this is the greatest bill. Ever. People are saying that...everywhere...standing ovations for this bill of mine...never happened before...never...in the history of bills...tremendous bill...yuge..."
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The sweeping dishonesty of the Trump campaign / administration is overwhelming.
It's so overwhelming that, in the public sphere at least, it is effectively meaningless.
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Trump signed the Russia sanctions bill, despite his best efforts to avoid doing so. I can hear him now though...
"this is the greatest bill. Ever. People are saying that...everywhere...standing ovations for this bill of mine...never happened before...never...in the history of bills...tremendous bill...yuge..."
You jest but he has, in recent days, claimed that he has achieved more than any other President in history. Now, if you give him the benefit of the doubt and add the caveat he omitted of "at this point in office", he's still way off. He'd signed 42 bills, which wasn't even as much as Obama or Bush before him. Also, if you look at the substantive nature of legislative accomplishment, he's at a big, fat zero. Most Presidents, especially when of the same party of the one which controls the House and Senate, had passed some pretty important legislation by this point in office. Trump has this sanctions bill and a bunch of procedural or ceremonial bills.
On the flip side, Obamacare is alive and bin Laden is still dead.
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Trump appended a signing statement (https://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2017/08/02/statement-president-donald-j-trump-signing-countering-americas) to the sanctions bill he signed today. The full text is at the foregoing link, but here's a taste:
Waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!
In all seriousness, it's a piece of work. You need to read it.
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Trump appended a signing statement (https://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2017/08/02/statement-president-donald-j-trump-signing-countering-americas) to the sanctions bill he signed today. The full text is at the foregoing link, but here's a taste:
In all seriousness, it's a piece of work. You need to read it.
Here's the money shot:
Still, the bill remains seriously flawed – particularly because it encroaches on the executive branch’s authority to negotiate. Congress could not even negotiate a healthcare bill after seven years of talking.
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I built a truly great company worth many billions of dollars. That is a big part of the reason I was elected. As President, I can make far better deals with foreign countries than Congress.
What a child.
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I built a truly great company worth many billions of dollars. That is a big part of the reason I was elected. As President, I can make far better deals with foreign countries than Congress.
What a child.
Any Republican legislator that defends this guy in public is a shameless, dickless invertebrate.
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Any Republican legislator that defends this guy in public is a shameless, dickless invertebrate.
And now on the news tonight they're describing how he's yelling at the generals and advisors who are describing the Afghanistan situation. His entire business "success" is based on bluster and bullying, and he's finally finding out that that only goes so far.
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Any Republican legislator that defends this guy in public is a shameless, dickless invertebrate.
The evidence is mounting (https://www.lawfareblog.com/our-non-unitary-executive) that they're just ignoring him and doing what they were going to do anyway.
The president seems scary, and he is, but he also has no control over his administration. There is lots of talk about Trump’s threat to the independence of the Justice Department, the FBI, the intelligence community, and the like. But the truth is that these agencies are operating with an independence to presidential wishes like never before. It’s a very strange state of affairs.
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The evidence is mounting (https://www.lawfareblog.com/our-non-unitary-executive) that they're just ignoring him and doing what they were going to do anyway.
The response of the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs to his transgender ban was as close to an "f you" from the military to the CIC as I'd ever thought I'd see.
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And now on the news tonight they're describing how he's yelling at the generals and advisors who are describing the Afghanistan situation. His entire business "success" is based on bluster and bullying, and he's finally finding out that that only goes so far.
The hilarious part about his rant at the Generals was that he regaled them with a story about remodelling a restaurant, and how he got better information from the waitstaff than the management. OK, Don, grab a flak jacket and head to Afghanistan to get the scoop from the "waitstaff" on the ground...
Meanwhile, the latest round of polls are pretty brutal. Quinnipiac has him at a 33% approval rating vs. 60% disapproval. They also found that most Americans say they are embarrassed to have Trump as president, believe Trump is abusing the powers of his office, and see Trump as positioning himself as above the law. The same poll showed a majority of Americans agreeing that Trump is not levelheaded, not honest, lacking in leadership skills, and unconcerned with average Americans. He only has a 76% approval rating among Republicans and is underwater with white, non-college educated men...you know, his base.
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The response of the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs to his transgender ban was as close to an "f you" from the military to the CIC as I'd ever thought I'd see.
Yesterday, he got eff-you'd by the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, Prime Minister Medvedev of Russia, President Nieto of Mexico, White House Chief of Staff Kelly and the head of the Boy Scouts of America. He's a lame duck 6 months in.
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The eff-you from Medvedev is worth highlighting itself. It signals Putin being at the end of his rope with his ineffective puppet; he expelled 755 U.S. diplomats this week, and Trump has still yet to utter a word about it. The peepee tape can't be far behind.
The Trump administration has shown its total weakness by handing over executive power to Congress in the most humiliating way. The US establishment fully outwitted Trump. The President is not happy about the sanctions, yet he could not but sign the bill. We will steadily continue our work on developing the economy, relying mostly on ourselves. We have learned to do this.
Of course, the biggest take away from this is that the Prime Minister of Russia speaks better English than the President of the United States of America.
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He only has a 76% approval rating among Republicans and is underwater with white, non-college educated men...you know, his base.
What have you done for me lately??
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What have you done for me lately??
Exactly. No wall, chaos around the Mooslem ban, Hillary walking free and they still have their healthcare.
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The eff-you from Medvedev is worth highlighting itself. It signals Putin being at the end of his rope with his ineffective puppet; he expelled 755 U.S. diplomats this week, and Trump has still yet to utter a word about it. The peepee tape can't be far behind.
Putin is doing what Putin does: sewing chaos and discord. They are just jerking the chain around.
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Putin is doing what Putin does: sewing chaos and discord. They are just jerking the chain around.
Agreed. Trump is becoming more and more unhinged by all this, to the extent he made up two phone calls that never happened on the same day and shouted at his our Generals.
Having said that, it's a close thing whether Trump's flailing or Miller's press briefing was the most bizarre thing yesterday.
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Agreed. Trump is becoming more and more unhinged by all this, to the extent he made up two phone calls that never happened on the same day and shouted at his our Generals.
Having said that, it's a close thing whether Trump's flailing or Miller's press briefing was the most bizarre thing yesterday.
I can believe that a 70+ year old man who eats like shit and never exercises is in cognitive decline.
I can't believe the United States put a 31 year old white nationalist who couldn't have won a high school debate tournament at the podium to speak on its behalf.
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I can't believe the United States put a 31 year old white nationalist who couldn't have won a high school debate tournament at the podium to speak on its behalf.
The list of human garbage in Trump's orbit is long.
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I can't believe the United States put a 31 year old white nationalist who couldn't have won a high school debate tournament at the podium to speak on its behalf.
This administration has said to hell with dog whistles and moved right back to overt racism.
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This administration has said to hell with dog whistles and moved right back to overt racism.
Doesn't mean I've moved past denial, etc to acceptance.
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The transcripts of the calls PPG had with Peña Nieto and Turnbull are fucking brutal.
What a negotiator. You could randomly pluck some 17 year old out of the Amarillo Model UN and see them do a better job.
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I can believe that a 70+ year old man who eats like shit and never exercises is in cognitive decline.
Trump has assured me that doctors have pronounced him the healthiest individual to ever take the oath of office. In fact, doctors are stunned, at a loss even, to explain how Trump can be so vibrant and healthy.
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Trump has assured me that doctors have pronounced him the healthiest individual to ever take the oath of office. In fact, doctors are stunned, at a loss even, to explain how Trump can be so vibrant and healthy.
"Vibrant" does not mean "jiggles like a bowl full of jelly".
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The transcripts of the calls PPG had with Peña Nieto and Turnbull are fucking brutal.
What a negotiator. You could randomly pluck some 17 year old out of the Amarillo Model UN and see them do a better job.
It must be terrible to have all your internal or private discussions blasted out on the internet for all to see...
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It must be terrible to have all your internal or private discussions blasted out on the internet for all to see...
At least we have a relatively high level of confidence that these calls actually happened and aren't just some bizarre, demented fever dream.
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At least we have a relatively high level of confidence that these calls actually happened and aren't just some bizarre, demented fever dream.
This extract of the transcript (https://scontent.fhou1-1.fna.fbcdn.net/v/t1.0-0/p480x480/20525296_10155662593801800_8711826979048535314_n.jpg?oh=35a6e1ab0855181c2758a5e60b3c6c15&oe=59F761B3) is extremely telling.
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I believe the proper internet parlance is "shit just got real":
https://www.wsj.com/amp/articles/special-counsel-mueller-impanels-washington-grand-jury-in-russia-probe-1501788287
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I believe the proper internet parlance is "shit just got real":
https://www.wsj.com/amp/articles/special-counsel-mueller-impanels-washington-grand-jury-in-russia-probe-1501788287
Preemptive strike against North Korea in three...two...
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I believe the proper internet parlance is "shit just got real":
https://www.wsj.com/amp/articles/special-counsel-mueller-impanels-washington-grand-jury-in-russia-probe-1501788287
Apparently it's been sat for a few weeks and has already issued subpoenas on, at least, the June 2016 Russia meeting.
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Trump told Congress to stay in session until they get health care reform done. Then Trump went on vacation. Then Congress left for the summer.
But they didn't completely ignore the President. Lisa Murkowski proposed that they keep the Senate in session to block any recess appointments. The Senate approved the measure without a single vote against.
He. Is. Done.
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Trump told Congress to stay in session until they get health care reform done. Then Trump went on vacation. Then Congress left for the summer.
But they didn't completely ignore the President. Lisa Murkowski proposed that they keep the Senate in session to block any recess appointments. The Senate approved the measure without a single vote against.
He. Is. Done.
The fact that Murkowski, a woman, made the motion is fantastic. His head will explode. I legitimately expect him to have a stroke before his term is up.
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The fact that Murkowski, a woman, made the motion is fantastic. His head will explode. I legitimately expect him to have a stroke before his term is up.
Trump already had the Interior Dept explicitly threaten funding to Alaska after her earlier healthcare vote. Then she held up a committee vote on some nominees. Now this. I'm liking this lady more and more every day. She's got bigger balls than 99% of the GOP.
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I wonder how Zinke's going to get to work when they take away his pony because PPG wants to ride it.
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How can anyone who has read the transcripts of the calls Trump had with Nieto and Turnbull think this orange opossum taint has any business being the President of the United States of America? Head of a handed down family business, sure. Reality TV star. Perfect. President of the United States of America? Come the fuck on. This guy is an absolute clown. Most of us Americans realized this long ago.
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How can anyone who has read the transcripts of the calls Trump had with Nieto and Turnbull think this orange opossum taint has any business being the President of the United States of America? Head of a handed down family business, sure. Reality TV star. Perfect. President of the United States of America? Come the fuck on. This guy is an absolute clown. Most of us Americans realized this long ago.
I don't think it's a coincidence that the Senate took this action right on the heels of the phone call transcript leaks and his new, terrible, poll numbers. I think everyone who was hoping to ride the chaos to achieve their own political goals - from Putin to the GOP- has come to the realization that Trump is just so completely incompetent that nothing can get done.
Now that Congressional Republicans have given up on him, they'll line up on the right side of the Russia investigation. This move to protect Sessions - and therefore Mueller too - is just the start.
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The Senate also had a bipartisan bill introduced to allow a Special Prosecutor to appeal his/her firing to the Senate. So, if passed (and it seems likely that it would), Trump can fire Session and have the new AG fire Mueller, then Mueller could appeal to the Senate and they can reinstate him.
It appears that Republicans have realized the folly of their plan to ride the Trump Crazy Train, and are now moving to protect the institutions of government from the Boy King.
Also, this Newsweek cover (http://az705044.vo.msecnd.net/20170804/newsweek-trump-cover.png). Ouch!
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Also, this Newsweek cover (http://az705044.vo.msecnd.net/20170804/newsweek-trump-cover.png). Ouch!
I'm pretty sure that's a bag of Cheetos on his right. Classic!
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I'm pretty sure that's a bag of Cheetos on his right. Classic!
The article inside (http://www.newsweek.com/2017/08/11/donald-trump-hillary-clinton-gop-white-house-potus-bannon-643996.html) isn't pretty reading. It likens him to Al Bundy:
So he sits and stews, like Al Bundy, the shoe-selling protagonist of Married ... With Children, the sitcom of roiling white discontent that predicted Trump better than any political scientist or pundit. Unsatisfying job, ungrateful children, all around him a nation in decline. Bundy dreams of the days when he was a high school football star; Trump, of his election-night romp through the Upper Midwest.
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If a person spends all their time golfing and watching TV, what do they do on vacation?
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If a person spends all their time golfing and watching TV, what do they do on vacation?
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The wife and I spent last weekend in Charleston, SC (great town BTW) and we were standing I line for something when a young fellow in front of us said "I usually don't do this, hey, I'm on vacation". As my wife laughed his father rolled his eyes and said "that's right...he's 9...and on vacation".
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What was the young fellow using his vacational license to do, tweet before 5 AM?
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What was the young fellow using his vacational license to do, tweet before 5 AM?
I don't remember exactly, but I think it had something to do with sleeping later than usual. Whatever it was, the responsibilities of the daily grind of being a 9 year old was clearly wearing him out, and the chance to relax was in order.
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I don't remember exactly, but I think it had something to do with sleeping later than usual. Whatever it was, the responsibilities of the daily grind of being a 9 year old was clearly wearing him out, and the chance to relax was in order.
So, like Trump then.
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I'm pretty sure that's a bag of Cheetos on his right. Classic!
That is amazing.
Something tells me he won't be hanging that in the clubhouse next to his fake Time cover.
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Nope, not on vacation. This morning he was back tweeting classified information that endangers US intelligence assets. In this case, he retweeted a Fox and Friends story about North Korea that UN Ambassador Nikki Haley condemned as containing leaked classified intel that put Americans in danger.
Now watch this drive...
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Nope, not on vacation. This morning he was back tweeting classified information that endangers US intelligence assets. In this case, he retweeted a Fox and Friends story about North Korea that UN Ambassador Nikki Haley condemned as containing leaked classified intel that put Americans in danger.
Now watch this drive...
I bet it was the best drive ever and went further than anyone's drive before.
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I bet it was the best drive ever and went further than anyone's drive before.
His golf prowess is rivaled only by Kim Jong Il.
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His golf prowess is rivaled only by Kim Jong Il.
I'm sure he's a decent player; he practices enough! But I read that he never posts his scores so no one knows what he true standard actually is.
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I'm sure he's a decent player; he practices enough! But I read that he never posts his scores so no one knows what he true standard actually is.
He's won 18 club championships. (https://twitter.com/realdonaldtrump/status/313970051453710336)
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I'm sure he's a decent player; he practices enough! But I read that he never posts his scores so no one knows what he true standard actually is.
He should play with Judge Smails and Dr. Beeper. Dr. Beeper is club champion, three years running, and Smails is no slouch himself.
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Trump's approval rating just hit 32% in the latest poll released today. Opposition to him remains steady among democrats and minorities etc., it's the white-collar, non-college educated rust belt voter who's moving the number. He's losing his base.
Still, I'm sure video of him on a 17-day, tax-payer funded golf trip to a swanky country club that he owns is going to turn that around. Eh? Oh.
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Trump's approval rating just hit 32% in the latest poll released today. Opposition to him remains steady among democrats and minorities etc., it's the white-collar, non-college educated rust belt voter who's moving the number. He's losing his base.
Still, I'm sure video of him on a 17-day, tax-payer funded golf trip to a swanky country club that he owns is going to turn that around. Eh? Oh.
The good thing is though, that because he owns the country club, the money the taxpayers are paying is going back into his pocket. So it's a win, win.
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The good thing is though, that because he owns the country club, the money the taxpayers are paying is going back into his pocket. So it's a win, win.
He needs the revenue uptick after he his management team tried gouging the Secret Service so badly they decided to move out of Trump Tower.
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Quick summary of the day:
1. POTUS gets 2 briefing folders a day to tell him how awesome he is;
2. The solution to the "opoid" crisis is to tell kids, "no good, really bad for you"; and
3. The solution with North Korea is "fire and fury".
/thisisfinedog.jpg
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POTUS gets 2 briefing folders a day to tell him how awesome he is;
Apparently, his nickname around the White House is "Two-Minute Man" - which he may take as a compliment but it's actually a reference to his attention span. They have to show him pictures of nukes and the like to keep his mind on the topic at hand, but even that is unsuccessful much of the time.
For those who care to read long articles, here's one from Politico (http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2017/08/07/trump-tpp-deal-withdrawal-trade-effects-215459) about how Trump pulling out of the TPP is dry-fucking rural America while he flails on the international stage allowing our competitors to steal a march on signing up lucrative trade deals. This is business that be forever lost to the US. #MAGA (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TCm9788Tb5g)
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3. The solution with North Korea is "fire and fury".
What good is biblical hyperbole without brimstone?
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What good is biblical hyperbole without brimstone?
I thought "fire and fury" was the name for his burnt steak and catsup delicacy.
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I thought "fire and fury" was the name for his burnt steak and catsup delicacy.
No, it's what he feels when he pees.
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No, it's what he feels when he pees.
I thought he'd had a deferment from his own private Vietnam.
Who knows, maybe it's PTSTD.
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I thought he'd had a deferment from his own private Vietnam.
Who knows, maybe it's PTSTD.
Well done (http://gph.is/1bDaUFb).
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So much this... (https://i2.wp.com/www.meriahnichols.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/16144694_832586618117_1338187674_n.jpg)
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So Manaforte's house was raided at dawn by the FBI a couple of weeks ago. While he was ostensibly cooperating with the investigation - notably after they subpoenaed him - the Feds were worried that he might destroy documents in the meantime.
While that's hilarious interesting, what's more interesting is that it seems that Manaforte was the source who gave up the details on Don Jr's big Russian baby meeting. While a lot of Trump's inner circle is also his immediate family and in-laws, I can see everyone not related to Sr rolling over and singing like the dawn chorus. They'll ringfence the Trump clan and Trump himself will be left with a literal Sophie's Choice as to which kid he's going to throw to the wolves [oh...um...spoiler alert].
Note to self: buy shares in Orville Redenbacher.
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Sophie's Choice
OVER-RATED.
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Fuck Trump and all the Nazi & KKK people that voted for him. What sad human being he is.
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Forget about 3am phone calls, Trump is failing every test that comes his way as President. It takes a special kind of man to have threatening nuclear war be the second worst thing he did last week.
On that whole nuclear thing...Maddow has been pulling at a thread on this. The Defense Intelligence Agency first declared that NK had miniaturized a nuclear warhead in 2013. There was no outcry at the time and, notably, the story was debunked very quickly by pretty much every other intelligence agency, American or otherwise. The head of the DIA - one Gen. Michael Flynn - was fired because of this and because of grave concerns about how he was running the agency.
So, in 2017, the story breaks again. It's leaked to the Washington Post - from the DIA again - and Trump starts beating his war drum. Unlike 2013, the report was not immediately debunked by other agencies, so it seemed that it was only a matter of time before the confirmations started rolling in. Except that they haven't. It's still not been debunked, but no one else in the US or anywhere is claiming to have confirmed the same intelligence. So what we have is Trump's DIA leaking an uncorroborated horror story which Trump used - finally - to move Russia off the front page.
Maddow isn't saying the story is bullshit; but the longer it goes without being seconded the more it starts to whiff.
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Fuck Trump and all the Nazi & KKK people that voted for him. What sad human being he is.
At least he finally denounced the "truly bad people" (in his words) today: the media.
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At least he finally denounced the "truly bad people" (in his words) today: the media.
Did he call them Radical Islamists Bad Hombres Domestic Terrorists?
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Did he call them Radical Islamists Bad Hombres Domestic Terrorists?
Nasty women.
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I see that Trump could only maintain his fake concern for 24 hours and is now back to the both sides shit. In Trump's ideal world, no one would have ever opposed the Nazis or the Klan and presumably, everything would have been hunky dory.
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I see that Trump could only maintain his fake concern for 24 hours and is now back to the both sides shit. In Trump's ideal world, no one would have ever opposed the Nazis or the Klan and presumably, everything would have been hunky dory.
He referred to the white supremacists as "very fine people." He says many sides but is making it very clear which side he is on.
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He referred to the white supremacists as "very fine people." He says many sides but is making it very clear which side he is on.
No joke:
TRUMP: Okay, what about the alt-left that came charging at us – excuse me – what about the alt-left that came charging at the, as you say, the alt right? Do they have any semblance of guilt?
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Here's the transcript. (http://www.politico.com/story/2017/08/15/full-text-trump-comments-white-supremacists-alt-left-transcript-241662).
Excerpts:
The statement I made on Saturday, the first statement, was a fine statement, but you don't make statements that direct unless you know the fact. And it takes a little while to get the facts. You still don't know the facts. And it is a very, very important process to me. It is a very important statement. So I don't want to go quickly and just make a statement for the sake of making a political statement. I want to know the facts. If you go back to my statement, in fact I brought it. I brought it.
This is from the piece of shit who spent five years claiming that Obama wasn't an American citizen and spent the first few days in office screaming about fake crowd sizes.
Okay, what about the alt-left that came charging at us – excuse me – what about the alt-left that came charging at the, as you say, the alt right? Do they have any semblance of guilt?
"Us" speaks volumes. [Note - the "us" is a apparently a transcription error, but his description of the events amazingly frames the white supremacists, KKK and neo-nazis, who descended upon this town to preach genocide and one of whom murdered an unarmed woman, as the victims.]
And you had, you had a group on one side that was bad. And you had a group on the other side that was also very violent. And nobody wants to say that, but I'll say it right now. You had a group – you had a group on the other side that came charging in without a permit, and they were very, very violent.
The "sides" are white supremacists, KKK, neo-nazis on the one hand, and people who are not white supremacists, KKK, neo-nazis on the other hand.
Many of those people were there to protest the taking down of the statue of Robert E. Lee. So this week, it’s Robert E. Lee, I noticed that Stonewall Jackson’s coming down. I wonder, is it George Washington next week? And is it Thomas Jefferson the week after. You know, you really do have to ask yourself, where does it stop?
He does not understand the difference between George Washington and Robert E. Lee. This is amazingly stupid, and also a typical white supremacist defense of Jim Crowe monuments that people want removed. Right in line with his "cherish our history" dog whistle that Miller or Bannon wrote for him the other day.
REPORTER: Does the statue of Robert E. Lee stay up?
TRUMP: I would say that’s up to a local town, community or the federal government, depending on where it is located.
The Charlottesville city council voted to remove the statue. The racist protesters came mostly from out of town to prevent the city's determination.
REPORTER: You said there was hatred and violence on both sides?
TRUMP: I do think there is blame – yes, I think there is blame on both sides. You look at, you look at both sides. I think there’s blame on both sides, and I have no doubt about it, and you don't have any doubt about it either. And, and, and, and if you reported it accurately, you would say.
REPORTER: The neo-Nazis started this thing. They showed up in Charlottesville.
TRUMP: Excuse me, they didn't put themselves down as neo-Nazis, and you had some very bad people in that group. But you also had people that were very fine people on both sides. You had people in that group – excuse me, excuse me. I saw the same pictures as you did. You had people in that group that were there to protest the taking down, of to them, a very, very important statue and the renaming of a park from Robert E. Lee to another name.
The "very fine people" on the white supremacist, KKK, neo-nazi side were white supremacists, KKK, neo-nazis. They were waiving swastikas and giving hitler salutes.
Naturally, David Duke and Stormfront and the like are enthusiastically praising his comments.
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They are saying "us" was a transcript error
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They are saying "us" was a transcript error
Possibly. It's also one of Trump's normal verbal tics. He generally defaults to making anything about him. For instance, here is what he had to say about the woman who was killed by the white supremacist:
In fact, the young woman who I hear is a fantastic young woman and it was on NBC, her mother wrote me and said through I guess Twitter, social media, the nicest things, and I very much appreciated that. I hear she was a fine, really actually an incredible young woman, but her mother on Twitter, thanked me for what I said.
His version of expressing condolences and sharing grief is "she said nice things about me."
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They are saying "us" was a transcript error
Well, that's a relief. Good to know he's not a racist cumstain or anything.
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Well, that's a relief. Good to know he's not a racist cumstain or anything.
crisis averted
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crisis averted
I think we can all agree that it's time to move on to more pressing matters like Sing Sing and Old Sparky for the Central Park Five.
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Emotional turmoil and physical violence caused by symbolism, stupidity, and hurt feelings.
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I think we can all agree that it's time to move on to more pressing matters like Sing Sing and Old Sparky for the Central Park Five.
Or that Clinton's pastor plagiarized part of his new book.
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Or that Clinton's pastor plagiarized part of his new book.
People are saying he lifted it directly from Two Corinthians.
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Just saw the video of his remarks. They're even more gobsmacking when given such context. He was arguing with the press and expressing moral indignation that his soft peddling of this Nazi mob was being challenged.
Did you know the Fred Trump was once arrested at a Klan rally? Don denies it but contemporary news reports say otherwise. Apple...tree
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People are saying he lifted it directly from Two Corinthians.
Or from Kim Jong-Un's dad, Kim Jong the Second*.
* Trump did actually say this.
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Or from Kim Jong-Un's dad, Kim Jong the Second*.
* Trump did actually say this.
I knew that good old GW had referred to him as "Kim Jong Two" and that Rick Perry had taken a break from a passionate pas de deux at some point to refer to him as "Kim Jong the Second." So it is at some level unsurprising that the president would find himself in such estimable company.
On the other hand, these small faux pas would seem to suggest that the above-mentioned members of our constitutional élite had seen Dear Leader Kim's name in print, the inescapable implication being that information was absorbed while reading.
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I knew that good old GW had referred to him as "Kim Jong Two" and that Rick Perry had taken a break from a passionate pas de deux at some point to refer to him as "Kim Jong the Second." So it is at some level unsurprising that the president would find himself in such estimable company.
On the other hand, these small faux pas would seem to suggest that the above-mentioned members of our constitutional élite had seen Dear Leader Kim's name in print, the inescapable implication being that information was absorbed while reading.
That's true, but it also suggests a crushing lack of knowledge prior to his political career. I mean, who hadn't heard of Kim Jong-Il by 2016? It's similar to his appearance alongside Erdogan of Turkey - on multiple occasions, Trump pronounced that name with a hard "g". Clearly, he'd never even discussed the man before the press op, because if he had he'd have heard the correct pronunciation.
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That's true, but it also suggests a crushing lack of knowledge prior to his political career. I mean, who hadn't heard of Kim Jong-Il by 2016? It's similar to his appearance alongside Erdogan of Turkey - on multiple occasions, Trump pronounced that name with a hard "g". Clearly, he'd never even discussed the man before the press op, because if he had he'd have heard the correct pronunciation.
or everyone else has been mispronouncing it.
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Here's the transcript. (http://www.politico.com/story/2017/08/15/full-text-trump-comments-white-supremacists-alt-left-transcript-241662).
It amazes me how many people are feeling more comfortable making racists posts on Facebook. I am also shocked that I still know people that are supporting what Trump said. My niece and I have taken on the task of trying to educate her aunt (other side of her family). She recently went to Germany and has strong feelings about removing confederate statues.
She had a post about removing statues of Lenin and here was part of our conversation.
Me: Take them down. I'm curious did you see any Nazi statues in Germany?
Her: No
Me: Wonder why they aren't proud they fought in WWII.
Her Hitler killed WHITE people. It's against the law in Germany for anyone to do the Hitler salute. So I guess your saying that everyone who fought in the Confederate war did it for nothing, they lost their lives for nothing, they are veterans just like Tommy Joe, our uncles and all
She saw nothing wrong with her statement. She thinks removing statues is rewriting history. That there is Christianity in the confederate flag. For each racist post she has she then has one with a prayer for people. These are the people that don't understand (or want to understand) what racism is.
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When is the Sam Houston statue at Hermann Park coming down?
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or everyone else has been mispronouncing it.
No possible; he hired the "best people".
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It amazes me how many people are feeling more comfortable making racists posts on Facebook. I am also shocked that I still know people that are supporting what Trump said. My niece and I have taken on the task of trying to educate her aunt (other side of her family). She recently went to Germany and has strong feelings about removing confederate statues.
She had a post about removing statues of Lenin and here was part of our conversation.
Me: Take them down. I'm curious did you see any Nazi statues in Germany?
Her: No
Me: Wonder why they aren't proud they fought in WWII.
Her Hitler killed WHITE people. It's against the law in Germany for anyone to do the Hitler salute. So I guess your saying that everyone who fought in the Confederate war did it for nothing, they lost their lives for nothing, they are veterans just like Tommy Joe, our uncles and all
She saw nothing wrong with her statement. She thinks removing statues is rewriting history. That there is Christianity in the confederate flag. For each racist post she has she then has one with a prayer for people. These are the people that don't understand (or want to understand) what racism is.
As (I think) Stephen Colbert put it, Trump has traded in his racist dog whistle for a racist vuvuzela. Leadership (or lack thereof) matters, so his veiled support for the white supremacist movement is heard loud and clear by those in that movement - as has been born out by grateful tweets from the likes of David Duke. The fact that the KKK will march without hoods (and lit by tiki-torchlight) is a frightening development.
Today in the House, three Democrats plan to introduce a censure motion against Trump for his tacit support to the neo-Nazis et al. It's toothless, but it will get people to go on record whether they will stand up for what's right or not. It's not like it's a tough decision; but for many it'll be a tough political decision, which is desperately sad.
Meanwhile, here's a very good article comparing (https://www.vox.com/world/2017/8/16/16152088/nazi-swastikas-germany-charlottesville) and contrasting how the U.S. handles its Confederate history to how Germany handles its Nazi history.
A point of order about the Lee statue though, is that they weren't removing it, they were moving it to a location with less prominence. My understanding is that it's current position dominates the town, so the democratically elected town council voted to move it to de-emphasise it. Also, it was put up in 1924, during a time where white supremacy and the KKK were having arguably their heyday and when the reason for the civil war was being morphed from a fight about slavery to a fight about states' rights. Many of these statues earmarked for movement were erected during this period, so they're not so much celebrating the individuals as celebrating the supremacy of white supremacy at that time. Moving them isn't so much whitewashing history, it's undoing the whitewashing of history that was done 50 years or so after the event.
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When is the Sam Houston statue at Hermann Park coming down?
Sam Houston wasn't a traitor. He resigned rather than fight against the United States, and refused to make any oath to the Confederacy.
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Interesting article but one that could be used to argue against removing confederate statues.
I told a friend the other day that one of the best things about america is free speech and yet it is one of the worst things too.
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Sam Houston wasn't a traitor. He resigned rather than fight against the United States, and refused to make any oath to the Confederacy.
So the barometer is not slave ownership? I'm never sure about the lines of demarcation when it comes to these things.
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So the barometer is not slave ownership? I'm never sure about the lines of demarcation when it comes to these things.
I think the barometer should be the reason behind the honor of the monument. For example, Washington is honored for leading the revolutionary war and being the first President; Jefferson is honored for writing the Constitution etc. etc. The fact that they were slave owners is a flaw that is passed over because of the time in which they existed and did their good works.
Lee was a slave owner who fought for the right to keep his human property despite the law of the land saying otherwise. The statue, at best, honors that fight and, at worst, honors the resurgence of white supremacy in the 1920s. The statue itself bears no inscription - to my knowledge - other than the man's name.
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Lee wrote that he did not support the erection of confederate monuments, or the use of confederate flags. So we really don't honor him much...
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Interesting article but one that could be used to argue against removing confederate statues.
I told a friend the other day that one of the best things about america is free speech and yet it is one of the worst things too.
I agree that the article does show the argument "on many sides". What it tells me is that there isn't a one size fits all response here, and that Confederate monuments need to be assessed based on the merits of each - such as the historical message - compared to the offense it generates. In this case, moving the statue and, presumably, providing a more informative inscription, does not seem unreasonable to me.
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So the barometer is not slave ownership? I'm never sure about the lines of demarcation when it comes to these things.
I think you ask yourself: why is this guy here, enshrined in front of my eyes?
If you can't answer it, and yet know that the enshrinement insults your neighbors, you do what any decent neighbor would do and at a minimum, do not oppose its removal.
If it is because he was a leader of something you admire or miss, flesh out why you admire or miss it.
If you answer "cause he owned slaves," then I guess you now have an additional reason to admire the Jefferson and Washington statues.
At any rate, I doubt anyone steps in front of Washington's statue and says "Damn, I really admire him for owning slaves."
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I think the barometer should be the reason behind the honor of the monument. For example, Washington is honored for leading the revolutionary war and being the first President; Jefferson is honored for writing the Constitution etc. etc. The fact that they were slave owners is a flaw that is passed over because of the time in which they existed and did their good works.
Lee was a slave owner who fought for the right to keep his human property despite the law of the land saying otherwise. The statue, at best, honors that fight and, at worst, honors the resurgence of white supremacy in the 1920s. The statue itself bears no inscription - to my knowledge - other than the man's name.
I'm not defending keeping the shrines up. And there is no such thing as the noble slave owner. Nor will I make the comparison to the Taliban destroying some 6000 Buddhist antiquities. However, did not Jefferson and Washington both participate in a revolt against the law of the land? Were they not traitors to their King?
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However, did not Jefferson and Washington both participate in a revolt against the law of the land? Were they not traitors to their King?
They did! They were!
Hey Limey, can you show me all the monuments to Washington and Jefferson in Britain?
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They did! They were!
Hey Limey, can you show me all the monuments to Washington and Jefferson in Britain?
Funny. Washington's is right there in front of the National Gallery on Trafalgar Square. They also have statues of guys like Robert Clive and his ilk.
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I'm not defending keeping the shrines up. And there is no such thing as the noble slave owner. Nor will I make the comparison to the Taliban destroying some 6000 Buddhist antiquities. However, did not Jefferson and Washington both participate in a revolt against the law of the land? Were they not traitors to their King?
Yeah, but they won, so...statue!
Also (tongue removed from cheek), it's ok to honor losing generals too. Half of the symbols of British pride are in honor of heroic defeat: Scott of the Antarctic, Gordon of Khartoum, Dunkirk... But, again, I think it's the intent behind the honor so, in the case of British losers, it's celebrating the men whereas the Confederate monuments have a strong whiff of honoring the Confederacy, not the individuals.
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Funny. Washington's is right there in front of the National Gallery on Trafalgar Square. They also have statues of guys like Robert Clive and his ilk.
To be fair, we probably stole those on the way out.
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Funny. Washington's is right there in front of the National Gallery on Trafalgar Square. They also have statues of guys like Robert Clive and his ilk.
Interesting, good on them for being gracious losers? But while Robert Clive was likely a bad guy, he never fought against the Crown. The equivalent you're looking for is Guy Fawkes. Does he have a statue? (I honestly don't know)
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Funny. Washington's is right there in front of the National Gallery on Trafalgar Square. They also have statues of guys like Robert Clive and his ilk.
6 Presidents total (https://www.guidelondon.org.uk/blog/around-london/statues-6-american-presidents-london/), although Kennedy's is only a bust, not a full statue (presumably because they couldn't show him from the waist down as Marylin was down there).
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Interesting, good on them for being gracious losers? But while Robert Clive was likely a bad guy, he never fought against the Crown. The equivalent you're looking for is Guy Fawkes. Does he have a statue? (I honestly don't know)
No statue that I'm aware of, but every November 5th, we burn his effigy, set off fireworks, drink too much and lose too many appendages to accidents.
Remember, remember, the 5th of November
The Gunpowder Treason and plot;
I know of no reason why Gunpowder Treason
Should ever be forgot
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The equivalent you're looking for is Guy Fawkes. Does he have a statue? (I honestly don't know)
I had to look it up. they do. Didn't have to look up the pacifist rebel Ghandi.
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Half of the symbols of British pride are in honor of heroic defeat: Scott of the Antarctic, Gordon of Khartoum, Dunkirk...
Alf Ramsey...
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Alf Ramsey...
Hey! Now that's fighting talk!
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Here's a great speech. (http://pulsegulfcoast.com/2017/05/transcript-of-new-orleans-mayor-landrieus-address-on-confederate-monuments) Definitely worth taking the time to read.
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Here's a great speech. (http://pulsegulfcoast.com/2017/05/transcript-of-new-orleans-mayor-landrieus-address-on-confederate-monuments) Definitely worth taking the time to read.
That really articulates the issue well.
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Well, Kelly sacks his first high profile victim: Steve Bannon out.
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Well, Kelly sacks his first high profile victim: Steve Bannon out.
Hopefully Gorka and Miller are soon to follow. If you're going to have an openly racist president at least get rid of the people egging him on.
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Hopefully Gorka and Miller are soon to follow. If you're going to have an openly racist president at least get rid of the people egging him on.
So one quote I heard today is "Now Bannon will be pissing on the tent from the outside"
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So one quote I heard today is "Now Bannon will be pissing on the tent from the outside"
Probably. And the Bannon - Drudge war should be amusing.
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Probably. And the Bannon - Drudge war should be amusing.
I'll be curious to see whether Bannon/Breitbart aim at Trump or at Javanka et al.
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I'll be curious to see whether Bannon/Breitbart aim at Trump or at Javanka et al.
Bannon says he's going to dedicate himself to continuing pushing Trump's agenda.
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Bannon says he's going to dedicate himself to continuing pushing Trump's agenda.
He also said that the Trump administration as we knew it is over. What that means, who the fuck knows? What we do know is that Bannon was supposed to have a smooth, controlled exit until he shit all over himself with the American Prospect interview and torpedoed that plan. Breitbart has since gone after McMaster and Kushner, so we can expect to see more and more fallout as Bannon fails to control himself and starts pissing more Palace intrigue over the interwebs.
Meanwhile, counting the continuing collateral damage from his Charlottesville musings, Trump has now disbanded (mostly retroactively after they emptied out) the American Manufacturing Council, his Strategy and Policy Forum, his Advisory Council on Infrastructure, the Digital Economy Board of Advisors and the Committee on the Arts and Humanities.
Ironically, Trump's unofficial Evangelical Advisory Council is holding firm with the President, with the exception of New York City megachurch pastor A.R. Bernard, who announced Friday that he had stepped down. It's also worth noting that the Sunday shows reached out to Republicans - any Republicans - to get them to come on TV and defend Trump; none would. The White House would not offer any administration officials either, and offered up Jerry Fartwell Jr. instead. That didn't go so well as he suggested that Trump knew there were good people in the pro-Nazi, anti-Jew chanting hoards, because he had secret tapes or something.
So, while everyone tries to get to a minimum safe distance from Trump, evangelical leaders are mostly staying with him. Because...that's what Jesus would do?
ETA: It's now believed that 10 charities and other organisations have cancelled events at Mar-a-Lago. While not citing the Trump's Nazi-hugging directly, each stated that they did not want their event to be associated with the President. Although, with the Bedminster resort joining Mar-e-Coli on the kitchen violation list, I'm not sure why anyone would want to go to these places without a hazmat suit.
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In just seven short months, Trump was able to bring back an eclipse to the US. Obama had EIGHT YEARS!!! Nada. Nothing. Not even a partial. Sad.
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In just seven short months, Trump was able to bring back an eclipse to the US. Obama had EIGHT YEARS!!! Nada. Nothing. Not even a partial. Sad.
MAKE AMERICA BLIND AGAIN
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MAKE AMERICA BLIND AGAIN
To a significant degree I think we've got that covered.
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MAKE AMERICA BLIND AGAIN
You were saying... (http://i.imgur.com/zYQFXTf.jpg)
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You were saying... (http://i.imgur.com/zYQFXTf.jpg)
He is literally a child. "Now Donny, don't look directly at the sun without your special glasses on..."
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He is literally a child. "Now Donny, don't look directly at the sun without your special glasses on..."
"What did I just tell you..."
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When future generations study the inevitable collapse of this society they will marvel at shit like this. I don't mean Trump - everyone knows he's a fucking imbecile - I mean the idiot in the inset who is for no apparent reason wearing eclipse glasses as she addresses the camera.
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Am I the only one that sees parallels between this and the end of the Roman Empire? Just think about Trump and some of those emperors.
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It's not like the back-up (http://static.boredpanda.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/mike-pence-do-not-touch-nasa-space-flight-hardware-florida-fb__700-png.jpg) is much better.
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Am I the only one that sees parallels between this and the end of the Roman Empire? Just think about Trump and some of those emperors.
This is how all empires end; they rot from the inside.
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When future generations study the inevitable collapse of this society they will marvel at shit like this. I don't mean Trump - everyone knows he's a fucking imbecile - I mean the idiot in the inset who is for no apparent reason wearing eclipse glasses as she addresses the camera.
We need more people like Jeff Sessions (https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DHxnD2LXUAQ3wiB.jpg), who I think is about to sing something from The Sound of Music.
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We need more people like Jeff Sessions (https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DHxnD2LXUAQ3wiB.jpg), who I think is about to sing something from The Sound of Music.
Wagner, rather, I would think.
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We need more people like Jeff Sessions (https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DHxnD2LXUAQ3wiB.jpg), who I think is about to sing something from The Sound of Music.
I'm sure he's s not a South Pacific fan.
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So Glenn Simpson - the founder of Fusion GPS, the organisation that ordered up the Steele dossier on Trump (the peepee party file published by Buzzfeed) - spent more than 10 hours testifying in closed session to the Senate Intelligence Committee (http://www.cnn.com/2017/08/22/politics/glenn-simpson-senate-judiciary-investigators/index.html). Fusion GPS also turned over around 40,000 documents to the committee.
Now, the uproar over the golden shower aspects of the Steele dossier kind of drowned out the 99% of the findings that didn't involve hooker whizz, but did involve the explanation of how the Russians had been cultivating Trump for years, while at the same time collecting kompromat to use against him when the time came. Ironically, the Russians found that they didn't need blackmail to get Trump to do what they wanted, he would do it willingly.
While the squawking about the dossier has died down since its controversial publication by Buzzfeed, over time the less salacious aspects of the findings have been independently confirmed. I understand that, while not everything has been verified, things have only been confirmed and nothing has yet been found to be false (this may be because they started with the low hanging fruit). People in the know describe Christopher Steele as a serious operator, as you might expect from a former MI6 agent, so it would be unlikely that he'd come up with a fake account especially one with such outlandish details.
So this brings us back to Simpson and his Senate testimony. Chuck Grassley - the committee chairman - has been asked about publishing the testimony. He equivocated, claiming that the transcript needs to be checked and approved by Simpson but otherwise he has no current objections to releasing the transcript. Well, there is no obligation on the committee to allow the interviewee to confirm the transcript, and Simpson has said that he's happy for them to publish the whole thing along with all the 40,000 or so documents.
Simpson's testimony, the Steele dossier and all that supporting documentation now provided has been described as a road map to the Trump-Russia scandal. Watch this space...
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Trump has pardoned Arpaio. It's a new day in the nation, and it's not a good one.
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Trump has pardoned Arpaio. It's a new day in the nation, and it's not a good one.
Now he can take his seat when he runs for the Senate
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Trump has pardoned Arpaio. It's a new day in the nation, and it's not a good one.
With a stroke of his pen he has further emboldened his racist supporters and signaled to his staff that they needn't worry about Mueller. Disgusting.
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Back to regularly scheduled terror:
Trump: "...fire and fury like the world has never seen."
Kim Jong-Un: "Hold my beer..."
Oh, and repealing DACA? This clown's default setting is cruel. It's also stupid because the US rakes in $800mm every two years in registration fees from the Dreamers. 91% of them are employed, 100% of them have no criminal record and they're buying cars and houses and shit.
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I thought I read a headline in the Chronicle that undocumented labor will likely be needed to rebuild Houston. Or maybe droves of folks from the Midwest will be coming down. I wonder which.
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I thought I read a headline in the Chronicle that undocumented labor will likely be needed to rebuild Houston. Or maybe droves of folks from the Midwest will be coming down. I wonder which.
Don't worry, Turmp is going to give Texas so much recovery money (Florida won't need any) that we won't need the undocumented workers.
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Don't worry, Turmp is going to give Texas so much recovery money (Florida won't need any) that we won't need the undocumented workers.
Not from his pocket, of course.
Oh, I forgot he "pledged" $1M - which, if ever paid, will come from the Trump Foundation, to which he doesn't contribute a dime.
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Oh, and repealing DACA? This clown's default setting is cruel. It's also stupid because the US rakes in $800mm every two years in registration fees from the Dreamers. 91% of them are employed, 100% of them have no criminal record and they're buying cars and houses and shit.
There is no policy reason for repealing DACA other than racist cruelty.
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Not from his pocket, of course.
Oh, I forgot he "pledged" $1M - which, if ever paid, will come from the Trump Foundation, to which he doesn't contribute a dime.
The Trump Foundation is currently embargoed while it tries to sort out legal issues around other charitable deeds such as paying off Donald's civil fines and buying him a painting of himself to hand in his own country club.
There is no way Trump coughs up out of his own pocket - he has a history of this. Sarah Sanders was equivocating on this as early as last Friday when being pressed by reporters for when Trump would make good on his pledge from the previous Tuesday. She refused to confirm that it would be his own money but, with the foundation shuttered, it seems that he has two options: pay up or take the heat.
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The Trump Foundation is currently embargoed while it tries to sort out legal issues around other charitable deeds such as paying off Donald's civil fines and buying him a painting of himself to hand in his own country club.
There is no way Trump coughs up out of his own pocket - he has a history of this. Sarah Sanders was equivocating on this as early as last Friday when being pressed by reporters for when Trump would make good on his pledge from the previous Tuesday. She refused to confirm that it would be his own money but, with the foundation shuttered, it seems that he has two options: pay up or take the heat.
He can't do it because there's an audit.
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There is no policy reason for repealing DACA other than racist cruelty.
The human race is the cruelest of them all.
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There is no policy reason for repealing DACA other than racist cruelty.
It is so bizarrely economically idiotic that it amazes me that anyone would publicly express support for it. But then, it's cool to be racist again.
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91% of them are employed, 100% of them have no criminal record
I think you've stepped in some fake news.
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I think you've stepped in some fake news.
How so?
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How so?
That's not what they said on Breitbart.
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How so?
It is not a fact that zero DREAMers have a criminal record, nor that 91% are actually employed. These statistics came from an online poll.
The questionnaire was administered to an online panel of DACA recipients recruited by the partner organizations. (https://www.americanprogress.org/issues/immigration/news/2017/08/28/437956/daca-recipients-economic-educational-gains-continue-grow/)
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It is so bizarrely economically idiotic that it amazes me that anyone would publicly express support for it. But then, it's cool to be racist again.
Trump couldn't even muster the backbone to do this himself; he had Sessions announce the change which involves pulling the pin on the grenade and lobbing into Congress' butter-laced hands. He hasn't even come out and said what he wants back from Congress, so there's no guarantee that he'll sign what they send him. Such a weak, sad, cruel person.
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It is not a fact that zero DREAMers have a criminal record, nor that 91% are actually employed. These statistics came from an online poll.
The questionnaire was administered to an online panel of DACA recipients recruited by the partner organizations. (https://www.americanprogress.org/issues/immigration/news/2017/08/28/437956/daca-recipients-economic-educational-gains-continue-grow/)
This is lame. It is a fact that in order to be eligible for DACA the applicant cannot have been convicted of a felony, significant misdemeanor or three misdemeanors. It is a fact that in order to be eligible the applicant must be in high school or have a high school degree. And the results of the survey regarding employment are the latest data points, and are in line with a 2014 UCLA study (http://www.chicano.ucla.edu/files/Patler_DACA_Report_061515.pdf) finding an 84% employment rate among DACA recipients.
The program gives basic protection to people that have grown up knowing no other home than this country, who have worked hard, and have stayed out of trouble. In addition to the fact that it's just fucking mean to ruin these people's lives for no reason (and the lives of their children who are US citizens), deporting them would reduce the national GDP by $433 billion (https://www.cnbc.com/2017/08/31/u-s-gdp-would-take-a-hit-from-daca-deportations-report-finds.html) over the next 10 years.
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This is lame.
I agree. The poll and those who state the results of the poll as fact are both lame.
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As are those who fail to address the issue head on, in an honest manner.
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Jeff Sessions made a strong case that this is about the rule of law, so there's only one possible solution: Trump must pardon all the Dreamers the same way he did Joe Arpaio.
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Jeff Sessions made a strong case that this is about the rule of law, so there's only one possible solution: Trump must pardon all the Dreamers the same way he did Joe Arpaio.
But for the fact there is no crime from which to pardon them ...
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As are those who fail to address the issue head on, in an honest manner.
Labeling everyone that has a different opinion cruel racists is pretty honest about any actual desire to address issues head on.
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Labeling everyone that has a different opinion cruel racists is pretty honest about any actual desire to address issues head on.
The fact that supposedly pragmatic, bottom-line, business-minded Republicans are happy to do hundreds of billions of dollars of damage to the national economy tells me pretty clearly just exactly what the fuck is behind this.
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Labeling everyone that has a different opinion cruel racists is pretty honest about any actual desire to address issues head on.
There are also assholes who may not be overtly cruel racists but are all too happy to defend and endorse the overtly cruel racists.
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Labeling everyone that has a different opinion cruel racists is pretty honest about any actual desire to address issues head on.
Labeling aside, I've at least heard actual arguments and rebuttals on one side of the issue: moral, economic, no fault of their own, screened for criminality, etc. What I haven't heard much of is arguments on the other side, other than "rule of law." What are the other arguments?
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There are also assholes who may not be overtly cruel racists but are all too happy to defend and endorse the overtly cruel racists.
This probably wont make sense because it requires one to be able to make observations from multiple perspectives and abandon preconceived notions but there are the simpletons who so love to make race an issue that they can't see past the claims of "racial cruelty" to understand it's purely a political move. i.e. If the vast majority of "dreamers" were Republican voters instead of Democrat voters--Obama would never had issued the executive order. It's one of the reasons I hate the dogmatic insular absoluteness of the Us vs Them political agendas.
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That post places you firmly in the racist asshole category - in perpetuity.
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That post places you firmly in the racist asshole category - in perpetuity.
But I have Asperger's.
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This probably wont make sense because it requires one to be able to make observations from multiple perspectives and abandon preconceived notions but there are the simpletons who so love to make race an issue that they can't see past the claims of "racial cruelty" to understand it's purely a political move. i.e. If the vast majority of "dreamers" were Republican voters instead of Democrat voters--Obama would never had issued the executive order. It's one of the reasons I hate the dogmatic insular absoluteness of the Us vs Them political agendas.
They weren't voters at all. More importantly, your cynicism apparently leaves no room that Obama may have done it out of simple decency.
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They weren't voters at all. More importantly, your cynicism apparently leaves no room that Obama may have done it out of simple decency.
I know you are capable of seeing beyond the surface, you just have to try. They will be voters, they have family.
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I know you are capable of seeing beyond the surface, you just have to try. They will be voters, they have family.
Not if this dickhead (who you apparently think is fine because you 'hate Hillary') has his way. He wants to fucking deport them. Did you not catch that?
I know you. Some. I know you can try less hard to be a total dumbass.
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I know you. Some. I know you can try less hard to be a total dumbass.
I didn't mean to imply I want anyone deported or that I supported anything Trump is doing. I was just pointing out that Trump's motivation is political and about nationality, not race. The differences don't seem that subtle to me. I would be real surprised if they get deported. Pretty sure it wont ever come to that. God, I hope not.
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He has no idea where these kids are from. He's doing it to appeal to the baser instincts of his supporters, a majority of whom tellingly self identify as Christian.
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He has no idea where these kids are from. He's doing it to appeal to the baser instincts of his supporters, a majority of whom tellingly self identify as Christian.
Ugh. Damn Christians fuck everything up. Hehehe...
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Ugh. Damn Christians fuck everything up. Hehehe...
Take a stand for something, dude. Seriously. For once in your life. It certainly needn't be something I stand for. Just commit to something that strikes you as good and pure. I'm not speaking as my persona here but as me as the person you know. Some.
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I stand for love, my brother. I stand for happiness. I bow down to Nature. I don't stand for Democrats or Republicans. That's just not how I'm wired. It's not something I need. The barrage makes me weary.
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Ugh. Damn Christians fuck everything up. Hehehe...
The pinnacle pejorative.
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So Congress has a bit of work to do now. By the end of September, they will need to have passed a spending bill to keep the government’s lights on, raised the debt ceiling, reauthorized the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP), reauthorized the National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP), reauthorized the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), and approved at least one disaster-relief package (probably two).
Republicans also have to work on the National Defense Authorization Act, tax reform and, as of yesterday, immigration policy. Trump even wants Congress to take another crack at health care reform before its Sept. 30 deadline (after which the 50-vote reconciliation option goes away forever).
They have 16 working days scheduled for the rest of September.
As Al Franken has been saying for decades now: Republicans run on a platform that government doesn't work and, if they get elected, they set about proving it.
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I didn't mean to imply I want anyone deported or that I supported anything Trump is doing. I was just pointing out that Trump's motivation is political and about nationality, not race. The differences don't seem that subtle to me. I would be real surprised if they get deported. Pretty sure it wont ever come to that. God, I hope not.
I really don't understand your point. Racist cruelty is fine if the purpose is to motivate one's white nationalistic political base?
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At 11am yesterday, Session (disgustingly gleefully) announced the rescission of DACA. Reports claim that, as late as 10am, Trump administration officials still thought Trump might change his mind because they didn't think he understood what he was doing and, when he did, he'd change his mind. Well the 11am announcement was made and Trump lobbed this live grenade at Congress telling them to "do their job," giving them a 6-month deadline. Later he clarified that he meant they should enact DACA into law.
In the meantime, the DHS sent our a primer telling DACA recipients, among other thing, to "prepare for and arrange their departure from the United States." Last evening, Trump tweeted that if Congress fails to meet his arbitrary, unnecessary and self-imposed deadline, he would "revisit the issue."
What the fucking fuck?
So, DACA recipients have a stay of 6 months, but should prepare to be kicked out, but Congress might get this written into law in which case you will be able to stay, but they probably won't get it done so you're leaving, but Trump will revisit the issue if that happens, but he won't tell you what he's going to do so prepare to kicked out anyway. Maybe.
It's like they refined cruelty in a lab.
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I really don't understand your point. Racist cruelty is fine if the purpose is to motivate one's white nationalistic political base?
That hysteria goes well with the hyperbole. That's right, you really don't understand my point.
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The pinnacle pejorative.
At least when I'm around my "cruel racist Christian" friends I don't have to worry about having my head chopped off like I do around my loving Muslim friends.
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At least when I'm around my "cruel racist Christian" friends I don't have to worry about having my head chopped off like I do around my loving Muslim friends.
Unless you're a doctor who performs legal abortion services, in which case a loving Christian will walk into your church and blow your fucking head off.
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Unless you're a doctor who performs legal abortion services, in which case a loving Christian will walk into your church and blow your fucking head off.
Good point, though I'm usually pre-occupied with worrying one might be a Catholic Preist or Baylor Football player and might sexually abuse me to ever get to the abortion doctor thing.
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Back to Russia fake news. There was a significant ad buy on Facebook during the election that promoted certain divisive messaging. It was targeted, apparently down to the individual in some cases. Facebook has (finally, after repeated denials) admitted that the buy was placed by a Russian company, which turns out to be a front for Russian Military Intelligence.
In addition to it being a crime for foreigners to spend money in US elections, it's also now a question - that Mueller appears to be trying to answer - as to whether Kushner's digital campaign operation helped with targeting the attack. Facebook has handed over everything it has on the ad buys.
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You get a lawyer and you get a lawyer...everybody gets a lawyer...part deux.
Former WH counsel McGahn has hired the same lawyer as Priebus as both men are due to be interviewed by Mueller. In other news, recently installed and credential-less communications director - Hope Hicks - has also lawyered up despite being on the job only for a week or two.
What I want to know is, who the fuck is paying for all these lawyers?
PS, Hicks lawyer is from the firm Trout, Cacheris and Janis. Why oh why couldn't that last person be called "Ralis"?
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While most of Houston, most of Florida, half the Caribbean and 1/3rd of Bangladesh have been underwater, and Mexico has been shaken to the ground, Robert Mueller has been working on getting documents from the White House. The special counsel has asked for:
1. Internal communications and documents related to Mike Flynn's FBI interview in January.
2. Documents related to Flynn`s conversations with the Russian ambassador in December.
3. Records on acting Attorney General Sally Yates' warnings to the White House about Flynn.
4. Materials related to Flynn's departure from the White House.
5. Communications on Trump's campaign foreign-policy team, which may have included at least one suspected Russian agent.
6. Documents related to Trump's meetings with former FBI Director James Comey before his firing.
7. Records of internal White House discussions about Comey's firing.
8. Documents related to external White House communications about Comey's firing.
9. Documents related to Sean Spicer's comments about Comey the week before his firing.
10. Materials related to Trump's Oval Office meeting with Russian officials the day after Comey's firing.
11. Records related to last summer's Trump Tower meeting between top members of Trump's team and Putin-connected Russians.
12. Documents related to the White House's response to media inquiries about the Trump Tower meeting.
13. Any email or document the White House holds that relates to Paul Manafort, Trump's former campaign chairman.
Remember when there was a question about whether or not Trump's actions were themselves the subject of a federal investigation? That no longer appears to be in doubt.
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Remarkable (http://www.espn.com/nfl/story/_/id/20788354/president-donald-trump-speaks-nfl-player-protests). I don't even know what to say anymore.
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What a buffoon.
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Remarkable (http://www.espn.com/nfl/story/_/id/20788354/president-donald-trump-speaks-nfl-player-protests). I don't even know what to say anymore.
He then doubled down by "uninviting" the Warriors from their White House visit.
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He is a moron. Not sure how anyone can defend this dotard any longer.
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LOCK HIM UP! LOCK HIM UP! LOCK HIM UP! LOCK HIM UP!
Kushner used private email account for official White House business. (https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/white-house/jared-kushner-used-private-email-account-white-house-n804351)
No, seriously, lock him the fuck up.
Meanwhile, Mnuchin got caught taking a "company" (i.e. tax-payer funded) jet on a boondoggle with his wife after which it was disclosed that he tried to get one for his honeymoon to Europe. Then Tom Price - head of HHS - got outed for racking up $300,000 of private jets for "business" travel. After getting caught, he put out a series of nonsensical excuses, all the while continuing the practice such that his travel bill is up to $400,000.
The point isn't these individual abuses. The point is that those in the administration seem to think it's ok. This free-spending environment couldn't be the result of the boss taking the company jet to his Florida retreat every weekend at the cost of $3mm, could it?
Lock them all the fuck up.
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Did y'alls President just declare war on North Korea?
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Did y'alls President just declare war on North Korea?
He was trying to tweet at "Colin Kapernick" but it came out as "North Korea".
#Covfefe
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Did y'alls President just declare war on North Korea?
The sad thing is I have no idea if you're kidding.
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The sad thing is I have no idea if you're kidding.
I went and looked at his Twitter feed to find out.
Fortunately for the species Honky Cat hasn't been tweeting very much about Rocket Man over the last couple of days. There was quite a bit about the NFL in there, though. So much so that all of his tweets about the devastation in Puerto Rico were well down the page, far enough to where I didn't even see them.
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So much so that all of his tweets about the devastation in Puerto Rico were well down the page, far enough to where I didn't even see them.
Foreigners need to look after their own.
Eh? Oh.
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Graham-Cassidy is dead; long live Graham-Cassidy!
The new version is, of course, even worse than the previous, taking even more money out of Medicaid to pay for...carve-outs for Alaska and Maine.
We need to invent a new word that supersedes "craven", because this is beyond the scope of the current lexicon to describe. How about "unpresidented"?
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Graham-Cassidy is dead; long live Graham-Cassidy!
The new version is, of course, even worse than the previous, taking even more money out of Medicaid to pay for...carve-outs for Alaska and Maine.
We need to invent a new word that supersedes "craven", because this is beyond the scope of the current lexicon to describe. How about "unpresidented"?
It amuses me to watch this collection of ass scratching, shit smearing monkeys dance to the lurching tune of their Kansan organ grinders.
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It amuses me to watch this collection of ass scratching, shit smearing monkeys dance to the lurching tune of their Kansan organ grinders.
I thought Kansas had outlawed organ grinding?
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It amuses me to watch this collection of ass scratching, shit smearing monkeys dance to the lurching tune of their Kansan organ grinders.
It reminds me of watching a toddler attempt a complicated jigsaw puzzle. No sense of what the overall picture should look like or even how the individual pieces fit together. They just keep spinning random pieces around and hopefully looking up expecting to be told that they did it right.
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I thought Kansas had outlawed organ grinding?
Not if you do it Brownback.
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Graham-Cassidy has been pulled from the floor. Repeal is dead...for now. Trump will continue to sabotage it as much as possible, but Obamacare remains the law of the land.
Now they're moving on to tax reform. I'm sure it'll be fine (https://i.imgur.com/c4jt321.png).
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Now they're moving on to tax reform. I'm sure it'll be fine (https://i.imgur.com/c4jt321.png).
Hey, I've (https://media.giphy.com/media/n2jGtmTGMEvpS/giphy.gif) got a good idea! Let's lower taxes on rich people! (https://media0.giphy.com/media/l0HlyrQbIvWDdTa6I/giphy.gif)
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Graham-Cassidy has been pulled from the floor. Repeal is dead...for now. Trump will continue to sabotage it as much as possible, but Obamacare remains the law of the land.
Now they're moving on to tax reform. I'm sure it'll be fine (https://i.imgur.com/c4jt321.png).
Post NFL-BS, any bets on what his next diversionary tactic is?
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Post NFL-BS, any bets on what his next diversionary tactic is?
He hasn't fucked with Mexico with a week or two.
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He hasn't fucked with Mexico with a week or two.
Sure, he sent hurricane relief supplies there today!
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That reminds me, Trump's not waiving the Jones Act (which is a fucking stupid law to begin with and needs to be abolished completely) for Puerto Rico is as vile as it is predictable.
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That reminds me, Trump's not waiving the Jones Act (which is a fucking stupid law to begin with and needs to be abolished completely) for Puerto Rico is as vile as it is predictable.
I'm sure he's got friends in shipping.
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I'm sure he's got friends in shipping.
Steinbrenner's dead.
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Steinbrenner's dead.
but does he remember that?
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George is an example of somebody who’s done an amazing job and is getting recognized more and more, I notice.
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Jared Kushner is so smart that he's been tasked with solving most of the world's problems, including the Middle East. Simples. However, he seems to have an Achilles heel when it comes to filling out forms, because he made so many mistakes on his security application that it's almost criminal (spoiler alert: it's actually criminal). But new revelations suggest that there is nothing nefarious about Kushner's failure to disclose dozens of meetings with foreign officials or hundreds of millions of dollars of overseas investments or hundreds of millions of dollars in loans that he personally guaranteed. No, it's just paperwork that he's bad at.
Jared Kushner is registered to vote in New York as a woman.
Jared Kushner's previous voter registration in New Jersey has his gender as "unknown".
I'm now going to go and laugh myself to death like a weasel in Roger Rabbit.
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Jared Kushner's previous voter registration in New Jersey has his gender as "unknown".
Maybe he didn't have gender fluid as an option.
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Maybe he didn't have gender fluid as an option.
Nor squeaky man-child.
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So, about the new "Friends and Family (of Trump) tax plan. It would increase taxes on many middle-class American families (http://www.businessinsider.com/trump-tax-plan-raise-taxes-middle-income-families-2017-9). In addition, it would have reduced Trump's tax burden - in the one year of tax returns he leaked - by 83%. A saving of $30mm.
Here's what Government Sachs adviser Gary Cohn said about tax savings under the plan: "If we allow a family to keep another $1,000 of their income, what does that mean? They can renovate their kitchen, they can buy a new car, they can take a family vacation, they can increase their lifestyle." For a grand? What fucking planet is he on? Oh, that's right, Planet So Rich I Have No Idea of the Value of Money.
In a later interview he was pressed about whether this plan would reduce taxes for many middle-income families. He could not say that it would. Giver him a gold star (and probably a pink slip) for not lying.
This plan was cooked up by 6, like-minded Republicans, behind closed doors. Paul Ryan lied his ass off as usual by volunteering that they'd done the "heavy lifting" on this, which is patently false. All they've done is collate a basket of wish list tax cuts for the wealthy, without even bothering to do the math on whether it hurts everyone else and not suggesting a single balance elsewhere to pay for the massive drop in tax revenue.
They aren't even trying very hard to hide their intentions. The plan increases the tax rate in the lowest tax bracket by 20%. This is how yours (and my) taxes go up, because if you have deductions that exceed the standard deduction (because you have kids and/or a mortgage) then you're paying 20% more from dollar one.
This is even more of a sick fucking joke than even I expected.
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Meanwhile, Mnuchin got caught taking a "company" (i.e. tax-payer funded) jet on a boondoggle with his wife after which it was disclosed that he tried to get one for his honeymoon to Europe. Then Tom Price - head of HHS - got outed for racking up $300,000 of private jets for "business" travel. After getting caught, he put out a series of nonsensical excuses, all the while continuing the practice such that his travel bill is up to $400,000.
The point isn't these individual abuses. The point is that those in the administration seem to think it's ok. This free-spending environment couldn't be the result of the boss taking the company jet to his Florida retreat every weekend at the cost of $3mm, could it?
Lock them all the fuck up.
So Price's tax-payer funded private jet bill took a big jump this week, when it was unearthed that he'd used military jets to fly to Europe. His private travel bill is now over $1mm. Further, it turns out that he was taking "business" trips to where he had family and/or property. How convenient. Well, it's got to the point where even Price is feeling the heat, so he has agreed to pay back the cost of his seat. Not the whole cost of the jets he hired for himself, just the cost of his individual seat...commercial. That's about $50k. By my reckoning, he's about $950k short.
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So Price's tax-payer funded private jet bill took a big jump this week, when it was unearthed that he'd used military jets to fly to Europe. His private travel bill is now over $1mm. Further, it turns out that he was taking "business" trips to where he had family and/or property. How convenient. Well, it's got to the point where even Price is feeling the heat, so he has agreed to pay back the cost of his seat. Not the whole cost of the jets he hired for himself, just the cost of his individual seat...commercial. That's about $50k. By my reckoning, he's about $950k short.
He says he will reimburse only the portion that the government should have reasonably covered in the first place, leaving the tax payers on the hook for the portion that is giant waste and not the sliver that was legitimate.
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He says he will reimburse only the portion that the government should have reasonably covered in the first place, leaving the tax payers on the hook for the portion that is giant waste and not the sliver that was legitimate.
Of course this is completely insane, yet expected from this group.
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This is even more of a sick fucking joke than even I expected.
I wouldn't worry about it too much. Any minute now the Freedom Caucus will come galloping in to declare that they will not support any bill that does not fully eradicate the EITC.
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He says he will reimburse only the portion that the government should have reasonably covered in the first place, leaving the tax payers on the hook for the portion that is giant waste and not the sliver that was legitimate.
Oh, and by the way, we don't have any money for Medicaid. Sorry about that.
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Oh, and by the way, we don't have any money for Medicaid. Sorry about that.
Well, to be fair, how can they possibly pay for it in light of a trillion dollar tax cut that primarily benefits the richest Americans?
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Well, to be fair, how can they possibly pay for it in light of a trillion dollar tax cut that primarily benefits the richest Americans?
They should change the name from Trickle Down to Bukkake.
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Here's the The Tax Policy Center's (http://www.taxpolicycenter.org/sites/default/files/publication/144971/a_preliminary_analysis_of_the_unified_framework_0.pdf) preliminary analysis of the proposed tax plan.
Bottom line is it would reduce federal revenues by $2.4 trillion in the first decade and an additional $3.2 trillion in the second decade.
And, of course, the top 1% of the income distribution would receive half of the total tax benefit.
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Oh, and by the way, we don't have any money for Medicaid. Sorry about that.
The did get around to adding seven hundred billion unwanted dollars to the Pentagon's budget. But, while they were farting around with another ACA repeal this week, they let the Children's Health Insurance Program - the covers 9 million kids - expire. Because...freedom?
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They should change the name from Trickle Down to Bukkake.
This is perfect.
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I'm a fan of referring to it as a Golden Shower
-Donald Trump
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HHS Secretary Price is stepping down to spend more time on private jets. Mnuchin is another jet-setter who may be in the crosshairs, along with Interior Secretary Zinke - he who tried to blackmail Alaska over Sen. Murkowski's TrumpCare no vote - has also been caught riding a chartered private jet.
At this point, it might also be worth noting that, among the 100s of positions for which the Trump administration has failed to even proffer a nominee, the head of the Department of Homeland Security - which includes FEMA - is one of them. He can't afford to lose too many more cabinet members as there are so many empty chairs already.
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Drain the swamp!
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Drain the swamp!
Im not sure what is more amazing/sad, people (idiots) who thought Trump would drain the swamp or people who thought Trump would get Mexico to pay for a wall. Or people that thought Trump wasnt a complete moron.
Sad!
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Im not sure what is more amazing/sad, people (idiots) who thought Trump would drain the swamp or people who thought Trump would get Mexico to pay for a wall. Or people that thought Trump wasnt a complete moron.
Two things - first, the pathetic shitstains who object to public figures using their First Amendment rights to highlight police brutality are exactly the same vile motherfuckers who would have in decades past run people out of the Woolworths lunch counter in Greensboro, who would have opened a high pressure water hose on peaceful marchers in Birmingham, who would have screamed in Elizabeth Eckford's face as she went to school, on and on. You dickheads were on the wrong side of history then, and to continue with the same openly racist bullshit in 2017, well, it's a fucking disgrace and you'd be shameless freaks if you had any shame, but you don't, so fuck you. Don't try to make it into some bullshit about the fucking flag or the troops or dividing the country or any of the other fucking bullshit you try to spin. It's plantation level control that you're after, and you can't have it so you go fucking crazy. Fuck you.
Second, when the inevitable hammer comes down on this fucking cocksucker I cannot wait, CANNOT WAIT, to see the Trumpspunkers deny it all. Mueller? Deep state! Manafort? 2012! Felix Slater? Don't know him! Pee tape/snuff tape? Fake news! Evidence of actual vote tampering? Bernie!
It's going to be great. Of course these are the same people who think that the earth is 5,000 years old and that global warming is a Chinese hoax. Or an Al Gore hoax. Or a plot by people like me who hate money. You know, who knows. These hypocritical intellectual mollusks are capable of all sorts of bizarre yogic contortions at the behest of their minders.
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So President Dotard is attacking the San Juan mayor this morning. It is amazing people still support this clown.
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You'd think that since Jared's got the whole Middle East situation sorted out he'd now have enough free time to figure out how to get water and diesel fuel to a nearby island.
Boy, I'm really looking forward to these outstanding organizational skills being put to work in the upcoming war with Iran.
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You'd think that since Jared's got the whole Middle East situation sorted out he'd now have enough free time to figure out how to get water and diesel fuel to a nearby island.
Boy, I'm really looking forward to these outstanding organizational skills being put to work in the upcoming war with Iran.
He could have started his Pax Trumpicana in the Western Hemisphere at least.
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So "warmest condolences" tweeted to the over 400 killed and injured in Las Vegas last night. Not a word about the shooter - a 64-year old resident of a Nevada golf course retirement community named Stephan Pollock. Newly installed as the U.S's most deadly mass shooter, having killed over 50 people and injured over 400 more - mind-boggling numbers.
Not. A. Word.
Anyone think the President's response (other than to cancel his trip to PR because he didn't want to go anyway) would have been very much different if the shooter's background had been a little different?
These are the extraneous tests that were always going to come - the ones not created by his own ego and impetuousness - Harvey, Irma, Maria, North Korea and Las Vegas. He has failed each one spectacularly and tragically.
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It's the old "practice to deceive" saying. He might not be in such a tangled web if he'd just treat all motherfuckers the same, whether they be "them" or "us."
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Death toll now 58, maybe 59, with 515 recorded as injured.
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Let me guess, "This isn't the time to talk about gun control."
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Let me guess, "This isn't the time to talk about gun control."
Saw a guy on the news just now say that he wasn't sure if there was anything that could be done to prevent things like this.
Not booking that fucktard on the news ever again would a good start.
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Saw a guy on the news just now say that he wasn't sure if there was anything that could be done to prevent things like this.
Not booking that fucktard on the news ever again would a good start.
'No Way to Prevent This' Says Only Nation Where This Regularly Happens. (http://www.theonion.com/search?q=No+Way+To+Prevent+This%2C%27+Says+Only+Nation+Where+This+Regularly+Happens.)
The Onion has run that story 5 times in the last two and a half years.
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There's a toll booth here that costs 90 cents to go through. I know of another one on the coast of Colombia that costs 20,100 pesos. I can imagine the quarterly meetings. Say, fellas, it's costing us a fortune to ship these 200 kilo bags of coins to and from these toll booths, I tell ya, it's a real problem! Yeah, boss, and the cajeros tell me that dealing with all that change really slows things down! Well, boys, what to do, what to do - anyone got any bright ideas? No? Anyone? No? Okey-dokey, then, I guess this is just one of those things. Let's break for lunch!
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The next shoe to drop, of course, is that the guns used were fully automatic and thus illegal. So, we don't need to change gun laws because the illegal actions of one madman... etc. etc. ad nauseam.
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Let me guess, "This isn't the time to talk about gun control."
That is apparently the only waiting period that can be considered.
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
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That is apparently the only waiting period that can be considered.
I just want to talk about Sandy Hook but, dammit, by the time I've waited long enough to politely bring it up there's already been another mass shooting.
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I just want to talk about Sandy Hook but, dammit, by the time I've waited long enough to politely bring it up there's already been another mass shooting.
As I have seen it succinctly put on Twitter, the debate about gun control ended when we were cool with kids being slaughtered.
Oh, and there was another mass shooting last night, this one in Kansas (http://www2.ljworld.com/news/2017/oct/01/three-people-reported-shot-downtown-lawrence/). Only one tenth the victims, though, so nothing to see there.
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As I have seen it succinctly put on Twitter, the debate about gun control ended when we were cool with kids being slaughtered.
If 20 murdered six-year-olds didn't move the needle I don't know--or even want to imagine--what would.
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If 20 murdered six-year-olds didn't move the needle I don't know--or even want to imagine--what would.
False flag, deep state, sheeple, fake news, conspiracy to repeal the Second Amendment.
Imagine what Alex Jones crossed with Bon Iver would sound like. Wait, you don't have to imagine.
https://youtu.be/uWd6XgBVIcg
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If 20 murdered six-year-olds didn't move the needle I don't know--or even want to imagine--what would.
Looks some some in Congress are trying to jump on this and strike while the barrel's iron's hot, and dismissing the "now's not the time" obfuscation for what it is. They face a strong headwind, so we'll see how that goes. I think the sheer number of victims - and the insane number of guns (23 in the hotel, another 19 at home) - might be a factor here.
It's the poster child situation showing the need for a gun registry and ammunition purchase registry. The shooter bought all his guns - and thousands of rounds of ammunition - legally, passing a background check along the way. But, if he had to register all those guns, there would at least have been a red flag flown high over his head. Why would a single man need over 40 guns? Why does one individual need a couple o' thousand semi-automatic rounds?
Think about it: 1 idiot tried to mix chemicals on a plane to make explosives, and now no one can take usable toiletries onto a plane. 1 idiot tried to blow up his shoes, and now we have to kick off our shoes to get through airport security. 1 idiot set his underpants on fire, and now we have to be subjected to a naked body scan or let the TSA get to 2nd base. No one died in any of those botched attacks.
Here, 1 idiot stockpiled enough guns and ammunition to start a small war, and then shot nearly 600 people with them. That's the equivalent of the passenger capacity of three 737s. I think we can all take a small inconvenience of registering guns in an effort to make this much less likely to be repeated; like the liquids bomber, like the shoe bomber, like the underpants bomber.
Of course, it would be a good first step simply to designate this terrorism.
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Of course, it would be a good first step simply to designate this terrorism.
Another good first step would be to devote federal funds to studying the issue and developing science-based policy recommendations to evaluate, but that itself would require a significant change in law and policy (http://www.latimes.com/business/hiltzik/la-fi-hiltzik-gun-research-funding-20160614-snap-story.html) that has continually been resisted by the NRA and its congressional puppets.
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Another good first step would be to devote federal funds to studying the issue and developing science-based policy recommendations to evaluate, but that itself would require a significant change in law and policy (http://www.latimes.com/business/hiltzik/la-fi-hiltzik-gun-research-funding-20160614-snap-story.html) that has continually been resisted by the NRA and its congressional puppets.
I'm waiting for the "it's a mental health, not gun control, issue" talking point. Oh yeah? Well then, where's all the money for mental health in your healthcare bill and/or budget?
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Trump hails Las Vegas as a "miracle" and tells Puerto Ricans that they've really thrown his budget out of whack.
Is there anything over which he cannot pick the wrong side, words and tone?
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So Rex Tillerson had to have a press conference today to confirm that he wasn't resigning after reports came out that he called Trump a "fucking moron". What Tillerson never said today, though, was that he'd never called Trump a "fucking moron".
Meanwhile, it turns out that the Kushners, in addition to using their personal emails for official White House business, had been using a third unauthorised email to conduct White House business - one that was shared with their household staff. It's not just that all of these people get caught doing what they've accused their opponents of doing. It's that they do it 10x worse.
Mick Mulvaney - White House Budget Director - for example, once said it would be better for the U.S. to default on its debt and crash the world economy, rather than pass a clean debt ceiling bill. Now, with Trump's tax cuts (a phrase that can be read both ways and be correct both ways), he has stated the need to allow new deficits in the budget to promote growth. Really? Like a stimulus package?
And, with Trump in Vegas today, he was about as Trumpian as he could be when he said that "it's a very, very sad day for me."
Also, today, Mulveiny (because he's a prick) said that there would be no debt relief for Puerto Rico. So, the 1% need relief from taxes but brown people who are 99% devastated by a natural disaster can go fuck themselves. At least they're consistent on this theme. Maybe he's sending out invoices for those rolls of paper towels that Trump lobbed at them yesterday.
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What a week it was last week. Trump made up shit about how he's the best President at calling the families of those killed in combat - something that was demonstrably and demonstrated to be false - in order to avoid answering the question that he has continued to avoid for about three weeks now: what the fuck happened in Niger?
He then had to play catch up on his consoling duties, so he called the widow of Sgt. La David Johnson while she was riding with family and close friends - including Rep. Frederica Wilson - to collect her husband's remains, and told her that her husband "knew what he signed up for." Rep. Wilson jumped all over this appallingly tone deaf comment, at which point the shit got turned up to 11...thousand...with Trump calling everyone a liar and sending General Kelly out to deflect attention by using his own personal tragedy of losing his son in combat as a shield and then flat-out lying about Rep. Wilson to make her look bad. Trump insulted Wilson by saying that her attire is ridiculous while confusing her with Maxine Walters. Later reports stated that Trump seemed to be struggling to remember the name of Sgt. Johnson on the original call, something that gained credence when he could not remember Myeisha Johnson's name when insulting her in the press - referring to her as "the wife" and "the widow" but not by name.
Remember; this all started because Trump does not want to talk about Niger.
What we know about Niger is that a squad of Green Berets got ambushed by a significantly larger force of ISIS-friendly combatants - perhaps a 4-1 advantage - and 4 US soldiers were killed, including Sgt. Johnson whose remains were not recovered until 48 hours after the fight. I have seen claims that he put up a beacon after everyone else had been evacuated - suggesting they left him out there still alive - and also that his remains were heavily mutilated, but I have not seen any confirmation of this. At best, this is as bad a fuck up as Benghazi...at best!
Those troops were sent into harm's way without air cover and without back-up, save some French forces who were under orders not to open fire. They were in pick-up trucks, not armored Humvees. Reports now state that they were lured into a meeting and duped into staying longer than safety allowed, allowing the ISIS forces to set up not only the main ambush, but a secondary ambush site on their escape route. When the Green Berets retreated from the initial ambush, they ran smack bang into the secondary force. Sgt. Johnson appears to have been left at the original combat site and so was not evacuated when help finally arrived, some hours later.
So about that help and support. Chad, a neighboring country to Niger's east - has been the most competent and cooperative ally in the fight against ISIS and al Qaeda-inspired groups in the region - including Boko Haram. Most (if not all) the international operations combating these militant forces are based in Chad for this very reason, including that of the US. Chad was very active in Niger...until very recently.
In September, the Trump administration added Chad to the list of countries on his latest iteration of the Muslim ban. The decision shocked and confused almost everyone, the decision to ban Chad being described as "puzzling" and "inexplicable". It turns out that it was due to them not supplying a fresh sample of a passport for review by us - because they were awaiting new supplies of the special paper used for passports - so on the banned list they went. Venezuela was added too, presumably so that the banned list looks a lot less Muslimy.
Within days of hitting the banned list, Chad began withdrawing its troops from Niger - an action that coincided with a steadily increasing rate of attacks by militant forces in that country. Chad had completely exited Niger about a week before the attack on the Green Berets. So, we still have massive gaps in knowledge about what the fuck happened in Niger. But we do have some strong indications as to why Trump doesn't want to talk about it; his domestic political bullshit may have lead directly to the deaths of US troops in combat.
The Russian scandal is way worse than Watergate, and now this is shaping up to be way worse than Benghazi.
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Well, Benghazi was complete bullshit, as small organizational decisions in a military event were amplified by dipshits into supposed criminal failures of Obama and Clinton. The bullshitness on this is likely similar, but nothing will come of it because of course, the tribal right wing is completely without integrity.
The more interesting and important aspect, the ripple effects of his demagoguery, will never be discussed due to the same lack of integrity.
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Well, Benghazi was complete bullshit, as small organizational decisions in a military event were amplified by dipshits into supposed criminal failures of Obama and Clinton. The bullshitness on this is likely similar, but nothing will come of it because of course, the tribal right wing is completely without integrity.
The more interesting and important aspect, the ripple effects of his demagoguery, will never be discussed due to the same lack of integrity.
Embattled Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke awarded a $300 million contract for the repair of Puerto Rico's power grid to a fledgling company in Whitefish, Montana that - at the time of the award - had two employees. Zinke is from Whitefish, Montana.
This is happening up and down the government. Pretty much everyone has been flying private on the taxpayers' dime and it's clearly so pervasive that Mneuchin thought it appropriate to request a military private jet (the most expensive kind) for his honeymoon in Europe. EPA director Pruitt has been using paid for private jets in service of his upcoming Gubernatorial campaign, and has upped his personal security detail to 30. Thirty! Why the fuck does he need even one?
They are spending our dollars on their friends, families and themselves, and very few if any will see any consequences because no one is in charge of this particular asylum. It's a full-blown kleptocracy at this point.
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Embattled Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke awarded a $300 million contract for the repair of Puerto Rico's power grid to a fledgling company in Whitefish, Montana that - at the time of the award - had two employees. Zinke is from Whitefish, Montana.
This is happening up and down the government. Pretty much everyone has been flying private on the taxpayers' dime and it's clearly so pervasive that Mneuchin thought it appropriate to request a military private jet (the most expensive kind) for his honeymoon in Europe. EPA director Pruitt has been using paid for private jets in service of his upcoming Gubernatorial campaign, and has upped his personal security detail to 30. Thirty! Why the fuck does he need even one?
They are spending our dollars on their friends, families and themselves, and very few if any will see any consequences because no one is in charge of this particular asylum. It's a full-blown kleptocracy at this point.
What's your point? That people should be held accountable to how they are spending my lower-middle-class tax dollars. That would be great but I have low expectations.
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What's your point? That people should be held accountable to how they are spending my lower-middle-class tax dollars. That would be great but I have low expectations.
Yes. There should be oversight on such things by Congress, but that is looking patchy at best.
Low expectations is exactly what they want you to have, so that you stop caring and they can get away with whatever they want.
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Of course, it is terrible but I am grateful for the recent eight year hiatus in government profligacy. If only the era assiduous stewardship of public funds hadn't been interrupted.
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You forgot to mention that Chad fined Exxon $74 billion.
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You forgot to mention that Chad fined Exxon $74 billion.
Thank you. Yes.
It's hard not to sound like a tin foil hat wearing super conspiracy theorist these days, but it's what happens when you put pure business interests in charge of the public coffers and levers of power. It's only by following the money that you get to make sense of any of it.
Also, Trump update: still has not said jack-shit about the combat deaths in Niger. He's golfed multiple times and tweeted hundreds of times, but still has not released - for example - the official statement that was written for him the day after the battle. It's been cheekily suggested that "Niger" might trigger an unfortunate auto-correct on his BlackBerry, but as time goes on, it becomes more and more bizarre and by leaving a vacuum he opens the door to all kinds of speculation.
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still has not said jack-shit about the combat deaths in Niger
Niger was a golden opportunity for Trump to change the subject from all his other problems: "Fuck your hurricane... WHAT ABOUT THE TROOPS?" "Radical Islamic Terror!" "WARTIME PRESIDENT!" But he stayed dead silent. The only reason I can think of is that the truth about how and why it happened is truly horrific.
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Niger was a golden opportunity for Trump to change the subject from all his other problems: "Fuck your hurricane... WHAT ABOUT THE TROOPS?" "Radical Islamic Terror!" "WARTIME PRESIDENT!" But he stayed dead silent. The only reason I can think of is that the truth about how and why it happened is truly horrific.
Well the inference is that Chad was punished by the US government for fining Exxon $74 billion, and was put on the immigration banned list; so Chad decided to pull their well trained and competent forces from Niger, which left the US troops woefully exposed. So, yeah, if true, that's pretty horrific. In fact, settling Exxon's scores with the blood of US servicemen is about as horrific as it gets, because that is very much not what they signed up for.
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Well the inference is that Chad was punished by the US government for fining Exxon $74 billion, and was put on the immigration banned list; so Chad decided to pull their well trained and competent forces from Niger, which left the US troops woefully exposed. So, yeah, if true, that's pretty horrific. In fact, settling Exxon's scores with the blood of US servicemen is about as horrific as it gets, because that is very much not what they signed up for.
The $74 billon fine was a shakedown of absurd Dr. Evil proportions, and even Chad knew it. They settled that deal six months ago.
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The $74 billon fine was a shakedown of absurd Dr. Evil proportions, and even Chad knew it. They settled that deal six months ago.
This is the problem with the information vacuum; it gives space for speculation.
Yes, the Chadian govt is horribly corrupt and almost all the oil money goes into the pocket of Idriss Déby, but that doesn't necessarily mean that there wasn't some element of payback on the decision to add them to the immigration ban. There is no credible explanation for that, and there is so little information about the deadly mission that all we can do is ask questions. Questions which Trump - when asked to his face - flat out ignores.
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Happy Muellerwe'en!
Manafort indicted (https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/oct/30/paul-manafort-robert-mueller-donald-trump-russia-inquiry) for a whole bunch of money, fraud and tax offenses, and also for "conspiracy against the United States". Another Trump campaign aide - George Papadopoulos - already has plead guilty to lying to the FBI.
This probably explains Trump's extended Tweet-storm over the weekend about Clinton and Russia (WTF?), as well as Roger Stone's unhinged rantings that got him suspended from that service. The noose is tightening....
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Happy Muellerwe'en!
Manafort indicted (https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/oct/30/paul-manafort-robert-mueller-donald-trump-russia-inquiry) for a whole bunch of money, fraud and tax offenses, and also for "conspiracy against the United States". Another Trump campaign aide - George Papadopoulos - already has plead guilty to lying to the FBI.
This probably explains Trump's extended Tweet-storm over the weekend about Clinton and Russia (WTF?), as well as Roger Stone's unhinged rantings that got him suspended from that service. The noose is tightening....
All weekend I figured it would be Manafort or somebody we've never heard of. Good ol' Mueller with the WHY NOT BOTH? special.
The Clinton-Russia urananium/dossier conspiracy theories are exceedingly bizzare and this is coming in a week where the JFK papers were released.
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Papadopoulos is a kid who Trump lauded as a foreign policy adviser when pressed about who he had on his team by the press. He was part of the list that included Russian stooge Carter Page. Part of Papadopoulos' resume in this regard is that he'd participated in a "Model U.N.". I shit you not.
What's interesting is that Papadopoulos was charged secretly months ago, and has been cooperating with the investigation ever since (https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/trump-campaign-adviser-george-papadopoulos-pleads-guilty-lying-n815596). Papadopoulos famously initiated an email thread around the campaign higher ups about trying to set up a meeting between the campaign and Putin. Literally. His cooperation could be quite revealing; I'm sure he didn't make enough money and has too much of his life left to want to go to jail to protect anyone else.
Papadopoulos was arrested in July 2017 and pleaded guilty on Oct. 5. His plea agreement says the government will inform the sentencing judge of his "efforts to cooperate with the Government, on the condition that your client continues to respond and provide information regarding any and all matters as to which the Government deems relevant."
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The Clinton-Russia urananium/dossier conspiracy theories are exceedingly bizzare and this is coming in a week where the JFK papers were released.
This is the most bizarre manifestation to date of something I have noticed over the past six or eight years - if you want to know what underhanded or illegal shit the Republicans are up to, just refer to whatever they're accusing the Democrats of and you'll end up with a pretty complete picture.
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A thorough analysis (https://twitter.com/SethAbramson/status/924988111880417280) of the indictments in twitter thread form.
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A thorough analysis (https://twitter.com/SethAbramson/status/924988111880417280) of the indictments in twitter thread form.
I just went from six to midnight.
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A thorough analysis (https://twitter.com/SethAbramson/status/924988111880417280) of the indictments in twitter thread form.
That guy is a world class badass.
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Papadopoulos was charged on July 27, plead guilty on October 5 but all such records were sealed until today. He was described by prosecutors as a "proactive cooperator" which is cop-speak for "wore a wire". Potentially for three months...
I'm buying popcorn!
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Pretty amazed they kept that arrest quiet until today.
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Pretty amazed they kept that arrest quiet until today.
The unsealing of the arrest/charges/plea yesterday means that the "proactive cooperation" is over. That means either they listened for weeks/months and got nothing, or they listened for weeks/months and got what they needed. I'm leaning towards the latter, because if there's one thing that we can see in the behavior of Trump World so far is that no one can stop their lips from flapping.
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The unsealing of the arrest/charges/plea yesterday means that the "proactive cooperation" is over. That means either they listened for weeks/months and got nothing, or they listened for weeks/months and got what they needed. I'm leaning towards the latter, because if there's one thing that we can see in the behavior of Trump World so far is that no one can stop their lips from flapping.
If they got anything off a wire from this dumbass I'll be most interested to see what it was and by whom. What I mean is, who the hell would give this imbecile the time of day much less spill anything that is actionably illegal?
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If they got anything off a wire from this dumbass I'll be most interested to see what it was and by whom. What I mean is, who the hell would give this imbecile the time of day much less spill anything that is actionably illegal?
He was name-checked by Trump when he was asked to say who was advising him on foreign affairs. This was after the famous "I have a very good brain" speech. Trump knew him by name as a campaign adviser, he worked on the campaign, and he sent multiple emails to campaign colleagues about setting up a meeting with representatives of Putin's government, one of which, at least, was referenced by Manafort in an email he sent.
The fact that he's, at best, a babe in the woods is not surprising. Trump World is full of know-nothings and incompetents. Fealty to the Dear Leader is the only qualification required.
Here's an article (https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/anyone--with-a-pulse-how-a-russia-friendly-adviser-found-his-way-into-the-trump-campaign/2017/05/25/32438f72-4014-11e7-8c25-44d09ff5a4a8_story.html?utm_term=.7bdb8ff8d48b) from back in May which talks more about Carter Page, but it's now quite relevant in how it discusses also Papadopoulos:
Another unusual name on Trump’s list of foreign policy experts was a little-known figure named George Papadopoulos, whose inclusion may also have demonstrated the vulnerabilities that came with limited vetting.
“He’s an energy consultant,” Trump said. “Excellent guy.”
The news media soon reported that Papadopoulos seemed to have exaggerated elements of his résumé. And, touting his position as a Trump adviser, Papadopoulos began offering positive comments about Russian President Vladimir Putin to foreign audiences.
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Just something to remember - when facing the blizzard of lies, obfuscation and denials from Trump World - is that collusion is no longer "alleged". George Papadopoulos, in pleading guilty to lying to the FBI, attested under oath to the veracity of a whole bunch of emails he sent and received in which - as a member of the Trump campaign - he was negotiating to meet with Russians, members of the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and "Putin's people" in order to receive dirt on Clinton. These negotiations were reported to, sanctioned and encouraged by Papadopoulos' supervisor - unnamed in the court filings but believed to be Sam Clovis - and also discussed in correspondence by Manafort.
That's collusion with Russians by the Trump campaign by dictionary definition.
Now they can weasel around whether Papadopoulos was important, but Manafort went in writing saying that Papadopoulos should attend such meetings, but no one more senior, which is hardly shutting down what was clearly inappropriate and illegal activity as any seasoned campaign manager (which he is) would know. So three-passport Manafort is complicit here too.
So, to use a "Harvey" analogy, Trump is not underwater here, but it's right up to his fucking doorstep.
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From here on out, it's just like laying out evidence at a trial, without the drama since every rational person knows there was collusion, and every rational person knows there a quid pro quo as part of that collusion.
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“I will tell you this, Russia: If you’re listening, I hope you’re able to find the 30,000 emails that are missing."
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There's a lot going on right now: the Paradise Papers are blowing up the lies about non-involvement in Russia for the likes of Ross and Kushner; Flynn's indictment is imminent (or done already but sealed); and Carter Page just implicated Lewandowski, Hicks and Sessions by telling congress that they knew about his trip to Russia before and after it happened.
Here's something really hilarious about billionaire Commerce Secretary Ross: he's not actually a billionaire (https://www.forbes.com/sites/danalexander/2017/11/07/the-case-of-wilbur-ross-phantom-2-billion/#5f06fdfb7515). Forbes took the financial disclosures he gave as part of being vetted for a cabinet post, compared it to what they'd been told over the years, and concluded that Ross is a fucking liar and not a billionaire.
So began the mystery of Wilbur Ross' missing $2 billion. And after one month of digging, Forbes is confident it has found the answer: That money never existed. It seems clear that Ross lied to us, the latest in an apparent sequence of fibs, exaggerations, omissions, fabrications and whoppers that have been going on with Forbes since 2004.
...
"Wilbur doesn't have an issue with bending the truth," says David Wax, who worked alongside Ross for 25 years and served as the No. 3 person in his firm. Another former colleague, who requested anonymity, was less circumspect: "He's lied to a lot of people."
Only the best, right Donald?
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The meltdown from the elections last night have been enjoyable to watch from the Trumpkins.
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The meltdown from the elections last night have been enjoyable to watch from the Trumpkins.
“What elections?” - Fox News
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
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Aint that the(ir) truth...
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Trump showing his ass again today. What a fucking embarrassment. I can understand people not liking Clinton and voting against her. I am at a complete loss to understand how anyone with an IQ above 37 could watch what is going on now and think, yeah I support this Dotard.
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So Don Jr. has incriminated himself again by releasing a series of direct messages between him and the WikiLeaks Twitter account. Amongst other things in those messages, WikiLeaks asked him to publicize a link to their website which hosted the stolen* DNC emails, which Jr. dutifully did. So, having swept away any reasonable doubt about collusion with the Papadopoulos conviction, there is now no argument against coordination.
* Let's not overlook the fact that these emails were stolen. The Russians broke into the DNC campaign's offices in the Watergate Hotel computers and took them, which is theft.
It's also worth noting that, during the time Don Jr. was palling around with cyber terrorists messaging WikiLeaks, Don Sr. was professing his blue-veined man-love for the organization at every opportunity on the stump, and sending his alien-baby Nigel Farage to the Ecuadorian embassy in London for reasons which Nigel - when confronted by a reporter immediately upon leaving the building - couldn't remember.
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From The Atlantic's article: (https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2017/11/the-secret-correspondence-between-donald-trump-jr-and-wikileaks/545738/)
“Strongly suggest your dad tweets this link if he mentions us,” WikiLeaks went on, pointing Trump Jr. to the link wlsearch.tk, which it said would help Trump’s followers dig through the trove of stolen documents and find stories. “There’s many great stories the press are missing and we’re sure some of your follows [sic] will find it,” WikiLeaks went on. “Btw we just released Podesta Emails Part 4.”
Trump Jr. did not respond to this message. But just 15 minutes after it was sent, as The Wall Street Journal’s Byron Tau pointed out, Donald Trump himself tweeted, “Very little pick-up by the dishonest media of incredible information provided by WikiLeaks. So dishonest! Rigged system!”
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From The Atlantic's article: (https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2017/11/the-secret-correspondence-between-donald-trump-jr-and-wikileaks/545738/)
“Strongly suggest your dad tweets this link if he mentions us,” WikiLeaks went on, pointing Trump Jr. to the link wlsearch.tk, which it said would help Trump’s followers dig through the trove of stolen documents and find stories. “There’s many great stories the press are missing and we’re sure some of your follows [sic] will find it,” WikiLeaks went on. “Btw we just released Podesta Emails Part 4.”
Trump Jr. did not respond to this message. But just 15 minutes after it was sent, as The Wall Street Journal’s Byron Tau pointed out, Donald Trump himself tweeted, “Very little pick-up by the dishonest media of incredible information provided by WikiLeaks. So dishonest! Rigged system!”
Ironically, the day that Jr. was cahooting with WikiLeaks, Mike Pence was asked specifically about whether the campaign was in cahoots with WikiLeaks and he said "no". Yesterday, he issued a statement saying that he was not aware of Jr's cahooting, such a denial being notable because it's the first such denial albeit in response to the nth time that he has been made a liar by the actions of himself and/or the campaign.
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Speaking of Alabama judges...no, not that one...Trump's pick for a lifetime appointment to the Federal bench in that state is running into some trouble. Ignoring the fact that he's only 36, is a blogger, has never tried a case or even argued a motion in court (although he does have a law degree), received a unanimous assessment of "not qualified" from the American Bar Association*, and suggested - in response to the Sandy Hook massacre - that we need to sop being "pansies" and "man-up", Brett Talley failed to disclose some material details on some of his personal connections (I know, right?)
To wit, he's married to the White House counsel's Chief of Staff, Ann Donaldson. That's the same Ann Donaldson who has been interviewed by Mueller as part of the Russia investigation.
As far as I know, Donaldson isn't actually Russian herself, so I guess that's an improvement.
Every Republican on the Judicial Committee has endorsed Talley.
* The ABA has issued only six unanimous "not qualified" assessments in its history; four of these six were Trump nominees.
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OK, my level of outright disgust is Harvian right now:
- The tax bill is being retrofitted to be an ACA repeal (and not replace), they're taking $338bn from Medicaid, giving it to corporations and throwing 13 million people off insurance in the process
- The WSJ's CEO Counsel put the lie to the Republican trickle down theory when the room was asked to show hands for those who would invest more once their taxes were cut; maybe two hands (out of dozens) went up and Gary Cohn was reduced to embarrassed laughter (corporations don't need tax cuts to invest, they need demand)
- "Friend of Russia" Rex Tillerson's State Department just gave a no-bid contract for security services at the Moscow embassy to company founded by a former KGB spy-master who worked with (at the KGB) and is a friend of Putin
- Trump retweeted himself to offer sympathy to the victims of the CA elementary school shooting without bothering to change the location from Sutherland Springs; if someone could give less than zero shits, this is what it would look like
- Jeff Sessions lied to the House Judiciary committee about lying to the Senate Judiciary committee about lies on his security disclosure form, and got pantsed frequently for being purely partisan and racist in his approach to law enforcement (Sessions has lied so many times about lying that they're going to use it as the basis for a sequel to "Inception")
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And if all goes really well they will get a child molester elected to the senate so the perjured attorney general can take his spot allowing a new AG to curtail the investigation into the president.
...The Aristocrats!
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And if all goes really well they will get a child molester elected to the senate so the perjured attorney general can take his spot allowing a new AG to curtail the investigation into the president.
...The Aristocrats!
I careen wildly between believing them to be a scheming pile of Machiavellian geniuses, to them being a steaming pile of heartless retards. I really have no idea if this is a grand scheme or if the media is conjuring plots to try and make sense of just a rolling set of disconnected fuck ups.
Meanwhile, 4 more accusers for Moore come forward and the Alabama GOP - who have the power to decertify Moore so that any votes for him have no meaning and he's ineligible for election - met last night and decided..."Meh." They did nothing.
Moore is now down in a number of polls, but I don't believe a word of it. People answering questions to pollsters will give one answer, and when they're in the privacy of the booth, they'll punch the card for the GOP candidate because otherwise Hillary Clinton is going to appoint Barack Obama to the Alabama Senate seat with one simple email sent from her private server in the basement of a pizza parlor and Sharia Law and no guns and stuff. Now, where's my hammer...I've got a Keurig to smash. Fucking Ikea!
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The GOP tax plan is massively unpopular. Recent polling has it at 52% - 25% disapproval while 60+% think it will favor the wealthy and corporations. This was before they retrofitted it to be also a repeal of Obamacare that will put up insurance premiums by 10% annually and result in 13 million people losing their coverage.
So, is the Moore stuff and Trump's general Twitter presence a planned distraction, or just situation normal...?
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Trump just lifted the ban on repatriating hunting trophies.
With every decision he lands on the side that is grotesque and cruel.
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Trump just lifted the ban on repatriating hunting trophies.
With every decision he lands on the side that is grotesque and cruel.
Not just hunting trophies, elephant hunting trophies. I've decided I'm opening a restaurant that serves nothing but golden retriever.
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Al Franken is now caught in the harassment net. He disputes Leann Tweeden's characterization of the kiss she claims Franken aggressively planted on her while the two were on a rehearsing a "bit" for on a VSO tour, but her claim that he had a photo taken of him touching her boobs (admittedly outside her flak jacket) while she was asleep on a flight is indisputable...because there's a photo. Franken doesn't dispute the photo and apologizes for it.
I think it's great that sex pests galore are getting outed. There's going to be some tough ones, though, like Franken, where the disappointment will be hard to swallow. Shame on you, Al.
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Shame on you, Al.
Agreed.
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I'm just shocked me in powerful positions would take advantage of women.
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I'm just shocked me in powerful positions would take advantage of women.
Not you too!
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I think it's great that sex pests galore are getting outed. There's going to be some tough ones, though, like Franken, where the disappointment will be hard to swallow. Shame on you, Al.
Damn right. There's no room for any of that shit.
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Damn right. There's no room for any of that shit.
Right. And for every dollop of gleeful schadenfreude from when overt pigs like Moore or Weinstein get tagged, there's going to be a Spacey or Franken that's going to cause a sad.
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Speaking of dicks that shouldn't be out in public, the House just passed its version of the tax bill with all Democrats and 13 Republicans voting against. This bill is presumed to be DOA at the Senate and the Senate bill itself is already on the bubble. Whatever happens, they are in a race to get the Senate bill resolved prior to the Alabama special election, because they may lose the ironically named Sen. Strange's vote to Moore's Democratic challenger as they are already running out of margin with the ironically named Sen. Johnson already saying he will break from his fellow Republicans and vote nay. Lots of eyes on the uninterestingly-named Sens Collins, Murkowski and McCain to see how they will vote, now that a partial healthcare repeal has been grafted onto the bill.
It remains to be seen whether the Democrats lose Al Franken's vote in the short term (i.e. if he's forced to step down), but Minnesota's governor is a Democrat and so any appointed replacement will likely be a Democrat too. Sen. Menendez' corruption trial has ended with the jury hung (ironically), so New Jersey's governor Krisp Krispy doesn't get to appoint Menendez' replacement. Should a future trial find Menendez guilty, a the duty of replacing him would fall on New Jersey's new, Democratic, governor. In both cases, a resultant special election would likely return a Democrat to the seat.
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Votes missing from the minority don't matter. 49-50 is just as good as 49-51. That has likely made it easier for the Democrats to say "Sure, let's rid the place of all of em."
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Votes missing from the minority don't matter. 49-50 is just as good as 49-51. That has likely made it easier for the Democrats to say "Sure, let's rid the place of all of em."
Good point. Seems the Dems might choose to make an example of Franken - or ask him to fall on his sword - so as to maintain a semblance of purity on this matter. Of the current crop of harassers, those with left leanings all (I believe) have had some form of comeuppance (with Franken's fate still to be decided). These being Weinstein, CK, Spacey and - going back a little way - Weiner. Meanwhile, Moore is hanging around and making things uncomfortable for those on the right and, of course, the Pussy-Grabber-in-Chief is still in the White House (and keeping his dry lips tightly closed on this subject).
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I will eat my confederate flag do-rag if those Alabama pig fuckers don't vote for Moore in overwhelming numbers.
I would have paid good money to see those inbreds try to figure out if their percolator was a Keurig or not.
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Our pussy-grabber in chief - while still silent on Moore - just went after Al Franken in multiple tweets.
I’m not shocked, but I’m almost overcome by shock.
This. Is. Insane.
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Trump has finally today responded to - instead of pretending not to hear - questions about Roy Moore:
Trump: "I can tell you one thing for sure. We don't need a liberal person in there, a Democrat. Jones."
Reporter: "Is an accused child molester better than a Democrat?"
Trump: "Well, he denies it. Look, he denies it. I mean, if you look at what is really going on. You look at all the things that have happened over the last 48 hours, he totally denies it. He says it didn't happen. And you know, you have to listen to him also."
One man vs. nine accusers, plus multiple contemporaneous corroborations of the accusers, plus further details such as his banning from a mall for bothering the schoolgirls there, a former police officer used to have to keep Moore away from the cheerleaders at high school football games and the bizarre, self-admitted anecdote that his wife first caught his eye at a high school dance recital. Sure, those are totally equal...
I'm not sure what's more creepy here: the fact that a grown man with no reason to be there was hanging around a high school dance recital, or that he first noticed - in that way - the girl he would later marry when she was 15 or 16 years old (people went back and checked the records).
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"Mr Trump, she misheard, I told that cheerleader I couldn't wait to see Justin Beiber, not Justine's beaver."
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Every day is a Shitnado of racism, bigotry, corruption and incompetence, so I won’t try to offer a digest of events since the last such digest. I’ll just deal with today’s big story.
No, not the impending firing of Secretary of State Rex Tillerson.
No, not the Muslim-baiting that’s getting Trump uninvited to the UK (probably) and the Royal Wedding (definitely).
No, not Sessions being hauled in front of the House Judiciary Committee behind closed doors.
No, not the ever-expanding sexual harassment sinkhole.
No, it’s the tax bill. It’s going to pass the Senate tonight, even though they haven’t even finished writing it yet. They tried to get it done before the Congressional Joint Committee for Taxation issued its analysis, but the JCT rushed out its report today (https://www.nytimes.com/2017/11/30/us/politics/tax-overhaul-senate-debate.html), and it’s everything we already knew and that Republicans have been denying. Even using the controversial method of dynamic scoring – favored by Republicans because it incorporates the imaginary boost to the economy generated by tax cuts to the wealthy – the bill comes up a little short. $1 trillion short, to be exact.
This bill is so fucking dishonest that it beggars belief, even for these crooks. It gives the middle class tax breaks early on, but these breaks expire as time goes on such that those families making less than $100,000 a year will end up paying more in tax in perpetuity. If you make less than $30,000 a year, you will more than likely start paying more tax right away. Meanwhile, income tax breaks for the wealthy kick in later but are enshrined. This has the effect of transferring trillions of dollars from hundreds of millions of Americans up to the 1%. Oh, and the estate tax repeal, coupled with the “improvement” to carried interest and pass-through loopholes, means that the beneficiaries of inherited wealth can live off that money tax free forever. Seriously.
Then there’s the corporation tax reduction – predicated entirely on the lie that the US has the highest corporate tax rate on Earth. It doesn’t. We’re 38th. The supporting lie is that businesses will take the tax credit and give it to workers in the form of higher wages. They won’t; the C-Suite would be voted out at the next AGM if they did. No, they will take the tax break and do what they did with the last tax break (Bush’s tax amnesty), buy back shares which increases the stock price, making shareholders happy and ballooning CEO pay which is customarily these days tied to the stock price.
Oh, and it has the bonus of kicking 13 million people off health insurance while gutting Medicare / Medicaid to the point that expensive life-saving treatments will be scaled back. Death panels, anyone?
I am incandescent with rage over this.
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You forgot the bit about Mike Flynn working with the Turks to help the Iranians avoid sanctions. I wonder just what Tom Cotton makes of that.
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Every day is a Shitnado of racism, bigotry, corruption and incompetence, so I won’t try to offer a digest of events since the last such digest. I’ll just deal with today’s big story.
No, not the impending firing of Secretary of State Rex Tillerson.
No, not the Muslim-baiting that’s getting Trump uninvited to the UK (probably) and the Royal Wedding (definitely).
No, not Sessions being hauled in front of the House Judiciary Committee behind closed doors.
No, not the ever-expanding sexual harassment sinkhole.
No, it’s the tax bill. It’s going to pass the Senate tonight, even though they haven’t even finished writing it yet. They tried to get it done before the Congressional Joint Committee for Taxation issued its analysis, but the JCT rushed out its report today (https://www.nytimes.com/2017/11/30/us/politics/tax-overhaul-senate-debate.html), and it’s everything we already knew and that Republicans have been denying. Even using the controversial method of dynamic scoring – favored by Republicans because it incorporates the imaginary boost to the economy generated by tax cuts to the wealthy – the bill comes up a little short. $1 trillion short, to be exact.
This bill is so fucking dishonest that it beggars belief, even for these crooks. It gives the middle class tax breaks early on, but these breaks expire as time goes on such that those families making less than $100,000 a year will end up paying more in tax in perpetuity. If you make less than $30,000 a year, you will more than likely start paying more tax right away. Meanwhile, income tax breaks for the wealthy kick in later but are enshrined. This has the effect of transferring trillions of dollars from hundreds of millions of Americans up to the 1%. Oh, and the estate tax repeal, coupled with the “improvement” to carried interest and pass-through loopholes, means that the beneficiaries of inherited wealth can live off that money tax free forever. Seriously.
Then there’s the corporation tax reduction – predicated entirely on the lie that the US has the highest corporate tax rate on Earth. It doesn’t. We’re 38th. The supporting lie is that businesses will take the tax credit and give it to workers in the form of higher wages. They won’t; the C-Suite would be voted out at the next AGM if they did. No, they will take the tax break and do what they did with the last tax break (Bush’s tax amnesty), buy back shares which increases the stock price, making shareholders happy and ballooning CEO pay which is customarily these days tied to the stock price.
Oh, and it has the bonus of kicking 13 million people off health insurance while gutting Medicare / Medicaid to the point that expensive life-saving treatments will be scaled back. Death panels, anyone?
I am incandescent with rage over this.
In addition to being a massive and wholly unjustified transfer of wealth from the professional, middle, and lower classes to the wealthy and crippling the individual health insurance market, it (1) makes graduate school oppressively expensive by taxing tuition waivers (2) imposes an endowment tax on universities who rely upon proceeds from endowment earnings to subsidize tuition for lower income students (3) repeals deductions for student loan interest (3) will make it harder for state and local governments to provide social services, transportation, and education by double taxing dollars that go to state and local taxes (4) repeals the Johnson amendment which prevents untraceable money being funneled into politics through tax-exempt churches and (5) prevents immigrants from claiming the child tax credit.
It hits hardest at the most vulnerable in the two most fundamental aspects of their ability to pursue the American dream: education and healthcare.
And it's being done without hearings, testimony, analysis, amendment or anything resembling democratic order. It is utterly despicable.
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You forgot the bit about Mike Flynn working with the Turks to help the Iranians avoid sanctions. I wonder just what Tom Cotton makes of that.
Flynn to plead guilty (https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/dec/01/trumps-ex-national-security-adviser-michael-flynn-charged-with-lying-to-fbi) to lesser charges of lying to the FBI. It is presumed that this is a plea deal in return for cooperation in other things.
The noose tightens...
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In addition to being a massive and wholly unjustified transfer of wealth from the professional, middle, and lower classes to the wealthy and crippling the individual health insurance market, it (1) makes graduate school oppressively expensive by taxing tuition waivers (2) imposes an endowment tax on universities who rely upon proceeds from endowment earnings to subsidize tuition for lower income students (3) repeals deductions for student loan interest (3) will make it harder for state and local governments to provide social services, transportation, and education by double taxing dollars that go to state and local taxes (4) repeals the Johnson amendment which prevents untraceable money being funneled into politics through tax-exempt churches and (5) prevents immigrants from claiming the child tax credit.
It hits hardest at the most vulnerable in the two most fundamental aspects of their ability to pursue the American dream: education and healthcare.
And it's being done without hearings, testimony, analysis, amendment or anything resembling democratic order. It is utterly despicable.
This needs to be included in any future obituary of Orrin Hatch.
Today, Hatch was challenged by Sherrod Brown to take up renewal of the Children's Health Insurance Program (CHIP). Republicans have let slide this piece of admin since October 1. The program costs $15bn annually. Hatch bristled at the suggestion that it wouldn't get done, but admonished Brown that he should remember that there just isn't the money to do these things.
To. Day. (https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2017/11/30/1719944/-Hatch-leading-the-fight-for-1-5-trillion-deficit-boosting-tax-cuts-says-we-can-t-afford-CHIP)
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You forgot the bit about Mike Flynn working with the Turks to help the Iranians avoid sanctions. I wonder just what Tom Cotton makes of that.
Or conspiring to kidnap an American resident and transport him to an authoritarian regime in exchange for $15 million.
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ABC is reporting that Flynn will testify that Trump instructed him to reach out to the Russians in 2016 - during the campaign.
I'll let that sink in for a moment...
Given that there are currently 19 known individual Russians who were in contact with the Trump campaign and/or transition team, it seems that this is tip of the iceberg. The dominoes will start falling now.
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Here's a somewhat lengthy but informative analysis of what Flynn 's plea bargain means (https://twitter.com/SethAbramson/status/936602442996813824/photo/1?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.holmesdale.net%2Fpage.php%3Fid%3D106%26tid%3D167458%26page%3D15).
Meanwhile, this puts into perspective the urgency to get the tax bill passed this week, when it's still isn't finished being drafted (as of last night, at least). Direct allegations against Trump will serve also to highlight the complicity of Congressional Republicans, and this will only increase the stink on anything that Congress has passed - which will be basically just this bill.
I have no doubt that there will be a shameless push to get this passed today, and that's its likely to succeed. What happens to the Republican Party afterwards will be a case study for centuries. Assuming anyone is left alive then, of course.
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Flynn has fingered Trump and Kushner according to the court documents filed today. Finally, an unwanted fingering that we can all get behind!
The White House just described Flynn as an "Obama official". I shit you not.
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The White House just described Flynn as an "Obama official". I shit you not.
One that Obama specifically warned Trump against keeping around.
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Or conspiring to kidnap an American resident and transport him to an authoritarian regime in exchange for $15 million.
Yeah, that was cute, too. You know, I've read in many places (and have observed) that Trump takes pages if not full chapters from the dictator's playbook. Nowhere is this more evident than when you compare Trump with Erdogan. Trump's FAKE NEWS is Erdogan's Gulen. That is one powerful motherscratcher, that Gulen, able as he is to be a global mastermind from a futon in a hunting shack in the Poconos somewhere. It's amazing that Gulen is able to control every facet of Turkish life in a place with such spotty cell service. Just wait until they do away with net neutrality and Gulen has to pay extra to get on the fast lane to memurlar.net.
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The White House just described Flynn as an "Obama official". I shit you not.
They tried this shit back in April, too. I think they said that it's all Obama's fault because he didn't vet Flynn properly, something like that.
When the whip comes down on Trumpy it's going to be hilarious to watch him ping pong between fake news and it's Obama's fault.
And it's going to be depressing to watch the pigfucking Trumpspunkers slurp up every dripping syllable.
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Yeah, that was cute, too. You know, I've read in many places (and have observed) that Trump takes pages if not full chapters from the dictator's playbook. Nowhere is this more evident than when you compare Trump with Erdogan. Trump's FAKE NEWS is Erdogan's Gulen. That is one powerful motherscratcher, that Gulen, able as he is to be a global mastermind from a futon in a hunting shack in the Poconos somewhere. It's amazing that Gulen is able to control every facet of Turkish life in a place with such spotty cell service. Just wait until they do away with net neutrality and Gulen has to pay extra to get on the fast lane to memurlar.net.
I believe "Fethullah Gülen" is Turkish for "Emmanuel Goldstein".
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And it's going to be depressing to watch the pigfucking Trumpspunkers slurp up every dripping syllable.
What a delightful mental image. Thanks! You just saved me from having to get lunch today.
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ABC is reporting that Flynn will testify that Trump instructed him to reach out to the Russians in 2016 - during the campaign.
I'll let that sink in for a moment...
You were lied to. Again.
Does this cause a sad?
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I'm just excited about my tax break! What? Oh.
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You were lied to. Again.
Does this cause a sad?
That guy, rightfully so was suspended.
Meanwhile the President of the United States lies over and over and over, and his own party/backers refuse to hold him accountable
Does this cause a sad?
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That guy, rightfully so was suspended.
Meanwhile the President of the United States lies over and over and over, and his own party/backers refuse to hold him accountable
Does this cause a sad?
If I have always expected politicians to lie, should I expect more from their enablers in the press?
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John Dowd, Trump's lawyer who for some reason which I cannot fathom is claiming that he authored Trump's twitter confession to obstruction of justice, (https://www.law.com/americanlawyer/sites/americanlawyer/2017/12/04/a-world-of-twitter-pain-for-trumps-lawyer-john-dowd/?slreturn=20171105145754) is the same John Dowd of the Dowd Report which summarized the investigation into Pete Rose's gambling. He has other baseball connections too: (http://mlb.nbcsports.com/2017/12/05/john-dowd-pete-roses-mortal-enemy-donald-trumps-lawyer/)
He’s most famous, however, for leading Major League Baseball’s investigation into Pete Rose after allegations emerged that Rose bet on baseball. The first reports of Rose’s gambling came in Sports Illustrated in March of 1989. Dowd was hired as Special Counsel on April 3. He delivered his report on Rose’s gambling to Commissioner Bart Giamatti in May. By August Rose realized that Dowd had him dead to rights. Rose agreed to the permanent ban, essentially pleading no contest to Dowd’s damning report. With that, Rose’s time in baseball was over. Dowd, however, would continue to handle investigations for Major League Baseball, looking into gambling allegations against Lenny Dykstra and some umpires and into George Steinbrenner’s hiring of a gambler named Howie Spira to dig up dirt on outfielder Dave Winfield. Dowd’s work got Steinbrenner banned for a time too.
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John Dowd, Trump's lawyer who for some reason which I cannot fathom is claiming that he authored Trump's twitter confession to obstruction of justice, (https://www.law.com/americanlawyer/sites/americanlawyer/2017/12/04/a-world-of-twitter-pain-for-trumps-lawyer-john-dowd/?slreturn=20171105145754) is the same John Dowd of the Dowd Report which summarized the investigation into Pete Rose's gambling. He has other baseball connections too: (http://mlb.nbcsports.com/2017/12/05/john-dowd-pete-roses-mortal-enemy-donald-trumps-lawyer/)
I have seen pundits make the point that the tweet being authored by Trump's attorney gives it more weight, not less. Also, the tweet and the public statements about who wrote it are not subject to privilege, so Mueller can put Dowd under oath and ask him if he really did write it. Either way it appears he's in a no win situation ethically. Also, if he really wrote it, he would've been fired by now.
Once again, a Trump lawyer may need a lawyer. They're going to run out of people prepared to jump into this legal minefield. I saw a tweet that reminded those in Trump's orbit that, while 15 of Nixon's staff went to jail over Watergate, Nixon himself walked scott free...
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I have seen pundits make the point that the tweet being authored by Trump's attorney gives it more weight, not less. Also, the tweet and the public statements about who wrote it are not subject to privilege, so Mueller can put Dowd under oath and ask him if he really did write it. Either way it appears he's in a no win situation ethically. Also, if he really wrote it, he would've been fired by now.
Once again, a Trump lawyer may need a lawyer. They're going to run out of people prepared to jump into this legal minefield. I saw a tweet that reminded those in Trump's orbit that, while 15 of Nixon's staff went to jail over Watergate, Nixon himself walked scott free...
Someone pointed out last night that the language of the tweet - "pled guilty" - pretty much rules out Dowd authoring it; any 1L would say "pleaded guilty".
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Someone pointed out last night that the language of the tweet - "pled guilty" - pretty much rules out Dowd authoring it; any 1L would say "pleaded guilty".
Is anyone really falling for the "my lawyer wrote it" defense?
SNL had it right that every week is so chock full of front page, administration-ending news that 75% of it gets bumped to the social pages.
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Trump Jr. spent 8 hours on Capitol Hill yesterday, testifying to the House Intelligence Committee. It was a closed-door session, so there's not going to be a transcript or any discussion of what he said, but that doesn't mean that committee members can't talk about what he didn't say.
Jr. was asked if he'd ever discussed the June '16 meeting with various Bond villains Russians. He said he had, but that he would not say what he discussed because of Attorney-Client privilege; there were attorneys in the room at the time, apparently.
TZ lawyers......GO!
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Those Hill hearings don't mean shit. The fucking jokes in charge of the committee could care less. Just going through the motions. "OK, Donnie, can't remember on that one, check, next question." Lame ass theater.
It's all up to Mueller's investigation, and the fuckers ruining the country are now trying to tear him down. All in the name of propping up this piece of shit called Trump. History will be very unkind to the cowards who failed to oversee, and to all their citizen enablers (Trump's base).
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Trump Jr. spent 8 hours on Capitol Hill yesterday, testifying to the House Intelligence Committee. It was a closed-door session, so there's not going to be a transcript or any discussion of what he said, but that doesn't mean that committee members can't talk about what he didn't say.
Jr. was asked if he'd ever discussed the June '16 meeting with various Bond villains Russians. He said he had, but that he would not say what he discussed because of Attorney-Client privilege; there were attorneys in the room at the time, apparently.
TZ lawyers......GO!
I have a super power I didn't know I had.
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Trump Jr. spent 8 hours on Capitol Hill yesterday, testifying to the House Intelligence Committee. It was a closed-door session, so there's not going to be a transcript or any discussion of what he said, but that doesn't mean that committee members can't talk about what he didn't say.
Jr. was asked if he'd ever discussed the June '16 meeting with various Bond villains Russians. He said he had, but that he would not say what he discussed because of Attorney-Client privilege; there were attorneys in the room at the time, apparently.
TZ lawyers......GO!
I hope they asked him who the lawyer was and they bring him in next.
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I hope they asked him who the lawyer was and they bring him in next.
He wouldn't be able to tell because it was confidential. And anyway nobody can tell lawyers apart.
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Trump Jr. spent 8 hours on Capitol Hill yesterday, testifying to the House Intelligence Committee. It was a closed-door session, so there's not going to be a transcript or any discussion of what he said, but that doesn't mean that committee members can't talk about what he didn't say.
Jr. was asked if he'd ever discussed the June '16 meeting with various Bond villains Russians. He said he had, but that he would not say what he discussed because of Attorney-Client privilege; there were attorneys in the room at the time, apparently.
TZ lawyers......GO!
"Answer the question, Mr. Trump."
"I can't. Attorney-client privilege."
"Doesn't apply."
"Executive privilege."
"Doesn't apply."
"White privilege?"
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I will eat my confederate flag do-rag if those Alabama pig fuckers don't vote for Moore in overwhelming numbers.
I think a pairing with ranch is appropriate.
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I think a pairing with ranch is appropriate.
To be fair, white people still voted for Moore in overwhelming numbers. I think that's who chuck was referencing.
It was the overwhelming turnout and overwhelming support for Jones from the African-American communities that tipped the balance.
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And anyway nobody can tell lawyers apart.
Roy Moore makes his Jew lawyer wear a yellow star so he knows which one it is.
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So glad he lost. This is a giant step in the proper direction. Southern change gonna come at last. Hallelujah!
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So glad he lost. This is a giant step in the proper direction. Southern change gonna come at last. Hallelujah!
One thing I think I haven't seen discussed much is the failure of the Voter ID law to continue suppressing the minority vote. Alabama's has been in place since 2011 and so it's been through a number of election cycles already. With African-Americans making up 25% of the population but 30% of the electorate on Tuesday, it seems that the effectiveness of the law has an expiry date. Those who were originally disenfranchised by it appear to have obtained an approved ID and are using it against those who took away their vote in the first place.
If the same is true in Texas, Ted Cruz is in a lot of trouble.
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One thing I think I haven't seen discussed much is the failure of the Voter ID law to continue suppressing the minority vote. Alabama's has been in place since 2011 and so it's been through a number of election cycles already. With African-Americans making up 25% of the population but 30% of the electorate on Tuesday, it seems that the effectiveness of the law has an expiry date. Those who were originally disenfranchised by it appear to have obtained an approved ID and are using it against those who took away their vote in the first place.
If the same is true in Texas, Ted Cruz is in a lot of trouble.
While African-Americans don't make up 30% of the electorate in Texas, Hispanics do. I think Teddy is in a heap of trouble.
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While African-Americans don't make up 30% of the electorate in Texas, Hispanics do. I think Teddy is in a heap of trouble.
Yeah, we're a majority-minority state. HIspanics aren't the reliable 90+% Democratic voting bloc that African-Americans are, but DACA repeal, border walls and general racist shit-baggery coming from the White House is a stank that's going to be hard to run clear of.
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Profiles in Courage: Paul Ryan
He's not going to run for re-election in 2018. So, he's going to ram through this deeply unpopular tax bill (that gets more unpopular by the day and will be a disaster if implemented) and then run for the hills. What a humongous douchebag. The expectation is that he's trying to avoid getting too much Trump on him so that he can run for Prez in 2020 or, more likely, 2024. In the meantime, he can sit and snipe from the sidelines like the spineless piece of shit he truly is.
Ideally for Ryan, Trump will lose in 2020 to a Democrat who - being a grown up like Obama and Clinton before that - will try and fix the black hole at the center of the federal budget called the Tax and Jobs Act - and then Ryan can run against said Democrat as someone who will cut the job-killing tax increases just implemented by the Democrat-in-Chief. It may well work too. It's so weird that he has this reputation of being a wonk and a thinker, when he's really not at all bright; just craven, baby-faced and the tallest pygmy in the GOP.
I fucking hate Paul Ryan.
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2018 arithmetic:
Trump appears to be all out of political juice. He's backed three losers in a row and is more underwater in the polls than the Titanic. The spectre of Doug Jones has just handed the levers of power to any number of moderate Republican senators who will be able to torpedo any bill going forward and so will be able to extract maximum compensation for a "yes" vote. Ryan's apparent decision not to run for re-election in 2018 means that his House caucus has little or no reason to support him.
Meanwhile, the average swing to Democrats in recent elections - even in races they lost because the existing deficit was too large to overcome - is 10%. That puts about 40 House Republicans in serious danger of being ousted by an energized electorate and a Democratic Party that finds itself awash with quality candidates. For example, in 2018 Democrats will contest every district in Texas (https://www.npr.org/2017/12/13/570241652/in-reaction-to-trump-democratic-candidates-surge-in-deep-red-texas); the first time this has happened in 25 years. When they did this in the Virginia state races, they erased an unassailable Republican majority with a 32% swing - partly the result of many counties having a Democrat to vote for on the ballot for the first time in forever.
So, the tax bill is the canary in this coalmine. Corker has already balked and now Rubio - likely trying to preserve credibility for another Presidential run - is now saying he's out because they took the 1% he wanted added back to the corporate tax rate that he wanted to use to expand the child tax credit and used it to lower the top tax rate; yeah, they're that cunty. Flake has been getting shit on this while Collins and Murkowski must be seeing how this story ends for them if they go along. Also, John McCain is in hospital in Arizona although he says he expects to be able to attend the vote next week.
(That will be a towering moment of juxtaposition as a man receiving tax-payer funded cancer treatment rises from his hospital bed to cast a vote to take away cancer treatment from Medicaid patients and throw 13 million people off health insurance. Will McCain really seal the death of his reputation in support of these clowns?)
McConnell et al are now on life-support, and also now have an actual time crunch (as opposed to the self-imposed time crunch of trying to get this bill passed before the year ends and before people had a chance to read it) as he won't be able to deny Doug Jones his senate seat forever. Mike Pence cancelled an official visit (to India, I think) in order to be around to break a tie - so as to add this to the long list of bills crashed through 51/50, 5/4 or 3/2 (in the case of net neutrality). Because...democracy.
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One more thing for the day: uber-Christian Mike Pence is a pariah in the Middle East because of Trump's decision to recognize Jerusalem as the capital of Israel. This has thrown a giant wrench into his Middle East tour such that Christian leaders are refusing to meet with him and his planned visit to the subterranean shrine in Bethlehem said to be the birthplace of Jesus...has been cancelled (https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/dec/15/mike-pence-holy-land-visit-disarray-jerusalem-recognition).
Awesome!
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(That will be a towering moment of juxtaposition as a man receiving tax-payer funded cancer treatment rises from his hospital bed to cast a vote to take away cancer treatment from Medicaid patients and throw 13 million people off health insurance. Will McCain really seal the death of his reputation in support of these clowns?)
Let's not forget the venality of someone with a likely fatal medical condition who happens to be worth over $20 million dollars voting for a bill that will (1) throw 13 million people off health insurance (2) make graduate school significantly if not prohibitively more expensive for the very people researching cures for that condition that could benefit others in the future and (3) either scrap the estate tax altogether or extend it to $20 million for his soon to be heirs (assuming he bequeaths directly to his kids and not his wife who herself is worth over $100 million).
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Let's not forget the venality of someone with a likely fatal medical condition who happens to be worth over $20 million dollars voting for a bill that will (1) throw 13 million people off health insurance (2) make graduate school significantly if not prohibitively more expensive for the very people researching cures for that condition that could benefit others in the future and (3) either scrap the estate tax altogether or extend it to $20 million for his soon to be heirs (assuming he bequeaths directly to his kids and not his wife who herself is worth over $100 million).
Shit.
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The expectation is that he's trying to avoid getting too much Trump on him so that he can run for Prez in 2020 or, more likely, 2024.
I'm sure he'll receive tremendous support from the fellows on his cell block.
Meanwhile, Roy Moore is claiming voter suppression. Many of the polling places in Alabama of course are schools, and a significant portion of his base is not allowed within 100 yards.
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Meanwhile, Roy Moore is claiming voter suppression. Many of the polling places in Alabama of course are schools, and a significant portion of his base is not allowed within 100 yards.
* Rimshot*
I think it's pretty funny that - presumably anticipating a squeaker win for Moore - Alabamian election officials fought to the State Supreme Court to get a ban on counties retaining electronic images of electronic ballots, which would make a recount damn near impossible. So, even if Moore gets close enough to trigger a recount (he cannot order one as has been reported, that's only an avenue for in-state elections, not Federal), they won't be able to do one. Genius!
As to his refusal to concede...so effing what?!! The vote will be certified, he will have lost and Jones will be sat when McConnell is good and ready (sometime in 2023).
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As to his refusal to concede...so effing what?!! The vote will be certified, he will have lost and Jones will be sat when McConnell is good and ready (sometime in 2023).
Fuck him and the horse he rode in on.
Oh yeah, someone remind Yertle of Scott Brown.
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Oh yeah, someone remind Yertle of Scott Brown.
That Republicans are terrified of the routine functioning of a democracy tells you all you need to know.
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Fuck him and the horse he rode in on.
The horse doesn't deserve that.
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The horse doesn't deserve that.
Correct (http://media.al.com/politics_impact/photo/roysassymetoo2jpg-020e2ca91afacf2c.jpg).
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Corker and Rubio just flipped to "yes" on the tax bill. Game over.
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Corker and Rubio just flipped to "yes" on the tax bill. Game over.
Mrs. MM's firm expects passage tonight.
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Mrs. MM's firm expects passage tonight.
It's going to the House floor early next week, then back to the Senate then to Trump's desk. It'll be implemented on 1/1 with no rules written and no ability for employers to adjust withholdings accordingly. It's going to be an administrative mess for the first year at least.
FYI, in addition to dropping the top tax rate from 39% to 37.5%, they added a special tax break for real estate LLCs. Trump and Corker have real estate LLCs.
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The ridiculous freakout by TrumpWorld over Mueller's acquisition of emails sent from government servers is as hilarious as it is telling. There is nothing wrong with Mueller's approach here, because the emails in question are the property of the US government, not the Trump campaign (which is why they bitched to Congress instead of going to court, because they have no legal leg on which to stand). It's unusual for prosecutors to get a data dump like this - usually preferring to get curated records from those being investigated - but this just shows how little Mueller trusts TrumpWorld to give a complete rendering of the email correspondence.
TrumpWorlders found out about this email acquisition rather abruptly when they sauntered into interviews with Mueller's team, confident that Mueller didn't have the email goods, only to find out how wrong they were. Hopefully, somewhere, there's a montage of shit-eating grins getting wiped off eminently punchable faces.
This will only infuriate / terrify Trump further, and speed his inevitable firing on Mueller. The RWNM is already working on destroying the reputation of this dedicated public servant, war hero and lifelong Republican. Word is that Trump is going to drop the hammer once Congress recesses to count its money from the tax bill heist. He has three options to get this done: (1) replace Sessions as AG and recess-appoint someone who is not recused from the Russia investigation who will do it; (2) demand Rosenstein fire Mueller and engage in "Saturday night massacre" serial firing until he finds his Robert Bork; or (3) claim authority to do it himself, and have Mueller forcibly removed from his office when he refuses to accept Trump's pink slip.
Any of these three will ignite a firestorm of a constitutional crisis, that Congressional Republicans will do their best to ignore. Maybe they'll ban the words "constitution" and "crisis" and hide under their desks until it's over.
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Something to put a pin in for when the indictments really start flying: the Trump campaign was warned by the FBI in July 2016 - just after he became the nominee - that Russia would likely try and infiltrate his campaign (https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/fbi-warned-trump-2016-russians-would-try-infiltrate-his-campaign-n830596) (Clinton got the same warning). By the time Trump got this warning, however, his campaign staff and family members had already had at least half-a-dozen meetings with Russian that we know of, yet no one seemed motivated to mention this to the FBI.
So, when they claim that they didn't think there was anything wrong (while violating any number of campaign and national security regulations), they were actually fully aware that this was a threat, the nature of the threat, and from where it would come. Instead of guarding against the threat and/or reporting the attempted contacts, they decided that it was a good idea to see what was in it for themselves.
An interesting aside, based on when the FBI opened its investigation into collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia, it's likely that the agents giving the Russia briefing to Trump already knew that contacts had taken place. It must have been very surreal to give the briefing, expecting some amount of fessing up, and getting nothing.
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Here's a handy-dandy calculator (http://taxplancalculator.com/), to see how much of the $1.5 trillion giveaway you're getting.
Me, I'm saving $1,000 in 2018, which will be eroded overtime as the brackets don't keep up with inflation and the personal tax rate cuts sunset in a few year. Meanwhile, if my health insurance goes up by 10% more a year (compounding) as is projected because of the repeal of the individual mandate, it'll cost me $500 more in 2019, $1,050 more in 2020 (and there goes my tax saving) and I'm properly underwater and getting worse in 2021 and beyond.
Most people will save in 2018, because it's designed specifically that way being an election year. It's why the bill was rushed through, but will now sit on Trump's desk until January because, if signed before the end of the year, the automatic cuts to Medicaid that this bill creates would start right away. By delaying signing until next year, the cuts don't come until 2019.
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I own an office building I rent back to myself at an exorbitant rate via a pass-through LLC so fuck you and your healthcare you goddamn plebe.
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Here's a handy-dandy calculator (http://taxplancalculator.com/), to see how much of the $1.5 trillion giveaway you're getting.
Me, I'm saving $1,000 in 2018, which will be eroded overtime as the brackets don't keep up with inflation and the personal tax rate cuts sunset in a few year. Meanwhile, if my health insurance goes up by 10% more a year (compounding) as is projected because of the repeal of the individual mandate, it'll cost me $500 more in 2019, $1,050 more in 2020 (and there goes my tax saving) and I'm properly underwater and getting worse in 2021 and beyond.
Most people will save in 2018, because it's designed specifically that way being an election year. It's why the bill was rushed through, but will now sit on Trump's desk until January because, if signed before the end of the year, the automatic cuts to Medicaid that this bill creates would start right away. By delaying signing until next year, the cuts don't come until 2019.
Wow. I’m saving almost 3 grand next year.
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Wow. I’m saving almost 3 grand next year.
Multiply that by 5...and then add three zeros...and you're up with Trump.
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I own an office building I rent back to myself at an exorbitant rate via a pass-through LLC so fuck you and your healthcare you goddamn plebe.
Mrs Limey is a realtor, which means she's self-employed in real estate. We're seriously going to look into setting up an LLC for her so that she can take advantage of the pass-through loophole.
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Mrs Limey is a realtor, which means she's self-employed in real estate. We're seriously going to look into setting up an LLC for her so that she can take advantage of the pass-through loophole.
Let me know if you desire any assistance in selecting a monocle and a cravat. Also, you can never go far wrong in one of those money bag shirts designed by that fat fucking idiot son of one of those Koch suckers.
Although to be honest his shirts are a little loud, which makes the cravat pairing trickier than it otherwise might be. But what the hell, in Monaco the rules are just different, wouldn't you say?
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Let me know if you desire any assistance in selecting a monocle and a cravat. Also, you can never go far wrong in one of those money bag shirts designed by that fat fucking idiot son of one of those Koch suckers.
Although to be honest his shirts are a little loud, which makes the cravat pairing trickier than it otherwise might be. But what the hell, in Monaco the rules are just different, wouldn't you say?
I am still a little confused why that pudgy waste of space is the poster child for the tax bill, when we already have Don Jr., Erik and Ivanka, who are all as useful as a chocolate teapot.
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Little Koch and the Trump kids will be examples of how wealth trickles down and then evaporates.
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I follow politics, but haven't followed this tax bill other than headlines.
By the calculator I get to save around $4000. That's just my individual case, but it's not the doom and gloom I've been hearing from the media.
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Little Koch and the Trump kids will be examples of how wealth trickles down and then evaporates.
It doesn't evaporate; it gets enshrined in tax-free inheritance and tax-free carried interest thereafter (oh yeah, they left the carried interest loophole in there too). What it doesn't do, is create jobs.
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I follow politics, but haven't followed this tax bill other than headlines.
By the calculator I get to save around $4000. That's just my individual case, but it's not the doom and gloom I've been hearing from the media.
I am happy for you. But, unless your income is from carried interest or a pass-through, all your tax cuts will erode over time and expire completely in 2025.
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I realize it gets passed down with little to no government cut, but after that, in those incompetent hands, it basically evaporates. My inarticulate point is that it is a bad misuse if capital, sort of the opposite of the theory they use to justify this shit. It trickles down to bad shirts and shitty real estate investments.
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I realize it gets passed down with little to no government cut, but after that, in those incompetent hands, it basically evaporates. My inarticulate point is that it is a bad misuse if capital, sort of the opposite of the theory they use to justify this shit. It trickles down to bad shirts and shitty real estate investments.
Gotcha.
Yes, there is the potential for inheritance to be wasted but, in reality, the dynastic fortunes that have been accumulated by the 0.1% - one of the things the estate tax is meant to prevent - are pretty much impossible to blow.
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Yes, there is the potential for inheritance to be wasted but, in reality, the dynastic fortunes that have been accumulated by the 0.1% - one of the things the estate tax is meant to prevent - are pretty much impossible to blow.
That depends largely on how many defense attorneys you have to hire.
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I follow politics, but haven't followed this tax bill other than headlines.
By the calculator I get to save around $4000. That's just my individual case, but it's not the doom and gloom I've been hearing from the media.
The difference is you could save much more than that and it not be temporary and more people get healthcare and disability insurance and food stamps and public education and higher education and social security and public radio and arts and infrastructure and defense and all the shit that government should exist for without compromising those values so that wealthy layabout heirs can be even more wealthy.
The entire point of this country is that all people are created equally and should be afforded an equal chance. The only way that promise can be met is if everyone is given a legitimate chance to succeed on their own, regardless of the circumstances of their birth. If you think that government exists to make society better and to give everyone an equal chance of accomplishing all they are capable of then you are against this tax bill. If you think that the sperm lottery should decide everyone's fate then this tax bill will increase the multitude of benefits that you have already received by luck and birth.
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I follow politics, but haven't followed this tax bill other than headlines.
By the calculator I get to save around $4000. That's just my individual case, but it's not the doom and gloom I've been hearing from the media.
I’m so happy that you were one of the lucky peasants that received one of the gold coins tossed out of the wagon on its way to the castle. Congrats....
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I follow politics, but haven't followed this tax bill other than headlines.
By the calculator I get to save around $4000. That's just my individual case, but it's not the doom and gloom I've been hearing from the media.
Generally there are winners in every tax brackets, and losers in every tax bracket. It seems to largely depend on whether you're in a high local tax state. The largest winners are in high tax brackets--1% means more to someone making $40,000,000 than to someone making $4,000. For me there are three real questions. Why, when the economy is doing relatively well, do we need to increase the deficit by $1.5 billion? How do the corporate tax cuts and the change in taxation of offshore income incentivize US corporations to invest in US jobs? Why were some special interest advantages like real estate development added?
I can probably think of more.
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Generally there are winners in every tax brackets, and losers in every tax bracket. It seems to largely depend on whether you're in a high local tax state. The largest winners are in high tax brackets--1% means more to someone making $40,000,000 than to someone making $4,000. For me there are three real questions. Why, when the economy is doing relatively well, do we need to increase the deficit by $1.5 billion? How do the corporate tax cuts and the change in taxation of offshore income incentivize US corporations to invest in US jobs? Why were some special interest advantages like real estate development added?
I can probably think of more.
More study of this bill is unearthing more ridiculous double-standards. For example, for you lawyers out there, the pass-through provisions for partners gives very generous tax breaks whereas a similarly remunerated employee will be paying full freight income tax. It's now expected that many individuals will become LLCs, employees will "resign" to become consultants - under LLCs - and, the holy grail, firms will incorporate to lock in the 21% corporate tax rate.
I doubt very much that any of this was considered when the plans were written, so expect such tax avoidance schemes to further erode the already thin revenue going forward. Once again, one rule for the rich...
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That depends largely on how many defense attorneys you have to hire.
Well, until recently at least, the RNC - i.e. campaign donors - were paying the legal bills of Big Donnie and Little Donnie...
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Once again, one rule for the rich...
It's always been like that. Sad.
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Meanwhile, Trump is still dispatching his flying monkeys to throw shit around in different parts of the world. Peter Hoekstra is a raving wingnut, founder member of the Tea Party caucus and finder of non-existent WMDs in Iraq when on the House "Intelligence" Committee. As a Dutch-born American, he would seem to be the perfect choice to be the US Ambassador to The Netherlands, and he was duly sworn in as such by chief presidential fluffer Mike Pence on December 11. So far, it's gone about as expected (https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/dec/22/us-ambassador-to-netherlands-describes-own-words-as-fake-news).
Hoekstra was asked by a Dutch reporter why he'd said that there are no-go areas in The Netherlands because Muslims are burning cars and politicians - a claim that's ridiculously untrue. Pete said he'd never said those things and called the report fake news. The reporter then played Hoekstra a video clip of him saying that there are no-go areas in The Netherlands because Muslims are burning cars and politicians, and asked why he called it fake news. Hoekstra then denied having used the term "fake news".
Another former Republican Congressman, Scott Brown, is under investigation by the State Department for, basically, creeping out the entire South Pacific (https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/oct/25/scott-brown-us-ambassador-to-new-zealand-investigated-over-inappropriate-comments) while trying to fulfill his duties as Ambassador to New Zealand.
And then there's the whole Jerusalem debacle, the pathetic schoolyard bullying tactic - that was completely ignored as only 7 countries other than the US and Israel were prepared to say that it was ok to flip a giant middle finger to the Palestinians. Ambassador Haley's whining speech to the UN was a complete embarrassment, as was the decision to throw a party for everyone who didn't go against the US in the recent vote. Basically throwing a losers' party after getting excluded from the cool kids' party. Something else the US is excluded from now, is any further involvement in the Middle East peacemaking process.
It took Trump less than a year to topple the US' from its position as leader of the free world. With Trudeaux in Canada, we're not even the leader of the north American continent.
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To me the tax plan is just Republicans finding another way to grab me by the pussy.
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More study of this bill is unearthing more ridiculous double-standards. For example, for you lawyers out there, the pass-through provisions for partners gives very generous tax breaks . . ..
Wait, wait, are you saying this is a problem?
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I'm wondering if, when I retire, I can establish an LLC for my investment activity and then use the pass-through provisions for distributions. Sphinx, research that for me, will you?
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I'm wondering if, when I retire, I can establish an LLC for my investment activity and then use the pass-through provisions for distributions. Sphinx, research that for me, will you?
I'll get right on it as soon as I can.
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Wait, wait, are you saying this is a problem?
It's a feature, not a bug.
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I'm wondering if, when I retire, I can establish an LLC for my investment activity and then use the pass-through provisions for distributions. Sphinx, research that for me, will you?
If it's real estate investment...absolutely. Other investment might work, if you live of carried interest or dividends.
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I am happy for you. But, unless your income is from carried interest or a pass-through, all your tax cuts will erode over time and expire completely in 2025.
I'm a draftsman in petrochemical engineering. Middle class...dad retired as a pipefitter. I'm sure I'll inherit a welding machine though!
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Generally there are winners in every tax brackets, and losers in every tax bracket. It seems to largely depend on whether you're in a high local tax state. The largest winners are in high tax brackets--1% means more to someone making $40,000,000 than to someone making $4,000. For me there are three real questions. Why, when the economy is doing relatively well, do we need to increase the deficit by $1.5 billion? How do the corporate tax cuts and the change in taxation of offshore income incentivize US corporations to invest in US jobs? Why were some special interest advantages like real estate development added?
I can probably think of more.
I agree, there is no need to increase the deficit.
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I’m so happy that you were one of the lucky peasants that received one of the gold coins tossed out of the wagon on its way to the castle. Congrats....
So are the amounts from this tax bill not benefiting the middle class or not? It did for my family. I passed the calculator to a few friends...they got tossed gold coins too.
I've only seen myself and one other poster share what the calculators findings are in this thread. Both are a benefit in savings...at least in the short term. I'll have to read a bit more on the effects in the years to come.
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So are the amounts from this tax bill not benefiting the middle class or not? It did for my family. I passed the calculator to a few friends...they got tossed gold coins too.
I've only seen myself and one other poster share what the calculators findings are in this thread. Both are a benefit in savings...at least in the short term. I'll have to read a bit more on the effects in the years to come.
I think the bottom line is that middle class tax cuts are temporary, corporate tax cuts are permanent, so it's the fact that middle class taxes go up in a few years is what's paying for the corporate tax cut. Otherwise, this could not be passed using the reconciliation process.
At the same time, it's creating an extra $5,000 of debt for every man, woman and child in the country. Who is going to pay that bill when it comes due?
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At the same time, it's creating an extra $5,000 of debt for every man, woman and child in the country. Who is going to pay that bill when it comes due?
The same people who will have to pay the $20 trillion or so of already existing debt?
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The same people who will have to pay the $20 trillion or so of already existing debt?
yeah. them.
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I think the bottom line is that middle class tax cuts are temporary, corporate tax cuts are permanent, so it's the fact that middle class taxes go up in a few years is what's paying for the corporate tax cut. Otherwise, this could not be passed using the reconciliation process.
At the same time, it's creating an extra $5,000 of debt for every man, woman and child in the country. Who is going to pay that bill when it comes due?
That's clearly stated and helps me understand, thanks!
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I've only seen myself and one other poster share what the calculators findings are in this thread. Both are a benefit in savings...at least in the short term. I'll have to read a bit more on the effects in the years to come.
According to the calculator, I will benefit quite a bit next year. However; 1) there are the long-term implications, and 2) it's not all about me.
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According to the calculator, I will benefit quite a bit next year. However; 1) there are the long-term implications, and 2) it's not all about me.
Hear here.
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2) it's not all about me.
Too bad, I think you would be a benevolent Dictator and things would be better across the spectrum of humanity for all.
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Too bad, I think you would be a benevolent Dictator and things would be better across the spectrum of humanity for all.
I was assuming that he said that because he knew it was all about me.
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So, after 10 days off and 7 rounds of golf (breaking the record for Presidential golf outings in just one year), Trump returned to watching Fox News with full gusto. As identified by the Toronto Star's Daniel Dale (https://twitter.com/ddale8/status/948416574670688256), Trump's day consisted of:
7:48 a.m.: Attacks Justice Dept., Abedin after Fox segment
8:44 a.m.: Tweets to Fox
8:49 a.m.: Tweets about taxes after Fox segment
9:08 a.m.: Talks North Korea after Fox segment
9:13 a.m.: Takes credit for aviation safety after Fox segment
7:49 p.m.: Mocks Kim Jong-un after Fox segment
8:16 p.m.: Urges people to watch Fox show
11:03 p.m.: Live-tweets Fox Business
The "my button is bigger than your button" tweet got a lot of very appropriate attention, i.e. it scared the living shit out of rational people. But it's important in this context because KJI's statement was almost 2 days prior to Trump's witty rejoinder, meaning he responded to it after seeing the report on Fox, not because he had been briefed on it. He is getting his intel direct from Fox News and not from the US intelligence services. More proof is that he claimed China was selling oil to North Korea, not because the CIA told him but because Fox reported it.
Add this to the unhinged, rambling NYT interview over the holidays, and we must be getting close to a 25th amendment remedy. Right?
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I thought he didn't have time to watch TV because documents.
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Michael Wolff's salacious book was due out on January 9th. Trump issued a cease and desist letter, threatening a lawsuit if they didn't stop publication, so the publishers moved up the release to tomorrow. It shot to #1 on the Amazon best-sellers list.
[Golf Clap]
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Michael Wolff's salacious book was due out on January 9th. Trump issued a cease and desist letter, threatening a lawsuit if they didn't stop publication, so the publishers moved up the release to tomorrow. It shot to #1 on the Amazon best-sellers list.
[Golf Clap]
Two really remarkable stories about abuse of power today. First, Trump cajoled the DOJ into reopening the investigation into Hillary's fucking email server and second the President of the United States is trying to prevent the publication of book that makes him look bad. This is banana republic shit.
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Two really remarkable stories about abuse of power today. First, Trump cajoled the DOJ into reopening the investigation into Hillary's fucking email server and second the President of the United States is trying to prevent the publication of book that makes him look bad. This is banana republic shit.
I have never been so certain of anything as I am that Trump will take credit for the record sales of the book whose publication he tried to prevent.
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
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With everything else going on, I think my favorite moment from the last couple of days is his Wizard of Oz cameo, whereby he projected himself remotely into the press briefing, which is about 50 feet from the desk at which he was sitting. He is becoming a caricature of his own caricature.
He's also demonstrably mental.
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I have never been so certain of anything as I am that Trump will take credit for the record sales of the book whose publication he tried to prevent.
Oh, hell yeah.
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Bannon now crawfishing on his comments. Apologizes, says his comments were not about Trump, but rather about Manafort. He's essentially groveling at Trump's feet.
Dilly, Dilly!
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It's amazing how the shit is flying so fast that you barely have time to process one giant dungheap before the next one comes plopping down.
For example, the fact that Trump is spitting out poorly written tweets about being a stable genius - while also tweeting that his presidency is "consensual" and linking someone's email address instead of a URL, which somewhat undercuts the original tweet - overshadowed the fact that the first referral from Congress to the DoJ for criminal prosecution arising out of the Russia scandal was made on Friday. Almost a year to the day when the entirety of the US intelligence services agreed that Russia had illegally acted upon our election in favor of Trump, Senate Republicans - and Senate Republicans only, done without even telling Senate Democrats - sent the name Christopher Steele to the DoJ.
Apparently, there's some discrepancy in some of the dates he'd provided to the FBI, and so they want him prosecuted for it. Ignoring the simple lunacy of the charges - Jared Kushner has been forced to correct his security disclosure about a dozen times and yet still has security clearance - it's clear that they're not even pretending to be doing a proper job any more. Steele has enough shit to fertilize the Sahara, and Republicans don't want him testifying. Referring him for prosecution does two things" (1) it undermines his credibility as a witness should that ever come to pass; and (2) it pressures him into staying out of the U.S. for fear of arrest on trumped up (pun intended) charges (I don't think U.S. courts can compel a foreign citizen to show for an interview but they certainly can arrest him if on U.S. soil).
This is getting off-the-charts scary now. In addition to the malicious prosecution of Steele, Congress also re-opened investigations into the dead horses of Clinton's emails and the Uranium One deal. Yes, the United States Federal Government is prosecuting its political enemies.
Trump hasn't even completed one year in office.
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Congressional committees took over 21 hours of testimony from the heads of Fusion GPS, relating to the its commissioning of Trump-Russia dossier. The chair of the Senate Committee - Chuck Grassley - was asked by a constituent if he'd agree to release the transcript, to which Grassley said he could see no reason why he wouldn't vote to release the transcript. Fusion GPS, for their part, waived any opportunity to review the transcript and urged the committee to release it asap. That was all a few months ago now.
Since then, Grassley and his Republican colleagues have both refused to release the transcript while simultaneously making derogatory comments about the testimony therein and, just last week, referring the file's author - Christopher Steele - to the DoJ for prosecution on lying to the FBI (he mixed up some dates, apparently). The Fusion GPS guys aren't backing down and say they're 100% behind everything in the Steele report (yep, including the watersports) and wrote an op-ed in the (failing) NY Times to that effect and, again, calling for the release of the transcript of their testimony.
Bizarrely, Grassley countered by saying if they want their testimony public, they should come back and testify in open session. Ummm, why? They didn't ask for a closed hearing (they clearly wanted it to be open) and the transcript of the closed testimony exists so why the need for an open do-over?
Anyway, today Diane Feinstein had enough of this bollocks and dumped the whole 312 pages on the interwebs for all to see.
The first major revelation I've seen so far is that someone in the Trump campaign - back in mid-2016 - had seen enough of the Russian involvement and made a call into the FBI. I suspect this testimony will have more smoking guns in it than the toll booth scene in The Godfather. And now that it's out there, the (dishonest) press can set about validating the contents.
Popcorn, anyone?
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Congressional committees took over 21 hours of testimony from the heads of Fusion GPS, relating to the its commissioning of Trump-Russia dossier. The chair of the Senate Committee - Chuck Grassley - was asked by a constituent if he'd agree to release the transcript, to which Grassley said he could see no reason why he wouldn't vote to release the transcript. Fusion GPS, for their part, waived any opportunity to review the transcript and urged the committee to release it asap. That was all a few months ago now.
Since then, Grassley and his Republican colleagues have both refused to release the transcript while simultaneously making derogatory comments about the testimony therein and, just last week, referring the file's author - Christopher Steele - to the DoJ for prosecution on lying to the FBI (he mixed up some dates, apparently). The Fusion GPS guys aren't backing down and say they're 100% behind everything in the Steele report (yep, including the watersports) and wrote an op-ed in the (failing) NY Times to that effect and, again, calling for the release of the transcript of their testimony.
Bizarrely, Grassley countered by saying if they want their testimony public, they should come back and testify in open session. Ummm, why? They didn't ask for a closed hearing (they clearly wanted it to be open) and the transcript of the closed testimony exists so why the need for an open do-over?
Anyway, today Diane Feinstein had enough of this bollocks and dumped the whole 312 pages on the interwebs for all to see.
The first major revelation I've seen so far is that someone in the Trump campaign - back in mid-2016 - had seen enough of the Russian involvement and made a call into the FBI. I suspect this testimony will have more smoking guns in it than the toll booth scene in The Godfather. And now that it's out there, the (dishonest) press can set about validating the contents.
Popcorn, anyone?
Simson also said that one person had already been killed in connection with the dossier.
ETA: Apparently the "walk in informant" was a reference to the Australian diplomat who alerted the FBI after drinks with Papadapalous.
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Fuck that corn fed fuckwit and his little fop friend.
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It appears that the major "revelation" is simply that the dossier didn't start the investigation. In some respects, this isn't much of a reveal, but it makes you wonder why the republicans were so bent on keeping this covered up. I was sort of assuming that the reveal would be more support for the dossier, but it appears that it simply undercuts the lame republican narrative that the investigation sprung from poisonous fruit.
So Grassley and all the pricks spent this much capital and credibility just to prop up a convoluted lie that they figured would be a workable defense of Trump? They really assumed no one would make it public? Just shows their hubris in that they really think the USA is some authoritarian state where their fiction will become reality. Pretty pathetic.
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It appears that the major "revelation" is simply that the dossier didn't start the investigation. In some respects, this isn't much of a reveal, but it makes you wonder why the republicans were so bent on keeping this covered up. I was sort of assuming that the reveal would be more support for the dossier, but it appears that it simply undercuts the lame republican narrative that the investigation sprung from poisonous fruit.
So Grassley and all the pricks spent this much capital and credibility just to prop up a convoluted lie that they figured would be a workable defense of Trump? They really assumed no one would make it public? Just shows their hubris in that they really think the USA is some authoritarian state where their fiction will become reality. Pretty pathetic.
Right now, the entire Republican Party is working to protect it's Dear Leader. For example, the FBI and DOJ cratered to Nunez and agreed to hand over all materials related to the Mueller investigation - mid-investigation! This doesn't ever happen because such things tend to derail investigations, which is exactly what the DOJ was told, yet they did it anyway. Nunez is a Trump-puppet, so Mueller will now be playing poker with all his cards face up.
I can only think that their trying to keep this lid closed until after the 2018 mid-terms. If they can survive 2018 with majorities intact, maybe they think they will all get to scoot; Trump included. I can only hope that this will damn the lot of them.
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Simson also said that one person had already been killed in connection with the dossier.
Was that the bag-over-the-head guy?
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Right now, the entire Republican Party is working to protect it's Dear Leader. For example, the FBI and DOJ cratered to Nunez and agreed to hand over all materials related to the Mueller investigation - mid-investigation! This doesn't ever happen because such things tend to derail investigations, which is exactly what the DOJ was told, yet they did it anyway. Nunez is a Trump-puppet, so Mueller will now be playing poker with all his cards face up.
I can only think that their trying to keep this lid closed until after the 2018 mid-terms. If they can survive 2018 with majorities intact, maybe they think they will all get to scoot; Trump included. I can only hope that this will damn the lot of them.
Better than even odds that people like Nunez are either complicit in the crime, thus protecting their own ass, or compromised by something Trump or Putin knows. It's no coincidence that Roy Cohn is a Trump hero and provided an ideal on how to operate in the circle of power.
No guarantee, but I'm optimistic that many things will come to light, and that a lot of Republicans will eventually realize that continually doubling down on a three-legged horse was a very bad bet. Most of the loudest supporters will be out of office and disgraced.
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CNN is reporting that National Security Adviser McMaster and - perhaps more notably - White House Legal Counsel McGahn (the lawyer who famously hired lawyers) are leaving the administration adding two more names to the long, long, loooooong list of senior White House staff who didn't make it to Trump's first anniversary. The McGahn thing is interesting, because he may have realized the extent of the peril he is in hanging around the Trumps as they grift their way through a Presidency. McMaster will be the second NSA Trump has lost.
Also, from CNN, Gen. Kelly has been organizing a loyalty pledge drive with White House staff, getting them to promise to stay on at least through the mid-terms. With a significant number of vacancies unfilled in the administration - with the list growing daily, it seems - perhaps they are realizing that somebody need to be doing something other than enjoying "Executive Time" in the White House.
The schadenfreude of watching Trump and all the best people flail and disintegrate is tempered, of course, with the terror of an unsupervised Trump in office.
My analogy to Star Wars (of which I am very proud so I'll bring it up again) becomes more and more apt every day. Trump will bring balance to U.S. politics in the same way the Anakin Skywalker brought balance to the Force. The latest star of conservative politics to get picked up and lobbed down a bottomless stairwell is Steve Bannon. Trump is torching everyone around him and his toxicity is spreading. Now the likes of Grassley and Graham have been shown to be craven sycophants, suppressing testimony expressly to protect a White House lie.
This will not end well for any of them.
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Fuck that corn fed fuckwit and his little fop friend.
BTW, your mate Issa isn't running for re-election. Add him to the long list of prominent Republicans who are quitting rather than getting smoked in November.
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Add him to the long list of prominent Republicans who are quitting rather than getting smoked in November.
Careful with the "smoked" talk. 2 years ago you were laughing at the idea that any Republican would beat Hillary. That kind of talk leads to arrogance which diminishes voter passion.
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BTW, your mate Issa isn't running for re-election. Add him to the long list of prominent Republicans who are quitting rather than getting smoked in November.
The clear winner in this scenario is Gohmert.
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Careful with the "smoked" talk. 2 years ago you were laughing at the idea that any Republican would beat Hillary. That kind of talk leads to arrogance which diminishes voter passion.
I don't think that was me. I thought nominating Clinton was a big mistake because it was handing Republicans a hymn sheet of attack lines with which they were already very familiar.
I do hear you about getting complacent about November, though. Enthusiasm seems to be off the charts, however, notably with there being an unpresidented (sic) number of first-time candidates running for House seats, almost entirely on the Democratic side. Maddow had a short segment on this last month (http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow/watch/exceptional-number-of-democratic-house-challengers-await-2018-1119443523900), and it's worth a quick look. The "Red Wave" in 2010 followed a jump in new candidates on the Republican side - 78 up from 49 in the previous cycle - compared to a falling number of Democrats - 40 vs. 57 from the previous cycle. That Republican enthusiasm translated into a game-changing wipeout for Democrats in 2010.
Fast-forward to 2017, and new Republican registrants remains constant from the prior cycle - 28. On the Democratic side, though, the 44 new candidates they got in the prior cycle has been blown away - 209 new candidates for the 2018 midterms. It was a glut of good candidates that saw the Republican majority in the Virginia House of Delegates all-but erased - it only surviving by one delegate and that was achieved only by dint of lawsuits and the luck of the draw. Gone are the days when Republicans ran unopposed in House districts -they'll be facing Democratic challengers and an angry electorate.
I'm not complacent; I'm amped.
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I don't think that was me. I thought nominating Clinton was a big mistake because it was handing Republicans a hymn sheet of attack lines with which they were already very familiar.
I do hear you about getting complacent about November, though. Enthusiasm seems to be off the charts, however, notably with there being an unpresidented (sic) number of first-time candidates running for House seats, almost entirely on the Democratic side. Maddow had a short segment on this last month (http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow/watch/exceptional-number-of-democratic-house-challengers-await-2018-1119443523900), and it's worth a quick look. The "Red Wave" in 2010 followed a jump in new candidates on the Republican side - 78 up from 49 in the previous cycle - compared to a falling number of Democrats - 40 vs. 57 from the previous cycle. That Republican enthusiasm translated into a game-changing wipeout for Democrats in 2010.
Fast-forward to 2017, and new Republican registrants remains constant from the prior cycle - 28. On the Democratic side, though, the 44 new candidates they got in the prior cycle has been blown away - 209 new candidates for the 2018 midterms. It was a glut of good candidates that saw the Republican majority in the Virginia House of Delegates all-but erased - it only surviving by one delegate and that was achieved only by dint of lawsuits and the luck of the draw. Gone are the days when Republicans ran unopposed in House districts -they'll be facing Democratic challengers and an angry electorate.
I'm not complacent; I'm amped.
Right. The you wasn't Limey specific. More dems/lefts in general.
It's typical that mid-term elections go against the party in the White House. Not always as big a swing as 10 though.
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Right. The you wasn't Limey specific. More dems/lefts in general.
It's typical that mid-term elections go against the party in the White House. Not always as big a swing as 10 though.
Looking at the special elections that have occurred since 2016's general, the swing to Democrats - even in races they lost (because of a seemingly unassailable Republican advantage) - has been massive, and far greater than the swing to the right in 2010. It's averaging about 20 points. If that holds in November, it will be a bloodbath of historic proportions. The swing to Republicans in 2010 was 9%.
As another aside, Devin Nunes is one of 7 California Republicans from districts that Clinton won in 2016...
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Looking at the special elections that have occurred since 2016's general, the swing to Democrats - even in races they lost (because of a seemingly unassailable Republican advantage) - has been massive, and far greater than the swing to the right in 2010. It's averaging about 20 points. If that holds in November, it will be a bloodbath of historic proportions. The swing to Republicans in 2010 was 9%.
As another aside, Devin Nunes is one of 7 California Republicans from districts that Clinton won in 2016...
Because of November 2016 I'm ignoring all polls.
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Because of November 2016 I'm ignoring all polls.
These are actual votes in elections for national office. Trump likes to tout that Republicans are 5-0 in special elections - which isn't true, of course, because they're 5-2 - but this hides the underlying truth: in these elections, and also the elections for state office in New Jersey and Virginia, the swing to Democrats has been huge (https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/special-elections-so-far-point-to-a-democratic-wave-in-2018/). Republicans won 5 special elections because they happened to be in ultra-conservative districts where their majority was such that they could withstand such a swing and still prevail.
So these aren't opinion polls, they're actual polls. Moreover, they're actual polls that are one-offs where turnout is usually even worse than off-year mid-terms. If Republicans are getting overrun by Democratic turnout in these elections, it sets up very nicely for the full-on vote in November.
FYI, the link above to fivethirtyeight.com has the average swing to Democrats at 16%, not the 20% I said (but still pretty handsome). The swing to Republicans in 2010 was 7%.
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Every day, the Trump administration coughs up a scandal that would bring down most administrations, all the while enduring the worst scandal any administration has ever had: Russia. But while Mueller is in place and doing his thing, I think it's worth focusing on the cadre of enablers and excusers for this President: Congressional Republicans.
This weekend, numerous Republicans were on TV attempting to normalize racism. The whole porn star pay-off scandal didn't even merit a mention, there was no room to discuss his blatant lies about his rationale for cancelling his visit to the UK, while the Hawaii mess - where we learned that the DHS has no plan to respond to a missile attack and Trump thought it appropriate to finish his round of golf rather than deal with a potentially catastrophic error - was shrugged off. Where are the strong on defense, family values Republicans on all of this? Trying to blame Clinton for Haiti and something something...emails.
Rand Paul, for example, presumably wanting attention after being upset that no one gave a shit that he was quite ill after getting beaten up by a neighbor, claimed that immigrants don't want to work and have to be forced to do so. Ryan condemned the President in the weakest terms possible - which is terrifying given that he's third in line to the Oval Office. Cotton and Perdue - who where in the room when shitholes were being discussed - say that they didn't hear what the President said but that Durbin is lying. This makes no sense (how can they deny what Durbin heard when they were both suffering from temporary deafness) even before you realize that they are ignoring Lyndsey Graham who said that he "said his piece" to the President at the time and will discuss it no further.
What a disgusting bunch of tools.
DHS Secretary - the very Normegian-looking Kirstjen Nielsen - was also in the room when Trump was insulting almost half the countries in the world (and the entire African-American population of the U.S.), and she too suffered from the same temporary deafness that addled Sens Cotton and Perdue. It seems impossible that the moment could have gone unnoticed given that both Sens Durbin and Graham claim to have dressed down the President at the time. It would be a moment in a meeting that would stand out, you'd think. Well, Nielsen's hearing / memory is going to be put on the spot as she's due to give testimony to the Senate Judiciary Committee this week; the ranking member of that committee is one Sen. Dick Durbin.
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If you thought that 2018 has been exhausting already, you're not alone (http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/thanks-trumps-antics-2018-exhausting-start#break).
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My analogy to Star Wars (of which I am very proud so I'll bring it up again) becomes more and more apt every day. Trump will bring balance to U.S. politics in the same way the Anakin Skywalker brought balance to the Force. The latest star of conservative politics to get picked up and lobbed down a bottomless stairwell is Steve Bannon. Trump is torching everyone around him and his toxicity is spreading. Now the likes of Grassley and Graham have been shown to be craven sycophants, suppressing testimony expressly to protect a White House lie.
This will not end well for any of them.
The NRA may have been laundering illegal campaign contributions (http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2018/01/the-nra-is-part-of-the-trumprussia-scandal-now.html) from Russians to the Trump campaign.
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The NRA may have been laundering illegal campaign contributions (http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2018/01/the-nra-is-part-of-the-trumprussia-scandal-now.html) from Russians to the Trump campaign.
A complaint has been filed with the FEC that the hush-money payment to Stormy Daniels violates Federal Election laws as it was a benefit in kind to the Trump campaign which was not declared.
The real story here has always been the source of the money for the payment, made by Trump's lawyer Michael Cohen through a Delaware LLC established solely for this one purpose. Trump has a history of using his charity vehicle to pay his personal bills - including settling lawsuits - so it would be very much in character for him to direct campaign funds to pay off his one-time side piece.
Interestingly though, the FEC complaint claims that the source of the funds doesn't matter. The complaint is that the pay-off was of benefit to the campaign so - even if Trump ponied up himself - it's still a violation of campaign finance laws. This smacks strongly of fishing to find the source of the money, which is a good idea because there's no way Trump paid this himself.
In related news, the Trump campaign still has not accounted for how they distributed the $107 million it raised for Trump's inauguration. The money is not treated the same as campaign contributions - it's basically a gift - so they can spend it pretty much how they want. However, what they can't do is simply trouser it, because that has tax implications for whomever gets the money, so they are required to say where it all ended up.
That $107 million was literally double the amount raised by Obama for his first inauguration, and that party was off the hook - awash with A-List stars. Obama raised about $50 million, spent about $25 million - the most expensive inauguration to date - and donated the remainder to charities. Trump's headline acts were some Irish dancers, some baton twirlers and Three Doors Down. Also, he had only 3 balls compared to Obama's 8 (also Trump's were smaller etc. etc.). So there's no way there wasn't, oh, about $100 million left over.
Where is it? They aren't saying. And those who should make them say, aren't.
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In other news, Jeff Sessions took time off - from pressuring FBI Director Wray to fire FBI Deputy Director McCabe - to go and have a chat with Robert Mueller. For a few hours.
Given his struggles with the truth during Senate testimony, I'm sure it went well.
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A complaint has been filed with the FEC that the hush-money payment to Stormy Daniels violates Federal Election laws as it was a benefit in kind to the Trump campaign which was not declared.
The real story here has always been the source of the money for the payment, made by Trump's lawyer Michael Cohen through a Delaware LLC established solely for this one purpose. Trump has a history of using his charity vehicle to pay his personal bills - including settling lawsuits - so it would be very much in character for him to direct campaign funds to pay off his one-time side piece.
Interestingly though, the FEC complaint claims that the source of the funds doesn't matter. The complaint is that the pay-off was of benefit to the campaign so - even if Trump ponied up himself - it's still a violation of campaign finance laws. This smacks strongly of fishing to find the source of the money, which is a good idea because there's no way Trump paid this himself.
Here you go: (https://twitter.com/CREWcrew/status/955827857221193728)
President Trump is accused of paying $130,000 in hush money to porn star Stormy Daniels to hide an affair a month before the election. In what is probably just a coincidence, the Trump campaign transferred $130K to the Trump businesses a month after the election.
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Here you go: (https://twitter.com/CREWcrew/status/955827857221193728)
President Trump is accused of paying $130,000 in hush money to porn star Stormy Daniels to hide an affair a month before the election. In what is probably just a coincidence, the Trump campaign transferred $130K to the Trump businesses a month after the election.
For all the randomness of the man, he is actually quite predictable: just think of the dumbest, most obvious, self-enriching thing he could do...and that's what he did. #StupidWatergate
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For all the randomness of the man, he is actually quite predictable: just think of the dumbest, most obvious, self-enriching thing he could do...and that's what he did. #StupidWatergate
The most galling aspect of his myriad ethical abuses is that they are entirely obvious but the GOP congress will not uphold their part of the separation of powers bargain struck in the Constitution.
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Here you go: (https://twitter.com/CREWcrew/status/955827857221193728)
President Trump is accused of paying $130,000 in hush money to porn star Stormy Daniels to hide an affair a month before the election. In what is probably just a coincidence, the Trump campaign transferred $130K to the Trump businesses a month after the election.
There's a broader picture here too: the fact that Trump is so easily compromised and so willing to break laws to save his skin, it's impossible to think that the Russians don't have his tiny orange balls in a vice. He's basically proving the naughty bits of the Steele Dossier all on his own.
He'll fuck anything that moves (even raw-dogging with a porn star which has to be terrifying for Melania from back when they used to have sex) and he'll pay up when someone threatens to spill the beans. He paid off Daniels, he had his buddy at the National Enquirer "catch and kill" the story of another affair involving a Playboy model, and he has Jessica Drake in an NDA following her accusation of sexual assault against him.
His was overheard being offered hookers in Russia, and his bodyguard claimed to have fended them off and then remained outside Trump's room for a couple of hours to make sure they didn't come back. Sure...right! Or to make sure they left once Trump was done. The Russians are experts at this, and Trump is a grotesque pig of a man. I have no doubt that he walked into their honey trap with his flies wide open, and they've been yanking him around ever since.
Well that, plus the hundreds of millions of dollars they've laundered through his properties over the years.
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Because the President and First Lady - whoever they are - essentially are America's royal family, it's hard to ignore the personal drama playing out alongside the political one. The confluence of the anniversary of their first year in office, their 13th wedding anniversary, the planned trip to the economic summit in Davos and the Stormy Daniels revelations are hard to ignore.
As I mentioned above [Gross Mental Image Alert] Trump raw-dogged it with a porn star, for about a year, right after he and Melania got married and she bore his son. That's just horrendous news on so many levels. I have limited sympathy for Melania - she admitted to marrying him for money and he wasn't exactly an unknown quantity when she met him - but even still that's pretty cold, cruel, callous and dangerous behavior on his part.
So, how are things going? They spent their 13th wedding anniversary apart - he was stuck in Washington, hiding under his bed while the slightly more grown-up folks there tried to re-open the government. But she celebrated their political anniversary by tweeting a photo of herself - not with Donald but with a square-jawed Marine (who looked like he was actually 6' 3", 239lbs). Her tweet didn't even mention Donald. They have not been seen together in public recently, and she just announced that she's not now going to be joining him on the Davos trip.
Trump doesn't read, so I doubt he's read the legend of Icarus. It's too late for him to do so now.
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Melania being pissed at him is the least of his problems.
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Melania being pissed at him is the least of his problems.
In the movies, she’d roll on him to Mueller in retribution. But this is all crazier than any movie.
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Melania being pissed at him is the least of his problems.
I suspect she knows a lot...
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I suspect she knows a lot...
I suspect she doesn't.
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I suspect she doesn't.
Michelle knows a lot, therefore Melania knows a lot. QED.
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Michelle knows a lot, therefore Melania knows a lot. QED.
Clearly they're similar power couples.
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Melania knows she should have negotiated a better prenup.
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Melania knows she should have negotiated a better prenup.
She should also know that his subcontractors often have a hard time getting paid.
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She should also know that his subcontractors often have a hard time getting paid.
Apparently all you need is a story to tell, in order to get paid.
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Melania knows she should have negotiated a better prenup.
The book and movie deals will leave her and Barron set for life...
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Melania skipped traveling to Davos with Donald in order to do something less depressing, apparently. She visited the Holocaust Museum.
In other news, the right-wing freakout about the FBI's secret society is absolutely hilarious as every single element of it was completely debunked in a matter of a day or two. It was a single text out of 50,000, which was in jest, there were no meetings, no other texts about meetings and no "deleted" texts because they were lost temporarily - not deleted - when about 3500 agents switched from iPhone to Android (or the other way around) and those messages have all since been recovered.
Hannity had to switch from stoking this particular fire to a car chase video because the whole thing was crumbling around him as he poked. Literally, "Hey! Squirrel!" But therein lies the rub. The story was out there, being signal-boosted by the right-wing media and the likes of Senate Homeland Committee Chairman Ron Johnson, who claimed to have seen classified information that added credence to the burgeoning scandal, but which of course did not...could not...have existed. Now it's a complete non-story, and Fox et al are just letting it drop. No retraction, no mea culpa, no correction. Johnson has walked back his bullshit, but that too goes unreported on right-wing media.
So now we can add this to the ever-lengthening list of "Zombie Lies", that are completely false but will live forever in the hearts and minds of Republicans everywhere and be impossible to kill. They know it to be true because they've never been told anything to the contrary. Also, Hannity et al will dig this up again in the future once it's had time to fester and become weaponized. Like kimchi.
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Why won't the Democrats release the memo??? RELEASE THE MEMO!!!
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how about this, the “memo” gets released along with Trump’s tax returns. You game you fucking republican pussies?
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Narrator: They aren’t game
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I'm tired of hearing the press talk about the "memo." Calling it a memo is misleading as it implies it is a FBI memo. It's not a memo, but a Devin Nunes talking point. So stop being so fucking lazy and getting spoonfed by the Republicans, and start clamoring about whether Nunes will release his talking point.
Besides, it appears that his talking point is in essence that Carter Page's apparently damning conversation(s) are tainted because the FISA warrant shouldn't have been issued. In other words, "The dead body you found in the trunk can't be used in court, cause the driver didn't really cross the yellow line." This is the argument that they have been reduced to?
Many Americans will want to know about the dead body, and how it got there.
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RELEASE THE MEMO!!!
By the way, who the hell is supposed to be prohibiting the release of the memo? Ultimately it is Obama's fault, plainly, but just sort of functionally, who is supposed to be hindering this revelation of truth and justice?
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This is the argument that they have been reduced to?
Yes. On every topic.
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RELEASE THE MEMO!!!
By the way, who the hell is supposed to be prohibiting the release of the memo? Ultimately it is Obama's fault, plainly, but just sort of functionally, who is supposed to be hindering this revelation of truth and justice?
Actually, it's cock full o' sensitive information, because they took the intelligence gathered for the Russia investigation and cherry-picked it for something that could discredit the FBI. Nunes has already shared it with the entire House Republican caucus, even though the information was under such restricted access that only the Chairman (Nunes) and Ranking Member (Schiff) of the Intelligence Committee, plus a couple of staffers each, were allowed to read it, and only then in a SCIF, and they weren't allowed to take copies or even notes. So they're already blathering confidential information around the Hill, but at least this wasn't given directly to the Russians like Trump did.
So it cannot be released because it's classified, hence the "release the memo" talking point. If they ever were allowed to release the memo, we'd all see what a giant steaming pile of nothing it actually is. So this is perfect Republican fodder because it's literally "fake news" and the universe's supplies of irony have been exhausted in just the first year of the Trump administration.
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Also, you know who could release the memo if he wanted to? Trump. He is allowed to declassify anything he feels like at any time. He could just tweet it out and there'd be no repercussions on him.
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It would be good for Trump to have as many enemies as possible. Release away.
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RELEASE THE MEMO!!!
It's coming out today, reportedly. Also, it appears that Nunes has "materially changed" the memo from the form that was approved for release - entirely on a party-line vote - by the House "Intelligence" Committee. The changed memo has been sent to the White House, so changes are a moot issue if it's released by Trump (he has the authority to do so). If it's released by the House Committee, it's yet another serious breach of rules and etiquette that will go unremarked.
It's just worth taking a step back at this moment. With this memo, House Republicans are positing that Trump-appointee Wray, Trump-appointee McCabe and Trump-appointee Rosenstein - amongst others - are trying to cover up the FBI's interference on behalf of Clinton in an election that Trump won. Also, Putin is innocent. I have stopped watching Black Mirror because the news is far more far-fetched and far more scary.
Meanwhile, Cabinet members and Trump appointees continue to resign in droves; hundreds of government roles remain unfilled - like the Ambassador to South Korea (because there's nothing important happening there) - and those in office continue to collect corruption allegations like they're Pokemons. Ben Carson is the latest, virtually completing the set of cabinet secretaries in ethics violations.
One year and 11 days in...
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With this memo, House Republicans are positing that Trump-appointee Wray, Trump-appointee McCabe and Trump-appointee Rosenstein - amongst others - are trying to cover up the FBI's interference on behalf of Clinton in an election that Trump won.
What is your position on FBI (or other governmental agency) interference in the election? It didn't happen or it doesn't matter since he won?
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What is your position on FBI (or other governmental agency) interference in the election? It didn't happen or it doesn't matter since he won?
If Americans want people tried and punished for breaking the law, then it should not matter who they are. So, if Hillary broke the law, appropriate action should be taken. If Trump has broken the law, then appropriate action should be taken. Would be interesting to see a bunch of honest people in office. Yes, I know that is me on a high since I got a hug from Carl Lewis this morning.
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What is your position on FBI (or other governmental agency) interference in the election? It didn't happen or it doesn't matter since he won?
The FBI was investigating both nominees.
They announced that they were investigating only one.
Then they announced they were re-opening the investigation into that nominee 10 days before the election.
It what world would their goal be to elect the nominee they announced those investigations into?
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What is your position on FBI (or other governmental agency) interference in the election? It didn't happen or it doesn't matter since he won?
I think Comey should not have publicized that he was considering reopening the Clinton investigation because of Anthony Weiner's laptop in the days before the election. And that was particularly improper given the fact that Trump's campaign was actually under an active investigation was not publicized.
On a lesser level the NYC FBI office was constantly leaking selective stuff about the Clinton investigation through Guiliani that the Trump campaign continued to make hay with. That probably shouldn't happen, but I don't think it's that big of a deal and is little more than sour grapes, but indicative of how truly ridiculous the GOP's war on "partisan Clinton/Obama agents in the deep state FBI" is.
I don't understand the argument that the FBI did anything improper regarding the Trump campaign especially given the fact that nothing that the FBI did regarding the Trump campaign was publicized prior to the election.
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It what world would their goal be to elect the nominee they announced those investigations into?
In the same world where a group of predominantly white, male, middle aged law enforcement officers have been secretly harboring an extreme liberal bias.
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I don't understand the argument that the FBI did anything improper regarding the Trump campaign especially given the fact that nothing that the FBI did regarding the Trump campaign was publicized prior to the election.
BUT THERE EMAILS TEXTS!!!
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BUT THERE EMAILS TEXTS!!!
Yes. Texts by the same guy who wrote the first draft of the Comey letter which probably tipped the election to Trump.
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On a lesser level the NYC FBI office was constantly leaking selective stuff about the Clinton investigation through Guiliani that the Trump campaign continued to make hay with. That probably shouldn't happen, but I don't think it's that big of a deal and is little more than sour grapes, but indicative of how truly ridiculous the GOP's war on "partisan Clinton/Obama agents in the deep state FBI" is.
I think it's actually a very big deal as they effectively blackmailed Comey into reigniting the meaningless email investigation days before the election. And I believe that it is probable that this group of FBI agents acted in a coordinated way to spread lies to various media outlets.
I think there's probably quite a bit of fire beneath the Tumplandia angle and hopefully it will come to light in due course, but again, this is another excellent example of what you can see everywhere you look - if you want to know what sort of fucked up shit the Republicans are doing just listen to what they're accusing everyone else of.
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I think it's actually a very big deal as they effectively blackmailed Comey into reigniting the meaningless email investigation days before the election. And I believe that it is probable that this group of FBI agents acted in a coordinated way to spread lies to various media outlets.
Perhaps. But at the end of the day, that was Comey's call and he made the wrong one, which ended up mattering a lot.
I think there's probably quite a bit of fire beneath the Tumplandia angle and hopefully it will come to light in due course, but again, this is another excellent example of what you can see everywhere you look - if you want to know what sort of fucked up shit the Republicans are doing just listen to what they're accusing everyone else of.
If he stepped on your toe, Devin Nunes would accuse you of cutting off one his feet despite the fact that he's kicking you with it as you're hopping around.
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Perhaps. But at the end of the day, that was Comey's call and he made the wrong one, which ended up mattering a lot.
I'm not so sure it really made a difference anymore. I think people had their minds made up already. I'd like to believe it did make a difference, but people weren't saying they were voting for Donald when they were. I'm amazed at how many people I know, and usually like, voted for him and think he is doing a great job. If he runs and wins again I will not be surprised.
But, I do think Mitch McConnell is one evil fucker.
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I'm not so sure it really made a difference anymore. I think people had their minds made up already. I'd like to believe it did make a difference, but people weren't saying they were voting for Donald when they were. I'm amazed at how many people I know, and usually like, voted for him and think he is doing a great job. If he runs and wins again I will not be surprised.
Nate Silver had a fairly persuasive analysis (https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/the-comey-letter-probably-cost-clinton-the-election/) concluding that amongst the various and myriad factors "The Comey Letter Probably Cost Clinton the Election:"
The impact of Comey’s letter is comparatively easy to quantify, by contrast. At a maximum, it might have shifted the race by 3 or 4 percentage points toward Donald Trump, swinging Michigan, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin and Florida to him, perhaps along with North Carolina and Arizona. At a minimum, its impact might have been only a percentage point or so. Still, because Clinton lost Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin by less than 1 point, the letter was probably enough to change the outcome of the Electoral College.
But, I do think Mitch McConnell is one evil fucker.
He and Paul Ryan deserve more scorn than probably even Trump himself.
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Nate Silver had a fairly persuasive analysis (https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/the-comey-letter-probably-cost-clinton-the-election/) concluding that amongst the various and myriad factors "The Comey Letter Probably Cost Clinton the Election:"
The impact of Comey’s letter is comparatively easy to quantify, by contrast. At a maximum, it might have shifted the race by 3 or 4 percentage points toward Donald Trump, swinging Michigan, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin and Florida to him, perhaps along with North Carolina and Arizona. At a minimum, its impact might have been only a percentage point or so. Still, because Clinton lost Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin by less than 1 point, the letter was probably enough to change the outcome of the Electoral College.
I still think they were looking for a reason to justify voting for him over her. If it was Comey it would have been something else.
But hey, my withholding went down this month. I'm finding my wealth!
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Perhaps. But at the end of the day, that was Comey's call and he made the wrong one, which ended up mattering a lot.
Those were dark days indeed. I do find solace though in the wisdom of our president who promptly demanded atonement from Comey for his reckless decisions and unfair actions.
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Those were dark days indeed. I do find solace though in the wisdom of our president who promptly demanded atonement from Comey for his reckless decisions and unfair actions.
I'm a little distressed that we're going to find out just how much of a sap Rosenstein is.
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I'm a little distressed that we're going to find out just how much of a sap Rosenstein is.
It seems like he may have found some religion between his participation in that idiotic, transparent charade and his oversight of Mueller's investigation.
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It seems like he may have found some religion between his participation in that idiotic, transparent charade and his oversight of Mueller's investigation.
“Of course, we’re all on your team, Mr. President,” Rosenstein told Trump awkwardly.
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“Of course, we’re all on your team, Mr. President,” Rosenstein told Trump awkwardly.
“I’m sorry, Mr. President, could you speak more clearly, and into this flower on my lapel?”
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What is your position on FBI (or other governmental agency) interference in the election? It didn't happen or it doesn't matter since he won?
It didn’t happen - at least, not in the way they’re claiming. The FBI was investigating Clinton for her emails (repeatedly dismissed as a non-issue) AND Trump for possible collusion with Russia (since proven). Prior to the election, only one of these investigations was made public by the FBI, arguably in the most damaging way possible. It was not the one into Trump.
This whole sham is purely to discredit the FBI and, by inference, Mueller’s investigation so that, when his findings are released, Republicans can claim it to be the fruit of that poisoned tree.
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I'm a little distressed that we're going to find out just how much of a sap Rosenstein is.
Rosenstein wrote the fake justification for Comey's firing. He's complicit in this process and it's gobsmacking that he isn't now recused from an investigation in which he's a likely material witness.
Also, remember when Nunes recused himself from the Russia investigation after his hilariously inept attempt to launder White House misinformation on the subject? How the fuck is he all over this FBI memo if he's recused?
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Rosenstein wrote the fake justification for Comey's firing. He's complicit in this process and it's gobsmacking that he isn't now recused from an investigation in which he's a likely material witness.
True, but at this point better him than whomever else Trump appoints to lead the investigation on the DOJ side.
Also, remember when Nunes recused himself from the Russia investigation after his hilariously inept attempt to launder White House misinformation on the subject? How the fuck is he all over this FBI memo if he's recused?
It's entirely bizarre and improper and the fact that he is allowed to behave like this is another example of Paul Ryan's complicity.
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If he runs and wins again I will not be surprised.
I disagree BG. I believe that as long as the dems don't trot Hilary out again they will prevail in 2020.
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I disagree BG. I believe that as long as the dems don't trot Hilary out again they will prevail in 2020.
I sincerely hope you are right.
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I sincerely hope you are right.
I just have to be right.
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I disagree BG. I believe that as long as the dems don't trot Hilary out again they will prevail in 2020.
The DNC does not inspire confidence. I wonder who it will be?
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The DNC does not inspire confidence. I wonder who it will be?
Please no Hillary or Bernie.
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The DNC does not inspire confidence. I wonder who it will be?
It'll be a monkey shit fight of a primary. Biden may run, but it'll be a clown car of candidates including Booker, Harris, de Blasio, Cuomo, Newsome and, yes, Clinton and Sanders.
The good news is that a monkey shit fight of a primary - if it's about issues (and not emails...or dick size) - will grab people's attention so that the surviving candidate will have the name recognition and issue recognition to go up against President Trump Pence Ryan.
This is, of course, assuming that we're not looking to replace President Pelosi.
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ROFTLMAO at Devin Nunes. The Memo is about as damming as a pebble in the Mississippi.
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ROFTLMAO at Devin Nunes. The Memo is about as damming as a pebble in the Mississippi.
It also allows the mainstream media the platform to explain how huuuuge of a Russian stooge is Carter Page. This will backfire spectacularly.
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It'll be a monkey shit fight of a primary. Biden may run, but it'll be a clown car of candidates including Booker, Harris, de Blasio, Cuomo, Newsome and, yes, Clinton and Sanders.
The good news is that a monkey shit fight of a primary - if it's about issues (and not emails...or dick size) - will grab people's attention so that the surviving candidate will have the name recognition and issue recognition to go up against President Trump Pence Ryan.
This is, of course, assuming that we're not looking to replace President Pelosi.
And young Kennedy. I get an email from him nigh on once an hour. They need a Southerner.
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I follow this closely and still don't get what the Trump/Nunes point is.
Even if I accept their talking point that the warrant shouldn't have been issued, so what. Even if I assume all the evidence against Trump came from Page's surveillance (which isn't true), am I then supposed think that the evidence was false? At some point, the evidence will be released and judged on its own merit. If the evidence is persuasive, no one will give a shit whether the search warrant was weak or not; similarly, if the evidence is not persuasive, no one will give a shit whether the search warrant was weak or not.
Bottom line, this last week has been like lame lawyer bullshit. Just let the public/congress see all the evidence and decide for themselves.
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And young Kennedy.
AKA: Baboso.
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It'll be a monkey shit fight of a primary. Biden may run, but it'll be a clown car of candidates including Booker, Harris, de Blasio, Cuomo, Newsome and, yes, Clinton and Sanders.
The good news is that a monkey shit fight of a primary - if it's about issues (and not emails...or dick size) - will grab people's attention so that the surviving candidate will have the name recognition and issue recognition to go up against President Trump Pence Ryan.
This is, of course, assuming that we're not looking to replace President Pelosi.
This is a joke, right? Clinton and Sanders don't have the pull they did 4 years ago. It'll be the lesser-knowns fighting to be the most likeable on TV. In the information age it's become a personality contest. Who of that group is the most charming and eloquent and least offensive?
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This is a joke, right? Clinton and Sanders don't have the pull they did 4 years ago. It'll be the lesser-knowns fighting to be the most likeable on TV. In the information age it's become a personality contest. Who of that group is the most charming and eloquent and least offensive?
I don't think Clinton, Sanders, Biden, Kerry or anyone of that generation will make it far in the primaries if they run. It will probably be someone who's not at the current forefront of the conversation. It's also far enough away that there's a lot more relevant things to speculate about.
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This is a joke, right? Clinton and Sanders don't have the pull they did 4 years ago. It'll be the lesser-knowns fighting to be the most likeable on TV. In the information age it's become a personality contest. Who of that group is the most charming and eloquent and least offensive?
I do think some of the old guard will run but, as Bench says, will not make it far in the primary process.
The Obama blueprint is to run as quickly as possible after ascending to a prominent position; that way you have less of a record with which to be beaten by your opponents. So, Booker (first term Senator, 48), Harris (first term Senator, 53) and Newsome (soon to be first term CA Governor, 50) all fit that profile and all seem to be positioning themselves to make a run. Obama was barely a first term Senator, aged 46, when he announced his run.
Booker has his "running into a burning building...literally" good-guy bona fides; Harris is a former state AG, so she has gravitas to go along with her populist / no bullshit personality; and Newsome is a big state Governor who is as polished as the Queen's cutlery with impeccable progressive credentials.
Of course, I was also overlooking Elizabeth Warren (first term Senator, 68). She will drive the right more bonkers perhaps even than Clinton, and force the other candidates to stake out more progressive positions than they would otherwise (Booker, in particular, seems to have maleable principles). Considering that we seem to be veering from opposite to opposite - Bush to Clinton (Bill) to Bush Jr. to Obama to Trump - it stands to reason that it'll be a Booker/Harris/Warren type to win. Newsome, being the straight white male - woke or not - would get left out in this pendulum swing.
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It would so cool if Julian and Joaquin ran as a team and won. They could take turns and nobody would know which was which at any given moment.
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It would so cool if Julian and Joaquin ran as a team and won. They could take turns and nobody would know which was which at any given moment.
Also, a President Castro would drive all those right-wingers (who voted for Raphael Cruz and Marco Rubio) crazy!
Speaking of which, what if Beto does humanity a favor and unseats Cruz in November; does he get to run for the White House straight away too?
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I do think some of the old guard will run but, as Bench says, will not make it far in the primary process.
The Obama blueprint is to run as quickly as possible after ascending to a prominent position; that way you have less of a record with which to be beaten by your opponents. So, Booker (first term Senator, 48), Harris (first term Senator, 53) and Newsome (soon to be first term CA Governor, 50) all fit that profile and all seem to be positioning themselves to make a run. Obama was barely a first term Senator, aged 46, when he announced his run.
Booker has his "running into a burning building...literally" good-guy bona fides; Harris is a former state AG, so she has gravitas to go along with her populist / no bullshit personality; and Newsome is a big state Governor who is as polished as the Queen's cutlery with impeccable progressive credentials.
Of course, I was also overlooking Elizabeth Warren (first term Senator, 68). She will drive the right more bonkers perhaps even than Clinton, and force the other candidates to stake out more progressive positions than they would otherwise (Booker, in particular, seems to have maleable principles). Considering that we seem to be veering from opposite to opposite - Bush to Clinton (Bill) to Bush Jr. to Obama to Trump - it stands to reason that it'll be a Booker/Harris/Warren type to win. Newsome, being the straight white male - woke or not - would get left out in this pendulum swing.
Warren has way too much baggage.
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I do think some of the old guard will run but, as Bench says, will not make it far in the primary process.
The Obama blueprint is to run as quickly as possible after ascending to a prominent position; that way you have less of a record with which to be beaten by your opponents. So, Booker (first term Senator, 48), Harris (first term Senator, 53) and Newsome (soon to be first term CA Governor, 50) all fit that profile and all seem to be positioning themselves to make a run. Obama was barely a first term Senator, aged 46, when he announced his run.
Booker has his "running into a burning building...literally" good-guy bona fides; Harris is a former state AG, so she has gravitas to go along with her populist / no bullshit personality; and Newsome is a big state Governor who is as polished as the Queen's cutlery with impeccable progressive credentials.
Of course, I was also overlooking Elizabeth Warren (first term Senator, 68). She will drive the right more bonkers perhaps even than Clinton, and force the other candidates to stake out more progressive positions than they would otherwise (Booker, in particular, seems to have maleable principles). Considering that we seem to be veering from opposite to opposite - Bush to Clinton (Bill) to Bush Jr. to Obama to Trump - it stands to reason that it'll be a Booker/Harris/Warren type to win. Newsome, being the straight white male - woke or not - would get left out in this pendulum swing.
Also, a) I don't believe Trump will be dealt a legal deathblow and b) he won't run for a second term. If I'm right I expect the Republican candidate to be Haley. From what I've seen she's about as good as they've got.
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Warren has way too much baggage.
Probably. Also, if millennials actually show up to vote (because they got taught a very harsh lesson about not voting last time around), it'll likely be a younger candidate who is preferred. Warren will be 71 on inauguration day 2021, Trump was 70 at his inauguration.
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Also, a) I don't believe Trump will be dealt a legal deathblow and b) he won't run for a second term. If I'm right I expect the Republican candidate to be Haley. From what I've seen she's about as good as they've got.
Haley has Trump stank on her (literally, according to Wolff). Expect any one of the army of deserting Republican congressmen to show up as reborn candidates for President...Ryan most definitely included.
Also, I'm not so sure that a Democratic-lead Congress, aided by chastened Republicans, won't see off Trump before he's due. The RNC may need this done in order to show the voting public that it dealt with its own issue and so can still be trusted with the levers of power. Further, Trump is unlikely to want to stick around for the oversight that will inevitably paralyze his administration if Democrats take either branch of Congress.
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RELEASE THE OTHER MEMO!
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RELEASE THE OTHER MEMO!
And Trump's taxes! Weird how republicans STFU when those 2 topics come up. Frauds, all of them.
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And Trump's taxes! Weird how republicans STFU when those 2 topics come up. Frauds, all of them.
Actually, I was talking about the memo that ace political operative Nunes, after he dramatically reveals that the FBI is secretly comprised of I'm With Her types and Bernie Bros, the memo that APO Nunes will use to bring down the Department of State and its resident assorted Maoists, anarchists, irreligious freethinkers and Bukharinites.
But what the hell, while we're having fun let's release that one, too.
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Actually, I was talking about the memo that ace political operative Nunes, after he dramatically reveals that the FBI is secretly comprised of I'm With Her types and Bernie Bros, the memo that APO Nunes will use to bring down the Department of State and its resident assorted Maoists, anarchists, irreligious freethinkers and Bukharinites.
But what the hell, while we're having fun let's release that one, too.
I'm still trying to figure out how that little toadie Nunes, who I *thought* had recused himself, is still involved in all of this.
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I'm still trying to figure out how that little toadie Nunes, who I *thought* had recused himself, is still involved in all of this.
It’s all good. That memo had no material bearing on the Russia investigation.
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Maddow had an interesting take on The Memo in her opening segment on Friday. In addition to, basically, LOLing at the content, she pointed out that the GOP has tried previously to peddle this same theory to equally laughable results.
The Memo insinuates that the October 2016 FISA warrant on Carter Page was illegal or at least the fruit of Christopher Steele’s poisoned tree. Back in February 2017, Trump caused a storm in a covfefe cup when he tweeted the assertion that Obama had illegally wiretapped Trump Tower...in October 2016. This summer, Nunes’ midnight dash to brief the White House on information they’d given to him in the first place related to the surveillance of Trump campaign staff in...say it with me...October 2016.
Essentially, they’ve had this nonsense in hand for almost a year, and have been trying to find a way to use it this whole time. It seems that it’s the only pushback they have against the Mueller probe, so they’ve been getting more and more desperate to make it stick. The Memo appears to be the latest (last?) go at trying to get some mileage out of it.
Of course, it’s a complete nothingburger because Page had been on the FBI’s radar since before Trump even announced that Mexicans are rapists he was running for office and, as The Memo itself acknowledges, the FBI’s investigation into the Trump campaign was started because of George Papadopoulos’ fat mouth (for which he’s already pleaded guilty), not because of Steele’s dossier.
One has to think that, if they had anything better, they’d be using it. If this is all they have to offer as a repost to the Mueller probe, then they’re all seriously fucked. This was supposed to give Trump cover to fire Rosenstein so that he could appoint someone who could fire Mueller or, at least, hobble his investigation. All they’ve done in actuality is unzipp their fly and show the world to tiny, limp, shriveled appendage inside.
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That's one of my favorite images of this whole goddamned shitshow - APO Nunes racing to the White House breathlessly to inform his betters of information he had received... from the White House.
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Still waiting for the Presidential tweets about the record setting day on Wall Street yesterday...
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Fake Stocks!
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They are back up today. Hannity can now muse about Trump's magic overcoming the Obama stank that caused yesterday's drop.
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They are back up today. Hannity can now muse about Trump's magic overcoming the Obama stank that caused yesterday's drop.
I wish you were joking, but I know you are not.
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I just want to vent again about how bad Democrats are at politics.
They continue to allow weak narratives to live and sometimes thrive. Carter Page? The Dems need to respond to every every reporter sticking a mic in their face on the subject of Carter Page with: why wouldn't the FBI want to spy on a guy who they know was recruited by the Russians, who said he advises the Kremlin, who travels to Russia and publicly thrashes American policy. Seems like if the FBI didn't, it puts America at risk. Do the Republicans really think the FBI shouldn't try to protect America and What did the FBI hear from Carter Page that allowed them to extend the warrant, we demand to know. Instead, they talk about their 10 page rebuttal and the narrative continues to be dossier this, dossier that and poor ole Carter Page. The Dems have to force the press to focus, but they don't really even try.
Also, why aren't they, every time they are interviewed about Trump and Russia continually repeating "Just like with his taxes, if Trump has nothing to hide, he has nothing to fear and should support the investigation?" Don't answer the specifics of the question and repeat this talking point.
Basically Republicans are good at this shit because they are shameless and obedient, continually repeating absurd points with vigor. Dems on the other hand try to rebut the absurd shit instead of launching their own volleys. Get on the offense.
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Basically Republicans are good at this shit because they are shameless and obedient, continually repeating absurd points with vigor. Dems on the other hand try to rebut the absurd shit instead of launching their own volleys. Get on the offense.
You're totally right. Elizabeth Warren is the only one who does a good job of it, and to a lesser extent guys like Ted Lieu.
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You're totally right. Elizabeth Warren is the only one who does a good job of it, and to a lesser extent guys like Ted Lieu.
Swalwell and Schiff do well too (in the area of house intelligence shenanigans, at least). Of the bunch likely to run in 2020, I'd say Harris is the best at burning down opposition stupidity. A debate between her and Trump would be for the ages.
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An interesting night in state special elections on Tuesday night. A Missouri Democrat unseated his Republican opponent in a seat that went for Trump by +28%. The swing was 31%, and that was mirrored in the other three Missouri special elections, albeit ones in which Trump's margin of victory was even higher so the Republicans held those seats.
In 2017, the swing to Democrats in state special elections was 10%. They flipped 34 seats while losing only 4. So far in 2018 (two rounds of special elections), the average swing to Democrats has been 30%. In the "Red Wave" of 2010, the swing to Republicans was about 8%.
Of course, Congressional Democrats are in the process of trying to suck all the wind out of progressives' sails by caving over DACA, so there's still plenty of time between now and November for them to shit this particular bed.
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Looking at his ex-wives and Hope Hicks, one thing that’s certain about Rob Porter: he has a very clear type of woman...
...that he likes to punch.
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Looking at his ex-wives and Hope Hicks, one thing that’s certain about Rob Porter: he has a very clear type of woman...
...that he likes to punch.
But of course he's a very fine young man and deserves to be promoted by Kelly, despite the fact that Kelly was aware of the domestic abuse history because it prevented Porter from getting security clearance. And while Porter is allowed handle all manner of sensitive information that he's not actually cleared to review (because the handling of sensitive information wasn't an issue Trump campaigned on), it's worth it because Kelly knows that he's the type of person that can help American return to the time when "women used to be revered."
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But of course he's a very fine young man and deserves to be promoted by Kelly, despite the fact that Kelly was aware of the domestic abuse history because it prevented Porter from getting security clearance. And while Porter is allowed handle all manner of sensitive information that he's not actually cleared to review (because the handling of sensitive information wasn't an issue Trump campaigned on), it's worth it because Kelly knows that he's the type of person that can help American return to the time when "women used to be revered."
Every single answer to every single question is discreet, unconnected to any other answer, and designed purely to get past the question at hand.
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Every single answer to every single question is discreet, unconnected to any other answer, and designed purely to get past the question at hand.
Here's the full quote. I got it wrong.
“When I was a kid growing up, a lot of things were sacred in our country, women were sacred and looked upon with great honor. That’s obviously not the case anymore, as we see from recent cases.”
And he's the "adult in the room."
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Here's the full quote. I got it wrong.
“When I was a kid growing up, a lot of things were sacred in our country, women were sacred and looked upon with great honor. That’s obviously not the case anymore, as we see from recent cases.”
And he's the "adult in the room."
Is that from the speech where he flat out lied about Frederika Wilson?
So, there's that nonsense about women being respected historically (while being subject to unchecked abuse and lower pay); the lie about Wilson (which was debunked by a video of her speech); Mexicans being too lazy to file for DACA; and Rob Porter being a fine gentleman (while knowing full well that he'd beaten his ex-wives).
We can now add to this list of whoopsies the felony crime of passing confidential information to an unauthorized person. You see, Porter had been refused security clearance; something of which the President is claiming to have been unaware. Unlike, say, Javanka (and all the staff and guests at Mar a Lago) who were permitted to see classified information knowingly by the President - something that the President is allowed to do - Porter was being given classified information on a daily, perhaps hourly basis. Some of this information is so classified that the term for its level of classification is classified.
Kelly and WH Counsel McGann were both aware that: (1) Porter's job evolved handling every piece of paper that Trump reads gets given; and (b) he did not have a security clearance. That means they aided and abetted in the commission of a felony each and every time they allowed Porter to do his job.
Remember the good old days when Clinton's decision to use her own email server to send emails, ones of which were later classified? Yeah, these same folks in Congress - I'm looking at you Trey Bengowdy - who crusaded on this for years are the same people who are ignoring these major breaches of security inside the White House. It turns out that there may be dozens of White House staffers who don't have security clearance - not because of admin or some such; but because the FBI has performed its background check and withheld such clearance.
What the fucking fuck?!
Oh, and another 1000-point drop on the Dow yesterday.
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I don't think my television is going to make it through the election if Dan Patrick keeps showing up a few times every evening.
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It's interesting to see how much traction is being gained by the Rob Porter scandal. It's been going on for a week now, and it keeps gaining momentum. I think this is due to a couple of factors: (1) with previous scandals, another usually comes along within days to occupy the press and so the earlier one simply fades into the background noise; and (b) it seems to encapsulate all of the non-Russia issues of this administration.
To wit, it involves:
- Serious breaches of security protocol;
- The abuse of women;
- The hiring and harboring of a deplorable;
- Failure to handle routine activities like background checks;
- Failure to deal with a serious issue with any sort of timeliness or aplomb;
- Lying to the media/public;
- Complete lack of professionalism by White House staff; and
- Tone deaf (at best) Presidential tweets.
It's ironic that this is the particular shit that sticks, given Trump's own admitted history as a serial sex pest, but it has claimed Porter himself and a White House speechwriter (who may have gone anyway as he, too, was beating his wife). However, it's also layered on additional evidence that Gen. Kelly is not the "adult in the room", but just another misogynist (to add to his racism from the week prior) who will lie unrepentantly to cover his own arse. WH Counsel Don McGahn, too, is caught up in this as he has known for a year about Porter's offenses, while he and Kelly have known for months that Porter's permanent security clearance was being withheld for the same reason, and neither acted on it despite Porter touching every piece of confidential paper that crossed the Resolute desk.
The list of high-level officials leaving this administration is endless. Losing Kelly and McGahn (and Hicks - who has proven many times that she's grossly incompetent and serially unprofessional) would be a severe blow - especially McGahn who is eyeball-deep in the Russia defense. No one good will take those posts, and the US government will continue to be purged of competence while this administration sinks deeper and deeper into the quicksand.
While the economy continues to be strong, the one economic indicator that Trump likes to point to - the DJIA - is deserting him. Market prognosticators are expecting this correction to continue for a while yet, undercutting the one argument that Republicans can make in favor of their tax cut bill. Pollsters are now predicting a 40 -50 seat swing in the House in November.
ETA: As an aside, Omarosa - supposedly sequestered in the Big Brother House since before the Porter scandal broke - has spoken on the show about the shockingly high number of misogynists and abusers there are in the administration. I would not be surprised if the producers teed up that discussion point, but given what we've seen in recent weeks, she doesn't appear to be exaggerating.
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Layering on the Porter scandal, Kelly's Deputy CoS has resigned to take another post in the administration. Porter had been tagged for the promotion to that vacant spot. All this, knowing full-well that he had very credible accusations of wife-beating against hime; FBI Director Wray confirming today that they had concluded their security background check on Porter last July, and the result was "Nope".
Speaking of vacant positions, the agency that overseas the railroads - nothing serious going wrong there, right? Eh? Oh - has been without a director for over a year. Trump had nominated a decent candidate ages ago, but McConnell et al haven't got around to confirming him yet. No rush; the agency was being run by Heath Hall - the deputy director. Hall has no experience in rail administration or safety, save having interned at the agency as a student. He also was maintaining his old job, so he was getting paid twice and, worse, was using agency resources to support his other employment. He was found out and quit with immediate effect. So now no one is running the agency. #MAGA
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Regarding the railroads, I noticed that the dickhead in chief hasn't claimed that all the train wrecks over the last year can be credited to him, you know, the way he did for the lack of plane crashes. I don't blame the wrecks on him, just pointing out more of his stupid hypocrisy.
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Meanwhile, instead of letting people on food stamps decide what food to buy and prepare for themselves and their family, the party of small government conservatives has announced that the government will decide what items of food (https://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2018/02/12/585130274/trump-administration-wants-to-decide-what-food-snap-recipients-will-get) they will get in a monthly "box." Of course, in addition to being dehumanizing, ignoring the specific needs of people with particular allergies, cooking experiences, and just plain taste while providing much less of a food benefit, it's also significantly more expensive to have to arrange for the logistics, shipping, and delivery of these boxes with the added benefit of reducing the amount of money spent in the local shops where the food stamp recipient would normally buy his or her food. The plan will also kick 4 million people off the program.
There is of course absolutely no good public reason for this policy. I assume the only beneficiaries will be the Sysco's of the world who will get government contracts to supply the contents of the boxes.
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I don't understand why the media doesn't just fucking savage the administration over this Porter thing. The timing literally could not be better. (The timing isn't terribly relevant if you're a woman getting punched in the fucking face, though, I don't imagine.) The president lied about it, that shitstain Kelly lied about it, that painfully stupid glob that some neck wrestled out of an Arkansas River noodle hole lied about it. I don't understand why at every press conference, at every opportunity, why doesn't everyone who isn't there representing InfoWars or the fucking Flat Earth Society, why don't they repeatedly ask Why the fuck are you freakish savages lying to cover for a wife beater?
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Obviously wife-beating cannot be exclusionary given Trump’s documented past on this. Reports now say that the cover up is to protect Javanka and the myriad other White House staff and passers-by who are allowed to see classified material without a permanent security clearance. Apparently, there’s a lot of staff who have been refused a permanent clearance because, presumably, they’re just too good.
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ETA: As an aside, Omarosa - supposedly sequestered in the Big Brother House since before the Porter scandal broke - has spoken on the show about the shockingly high number of misogynists and abusers there are in the administration. I would not be surprised if the producers teed up that discussion point, but given what we've seen in recent weeks, she doesn't appear to be exaggerating.
She also said Pence is much scarier. FWIW.
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Obviously wife-beating cannot be exclusionary given Trump’s documented past on this. Reports now say that the cover up is to protect Javanka and the myriad other White House staff and passers-by who are allowed to see classified material without a permanent security clearance. Apparently, there’s a lot of staff who have been refused a permanent clearance because, presumably, they’re just too good.
Sure. But why is the supposed liberal media not going nutso on this? Why are they allowing all of this blatant lying? Politico had a thing where they said that Kelly's staff had been "confronted with zigzagging accounts." No, motherfucker, they are FUCKING LYING. Quit being led around by the nose by this traitorous filth. The Times is obviously going to continue the dirty scrotum licking. Someone has to step the fuck up.
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She also said Pence is much scarier. FWIW.
Trump is an anchorless idiot owned by organized crime. Pence is a fucking closet case Christian zombie. (Several possible redundancies in there I suppose.) I'm not sure which I'd pick if I had to. Lucky for me, I don't have to; we're stuck with the both of them. For now.
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Sure. But why is the supposed liberal media not going nutso on this? Why are they allowing all of this blatant lying? Politico had a thing where they said that Kelly's staff had been "confronted with zigzagging accounts." No, motherfucker, they are FUCKING LYING. Quit being led around by the nose by this traitorous filth. The Times is obviously going to continue the dirty scrotum licking. Someone has to step the fuck up.
They should also be yelling at McConnell and Ryan for not doing anything to investigate how this security breach occurred in the first place and why the administration was lying to cover it up for so long.
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Nothing worse than Christian - for sure.
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So, in confirming the payment to Stormy Daniels, Cohen most likely blew up the NDA. These things require silence from both parties, and the Trump side just violated that. Daniels’ representative has stated that she’ll be talking now - I’m sure the bidding war is intense already.
These guys are really bad at this. The merest hint of scrutiny, and their shenanigans explode in their faces. Something Stormy knows a lot about.
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Nothing worse than Christian - for sure.
Why are you bringing 50 Shades into this?
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So, in confirming the payment to Stormy Daniels, Cohen most likely blew up the NDA. These things require silence from both parties, and the Trump side just violated that. Daniels’ representative has stated that she’ll be talking now - I’m sure the bidding war is intense already.
Gonna be a Stormy weekend in Tampa. (http://www.tampabay.com/florida-politics/buzz/2018/02/14/porn-star-stormy-daniels-cashing-in-on-trump-fame-with-visit-to-florida-strip-club/)
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I'm impressed by the outrage among the multitudes of self-professed evangelical Christian Trump supporters at having backed an apostate sexual deviant serial adulterer whore mongering habitual liar. Oh, and I forgot, who hates the poor and the sick and the dispossessed. You know, just like Jesus did.
Seriously, fuck all of you goddamned hypocritical cumstains.
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Getting lost in the noise of another school shooting - the NYT is reporting that there’s at least 100 White House staff who have access to classified material but do not have a permanent security clearance. This includes Javanka but, gobsmackingly, it also includes WH Counsel Don McGahn.
One. Hundred.
Ummm...lock them up?
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I'm impressed by the outrage among the multitudes of self-professed evangelical Christian Trump supporters at having backed an apostate sexual deviant serial adulterer whore mongering habitual liar. Oh, and I forgot, who hates the poor and the sick and the dispossessed. You know, just like Jesus did.
Seriously, fuck all of you goddamned hypocritical cumstains.
"But but... He never raped anybody... He didn't kill no one."
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"But but... He never raped anybody... He didn't kill no one."
19 different women have publicly accused him of sexual assault, he doubled down on the death penalty for the Central Park Five even after evidence proved their innocence, and since he took office there has been a massive increase in civilians killed in US military strikes.
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Getting lost in the noise of another school shooting - the NYT is reporting that there’s at least 100 White House staff who have access to classified material but do not have a permanent security clearance. This includes Javanka but, gobsmackingly, it also includes WH Counsel Don McGahn.
One. Hundred.
Ummm...lock them up?
One hundred and thirty (https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/white-house/scores-top-white-house-officials-lack-permanent-security-clearances-n848191). Including 30 whose positions report directly to the President and 34 who joined the administration on its first day. 10 of the 24 seats on the National Security Council are occupied by people without a permanent clearance.
Sarah Sanders, too, is without a permanent clearance, so it will be interesting to see how she dodges a direct question about her personal security clearance, or lack thereof. No way to demur on that one.
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19 different women have publicly accused him of sexual assault, he doubled down on the death penalty for the Central Park Five even after evidence proved their innocence, and since he took office there has been a massive increase in civilians killed in US military strikes.
Trump's drones have killed as many civilians in one year as Obama's drones killed in eight years, and Obama's killings were already at an unacceptable level.
Trump has unleashed (literally) the generals, so there is no civilian oversight to temper their enthusiasm for a target with concern for non-targets sitting at the same dinner table.
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One hundred and thirty (https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/white-house/scores-top-white-house-officials-lack-permanent-security-clearances-n848191). Including 30 whose positions report directly to the President and 34 who joined the administration on its first day.
This also includes Sarah Sanders, so it will be interesting to see how she dodges a direct question about her personal security clearance, or lack thereof.
I'm sure the fact that so many ethically questionable highly self-enriching scumbags have been permitted access to state secrets -- against the express will of the FBI -- poses no threat to national security once they leave office with that knowledge.
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I'm sure the fact that so many ethically questionable highly self-enriching scumbags have been permitted access to state secrets -- against the express will of the FBI -- poses no threat to national security once they leave office with that knowledge.
They'll be able to share all the classified and otherwise sensitive information they have - but first they'll just have to stand in line at the payphone like everyone else.
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One hundred and thirty (https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/white-house/scores-top-white-house-officials-lack-permanent-security-clearances-n848191). Including 30 whose positions report directly to the President and 34 who joined the administration on its first day. 10 of the 24 seats on the National Security Council are occupied by people without a permanent clearance.
Sarah Sanders, too, is without a permanent clearance, so it will be interesting to see how she dodges a direct question about her personal security clearance, or lack thereof. No way to demur on that one.
What is the difference between a permanent and non-permanent security clearance?
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What is the difference between a permanent and non-permanent security clearance?
In this administration, the answer is "there was none." Sounds like now that the public realizes this, Kelly wants to make a distinction between the two.
Of course, one might wonder how the right, particularly the lock her up crowd, ignore far greater transgressions from their tribe.
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What is the difference between a permanent and non-permanent security clearance?
Everyone starts with an interim clearance for those whose positions required same. In the past, those who failed to get permanent clearance were asked to leave that post. Not so in the Trump administration.
This is poor management but not illegal if the President is aware and allows the situation to continue. However, it’s craven when the Trump campaign was based substantially on the possibility that the opposing candidate had be lax in handling of classified communications.
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Kushner has been there since day one, and reads the PDB in lieu of his father-in-law. He has had to “revise” his security application multiple times and is still making revisions more than a year later. He has been denied a permanent clearance because, amongst other things, he and his wife are tens of millions of dollars in debt to foreign entities. This is exactly the sort of thing that a security check is meant to uncover, because substantial debt (foreign or not) leaves you wide open to being leveraged.
Kushner will never get a permanent clearance. Unless Congress acts, he will continue to be security risk every day.
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Everyone starts with an interim clearance for those whose positions required same. In the past, those who failed to get permanent clearance were asked to leave that post. Not so in the Trump administration.
This is poor management but not illegal if the President is aware and allows the situation to continue. However, it’s craven when the Trump campaign was based substantially on the possibility that the opposing candidate had be lax in handling of classified communications.
You are equating 'non permanent clearance' with 'denied clearance'. This is not the same thing.
Everyone starts with an investigation. Some that are considered 'low risk' receive an interim clearance (this is what the article is referring to as non-permanent). Everyone receives final adjudication for their permanent clearance. I have colleagues that are approaching two years of waiting for final adjudication.
You take a misunderstanding of the terms and process and draw a conclusion that Trump is therefore craven in his disregard for mishandling classified material. This is hyperbole that muddies the waters of the discussion.
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Kushner has been there since day one, and reads the PDB in lieu of his father-in-law. He has had to “revise” his security application multiple times and is still making revisions more than a year later. He has been denied a permanent clearance because, amongst other things, he and his wife are tens of millions of dollars in debt to foreign entities. This is exactly the sort of thing that a security check is meant to uncover, because substantial debt (foreign or not) leaves you wide open to being leveraged.
Kushner will never get a permanent clearance. Unless Congress acts, he will continue to be security risk every day.
You have again equated a lack of final adjudication with a denial. The two are not the same. A failure to list items on your SF-86 will delay final adjudication, but will not by itself disqualify anyone from receiving a security clearance. However, as I mentioned in the previous post, receiving an interim does indicate that someone is considered generally 'low risk'.
Also, there is nothing that says Kushner receives the PDB 'in lieu' of Trump. This is also hyperbole. Or more like fake news.
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Of course, one might wonder how the right, particularly the lock her up crowd, ignore far greater transgressions from their tribe.
A subjective decision (by one empowered to make such a decision) to allow those with interim clearance to review classified material is not a transgression.
Mishandling classified information in violation of federal law is a transgression.
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Trump has unleashed (literally) the generals, so there is no civilian oversight to temper their enthusiasm for a target with concern for non-targets sitting at the same dinner table.
More of (disgusting) hyperbole. Generals have 'enthusiasm' for killing non-targets that might dine with an actual target. Only a civilian can provide the required oversight to stop these blood thirsty monsters. There is no other explanation.
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A subjective decision (by one empowered to make such a decision) to allow those with interim clearance to review classified material is not a transgression.
Mishandling classified information in violation of federal law is a transgression.
Given that you know (or should, if you are interested) people who CANNOT get security clearances were continually allowed access to top secret material, you might as well scream from the top of your lungs that you have no intellectual honesty.
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Given that you know (or should, if you are interested) people who CANNOT get security clearances were continually allowed access to top secret material, you might as well scream from the top of your lungs that you have no intellectual honesty.
Who is it that 'CANNOT' get a security clearance?
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Who is it that 'CANNOT' get a security clearance?
Rob Porter, for one.
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Rob Porter, for one.
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Allegations of domestic violence do not necessarily prevent someone from receiving a clearance.
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Kushner is likely two.
Along those lines, it was reported that he requests more secret documents than everyone, but those on the NSC.
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Allegations of domestic violence do not necessarily prevent someone from receiving a clearance.
Except in his specific case, they did.
Just give up
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Allegations of domestic violence do not necessarily prevent someone from receiving a clearance.
The reports I saw were that Justice had concluded he could not receive clearance.
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The reports I saw were that Justice had concluded he could not receive clearance.
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Justice cannot make that decision.
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Except in his specific case, they did.
Just give up
No, he was terminated which ended the clearance process.
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More of (disgusting) hyperbole. Generals have 'enthusiasm' for killing non-targets that might dine with an actual target. Only a civilian can provide the required oversight to stop these blood thirsty monsters. There is no other explanation.
This is exactly why the founding fathers subjugated the military under civilian leadership.
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You have again equated a lack of final adjudication with a denial. The two are not the same. A failure to list items on your SF-86 will delay final adjudication, but will not by itself disqualify anyone from receiving a security clearance. However, as I mentioned in the previous post, receiving an interim does indicate that someone is considered generally 'low risk'.
Also, there is nothing that says Kushner receives the PDB 'in lieu' of Trump. This is also hyperbole. Or more like fake news.
Credible reports from White House sources state that Kushner reads the PDB while Trump never reads it but will occasionally take a verbal summation.
As to clearances, they’ve had since November 2016 to work on this. People who came over from the campaign, transition and into the administration are still without a permanent clearance fourteen fucking months later. Senior people, like Kushner, McGahn and Sanders.
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Allegations of domestic violence do not necessarily prevent someone from receiving a clearance.
Yes, they do. And in Porter’s case, they actually did.
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Yes, they do. And in Porter’s case, they actually did.
You may believe this. You may want this to be true. Perhaps it should be true. But, I can tell you with absolute certainty that allegations of domestic violence, or any other crime, will not necessarily prevent someone from receiving a clearance.
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No, he was terminated which ended the clearance process.
The White House was alerted to problems with Porter’s clearance in March 2017. By July 2017, the FBI has completed its background investigation and passed the complete results on to the WH. There was some clarification requested, the back and forth on which was completed by November. He was not getting a permanent clearance yet was still being considered for a promotion until the abused ex-wives went public and he was forced out.
To say that he was fired before the vetting process was complete is a complete misstatement of the circumstances.
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You may believe this. You may want this to be true. Perhaps it should be true. But, I can tell you with absolute certainty that allegations of domestic violence, or any other crime, will not necessarily prevent someone from receiving a clearance.
Yes, nothing of course "necessarily" prevents clearance. That's why generally a nondisclosure is generally worse than the underlying conduct that you failed to disclose (except Kushner, I guess). But in this case the FBI had closed their file after not agreeing to issue permanent clearance. And yes, the FBI only makes recommendations and does not make the final decision, but their recommendations are usually given deference.
And usually "interim" does not connote "indefinite". I too know plenty of people working in government granted interim security clearance and the case has not been investigated due to backlog. I was one of these people and the investigation never occurred by the time my term was up. But the folks in the inner circle usually get their cases looked at pretty quickly.
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CoS Kelly has stated in a memo that - as of Friday this week - no one will be allowed to continue working under an interim clearance if they've been on that status since June 1, 2017 or earlier. Most notably, this would include Kushner. Asked about it in the press briefing today, Sarah Sanders said that nothing would interfere with the "good work" that Jared is doing on many fronts (she didn't clarify who for), a position that is in direct conflict with Kelly's memo.
Meanwhile, Don Jr. is in India where he will have a one-on-one meeting with the Prime Minister and give a foreign policy speech. The conflation of government and business is so complete now, it seems almost impossible to unravel it.
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Meanwhile, in the woke world, Democrats just flipped a state legislature seat in Kentucky (https://www.vox.com/2018/2/20/17034262/kentucky-special-election-linda-belcher) in a district that Trump won by 49 points (72-23). So far in 2018, in the 14 state special elections, Democrats are running 28 points ahead of Clinton and 14 points ahead of Obama. That's nuts!
It's not known what impact the Russians had on the actual result of the 2016 election (despite what Pompeu, Pence and Sanders would have you believe), and it's possible that much of their Fake News™ reverberated around an echo chamber and had little effect. It's also true that the election came down to less than 80,000 votes in three rust belt states, so they didn't need to move the needle much to make flip the result to their guy. It is known that they are still working on it and will be around for this year's mid-terms and the 2020 general unless we do something to stop them.
However, at least for the mid-terms, against this kind of wave, how much can the Russians do? They are not trying to eke out a win in the electoral college; 2018 is district by district, state by state for national and local seats. How many inboxes can they hack? How many Facebook groups can they set up? Do they even know if Triantaphyllis is a candidate or an STD Trump caught from Stormy Daniels?
Turnout will always trump (pun intended) election rigging (millennials failed to turn out in 2016, for example). I'm not saying that we should be complacent about Russian meddling in 2018 and certainly in 2020, but the consistent and growing swing to the Democrats, combined with the consist and growing pile of shit being accumulated by Trump, his administration and congressional Republicans - plus Mueller's death by a thousand cuts investigation - surely points to a shift that will be insurmountable by legitimate or other means.
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Do they even know if Triantaphyllis is a candidate or an STD Trump caught from Stormy Daniels?
Fwiw, he was my daughter's freshman week counselor, and his father and I played soccer together in college.
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Fwiw, he was my daughter's freshman week counselor, and his father and I played soccer together in college.
I bet the cheerleaders didn't chant his name much. :)
Like the most unpopular man in the home stands at a Borussia Munchen Gladbach game who starts "Give me a 'B'!"
It seems Alex T doesn't think Donald Trump is a good President but, from his commercials, you can't tell what sets him apart from his primary opponent (who, presumably, also isn't fond of The Donald). No biggie. He's not in my district. Just a disinterested observation. Seems like a nice young man and I wish him well.
I'm District 2, so we get to replace Ted Poe this year. I'm voting for Todd Litton, who seems like a solid candidate and one with a bit more horsepower to take on the Republican opponent than the others in the primary .
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Fwiw, he was my daughter's freshman week counselor, and his father and I played soccer together in college.
And of course his father and I were in law school together.
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I bet the cheerleaders didn't chant his name much. :)
Like the most unpopular man in the home stands at a Borussia Munchen Gladbach game who starts "Give me a 'B'!"
It seems Alex T doesn't think Donald Trump is a good President but, from his commercials, you can't tell what sets him apart from his primary opponent (who, presumably, also isn't fond of The Donald). No biggie. He's not in my district. Just a disinterested observation. Seems like a nice young man and I wish him well.
I'm District 2, so we get to replace Ted Poe this year. I'm voting for Todd Litton, who seems like a solid candidate and one with a bit more horsepower to take on the Republican opponent than the others in the primary .
The knock on Alex T is that he lives outside the district, which people feel will be an issue in the general. I do live in District 7 and have been stumping for Laura Moser. Incidentally, and to tie this thread to another of this forum's passions, Alyssa Milano will be spearheading a rally for Laura at the Firehouse Saloon at 4:00 pm on Saturday.
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The knock on Alex T is that he lives outside the district, which people feel will be an issue in the general. I do live in District 7 and have been stumping for Laura Moser. Incidentally, and to tie this thread to another of this forum's passions, Alyssa Milano will be spearheading a rally for Laura at the Firehouse Saloon at 4:00 pm on Saturday.
Moser's my pick too. Triantaphyllis and Fletcher are the wrong kind of Democrats, IMO.
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Gates takes a plea deal and yet more charges filed against Manafort. He now faces charges in two different venues - DC and Virginia - such is the breadth and volume of the charges against him. Mueller is accelerating; now with 4 convictions and 14 other individuals under indictment for serious charges. Very hard to argue (outside of the Fox News bubble) that this is a witch hunt because this has more witches than Eastwick.
Maddow had a very interesting analysis of the Manafort indictments on Thursday. She followed the timeline of the (heavily supported) allegations to show that:
(1) He was desperate for money following the toppling of his sugar daddy Yanokovich in 2015;
(2) Throughout 2015 and early 2016, Manafort (actively aided by Gates) made increasingly desperate (read "fraudulent") efforts to borrow millions from various sources, only to be shot down at every turn;
(3) In early 2016, he reached out to the Trump campaign and offered his services for free (an odd thing given his ongoing financial troubles);
(4) In May 2016, Trump appointed him as campaign chairman (and Gates as deputy);
(5) In July 2016, Manafort got a loan from a small bank in Chicago that specializes in providing services to veterans (Manafort has no ties to Chicago and isn't a veteran);
(6) That bank is owned by a major Trump booster; and
(7) The loan was for $16 million, representing one quarter of the small bank's available capital.
Follow the money...
Meanwhile, Gates' plea deal is quite lenient, given that many pundits - prior to the plea - were suggesting that Mueller already had so much on Manafort that they didn't need Gates to roll. But Manafort and Gates have been joined at the hip for years and, perhaps more importantly, Gates stayed with the campaign past Manafort's tenure and on into the transition. He may be offering up bigger fish than even Manafort, therefore, in order to get such a sweet plea deal.
Manafort is going to lose every penny he has and going to go to jail for the rest of his life, unless he gives Mueller something even more valuable than his own, smug, fat head. That's a small sack of gifts to pull from; it's basically Jared, Don Jr. or Don Sr. Mueller might want all three (and it may be impossible to give up just one in isolation anyway).
If Manafort isn't desperately trying to work out a plea deal (and witness protection) right now, I'll be gobsmacked. This is being handled like a racketeering case, but they aren't the mafia. No one is going to take the fall to protect Don Corleoneald Trump at the top because there is honor amongst thieves but not amongst these spineless charlatans.
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One hilarious detail that came out with the newest plea deal was how Manafort and Gates created a chain of evidence against themselves, because Manafort didn't know how to convert .pdf files to Word, and back again. He was editing and faking up financial documents, but didn't know how to convert them. Gates did know how, so they were emailing the documents back and forth, detailing their fraudulent activity the whole way.
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One hilarious detail that came out with the newest plea deal was how Manafort and Gates created a chain of evidence against themselves, because Manafort didn't know how to convert .pdf files to Word, and back again. He was editing and faking up financial documents, but didn't know how to convert them. Gates did know how, so they were emailing the documents back and forth, detailing their fraudulent activity the whole way.
I loved that, too. Hey, international criminal mastermind, check this out: File -> Save As -> PDF
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One hilarious detail that came out with the newest plea deal was how Manafort and Gates created a chain of evidence against themselves, because Manafort didn't know how to convert .pdf files to Word, and back again. He was editing and faking up financial documents, but didn't know how to convert them. Gates did know how, so they were emailing the documents back and forth, detailing their fraudulent activity the whole way.
I'm partial to the fact that Gates pled guilty to making a false statement to federal investigators on Feb. 1, 2018.
DUDE LIED IN THE MIDDLE OF HIS PLEA BARGAIN NEGOTIATIONS AND HAD TO COP TO IT IN HIS PLEA BARGAIN.
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I'm partial to the fact that Gates pled guilty to making a false statement to federal investigators on Feb. 1, 2018.
DUDE LIED IN THE MIDDLE OF HIS PLEA BARGAIN NEGOTIATIONS AND HAD TO COP TO IT IN HIS PLEA BARGAIN.
That was good, too. These guys are some slick operators. Mueller must really be at the top of his game to nab guys like this.
Funny thing is, it's a pretty good bet that these slapdicks were the brains behind the operation.
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Funny thing is, it's a pretty good bet that these slapdicks were the brains behind the operation.
Yep. So what are the chances that Uday, Kusay and Jared covered their tracks? I mean, Uday tweeted out proof of him engaging in crimes against election laws in order to deny that he’d violated election laws. What’s the odds that instead of pleading not guilty, he pleads “nothingburger”? Oh, and Manafort went to that meeting.
John Oliver had it nailed when he dubbed this “Stupid Watergate”, because “everyone is stupid and crap at everything“.
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I'm partial to the fact that Gates pled guilty to making a false statement to federal investigators on Feb. 1, 2018.
DUDE LIED IN THE MIDDLE OF HIS PLEA BARGAIN NEGOTIATIONS AND HAD TO COP TO IT IN HIS PLEA BARGAIN.
Apparently that chopped himself off at the knees with that lie, which cost him any leverage he may have had in the bargaining and cost him also his legal team...who quit. The plea agreement he ended up with has him being owned by the FBI until they’re done with him, PLUS a likely 4 - 6 years in jail.
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Trump is having a pretty miserable day (or he should be, if he understood what was going on). He just dropped back to tie his equal-worst approval rating - 35% - after showing signs of improvement until "his" stock market became less bullish and he botched his response to 17 kids getting slaughtered in a Florida high school. Mueller's investigation is rolling up guilty pleas and inching ever closer to Trump's doorstep. The Democratic memo, that the White House tried to release under cover of a busy news weekend, trashes his witch hunt accusation (along with what was left of Nunes' reputation) and garnered significantly more interest after he decided to blast it on Twitter.
Further, having held hostage the Dreamers to extract almost everything he wanted from Democrats over immigration recently - everything save a cut in future immigration (i.e. he got funding for his wall) - Trump canned the deal because he wanted it all. Well, this morning, the US Supreme Court decided not to hear his administration's appeal over a Federal court ruling that keeps DACA in place. So his one and only bargaining chip just evaporated. Dreamers can continue to renew their status and continue to stave off deportation until Congress overrules DACA, for which Republicans now have absolutely zero leverage over Democrats.
Worst. Bond Villain. Ever.
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Meanwhile the Supreme Court has declined to review the nationwide injunction against Trump's termination of DACA, which means DACA recipients can continue to renew their status past Trump's March 5 deadline. DACA must remain in effect pending the trial of the lawsuits filed to block termination of the program.
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I see that Mr. Courageous was quoted as saying:
“I really believe I’d run in there even if I didn’t have a weapon.”
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This is as good a place as any to mention that the CPAC attendees lustily booed the very mention of naturalization ceremonies. Which to me are the single most beautiful, most essentially American function that is. This is the sort of perversion that Trumpism has encouraged to surface. Frankly, I'm glad these disgusting freaks are showing their true colors.
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This is as good a place as any to mention that the CPAC attendees lustily booed the very mention of naturalization ceremonies. Which to me are the single most beautiful, most essentially American function that is. This is the sort of perversion that Trumpism has encouraged to surface. Frankly, I'm glad these disgusting freaks are showing their true colors.
Turns out it wasn't the "illegal" part of "illegal immigration" that they have a problem with.
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This is as good a place as any to mention that the CPAC attendees lustily booed the very mention of naturalization ceremonies. Which to me are the single most beautiful, most essentially American function that is. This is the sort of perversion that Trumpism has encouraged to surface. Frankly, I'm glad these disgusting freaks are showing their true colors.
This is not true.
https://twitchy.com/brettt-3136/2018/02/24/fake-news-no-cpac-attendees-did-not-boo-naturalization-ceremonies-video/ (https://twitchy.com/brettt-3136/2018/02/24/fake-news-no-cpac-attendees-did-not-boo-naturalization-ceremonies-video/)
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Thank god someone told where to go in that clip as 30 minutes of CPAC wouldn't be worth learning the "truth." At any rate, there was restlessness from the crowd when the subject came up and it is hard to tell how loud from the clip. Also find it illuminating that one twitterer points out that:
"They didn’t boo naturalization ceremonies. They booed a liberal analyst who said Mexican immigrants were gettable GOP voters."
Why the fuck would they boo that? or alternatively, who fucking boos that?
How zealously the Trump base (what's left of the Republican Party) represents the recurring, abhorrent anti-immigrant strain in America is open to debate. That they represent it is not.
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Today, the NSA Director - who would lead the charge against Russian hacking - said that he has not been instructed to combat future Russian hacking. That order should come from the White House, but he’s still waiting.
Also, Kushner list his temporary “Top Secret “ security clearance, being downgraded to just “Secret”, which is enough to prevent him from continuing any of the policy initiatives he’s been tasked with. Also, at least 4 countries have been found to have leverage over Kushner, being UAE, China, Israel and (ironically) Mexico.
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Today, the NSA Director - who would lead the charge against Russian hacking - said that he has not been instructed to combat future Russian hacking. That order should come from the White House, but he’s still waiting.
I wish I could say that it is astonishing that the leaders of this country are not interested in protecting the fundamental operation of our democracy from a hostile foreign attack. It should be, but it isn't. This includes not only the White House but McConnell, Ryan and company. But no, they are much more interested in running an interference campaign to continue covering up the earlier hostile foreign attack that they've been lying about since before the 2016 election.
Also, Kushner list his temporary “Top Secret “ security clearance, being downgraded to just “Secret”, which is enough to prevent him from continuing any of the policy initiatives he’s been tasked with. Also, at least 4 countries have been found to have leverage over Kushner, being UAE, China, Israel and (ironically) Mexico.
To be fair it was reported that those countries were looking for ways to leverage the mess that is Kushner Cos, not that they in fact do have leverage (but the whole point with him not getting security clearance is that it would be awfully easy for them to do so). And Israel is a bit more ironic considering the Kushners' relationship with fellow grifter Netanyahu.
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I wish I could say that it is astonishing that the leaders of this country are not interested in protecting the fundamental operation of our democracy from a hostile foreign attack. It should be, but it isn't. This includes not only the White House but McConnell, Ryan and company. But no, they are much more interested in running an interference campaign to continue covering up the earlier hostile foreign attack that they've been lying about since before the 2016 election.
Their actions scream: Why on earth would we discourage Russian interference, since it is to our benefit.
I often think that the only way Trump could ever partially redeem himself is, when he is being escorted out in cuffs, he says "What took you so long, I've been doing it in your full view, but you never had the balls to stop me."
Not really redemption, but at least establishing that he isn't the lowest creature on the stage.
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To be fair it was reported that those countries were looking for ways to leverage the mess that is Kushner Cos, not that they in fact do have leverage (but the whole point with him not getting security clearance is that it would be awfully easy for them to do so). And Israel is a bit more ironic considering the Kushners' relationship with fellow grifter Netanyahu.
True. Also, in a Trump-less world, Bibi's travails in Israel would be headline news around the globe.
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Locally, Democratic turnout in early voting for next week's primaries is off the charts. It's up 93% vs. a 17% increase for Republicans. Turnout hurts Republicans, and both Abbott and Cruz are shitting themselves over what they're seeing; and gerrymandering can't save them in statewide races.
Beto is out-raising Cruz despite not (yet) being the nominated candidate. I think his town-by-town strategy is excellent and now he is being invited to visit towns where they have set up the event for him, rather the other way around. He is filling venues everywhere he goes.
Trump won Texas by 9% - 52% vs. 43%. Currently, Trump's approval rating in Texas is under 40%, and his disapproval is over 50%. Three more (non-Texas) special state elections happened yesterday, with the Democratic candidates all enjoying a swing their way of more than 20% vs. Trump's performance in 2016. Dems flipped two of three seats, with the third having gone for Trump by +67%, but even here, the swing to the losing Democrat was +28%.
Democrats have now flipped 39 state seats compared to 4 being flipped the other way. In 2018, the average swing to Democrats in all special elections in more than 20%. As I have reminded everyone before, the Red Wave of 2010 was a swing to Republicans of +9%. This is shaping up to be an electoral massacre that could change the face of America for a generation. Let's see how the Democrats fuck this one up!
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I am amazed at the anti-Sarah Davis mailings I have received.
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Let's see how the Democrats fuck this one up!
You can start with a bad faith attack by the DCCC against the democratic candidate with the strongest grass roots support just over a week before the primary!
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I am amazed at the anti-Sarah Davis mailings I have received.
It's really disturbing, especially given what a crackpot her opponent is. Though she did introduce me to the batshittery that is the "Seastead" movement. WTF?
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Not really redemption, but at least establishing that he isn't the lowest creature on the stage.
This is a pretty interesting thing to contemplate, that in fact Trump is not the lowest creature on the stage, and not by a long shot.
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You can start with a bad faith attack by the DCCC against the democratic candidate with the strongest grass roots support just over a week before the primary!
Bingo!
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It's really disturbing, especially given what a crackpot her opponent is. Though she did introduce me to the batshittery that is the "Seastead" movement. WTF?
Who would you vote for if you had to chose between Susanna Dokupil or Katherine Wall?
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Who would you vote for if you had to chose between Susanna Dokupil or Katherine Wall?
I cannot bring myself to imagine such a horrible existence.
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I cannot bring myself to imagine such a horrible existence.
Two strongly Democratic districts in California - where the top two vote-getters in the primary face off regardless of party - are in danger of ending up having to choose between two Republicans. There are so many Democratic candidates that they're splitting the majority to such an extent that two Republicans could end up topping the polls.
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You can start with a bad faith attack by the DCCC against the democratic candidate with the strongest grass roots support just over a week before the primary!
The attack might backfire in a big way. Moser's raised over $100k since the DCCC went after her.
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Two strongly Democratic districts in California - where the top two vote-getters in the primary face off regardless of party - are in danger of ending up having to choose between two Republicans. There are so many Democratic candidates that they're splitting the majority to such an extent that two Republicans could end up topping the polls.
They have until March 9 to get it sorted out. The candidates running at the bottom of the race surely have to come to their senses.
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The candidates running at the bottom of the race surely have to come to their senses.
This made me laugh out loud.
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Today...wow!
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They have until March 9 to get it sorted out. The candidates running at the bottom of the race surely have to come to their senses.
This is something that's important to know about politicians. They really do think they can win. Always. They have a path to victory and even if no one else can see it, it's as certain as the yellow brick road.
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Jared (and Trump) are in serious peril if this is true.
Remember when the world issued a collective “Wait...what?!” to the news that Qatar had been added to the Muslim ban? It was weird and crazy because Trump called them out as being a state sponsor of terror, even though they’re one of our best allies in the Middle East and we have thousands of troops based there. It just didn’t make sense.
Well now it does. The Qataris were being punished for not giving Jared the loans he so desperately needs. It’s one thing to use the influence of your public office to line your pockets - that’s run of the mill corruption - but it’s quite another to use U.S. foreign policy to punish those who don’t give you money. That’s a whole new level of corrupt.
And now we know that Bob Mueller knows (https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/white-house/mueller-team-asking-if-kushner-foreign-business-ties-influenced-trump-n852681). They’re all going to jail for a very long time.
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In other non-election news...I see where ExxonMobil has decided to pull out of all the Russian deals brokered by Tillerson before he became SoS. Apparently meddling, sanctions...all that jazz. The Russians and Rex are NOT happy.
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In other non-election news...I see where ExxonMobil has decided to pull out of all the Russian deals brokered by Tillerson before he became SoS. Apparently meddling, sanctions...all that jazz. The Russians and Rex are NOT happy.
We can start the countdown to the Russians dropping all the shit they have on Trump (and Tillerson). Trump (and Tillerson) was supposed to get the sanctions lifted that killed the half-trillion dollar Exxon - Rosneft deal that puts money directly into Putin's pocket. They have failed, and both are now so neutered by scandal that it almost certainly cannot be done. Seriously, in a world in the throes of an international shit-storm, this is the first time I've seen Tillerson's name in months!
All of the (fake) collusion involved sanctions*. The lifting of such was always the quo to the election-meddling quid. Russia won't be happy and they will take their revenge. If they can't get what they want, they will burn those responsible and sew chaos in America and the world at the same time. What really worries me is that someone familiar with Trump (can't remember who/where) said recently that he will burn the world to save his own skin. He just started a trade war that, if prosecuted further, will be an economic disaster and could lead to a cold war and then a hot war. The threat is real.
* When Russians - and therefore Don Jr. et al - talk about "adoptions", they are talking about the crippling sanctions imposed on Russia under the Magnitsky Act, and their retaliatory action of banning adoptions from Russia by U.S. citizens.
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So, Steele also reportedly had a memo outlining how the Russians blocked Romney for SOS. Obviously don't know if it is true, but it fits so nicely: he's not Vlad's pal, but Rex is.
Think about the gigantic fucking mess Trump has created: Vlad probably tells him who he can hire, attacks our troops, takes actions against our interests, and interferes with our elections, all while Trump does and says zip. Meanwhile, we take actions against our allies merely to settle a score for Jared's company. What is the common theme to these two areas? The financial interests of Trump and his family. Selling out the country for fucking money. The most basic definition of treason.
And yet his minions still cheer: "Look, he's draining the swamp, telling it like it is, finally standing up for America." Trump supporters are proud to be stupid.
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Part of the pushback against accusations that the Trump administration is doing nothing to combat future Russian interference in elections is that resources have been allocated. This is true; the State Dept. has a budget of $120 million for this very task. Ignoring whether this is an appropriate budget for the job (I have no idea), we can look at how much they've spent so far.
It's zero. Zero dollars spent (https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/04/world/europe/state-department-russia-global-engagement-center.html). They also don't have any Russian speakers, and they aren't allowed to hire any computer experts. #MAGA
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In news that should scare the ever-lovin' shit out of Republicans (https://www.dallasnews.com/news/2018-elections/2018/03/02/texas-early-voting-numbers-wake-call-gop-democrats-double-2014-turnout), Harris Co. early vote tallies show that Republican early voters - something indicative of voter enthusiasm - is up 6.4% compared to 2014 early voting but down 45% compared to 2016 which, of course, was a Presidential election year so that's natural.
Early voting for Democrats in Harris Co., though, is down only 3.5% over 2016, and up 308% over 2014. Yes, early voting turnout for Democrats has tripled over the last mid-term cycle.
In the 15 most populous counties in the State, those numbers remains consists. Statewide, Republican early voting is a little better, being up 16% over 2014 while down 42% over 2016. Democratic early voting is fractionally up over 2016 and up by 98% over 2014 (i.e. nearly double).
The raw numbers favor Democrats too, with a total of 406,302 early voters in these 15 major counties, vs. 352, 963 Republicans. A reminder, Trump won Texas by 9% in 2016.
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In news that should scare the ever-lovin' shit out of Republicans (https://www.dallasnews.com/news/2018-elections/2018/03/02/texas-early-voting-numbers-wake-call-gop-democrats-double-2014-turnout), Harris Co. early vote tallies show that Republican early voters - something indicative of voter enthusiasm - is up 6.4% compared to 2014 early voting but down 45% compared to 2016 which, of course, was a Presidential election year so that's natural.
Early voting for Democrats in Harris Co., though, is down only 3.5% over 2016, and up 308% over 2014. Yes, early voting turnout for Democrats has tripled over the last mid-term cycle.
In the 15 most populous counties in the State, those numbers remains consists. Statewide, Republican early voting is a little better, being up 16% over 2014 while down 42% over 2016. Democratic early voting is fractionally up over 2016 and up by 98% over 2014 (i.e. nearly double).
The raw numbers favor Democrats too, with a total of 406,302 early voters in these 15 major counties, vs. 352, 963 Republicans. A reminder, Trump won Texas by 9% in 2016.
This drumroll of yours is scaring the crap out of me. Them chickens ain’t hatched yet.
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Early voting results in Texas primary elections always have a large margin for error due to being skewed by the people who vote in the other party's primary. But the sheer numbers aren't surprising given the emotions Trump stirs.
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I have my sample ballot ready to go. And I usually vote in the other primary.
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You people are weird.
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You people are weird.
A vote against Dan Patrick is it's own reward.
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In news that should scare the ever-lovin' shit out of Republicans (https://www.dallasnews.com/news/2018-elections/2018/03/02/texas-early-voting-numbers-wake-call-gop-democrats-double-2014-turnout), Harris Co. early vote tallies show that Republican early voters - something indicative of voter enthusiasm - is up 6.4% compared to 2014 early voting but down 45% compared to 2016 which, of course, was a Presidential election year so that's natural.
Early voting for Democrats in Harris Co., though, is down only 3.5% over 2016, and up 308% over 2014. Yes, early voting turnout for Democrats has tripled over the last mid-term cycle.
In the 15 most populous counties in the State, those numbers remains consists. Statewide, Republican early voting is a little better, being up 16% over 2014 while down 42% over 2016. Democratic early voting is fractionally up over 2016 and up by 98% over 2014 (i.e. nearly double).
The raw numbers favor Democrats too, with a total of 406,302 early voters in these 15 major counties, vs. 352, 963 Republicans. A reminder, Trump won Texas by 9% in 2016.
There's also a lot more to vote for in the Democratic primary. Unless you live in one of the very few districts with a hotly contested race like Sarah Davis against Lucy Seastead there's not a whole lot of excitement on the Republican ballot.
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It's starting to get uglier. Sam Nunberg, a Trump aide who received a subpoena, has this reaction in a Wapo article:
Among those that the subpoena requests information about are departing White House communications director Hope Hicks, former White House strategist Stephen K. Bannon, Trump lawyer Michael Cohen, former Trump campaign manager Corey Lewandowski and adviser Roger Stone.
Nunberg said he does not plan to comply with the subpoena, including either testimony or providing documents.
“Let him arrest me,” Nunberg said. “Mr. Mueller should understand I am not going in on Friday.”
Nunberg said he was planning to go on Bloomberg TV and tear up the subpoena.
So that is going to be the tactic now: "fuck you and your investigation." Queue all the Trumpkins across the land shouting their encouragement. Law and order baby.
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A vote against Dan Patrick is it's own reward.
Good point.
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It's starting to get uglier. Sam Nunberg, a Trump aide who received a subpoena, has this reaction in a Wapo article:
So that is going to be the tactic now: "fuck you and your investigation." Queue all the Trumpkins across the land shouting their encouragement. Law and order baby.
Lock him up! Lock him up!
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It's starting to get uglier. Sam Nunberg, a Trump aide who received a subpoena, has this reaction in a Wapo article:
So that is going to be the tactic now: "fuck you and your investigation." Queue all the Trumpkins across the land shouting their encouragement. Law and order baby.
I just saw this called the slow-speed, white Bronco chase of the Mueller investigation. Thanks, Twitter.
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Lock him up! Lock him up!
In “things that will change shortly”: Nunberg is a member in good standing of the NY state bar
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
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In “things that will change shortly”: Nunberg is a member in good standing of the NY state bar
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
And soon no doubt he’ll slot into an hour or two on the AM spectrum.
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This dude is a complete idiot. If I knew him in real life, I would stay far away and occasionally visit for the spectacle, and then feel guilty. The last thing I would do is hire him, yet he worked for Trump for years.
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This dude is a complete idiot. If I knew him in real life, I would stay far away and occasionally visit for the spectacle, and then feel guilty. The last thing I would do is hire him, yet he worked for Trump for years.
You seem surprised. Check out the law school ranking of Trump's lawyer buddy Cohen. Only the best for Trump. MAGA.
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This dude is a complete idiot. If I knew him in real life, I would stay far away and occasionally visit for the spectacle, and then feel guilty. The last thing I would do is hire him, yet he worked for Trump for years.
One of the CNN anchors called him out for being drunk, "I can smell it on your breath."
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One of the CNN anchors called him out for being drunk, "I can smell it on your breath."
It's entirely possible that he sobered up between yesterday and today. It is exceedingly unlikely that he got any smarter.
I saw some speculation that it was a grand sort of performance art project designed to distract from the idea that the Rooskies have control over PPG's cabinet. If so, it was a brilliant success.
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What the fuck is wrong with these people? (https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/gratuitous-cruelty-by-homeland-security-separating-a-7-year-old-from-her-mother/2018/03/04/98fae4f0-1bff-11e8-ae5a-16e60e4605f3_story.html?utm_term=.45d0b012ceeb)
The Trump administration has said that it is considering separating parents from their children as a means of deterring other families, most of them Central American, from undertaking the perilous trip necessary to reach the United States and seek asylum. Now, without any formal announcement, that cruel practice, ruled out by previous administrations, has become increasingly common, immigrant advocacy groups say. In the nine months preceding February, government agents separated children from their parents 53 times, according to data compiled by the Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service.
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What the fuck is wrong with these people? (https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/gratuitous-cruelty-by-homeland-security-separating-a-7-year-old-from-her-mother/2018/03/04/98fae4f0-1bff-11e8-ae5a-16e60e4605f3_story.html?utm_term=.45d0b012ceeb)
No one has enough time or energy to answer that.
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It's pure racist animus. From the family values party, of course. Fucking hypocritical shitstains, nauseating people, every fucking one of them.
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The attack might backfire in a big way. Moser's raised over $100k since the DCCC went after her.
Congrats 2nd Districters, Moser made the runoff of Wall didn’t.
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Sarah Davis held on in HD134, but by less than I expected. I think it's reasonable to expect a lot of conservatives to no-vote that race in November, so Davis will need a fair amount of Dems to cross over for her to keep the seat.
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Sarah Davis held on in HD134, but by less than I expected. I think it's reasonable to expect a lot of conservatives to no-vote that race in November, so Davis will need a fair amount of Dems to cross over for her to keep the seat.
It wasn't close, but I expected it to be more as well. Apparently Abbott's only win last night, other than his own, was in Galveston County. I don't think Davis will have any problem with picking up crossover votes.
The one thing that surprised me out of last night's voting was how high the statewide totals were for the Republicans. I think I'd bought the Kool-aid that Democrats were turning out all over. It did look like Democrats had higher vote totals than Republicans in the urban centers: Tarrant, Dallas, Travis, Bear, and Harris. Pretty interesting.
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When the tariff talk surfaced, I wondered if Trump had an economist working for him. Not any more as Cohn tendered his resignation yesterday.
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The one thing that surprised me out of last night's voting was how high the statewide totals were for the Republicans. I think I'd bought the Kool-aid that Democrats were turning out all over. It did look like Democrats had higher vote totals than Republicans in the urban centers: Tarrant, Dallas, Travis, Bear, and Harris. Pretty interesting.
It appears that roughly 50% more people voted in the republican primaries than the democratic primaries, even when democrats are pissed. I guess this means that no statewide dems have a prayer in the general. I should never allow even the slightest sliver of hope to enter my mind.
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It appears that roughly 50% more people voted in the republican primaries than the democratic primaries, even when democrats are pissed. I guess this means that no statewide dems have a prayer in the general. I should never allow even the slightest sliver of hope to enter my mind.
My thought exactly. It still looks like down-ballot races in Harris County flip.
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I know quite a few Dems who voted in the Republican primary. There were candidates we didn't want on the ballot - Walll and Dupokil. I don't know if Texas will be purple come November, but there is still hope.
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The one thing that surprised me out of last night's voting was how high the statewide totals were for the Republicans. I think I'd bought the Kool-aid that Democrats were turning out all over. It did look like Democrats had higher vote totals than Republicans in the urban centers: Tarrant, Dallas, Travis, Bear, and Harris. Pretty interesting.
Yep. The statewide races had vote totals that were significantly higher for Republicans than Democrats. It's going to come down to whether the Democrats can get out the vote because the more the media talks about Texas turning blue, the more it will motivate Republicans to come out to make sure that doesn't happen.
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The one thing that surprised me out of last night's voting was how high the statewide totals were for the Republicans. I think I'd bought the Kool-aid that Democrats were turning out all over. It did look like Democrats had higher vote totals than Republicans in the urban centers: Tarrant, Dallas, Travis, Bear, and Harris. Pretty interesting.
Presumably means O'Rourke won't be much of a threat to Cruz, but Culberson and Sessions should be terrified.
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When the tariff talk surfaced, I wondered if Trump had an economist working for him. Not any more as Cohn tendered his resignation yesterday.
The stock market opened down, but not as badly as after-market trading was predicting yesterday after Cohn's announcement. Importantly, Cohn's deputy resigned a few weeks ago, so Trump's White House is getting as bare as his display cabinet of humanitarian awards.
As usual, the shit that happened just yesterday* would each be earth-shattering stories that would consume the narrative for months. But in TrumpWorld, they just get overrun by the next major breaking story.
* Cohn's resignation
* Conway found guilty of a violation of the Hatch Act...keeps her job (even though no one knows what it is)
* Trump lying about a phone call (with North Korea) that he never had
* The President being sued by a porn star
On that last one, remember the Starr investigation? Remember how it was the only thing that people could talk about for almost a year? Remember how the Starr report was published online and it was instantly the most downloaded thing ever on the internet? Yet, here we are, with a far worse sex-scandal - in that Trump tried to buy the woman's silence (but his "best" people are too incompetent to even get that right) - and it's merely a footnote on the day's news.
Did you even know that a Russia-linked businessman from the UAE - who was involved in the "back channel" meeting in the Seychelles with DeVoss' brother-in-law Eric "Blackwater" Prince - was intercepted by Mueller at Dulles Airport (ironically on his way to Trump's first year anniversary party at Mar-a-Lago) and has since been cooperating with Mueller? That came out yesterday too, and it should have been a supernova of a story. But, nope. Too much other stuff going on.
Drinking from the fire hose doesn't even come close to this.
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I know quite a few Dems who voted in the Republican primary. There were candidates we didn't want on the ballot - Walll and Dupokil. I don't know if Texas will be purple come November, but there is still hope.
I thought the point behind voting in the other primary was to get the worst candidates on the ballot in November? Democrats may struggle against qualified candidates, but put them up against Sharron "Second Amendment Remedies" Angel and Christine "Not a Witch" O'Donnell, and they have a punchers chance.
I'm new to this, by the way...
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Presumably means O'Rourke won't be much of a threat to Cruz, but Culberson and Sessions should be terrified.
O'Rourke's strategy of going door-to-door throughout the entire state is the only way he'll win. And he still may not.
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I thought the point behind voting in the other primary was to get the worst candidates on the ballot in November? Democrats may struggle against qualified candidates, but put them up against Sharron "Second Amendment Remedies" Angel and Christine "Not a Witch" O'Donnell, and they have a punchers chance.
I'm new to this, by the way...
If you want the worst candidate, then Republicans did that. I think almost anyone was better than Cruz, so I voted for Miller.
Plus, if you all take a moment to look at the propositions that were voted on , get ready for more bathroom bill legislation. Proposition 6 passed with 90% of the vote. Dan Patrick is going to run with that and Abbot is going to do his best to make abortions illegal.
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I thought the point behind voting in the other primary was to get the worst candidates on the ballot in November? Democrats may struggle against qualified candidates, but put them up against Sharron "Second Amendment Remedies" Angel and Christine "Not a Witch" O'Donnell, and they have a punchers chance.
I'm new to this, by the way...
In Texas the reason I vote in the Republican Primary from time to time is because (a) the Democratic Primary was usually meaningless and (b) there was someone I wanted to vote for (or against). I've voted for David Dewhurst from time to time because I like his wife, like him ok, and usually disliked his opponent. His opponents, Cruz and Patrick, won. I've been told by vote counter types that it's always a useless exercise for Democrats because there are never enough cross-over votes to make a difference. As to putting up the worst candidates, that usually happens without any help.
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I thought the point behind voting in the other primary was to get the worst candidates on the ballot in November? Democrats may struggle against qualified candidates, but put them up against Sharron "Second Amendment Remedies" Angel and Christine "Not a Witch" O'Donnell, and they have a punchers chance.
I'm new to this, by the way...
As we are experiencing, the problem with that strategy is that sometimes the worst candidate wins.
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In a move that I wasn't expecting to see unless and until O'Rourke showed some strength in the polls, Ted Cruz mocked O'Rourke for using his preferred name "Beto" rather than his given name, Robert. Yes, that was Raphael Eduardo Cruz mocking his Democratic challenger for going by an abbreviated name rather than the one given to him by his parents.
To his credit, Beto responded saying "We can get into name-calling and talk about why the other person is such an awful guy, or we can focus on the big things we want to do for the future of our country, for the generations that will succeed us. We can focus on the small, mean, petty stuff, or we can be big, bold, courageous, and confident."
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That is so Ted, however the hell "Ted" comes out of those names. Maybe, the Canadians were a bit off on his birthday.
Anyways, O'Rourke's demeanor (focus on listening and things that need to be done, rather than political barbs) is refreshing and likely to help with some anti-Ted moderates. Still doubt he has a legit chance.
I wonder if there will be a debate.
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That is so Ted, however the hell "Ted" comes out of those names. Maybe, the Canadians were a bit off on his birthday.
Anyways, O'Rourke's demeanor (focus on listening and things that need to be done, rather than political barbs) is refreshing and likely to help with some anti-Ted moderates. Still doubt he has a legit chance.
I wonder if there will be a debate.
I think Rafael will be wary of a debate as O’Rourke seems pretty poised under questioning and has learned the dark art of saying what you want to say regardless of what you’re asked. Cruz looks like a dick.
I agree that O’Rourke’s strategy is sound and he’d win in most places not called Texas.
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Regarding the Stormy Daniels lawsuit, Trump’s basically fucked, right? I’m not thinking that Congress will do anything, but Daniels simply wants the NDA ripped up and could likely get a summary judgment her way because (1) Trump never signed the contract and (b) his minions have been talking about the agreement in public likely in breach of the terms of the agreement.
Daniels ungagged (if that’s not one of her movie titles it should be) is a nightmare - if nothing else than it likely torpedoes his prenup with Melania. If he fights it and is deposed, he will be ripped to pieces. His only option is to settle this (again), but I suspect Daniels has stuck a zero on the end of the original amount at least. But even so, it’s still a massive ethics issue for Cohen, and still a serious FEC issue for Trump.
How ironic if he’s brought down by the same thing as what nearly put pay to (Bill) Clinton’s presidency, using the SCOTUS precedent established in Clinton vs. Jones.
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I did not know this was happening in Europe as well. (http://abcnews.go.com/International/norway-set-deport-teenager-war-zone/story?id=53388009) I first wondered when Trump became President of Norway.
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If Sid Miller can get re-elected, any Republican can get re-elected in Texas.
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I did not know this was happening in Europe as well. (http://abcnews.go.com/International/norway-set-deport-teenager-war-zone/story?id=53388009) I first wondered when Trump became President of Norway.
Norway has always flirted with right-wing extremism, going back at least to WW2 and its close relationship with Hitler’s Germany. This is a wrinkle that was missed when Trump was extolling the virtues of immigrants from Norway vs. those from shithole countries.
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Meanwhile, Sarah Sanders appears to be in hot water with the Cheeto-in-Chief for accidentally speaking some truth at yesterday’s press briefing. She confirmed that Trump had won his arbitration with Stormy Daniels over the NDA, basically confirming everything that Daniels has been intimating and everything that Trump has been denying.
Oopsie!
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Still don't know why Trump gives a shit about the Stormy Daniels thing. It's not like he has reputation to destroy. Maybe it contains a golden showers episode, and that worries him, although I'm not sure why that would worry him as it's not like he has a reputation to destroy. Maybe he doesn't care about the golden showers/Moscow bit at all, but he just doesn't want the dossier to look legit. I always get confused as to what shit actually bothers him and what doesn't. Not being adored and having his ass kicked (literal ass-kicking) seem to be primal fears in him, not sure what else are.
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Still don't know why Trump gives a shit about the Stormy Daniels thing. It's not like he has reputation to destroy. Maybe it contains a golden showers episode, and that worries him, although I'm not sure why that would worry him as it's not like he has a reputation to destroy. Maybe he doesn't care about the golden showers/Moscow bit at all, but he just doesn't want the dossier to look legit. I always get confused as to what shit actually bothers him and what doesn't. Not being adored and having his ass kicked (literal ass-kicking) seem to be primal fears in him, not sure what else are.
Sharks
https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/environment/2018/jan/19/sharks-donald-trump
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Still don't know why Trump gives a shit about the Stormy Daniels thing. It's not like he has reputation to destroy. Maybe it contains a golden showers episode, and that worries him, although I'm not sure why that would worry him as it's not like he has a reputation to destroy. Maybe he doesn't care about the golden showers/Moscow bit at all, but he just doesn't want the dossier to look legit. I always get confused as to what shit actually bothers him and what doesn't. Not being adored and having his ass kicked (literal ass-kicking) seem to be primal fears in him, not sure what else are.
I don't know why he doesn't just hold a press conference and say "yeah, I fucked her. Next question?" The whole thing would go away and his approval rating among evangelicals would go through the roof.
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Still don't know why Trump gives a shit about the Stormy Daniels thing. It's not like he has reputation to destroy. Maybe it contains a golden showers episode, and that worries him, although I'm not sure why that would worry him as it's not like he has a reputation to destroy. Maybe he doesn't care about the golden showers/Moscow bit at all, but he just doesn't want the dossier to look legit. I always get confused as to what shit actually bothers him and what doesn't. Not being adored and having his ass kicked (literal ass-kicking) seem to be primal fears in him, not sure what else are.
You're correct that this will not have an impact on his standing with his remaining supporters - like the parable he likes to repeat at campaign rallies: they knew he was a snake when they let him in - but he's clearly concerned about this so there must be a reason or reasons.
I've heard it suggested that it's because of what proven infidelity does to his prenup with Melania; i.e. she can take him for most of his not-as-big-as-he-pretends fortune if there's a fidelity requirement in the contract. Also, it's been discussed that this sordid affair, plus the others that are getting unearthed where the women on the receiving end have been silenced - including another porn actress Jessica Drake and Playboy model Karen McDougal - adds credence to the elements of the Steele Dossier* that claim the Russians have video of him with overly hydrated hookers.
* The Steele Dossier continues to be validated by the various investigations and while multiple elements have been proven accurate, nothing has been found to be inaccurate. They are getting deeper and deeper into the dossier and everything they've checked out, has checked out.
Trump does have legitimate legal peril from an FEC violation and Cohen does have legitimate legal/ethical peril from settling a case on behalf of his client (he also has whinged to friends that Trump hasn't paid him back the $130,000 he fronted, bringing us back to the snake parable). Either one, other or both are true, but not none of them. But I doubt Trump is really scared of the FEC and I doubt he gives a shit about any trouble that Cohen is facing as loyalty and fealty is a one-way street with Trump (conversely, Cohen has said he'd take a bullet for Trump).
The NDA quoted in the Daniels' lawsuit says that she has possession of confidential information that was originated by "David Dennison", including images and texts. So this really could be a simple as the fact that he tweeted her a pic of his tiny orange junk, and he would move heaven and earth (i.e. nuke North Korea) to keep that out of the public domain.
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I don't know why he doesn't just hold a press conference and say "yeah, I fucked her. Next question?" The whole thing would go away and his approval rating among evangelicals would go through the roof.
That would blow up the NDA, which would allow Daniels' to spill whatever information she has on him that must be damaging (see above) or he wouldn't be so bothered about it.
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That would blow up the NDA, which would allow Daniels' to spill whatever information she has on him that must be damaging (see above) or he wouldn't be so bothered about it.
What could she possibly know? That he has a small dick? Common knowledge. That he likes the wet stuff? Common knowledge. That his real hair is really fucked up? Common knowledge? That he's in debt up to his eyeballs? Common knowledge. That he's in bed with the Russians? Common knowledge. I'm wondering what could possibly be out there that wouldn't elevate his status with the yahoos.
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What could she possibly know? That he has a small dick? Common knowledge. That he likes the wet stuff? Common knowledge. That his real hair is really fucked up? Common knowledge? That he's in debt up to his eyeballs? Common knowledge. That he's in bed with the Russians? Common knowledge. I'm wondering what could possibly be out there that wouldn't elevate his status with the yahoos.
I think you're conflating what we know about Trump with what Trump thinks his own image is. There's a lot on your list that we know that he doesn't think we know and doesn't want us to know. And there's still the whole prenup thing that has the threat of costing him hundreds of millions, which would rely on proof of infidelity that an in flagrante photo would provide*.
* I just threw up in my mouth a little bit.
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What are the odds that the world survives the Trump / Un meeting of fevered minds?
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George Nader is the name of the Russia-linked businessman involved in the Seychelles meeting and at least one other involving high-ranking members of the Trump campaign. Nader is also a suspected paedophile, having been arraigned previously but walking when the charges were dropped once the reams of child pornography found in his apartment were excluded from evidence on a technicality. It’s worth noting that, when he was intercepted by Mueller‘s team at Dulles, the immediately confiscated all his electronic devices. Nader is now a cooperating witness; what are the odds that they didn’t find his laptop bulging with child porn?
Speaking of which, Mueller now has Manafort’s tits in two separate wringers; one in DC and one in Virginia. For the latter, his court date was just set for July 10, that state being famous for its “rocket docket”. Because of the seriousness and the volume of charges he faces, even the lower end of the sentencing guidelines for these crimes would put Manafort in jail for decades, he would not see the outside again unless he lives into his 90s. The pressure on him must be intense.
With the likes of Nader, Papadopoulos and Flynn all now cooperating with Mueller, he has an attendee at many of the “meetings of interest” in his pocket. Adding Manafort to that list would give him the inside scoop on all the meetings he’s missing.
Here’s the fun part. A presidential pardon gets Manafort off the hook for his (alleged) crimes, but it also takes away any peril of self-incrimination. If pardoned he (a) is deemed to be guilty; and (ii) cannot plead the 5th so he can be compelled to testify to what he knows.
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I thought I heard somewhere that a lot of the financial crimes (potentially Gates and Manafort, but definitely Javanka in the future) can all be tried by the NY AG, and that kind of nullifies the power of Trump's pardon. So, while Trump could pardon and expend political capital, he could not prevent jail for at least his daughter and son-in-law.
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I thought I heard somewhere that a lot of the financial crimes (potentially Gates and Manafort, but definitely Javanka in the future) can all be tried by the NY AG, and that kind of nullifies the power of Trump's pardon. So, while Trump could pardon and expend political capital, he could not prevent jail for at least his daughter and son-in-law.
Correct. There is definitely overlap in the Venn, and Mueller reportedly is coordinating with the NY AG, so they all have non-Federal allegations to answer also.
In a move that’s unprecedented, Trump has been interviewing personally the replacement AGs (he fired them all a while ago) for the districts that cover Trump Tower, the Kushners and Mar-a-Lago; i.e. the venues for any criminal actions that could be brought against the inner family circle. Presumably any Trump-approved replacement would not pursue state-level charges against the Trump Crime Family.
This still leaves Manafort swinging in the wind and thus eminently flippable. Don’t forget, Gates got a sweet plea deal, so he’s cooperating already. Manafort stands alone and - to date - abandoned to his fate by Trump. He has two ankle bracelets to remind him every minute of every day of that fact.
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In a move that’s unprecedented, Trump has been interviewing personally the replacement AGs (he fired them all a while ago) for the districts that cover Trump Tower, the Kushners and Mar-a-Lago; i.e. the venues for any criminal actions that could be brought against the inner family circle. Presumably any Trump-approved replacement would not pursue state-level charges against the Trump Crime Family.
There are plenty of people on here who would know better than me, but I don't think this is right. He's looking at replacement federal AG's, the state level charges would be brought by the state AGs (like Schneiderman in NY) who aren't appointed by Trump (elected in NY at least).
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There are plenty of people on here who would know better than me, but I don't think this is right. He's looking at replacement federal AG's, the state level charges would be brought by the state AGs (like Schneiderman in NY) who aren't appointed by Trump (elected in NY at least).
What I have read is that the DOJ is responsible for sourcing replacement U.S. AGs (the wholesale firing of whom is common, but not in the "get your shit and get out" manner that the Trump administration approached it). Past Presidents certainly haven't engaged in the interview process and, in this case, it's highly suspicious that the only potential candidates Trump took time to interview were those who would be appointed to districts that would have jurisdiction over him and the Kushners.
You are correct that this is different to the state AGs like Schneiderman, who are appointed by the state government. Trump's moves appear to be an effort at protecting himself against Federal prosecution out of his home districts, but he cannot impact any state-lead prosecution. It's also a nightmare that we are having to parse the various law enforcement agencies who have jurisdiction over the President, so sweeping is the breadth of potential offenses he has committed.
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Trump's meeting with Kim Jong-Un was certainly a shock announcement. Most notably, it appears to have been a complete shock to the State Department; Tillerson was out of the country (in a shithole, no less) but had said that day that there were no plans for any talks with North Korea. A State Department spokesperson went further, saying that they haven't even been having talks about talks. Then, later that day...BOOM! The South Koreans announce that Trump has agreed to meet Jong-Un.
First, WTF? Why are the South Koreans announcing this - from the White House no less?
Now to the substance. There is no Ambassador to South Korea and the person nominated has long since withdrawn their name from consideration. The State Department expert on North Korea - a 30-year department veteran - quit a couple of weeks ago and was gone from Foggy Bottom before this ever came about. The State Department had no idea that any such meeting was on the cards. So who is driving this and what is the agenda?
Is Trump really going to take a meeting with Jong-Un, at Jong-Un's request, without any agenda and without even extracting anything in return for bestowing upon North Korea the gift of a Presidential audience? There are three Americans in North Korean gulags whose freedom could've been leveraged at least. North Korea has offered to cease testing missiles, but they haven't agreed to suspend or terminate the program - they can still be working without testing.
This is nuts! An audience with the President is the reward at the end of the process, not the opening gambit. It's just like moving the embassy in Israel to Jerusalem: no one else did it because they realized its value as a bargaining chip. Trump has just thrown away perhaps the biggest leverage he had save the release of sanctions - the legitimization of Jong-Un's government in the form of an awkward handshake and weird hair photo op.
Plus, John-Un is playing poker while Trump is playing Go Fish. Whatever comes out of this will be a nonsense that will not stand, either with the U.S. or with our allies (who, notably, weren't consulted on this momentous decision). We have seen Trump negotiate - he agrees with everyone in the room and then has to be corrected either later on in real time as to what his position is supposed to be. I mean, let's face it, our team is the one that fucked up paying hush money to a porn star.
This is really fucking scary.
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It may have been even worse than first thought (https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/08/us/politics/north-korea-kim-jong-un-trump.html):
Behind the scenes, events unfolded even more haphazardly. Mr. Trump was not scheduled to meet Mr. Chung until Friday, but when he heard that the envoy was in the West Wing seeing other officials, the president summoned him to the Oval Office, according to a senior administration official.
Mr. Trump, the official said, then asked Mr. Chung to tell him about his meeting with Mr. Kim. When Mr. Chung said that the North Korean leader had expressed a desire to meet Mr. Trump, the president immediately said he would do it, and directed Mr. Chung to announce it to the White House press corps.
Mr. Chung, nonplused, said he first needed approval from Mr. Moon, who quickly granted it in a phone call. Mr. Trump later called Prime Minister Shinzo Abe of Japan, and the two discussed coordinating diplomatic efforts. Mr. Trump also plans to call President Xi Jinping of China.
By day’s end, dazed White House officials were discussing whether Mr. Trump would invite Mr. Kim to come to the United States. That seemed entirely likely, the senior administration official said, though American officials doubt the North Korean leader would accept.
Sarah Sanders started moonwalking on this one today, saying that there is no firm meeting, no firm timetable and a need to see real action from North Korea towards denuclearization. I.e. What Would Obama Do?
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Uncle Rex sacked as Secretary of State. Allegedly for saying rotten things about Russia, so I'm sure it has nothing to do with ExxonMobil pulling out of the big deals in Russia that Tillerson negotiated and were set to funnel millions to Trump and his cronies.
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I like how the administration is imposing tariffs that affect the US's closest ally and largest trading partner and is completely ignoring Russia's nerve agent attack in the US's second closest ally.
America first, apparently.
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Uncle Rex sacked as Secretary of State. Allegedly for saying rotten things about Russia, so I'm sure it has nothing to do with ExxonMobil pulling out of the big deals in Russia that Tillerson negotiated and were set to funnel millions to Trump and his cronies.
#RexIt
A State Department spokesman put out a statement contradicting the White House version of events - claiming that Tillerson was blindsided and found out he was sacked, definitely sacked - not retired, from Trump’s tweet. That State Department spokesman was promptly sacked. Yes, the White House has devolved into the opening credits of Monty Python and The Holy Grail.
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I like how the administration is imposing tariffs that affect the US's closest ally and largest trading partner and is completely ignoring Russia's nerve agent attack in the US's second closest ally.
America first, apparently.
Article 5 of NATO seems to have some relevance here. Sanders refused to mention Russia when pressed on this subject yesterday, which is some fancy footwork. It’s beyond doubt that this administration will do anything and everything to curry favor with Putin; the only question remaining is “Why?”
Mueller...Mueller...
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... the only question remaining is “Why?”
I don't think that's too difficult a question.
It really does amaze me that these disgusting hypocrites would sell their political souls and whatever traces of self respect they might have had for a trillion dollar tax cut for the wealthy.
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What do you think would happen by the way if Putin suddenly decided this would be an outSTANding time to invade a Baltic country?
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Watching the coverage of the razor-thin PA-18 election (now stalled awaiting the absentee ballots), it’s worth remembering that:
- Trump beat Clinton here by 19 points (Trump said 22)
- Obama lost here to both McCain and Romney by double digits
- PA’s districts are so gerrymandered that the State Supreme Court just saw fit to redraw them ahead of the 2018 primaries
Right now, it’s leaning to the Democrat. That’s stunning. Trump was there just this weekend and - if he helped - it might be only to narrow the margin of defeat. They had to quit running pro-tax cut ads because the “weren’t resonating”. That means for Republicans, in November, the cupboard is bare.
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Whatever ends up happening here the fact that the Republican is struggling to win in Appalachia is absolutely stunning.
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Whatever ends up happening here the fact that the Republican is struggling to win in Appalachia is absolutely stunning.
Correct. This continues the 2018 trend of special elections swinging ~ 20 points to Democrats. Yes there are elements unique to this race - as there are in every race - but you can't ignore the bluenami that's swelling.
It's also worth noting that, on a day that was immensely important to the Republican brand, Trump decided to stomp on his micropenis all over the national news. Returns pointed to an increased turnout amongst Democrats and a suppressed turnout amongst Republicans. I can see that it would be hard to brave the lines and the PA weather to vote for the candidate whose party is lead by a man so weak that he tweet-fired his Secretary of State; while voting against that guy...
The analysis suggests that Saccone has to get about 90% of the remaining absentee ballots in order to overhaul Lamb, which is highly unlikely given his poor performance at the polls yesterday and the fact that he did less well in absentee ballots vs. the in-person votes in the counties who have already completed their counts. The only question that seems to be in doubt is whether there will be a recount, which is a confused issue right now as PA requires them for statewide races closer than 0.5%. This isn't a statewide race, but watch for the lawsuit to try to force a recount.
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There are 118 congressional districts where the margin of Trump’s voctory in 2016 is more narrow than in PA’s 18th. Democrats need to flip 23 to take the House.
Also, Lamb raised $3mm for his campaign and was aided by another $1.8mm from outside. Saccone raised only $600k - meaning he still got Republican votes but not their dollars - and was propped up by $10.7mm from outside, plus a Trump rally, plus campaign visits from Don Jr. and Ivanka. The cost of each vote for Lamb was $42 whereas each vot for Saccone cost $100.
This is not a winning formula for Republicans.
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A quote from the story where Trump proudly proclaims that he was pulling stats out of his ass during negotiations with Trudeau:
I didn’t even know... I had no idea. I just said, ‘You’re wrong.’
This is one of many fitting epitaphs for the man
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Often wrong, but never in doubt.
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A quote from the story where Trump proudly proclaims that he was pulling stats out of his ass during negotiations with Trudeau:
This is one of many fitting epitaphs for the man
It’s his ignorance and arrogance in full bloom: he’s ignorant of the reality (the US has a trade surplus with Canada) and he’s arrogant by assuming that Trudeau doesn’t know either. Does he really think he got something? Or got away with something? This isn’t Fox and Friends; Trudeau now knows (for certain) that Trump’s a fool and is there for the taking.
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This is awesome! (https://www.politico.com/story/2018/03/14/buzzfeed-stormy-daniels-trump-462261)
Buzzfeed - in its defense of the suit filed by Trump's personal lawyer Michael Cohen over the "Steele Dossier" - has demanded that Stormy Daniels retain any documents etc. that she has relating to her affair with Trump, and may also require her to submit to a deposition. So, either Trump has to drop the lawsuit or he risks Daniels' being deposed, whereby she will be able to tell her story - under oath, no less - without fear of retribution under an NDA.
Trump's an idiot and his legal representation is prone to repeated dick-stomping, so I'm expecting and hoping for the latter.
At some point Washington has to wake up to the fact that this isn't a sex scandal (although a similar scandal was enough to get Clinton impeached). The sitting President used multiple schemes, including the payment of hush money, in order to compel the silence of women he's had sex with (consensually or otherwise). His exposure to blackmail, by Russians or whoever, is massive and unknown.
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McMaster out. Trump wants someone more "fun" in the role. Meanwhile, WaPo cited nineteen...NINETEEN...White House staff in an article describing the mood in there as something like a cross between Lord of the Flies and The Purge.
The "new" Russia sanctions are just a copy 'n' paste of Mueller's list of bad Russians from his indictment. Meanwhile, the Russians have been hacking our energy infrastructure...including nuclear installations.
I'm torn for a meme between This is Fine (https://pbs.twimg.com/profile_images/783977505195556864/H2h3az3n_400x400.jpg) and Nothing to See Here (https://youtu.be/5NNOrp_83RU).
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The "new" Russia sanctions are just a copy 'n' paste of Mueller's list of bad Russians from his indictment. Meanwhile, the Russians have been hacking our energy infrastructure...including nuclear installations.
I'm torn for a meme between This is Fine (https://pbs.twimg.com/profile_images/783977505195556864/H2h3az3n_400x400.jpg) and Nothing to See Here (https://youtu.be/5NNOrp_83RU).
Although I shouldn't be, I'm sort of shocked how these "new sanctions" have been reported, even by the "fake news" sources.
For example, the NYT has a headline reading "US Gets Tougher on Russia; New Sanctions, Accusations" but has this info inside:
The named Russians — 19 in all — are unlikely to have any assets in the United States that would be covered, making the move largely symbolic. But it could help inoculate the president from persistent claims he's afraid or unwilling to stand up to Russian President Vladimir Putin or to fight back against efforts to undermine America's democracy and domestic affairs.
and then Sanders saying
We're going to be tough on Russia until they decide to change their behavior
Let's restate: the sanctions are symbolic/meaningless, but we, the liberal press will report it as new action that will inoculate Trump and then allow his press secretary to spin it without challenge.
Boy, the liberal press is so tough on him.
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The shit between the U.K. and Russia is getting real. With the World Cup in Russia just a couple of months away, this will get worse before it gets better. Pulling the England team out (exiting two games earlier than their usual departure) would be a huge thing....but it’s being mooted.
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Back in Trumplandia, Maine Congressman Leslie Gibson was running unopposed for re-election in November; then he called MSD high-schooler Emma Gonzalez a “skin-headed lesbian” on Twitter; then he picked up both a Republican and a Democratic opponent and now he has dropped out of the race.
For a while, Trump’s election gave these assholes reason to believe that they could let their asshole flag fly. A year or so later, and it seems that the rest of the country has had enough and is telling them to crawl back under the rock from whence they came.
November can’t come soon enough.
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The shit between the U.K. and Russia is getting real. With the World Cup in Russia just a couple of months away, this will get worse before it gets better. Pulling the England team out (exiting two games earlier than their usual departure) would be a huge thing....but it’s being mooted.
For the sake of argument, let's say England pulls out. What would the World Cup organizers do? Bring in somebody else from the same region/federation? Just go with a three-team group? If England really want to jam a stick in the spokes, they should wait until the day before to pull out. Or never announce anything and just not show up.
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For the sake of argument, let's say England pulls out. What would the World Cup organizers do? Bring in somebody else from the same region/federation? Just go with a three-team group? If England really want to jam a stick in the spokes, they should wait until the day before to pull out. Or never announce anything and just not show up.
They’re obviously looking for any excuse they can find to stay home since the UK lamentably find themselves in EL GRUPO DE LA MUERTE.
Or, more fittingly, le groupe de la mort.
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For the sake of argument, let's say England pulls out. What would the World Cup organizers do? Bring in somebody else from the same region/federation? Just go with a three-team group? If England really want to jam a stick in the spokes, they should wait until the day before to pull out. Or never announce anything and just not show up.
The furore in England if they pulled out would be massive, so the government is between a rock and hard place. I agree that it will be of more note if the decision was made late, as they would just have to forfeit England's games (so not much different to the likely outcomes), but FIFA would lose a lot of revenue from losing three group games.
If the decision is made now, there's plenty of time to draft a replacement and, if I were FIFA, I would have already requested cash bids canvassed likely national teams to alert them to the need to be ready. Italy is the most obvious choice, being that they're the most corruptible storied footballing nation not in the tournament, after they crashed out to Sweden in the second round playoffs having finished runners up to Spain in their qualifying group.
If they really want to stick it to England, though, they'd draft Scotland, who would probably go on and fucking win it just to piss us off even more.
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McCabe has memos. When will Trump realize that firing people just ungags them and turns them into witnesses for the prosecution? I hope never...
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This seems like it should have a higher profile (https://www.theguardian.com/news/2018/mar/17/cambridge-analytica-facebook-influence-us-election): Cambridge Analytica - owned by Trump-booster Robert Mercer and run by Steve Bannon - "harvested" 50 million profiles of U.S. Facebook users and used it to build a database of voters to bombard with pro-Trump / anti-Clinton messaging. Jared Kushner coordinated the digital marketing for the Trump campaign, which included hiring and using Cambridge Analytica.
We exploited Facebook to harvest millions of people’s profiles. And built models to exploit what we knew about them and target their inner demons. That was the basis the entire company was built on.
Basically, you can wrap-up the whole criminal enterprise right here.
Also, someone needs to be all over Facebook who seem to have been unwitting in the data breaches but definitely culpable in the cover-up of same. The platform is being hijacked, weaponized and turned on America in ways that bin Laden could have only dreamed!
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If they really want to stick it to England, though, they'd draft Scotland, who would probably go on and fucking win it just to piss us off even more.
The whole UK - Britain - Great Britain - England - Northern Ireland - Wales - Scotland - Isle of Man - Guernsey - Jersey - Monarchy - Parliamentary Democracy - FIFA thing really confuses me at times.
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The whole UK - Britain - Great Britain - England - Northern Ireland - Wales - Scotland - Isle of Man - Guernsey - Jersey - Monarchy - Parliamentary Democracy - FIFA thing really confuses me at times.
England is a country
Wales is England's Puerto Rico
Northern Ireland is England's Guam
Scotland is England's Alaska
Isle of Man is England's Bermuda
Guernsey / Jersey are England's Hawaii
The Monarchy is what Trump wants to be
The House of Lords is the Senate, with unelected "Lords" who typically have shorter tenure than Senators
The House of Commons is the House of Representatives with better grammar and less decorum
The Prime Minister is the Speaker of the House but required actually to answer for his/her actions
FIFA is Hydra
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Bermuda is a British Overseas Territory. I very much fear, sir, that this flaws your analogy.
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Bermuda is a British Overseas Territory. I very much fear, sir, that this flaws your analogy.
Like the Queen herself, I sometimes forget how much shit she owns.
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FIFA can’t be Hydra. (Captain) America actually has a win against Hydra.
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FIFA can’t be Hydra. (Captain) America actually has a win against Hydra.
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The FBI and IRS did pretty well against them.
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Today, continuing an unbroken streak going back at least a year, we learned from the Kremlin - not the White House - that Putin and Trump had spoken. When asked about it, Trump explained that he congratulated Putin on his victory - something the State Department had begged him not to do - and repeated multiple times that they would be meeting soon. He made no mention of the UK poisoning scandal.
Sanders was asked why Trump didn't discuss the poisoning with Putin, and she parried clumsily by saying "it didn't come up" while simultaneously calling on a different reporter.
No puppet...no puppet...you're the puppet.
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the State Department
Who?
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No puppet...no puppet...you're the puppet.
So, it appears that Kelly is furious that Trump's actions in the call to Putin leaked out. He apparently doesn't give a shit about Trump's actions, only that we know about them. Kelly/Trump will soon expunge the last people who might remotely subscribe to the true meaning of "America First," all while congressional Republicans fake the mildest of concern.
Trump supporters likely see this as further evidence that Trump is "kicking ass."
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So, it appears that Kelly is furious that Trump's actions in the call to Putin leaked out. He apparently doesn't give a shit about Trump's actions, only that we know about them. Kelly/Trump will soon expunge the last people who might remotely subscribe to the true meaning of "America First," all while congressional Republicans fake the mildest of concern.
Trump supporters likely see this as further evidence that Trump is "kicking ass."
That's draining the swamp.
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Trump’s lead defense attorney on the Russia case - John Dowd - just quit.
Trump has struggled to obtain quality / qualified help (in no small part to a history of not paying his attorneys), so Dowd is somewhat of a loss as, even though he’s been mostly useless, Sekulow is worse and Cobb is crazy (but not as crazy as Joe diGenova who Trump just hired).
Trump has been begging Emmet Flood to join his team, because he would increase the number of lawyers who know what the fuck they’re doing to “one”. Flood so far isn’t biting.
Trump is in real legal peril (reports claim that Felix Sater is claiming that he’s going to take Trump to jail with him), but his own history of being a complete dick is coming back to haunt him in ways those he’s stiffed could have only dreamed.
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Get ready for senseless war. McMaster out, Bolton in. This is one of the worst developments.
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Get ready for senseless war. McMaster out, Bolton in. This is one of the worst developments.
Why on earth isn't Bolton's shelf life exhausted? The man has no credibility whatsoever.
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So, this morning, after his lackeys helped negotiate the bill, the piece of shit has said he might veto the spending bill because of DACA and the wall. Specifically:
"I am considering a VETO of the Omnibus Spending Bill based on the fact that the 800,000 plus DACA recipients have been totally abandoned by the Democrats (not even mentioned in Bill) and the BORDER WALL, which is desperately needed for our National Defense, is not fully funded,"
IIRC, and I might not as the target constantly moves, wasn't he offered just this very deal recently, you know, "in exchange for a DACA fix, we'll fund your stupid wall."
The guy is a scourge in so many ways. No one knows what the fuck he wants, as his terms constantly change. Not just on domestic policy, but on trade, international relations, his cabinet, whether he will testify, etc. Now, he seems poised to fuck up the economy, fuck up the Iran nuclear deal, possible start a war over Korea or Iran, oh, and to create a constitutional crises by firing Mueller. At best, he's degrading the country; at worst, he's destroying it. All this because Obama mocked him at a ceremony, a bunch of angry fucks feel that he is in their corner and a bunch of coward pols are scared of the angry fucks.
Just another day of kicking ass, they say.
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Why on earth isn't Bolton's shelf life exhausted? The man has no credibility whatsoever.
Trump liked watching him on Fox News, which apparently is the only qualification needed to join this administration.
It's particularly odd considering how Trump likes to (rightfully) point out what a massive fraud and blunder the Iraq war was (while pretending he was against it at the time). That disaster was Bolton's signature accomplishment.
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IIRC, and I might not as the target constantly moves, wasn't he offered just this very deal recently, you know, "in exchange for a DACA fix, we'll fund your stupid wall.
Don’t forget that the reason DACA needs “fixing” is because, in a fit of childish rage, Trump smashed it to bits with a hammer.
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Don’t forget that the reason DACA needs “fixing” is because, in a fit of childish rage, Trump smashed it to bits with a hammer.
Trump would absolutely shoot his dog then berate the veterinarian for not saving it.
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Why on earth isn't Bolton's shelf life exhausted? The man has no credibility whatsoever.
Bolton recently penned an op-ed in which he laid out the “legal” argument for a preemptive strike against North Korea. This, and his other aggressive stances (e.g. Iran), are well known; so the really scary part is that Trump picked Bolton knowing this about him.
As an aside, given that North Korea definitely has an ICBM that can reach far in the U.S. mainland and possibly has a nuclear warhead to put on it, it’s worth noting that every commercial insurance policy - including your homeowners and the property policy on Trump Tower - excludes any loss from war or warlike action, any weapons of war employing atomic fission or fusion, and any damage from radiation or radioactive contamination.
This is perhaps how upstanding and conscientious members of society end up on “The Road”.
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Welp. Nice knowing you necks.
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Welp. Nice knowing you necks.
How close to the Canal are you? When the shit goes down, you better be ready.
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How close to the Canal are you? When the shit goes down, you better be ready.
A mile and a half at the most. Fortunately China would never let those goons bomb the canal. How the hell would they get all those Mardi Gras beads to New Orleans?
Of course, someone could drink too much soju and misprogram a missle intended for Seattle.
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Trump’s two newly-minted “best people” on his legal team - Joe diGenova and his wife Victoria Toensing, both formerly of Fox News actually can’t join his legal team due to a conflict of interest. So Trump lost Dowd because of these two and now these two can’t come aboard, meaning he’s a me minus one lawyer. Stable genius at work.
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Don't worry, a crack, white shoe firm will swoop in and seize such a prestigious opportunity.
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Don't worry, a crack, white shoe firm will swoop in and seize such a prestigious opportunity.
He says that lawyers are lining up to represent him.
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He says that lawyers are lining up to represent him.
So you know it's true. The guy from My Cousin Vinny, the guy on the back of the Enid, Oklahoma, phone book, there was another one... Well, two qualifies as a line, anyway.
I saw a billboard in Vegas recently: Sued by a whore? Call Bob Moore! 702-414-1000
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Don't worry, a crack, white shoe firm will swoop in and seize such a prestigious opportunity.
Apparently he’s had trouble getting crack, white shoe firms to take the bait. There are all sorts of reasons good firms wouldn’t want the President as their client, starting with he’s not known for paying his contractors.
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Don't worry, a crack, white shoe firm will swoop in and seize such a prestigious opportunity.
We've got top men working on it.
Who?
Top. Men.
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Top. Men.
First reaction I have is to chuckle at the image of some brawny gay guys sitting around trying to figure out how to get Trump out of this mess. Then I reflect that it's too bad that Trump isn't secretly gay. Then I realize, of course he's not secretly gay, he's not a real Republican.
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Apparently he’s had trouble getting crack, white shoe firms to take the bait. There are all sorts of reasons good firms wouldn’t want the President as their client, starting with he’s not known for paying his contractors.
Nobody wants a client who won't pay your bills and won't follow your advice anyway.
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The NRA just admitted to taking foreign money during its election activity, but says those funds weren’t spent on the election. Did they just admit to money laundering?
Say I want a new iPhone, but can’t afford it because of my car payment. My Uncle Vladimir offers to cover my car note one month, so I use the freed-up money to buy a new iPhone. So who bought the phone, me or my generous uncle?
BTW, this is the same argument that conservatives used to dismiss the separation of federal funds and donations by Planned Parenthood. It’s going to be interesting watching the advanced gymnastics around this one!
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Nobody wants a client who won't pay your bills and won't follow your advice anyway.
Trump has history of being sued for nonpayment by the lawyers he used to defend himself from a suit against him for nonpayment. It’s just jaw-dropping arrogance.
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You guys operate under the old paradigm, his attorneys pay his bills, not the other way around.
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First reaction I have is to chuckle at the image of some brawny gay guys sitting around trying to figure out how to get Trump out of this mess. Then I reflect that it's too bad that Trump isn't secretly gay. Then I realize, of course he's not secretly gay, he's not a real Republican.
So...while he's entertaining this porn girl, trying to get her into bed, he thinks a good line is:
You remind me of my daughter.
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So...while he's entertaining this porn girl, trying to get her into bed, he thinks a good line is:
You remind me of my daughter.
For the creepiness, it’s a proven technique.
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For the creepiness, it’s a proven technique.
Apparently he used it on Karen McDougal also. 2 for 2 that we know of.
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You guys operate under the old paradigm, his attorneys pay his bills, not the other way around.
Whoever said lawyers were cold-hearted and only looking out for their own best interest? Clearly there really is altruism out there.
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The NRA just admitted to taking foreign money during its election activity, but says those funds weren’t spent on the election. Did they just admit to money laundering?
BTW, this is the same argument that conservatives used to dismiss the separation of federal funds and donations by Planned Parenthood.
That is an excellent comparison. NRA is to the "right" what PP is to the "left".
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That is an excellent comparison. NRA is to the "right" what PP is to the "left".
More wacko missives from the land of false equivalencies.
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More wacko missives from the land of false equivalencies.
You can't see it?
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Maybe this will help. The NRA is to the "left" what PP is to the "right".
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Maybe this will help. The NRA is to the "left" what PP is to the "right".
I get your point that they are boogeymen for the respective viewpoints. But does the NRA actually do anything other than lobby and publish magazines? Planned Parenthood is an actual medical provider (and a critical one at that).
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I get your point that they are boogeymen for the respective viewpoints. But does the NRA actually do anything other than lobby and publish magazines? Planned Parenthood is an actual medical provider (and a critical one at that).
Exactly, not trying to make any comparison of the worthiness of either organization. I don't know the answer to your question but I would guess that whatever the answer may be it would not be deemed of value to those opposed to the organization. I mean, that's just how it goes.
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So much shit going on as usual - for example, the Dow plunged 700 point today following Trump escalating the trade war he started with China (despite saying the its already lost) and he wants to put scandal-plagued EPA Administrator Pruitt in Jeff Sessions’ job - but the one that made me laugh (aside from Trump lawyer Coehen getting searched and interviewed at his home by Mueller’s team) is that Trump is so dumb he’s making Stormy Daniel’s case for her.
He mentioned the case for the first time yesterday, responding to press corps questions on Air Force One and said that he knew nothing about the contract or the payment. Perfect! Only Trump had standing to enter into such a contract with Daniels so his assertions just torpedoed his own defense.
I think the most galling thing about all of this is that the entire country is being shaken down by some of the dumbest motherfuckers ever to lumber across the face of this good, green earth.
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So according to Trump, his lawyer just woke up one day and decided to give $130,000 of his own money to a porn star for no reason, no expectation of being paid back, and no expectation of anything in return. AND...included Trump in a non-disclosure agreement without Trimp’s knowledge. Just for the hell of it. That’s the story he’s going with. And the GOP is eating it up.
Question for the lawyers (please don’t send me a bill for this): can an attorney negotiate on behalf of a client without the client’s knowledge or consent? Seems that’s an ethical violation, if not a legal one.
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So according to Trump, his lawyer just woke up one day and decided to give $130,000 of his own money to a porn star for no reason, no expectation of being paid back, and no expectation of anything in return. AND...included Trump in a non-disclosure agreement without Trimp’s knowledge. Just for the hell of it. That’s the story he’s going with. And the GOP is eating it up.
Question for the lawyers (please don’t send me a bill for this): can an attorney negotiate on behalf of a client without the client’s knowledge or consent? Seems that’s an ethical violation, if not a legal one.
Probably depends on what the instructions from the client to the lawyer are. If a client at some point gave the lawyer some kind of general instruction like "handle all the stuff that comes up for me relating to {xxx}, I don't want to hear about it," where {xxx} included agreements with porn stars, then I'd guess the lawyer could handle all that stuff.
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If a client at some point gave the lawyer some kind of general instruction like "handle all the stuff that comes up for me relating to {xxx}, I don't want to hear about it," where {xxx} included agreements with porn stars...
Man, I wish I had a nickel.
I think my favorite of the week's stories is Scott Pruitt. Not only was he getting a sweetheart deal from someone with pending matters in front of his agency, but he decided he needed to pay the $50 only on nights he was actually in the apartment, and even with all that he STILL managed to be a deadbeat on the rent and refused to vacate, enough to where the landlords changed the locks on his ass.
I think the only thing he lacks in terms of credentials to the Republican Hall of Fame is a public restroom foot waggling incident.
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I thought this article was interesting.
https://www.chron.com/business/article/China-s-tariff-list-takes-aim-at-Texas-farmers-12810538.php
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Probably depends on what the instructions from the client to the lawyer are. If a client at some point gave the lawyer some kind of general instruction like "handle all the stuff that comes up for me relating to {xxx}, I don't want to hear about it," where {xxx} included agreements with porn stars, then I'd guess the lawyer could handle all that stuff.
One interesting wrinkle in the Daniels NDA is that it has a whole section dealing with paternity. There was never any whiff of offspring from this liaison, so that adds credence to this being a boiler plate NDA for Trump’s concubines. We all can never not know that Trump raw-dogged with both Daniels and MacDougal, so this presumably is his standard preference. So, this means that (a) he has bastard children out there to whom their mother is contractually bound not to reveal the identity of the father; and/or (2) he’s made someone pregnant who has then had an abortion (for which Trump/Cohen may have paid).
The existence of a boiler plate NDA means that there is an unknown number of women out there. Plus, option (2) particularly could be the end of the road for angelicals who so far have forgiven all of his other myriad sins.
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Plus, option (2) particularly could be the end of the road for angelicals who so far have forgiven all of his other myriad sins.
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA AAAAAAAHHHHHHH
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
One hundred, by the way, is the number Steve Bannon mentioned.
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One hundred, by the way, is the number Steve Bannon mentioned.
You've got to think at least a few of them are scrambling to see if their NDA's were signed.
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You've got to think at least a few of them are scrambling to see if their NDA's were signed.
The bigger point is that Daniels got Trump Cohen to cough up the $130k on the eve of the election because she was otherwise going to tell her story. That's blackmail, and TrumpWorld was slow-walking the payment to Daniels hoping to run out the clock but she was having none of it because she knew his track record in this regard.
So it's not a question of if he's at risk of being blackmailed, it's a question of how many people are actually blackmailing him. Being lead around by the nose and jumping when directed is a good explanation of his random and inexplicable actions (over and above his own arrogance and incompetence and that of those around him).
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So according to Trump, his lawyer just woke up one day and decided to give $130,000 of his own money to a porn star for no reason, no expectation of being paid back, and no expectation of anything in return. AND...included Trump in a non-disclosure agreement without Trimp’s knowledge. Just for the hell of it. That’s the story he’s going with. And the GOP is eating it up.
Notwithstanding the fact that such a payment is facially an illegal campaign donation.
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I thought this article was interesting.
https://www.chron.com/business/article/China-s-tariff-list-takes-aim-at-Texas-farmers-12810538.php
"Trade wars are good and easy to win"
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It appears that federal prosecutors in New York have raided Mr. Cohen's office
Cohen’s hush payment to Daniels was reportedly not the only issue the feds sought to investigate, per the Times: “The F.B.I. also seized emails, tax documents and business records,” one source familiar with the raid told the paper.
Trump will probably fire the prosecutor, or maybe just pardon Cohen for any and all federal crimes
It's comical how much graft is attached to this family. Seems like this is just one of hundreds of stories, but in reality, it's probably only twenty or thirty.
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In other matters
An internal email suggests that Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Scott Pruitt approved a large pay raise for an aide in March—despite his claims that he "didn't know" about it, The Atlantic reported on Monday.
This guy is possibly sleazier than Trump. Not really, but he might be if given the chance. Flat out lied to that reporter (surprise, surprise, surprise) on that specific question (and very likely on others), and within days, presto, evidence of his lie. It won't matter, he's already basically accepted bribes, ruled on matters related to the bribers, ran up 3 mil on security, involved in other embarassing shit, but he still has almost every Republican in his corner.
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It appears that federal prosecutors in New York have raided Mr. Cohen's office
Trump will probably fire the prosecutor, or maybe just pardon Cohen for any and all federal crimes
It's comical how much graft is attached to this family. Seems like this is just one of hundreds of stories, but in reality, it's probably only twenty or thirty.
Appears the raid was on the orders or the US Attorney for the Southern District of NY, so I don’t know whether that means it’s State or Federal. That makes a big difference regarding pardoning ability.
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Appears the raid was on the orders or the US Attorney for the Southern District of NY, so I don’t know whether that means it’s State or Federal. That makes a big difference regarding pardoning ability.
Federal.
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I really hope that Trump denying knowledge of the deal with Daniels and the raid on Cohen are not unrelated.
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I really hope that Trump denying knowledge of the deal with Daniels and the raid on Cohen are not unrelated.
Whatever happened with the payment there were election law violations. But I feel quite sure that the Stormy Daniels business will be little more than a footnote.
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Whatever happened with the payment there were election law violations. But I feel quite sure that the Stormy Daniels business will be little more than a footnote.
Agreed. Mueller passed this one off to the US Attorney as, presumably, it’s acside story to the main event.
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Agreed. Mueller passed this one off to the US Attorney as, presumably, it’s acside story to the main event.
I fear that you expect too much from this investigation, that Mueller is going to come up with the goods on Trump, and he'll resign or be impeached. Nothing...I mean nothing...let me repeat...NOTHING...that comes out of that investigation could possibly influence the GOP or his supporters to turn on him. Rape...murder...treason...using descriptions or accounts without the express written consent of Major League Baseball...will only solidify his standing.
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I fear that you expect too much from this investigation, that Mueller is going to come up with the goods on Trump, and he'll resign or be impeached. Nothing...I mean nothing...let me repeat...NOTHING...that comes out of that investigation could possibly influence the GOP or his supporters to turn on him. Rape...murder...treason...using descriptions or accounts without the express written consent of Major League Baseball...will only solidify his standing.
This I completely understand. Mueller is likely to refer any criminality by Trump to Congress - there’s a significant doubt as to whether he has the power to indict a sitting President. He could just name Trump as an unindicted co-conspirator and leave it at that. Even if control of Congress switches hands in November, there will not be enough votes on hand to convict in the Senate even if the House indicts.
However, for history’s sake, it is important to learn what happened here. As Adam Schiff very succinctly tweeted: there was an offer of help, that help was enthusiastically welcomed and the help was given. It’s not a question of if, it’s a question of how much conspiring went on between the Trump campaign and the Russians.
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I'm likely naive, but I think it depends on what Mueller finds. If he finds that Trump is basically a crime boss or an election cheat, the Republicans will let him off. However, if there is evidence that Trump is truly compromised by foreign powers, some Senators will cross over and support impeachment.
In other news, Trump's company has written a letter to the President of Panama, asking for him to intercede on behalf of the company. Probably butchering the facts, but at a Trump-branded hotel there, the Trump folks lost a legal battle to retain the Trump name on the hotel. I assume the hotel owner didn't want to be associated with the fucker's brand any more. Anyways, now Trump wants the Panama president to intervene. I don't know the dynamics of Panamanian politics, but in many non-autocracies, being seen as supporting Trump isn't a popular look.
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In other news, Trump's company has written a letter to the President of Panama, asking for him to intercede on behalf of the company. Probably butchering the facts, but at a Trump-branded hotel there, the Trump folks lost a legal battle to retain the Trump name on the hotel. I assume the hotel owner didn't want to be associated with the fucker's brand any more. Anyways, now Trump wants the Panama president to intervene. I don't know the dynamics of Panamanian politics, but in many non-autocracies, being seen as supporting Trump isn't a popular look.
Isn't that the same one that the hotel's HOA voted to fire the Trump management, which resulted in a 2-3 day standoff in the hotel offices?
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This I completely understand. Mueller is likely to refer any criminality by Trump to Congress - there’s a significant doubt as to whether he has the power to indict a sitting President. He could just name Trump as an unindicted co-conspirator and leave it at that. Even if control of Congress switches hands in November, there will not be enough votes on hand to convict in the Senate even if the House indicts.
However, for history’s sake, it is important to learn what happened here. As Adam Schiff very succinctly tweeted: there was an offer of help, that help was enthusiastically welcomed and the help was given. It’s not a question of if, it’s a question of how much conspiring went on between the Trump campaign and the Russians.
I agree, but I think history is already pretty well established. 100 years from now, Trump's legacy will not have the luxury of his wingnut supporters and he'll be seen for what he is. But it won't amount to a tinker's dam during his Presidency.
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However, for history’s sake, it is important to learn what happened here.
History's sake? That is the standard?
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History's sake? That is the standard?
So we can learn from it lest we be doomed to repeat it.
Remind me again where the Starr investigation started and where it ended; and also just how many millions of dollars, thousands of man-hours and separate congressional committees were involved in the Benghazi investigations and where that ended up (*cough* emails *cough*).
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In other news, Trump's company has written a letter to the President of Panama, asking for him to intercede on behalf of the company. Probably butchering the facts, but at a Trump-branded hotel there, the Trump folks lost a legal battle to retain the Trump name on the hotel. I assume the hotel owner didn't want to be associated with the fucker's brand any more. Anyways, now Trump wants the Panama president to intervene. I don't know the dynamics of Panamanian politics, but in many non-autocracies, being seen as supporting Trump isn't a popular look.
Trump’s management team were removed from the Panama facility because, amongst others issues with how they were running it, the facility was being used as a money laundromat for Russian oligarchs.
Nothing to see here...
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However, if there is evidence that Trump is truly compromised by foreign powers, some Senators will cross over and support impeachment.
At some point in the next twelve months evidence will come to light that makes it quite clear that Trump is fully answerable to Russian organized crime. I don't see any of his supporters or any of his GOP enablers doing anything other than digging in deeper.
This is a group of people for whom, on many fronts, reality is irrelevant.
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I just hope the world lasts another 12 months.
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At some point in the next twelve months evidence will come to light that makes it quite clear that Trump is fully answerable to Russian organized crime. I don't see any of his supporters or any of his GOP enablers doing anything other than digging in deeper.
This is a group of people for whom, on many fronts, reality is irrelevant.
I have seen Republicans described as a runner who has taken too much of a lead off base, and now has to run it out and hope that something happens to stop them being thrown out easily. It’s a good analogy, especially for a baseball forum.
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Meanwhile, in routine Trump administration business, his national security spokesman and his homeland security advisor have both recently quit. I’m sure this has nothing to do with the start of John Bolton as National Security Advisor...
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Isn't that the same one that the hotel's HOA voted to fire the Trump management, which resulted in a 2-3 day standoff in the hotel offices?
This is pretty good:
The United States Embassy in Panama said that "matters related to the Trump Organization are sent directly to the White House" and declined to comment on the matter further.
https://www.prensa.com/politica/TrumpOrganization-pressures-Varela_0_5003499704.html
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This is pretty good:
https://www.prensa.com/politica/TrumpOrganization-pressures-Varela_0_5003499704.html
That’s awesome! They’re simultaneously side-stepping and highlighting the giant ethical problem here.
[Golf Clap]
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The ambassador here quit, you know. I think it was a direct response to the shithole country comment, but in any event it was directly related to his unwillingness to work for an ignorant, racist fuckface.
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The ambassador here quit, you know. I think it was a direct response to the shithole country comment, but in any event it was directly related to his unwillingness to work for an ignorant, racist fuckface.
Also, Trump poisons everything - and everyone - he touches. No one gets away clean.
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I really hope that Trump denying knowledge of the deal with Daniels and the raid on Cohen are not unrelated.
Quick update: there were 36 "office" hours between Trump denying knowledge of the deal to the press core (sic) and the Feds kicking in Cohen's doors (three of them). Also, it's been reported that the US Attorney is looking into payments to at least two women.
Daniels' lawyer was Pooholing it around the bases last night on TV, but he made a good point: Cohen is fucked three ways from Sunday because he used banks to "facilitate" the payment. Specifically:
(1) if he took out a new line of credit on his house to make the payment, he had to have lied about the purpose (he may have to have given a reason for the draw down even if it was an existing line of credit);
(2) he set up a bank account for the LLC through which the payment flowed, so he may well have lied here too, to get the account opened; and
(3) the actual transfer of funds was flagged and interrupted by the banks as suspicious, so he may well have lied in order to free up the funds and get them moving - he was up against the clock after all.
If Cohen lied at any or all of these banking checkpoints, and it's hard to see how he could have done this without lying to the banks at least once as "to pay a porn star $130k in hush money" is likely not passing muster at any of these challenge points, he's guilty of quite serious bank fraud. That evaporates any attorney-client privilege that Trump thought he enjoyed, at least in relation to the Daniels affair, and likely opens the doors to go deeper into the Cohen-Trump dealings.
Trump's unhinged ramble at the press availability yesterday - in which he looked more confused and defensive than normal (arms wrapped tightly around his own torso) - suggests that this hit home really hard. He knows what Cohen knows, and now Cohen is in the wringer. Will he hold the line and take the fall for Trump? It will be interesting...
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And now Paul Ryan is fleeing. He won't seek reelection in the fall. (https://www.washingtonpost.com/powerpost/house-speaker-paul-ryan-will-not-seek-reelection-he-tells-friends-and-colleagues/2018/04/11/0d2719e4-3d83-11e8-8d53-eba0ed2371cc_story.html?nid&utm_term=.4bab4865a18e)
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And now Paul Ryan is fleeing....
...with an enormous sack of money and the hopes that this will all be forgotten by the American people by 2020.
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And now Paul Ryan is fleeing. He won't seek reelection in the fall. (https://www.washingtonpost.com/powerpost/house-speaker-paul-ryan-will-not-seek-reelection-he-tells-friends-and-colleagues/2018/04/11/0d2719e4-3d83-11e8-8d53-eba0ed2371cc_story.html?nid&utm_term=.4bab4865a18e)
He knows - after the PA special election - that his beloved tax cuts are not a winner at the ballot box. The people who put Trump over the top aren’t seeing any benefit from it, and they know why. So he’s cutting and running so that he doesn’t have to fight a losing battle against an amateur opponent, and so that he can stay clean to run for President in 2020. #Leadership
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President? I'd scoff at the idea, but you know.
2020 doesn't seem likely though. Either he'd have to run against the dumbass and explain how he is superior to someone he enabled at every turn, or fill the post-impeachment void and explain why he enabled the impeached man at every turn. History won't be kind to this amoral coward.
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President? I'd scoff at the idea, but you know.
2020 doesn't seem likely though. Either he'd have to run against the dumbass and explain how he is superior to someone he enabled at every turn, or fill the post-impeachment void and explain why he enabled the impeached man at every turn. History won't be kind to this amoral coward.
I agree completely. That doesn’t mean he won’t run anyway.
What legislative achievements does he have to run on? The tax cuts and...
After that, it’s all Freedom Caucus revolts, government shutdowns and exploding debt and deficit.
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I look for Trump to fire Mueller and for the GOP to back him on that. While they know it's wrong, Mueller's investigation is hitting home while they're trying desperately to convince people to keep their party in the majority. They're already going to spend the entire summer trying to spin Trump's madness, and more and more guilty pleas will not help their cause. They need this to stop. They'd rather take their chances with a Constitutional crisis than with the consequences of the investigation.
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If this guy really wants to be president he could, now that he is free from re-election considerations, use his leadership position to, I don't know... lead?
He could push for a vote on DACA and universal background checks, he could push to protect the Mueller investigation, you know, things that are supported by a comfortable majority of Americans.
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I look for Trump to fire Mueller and for the GOP to back him on that. While they know it's wrong, Mueller's investigation is hitting home while they're trying desperately to convince people to keep their party in the majority. They're already going to spend the entire summer trying to spin Trump's madness, and more and more guilty pleas will not help their cause. They need this to stop. They'd rather take their chances with a Constitutional crisis than with the consequences of the investigation.
We know that Mueller has used sealed indictments and, more notably, sealed convictions, in this investigation. If they fire him and shut down the investigation, any sealed convictions will spring open like Sonic the Hedgehog giving up his rings. They really don’t know what will happen if they shut him down, but I agree that this may not stop them.
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I look for Trump to fire Mueller and for the GOP to back him on that. While they know it's wrong, Mueller's investigation is hitting home while they're trying desperately to convince people to keep their party in the majority. They're already going to spend the entire summer trying to spin Trump's madness, and more and more guilty pleas will not help their cause. They need this to stop. They'd rather take their chances with a Constitutional crisis than with the consequences of the investigation.
Unfortunately, I agree with you. All any opposing person would have to ask is why shut it down if nothing wrong was done? Of course, the opposing party seems pretty spineless when it comes to doing that.
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What, Ryan wont run for re-election? Horrible news. But no time for grief. Someone needs to quickly decide who next will be responsible now for gargling with enormous quantities of Charles Koch's semen and excrement, rolling around in an inflatable pool of hog vomit, jacking off to Ayn Rand objectivist snuff films, then marching into Satan's cavernous anus wearing a rubber Yogi Bear mask and sucking his balls for two years without coming up for air. Hopefully the selection process has already begun.
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What, Ryan wont run for re-election? Horrible news. But no time for grief. Someone needs to quickly decide who next will be responsible now for gargling with enormous quantities of Charles Koch's semen and excrement, rolling around in an inflatable pool of hog vomit, jacking off to Ayn Rand objectivist snuff films, then marching into Satan's cavernous anus wearing a rubber Yogi Bear mask and sucking his balls for two years without coming up for air. Hopefully the selection process has already begun.
Wow!
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PS: Won’t the Kochs be pissed because the gave Ryan $500,000, or does in not matter because it was taxpayers’ money anyway?
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PS: Won’t the Kochs be pissed because the gave Ryan $500,000, or does in not matter because it was taxpayers’ money anyway?
That was for services already rendered.
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Pssst! Russia...bombs are coming so you’d better move your shit out of the way*.
* They have now done this; recalling aircraft to their own bases and moving their ships out of Syrian ports.
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Wapo is reporting that the stupidest man on earth is now instructing administration officials to look at rejoining the Trans-Pacific Partnership. How does anyone on the national or international stage take this guy seriously. He's a fucking moron.
On a related note, Erik Erickson, a conservative writer, relaying a conversation with a Republican Congressman who wants to remain anonymous:
I say a lot of shit on TV defending him, even over this. But honestly, I wish the motherf*cker would just go away. We're going to lose the House, lose the Senate, and lose a bunch of states because of him. All his supporters will blame us for what we have or have not done, but he hasn't led. He wakes up in the morning, sh*ts all over Twitter, sh*ts all over us, sh*ts all over his staff, then hits golf balls. F*ck him. Of course, I can't say that in public or I'd get run out of town.
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Wapo is reporting that the stupidest man on earth is now instructing administration officials to look at rejoining the Trans-Pacific Partnership. How does anyone on the national or international stage take this guy seriously. He's a fucking moron.
On a related note, Erik Erickson, a conservative writer, relaying a conversation with a Republican Congressman who wants to remain anonymous:
I say a lot of shit on TV defending him, even over this. But honestly, I wish the motherf*cker would just go away. We're going to lose the House, lose the Senate, and lose a bunch of states because of him. All his supporters will blame us for what we have or have not done, but he hasn't led. He wakes up in the morning, sh*ts all over Twitter, sh*ts all over us, sh*ts all over his staff, then hits golf balls. F*ck him. Of course, I can't say that in public or I'd get run out of town.
fingers crossed
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Finally, some welcome good news for Republicans - former congressman Steve Stockman (Y'all remember him, right? Guy that said Obama would use ebola to take over the US?) was found not guilty on a federal fraud charge.
https://www.texastribune.org/2018/04/12/texas-congressman-steve-stockman-found-guilty-felony-charges/
What’s that? Oh. Yeah. Apparently he was found guilty on 23 other federal fraud charges. Mail fraud, wire fraud, money laundering, election finance violations. A veritable K-Tel collection of Republican greatest hits, all for only 19.95 years per conviction!
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Prosecutors argued that Stockman promised that money would go to specific purposes — including “educating” voters and renovating a conservative “Freedom House” for interns
What the hell is a "Freedom House" for interns? Seriously, my imagination fails me when trying to understand that species.
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What the hell is a "Freedom House" for interns? Seriously, my imagination fails me when trying to understand that species.
It’s a house where young people can feel free to use traditional gender-conforming pronouns without fear of liberal excoriation.
Yeah, beats me! Freedom House?
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Apparently Trumpy had a love child with the cleaning lady. Fukin anchor babies. Anyway, great news for Trumpy, takes the lustre right off the pee tape!
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Apparently Trumpy had a love child with the cleaning lady. Fukin anchor babies. Anyway, great news for Trumpy, takes the lustre right off the pee tape!
Aside from the fact that the phrase “cleaning woman” always makes me think of Steve Martin in “Dead Men Don’t Wear Plaid”, the important takeaway here isn’t the affair or the baby, it’s that this is now the third payoff we know about to prevent a salacious news story hitting the airwaves in the run up to the election. Moreover, this is another “catch and kill” favor by Trump’s good friends at the National Enquirer.
What’s different here is the the Enquirer was in communication with Michael Cohen, so the Feds may already have proof of the conspiracy between TrumpWorld and the Enquirer to engage in criminal violations of Federal election laws.
Also, Cohen has a habit of recording conversations, including those with Trump. Mueller may now have some/all of those recordings.
Also Cohen, if forced to give a deposition in the Daniels civil suit, will plead the fifth. In a civil suit...
Also, Trump isn’t going to do an interview with Muellerks team, to which they say “Cool! We’ll just accelerate the release of our findings,” which start with at least four incidents of obstruction of justice.
Also, Pompeo shit the bed in his confirmation hearing and may not make it out of committee.
Also, the seemingly nice man who is the White House doctor and has been put forward to run the VA did worse than Pompeo.
Expect a massacre at the DOJ this weekend as Trump Nixons his way through the senior management in order to have Mueller fired. Fox News has been screaming- literally - about this for a couple of days now and I’m sure the President’s most trusted advisers- Fox & Friends - will be championing that cause this morning.
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Mr. Cohen has been a busy little boy: specifically, a $1.6MM bag boy for another upstanding, family-values paragon of virtue in the Republican hierarchy.
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Trumps orders air strikes against Syria. This will energize the wingnut base and raise his approval level among the general yahoos.
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Trumps orders air strikes against Syria. This will energize the wingnut base and raise his approval level among the general yahoos.
I wonder if they’ll actually hit something this time.
What this really means, though, obviously, is that he’s going to fire Rosenstein tomorrow.
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I wonder if they’ll actually hit something this time.
What this really means, though, obviously, is that he’s going to fire Rosenstein tomorrow.
No and yes.
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Via tweet.
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And on a side note, Dead Men Don’t Wear Plaid is a very under appreciated film.
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And on a side note, Dead Men Don’t Wear Plaid is a very under appreciated film.
http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/newpix/2018/04/13/22/4B21BBBE00000578-0-image-a-36_1523655693533.jpg
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http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/newpix/2018/04/13/22/4B21BBBE00000578-0-image-a-36_1523655693533.jpg
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
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And on a side note, Dead Men Don’t Wear Plaid is a very under appreciated film.
https://youtu.be/rmkbudWbQ9A
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http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/newpix/2018/04/13/22/4B21BBBE00000578-0-image-a-36_1523655693533.jpg
Ladies and gentlemen, the personal attorney for the President of the United States.
I'd love to know who all of his lieutenants are and what they're up to, although I'm sure the FBI already does.
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Ladies and gentlemen, the personal attorney for the President of the United States.
I'd love to know who all of his lieutenants are and what they're up to, although I'm sure the FBI already does.
MAGA = My Attorney Got Arrested
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Headline in the failing New York Times:
"Trump Sees Cohen Inquiry as Greater Threat Than Mueller"
Ya think?
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Headline in the failing New York Times:
"Trump Sees Cohen Inquiry as Greater Threat Than Mueller"
Ya think?
Even better, there's less he can do about it.
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Even better, there's less he can do about it.
Cohen is involved in everything Trump is involved in. Mueller is investigating Cohen's trip to Prague, which was first reported in the Steele pissier dossier, denied by Cohen and since proven*. What's not proven (that we know of) is whether Cohen met with a prominent Russian in Prague, as Steele claims, but hands up who thinks that part of the story is going to be the bit that's not true.
Cohen knows everything about everything. Is he the sort of person to take a double-digit year jail sentence to protect Trump? A man Cohen has privately confided that he thinks will throw him under the bus?
* It's a continuing and expanding truism that everything in the Steele dossier that's been checked out, has checked out, while nothing in there...not one thing...has been disproven through these investigations.
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30% of our idiot population still support this clown. Rubes
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30% of our idiot population still support this clown. Rubes
Not only support, but think he’s doing a great job.
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Not only support, but think he’s doing a great job.
I imagine that there’s no overlap in the Venn between these people and Fox News viewers, who have been fed a steady diet of obfuscation and misinformation (putting it mildly) about Comey, Rosenstein and Mueller.
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So, Comey. While I am enjoying (metaphorically) him pantsing Trump, his admissions around the announcement(s) of the investigation into Clinton’s emails - while, on the surface, seemingly self-exculpatory - are actually quite damning. He admits that the only reason he announced the re-opening of the case just days before the election was because he believed Hillary would win, and he didn’t want her Presidency tainted if news of this came out later.
Two things:
1) That’s not his call to make! That’s a political decision being made by the person running a deliberately apolitical agency. His actions also directly impacted the result, so it was a wrong move on many fronts; and
B) HE WAS INVESTIGATING THE OTHER CANDIDATE AT THE SAME FUCKING TIME AND NEVER SAID A FUCKING WORD ABOUT IT!
He wants to been seen as a hero here, but he’s not. He’s no villain either, just a guy in a difficult position who abandoned principles in order to avoid potential embarrassment later. That’s just weak.
EOR
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Have only read excerpts but to me Comey sounds like he is as petty as Trump.
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Comey does not look great in this.
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Have only read excerpts but to me Comey sounds like he is as petty as Trump.
He went to the height and hands thing. That petty.
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Comey does not look great in this.
In trying to make himself look good, he’s making himself look worse. As Stephanopolous repeatedly highlighted, he didn’t stand up to Trump when he had the opportunity. And let’s not forget the whole hiding in the curtains thing.
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Eh, Comey pettiness doesn't seem important to me. Besides, being non-petty hasn't worked for anyone against Trump, not one bit.
The most important aspect of Comey's tour is to remind the public why this is important. Every time he says that "Trump may be compromised by the Russians" is a slap of reality to those that snooze or scoff at the whole investigation. My god, the Dems rarely ever say this, out of some fear of something. They get lost in the stupid plot and dialogue and forget the basic theme.
Comey should keep repeating it and let it sink into the subconscious of everyone. It will help keep the investigation going and increase the likelihood that the findings reach the light of day.
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Comey does not look great in this.
His "principles" undermined his principles.
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As Comey reminds us why this matters, WAPO reports
President Trump on Monday put the brakes on a preliminary plan to impose additional economic sanctions on Russia, walking back a Sunday announcement by U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley that the Kremlin had swiftly denounced as “international economic raiding.”
Preparations to punish Russia anew for its support of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s government over the alleged chemical weapons attack in Syria caused consternation at the White House. Haley had said on CBS News’s “Face the Nation” that sanctions on Russian companies behind the equipment related to Assad’s alleged chemical weapons attack would be announced Monday by Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin.
But Trump conferred with his national security advisers later Sunday and told them he was upset the sanctions were being officially rolled out because he was not yet comfortable executing them, according to several people familiar with the plan
Even those that support Trump, or at least don't oppose him, are aware of these things, or at least sense them in their gut. It's all building, and these things often turn on a dime.
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At a legitimate news organization, Hannity’s failure to disclose that he was Michael Cohen’s unnamed third client would be grounds for immediate termination.
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Yeah, what another fucked up element to the plot. Fox won't give a shit, but makes one wonder who Hannity has fathered and/or what what woman might have had him by the balls.
Further proof that Hannity is an idiot. Seriously, isn't there a real attorney he could hire with all his money. Or maybe, this was just a perk offered by Cohen, a quid pro quo for all Hannity's propaganda.
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legitimate news organization
Well, Fox News is one of those words.
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Well, Fox News is one of those words.
I think they just play one on TV.
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Interesting New Yorker piece from this weekend.
The Link (https://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/michael-cohen-and-the-end-stage-of-the-trump-presidency)
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At a legitimate news organization, Hannity’s failure to disclose that he was Michael Cohen’s unnamed third client would be grounds for immediate termination.
This is fucking awesome!*
* As long as it doesn’t lead to discussions of Hannity’s proclivities.
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Yeah, what another fucked up element to the plot. Fox won't give a shit, but makes one wonder who Hannity has fathered and/or what what woman might have had him by the balls.
Further proof that Hannity is an idiot. Seriously, isn't there a real attorney he could hire with all his money. Or maybe, this was just a perk offered by Cohen, a quid pro quo for all Hannity's propaganda.
“Other” attorneys may not have wanted to touch Hannity with a 10 foot pole.
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Interesting New Yorker piece from this weekend.
The Link
(https://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/michael-cohen-and-the-end-stage-of-the-trump-presidency)
That’s more warming than a puppy video.
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Hannity on Twitter:
“Michael Cohen has never represented me in any matter. I never retained him, received an invoice, or paid legal fees. I have occasionally had brief discussions with him about legal questions about which I wanted his input and perspective.”
How much of that do you think the FBI already knows to be bullshit?
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I don't actually have trouble believing that. Hannity's an idiot for asking Cohen's advice on anything, but I don't see a reason to believe they had a relationship of any significance.
(for entertainment's sake, I do hope I'm wrong about this)
Edit: I'm going to clarify and say it wouldn't surprise me at all if Cohen helped Hannity make a hush payment to someone. I just think it's very, very possible this is nothing.
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Hannity on Twitter:
“Michael Cohen has never represented me in any matter. I never retained him, received an invoice, or paid legal fees. I have occasionally had brief discussions with him about legal questions about which I wanted his input and perspective.”
How much of that do you think the FBI already knows to be bullshit?
I'm starting to wonder how Cohen earns a living... apparently he not only works for free, but hands out hundreds of thousands of dollars of his own money to random strangers just for the hell of it.
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I'm starting to wonder how Cohen earns a living... apparently he not only works for free, but hands out hundreds of thousands of dollars of his own money to random strangers just for the hell of it.
Taxi medallions. The classic NYC scam.
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I'm starting to wonder how Cohen earns a living... apparently he not only works for free, but hands out hundreds of thousands of dollars of his own money to random strangers just for the hell of it.
“Contingency fee?
No - money down!”
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“Contingency fee?
No - money down!”
...no attorney-client privilege.
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While we may never know why Hannity consulted a lawyer whose specialty appears to be facilitating payoffs to the concubines of rich men, I’m sure Mrs Hannity will want to know.
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I don't actually have trouble believing that. Hannity's an idiot for asking Cohen's advice on anything, but I don't see a reason to believe they had a relationship of any significance.
(for entertainment's sake, I do hope I'm wrong about this)
Edit: I'm going to clarify and say it wouldn't surprise me at all if Cohen helped Hannity make a hush payment to someone. I just think it's very, very possible this is nothing.
It’s worth remembering that Hannity’s name was brought up by Cohen’s lawyers, saying that he was a proper client in order to bolster their defense that Cohen is a proper lawyer. Hannity’s claim contradicts that, although he did also say that he may have casually given Cohen “10 bucks”, which is a token sum that courts have upheld as enough to establish an attorney-client relationship.
So either Cohen’s lawyers are lying in court or Hannity is lying on Twitter. Or both. But it can’t be neither.
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I'm starting to wonder how Cohen earns a living... apparently he not only works for free, but hands out hundreds of thousands of dollars of his own money to random strangers just for the hell of it.
He certainly seems to have been left out of the public money orgy going on in Washington. I wonder if that made him even a little bit resentful...
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It’s worth remembering that Hannity’s name was brought up by Cohen’s lawyers, saying that he was a proper client in order to bolster their defense that Cohen is a proper lawyer. Hannity’s claim contradicts that, although he did also say that he may have casually given Cohen “10 bucks”, which is a token sum that courts have upheld as enough to establish an attorney-client relationship.
So either Cohen’s lawyers are lying in court or Hannity is lying on Twitter. Or both. But it can’t be neither.
There's no requirement that money change hands to form the attorney-client privilege. The only requirement is from the client's perspective communications were made with a lawyer for the purpose of securing legal advice.
It's fairly obvious that Hannity sought legal advice from Cohen, even to the point that he asked Cohen not to reveal his identity. It's also perfectly plausible that Cohen didn't do much in the way of providing legal services beyond a few conversations and his lawyers overstated the extent of his Hannity file in order to recover the seized records.
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There's no requirement that money change hands to form the attorney-client privilege. The only requirement is from the client's perspective communications were made with a lawyer for the purpose of securing legal advice.
It's fairly obvious that Hannity sought legal advice from Cohen, even to the point that he asked Cohen not to reveal his identity. It's also perfectly plausible that Cohen didn't do much in the way of providing legal services beyond a few conversations and his lawyers overstated the extent of his Hannity file in order to recover the seized records.
One if the things that constantly gets hammered into us from the work lawyers is that privilege isn’t automatic and it isn’t universal. Not all attorney-client communication is privileged,even if you claim it. It must be legal advice, directly relevant to an ongoing or in reasonable anticipation of a legal matter in which the “client” is involved. It’s actualy pretty narrow in scope. I assume this is applicable here, which suggests that anything that survives the privilege scrutiny must be serious enough to warrant it, or perhaps something else was up. What say you, counselor?
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One if the things that constantly gets hammered into us from the work lawyers is that privilege isn’t automatic and it isn’t universal. Not all attorney-client communication is privileged,even if you claim it. It must be legal advice, directly relevant to an ongoing or in reasonable anticipation of a legal matter in which the “client” is involved. It’s actualy pretty narrow in scope. I assume this is applicable here, which suggests that anything that survives the privilege scrutiny must be serious enough to warrant it, or perhaps something else was up. What say you, counselor?
Whether a communication is privileged is fairly specific inquiry in to the nature, circumstances, and intent of the communication.
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Whether a communication is privileged is fairly specific inquiry in to the nature, circumstances, and intent of the communication.
Right, but doesn’t that at least imply that anything that truly is privileged is substantial, and not just casual cocktail party smalltalk as Hannity has claimed.
Where I’m going is...was Hannity using Cohen as a source to head off the reaction and spin Trump’s madness. Not necessarily illegal, but certainly journalistically unethical.
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Where I’m going is...was Hannity using Cohen as a source to head off the reaction and spin Trump’s madness. Not necessarily illegal, but certainly journalistically unethical.
How about the other way: Cohen using Hannity to push a narrative that helps his and Trump's case, similar to how they used Assange. Cohen might have taped it, knows it will look swampy, and figures that he can prevent its release if it is labeled as priviledged.
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How about the other way: Cohen using Hannity to push a narrative that helps his and Trump's case, similar to how they used Assange. Cohen might have taped it, knows it will look swampy, and figures that he can prevent its release if it is labeled as priviledged.
Exactly...other side of the same slimy coin. This is the relationship between Hannity and Cohen that I can see as entirely probable.
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Right, but doesn’t that at least imply that anything that truly is privileged is substantial, and not just casual cocktail party smalltalk as Hannity has claimed.
Where I’m going is...was Hannity using Cohen as a source to head off the reaction and spin Trump’s madness. Not necessarily illegal, but certainly journalistically unethical.
I think you're right.
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FWIW, various legal types on TV last night - including Stormy’s lawyer - think that there’s something “bad” in Cohen’s files with Hannity’s name on it. Lordy, let there be tapes.
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There's no requirement that money change hands to form the attorney-client privilege. The only requirement is from the client's perspective communications were made with a lawyer for the purpose of securing legal advice.
It's fairly obvious that Hannity sought legal advice from Cohen, even to the point that he asked Cohen not to reveal his identity. It's also perfectly plausible that Cohen didn't do much in the way of providing legal services beyond a few conversations and his lawyers overstated the extent of his Hannity file in order to recover the seized records.
Thanks for the clarification.
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FWIW, various legal types on TV last night - including Stormy’s lawyer - think that there’s something “bad” in Cohen’s files with Hannity’s name on it. Lordy, let there be tapes.
With apologies to the Eurythmics:
The third client’s Hannity
(Even though he disagrees)
Is he on the tape that has the pee?
All of these guys are covering something
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All the talk about Michael Cohen this week, including (and notably) from Jay Goldberg - Trump’s former divorce attorney to whom Trump reached out last week looking for advice - is about whether Cohen will flip on Trump. So I guess we’re past the point where people still have any doubts about whether Trump has committed any crimes and we just now know that he has and all that’s left is to see if and how he gets caught.
This is nuts.
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All the talk about Michael Cohen this week, including (and notably) from Jay Goldberg - Trump’s former divorce attorney to whom Trump reached out last week looking for advice - is about whether Cohen will flip on Trump. So I guess we’re past the point where people still have any doubts about whether Trump has committed any crimes and we just now know that he has and all that’s left is to see if and how he gets caught.
This is nuts.
It is amazing. Trump's spokespeople like the Mooch are basically stipulating that Trump has committed multiple crimes and are simply discussing whether Cohen will flip.
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https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/democratic-party-files-lawsuit-alleging-russia-the-trump-campaign-and-wikileaks-conspired-to-disrupt-the-2016-campaign/2018/04/20/befe8364-4418-11e8-8569-26fda6b404c7_story.html?utm_term=.a53caa7c79c9 (https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/democratic-party-files-lawsuit-alleging-russia-the-trump-campaign-and-wikileaks-conspired-to-disrupt-the-2016-campaign/2018/04/20/befe8364-4418-11e8-8569-26fda6b404c7_story.html?utm_term=.a53caa7c79c9)
I'm probably missing something, but is this an effort to require testimony from people?
My gut reaction was: here come the Democratic Party leaders, here to whine and play into Trump's narrative and generally fuck up something that is going their way. I hope my gut reaction is way off base.
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Shots fired. (https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/democratic-party-files-lawsuit-alleging-russia-the-trump-campaign-and-wikileaks-conspired-to-disrupt-the-2016-campaign/2018/04/20/befe8364-4418-11e8-8569-26fda6b404c7_story.html?utm_term=.b75e0f212dc1)
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What I like is that Trump decided that he doesn't have to fire Rosenstein and Mueller because Rosenstein told him he's not a target of the investigation. (What he probably said was that he is not THE target and Trump heard that as he wanted to.)
Which means, of course, that once Trump figures out that he is in fact in the crosshairs, why, that WILL be the time to fire those pests.
It amuses me when he obstructs justice in public.
Another thing I like is Giuliani. He and Trump are like second cousins, different sides of the mafia family. Giuliani says he's going to negotiate an end to the investigation. I'm not sure it works like that.
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https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/democratic-party-files-lawsuit-alleging-russia-the-trump-campaign-and-wikileaks-conspired-to-disrupt-the-2016-campaign/2018/04/20/befe8364-4418-11e8-8569-26fda6b404c7_story.html?utm_term=.a53caa7c79c9 (https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/democratic-party-files-lawsuit-alleging-russia-the-trump-campaign-and-wikileaks-conspired-to-disrupt-the-2016-campaign/2018/04/20/befe8364-4418-11e8-8569-26fda6b404c7_story.html?utm_term=.a53caa7c79c9)
I'm probably missing something, but is this an effort to require testimony from people?
My gut reaction was: here come the Democratic Party leaders, here to whine and play into Trump's narrative and generally fuck up something that is going their way. I hope my gut reaction is way off base.
Suing in part because they got caught rigging their own primary. Yes they are going to fuck up something that is going their way.
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My gut reaction was: here come the Democratic Party leaders, here to whine and play into Trump's narrative and generally fuck up something that is going their way. I hope my gut reaction is way off base.
My gut reaction too. This is how they’re going to screw this particular pooch. Instead of letting the multiple investigations run their course, they’re going to grandstand with a lawsuit that’s so easily dismissed as being partisan hackery, distract attention from the real issue and give Republicans something to attack them with.
It takes some true genius to come up with a ploy so completely self-destructive. You almost have to admire it.
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The DNC is the most effective Republican institution in existence. Incredible.
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The DNC is the most effective Republican institution in existence. Incredible.
The Pod Save America boys were in Houston a few weeks back. When they mentioned - at their live show stacked with an extremely liberal audience - the DCCC, the crowd booed lustily. They are a disaster and Tony Perez is planning on running a very generic campaign in 2018. Progressive voters will, as usual, have to try to save the party from itself.
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Suing in part because they got caught rigging their own primary. Yes they are going to fuck up something that is going their way.
How did they rig their own primary?
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How did they rig their own primary?
And who cares how they selected their nominee. It’s their club, they can do it any way they want. They don’t even have to have a primary, just a room full of old white guys pick somebody.
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And who cares how they selected their nominee. It’s their club, they can do it any way they want. They don’t even have to have a primary, just a room full of old white guys pick somebody.
I care. They can do that, but it is bad for them to do that.
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I care. They can do that, but it is bad for them to do that.
It’s a bad look when you say you’re going to one thing (primary) but then try and do the other (smoke-filled room) on the QT. Nothing illegal about it, but conning your own supporters is self-destructive.
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I care. They can do that, but it is bad for them to do that.
Then I think your priorities are misplaced. Perhaps it’s just my general disdain for political parties.
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Arizona 8th, where registered Republicans outnumber registered Democrats by 17 points. Won by Trump by 21points, an experienced Republican - supported by $1mm of RNC money - running against a 1st time Democratic candidate with negligible support from the DNC. No contest, right? The Republican won by 5 points.
GOP pollsters say that Republicans shouldn’t be hitting the alarm button, they should be slamming it. A great many House Republicans will be drowned by a 16-point swing. Which seems more and more likely as these dead-red seats take giant leaps to the left.
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Michael Cohen posted documents in court yesterday stating that - because of the parallel Federal investigation- he can’t answer any questions under oath in the Stormy Daniels civil case without the possibility of self-incrimination. Wow!
Hilariously, this could lead the court to speed past Cohen and green light a deposition of Trump himself. After all, he spends most of the day on Twitter proclaiming that he’s not under investigation and that he’s done nothing wrong. No chance of self-incrimination there!
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Michael Cohen posted documents in court yesterday stating that - because of the parallel Federal investigation- he can’t answer any questions under oath in the Stormy Daniels civil case without the possibility of self-incrimination. Wow!
Hilariously, this could lead the court to speed past Cohen and green light a deposition of Trump himself. After all, he spends most of the day on Twitter proclaiming that he’s not under investigation and that he’s done nothing wrong. No chance of self-incrimination there!
That's not an excuse to avoid testifying altogether. He'll still have to show up and specifically invoke his 5th amendment rights in response to each question. And generally (though not always the case) in civil suits when someone refuses to testify by invoking the 5th the fact-finder is entitled to make an adverse presumption.
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Trump called in to Fox and Friends (“Donald from DC, hello!”) and emphasized that Cohen did “only a tiny, tiny percentage” of his legal work.
Prosecutors have already identified the comments to the court in a request for expedited review of the seized materials.
They are so, so bad at this. It would be funny if it weren’t ruining our country.
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"Michael represents me like with this crazy Stormy Daniels deal."
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That's not an excuse to avoid testifying altogether. He'll still have to show up and specifically invoke his 5th amendment rights in response to each question. And generally (though not always the case) in civil suits when someone refuses to testify by invoking the 5th the fact-finder is entitled to make an adverse presumption.
Thanks. I assumed that pleading the 5th in a civil case is basically refusing to offer a defense, so it becomes a default win for the other side. It’s amazing that (a) we have the President’s personal lawyer doing this; and (2) that they’re really that dumb that they think this will work.
The pressure is coming on so many fronts now - Mueller, the NY USA and from a porn star (just mind boggling that this is part of the discussion) - that they cannot get free of it and Trump can’t fire / pardon his way out of it.
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Trump called in to Fox and Friends (“Donald from DC, hello!”) and emphasized that Cohen did “only a tiny, tiny percentage” of his legal work.
Prosecutors have already identified the comments to the court in a request for expedited review of the seized materials.
They are so, so bad at this. It would be funny if it weren’t ruining our country.
"Michael represents me like with this crazy Stormy Daniels deal."
Amazingly, in one, unhinged phone call to a TV station, Trump managed to blow up any concerns about privilege applying to the fruits of the FBI raids on Cohen AND tie himself to the Daniels contract. Stormy’s lawyer called the interview - during which Trump also mooted further acts of obstruction - a gift from the Gods.
America’s Dumbest Criminals.
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But hey. Kanye.
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Amazingly, in one, unhinged phone call to a TV station, Trump managed to blow up any concerns about privilege applying to the fruits of the FBI raids on Cohen AND tie himself to the Daniels contract. Stormy’s lawyer called the interview - during which Trump also mooted further acts of obstruction - a gift from the Gods.
America’s Dumbest Criminals.
Good God. When I read about this I thought for sure that it was an impersonator that called in. But it sure sounds like him. Sanders' press briefing later today should be fun.
Plumbing the depths of moronitude.
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Good God. When I read about this I thought for sure that it was an impersonator that called in. But it sure sounds like him. Sanders' press briefing later today should be fun.
Plumbing the depths of moronitude.
I haven’t seen it yet, but a report I read said that the Fox hosts pretty much hung up on him to stop him from incriminating himself further. When those three chuckleheads are smarter than the President...?
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GOP pollsters say that Republicans shouldn’t be hitting the alarm button, they should be slamming it. A great many House Republicans will be drowned by a 16-point swing. Which seems more and more likely as these dead-red seats take giant leaps to the left.
There are 147 House districts that were won by Trump by less than 16 points...
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Thanks. I assumed that pleading the 5th in a civil case is basically refusing to offer a defense, so it becomes a default win for the other side. It’s amazing that (a) we have the President’s personal lawyer doing this; and (2) that they’re really that dumb that they think this will work.
The pressure is coming on so many fronts now - Mueller, the NY USA and from a porn star (just mind boggling that this is part of the discussion) - that they cannot get free of it and Trump can’t fire / pardon his way out of it.
I don’t think pleading the 5th is a default, but in a civil case the fact finder (the judge or the jury) can infer that a truthful answer to the question would reflect negatively on the witness, and can give that whatever evidentiary weight they deem appropriate. You lawyers can correct me if I misunderstand.
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On a somewhat related note, how slimy do you have to be to have FIFA call you out for ethical lapses?
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On a somewhat related note, how slimy do you have to be to have FIFA call you out for ethical lapses?
Jabba the President.
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“Babbling like Rain Man ate a bag of coke.”
- Bill Maher’s description of Trump’s Fox and Friends call-in.
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Marco Rubio said, in an interview today, that the benefits of the tax cuts are going mostly to corporations who are using them to buy back stock and pay executive bonuses. Very little is being paid forward to workers.
He was surprised by this development.
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Marco Rubio said, in an interview today, that the benefits of the tax cuts are going mostly to corporations who are using them to buy back stock and pay executive bonuses. Very little is being paid forward to workers.
He was surprised by this development.
And yet, https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-election-millennials/exclusive-democrats-lose-ground-with-millennials-reuters-ipsos-poll-idUSKBN1I10YH. Though left leaning voters appear to be very motivated to vote not Republican.
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And yet, https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-election-millennials/exclusive-democrats-lose-ground-with-millennials-reuters-ipsos-poll-idUSKBN1I10YH. Though left leaning voters appear to be very motivated to vote not Republican.
They have two shitty choices.
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They have two shitty choices.
Tell me about it. One choice is totally beholden to a rapist, daddy-hates-me-complected, know-nothing, serial liar who has whored US foreign policy out to Russian organized crime. It gives tax breaks to billionaires on the backs of ordinary workers, denies science at every opportunity at the peril of the very survival of the species, and is intent on dismantling the essential structure of federal governance in the thrall of inconceivably wealthy hyper-polluters.
The other choice has failed to excite sufficiently a 60+ year old hermit who has dedicated the preponderance of his adult life to the participation in a fake religion - more fake somehow than actual religions that normal fuckwits subscribe to - and seems to have been inoculated to sincerity or truth of any kind.
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The other choice has failed to excite sufficiently a 60+ year old hermit who has dedicated the preponderance of his adult life to the participation in a fake religion - more fake somehow than actual religions that normal fuckwits subscribe to - and seems to have been inoculated to sincerity or truth of any kind.
Oh chuck, there is so much you don't know. Like, for instance, the shiniest prettiest turd is still a piece of shit.
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In two separate soft-ball interviews on Fox, Rudd Giuliani managed to tie Trump to the Stormy Daniels payment and also tie the payment to the election. Add these to his guest appearance in the Muslim Ban debate, when his public confirmation that it was a Muslim Ban was used in court to block it, and he’s the gift the keeps on giving.
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Remember the conspiracy-mongering over Jade Helm 15? It was a Russian bot operation and a precursor to 2016 (https://www.texastribune.org/2018/05/03/hysteria-over-jade-helm-exercise-texas-was-fueled-russians-former-cia-/).
Fuck that weasel Greg Abbott and his traitorous undermining of the US military.
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Interesting. Given the other stuff the Russian puppeteers did like the fake rally in Houston, this shouldn't surprise me. Abbott is so lacking in self confidence, he always swings toward the extreme to shore up his conservative/wacko cred. He's such a tool that he makes me want Rick back.
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You would think Abbott's supporting tort reform and fighting against the ADA when he was AG would have been enough for any sane person to determine that he is an irrational self-loathing corporate pawn. But no, we elect him governor. And no one can even remember who he ran against. And he'll probably win again, because the Democrats are too busy polishing turds.
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The Democrats will run another supremely qualified, dynamic, exciting, female candidate that jaded incel fuckwits will pooh-pooh.
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The Democrats will run another supremely qualified, dynamic, exciting, female candidate that jaded incel fuckwits will pooh-pooh.
ITYM poo-poo.
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ITYM poo-poo.
ITYM shit on.
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In two separate soft-ball interviews on Fox, Rudd Giuliani managed to tie Trump to the Stormy Daniels payment and also tie the payment to the election. Add these to his guest appearance in the Muslim Ban debate, when his public confirmation that it was a Muslim Ban was used in court to block it, and he’s the gift the keeps on giving.
Rudy Giuliani, secret double-agent?
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Essential Consultants, LLC may not be the smoking gun, but it's covered in gunpowder residue and stinks of cordite.
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There's a lot to like in this whole Essential Consultants deal, not least of which is that it served as a vehicle through which giant multinational corporations blatantly and brazenly sent bribes to the president of the country. But I think so far the thing I like best is that it was receiving hundreds of thousands of dollars in funds from Russian organized crime AFTER the investigation into Russian interference had officially begun.
This is a heady mix of arrogance and stupidity. And the funny thing is, we haven't even really scratched the surface of what these bungling fuckwits were really up to. All this latest information is directly attributable to the lawyer of a porn star that the president fucked and then paid for silence. And it's crazy that that bit isn't even scandalous. God knows what we'll find out when Nikolett's attorney shows up on Twitter or when it gets revealed that it was really Trump who knocked up that Playboy model. Wonder how Franklin Graham will spin that one.
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There's a lot to like in this whole Essential Consultants deal, not least of which is that it served as a vehicle through which giant multinational corporations blatantly and brazenly sent bribes to the president of the country. But I think so far the thing I like best is that it was receiving hundreds of thousands of dollars in funds from Russian organized crime AFTER the investigation into Russian interference had officially begun.
This is a heady mix of arrogance and stupidity. And the funny thing is, we haven't even really scratched the surface of what these bungling fuckwits were really up to. All this latest information is directly attributable to the lawyer of a porn star that the president fucked and then paid for silence. And it's crazy that that bit isn't even scandalous. God knows what we'll find out when Nikolett's attorney shows up on Twitter or when it gets revealed that it was really Trump who knocked up that Playboy model. Wonder how Franklin Graham will spin that one.
The very bestist part is that Bob Mueller has had all this information for weeks now, at least. Avenatti has been saying for a while that the Stormy Affair will bring down Trump, and now we know how...by being a back door into the rampant money laundering that's been the business model of the Trump Organization since they stopped borrowing money to buy real estate in 2006 and started using found cash.
They're all going to jail.
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They're all going to jail.
I wish I shared your confidence. Don't get me wrong: I'm quite confident that Mueller will detail a multitude of crimes so significant that in normal times the perps would be locked for multiple lifetimes. But I'm really afraid that TrumpCo's campaign to discredit the investigation has gained sufficient traction to prevent any action from being taken.
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I wish I shared your confidence. Don't get me wrong: I'm quite confident that Mueller will detail a multitude of crimes so significant that in normal times the perps would be locked for multiple lifetimes. But I'm really afraid that TrumpCo's campaign to discredit the investigation has gained sufficient traction to prevent any action from being taken.
TrumpCo’s bluster serves to keep the base in line. It won’t impact the legal cogs that are turning.
To wit, Mueller interviewed - last November- AT&T, Novartis and the Russian Vekselberg. When it all comes down, the 60% of us who haven’t drunk Trump’s kook aid will be more than enthusiastic about rounding them all up and throwing them in jail.
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While the volume, seriousness and speed at which Trump shit comes at us, today was a notable day which is notable in itself given that it follows on from the day on which Trump fessed up to the Stormy Daniels payment and got referred to the DOJ as a result.
Today the pay-for-play shakedown of Qatar was laid bare; the efforts towards getting a Trump Moscow green lit were revealed to have been far greater than previously thought and ongoing far deeper into the campaign that previously thought - including Cohen dealing with some of the very Russians named by Mueller as being part of Russia’s Team Trump in the election; and Mueller got another set of guilty pleas and a cooperating witness in the form of Manafort’s former son-in-law.
Oh, and Trump called some Mexicans “animals”.
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The Qatar shakedown should be the biggest scandal in a generation, but instead, it's just one of many Thursday night stories. The scale of corruption overwhelms even those that care. Those that aren't bothered, I don't begin to understand.
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The Qatar shakedown should be the biggest scandal in a generation, but instead, it's just one of many Thursday night stories. The scale of corruption overwhelms even those that care. Those that aren't bothered, I don't begin to understand.
I agree. Although I think the scale of corruption is overwhelming the media’s ability to deal with it too, partly because of their flawed preference for balance. Sometimes, one side is right and one side is not, and both don’t merit equal weight.
In the meantime, I think the shakedown model is going to be the common thread emerging in many/most of the Trump scandals. Think about the fact that Cohen was hitting up Fortune 500 companies for contracts to be their Trump Whosperer; then recognize that some did and some didn’t go along; then think back to the transition, when Trump would randomly tweet @ a major corporation and send their stock price plummeting. Does anyone think that we (Mueller) won’t find an almost perfect correlation between the refuseniks and the recipients of negative tweets from the President-Elect?
The stripping naked of Michael Cohen is going to reveal the entire scheme. I think Michael Avenatti knows this for a fact, which is why he has repeatedly foreshadowed such (well, that and because it gets himself on TV).
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I agree. Although I think the scale of corruption is overwhelming the media’s ability to deal with it too, partly because of their flawed preference for balance. Sometimes, one side is right and one side is not, and both don’t merit equal weight.
In the meantime, I think the shakedown model is going to be the common thread emerging in many/most of the Trump scandals. Think about the fact that Cohen was hitting up Fortune 500 companies for contracts to be their Trump Whosperer; then recognize that some did and some didn’t go along; then think back to the transition, when Trump would randomly tweet @ a major corporation and send their stock price plummeting. Does anyone think that we (Mueller) won’t find an almost perfect correlation between the refuseniks and the recipients of negative tweets from the President-Elect?
The stripping naked of Michael Cohen is going to reveal the entire scheme. I think Michael Avenatti knows this for a fact, which is why he has repeatedly foreshadowed such (well, that and because it gets himself on TV).
I was in junior high school for most of the goings-on of the Watergate scandal, back in the 1970s. In the summer of 1973, the Senate investigative committee hearings were broadcast live on KUHT/PBS – this was before widespread cable TV, CNN, etc. I remember the hearings being broadcast in black and white, although that could be my memory playing tricks on me.
My mother, who was still a stay-at-home housewife/mom at the time, was practically glued to the TV set that summer. She never watched much television otherwise, but she would not miss the hearings. I would pass through, in the midst of conducting my early teenage doings, and I would occasionally stop and watch with her for a while. I missed most of the high points – most of it seemed like dull, procedural stuff to my unsophisticated 14-year-old mind – but I vividly remember the day that Alexander Butterfield, a former White House staffer, disclosed in front of the committee that Richard Nixon had an extensive taping system in the Oval Office, unbeknownst to almost everyone else in the White House, and that practically all of his conversations with staffers were on tape.
That revelation blew up the Watergate investigation. It was getting a lot of attention already, but after that day it was huge, and Nixon’s fate was essentially sealed the moment Butterfield revealed the taping system.
For a lot of people my age and older, Nixon has always been the prime example of moral corruption and abject criminality in the upper reaches of our federal government. He has been the default bogeyman for all these years now. No question about it.
I have no idea what all is finally going to come out about Trump and his administration eventually; but it occurs to me that Nixon was less than an amateur crook, compared to Trump. Nixon was a guy with some good intentions, and a good side and a bad side. And the bad side won out. Nixon had morals, though – he ended up betraying them, and being immoral, but not amoral. Trump, on the other hand, does not seem to have any redeeming qualities at all that I can see. He has been up to no good from the start. It seems to me that he woke up one day and realized he was President, and just kept on doing what he apparently always did. I don’t think he made some cynical decision to be corrupt. He just is corrupt, that is his basic nature.
And he makes Richard Nixon look quite good by comparison. That is something I never thought I would ever say.
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That revelation blew up the Watergate investigation. It was getting a lot of attention already, but after that day it was huge, and Nixon’s fate was essentially sealed the moment Butterfield revealed the taping system.
If you're interested in the recordings specifically, this podcast episode is pretty interesting: https://www.20k.org/episodes/watergate
For instance, I had no idea that Nixon wasn't the first president to have a taping system; what was different about Nixon was that he taped EVERYTHING. Those before him just recorded special events.
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I was in junior high school for most of the goings-on of the Watergate scandal, back in the 1970s. In the summer of 1973, the Senate investigative committee hearings were broadcast live on KUHT/PBS – this was before widespread cable TV, CNN, etc. I remember the hearings being broadcast in black and white, although that could be my memory playing tricks on me.
My mother, who was still a stay-at-home housewife/mom at the time, was practically glued to the TV set that summer. She never watched much television otherwise, but she would not miss the hearings. I would pass through, in the midst of conducting my early teenage doings, and I would occasionally stop and watch with her for a while. I missed most of the high points – most of it seemed like dull, procedural stuff to my unsophisticated 14-year-old mind – but I vividly remember the day that Alexander Butterfield, a former White House staffer, disclosed in front of the committee that Richard Nixon had an extensive taping system in the Oval Office, unbeknownst to almost everyone else in the White House, and that practically all of his conversations with staffers were on tape.
I guess I'm about the same age as you. I remember the hearings. I was totally anti Nixon. I had a poster that said "Dick Nixon before Nixon dicks us" I remember being super pissed at my folks when they went ahead and voted for him again. I voted for Carter my first time because all the shit with Ford stunk so bad.
That revelation blew up the Watergate investigation. It was getting a lot of attention already, but after that day it was huge, and Nixon’s fate was essentially sealed the moment Butterfield revealed the taping system.
For a lot of people my age and older, Nixon has always been the prime example of moral corruption and abject criminality in the upper reaches of our federal government. He has been the default bogeyman for all these years now. No question about it.
I have no idea what all is finally going to come out about Trump and his administration eventually; but it occurs to me that Nixon was less than an amateur crook, compared to Trump. Nixon was a guy with some good intentions, and a good side and a bad side. And the bad side won out. Nixon had morals, though – he ended up betraying them, and being immoral, but not amoral. Trump, on the other hand, does not seem to have any redeeming qualities at all that I can see. He has been up to no good from the start. It seems to me that he woke up one day and realized he was President, and just kept on doing what he apparently always did. I don’t think he made some cynical decision to be corrupt. He just is corrupt, that is his basic nature.
And he makes Richard Nixon look quite good by comparison. That is something I never thought I would ever say.
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Today, House Republicans failed to pass the farm bill. The. Farm. Bill.
If there was any justice, they would be voted out of power for a generation.
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Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, who claims that gun control measures aren’t feasible, suggests that the state needs to look at redesigning all schools to limit the number of entrances.
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Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, who claims that gun control measures aren’t feasible, suggests that the state needs to look at redesigning all schools to limit the number of entrances.
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he's smart because limiting entrances also limits exits in the case of emergencies.
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Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, who claims that gun control measures aren’t feasible, suggests that the state needs to look at redesigning all schools to limit the number of entrances.
Yes, I’m happy that my tax dollars will go towards reconstructing every school in the state to resemble a SuperMax facility. It’s a sensible use of resources and avoids upsetting the snowflakes at the NRA and Fox News.
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Yes, I’m happy that my tax dollars will go towards reconstructing every school in the state to resemble a SuperMax facility. It’s a sensible use of resources and avoids upsetting the snowflakes at the NRA and Fox News.
It’s amazing that they think the problem with school shootings is the school and not the shooting.
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It’s amazing that they think the problem with school shootings is the school and not the shooting.
They don't think anything. They dance to whatever tune the organ grinder plays. If there were suddenly a hugely funded anti-gun lobby that started pouring money into Republican campaigns at a significantly better clip than the NRA does they'd immediately start trying to convince rednecks that everything they've been saying over the past 30 years was a big misunderstanding.
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Congrats 2nd Districters, Moser made the runoff of Wall didn’t.
Fletcher kicked her ass.
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By now, everyone has heard of Roseanne's moronic shit, and today, Trump follows it with an inane missive about how ABC should apologize to him. OK, it makes zero fucking sense, but it's Trump, so I excuse it to his typical lunacy. Now I read that Sanders is serious about this, making it an issue. In that world, Roseanne's racism means that ABC should apologize to Trump.
I get that this probably makes sense to some morons in Trump's base, who can only see the world through their extremely warped victimhood blinders, but this is insane. Seriously fucking insane.
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By now, everyone has heard of Roseanne's moronic shit, and today, Trump follows it with an inane missive about how ABC should apologize to him. OK, it makes zero fucking sense, but it's Trump, so I excuse it to his typical lunacy. Now I read that Sanders is serious about this, making it an issue. In that world, Roseanne's racism means that ABC should apologize to Trump.
I get that this probably makes sense to some morons in Trump's base, who can only see the world through their extremely warped victimhood blinders, but this is insane. Seriously fucking insane.
It's often hard to step back and see the big picture - of the world's most privileged individuals acting like its most put-upon caste - but episodes like this allow that to happen.
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Two really big things happened amidst the incessant pneumatic drilling that is the noise around the Russia investigation:
1) Manafort is about to get his chain yanked - maybe directly to jail - because he’s been contacting potential witnesses to coach their testimony. Watch out for the corn hole, bud!
And b) The Special Master has completed reviewing hundreds of thousands of pieces of communication seized in the raids on Cohen, and is finding ones of them to be privileged or “highly personal”. Shocking when you remember that Cohen’s vast client base consisted of three scumbags who all disavowed him as doing any meaningful work for him.
Cohen’s lawyers have been reviewing all the same documents and the judge has given them until the end of next week to come back with any challenges. That’s going to be the day when the Trump-Cohen dealings are going to be laid bare for prosecutors to see. Manafort could be in jail by the end of this week.
Any surprise, therefore, that Team Trump is talking about pardon power?
This is speeding up towards the end game.
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Also, don't forget:
1. They have admitted that they lied about the tale they told regarding Jr's meeting with the Russians. In reality, Senior did actually participate in crafting the lie. I wonder why they are now admitting it. They must have received info that Mueller indeed has ironclad proof that Senior helped craft that statement, but where did they get that info from?
2. Also, don't forget the "I am a king" narrative going on. For the life of me, I don't get why they are floating this. If you believe it, then just try it when the time comes, but don't throw it out there beforehand as very few Americans find that sentiment appealing. I suspect it turns off most moderate Republicans and even some of his base. "I am above the law" really is an odorous sell.
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Politicians and lying are synonymous. Trump takes lying to an entirely new level. Just a straight up pathological liar. He lies and lies and lies and lies. And the people that still support him cheer it on. It is utterly pathetic. The other members of his party just sit on their thumbs because they are afraid of the base of trump voters. These rubes willfully and cheeringly enjoy being lied to. MERICA!
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At least he delivers a hearty rendition of my favorite song, God Bless America.
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Nothing says honor America more than having a draft dodging, gold star family and POW mocking sack of shit, stand up and attempt to sing along to God Bless America and Not know,the words. The guy is the biggest douche bag ever.
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Giuliani, today, accused Mueller of trying to frame Trump. Yep, we’ve reached the last straw to be grabbed.
Also today, a State Department spokesperson responded to a question about the state of U.S. - German relations by claiming all is well, citing today being the anniversary of the D-Day landings. #TheBestPeople
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Also today, a State Department spokesperson responded to a question about the state of U.S. - German relations by claiming all is well, citing today being the anniversary of the D-Day landings. #TheBestPeople
Perfect
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Giuliani, today, accused Mueller of trying to frame Trump. Yep, we’ve reached the last straw to be grabbed.
After they went from No Collusion! to I Can Pardon Myself! so swiftly I sort of thought they'd stop there or at least the self-pardon float was some sort of end point. Shows what I know.
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Giuliani, today, accused Mueller of trying to frame Trump. Yep, we’ve reached the last straw to be grabbed.
Also today, a State Department spokesperson responded to a question about the state of U.S. - German relations by claiming all is well, citing today being the anniversary of the D-Day landings. #TheBestPeople
And in a call with PM Tredeau, when pressed on “national security” as the reasoning for tariffs, President Trump responded “Didn’t you guys burn down the White House in 1812?”
This is the only man who cheers unironically when Bluto says “Was it over when the Germans bombed Pearl Harbor?”
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After they went from No Collusion! to I Can Pardon Myself! so swiftly I sort of thought they'd stop there or at least the self-pardon float was some sort of end point. Shows what I know.
It looks like things are accelerating against them - Cohen's world is about to be laid wide open and Manafort is about to go to jail - so they are having to accelerate the pre-gaslighting of their supporters.
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Catching up on yesterdays news:
- Cambridge Analytica admitted that it used the pilfered Facebook data, presumably including in its efforts to influence the 2016 US election (and Brexit).
- Cambridge Analytica had meetings with, offered help to and funneled money to Wikileaks for its efforts to disseminate the emails stolen by Russian intelligence.
When you step back and realize that CA was, while all this was going on, being paid by the Trump campaign, was being run by Trump Campaign Chairman Steve Bannon and was funded by major Trump donor Robert Mercer, it's hard to reconcile that there was "no collusion".
- On the collusion front, a senior Trump campaign and now White House advisor has been busted for setting up meetings between the campaign and a Russian who was promising to be able to get Trump and Putin together to discuss Trump Tower Moscow. That senior advisor's name? Ivanka.
- Scott Pruitt broke a Federal law about not using your office to endorse a private business while defending himself on camera about breaking a Federal law about not using your office for personal gain.
- Oh, and in case you hadn't seen it, Water Bottle-a-Lago (https://www.reddit.com/r/gifs/comments/8p2y7v/trump_in_inexplicably_decides_to_put_his_water/).
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Now that Manafort and the family know the deep state is watching their communications, they've resorted to using the old water bottle signal trick.
I seriously was expecting each and every one at that table do the same. The whole meeting was fucking creepy and cultish. I just don't get how people with means/options can willingly subject themselves to that.
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Another musing of the insane:
President Trump on Wednesday appeared to claim that thousands of Texans had to be rescued during Hurricane Harvey last year because they ventured out in boats to gawk at the Category 4 storm. Speaking at a Federal Emergency Management Agency briefing to discuss the upcoming hurricane season, the president hailed the work of the Coast Guard during the hurricane, which left a trail of destruction and killed dozens in Texas last August. “They saved 16,000 people, many of them in Texas, for whatever reason that is,” Trump was quoted as saying by the Houston Chronicle. “People went out in their boats to watch the hurricane. That didn't work out too well,” he said. Numerous volunteer groups used boats to conduct rescue missions in the flood-stricken areas of Texas in the wake of the hurricane. There were no media reports of people simply venturing out to “watch” the storm. Asked about Trump’s claim, Texas Gov. Greg Abbott said he had “no information one way or the other about that.” Marty Lancton, president of the Houston Professional Fire Fighters Association, appeared equally baffled. “I don’t even know how to respond to that,” he told the Chronicle.
Love how the governor doesn't even have the nads to protect the reputation of his citizens from the Cult of Dear Leader.
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And now Colin Kapernick’s legal team wants to subpoena the President in his collusion case against the NFL.
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Another musing of the insane:
Love how the governor doesn't even have the nads to protect the reputation of his citizens from the Cult of Dear Leader.
It's stuff like this that has me convinced that he has dementia.
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Another musing of the insane:
Love how the governor doesn't even have the nads to protect the reputation of his citizens from the Cult of Dear Leader.
How does Abbot not have information that the coast guard did not have to rescue 16,000 people who went out on boats to watch a hurricane? Was he not paying attention at all when a massive natural disaster struck the state he so poorly governs?
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How does Abbot not have information that the coast guard did not have to rescue 16,000 people who went out on boats to watch a hurricane? Was he not paying attention at all when a massive natural disaster struck the state he so poorly governs?
Probably not.
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It's stuff like this that has me convinced that he has dementia.
Maybe so, but he has always been a raving lunatic.
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How does Abbot not have information that the coast guard did not have to rescue 16,000 people who went out on boats to watch a hurricane? Was he not paying attention at all when a massive natural disaster struck the state he so poorly governs?
We are talking about a guy who sent the troops to observe Jade Helm to make sure Obama wasn’t planning on invading Texas. He is a fucking dumbass.
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We are talking about a guy who sent the troops to observe Jade Helm to make sure Obama wasn’t planning on invading Texas. He is a fucking dumbass.
The devolution of the Texas governorship continues: Bush to his Lieutenant Perry to his Lieutenant Abbot. I don't need to remind you that Abbot's Lieutenant is Dan Patrick. It's like the evolution of man cartoon in reverse.
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The devolution of the Texas governorship continues: Bush to his Lieutenant Perry to his Lieutenant Abbot. I don't need to remind you that Abbot's Lieutenant is Dan Patrick. It's like the evolution of man cartoon in reverse.
If Dan Patrick somehow becomes governor, I am out of here.
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If Dan Patrick somehow becomes governor, I am out of here.
Do it quickly, before he starts removing the exits.
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Do it quickly, before he starts removing the exits.
Wow.
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If Dan Patrick somehow becomes governor, I am out of here.
There is exactly 0% chance in hell that Patrick is *not* your next governor. I can't believe it's even crossed your mind that he somehow won't be.
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There is exactly 0% chance in hell that Patrick is *not* your next governor. I can't believe it's even crossed your mind that he somehow won't be.
False. There's a decent chance he gets to the Senate first.
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If Dan Patrick somehow becomes governor, I am out of here.
Bye.
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Well, I was one of those Texans who was out in his boat, looking around at Harvey as it was coming down.
Granted, my "boat" was a brand new F-150, which I was praying had enough ground clearance to avoid getting flooded out, as I picked my way through the streets and around the underpasses, etc., while meanwhile Harvey was dropping 55+ fucking inches of rain here, in three days. I was surely out looking around at all that; though technically I was just trying to find a way to get to work. I work in a hospital, and felt it was fairly important that I get there, if I could.
I eventually did make it in, one of only three people in my department who did. We slept in our offices for two nights after that. My office does have a window, though, so conceivably I could have gawked at the storm through it.
So, strictly speaking, Trump is once again absolutely right.
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He's lobbying to get Russia back in the G7. I know, I'm as surprised as you are.
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He's lobbying to get Russia back in the G7. I know, I'm as surprised as you are.
Disrupt NATO
Trade war with European allies
Get back in the G7
Dismantling sanctions.
Advancing Russia's interests is the one thing he's ever been consistently focused on.
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He's lobbying to get Russia back in the G7. I know, I'm as surprised as you are.
YOU’RE THE PUPPET
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I really want to know whether he thinks he's going to serve his eight years and then Putin's going to gift him that tremendous tower everyone's talking about or if they have a tape of him raping a 12 year old or something. I guess it could be both, both delusion and kompromat.
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I really want to know whether he thinks he's going to serve his eight years and then Putin's going to gift him that tremendous tower everyone's talking about or if they have a tape of him raping a 12 year old or something. I guess it could be both, both delusion and kompromat.
Republicans don’t care if he rapes 12-year olds. His base would brag about how biblical that rape was.
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If Dan Patrick somehow becomes governor, I am out of here.
"Adios, mofo"
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Disrupt NATO
Trade war with European allies
Get back in the G7
Dismantling sanctions.
Advancing Russia's interests is the one thing he's ever been consistently focused on.
The rationalizations required to avoid reaching the conclusion that Trump is working for Putin must really be something.
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Republicans don’t care if he rapes 12-year olds. His base would brag about how biblical that rape was.
Giuliani has already posited the hypothetical extreme that Trump could have shot James Comey in the White House and still would be able to quash any investigation of it and pardon himself for it. Long live King Trump!
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The rationalizations required to avoid reaching the conclusion that Trump is working for Putin must really be something.
It's the same mental gymnastics that allows evangelicals to be pro-Trump, anti-immigration, pro-death penalty and anti-healthcare, to name but a few contradictions.
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Michael Cohen is about to get buried. The Special Master has found less than 1% of the documents seized to be privileged, so every sordid, criminal thing this piece of shit has done is about to get released to the NY AG's office. That last part is important, because Trump can't pardon Cohen for state crimes. The deadline for objections from Cohen's legal team expires tomorrow.
Speaking of which, Cohen's legal team is exiting stage left. Experts suggest that this is a precursor to Cohen rolling on Trump, and it's exactly how things went down with Flynn all those months ago. Cohen is facing decades in jail, financial ruin and no pardon in sight. He's also been disavowed by the man he'd take a bullet for, and is reportedly feeling very alone and angry*.
Between this and Manafort's impending date with an orange jumpsuit, and back-to-back trials starting in July, things are going to get very crazy very quickly.
* This was news to me only because I assumed that "alone and angry" was Cohen's default state.
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Trump legal jeopardy standings:
Mueller investigation
22 individuals or entities indicted
~90 charges brought (about half on Manafort alone)
5 guilty pleas, including NSA Mike Flynn (remember him) as well as Deputy Campaign Chairman and long-time Manafort side-kick Rick Gates
Manafort himself goes on trial in July and then again in September, in both cases facing mountains of documentary and personal testimony against him from Rick Gates et al
Trump Foundation
Suit filed by the NY A.G. against the foundation, Trump and the Trumpettes (Jr., Ivanka and Eric) for persistent self-dealing and illegally using charitable funds for campaign purposes
NY A.G. also referred its findings to the FEC and the IRS from which could stem serious (jailable) charges
Cohen Investigation
As discussed above, Cohen now making all the moves of a man about to roll over
Internal White House sources claim that this matter scares them far more than Mueller’s investigation
Defamation Suit
The appeals court in this suit against Trump by a contestant on The Apprentice is now the third court to rule against Trump’s efforts to terminate the suit
There is now nothing to stop the commencement of the discovery phase which could bring into the public domain all the outtakes from the NBC show which are reported to be seriously damning
Stormy Daniels Suit
Remember this one? It’s still around, still moving forward and still likely to result in Trump getting subpoenaed
Did I miss anything? I remember an anonymous CIA agent quoted (not long after Trump was elected and went on his shit-on-law-enforcement tour) that he (Trump) would “die in jail”. I’m starting to see how that could happen.
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Not related to the investigations and scandals, but his salute to the North Korean general is classic. He is so fucking stupid and so fucking proud to be so fucking stupid.
I chalk this mistake up to general idiocy, and it is so minor compared to matters of real national interest, but lord knows that if Obama had done that, the impeachment process would have already started.
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Update to the legal jeopardy update:
They just put Manafort in jail pending trial(s). When it was suggested that Manafort could be released with new restrictions the judge said “This isn’t middle school; I can’t just take your phone away.”
Trump today said he hardly knew the guy, while also lying about Manafort’s role and how long he performed it.
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Update to the legal jeopardy update:
Part Deux:
Cohen just lost his bid to have a restraining order imposed on Stormy Daniels’ lawyer Michael Avenatti. Cohen really is a shit lawyer.
Also, today is/was the deadline for objections to the release to the NY A.G. of the 99%+ of materials seized from Cohen that have been found not to be privileged communications. Even his clients didn’t want Cohen lawyering for them, it seems.
Meanwhile, Trump called the FBI "scum" and said that the DOJ’s IG report exonerated him which is an outlandish stretch even for him. #TheMostPresidential
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Oh, and after Sarah Sanders’ to-the-core sickening defense yesterday of the Trump administration’s evil policy to rip kids away from their asylum-seeking parents - including one who was literally wrenched from its mother’s breast whilst feeding - the administration has admitted to separating 2,000 kids from their parents in the last six weeks.
Two. Thousand.
They are going to house them in a tent city set up on a military base in Texas. In the summer. In tents. In Texas.
This is an episode of Black Mirror, right? It’s going to be over soon, right?
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Oh, and after Sarah Sanders’ to-the-core sickening defense yesterday of the Trump administration’s evil policy to rip kids away from their asylum-seeking parents - including one who was literally wrenched from its mother’s breast whilst feeding - the administration has admitted to separating 2,000 kids from their parents in the last six weeks.
Two. Thousand.
They are going to house them in a tent city set up on a military base in Texas. In the summer. In tents. In Texas.
This is an episode of Black Mirror, right? It’s going to be over soon, right?
The bible told Jeff Sessions to traumatize children. Reading comprehension is a consistent problem with this administration.
Apparently they are opening up child detention center in Houston just east of downtown for 240 kids.
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Oh, and after Sarah Sanders’ to-the-core sickening defense yesterday of the Trump administration’s evil policy to rip kids away from their asylum-seeking parents - including one who was literally wrenched from its mother’s breast whilst feeding - the administration has admitted to separating 2,000 kids from their parents in the last six weeks.
I agree it is horrible and despicable act. However, they are not seeking asylum, they are not political refugees. Because of the opportunities here far exceed those from where they are coming from, they just want to move here without the hassell and time it takes by going through a normal immigration process. I totally get and emphasize with their motivation and would be inclined to do the same if I were in their shoes.
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I agree it is horrible and despicable act. However, they are not seeking asylum, they are not political refugees. Because of the opportunities here far exceed those from where they are coming from, they just want to move here without the hassell and time it takes by going through a normal immigration process. I totally get and emphasize with their motivation and would be inclined to do the same if I were in their shoes.
Then send the family back. They are intentionally breaking up the families as some sort of warning to others. It's barbaric.
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I agree it is horrible and despicable act. However, they are not seeking asylum, they are not political refugees. Because of the opportunities here far exceed those from where they are coming from, they just want to move here without the hassell and time it takes by going through a normal immigration process. I totally get and emphasize with their motivation and would be inclined to do the same if I were in their shoes.
Except for the people who are seeking asylum: https://www.google.com/amp/www.sandiegouniontribune.com/news/immigration/sd-me-lawsuit-aclu-20180307-story,amp.html
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Then send the family back. They are intentionally breaking up the families as some sort of warning to others. It's barbaric.
And wrong. I have no desire to follow Jeff Sessions to hell.
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Where are we on Trump/Sessions/Miller's let's traumatize children for no reason policy? Trump said he was "reversing" the policy that wasn't a policy and there was nothing he could do but his "reversal" is to:
- do nothing to reunite the thousands of kids he's already separated
- order children to be incarcerated with their parents (which is illegal)
- try to get congress or the courts to change law
- when that fails blame congress or the courts for "forcing" him to go back to separating children from their families
- and in the meantime order the department of defense (not housing) to start constructing internment camps for families that he's not allowed to incarcerate
Just fucking disgusting.
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Don't forget the rally he held today to proclaim "Make America Great Again" is "the greatest phrase in the history of American politics" and bragged that he had a better apartment and more money than his "enemies". Oh, and he called out some hippies and had them thrown out of the buiilding. A banner day on the campaign trail.
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And Kennedy is retiring. Somehow I don't think the "too close to an election" rule will apply here.
This is seismic and will have profound and lasting effects for generations.
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And Kennedy is retiring. Somehow I don't think the "too close to an election" rule will apply here.
This is seismic and will have profound and lasting effects for generations.
The ONE thing the Senate has been doing with ruthless efficiency, is confirming young, conservative Federal judges. They are at a record-breaking pace; to the point that they will have confirmed about 50% of all sitting appellant court judges just in the first two years of Trump's term.
Another seat on SCOTUS is the cherry on the icing on that cake. Even if there's a blue wave this year and again in 2020, sweeping Democrats into control of two of the three branches of government, conservatives will have a stranglehold on the third branch for a generation at least, with the ability to undo much of what Democrats can get done, and roll back things like a woman's right to choose. #Gilead
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The ONE thing the Senate has been doing with ruthless efficiency, is confirming young, conservative Federal judges. They are at a record-breaking pace; to the point that they will have confirmed about 50% of all sitting appellant court judges just in the first two years of Trump's term.
Another seat on SCOTUS is the cherry on the icing on that cake. Even if there's a blue wave this year and again in 2020, sweeping Democrats into control of two of the three branches of government, conservatives will have a stranglehold on the third branch for a generation at least, with the ability to undo much of what Democrats can get done, and roll back things like a woman's right to choose. #Gilead
It’s gonna be more than that. Kennedy is right-leaning, mostly conservative. Trumps first two SCOTUS picks will be replacing other conservatives. But there’s a pretty good bet he’ll get to replace at least two more, both of whom are liberals. Trump will have appointed 4 out of the 9 judges, who will be in place for the next 40 years.
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It’s gonna be more than that. Kennedy is right-leaning, mostly conservative. Trumps first two SCOTUS picks will be replacing other conservatives. But there’s a pretty good bet he’ll get to replace at least two more, both of whom are liberals. Trump will have appointed 4 out of the 9 judges, who will be in place for the next 40 years.
I can't imagine Ginsburg leaving voluntarily while a Republican is President.
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I can't imagine Ginsburg leaving voluntarily while a Republican is President.
I can’t neither. But she’s 85 years old. I don’t see her lasting another 6+ years.
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It’s gonna be more than that. Kennedy is right-leaning, mostly conservative. Trumps first two SCOTUS picks will be replacing other conservatives. But there’s a pretty good bet he’ll get to replace at least two more, both of whom are liberals. Trump will have appointed 4 out of the 9 judges, who will be in place for the next 40 years.
The real travesty lies, like so many things, with Mitch McConnell.
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I feel about the country more and more how Crash Davis felt about Annie Savoy before shit got real: I’m not interested in a woman who’s interested in that boy. We seem to be ungovernably large (at least democratically ungovernable [lookin’ at you, Xi!]), and there doesn’t seem to be much likelihood of breaking up into smaller countries.
Folks in my age range have watched while 40-percent of the presidential administrations have been occupied by guys who got fewer votes than the other guy, and now we’re just idly watching as one political party reaps the rewards of a larceny effected in full view of everyone. Way to help the rich help themselves to the rest of the money, team!
A vote for that man was an act of cruelty, ignorance, idiocy, or cynicism—only idiocy being forgivable. Now his crew will set the agenda while Greenland melts. We went very very very very very wrong somewhere.
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It’s gonna be more than that. Kennedy is right-leaning, mostly conservative. Trumps first two SCOTUS picks will be replacing other conservatives. But there’s a pretty good bet he’ll get to replace at least two more, both of whom are liberals. Trump will have appointed 4 out of the 9 judges, who will be in place for the next 40 years.
Kennedy was the vote keeping abortion rights and allowing gay marriage. Trump's next nominee is going to vote against both of those things and 30+ states have "trigger laws" that mean that as soon as SCOTUS overturns Roe, abortion becomes illegal immediately. That very moment. Gone.
I agree that Trump defining the court for a generation or two is horrific, but the immediate impact will be literally deadly.
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The real travesty lies, like so many things, with Mitch McConnell.
McConnell will go down in history as a Buchanan-like figure; he didn't perpetrate the horrors that are to come, but he laid the groundwork for them to happen.
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I can’t neither. But she’s 85 years old. I don’t see her lasting another 6+ years.
And people who have no problems with locking babies in cages will have no problem with pushing an old lady down the stairs.
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And people who have no problems with locking babies in cages will have no problem with pushing an old lady down the stairs.
This is such horseshit on many different levels. First, prior presidents engaged in this practice. The pictures while President Obama was in office are undeniable. President Trump actually acted unilaterally to end the practice, and several of your helpful comrades complained that he lacked the authority to do the very thing about which they were complaining! Will anything he does ever make you happy? And to baldly accuse the other side of murderous intent and capability is laughable, hypocritical and sad, particularly since the string of deaths around the Clintons is so long.
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This is such horseshit on many different levels. First, prior presidents engaged in this practice. The pictures while President Obama was in office are undeniable. President Trump actually acted unilaterally to end the practice, and several of your helpful comrades complained that he lacked the authority to do the very thing about which they were complaining! Will anything he does ever make you happy? And to baldly accuse the other side of murderous intent and capability is laughable, hypocritical and sad, particularly since the string of deaths around the Clintons is so long.
As to the situation with kids at the border, Obama was confronted by an epidemic of UNACCOMPANIED children showing up, and came up with a far from ideal method of handling them. Trump, CREATED the unaccompanied children by taking them away from their parents. That was entirely new and entirely the choice of Trump and his administration.
The two scenarios are completely different - one forced and one by choice - so you can take your false equivalence and shove it.
As to murderous intent, if that was a reference to my comment that people will die, then you're misrepresenting what I said. My reference was to the fact that women die when access to safe, legal abortions is taken away. There is no doubt about this. I never said murderous and I never said intent. That was all you.
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We went very very very very very wrong somewhere.
Yes, and her name was Hilary. I don't understand why or how Donald Trump could be elected if not for the incompetency of the Democratic Party. I know y'all don't like it when I say this kind of stuff but it's true and until liberals and or progressives recognize what it takes (hint: Obama-like Bill Clinton-like and not their goddamn wives) the Democrats will continue to lose. Hilary, as bad as she was, she still almost won. That should be encouraging to the democratic party because almost anyone would be better than Hilary. I hate to think that people have already conceded the next election to Trump. That makes me sick. Surely there is some self accomplished charismatic person that can inspire the way Bill Clinton and Barack Obama did and unite the party and defeat Trump.
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This is such horseshit on many different levels. First, prior presidents engaged in this practice. The pictures while President Obama was in office are undeniable. President Trump actually acted unilaterally to end the practice, and several of your helpful comrades complained that he lacked the authority to do the very thing about which they were complaining! Will anything he does ever make you happy? And to baldly accuse the other side of murderous intent and capability is laughable, hypocritical and sad, particularly since the string of deaths around the Clintons is so long.
String of deaths around Clinton. Wtf. There was no string of fucking deaths and it doesn’t even follow your misleading crap beforehand.
Obama did not, as a matter of course, or as a expressed deterrent, separate children from their mothers. He also didnt criminalize the legal act of seeking asylum.
We will soon also learn that the incompetent monster you defend probably can’t actually reunite kids with their parents. If he doesn’t consider them people, I guess it follows that potentially tearing kids from their parents, potentially for life, wouldn’t be a problem.
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This is such horseshit on many different levels. First, prior presidents engaged in this practice. The pictures while President Obama was in office are undeniable. President Trump actually acted unilaterally to end the practice, and several of your helpful comrades complained that he lacked the authority to do the very thing about which they were complaining! Will anything he does ever make you happy? And to baldly accuse the other side of murderous intent and capability is laughable, hypocritical and sad, particularly since the string of deaths around the Clintons is so long.
Don't you have a pizzeria to be staking out somewhere? Does the Red Hen have a basement?
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And another thing, the more people vilify Trump, the more it galvanizes his supporters. The more you condemn them for supporting a maniac, the more you galvanize his supporters. It's salesmanship 101. If you want to change behavior you must appeal to the promise of a greater reward, you can't sell anything to someone if they think you think their stupid. their natural defense mechanism kicks in and they resist. Better to fool their damn asses with false promises of a brighter future than confront them with reality. Which is kind of what Trump did.
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I’m so sick of this sentiment: don’t offend the crazy as they’ll just bow up. We all have a responsibility for our actions and our honesty. Those are the rules. Everyone has to play by them, none get breaks.
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... particularly since the string of deaths around the Clintons is so long.
C'mon Hap, you're too smart for that tinfoil hat shit.
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I’m so sick of this sentiment: don’t offend the crazy as they’ll just bow up. We all have a responsibility for our actions and our honesty. Those are the rules. Everyone has to play by them, none get breaks.
I don't know what you mean by "don't offend the crazy." Are you suggesting that it is wise not to got to mental hospitals and such and attempt to offend the patients? If so, I agree.
I'm curious, do you think all people who disagree with you politically are crazy and want to fight if you intellectually challenge them? Or is that just a generalization? I mean I tend to agree with what you are saying regarding responsibility, I think.
I'm just trying to understand better.
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C'mon Hap, you're too smart for that tinfoil hat shit.
Exactly, just because they've had a whole lot of close associates die (far more than anyone else I know of outside of the mafia) under abnormal circumstances, doesn't mean they had anything to do with it. That is just such a reach and I'm not suggesting anything but that there are numbers there. Some on the dark side would say that's just doing business...
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I don't know what you mean by "don't offend the crazy." Are you suggesting that it is wise not to got to mental hospitals and such and attempt to offend the patients? If so, I agree.
I'm curious, do you think all people who disagree with you politically are crazy and want to fight if you intellectually challenge them? Or is that just a generalization? I mean I tend to agree with what you are saying regarding responsibility, I think.
I'm just trying to understand better.
Huh? You said something about the supporting a maniac. Your words. Supporting a maniac fits “crazy” in my mind. So, coddling those who support a maniac is the sentiment I’m referring to.
Also, coddling those that spout inane falsehoods also fits mt definition of crazy.
Supporting Trump with facts isn’t crazy, I just don’t see much of that.
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Exactly, just because they've had a whole lot of close associates die (far more than anyone else I know of outside of the mafia) under abnormal circumstances, doesn't mean they had anything to do with it. That is just such a reach and I'm not suggesting anything but that there are numbers there. Some on the dark side would say that's just doing business...
OR...if everyone around you - from cabinet members to campaign members to family members - has had meetings with Russians that were only disclosed under duress...
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Huh? You said something about the supporting a maniac. Your words. Supporting a maniac fits “crazy” in my mind. So, coddling those who support a maniac is the sentiment I’m referring to.
Also, coddling those that spout inane falsehoods also fits mt definition of crazy.
Supporting Trump with facts isn’t crazy, I just don’t see much of that.
Okay, gotcha. Thanks. I think he is a maniac, or a madman, if you will, I don't think he is clinically insane. I'm crazy about a lot of things. I'm crazy about a girl, I'm crazy for sushi... I don't think that males me either a maniac, a madman, or insane.
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OR...if everyone around you - from cabinet members to campaign members to family members - has had meetings with Russians that were only disclosed under duress...
Exactly like that. One can't help but wonder.
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C'mon Hap, you're too smart for that tinfoil hat shit.
[not sure if serious gif]
And let me just say that sure, maybe Hillary wasn't the best possible candidate. Sphinx certainly doesn't like her and we all admire his unerring political instincts. But she did win the popular vote by a healthy margin. And her opponent clearly spent illegal, foreign money and clearly conspired in an illegal manner with foreign enemies of the United States in order to gain various, concrete advantages, possibly including outright election fraud. I suspect that sooner than later evidence will surface that calls into serious question the very legitimacy of this presidency.
So, given all of that, if Hillary is literally the worst that the Democrats can do, I'd like to think that there is reason for optimism among sane and decent people going forward.
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[not sure if serious gif]
And let me just say that sure, maybe Hillary wasn't the best possible candidate. Sphinx certainly doesn't like her and we all admire his unerring political instincts. But she did win the popular vote by a healthy margin.
If only it were a popularity contest. And let me tell you, I had correctly predicted every presidential election going back to President Johnson over Goldwater. Every damn one. She fucked me. Damn right I don't like her, it's personal.
So, given all of that, if Hillary is literally the worst that the Democrats can do, I'd like to think that there is reason for optimism among sane and decent people going forward.
That's what I'm talking about!
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And another thing, the idea that anyone can make a persuasive counter-argument to Trump loyalists is idiotic. There is X% of the voting public, blessedly small but very vocal (and powerful in an outsized way thanks to the insane campaign finance 'regulations'), that has chosen its side as if this were sports and no matter what happens they will not diverge, they will not change teams. These people do not live on planet Earth. They live on a planet where science has no currency, especially if its findings conflict with adopted mythologies, they live on a planet where their sources of information are not designed to inform and enlighten but rather to mislead, misinform and outrage, they live on a planet whose moral gravity is weak enough to facilitate the total abandonment of previously held principle.
To anyone who worries about galvanizing these people, well, I suggest you busy yourself with other concerns. Like maybe trying to figure out who really killed Vince Foster.
Non-participants need to be urged into participation and in so doing we can collectively marginalize these despicable vermin to the diseased colon of history. And they know this, obviously. Why do you think they continuously try to make it so goddamn hard to vote?
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Sure she won the popular vote if you count the 6mm fake voters
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And another thing, the idea that anyone can make a persuasive counter-argument to Trump loyalists is idiotic.
That is true to for about 75 to 80 percent of Trump voters. They are impenetrable sycophants. The other 20 to 25 percent can be persuaded. I realize it is hard for some to see the difference between someone who chooses out of desire and one who chooses out of frustration. But anyway carry on and we'll see how it plays out.
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C'mon Hap, you're too smart for that tinfoil hat shit.
No, he believes that.
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I am consoling myself with the thought that the timing of this resignation is precisely because Kennedy (or those who persuaded him) are pretty certain of the coming blue wave.
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I am consoling myself with the thought that the timing of this resignation is precisely because Kennedy (or those who persuaded him) are pretty certain of the coming blue wave.
His replacement will be in seat before the upcoming election. The timing could not have been worse for Democrats, pending blue wave or not.
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I am consoling myself with the thought that the timing of this resignation is precisely because Kennedy (or those who persuaded him) are pretty certain of the coming blue wave.
James Comey's decisions to talk - early and often - about the Clinton email investigation (and not about the far more serious one into Trump running simultaneously therewith), was driven by his certitude that she was a shoo-in.
Trump said of Kennedy that he (Trump) appreciates the confidence that the Justice put in him to nominate his successor - thus ensuring the Trump stank all over him like he was a porn star / playboy model / random woman in grabbing distance.
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His replacement will be in seat before the upcoming election. The timing could not have been worse for Democrats, pending blue wave or not.
The plan seems to be crystallising to use the new "McConnell Rule" to deny consideration of a SCOTUS nominee in an election year. That might work if McConnell had any shame, which he doesn't. It's also an intellectual argument which - no offense - is not going to resonate with the public.
The other option is to get Collins or Murkowski - who people may not remember as being pivotal to the failure of healthcare reform because John McCain's theatrics sucked up all the coverage (as it was intended to do) - to vote against anyone not demonstrably pro-choice or at least properly agnostic on the matter. Their votes against healthcare reform were due to justifiable concerns about the effect on women's health, and this is very much inside that Venn.
Trump vowed to nominate only anti-choice Justices, so even though they will duck and dodge questions about their position on Roe, we must hope that Trump remains Trump and torpedoes his own nominee by touting their stance on this.
Also, control of the Senate after 2018 is not certain, even if there's a blue wave. The fight is here and now.
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The plan seems to be crystallising to use the new "McConnell Rule" to deny consideration of a SCOTUS nominee in an election year. That might work if McConnell had any shame, which he doesn't. It's also an intellectual argument which - no offense - is not going to resonate with the public.
The other option is to get Collins or Murkowski - who people may not remember as being pivotal to the failure of healthcare reform because John McCain's theatrics sucked up all the coverage (as it was intended to do) - to vote against anyone not demonstrably pro-choice or at least properly agnostic on the matter. Their votes against healthcare reform were due to justifiable concerns about the effect on women's health, and this is very much inside that Venn.
Trump vowed to nominate only anti-choice Justices, so even though they will duck and dodge questions about their position on Roe, we must hope that Trump remains Trump and torpedoes his own nominee by touting their stance on this.
Also, control of the Senate is not certain, even if there's a blue wave. The fight is here and now.
There is no fucking chance in hell that McConnell will stall a vote, even if it was January 19th of a lame duck Republican, let alone a non-Presidential election year. The man has no integrity whatsoever. Likewise, there is no chance in hell that a Republican Senator would not vote to confirm a Republican Supreme Court nominee. I appreciate your optimism, but it’s fantasy.
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There is no fucking chance in hell that McConnell will stall a vote, even if it was January 19th of a lame duck Republican, let alone a non-Presidential election year. The man has no integrity whatsoever. Likewise, there is no chance in hell that a Republican Senator would not vote to confirm a Republican Supreme Court nominee. I appreciate your optimism, but it’s fantasy.
Unfortunately, I agree with your assessment.
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This is such horseshit on many different levels. First, prior presidents engaged in this practice. The pictures while President Obama was in office are undeniable. President Trump actually acted unilaterally to end the practice, and several of your helpful comrades complained that he lacked the authority to do the very thing about which they were complaining! Will anything he does ever make you happy? And to baldly accuse the other side of murderous intent and capability is laughable, hypocritical and sad, particularly since the string of deaths around the Clintons is so long.
It is amazing how divorced from the facts your truth is. It's also illuminating.
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There is no fucking chance in hell that McConnell will stall a vote, even if it was January 19th of a lame duck Republican, let alone a non-Presidential election year. The man has no integrity whatsoever. Likewise, there is no chance in hell that a Republican Senator would not vote to confirm a Republican Supreme Court nominee. I appreciate your optimism, but it’s fantasy.
I am basing my...not optimism...hope(?) on the fact that the female Republican senators helped block healthcare reform because of the horrendous effect it would have on women's health. I see a SCOTUS vote as being part of the same issue. I would not be surprised to be proved wrong, but that doesn't mean that I am going to be resigned to that fate.
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It is amazing how divorced from the facts your truth is. It's also illuminating.
This thread is overflowing with condescension, fantasy, and purely hyperbolic nonsense that muddies the debate. Truth in any form is at a premium- Mr. Happy is hardly the only, or even the largest, offender.
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This excerpt from Jennifer Rubin's Wapo column is relevant here. She basically concludes, like those here, that confirmation is likely, but these are weird times, it is an election year, and Trump can certainly step on his very small hands.
There are certain delaying tactics senators could take, and while those tactics only slow down the process but do not stop it, there are myriad things that can happen between now and the time a new Congress is sworn in. Special counsel Robert S. Mueller III may release a report that suggests grounds for impeachment and/or indictment, thereby calling into grave question the legitimacy of a Trump nominee. Senators may vacate their seats for health or other reasons. In short, senators could take as much time as humanly possible both to fully vet nominees and to head off election-eve votes.
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This excerpt from Jennifer Rubin's Wapo column is relevant here. She basically concludes, like those here, that confirmation is likely, but these are weird times, it is an election year, and Trump can certainly step on his very small hands.
You spelled "dick" wrong.
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In other news:
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-06-28/north-korea-nuclear-facilities-improvements-made-at-rapid-pace/9920374 (http://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-06-28/north-korea-nuclear-facilities-improvements-made-at-rapid-pace/9920374)
So much shit happens on a daily basis, it's hard to keep abreast of Trump's successes? I was told he and Kim were trusting friends, brokering an historic, Nobel prize winning deal.
I wonder what Putin will agree to when they meet in July. No doubt, it will be another "deal" Trump will boast about, but with later scrutiny, will look like incompetent shamery.
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Let's not also forget John McCain and Jeff Flake. The latter may yet grow a spine to go along with his mouth, and the former may vote against an unfit nominee.
That's 4, at least, flippable Republicans.
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This thread is overflowing with condescension, fantasy, and purely hyperbolic nonsense that muddies the debate. Truth in any form is at a premium- Mr. Happy is hardly the only, or even the largest, offender.
There is never an honest debate when each opposition party believes their side is absolutely correct and the other side is absolutely wrong. Even when the same result is desired, they argue over methodology. And if you don't totally buy in to one side or the other, you get accused of lacking passion and being apathetic or even cynical.
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There is never an honest debate when each opposition party believes their side is absolutely correct and the other side is absolutely wrong. Even when the same result is desired, they argue over methodology. And if you don't totally buy in to one side or the other, you get accused of lacking passion and being apathetic or even cynical.
It's also impossible to take seriously, from the party that has embraced Trump, any complaints about honest debate and civility.
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Binary choices. From Politico:
Barring a major upset, next year there won’t be a single House Republican who supports abortion rights (https://www.politico.com/story/2018/06/28/house-republicans-abortion-rights-680629)
This is the 21st century, correct?
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Binary choices. From Politico:
Barring a major upset, next year there won’t be a single House Republican who supports abortion rights (https://www.politico.com/story/2018/06/28/house-republicans-abortion-rights-680629)
This is the 21st century, correct?
Roe v Wade will be overturned in the next 18 months. Abortion will be criminalized in the the next 24. It’s just going to happen. Gay marriage will take a little longer to outlaw, but it’s coming. Followed by sodomy and masturbation.
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Roe v Wade will be overturned in the next 18 months. Abortion will be criminalized in the the next 24. It’s just going to happen. Gay marriage will take a little longer to outlaw, but it’s coming. Followed by sodomy and masturbation.
So you're expecting a Republican House and Senate next year?
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So you're expecting a Republican House and Senate next year?
Yes. More to the point, I don’t see a blue Senate. I don’t see how they get there at all.
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There is never an honest debate when each opposition party believes their side is absolutely correct and the other side is absolutely wrong. Even when the same result is desired, they argue over methodology. And if you don't totally buy in to one side or the other, you get accused of lacking passion and being apathetic or even cynical.
Find me one registered Democrat who believes their side is absolutely correct about everything and I’ll eat my shorts. Find me two Democrats who agree about everything and i’ll eat their shorts too.
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Yes, and her name was Hilary. I don't understand why or how Donald Trump could be elected if not for the incompetency of the Democratic Party.
Republicans can’t be expected to act reasonably so any electoral failure is the fault of the democratic nominee?
And she wasn’t just someone’s fucking wife. What a thing to say.
Why insist on raging against the person and the party who garnered more votes? Why not funnel some of that juice into trying to fix the electoral system or dezombifying the GOP? I mean I get that you don’t didn’t and probably never liked her, but you’re taking victim-blaming to an astonishing level.
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This thread is overflowing with condescension, fantasy, and purely hyperbolic nonsense that muddies the debate. Truth in any form is at a premium- Mr. Happy is hardly the only, or even the largest, offender.
I concede the condescension, but where’s the fantasy, exactly? Just curious.
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Find me one registered Democrat who believes their side is absolutely correct about everything and I’ll eat my shorts. Find me two Democrats who agree about everything and i’ll eat their shorts too.
Well, I'm not eating any shorts.
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And she wasn’t just someone’s fucking wife. What a thing to say.
You are right, in the Clinton's case, I don't think there was much fucking with each other going on anymore. What I meant was, the best thing she ever did was marry Bill. It was mutually beneficial for both, she drove and supported him. It put her on the map. And that she's been riding that gravy train ever since.
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Team Politics will be our downfall, at least in the short term.
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You are right, in the Clinton's case, I don't think there was much fucking with each other going on anymore. What I meant was, the best thing she ever did was marry Bill. It was mutually beneficial for both, she drove and supported him. It put her on the map. And that she's been riding that gravy train ever since.
so, she drove him then rode the gravy train? Maybe she is smart enough to have done it all herself. Nah, she rode his gravy train.
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so, she drove him then rode the gravy train? Maybe she is smart enough to have done it all herself. Nah, she rode his gravy train.
She obviously is quite intelligent. Bill has said he had wanted to be in public life as an elected official since his high school days. Not sure how much credit she gets for driving him, more like helping him steer when he swayed off course--as he was wont to do from time to time. She was very shrewd to hitch her wagon to him because it made everything that was to follow possible. I really don't think anyone would know who she was if not for her marriage to Bill. She certainly doesn't get elected to the Senate without having been the First Lady. And doesn't get Secretary of State if not for being a Senator. To paraphrase Jimmie Dale Gilmore, She was the wave, Bill was the water. In my fevered mind, women like Lupe Valdez and Wendy Davis have done far more on their own merit than has Hillary.
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Roe v Wade will be overturned in the next 18 months. Abortion will be criminalized in the the next 24. It’s just going to happen. Gay marriage will take a little longer to outlaw, but it’s coming. Followed by sodomy and masturbation.
Sooner than that. There are dozens of states with laws on the books that are written to kick in the moment Roe is overturned. They won't need to pass new legislation, it's already locked and loaded.
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Sooner than that. There are dozens of states with laws on the books that are written to kick in the moment Roe is overturned. They won't need to pass new legislation, it's already locked and loaded.
I was thinking it usually takes at least 6 months for new legislation to go into effect, even after it's been promulgated. But yeah, it will be swift.
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I was thinking it usually takes at least 6 months for new legislation to go into effect, even after it's been promulgated. But yeah, it will be swift.
Apparently the number of states that will see an immediate ban on abortion is 21 (https://www.guttmacher.org/state-policy/explore/abortion-policy-absence-roe). 4 have trigger laws that take effect the moment Roe is overturned, 10 have pre-Roe laws still on the books that will become enforceable again and 7 have laws that restrict access to abortion to the bare minimum allowed by SCOTUS.
Oddly, Texas is not one of these states. So, ironically, Kennedy's retirement has just made all the local and state elections much, much more important. Because, if things like abortion are going to be up to the individual states, the firewall against losing the right to choose (assuming a Democratic-controlled House that will kibosh and Federal legislation) becomes the state legislatures and governorships. Lupe Valdez just got a signature issue to run on.
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We are a ways off. But I can’t wait for Muellers investigation to end. If you have followed Trump at all, you know he is a crook. It is gonna be awesome to watch shitbags like Mr Happy twist like a pretzel trying to dismiss Trumps transgressions...
People like him believe in Jade Helm and birther bullshit. SAD!
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Can one of you republican/Trumpkins explain why this investigation needs to WRAP THE HELL UP, like Trey Gowdy is demanding?
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Can one of you republican/Trumpkins explain why this investigation needs to WRAP THE HELL UP, like Trey Gowdy is demanding?
The investigation has backfired and revealed willful intent on the part of scumbags like Rod Rosenstein, Andrew McCabe and James Comey to adversely affect a candidate for president of the United States. This isn't a coup d'etat, but it's getting damn close. When Strzok said that he'd personally prevent Mr. Trump from becoming president and then acted on it, in my opinion, he crossed the line of criminality.
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The investigation has backfired and revealed willful intent on the part of scumbags like Rod Rosenstein, Andrew McCabe and James Comey to adversely affect a candidate for president of the United States. This isn't a coup d'etat, but it's getting damn close. When Strzok said that he'd personally prevent Mr. Trump from becoming president and then acted on it, in my opinion, he crossed the line of criminality.
So what’s your opinion of the the Benghazi investigation?
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I have so many more questions, but the Benghazi thing needs to be addressed first..
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The investigation has backfired and revealed willful intent on the part of scumbags like Rod Rosenstein, Andrew McCabe and James Comey to adversely affect a candidate for president of the United States. This isn't a coup d'etat, but it's getting damn close. When Strzok said that he'd personally prevent Mr. Trump from becoming president and then acted on it, in my opinion, he crossed the line of criminality.
So, you have your built-in excuse solidified. If the investigation yields crimes, conspiracies, treason, you don’t even have to consider those things because of alleged biases.
You are an attorney, but live in a world where facts don’t exist. Must take incredible will and energy to prop up that facade.
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The investigation has backfired and revealed willful intent on the part of scumbags like Rod Rosenstein, Andrew McCabe and James Comey to adversely affect a candidate for president of the United States. This isn't a coup d'etat, but it's getting damn close. When Strzok said that he'd personally prevent Mr. Trump from becoming president and then acted on it, in my opinion, he crossed the line of criminality.
There are 5...FIVE...convictions to date. F.I.V.E.
With another dozen individuals and entities under an avalanche of indictments.
That you choose to ignore all of this says so much. And none if it is good.
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The investigation has backfired and revealed willful intent on the part of scumbags like Rod Rosenstein, Andrew McCabe and James Comey to adversely affect a candidate for president of the United States. This isn't a coup d'etat, but it's getting damn close. When Strzok said that he'd personally prevent Mr. Trump from becoming president and then acted on it, in my opinion, he crossed the line of criminality.
WFW.
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It is gonna be awesome to watch shitbags like Mr Happy twist like a pretzel trying to dismiss Trumps transgressions...
There now.
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I found this article interesting. The Coming Collapse (https://www.commondreams.org/views/2018/05/21/coming-collapse?utm_campaign=shareaholic&utm_medium=facebook&utm_source=socialnetwork)
"The Democratic Party, which helped build our system of inverted totalitarianism, is once again held up by many on the left as the savior. Yet the party steadfastly refuses to address the social inequality that led to the election of Trump and the insurgency by Bernie Sanders. It is deaf, dumb and blind to the very real economic suffering that plagues over half the country. It will not fight to pay workers a living wage. It will not defy the pharmaceutical and insurance industries to provide Medicare for all. It will not curb the voracious appetite of the military that is disemboweling the country and promoting the prosecution of futile and costly foreign wars. It will not restore our lost civil liberties, including the right to privacy, freedom from government surveillance, and due process. It will not get corporate and dark money out of politics. It will not demilitarize our police and reform a prison system that has 25 percent of the world’s prisoners although the United States has only 5 percent of the world’s population. It plays to the margins, especially in election seasons, refusing to address substantive political and social problems and instead focusing on narrow cultural issues like gay rights, abortion and gun control in our peculiar species of anti-politics."
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This article in the left leaning Atlantic (https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2018/06/why-arent-top-democrats-acknowledging-the-black-women-running-for-office/562802/) quite enlightening on Democratic Party hipocracy.
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Don't conflate the party with the DCCC.
There are many, many women of color running this year, many are excellent candidates, and they will receive a tremendous amount of support whether they receive the attention of the DCCC or not.
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Don't conflate the party with the DCCC.
There are many, many women of color running this year, many are excellent candidates, and they will receive a tremendous amount of support whether they receive the attention of the DCCC or not.
Fair enough. But still, it is a symptom of a greater ill. Here is a bit of follow up and further speculation from Rolling Stone Magazine (https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/how-democrats-could-fumble-2018-midterms-w521753) ("It's gotta be true").
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Can one of you republican/Trumpkins explain why this investigation needs to WRAP THE HELL UP, like Trey Gowdy is demanding?
I don't think it takes any particular political persuasion to understand that Trey Gowdy doesn't want to see any further damage to the reputation of the FBI.
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I don't think it takes any particular political persuasion to understand that Trey Gowdy doesn't want to see any further damage to the reputation of the FBI.
Close, but that's not the entity whose reputation he's trying to protect.
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I don't think it takes any particular political persuasion to understand that Trey Gowdy doesn't want to see any further damage to the reputation of the FBI.
This is Trey Bengowdy, who kept an investigation into Clinton open for over two years, at the cost of millions, yielding no charges (and thus no convictions), only to shutter it the moment she lost the election. And he wants Mueller to wrap up his multiple indictment, multiple conviction investigation before pending prosecutions have even started?
Can you not smell even that bullshit?
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Can you not smell even that bullshit?
You are confusing what's being said with what's actually believed and feared.
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The investigation has backfired and revealed willful intent on the part of scumbags like Rod Rosenstein, Andrew McCabe and James Comey to adversely affect a candidate for president of the United States. This isn't a coup d'etat, but it's getting damn close. When Strzok said that he'd personally prevent Mr. Trump from becoming president and then acted on it, in my opinion, he crossed the line of criminality.
This is so far through the looking glass. The FBI actually did interfere to adversely affect a candidate for president of the United States... Hillary Clinton. They never said shit about Trump, despite the fact that his campaign was being investigated for far more serious transgressions at the time. It's amazing that anyone is pretending that the FBI negatively affected Trump's campaign in any way. What actually happened is the exact opposite.
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This is so far through the looking glass. The FBI actually did interfere to adversely affect a candidate for president of the United States... Hillary Clinton. They never said shit about Trump, despite the fact that his campaign was being investigated for far more serious transgressions at the time. It's amazing that anyone is pretending that the FBI negatively affected Trump's campaign in any way. What actually happened is the exact opposite.
In litrachoor this hyere's called aforeshadowin.
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This is so far through the looking glass. The FBI actually did interfere to adversely affect a candidate for president of the United States... Hillary Clinton. They never said shit about Trump, despite the fact that his campaign was being investigated for far more serious transgressions at the time. It's amazing that anyone is pretending that the FBI negatively affected Trump's campaign in any way. What actually happened is the exact opposite.
This is not right. The FBI acted to protect the presumed Clinton presidency. Comey was going to cut any Senate investigation into President Clinton at the knees. He was 100% certain she was going to win. The IG ripped him for acting from a political perspective.
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This is not right. The FBI acted to protect the presumed Clinton presidency. Comey was going to cut any Senate investigation into President Clinton at the knees. He was 100% certain she was going to win. The IG ripped him for acting from a political perspective.
Y'all certainly can spin tales. Comey may have presumed her presidency, but how exactly did he act to "protect" it? He publicly announced that the investigation yielded nothing (it wasn't cut off), while simultaneously scolding her for carelessness. All of violation of DOJ policy. Then, he announces the "restarting" the "investigation" all because he is afraid of the Trump-supporting agents who have leaked the idea that pervert's computer actually has damning evidence to Guiliani (it didn't). This arguably costs her the election.
So, the FBI, via Comey, goes against it's policy to announce things that hurt Clinton and help Trump, yet Trump and his supporters cry foul. I suspect they did it out of fear of Trump-supporting FBI insiders, not to actually harm her (they thought she was inevitable), but that is cold comfort.
Besides, the investigation of her was totally fucking bogus. Her fucking e-mails register about a 1 on the notional security scale, where Trump and his kin routinely register 8s, 9s and 10s, but no fucking national-security-loving Republican will even look in that direction.
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This is not right. The FBI acted to protect the presumed Clinton presidency. Comey was going to cut any Senate investigation into President Clinton at the knees. He was 100% certain she was going to win. The IG ripped him for acting from a political perspective.
Correct. The FBI's own rule was for them to STFU about all of it; Comey broke that rule on the Clinton investigation...and then some. Opinion polls moved towards Trump by about 4 points after the announcement of the re-opening of the investigation (Anthony Weiner - the gift that keeps on giving) and Trump won the pivotal states of MI, PA and WI by 0.2%, 0.7% and 0.8% respectively.
So, for all of his efforts at whitewashing his actions, and all of the efforts of Russia (whether assisted or not by the Trump campaign), Comey delivered the win to Trump. Of this I am convinced.
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Y'all certainly can spin tales. Comey may have presumed her presidency, but how exactly did he act to "protect" it? He publicly announced that the investigation yielded nothing (it wasn't cut off), while simultaneously scolding her for carelessness. All of violation of DOJ policy. Then, he announces the "restarting" the "investigation" all because he is afraid of the Trump-supporting agents who have leaked the idea that pervert's computer actually has damning evidence to Guiliani (it didn't). This arguably costs her the election.
The point was that Comey was so convinced of the unassailability of Clinton's position, that it was ok for him to go public with the investigation as it would end up being moot. He admitted that this was out of fear of the agency looking bad once Hillary won and then, later, the public finding about the investigation. So, basically, it was all about pre-covering his own arse.
The problem was that Comey fooled himself once and then fooled himself again (https://youtu.be/eKgPY1adc0A). After the first announcement (and unnecessary, headmasterly admonition of Clinton), Trump went full Giuliani such that every sentence he sputtered included a noun, a verb and "emails" (the first two being optional; in Trump syntax). That should have been enough to warn Comey of the acute sensitivity of announcing the re-opening of the case, but he still did it, likely because he'd boxed himself in with the original proclamation.
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My problem with Comey commenting was that it was an open investigation. Investigations are rarely to never discussed before they are complete.
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My problem with Comey commenting was that it was an open investigation. Investigations are rarely to never discussed before they are complete.
And, if there are no charges, they are never discussed beyond saying the investigation is closed. Comey broke protocol eight ways from Sunday.
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It's a Cohen flip.
The Special Master just released 1.3 million items of Cohen's correspondence to prosecutors. Purely coincidentally, Cohen is changing his legal representation and ceasing to coordinate with Trump's lawyers; known as the Full Flynn. At the same time, he's giving interviews where he announced that his decisions will be driven by what's best for his family.
Sounds like a flip to me.
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It's a Cohen flip.
The Special Master just released 1.3 million items of Cohen's correspondence to prosecutors. Purely coincidentally, Cohen is changing his legal representation and ceasing to coordinate with Trump's lawyers; known as the Full Flynn. At the same time, he's giving interviews where he announced that his decisions will be driven by what's best for his family.
Sounds like a flip to me.
No one is loyal anymore.
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No one is loyal anymore.
When criminals can't even trust each other...
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When criminals can't even trust each other...
What happened to honor among thieves?
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What happened to honor among thieves?
What did Trump say after hearing that North Korea has been accelerating its nuclear program all along?
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What did Trump say after hearing that North Korea has been accelerating its nuclear program all along?
It's beautiful, man:
"Many good conversations with North Korea — it is going well!. In the meantime, no Rocket Launches or Nuclear Testing in 8 months. All of Asia is thrilled. Only the Opposition Party, which includes the Fake News, is complaining. If not for me, we would now be at War with North Korea!”
That last part is what gives me warm fuzzies.
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I’m curious, of the remaining Trump supporters, how many take Alex Jones serious, like the President does. I’m guessing 85% fall in the, Alex is crazy, but he does bring up some interesting points, camp. Idiots.
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I’m curious, of the remaining Trump supporters, how many take Alex Jones serious, like the President does. I’m guessing 85% fall in the, Alex is crazy, but he does bring up some interesting points, camp. Idiots.
Did I miss the start of the second civil war? Is it potluck? What should I bring?
Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk
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I’m curious, of the remaining Trump supporters, how many take Alex Jones serious, like the President does. I’m guessing 85% fall in the, Alex is crazy, but he does bring up some interesting points, camp. Idiots.
Even after Jones has admitted under oath that he’s not crazy, he plays a character on a television program.
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I’m curious, of the remaining Trump supporters, how many take Alex Jones serious, like the President does. I’m guessing 85% fall in the, Alex is crazy, but he does bring up some interesting points, camp. Idiots.
Trump supporters have no interest in reality so why would it ever cross their minds that Jones is crazy or just makes shit up out of the blue if what he says resonates with what they already believe or what they wish to be true?
Why in the world would you think that they would have and employ any sort of a truth filter for Alex Jones but not for Donald Trump?
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Yesterday, with a little fuss as possible, the Senate Intelligence Committee dropped a report that confirmed that they agree with the intelligence community’s assessment that Russia interfered in the election, to damage Clinton and boost Trump, and that Putin ordered it.
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WITCH HUNT!
What about Seth Rich and Vince Foster! Not to mention secret pizza parlors! Where is the report on that!
Sad!
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Speaking of the witch hunt - more precisely, one of the witch hunters - Michael Avenatti, shocking ones of people, has said he might run for President in 2020. No word on whether (weather?) Stormy Daniels would be his running mate.
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Speaking of the witch being hunted, it's widely expected that Trump will be met with protests at every step during his visit to the UK. This includes flying a giant angry, cell phone wielding Trump baby blimp (https://youtu.be/_n330OrrJlg) over Westminster.
Trump will meet with the Queen and Theresa May (guard your pussies, ladies) but does not have any official engagements anywhere there is any kind of population density. He does have a golf trip planned to one of his courses in Scotland, where the locals are promising "carnival of resistance".
The visit is sandwiched between Trump pissing off everyone at the NATO meeting in Brussels and meeting Putin (one-on-one, behind closed doors) for his annual review.
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Yesterday, with a little fuss as possible, the Senate Intelligence Committee dropped a report that confirmed that they agree with the intelligence community’s assessment that Russia interfered in the election, to damage Clinton and boost Trump, and that Putin ordered it.
At the same time as this was happening, a 7-Republican delegation was meeting in Moscow (https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/europe/republican-lawmakers-come-to-moscow-raising-hopes-there-of-us-russia-thaw/2018/07/03/1213130c-7e94-11e8-b0ef-fffcabeff946_story.html?utm_term=.1afc64e26407) with various Russian counterparts - including every Republican's favorite Russian Sergei Kislyac - where they completely cratered on anything important. Sen. Shelby actually said out loud that he wasn't there to accusing them of "this or that and so forth". The Russians described it as the easiest such meeting they've ever had. I don't think it was a compliment.
Republicans went batshit over Obama bowing to a foreign leader out of respect. Here, Republicans sucked metres of Russian cock because they had to. I know which one I think is worse.
As an aside, there were no Democrats in the delegation, an unusual move to say the least, because Russia didn't want them there. This same trip was postponed previously because it included Democrats, who Russia refused to receive, so Republicans refused to go either in a rare moment of conscience or patriotism. Now, it seems, they don't give a shit about whatever they gave a shit about a few months ago.
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Brian Benczkowski.
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Pruitt resigns. Apparently 15 separate investigations into ethical violations is one too many.
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Brian Benczkowski.
I know I'm not going to like his position on many things - that's a given - but it will be interesting to see where he sits on the power of the executive and, of course, Roe. He will not answer questions on anything of substance, and my fear is that confirming judges is the one thing at which this administration and this congress has demonstrated any competence. If they've picked a low profile dude (it was always going to be a white dude), we won't know this stuff until it's too late.
Of course, there's fuck-all that can be done about it at this point. That option was given up in 2014 and 2016. Thank you no-show voters!
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From Wikipedia:
Benczkowski's clients [at Kirkland & Ellis] included Alfa-Bank, the largest private commercial bank in Russia.
Natch.
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Don't forget the rally he held today to proclaim "Make America Great Again" is "the greatest phrase in the history of American politics" and bragged that he had a better apartment and more money than his "enemies". Oh, and he called out some hippies and had them thrown out of the buiilding. A banner day on the campaign trail.
It really pisses me off that he is fucking with hippies. That's just going too far, man.
The investigation has backfired and revealed willful intent on the part of scumbags, etc., etc., etc.
You are an attorney, but live in a world where facts don’t exist.
Former attorney.
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Pruitt resigns. Apparently 15 separate investigations into ethical violations is one too many.
Or there is some even more hideous thing that we don't know about (yet).
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Natch.
Of course, that's the point. Like his (soon to be) boss, he's owned by the Russian mob. This is a completely different level of evil than the overt political operatives he has and will nominate to the SC. Not worse, just different.
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Former attorney.
Wrong. Technically, my suspension ended on January 11, 2009, over nine years ago. It's on the internet. I've been eligible for reinstatement since then. I've chosen, at least for now, not to seek reinstatement for several reasons. First, I've got no intention to ever practice again. Second, I've not lived in Louisiana since 2007, and I have no intention to ever return. Third, if I'm not going to practice, why pay dues to the bar association (over $1,000 a year for regular dues and specialization fees) or maintain CPE (not that doing so was ever a problem for me given the amount of speaking and writing that I do)? In short, it's just not necessary. Maybe one day I will. But I wouldn't bet on it.
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Wrong. Technically, my suspension ended on January 11, 2009, over nine years ago. It's on the internet. I've been eligible for reinstatement since then. I've chosen, at least for now, not to seek reinstatement for several reasons. First, I've got no intention to ever practice again. Second, I've not lived in Louisiana since 2007, and I have no intention to ever return. Third, if I'm not going to practice, why pay dues to the bar association (over $1,000 a year for regular dues and specialization fees) or maintain CPE (not that doing so was ever a problem for me given the amount of speaking and writing that I do)? In short, it's just not necessary. Maybe one day I will. But I wouldn't bet on it.
Is attorney-ing like the mafia, where once you get in you can't get out? My wife is a licensed teacher but hasn't taught since 2013. She doesn't get to go around telling people she's a teacher. Splitting hairs, I know.
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Is attorney-ing like the mafia, where once you get in you can't get out? My wife is a licensed teacher but hasn't taught since 2013. She doesn't get to go around telling people she's a teacher. Splitting hairs, I know.
A man walks into his local pub looking glum and sits down for a few drinks. The bartender pours him a shot and he slams it and continues with his gloomy demeanor. The bartender pours another shot – same thing. After a while the bartender asks the man what’s got him so depressed.
“You see that barn over there?" the man says. "I built that barn with my own two hands, but do they call me 'William the Barn Builder'? No.”
The bartender is confused but the man continues, “You see that bridge over there? I built that bridge stone by stone with my own two hands, but do they call me 'William the Bridge Builder'? No!"
"You fuck one sheep…”
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Wrong. Technically, my suspension ended on January 11, 2009, over nine years ago. It's on the internet. I've been eligible for reinstatement since then. I've chosen, at least for now, not to seek reinstatement for several reasons. First, I've got no intention to ever practice again. Second, I've not lived in Louisiana since 2007, and I have no intention to ever return. Third, if I'm not going to practice, why pay dues to the bar association (over $1,000 a year for regular dues and specialization fees) or maintain CPE (not that doing so was ever a problem for me given the amount of speaking and writing that I do)? In short, it's just not necessary. Maybe one day I will. But I wouldn't bet on it.
Still sounds like a former attorney. Right now, you cannot practice law - as I understand it - since you are not currently licensed in any state. I know a lot of people with law degrees that do not practice law. But a lot of people can be former whatever.
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A man walks into his local pub looking glum and sits down for a few drinks. The bartender pours him a shot and he slams it and continues with his gloomy demeanor. The bartender pours another shot – same thing. After a while the bartender asks the man what’s got him so depressed.
“You see that barn over there?" the man says. "I built that barn with my own two hands, but do they call me 'William the Barn Builder'? No.”
The bartender is confused but the man continues, “You see that bridge over there? I built that bridge stone by stone with my own two hands, but do they call me 'William the Bridge Builder'? No!"
"You fuck one sheep…”
We're talking about attorneys, not Aggies.
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We're talking about attorneys, not Aggies.
Either way, forever tarnished.
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Still sounds like a former attorney. Right now, you cannot practice law - as I understand it - since you are not currently licensed in any state. I know a lot of people with law degrees that do not practice law. But a lot of people can be former whatever.
This may be splitting hairs to you, but it's very much my reality. I view those who have voluntarily retired and surrendered their licenses and those disbarred to be former lawyers. As I said, I've been able to go back for over nine years, and I explained why I haven't thus far. I'm still required to report my address changes and other contact information to the Supreme Court. The Supreme Court still considers me a lawyer. I'm still required to be a non dues paying member of the Louisiana State Bar Association. In fact, should I decide to permanently retire, I have to ask permission from the Supreme Court. Therefore, I am still a lawyer, just without an active, good standing license.
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This may be splitting hairs to you, but it's very much my reality. I view those who have voluntarily retired and surrendered their licenses and those disbarred to be former lawyers. As I said, I've been able to go back for over nine years, and I explained why I haven't thus far. I'm still required to report my address changes and other contact information to the Supreme Court. The Supreme Court still considers me a lawyer. I'm still required to be a non dues paying member of the Louisiana State Bar Association. In fact, should I decide to permanently retire, I have to ask permission from the Supreme Court. Therefore, I am still a lawyer, just without an active, good standing license.
There's a lot of parsing here. I have a license to practice insurance, so I can call myself an insurance agent. If I don't keep up my license, I can't represent anyone until I get it back. I can spin not having a license however the fuck I want but, if I try to represent an insured in a transaction as an agent, I'm breaking the law.
You say, amid a blizzard of technobabble, that you do not have an active license to practice law. If you tried to represent someone as a lawyer, you would be breaking the law too.
I used to have a pilot's license; want to jump in a plane with me tomorrow? I can call myself a pilot if it makes you feel safer.
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Is the phrase former attorney pejorative or honorific?
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There's a lot of parsing here. I have a license to practice insurance, so I can call myself an insurance agent. If I don't keep up my license, I can't represent anyone until I get it back. I can spin not having a license however the fuck I want but, if I try to represent an insured in a transaction as an agent, I'm breaking the law.
You say, amid a blizzard of technobabble, that you do not have an active license to practice law. If you tried to represent someone as a lawyer, you would be breaking the law too.
I used to have a pilot's license; want to jump in a plane with me tomorrow? I can call myself a pilot if it makes you feel safer.
If I attempted to represent a client now, I could be disciplined by the same court that suspended me. It also will be an act of barratry, which is against the law in most jurisdictions. I merely pointed out that I still have duties and obligations to the bar, which is inconsistent with being a former lawyer. I'm still obligated to follow the Rules of Professional Conduct. What you see as technobabble actually is a factually accurate depiction of my situation.
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What if I formerly held a hairdresser’s license,but haven’t done a perm or a dye job in 9 years...
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What if I went and let my driver's license expire, got in a motor vehicle and then operated said vehicle on reservation land on a Sunday before noon?
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I let my Blockbuster Video card lapse. Is that OK?
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I let my participle dangle and they took away my poetic license. I can't even describe how that makes me feel.
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If I attempted to represent a client now, I could be disciplined by the same court that suspended me. It also will be an act of barratry, which is against the law in most jurisdictions. I merely pointed out that I still have duties and obligations to the bar, which is inconsistent with being a former lawyer. I'm still obligated to follow the Rules of Professional Conduct. What you see as technobabble actually is a factually accurate depiction of my situation.
As I said, you can call yourself whatever you want. I strikes me, though, that if you'd be disciplined by the courts for acting as a lawyer, you really aren't a lawyer.
I'd be disciplined for flying a plane these days (even though I've still got a pretty good idea of how it's done - it's pretty easy until the landing bit), so I don't call myself a pilot. If it comes up, I say something like "I used to fly, but my license lapsed some time ago." To say I was a pilot would be seriously misleading.
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I’m honestly less interested in whether Happy can practice law than I am if he is a birther. Mr Happy do you think Seth Rich was murdered by the DNC? Is Obama not a US citizen? Did the President order JADE HELM. Is Alex Jones really Bill Hicks?
These are the real issues.
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I don't know anything about his law license but I do know that a couple of years back the controlling authorities went ahead and granted him a lifetime exemption from having to file the annual papers on his dumbass license. I think they waived the fees, too.
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Dammit Chuck, let him answer the, are you insane questionnaire.
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I’m honestly less interested in whether Happy can practice law than I am if he is a birther. Mr Happy do you think Seth Rich was murdered by the DNC? Is Obama not a US citizen? Did the President order JADE HELM. Is Alex Jones really Bill Hicks?
These are the real issues.
Birther?/U.S. citizen Thus far, I've not been convinced that President Obama was born in Kenya or anywhere other than Hawaii. However, there are some peculiarities around Hawaii's handling of his birth certificate that concern me. However, this is no longer a big issue.
Seth Jones murder: He was clearly professionally hit, and one must ask why and who did it? He was leaking information, which could have been the raison d'etre for his murder. Do I think that the DNC ordered the hit? I really don't know and haven't seen any evidence to support such an allegation. However, what seems clear from Donna Brazile's actions and tell-all book that the Clintons were in control of the DNC up until fairly recently. People have a strange way of dying around the Clintons, so if it turns out to be true, it won't surprise me.
Alex Jones: Controversial figure. He likes to be controversial, so I really don't listen much to what he has to say.
Jade Helm: It appears to have been simply a joint military operation. I don't see any truth in all of the rumors, some of which are downright nutty.
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I don't know anything about his law license but I do know that a couple of years back the controlling authorities went ahead and granted him a lifetime exemption from having to file the annual papers on his dumbass license. I think they waived the fees, too.
Touche', you little dickhead.
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Pompeo went to North Korea to try to get codified the things that Trump claimed already to have achieved, and got the complete runaround. He was denied an audience with Kim Jong Un, had his schedule constantly fucked with, was sidelined by overly long meals and left with DPRK's foreign ministry decrying the U.S' "unilateral and gangster-like demand for denuclearization."
Remember, this is against the backdrop of Trump claiming that the threat from North Korea is over, while the press is reporting that their nuclear program has been accelerated. So Trump gave Kim the meeting he so desperately craved for nothing in return. Trump heaped praise on Kim for nothing in return. Trump cancelled the joint exercises with South Korea for nothing in return, using North Korea's language when describing them as provocative. And now that Kim has all these things he wanted, he's accelerating his nuclear program.
Just like moving the US embassy in Israel to Jerusalem, Trump has given up his bargaining chips without securing anything in return. #TheBestDeals
This week, he will mostly be destroying the North Atlantic alliance and playing golf.
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I don't even think this dumbass knows he was played by Kim. He'll keep repeating his stupid shit at rallies and the South Park character attendees will keep smiling and cheering.
Oh, and for those Trumpsters, it appears that he requested 61 foreign workers to help at his resort, and apparently made sure that the tariffs on China didn't include shit his daughter's business makes in China. How fucking brain-dead does one have to be to continue to support this corrupt and hypocritical imbecile?
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I don't even think this dumbass knows he was played by Kim. He'll keep repeating his stupid shit at rallies and the South Park character attendees will keep smiling and cheering.
Oh, and for those Trumpsters, it appears that he requested 61 foreign workers to help at his resort, and apparently made sure that the tariffs on China didn't include shit his daughter's business makes in China. How fucking brain-dead does one have to be to continue to support this corrupt and hypocritical imbecile?
The Republican Party used to be for free trade. Like, 18 months ago.
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The Republican Party used to be for free trade. Like, 18 months ago.
They were also in favor of law and order and pro-family.
Imagine being such a fucking idiot or bigot or both - loser, at any rate - that this imbecile shows up and embodies your ignorant outrage so perfectly that you are compelled to abandon significant numbers of deeply held principles.
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They were also in favor of law and order and pro-family.
Imagine being such a fucking idiot or bigot or both - loser, at any rate - that this imbecile shows up and embodies your ignorant outrage so perfectly that you are compelled to abandon significant numbers of deeply held principles.
Presumably, those deeply held principles weren't held as deeply as the principles espoused by Trump. Given the option of law and order, sanctity of marriage, family unity etc. etc., or keeping out brown people, they chose the latter ahead of all of the former.
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Meanwhile, non World Cup (it's coming home) related news out of the UK is that two of May's cabinet have resigned over her latest Brexit proposal (which will surely be rejected by the EU in any case). Notably, this includes professional buffoon Boris Johnson, who was previously working hard on being the worst Foreign Secretary in history. More resignations are expected.
They are less than a year from leaping off the Brexit cliff, and there is no soft landing in sight. Any proposal that would be acceptable to the EU is going to be rejected by many of May's party as being too weak, so she'd need opposition support which she won't get without major concessions that she can't give because her party would vote them down.
To give you an idea of one of the buhzillion things they didn't think about before, but have to now, a friend of mine is taking his family to London and then to Africa on an epic family trip this summer. Even though Brexit isn't until 2019, airlines are already warning of potential flight cancellations as UK airlines may not have the necessary permissions to overfly EU airspace.
Here's another: Lloyd's of London has set up an underwriting center in Brussels to service business from the EU. They are currently having to endorse policies with clause that allows them to - basically - abandon the contract if it becomes illegal for Lloyd's to write that policy because of Brexit. Would you want to buy that policy, knowing that the insurer can bail and leave you scrambling for an alternative? Or do you find an alternative now because you don't want any part of that shit?
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Presumably, those deeply held principles weren't held as deeply as the principles espoused by Trump. Given the option of law and order, sanctity of marriage, family unity etc. etc., or keeping out brown people, they chose the latter ahead of all of the former.
I have friends, that have college degrees, that support the policies of this administration. I wish they would look beyond their party and see the bigger picture. But, until they are hit in the pocketbooks and realize that Democrats are not to be blamed, they will stick to their self-righteous beliefs.
I wish I was wrong about that.
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I have friends, that have college degrees, that support the policies of this administration. I wish they would look beyond their party and see the bigger picture. But, until they are hit in the pocketbooks and realize that Democrats are not to be blamed, they will stick to their self-righteous beliefs.
I wish I was wrong about that.
Politics has become tribal. Thank you Fox News.
Also, among the strongly held principles being abandoned, I forgot to include breast-feeding.
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Reports are that May's party has enough members signed on to force a vote of no confidence in her leadership. She may be about to get the boot, which is nothing but thoroughly deserved as her tenure has been an exercise in sparing no expense to save her own job, but it means resetting the Brexit negotiations under the command of, say, Boris Johnson.
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Politics has become tribal. Thank you Fox News.
Also, among the strongly held principles being abandoned, I forgot to include breast-feeding.
Honestly, that is one that may make an impact for some.
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I have friends, that have college degrees, that support the policies of this administration. I wish they would look beyond their party and see the bigger picture. But, until they are hit in the pocketbooks and realize that Democrats are not to be blamed, they will stick to their self-righteous beliefs.
I'd venture to say we all have some friends and family that support the policies of this administration. I don't know, maybe some have actually cut off contact and unfriended them. All my closest friends are liberal/progressive democrats, but I've got more than a few old co-workers and family members that sure seem to support his policies.
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Reports are that May's party has enough members signed on to force a vote of no confidence in her leadership. She may be about to get the boot, which is nothing but thoroughly deserved as her tenure has been an exercise in sparing no expense to save her own job, but it means resetting the Brexit negotiations under the command of, say, Boris Johnson.
Surely, you've already seen this: https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2018/jul/09/boris-johnson-resigns-as-foreign-secretary-brexit?CMP=fb_gu
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Also, among the strongly held principles being abandoned, I forgot to include breast-feeding.
The old saying, invariably issued with much irony, They'd come out against motherhood.
Welp.
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Surely, you've already seen this: https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2018/jul/09/boris-johnson-resigns-as-foreign-secretary-brexit?CMP=fb_gu
Yep. But he's still an MP and thus can challenge for leadership of the party, which would make him Prime Minister - if he could keep May's coalition together. To be honest, I wouldn't trust Boris to keep two pieces of Lego together, so all this is likely to devolve into further chaos and result in the calling of a general election.
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Birther?/U.S. citizen Thus far, I've not been convinced that President Obama was born in Kenya or anywhere other than Hawaii. However, there are some peculiarities around Hawaii's handling of his birth certificate that concern me. However, this is no longer a big issue.
Why would it concern you?
Seth Jones murder: He was clearly professionally hit, and one must ask why and who did it? He was leaking information, which could have been the raison d'etre for his murder. Do I think that the DNC ordered the hit? I really don't know and haven't seen any evidence to support such an allegation. However, what seems clear from Donna Brazile's actions and tell-all book that the Clintons were in control of the DNC up until fairly recently. People have a strange way of dying around the Clintons, so if it turns out to be true, it won't surprise me.
So, not "No", then.
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Yep. But he's still an MP and thus can challenge for leadership of the party, which would make him Prime Minister - if he could keep May's coalition together. To be honest, I wouldn't trust Boris to keep two pieces of Lego together, so all this is likely to devolve into further chaos and result in the calling of a general election.
Oof! The (failing) NT Times lets Boris have it with both barrels (https://www.nytimes.com/2018/07/10/opinion/boris-johnson-resignation-brexit.html).
All of Mr. Johnson’s weaknesses have been exposed: his lazy reluctance to do detail, his preference for bluster over thinking, his contempt for business. The campaign was meant to secure his future; instead, in damaging the country, he fears he has wrecked his own future, too. As one of his allies told me last month: “He knows that the verdict of history is about to come down on him — and bury him.”
Does that description sound like anyone else?
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Why would it concern you?
They played cat and mouse with it. But I'm not really concerned about it.
So, not "No", then.
Wrong. My answer is no.
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They played cat and mouse with it. But I'm not really concerned about it.
They didn't play cat and mouse; they confirmed very quickly that Obama had a legit birth certificate (https://www.cbsnews.com/news/hawaii-confirms-obamas-birthplace-again/). Conservative media and conservative demagogues - Trump being at the forefront* - ignored this and continued to claim that this wasn't settled. It was settled, and it should never have been asked.
* Remember when Trump claimed to have sent investigators to Hawaii (http://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics/donald-trump-wannabe-president-investigators-hawaii-obama-citizenship-article-1.114417), and they were finding so much stuff? Funny thing: he was lying, because he never sent anyone.
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It would be so inconvenient of you to keep on pointing out all these bald lies if any of the people who support him, tacitly or otherwise, gave a single damn.
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They didn't play cat and mouse; they confirmed very quickly that Obama had a legit birth certificate (https://www.cbsnews.com/news/hawaii-confirms-obamas-birthplace-again/). Conservative media and conservative demagogues - Trump being at the forefront* - ignored this and continued to claim that this wasn't settled. It was settled, and it should never have been asked.
* Remember when Trump claimed to have sent investigators to Hawaii (http://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics/donald-trump-wannabe-president-investigators-hawaii-obama-citizenship-article-1.114417), and they were finding so much stuff? Funny thing: he was lying, because he never sent anyone.
Even if he did send someone, he probably didn't pay them.
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Even if he did send someone, he probably didn't pay them.
Haha! Exactly.
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Pompeo went to North Korea to try to get codified the things that Trump claimed already to have achieved, and got the complete runaround. He was denied an audience with Kim Jong Un, had his schedule constantly fucked with, was sidelined by overly long meals and left with DPRK's foreign ministry decrying the U.S' "unilateral and gangster-like demand for denuclearization."
Remember, this is against the backdrop of Trump claiming that the threat from North Korea is over, while the press is reporting that their nuclear program has been accelerated. So Trump gave Kim the meeting he so desperately craved for nothing in return. Trump heaped praise on Kim for nothing in return. Trump cancelled the joint exercises with South Korea for nothing in return, using North Korea's language when describing them as provocative. And now that Kim has all these things he wanted, he's accelerating his nuclear program.
Just like moving the US embassy in Israel to Jerusalem, Trump has given up his bargaining chips without securing anything in return. #TheBestDeals
This week, he will mostly be destroying the North Atlantic alliance and playing golf.
An update on the North Korea situation: one of the "concessions" that Trump got was that North Korea would return the remains of US service personnel killed in the Korean War. I put "concessions" in quotes, because it's something they have been offering for a long time, like nuclear talks, but on which they have never followed through, like nuclear talks. But, this time, there was a meeting set to arrange for the transfer. Great! Except, North Koreans simply didn't show (https://www.nytimes.com/2018/07/12/world/asia/north-korea-remains-soldiers.html).
Maybe Kim Jong Un will die laughing, because that's the only way this administration is going to get anything out of their efforts. It's why no one else has given them the honor of meeting the President, because they're lying fuckers who will take it and run. Which they did. We now have nothing left to offer, so they are taking the piss and standing us up at scheduled, high-level meetings.
#MAGA
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It would be so inconvenient of you to keep on pointing out all these bald lies if any of the people who support him, tacitly or otherwise, gave a single damn.
I like speaking truth to willfully ignorant. See also brick wall, head.
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Beto O'Rourke raised over $10mm in the last quarter (https://www.dallasnews.com/news/politics/2018/07/11/beto-orourkes-torrid-fundraising-leaves-ted-cruz-dust-another-10-million-last-3-months) - as usual, none of it from special interest groups or PACs. By comparison, Cruz raised less than half that amount over the same time.
Cruz is still the presumptive winner, but O'Rourke got handed a signature issue over the child separation debacle on the Texas border. He's been all over national TV as a result and, IMHO, comes across very well - he seems especially adept at getting a strong message out in a small window. At the very least, his public profile in Texas must have been raised a good few points because of this scandal.
I'm not suggesting it's a silver lining to a horrific situation, but the stark contrast between Beto's championing of the cause of these children and families, compared to Cruz'...what? Seriously, what has he done or even said about this? It's a pretty stark difference.
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The Strzok hearing today was insane. Strzok's contempt at being questioned by Trumpanzees like Gowdy and Gohmert was not only not hidden, it was worn like a badge of honor.
I think my favorite part was when the committee chairman tried to beat down Strzok because he was testifying under a subpoena, only for Strzok to point out (correctly) that he wasn't. That was their first, best shot out of the gate and it landed like a marshmallow. These are not smart people.
Fucking Issa (didn't he quit already) made Strzok read some of the more lurid and/or profane texts, and when Strzok edited out the profanity Issa made him read them again. Completely unnecessary and done purely to make Strzok embarrassed or uncomfortable. Issa was beating off under the desk...probably.
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I've only caught a little (it's still going, btw as House Republicans can't get enough) and while I doubt it changes much public opinion, this type of public exposure surely doesn't help the Republicans in their attempt to thwart the investigation.
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I've only caught a little (it's still going, btw as House Republicans can't get enough) and while I doubt it changes much public opinion, this type of public exposure surely doesn't help the Republicans in their attempt to thwart the investigation.
It’s both hilarious and maddening. Some twat is, right now, trying to retry the Clinton email issue. Strzok is far smarter, ffar better informed and far better prepared than his interrogators. A few have accused him of being smug, which is rich, but they stomp on their own dicks with almost every utterance.
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Rep. Raskin has his own Veep moment (https://youtu.be/eETuZBeSxuA), when he ran down a long list of Trump insults by fellow Republicans, to point out the hypocrisy of this kangaroo court. It was a thing of beauty.
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It’s both hilarious and maddening. Some twat is, right now, trying to retry the Clinton email issue. Strzok is far smarter, ffar better informed and far better prepared than his interrogators. A few have accused him of being smug, which is rich, but they stomp on their own dicks with almost every utterance.
Gowdy is one of the most insufferable little pricks around.
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These GOP goons will sink to levels before never known to defend their orange lord. Gohmert had the gall to try to diminish and FBI agents character over an affair, while simultaneously supporting a guy who fucked a pornstar while his wife was pregnant and has had who knows, 100s of adulterous affairs. Amazing.
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The complete lack of self awareness award goes to the lady from a Georgia who was indignant about Strzok’s affair, stating that it made him susceptible to blackmail.
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In other news, NOAA sensors are detecting increasingly dangerous atmospheric levels of carbon dioxide after enormous sighs of relief from 400 pound geniuses everywhere.
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Trump in the UK has been a disaster from start to finish, but with one more shoe to drop. AF1 sat on the pan for about an hour before finally taking off, the press pool didn't know why, until they saw Piers Morgan deplaning.
He gave an "exit interview" to Piers Fucking Morgan.
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Oh, and Mueller indicted 12 Russians - military intelligence all - for the underlying crime today: stealing Democratic campaign emails. Trump has known this was coming for a couple of days, but is still claiming a witch hunt. One juicy nugget is that the hacking of Clinton's personal and staff emails began the evening of the day that Trump asked if Russia was listening and if they could...you know...hack into Clinton's emails. #NoCollusion
Interestingly, the indictment makes reference to an unnamed Republican candidate - not Trump - who was trying to get Clinton's emails from the Russians. Given that Robert Mercer was bankrolling both Cambridge Analytica and Ted Cruz - it has to be Ted Cruz, right? Please let it be Cruz!!
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Oh, and Mueller indicted 12 Russians - military intelligence all - for the underlying crime today: stealing Democratic campaign emails. Trump has known this was coming for a couple of days, but is still claiming a witch hunt. One juicy nugget is that the hacking of Clinton's personal and staff emails began the evening of the day that Trump asked if Russia was listening and if they could...you know...hack into Clinton's emails. #NoCollusion
Interestingly, the indictment makes reference to an unnamed Republican candidate - not Trump - who was trying to get Clinton's emails from the Russians. Given that Robert Mercer was bankrolling both Cambridge Analytica and Ted Cruz - it has to be Ted Cruz, right? Please let it be Cruz!!
Tweet from Dave Weigel: I keep thinking of the family of Seth Rich, who have spent two years watching kooks and useful idiots accuse their murdered son of leaking these emails. Imagine how that feels.
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Wait, the President told us he asked Putin if Russia was involved in the hacking and Putin told him no. And Donald said he believed him.....
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One juicy nugget is that the hacking of Clinton's personal and staff emails began the evening of the day that Trump asked if Russia was listening and if they could...you know...hack into Clinton's emails. #NoCollusion
Fake news.
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Tweet from Dave Weigel: I keep thinking of the family of Seth Rich, who have spent two years watching kooks and useful idiots accuse their murdered son of leaking these emails. Imagine how that feels.
But if he didn’t leak the emails, then that means Clinton just murdered him for fun.
Lock her up! Lock her up!
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Fake news.
Seriously, no. The Trump request and the start of the targeting specifically Clinton and her staff, happened on the same day. That’s a fact, and one helluva coincidence.
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But if he didn’t leak the emails, then that means Clinton just murdered him for fun.
Hap thinks he was murdered for leaking the emails and Sphinx thinks he was murdered just for fun. I tell you what, when my magnetic poles of political truth are out of alignment I just don't know what to do with myself.
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Hap thinks he was murdered for leaking the emails and Sphinx thinks he was murdered just for fun. I tell you what, when my magnetic poles of political truth are out of alignment I just don't know what to do with myself.
When you're seeing double, just aim right down the middle.
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But if he didn’t leak the emails, then that means Clinton just murdered him for fun.
I'm sure Hannity will issue an apology tonight, or whenever the hell he's on the air.
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Sphinx thinks he was murdered just for fun
Did I say that? I don't recall ever saying what I thought happened because I have no idea what happened. I did say that Hillary has had an inordinate number of associates die under unnatural circumstances.
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Did I say that? I don't recall ever saying what I thought happened because I have no idea what happened. I did say that Hillary has had an inordinate number of associates die under unnatural circumstances.
So Seth Rich is an associate of Hillary? JFC you fucking Alex Jones believing rubes need to wise up. What in the world makes you so gullible? Hate, idiocy, too much Sean Hannity, a combo of all 3?
At what point do you 9/11 truther, Jade Helm believing, Obama birther, Sandy Hook and other shootings are false flags, Russia didn’t interfere with the election, loons realize you are getting duped. For the love of god, how can you be this ridiculous? At some point don’t you feel like Charlie Brown trying to kick the football only to have every conspiracy you are told about, yanked right from you?
It doesn’t cross your minds that the only people promoting this shit are legitimately the dumbest people in the nation? Nunes, Jim Jordan. Hannity, fox and friends, Gohmert, etc... these people are not bright. Why do you keep believing them?
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Timely (https://www.theguardian.com/books/2018/jul/14/the-death-of-truth-how-we-gave-up-on-facts-and-ended-up-with-trump)
Two of the most monstrous regimes in human history came to power in the 20th century, and both were predicated on the violation and despoiling of truth, on the knowledge that cynicism and weariness and fear can make people susceptible to the lies and false promises of leaders bent on unconditional power. As Hannah Arendt wrote in her 1951 book The Origins of Totalitarianism, “The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the convinced communist, but people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction (ie the reality of experience) and the distinction between true and false (ie the standards of thought) no longer exist.”
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Find me one registered Democrat who believes their side is absolutely correct about everything and I’ll eat my shorts. Find me two Democrats who agree about everything and i’ll eat their shorts too.
Navin and chuck. Happy dining.
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So Seth Rich is an associate of Hillary?
Never said that. You are making shit up.
JFC you fucking Alex Jones believing rubes need to wise up.
I've never mentioned the kook Alex Jones. He's a dangerous kook.
What in the world makes you so gullible?
If I'm gullible and I don't believe I am, it would be because I love everyone and am too trusting.
At what point do you 9/11 truther, Jade Helm believing, Obama birther, Sandy Hook and other shootings are false flags, Russia didn’t interfere with the election, loons realize you are getting duped. For the love of god, how can you be this ridiculous? At some point don’t you feel like Charlie Brown trying to kick the football only to have every conspiracy you are told about, yanked right from you?
I'm not a conspiracy dupe. You are hysterical.
It doesn’t cross your minds that the only people promoting this shit are legitimately the dumbest people in the nation? Nunes, Jim Jordan. Hannity, fox and iends, Gohmert, etc... these people are not bright. Why do you keep believing them?
What crosses my mind, besides the fact that Navin can be a dumbshit jerk at times, is if I must deal with authority, I want a balance of power. I understand the little issues and the big picture. I believe everyone deserves a certain amount of privacy and the right to be left alone, regardless of sex, race, religion. I want to help out those who can't help themselves. And I also want my investment portfolio to grow. I'll pay my taxes and be a good civilian, son, brother, and neighbor, but as long as it causes no harm, leave me the fuck alone when it comes to my pursuit of happiness. I vote but locally it's on issues, nationally now it's usually green or libertarian. I love everyone. I don't get pissed off much anymore. Not because things don't piss me off, but I don't dwell much on things that piss me off. I avoid ugly, seek beauty. Yeah, that's who I am. So don't mistake my lack of enthusiasm for the Democratic Party as being some kind of Republican apologist, I prefer to be thought of as an ass than an elephant. I don't live your dogma.
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Kids held hostage are living in cages in disused Walmarts but you know I don't get pissed off much anymore because I don't dwell on the ugly, maaaaan, and I love everyone, except Hillary Clinton and of course Tom Brady, and maybe I have to love those kids, too, but my pursuit of happiness, maaaan, and I can't pursue happiness if I'm reminded of kids in cages so leave me the fuck alone to seek beauty, maaaan.
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Thank you for that silly... whatever it was. Were you pretending to channel me or something? Making believe you were me? Anyway, it was unreal funny.
I do love everyone, but I still hate behaviors that hurt others. I used to be pissed off all the time and it wasn't a healthy way for me to live. All angry and bitter is no way for me to go about. I want to help those kids, chuck, I love them, I feel their pain. I want to help their families, I want them to be able to escape their ugly hell and embrace the beauty and opportunities that a safe and healthy life can offer. I hate the wall, it's ugly. I would love to see the wall go away.
You and Navin seem to think that most everyone who disagrees with you politically, even in the slightest, are either, dumbshits, fuckwits, racists, facists, sexist, avaricious, or cowardly, or some amalgamation there of. Some are, not all.
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You and Navin seem to think that most everyone who disagrees with you politically, even in the slightest, are either, dumbshits, fuckwits, racists, facists, sexist, avaricious, or cowardly, or some amalgamation there of. Some are, not all.
The thing is, there really isn't any nuance left any more. One party is supporting/enabling the caging of children, the destruction of the western alliance, the destruction of trade agreements (which will have the knock-on effect of destroying the economy), the destruction of civil rights, the destruction of equal rights, the destruction of law and order, the destruction of the middle class and the destruction of the United States' position as leader of the free world.
If you support that party in any way, you are part of that problem.
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It’s hard to step outside the turmoil created by Trump and this turmoil allows him to get away with so much. The Democrats, the press and even much of the public are either too tired or out of outrage, but it is absolutely astounding that he is meeting privately with Putin. Seriously, when has this been done before? Why is it necessary to meet privately? Even if you don’t think Trump is a Putin puppet, wouldn’t you just tell him “There’s no need to meet in private” or “what can’t you discuss with others in the room?”
There is absolutely no understandable reason for a private meeting, except for the obvious reason, but not one Republican will dare utter the obvious.
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Not surprisingly, the meeting went poorly, if you give a shit about America. In the press conference. Trump again blamed America for the "poor" relationship and defended Russia against the indictments. God only knows what he gave away in private.
It's going to take a decade of quality leadership to lead us out of the hole Trump has dropped us in. I bet his supporters still consider this "winning."
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How can anyone watch that and not think that Trump is completely in Putin's pocket.
#NoPuppet
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Today’s press conference in Helsinki was one of the most disgraceful performances by an American president in memory. The damage inflicted by President Trump’s naivety, egotism, false equivalence, and sympathy for autocrats is difficult to calculate. But it is clear that the summit in Helsinki was a tragic mistake.
"...but I'll still vote to confirm his SCOTUS nominee," he didn't need to add.
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Interestingly, the indictment makes reference to an unnamed Republican candidate - not Trump - who was trying to get Clinton's emails from the Russians. Given that Robert Mercer was bankrolling both Cambridge Analytica and Ted Cruz - it has to be Ted Cruz, right? Please let it be Cruz!!
I don't think it would matter in Texas.
Go Beto!
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The last day has been rather fascinating. In one sense, Trump acted like many expected he would and like he has repeatedly acted toward Putin and the Russian investigation. But this time, he was widely condemned by all in the left, center and moderate right, and even by some members of his fan club.
What changed? He was basically saying what he always does and what he has always gotten away with it. He thought he hit another home run and is apparently surprised/perplexed by the reaction. I am too, but in a very different way.
Basically, I think he sealed his fate, at least in the sense that the Mueller probe will have to be allowed to finish because too many people are now asking and concerned about the obvious: what does Vlad have on Donnie?
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Basically, I think he sealed his fate, at least in the sense that the Mueller probe will have to be allowed to finish because too many people are now asking and concerned about the obvious: what does Vlad have on Donnie?
This is what was laid bare in Helsinki (a name forever ruined for me by this (https://youtu.be/2gm29WZpBJc)), Trump jumped on a question to Putin and defended/protected him. It was so disgusting and obvious that even disinterested viewers cannot help but speculate that Trump is Putin's puppet. It's also hilarious to think that the two people accused of colluding can deflect the accusation by agreeing between themselves that it never happened.
In fact, while we don't know whether there is a pee tape, or if it's Trump's finances that have him on the end of Putin's short leash, there's also a third, obvious driver; the collusion itself. We know that collusion happened - the Trump Tower meeting is text book collusion - but we have nothing directly involving Trump. But if Trump did collude, even if he didn't realise that he was at the time, Putin will have proof of it and that may be enough to allow him to lead Trump around by the nose. And because Trump likes to involve his whole family, he could well be under threat that he and his favored offspring will all go to jail. That's a helluva lever.
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his favored offspring will all go to jail. That's a helluva lever.
I'm sure Tiffany will be fine.
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I'm sure Tiffany will be fine.
I think she’s alone now.
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
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I'm sure Tiffany will be fine.
And Melania; who will end up owning it all.
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I think she’s alone now.
Well, there doesn't seem to be any one around.
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This is amazing (https://youtu.be/k-LTRwZb35A).
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Manafort's case was delayed a week; no one (outside the court) knows why the "Rocket-Docket" judge did this. The judge denied Manafort's motion to change venue. Mueller filed paperwork with the court that he will be calling 5 witnesses against Manafort who are currently unknown to the public as being part of the case, but who have been given immunity. Wait...WTF?
Pass. The. Popcorn.
Case starts next Wednesday, and is scheduled to run for two weeks. Go directly to jail, do not pass go and do not collect a pardon.
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So...Maria Butina (https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/jul/16/maria-butina-charged-spying-russia-us-doj). Allegedly a Russian plant who was fucking at least one guy - American conservative political operative Paul Erickson (56-years old and likely grateful for anything he could get (https://talkingpointsmemo.com/muckraker/paul-erickson-center-nexus-between-butina-russia-gop)) - and at least one other guy, in return for political favors. She was part of the dubious Russian gun rights lobby (as if Putin would allow his subjects to be armed) and moved in the upper levels of conservative politics.
Her mission was to get the NRA and other conservative pressure groups to put their weight behind policies that Russia wanted enacted, and it appears that she was successful in achieving this goal. Oh, and spying, too.
What's not discussed in her indictment is whether the NRA was receiving, knowingly or unknowingly, Russian money to support its activities. It's notable that the near-half billion dollars the NRA spent on the 2016 election is double what it spent in 2012. That's $100 for each of it's 5 million members, while membership costs $40/year. Apropos nothing, the day after this news broke, the Treasure Dept. issued new guidelines that do away with the need for the likes of the NRA to report sources of funds.
Butina has been detained without bail, so her trial is going to go ahead. Manafort's trial is going to go ahead. Flynn's plea deal continues to have sentencing left open, a sign that he has more to give to, or do for, prosecutors. Trump's Russian flag underwear has been on full display for all to see. This is an amazing time, not in a good way.
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So...Maria Butina (https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/jul/16/maria-butina-charged-spying-russia-us-doj). Allegedly a Russian plant who was fucking at least one guy - American conservative political operative Paul Erickson (56-years old and likely grateful for anything he could get (https://talkingpointsmemo.com/muckraker/paul-erickson-center-nexus-between-butina-russia-gop)) - and at least one other guy, in return for political favors. She was part of the dubious Russian gun rights lobby (as if Putin would allow his subjects to be armed) and moved in the upper levels of conservative politics.
Her mission was to get the NRA and other conservative pressure groups to put their weight behind policies that Russia wanted enacted, and it appears that she was successful in achieving this goal. Oh, and spying, too.
What's not discussed in her indictment is whether the NRA was receiving, knowingly or unknowingly, Russian money to support its activities. It's notable that the near-half billion dollars the NRA spent on the 2016 election is double what it spent in 2012. That's $100 for each of it's 5 million members, while membership costs $40/year. Apropos nothing, the day after this news broke, the Treasure Dept. issued new guidelines that do away with the need for the likes of the NRA to report sources of funds.
Butina has been detained without bail, so her trial is going to go ahead. Manafort's trial is going to go ahead. Flynn's plea deal continues to have sentencing left open, a sign that he has more to give to, or do for, prosecutors. Trump's Russian flag underwear has been on full display for all to see. This is an amazing time, not in a good way.
And yet, people still support the President because it is fake news. This country is seriously broken. They don't believe what he himself has said.
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And yet, people still support the President because it is fake news. This country is seriously broken. They don't believe what he himself has said.
To be fair, he reverses direction more often and faster than Austin Powers (https://youtu.be/iLKR9tCiwvA), so they are hearing what they want to hear, not what he says. And, of course, he always puts far more energy and passion behind the shitty stuff, while he reads the corrections / damage control stuff from a script like a kidnapping victim.
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Sarah Huckabee Sanders is a truly awful person.
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To be fair, he reverses direction more often and faster than Austin Powers (https://youtu.be/iLKR9tCiwvA), so they are hearing what they want to hear, not what he says. And, of course, he always puts far more energy and passion behind the shitty stuff, while he reads the corrections / damage control stuff from a script like a kidnapping victim.
If only someone would kidnap him.
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Sarah Huckabee Sanders is a truly awful person.
are you just now realizing this?
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are you just now realizing this?
No. I gave her the benefit of the doubt for a while, but she burned up any doubt a long time ago. I am watching her performance today, and I just couldn't help but let that comment out.
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Yo, Limey: this
It's notable that the near-half billion dollars the NRA spent on the 2016 election is double what it spent in 2012. That's $100 for each of it's 5 million members, while membership costs $40/year. Apropos nothing, the day after this news broke, the Treasure Dept. issued new guidelines that do away with the need for the likes of the NRA to report sources of funds.
This is legit? I don't doubt it but I am seriously curious.
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The numbers are, sure (https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/nra-2016-spending_us_5a0dd3e6e4b0b17e5e14e636).
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Yo, Limey: this
It's notable that the near-half billion dollars the NRA spent on the 2016 election is double what it spent in 2012. That's $100 for each of it's 5 million members, while membership costs $40/year. Apropos nothing, the day after this news broke, the Treasure Dept. issued new guidelines that do away with the need for the likes of the NRA to report sources of funds.
This is legit? I don't doubt it but I am seriously curious.
Anyone know how I can apply for a job with the Treasure Department?
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Anyone know how I can apply for a job with the Treasure Department?
I don't know, but I bet you could make a mint.
In all seriousness, I would do it quickly because you never know when Hillary is going to sell 20% of the nation's gold to Russia.
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Anyone know how I can apply for a job with the Treasure Department?
Do you speak Russian?
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Anyone know how I can apply for a job with the Treasure Department?
Would you fuck this guy (https://bloximages.chicago2.vip.townnews.com/rapidcityjournal.com/content/tncms/assets/v3/editorial/c/46/c46572cc-113c-511c-988a-5046b8ded25d/5a7b3dbdb1726.image.jpg)?
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Quick update: Trump has been all over the map about what he did(n't) talk about with Putin. It's truly breathtaking how many contradictory positions he can maintain at one time. He's also thinking about handing over US diplomats for questioning by Russian investigators - because Daddy V. asked him to.
Coincidentally, the intelligence community leaked today details of the briefing that Trump got in January 2017 that laid out in detail (hopefully with pictures and a large font) that is was Putin who'd ordered the election interference and Russian military intelligence who'd done it. It's almost as if they're trying to tell us something...
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Would you fuck this guy (https://bloximages.chicago2.vip.townnews.com/rapidcityjournal.com/content/tncms/assets/v3/editorial/c/46/c46572cc-113c-511c-988a-5046b8ded25d/5a7b3dbdb1726.image.jpg)?
No.
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Would you fuck this guy (https://bloximages.chicago2.vip.townnews.com/rapidcityjournal.com/content/tncms/assets/v3/editorial/c/46/c46572cc-113c-511c-988a-5046b8ded25d/5a7b3dbdb1726.image.jpg)?
Is that the "Republican Operative" the Russian spy was stuck "cohabitating" with?
On a side note, continued exposure to all the characters in this movie reminds me how much history is created by truly idiotic people.
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Is that the "Republican Operative" the Russian spy was stuck "cohabitating" with?
On a side note, continued exposure to all the characters in this movie reminds me how much history is created by truly idiotic people.
John Oliver pegged this as "Stupid Watergate" a long time ago. So named because it's like Watergate but everyone is stupid and rubbish at everything.
Yes, that's the Republican operative she was bedding (and complaining about having to bed to her handler) while offering sex to other Republican operatives to enhance her ability to spy. I'm sure there's a whole bunch of such operatives, appointed officials and elected officials who are shitting themselves today, because they had dealings (sexual or otherwise) with this Russian spy.
Oh, and she's comfortably qualified to be called a spy. The prosecution team has been joined with the DOJ's most senior counterintelligence prosecutor, because, you know, she's a fucking spy.
Another aside: they have communications with her handler (at least her end of such) from just after Trump's "win" in which she discusses potential picks for Secretary of State. If you recall, there was a whole series of reality TV-style dates between Trump and candidates for the position, notably that awful dinner when Trump trolled Romney in person. Well Butina wanted to keep up with what "our people" thought of potential picks. Later, out of the blue, Trump announced friend of Putin and Russian Friendship medal winner Rex Tillerson as his nominee for State. Someone needs to get under the hood of that decision and see where the name Tillerson originated, because it might lead back to an NRA-linked operative who was banging a 20-something Russian chick...
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Trump's own hubris has got him into trouble again following a closed door meeting with a foreign dictator. After getting pwned by North Korea's Kim, he's in the process of suffering the same ignominious fate (https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/jul/19/donald-trump-putin-talks-helsinki-russia-white-house) following Monday's "summit" with Putin.
Russia’s ambassador to the US, Anatoly Antonov, told reporters in Moscow the two leaders had reached “important verbal agreements”, including preservation of the New Start and INF arms control agreements.
Antonov, who called the meeting “important, comprehensive, productive and constructive”, said the Russian president had made “specific and interesting proposals to Washington” on how the two countries could cooperate on Syria.
So, in addition to having the State department and various intelligence agencies scrambling to react to what the Russians say we've already agreed to, there's a growing call for Trump to account for what was discussed. There's talk of bringing the US' translator in front of Congress to testify as to what was discussed and agreed.
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There's talk of bringing the US' translator in front of Congress to testify as to what was discussed and agreed.
Nunes and his fellow quislings have already blocked that move on the House side.
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It's not going to surprise me if that motherfucker has some Russian ties as well.
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It's not going to surprise me if that motherfucker has some Russian ties as well.
Nunes? Ya think?
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Nunes? Ya think?
The most recent indictment indicates that the Russian entanglement with the GOP goes well beyond the Trump folks. I imagine that's a significant motivation with their ongoing attempts to interfere with Mueller's investigation and general willingness to cover up Trump's crimes, even if they don't know exactly what crimes they are covering up.
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Nunes? Ya think?
At first I thought he was talking about the translator, which, well, you have to learn the language somehow.
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At first I thought he was talking about the translator, which, well, you have to learn the language somehow.
"The translator, who gave his name as 'John Barron,' was last seen at Helsinki-Vantaa boarding a Crimeair flight for Sevastopol."
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Nunes and his fellow quislings have already blocked that move on the House side.
You using the word "quislings" may be the first good thing to come out of all this shit!
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The most recent indictment indicates that the Russian entanglement with the GOP goes well beyond the Trump folks. I imagine that's a significant motivation with their ongoing attempts to interfere with Mueller's investigation and general willingness to cover up Trump's crimes, even if they don't know exactly what crimes they are covering up.
Correct. The Butina case says that the Russians at large were getting conservative lobby groups at large to influence Republicans at large to support agenda(s) that Russia preferred. As these efforts get identified and unraveled, we will see what they knew and when they knew it. I'm sure there was near zero scrutiny used to vet offers of money or help, and zero fucks given about the quo to go with the quid, so most of these clowns will be shown to be stupid and craven but innocent of actual crimes.
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At first I thought he was talking about the translator, which, well, you have to learn the language somehow.
Me? No, I was talking Nunes, but I'd be worried about my safety if I was the translator
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but innocent of actual crimes.
There are very, very clear statutes that prohibit foreign campaign contributions - cash or in-kind assistance.
That's just a little amuse-bouche for our Republican friends enjoying a meal at the Golden Balalaika Buffet.
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There are very, very clear statutes that prohibit foreign campaign contributions - cash or in-kind assistance.
That's just a little amuse-bouche for our Republican friends enjoying a meal at the Golden Balalaika Buffet.
Of course. But there's a vast amount of wiggle room in which to claim plausible deniability. Unless they're like Facebook and took the money in rubles, if it was routed through a shell LLC, say something like "Essential Consultants", then they can claim they didn't know who they were with and I think that is all it would take.
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Of course. But there's a vast amount of wiggle room in which to claim plausible deniability. Unless they're like Facebook and took the money in rubles, if it was routed through a shell LLC, say something like "Essential Consultants", then they can claim they didn't know who they were with and I think that is all it would take.
Except that with some of these guys, their actions imply that they knew the quo and there might well be a communication trail of the quo, or flippers verifying it.
Also, if there is complicity of others, it doesn't just have to be from dirty campaign money. These characters are typical politicians: unsavory and stupid. Lots of traditional blackmail could also exist.
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Of course. But there's a vast amount of wiggle room in which to claim plausible deniability. Unless they're like Facebook and took the money in rubles, if it was routed through a shell LLC, say something like "Essential Consultants", then they can claim they didn't know who they were with and I think that is all it would take.
Outstanding point. These crack operatives are far too wily to have left a trail of crumbs behind that a bumbling, deep state embedded special counsel could follow to any ostensible conclusion.
Welp, boys, release the memo and wrap 'er up.
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Oh Lordy, there’s a tape!
Cohen secretly recorded a conversation between himself and Trump during which they discuss paying off his mistress. No, not that one, the other one.
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So, once again, Trump was right. His phone conversations WERE being taped.
Wait a minute, this the woman Hope Hicks swore no one knew anything about? Or the other one she swore no one knew? Or the other other one?
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So, once again, Trump was right. His phone conversations WERE being taped.
Wait a minute, this the woman Hope Hicks swore no one knew anything about? Or the other one she swore no one knew? Or the other other one?
It's almost like these folks might be lying to us.
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Geez, now the most pathetic man in the universe is once again on the warpath about players kneeling for the national anthem. Maybe he ought to concern himself with why our pharma companies are outsourcing production to offshore companies that don't seem to give a shit about production standards.
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Geez, now the most pathetic man in the universe is once again on the warpath about players kneeling for the national anthem. Maybe he ought to concern himself with why our pharma companies are outsourcing production to offshore companies that don't seem to give a shit about production standards.
I am less concerned about NFL players on their knees during the anthem than I am Presidents of the United States being on their knees during a joint press conference with our most powerful enemy.
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I am less concerned about NFL players on their knees during the anthem than I am Presidents of the United States being on their knees during a joint press conference with our most powerful enemy.
If you liked Helsinki this summer, you'll love DC this fall.
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If you liked Helsinki this summer, you'll love DC this fall.
So dumb to remind voters, right before the midterms, that they need to elect candidates who oppose Trump. But, whatever Vladdy wants, Vladdy gets.
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Or to remind them of how he wins.
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Two notable stories today:
First, the Trump administration will provide 12 billion in aid to farmers caught in his trade war. I doubt Trump supporters see the absurdity of this, but this is pretty much the definition of losing, both for the farmers whose business is hurt and the taxpayers who will pay for their hurt.
The second is just more hypocrisy from the Republican immigration frauds. Apparently, the house leadership promised some Republican members that if they didn't force a vote on dreamers, they would get a vote on a guest-worker bill. But, since the guest-worker bill included E-verify, McCarthy (from California), was beset by opposition from California farmers and reneged on the promise to bring the bill to the floor.
You see, California farmers know that in order to survive, they can't hire enough through the E-verify system and instead need traditional undocumented help. So, Republican leadership cries about illegal immigration screwing up the labor force, but refuses to vote on a bill that addresses it, because of course, they know they are living out a big fucking lie. Hypocrites who lack the courage to tell their rabid base the truth about immigration and the economy, and instead prefer to gin up the issue rather than lend their support to a sensible immigration policy.
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First, the Trump administration will provide 12 billion in aid to farmers caught in his trade war.
I like this story especially. A government does something profoundly stupid that harms millions of people (something that any economist who was awake warned would be the inevitable outcome), then, to retain the favor of those harmed, they rain down money on those affected. When the idiot in charge is someone like Maduro Republicans cry SOCIALISM! and wonder aloud if the US should invade. When the idiot in charge is Trump, well, I guess this is winning. So much winning.
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I like this story especially. A government does something profoundly stupid that harms millions of people (something that any economist who was awake warned would be the inevitable outcome), then, to retain the favor of those harmed, they rain down money on those affected. When the idiot in charge is someone like Maduro Republicans cry SOCIALISM! and wonder aloud if the US should invade. When the idiot in charge is Trump, well, I guess this is winning. So much winning.
It's even more stupid than you think. Trump has defended the impact of his ego trade war by claiming that we're playing with banks' money (https://www.cnbc.com/2018/07/20/trump-were-playing-with-the-banks-money-on-markets-gain-since-el.html). Of course, this is stupid on so many levels but, ultimately, it assumes that there will eventually be a winner in the war and it will be the U.S. This would mark the first example in recorded history of one country "winning" a trade war against another.
As an aside, the really, really stupid part is that Trump doesn't understand trade. He thinks that a trade deficit with another country is "losing" while a trade surplus is "winning". Trade is trade and he is a fucking idiot.
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I like this story especially. A government does something profoundly stupid that harms millions of people (something that any economist who was awake warned would be the inevitable outcome), then, to retain the favor of those harmed, they rain down money on those affected. When the idiot in charge is someone like Maduro Republicans cry SOCIALISM! and wonder aloud if the US should invade. When the idiot in charge is Trump, well, I guess this is winning. So much winning.
try explaining it to his supporters. republicans know if they don't give farmers money, their base is gone. democrats can't vote against it because then they'd be against supporting farmers. people are stupid and don't have a clue how economics work.
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Oh, and in the tax cut bill is having the desired effect (https://www.cbsnews.com/news/worker-wages-drop-while-companies-spend-billions-to-boost-stocks/): real wages - across 80% of industries and 2/3rds of the country - dropped 1.4% in the first 6 months under the new tax regime. So where did all that money go if not into the pay packets of American workers? Businesses spent $700 billion on stock buybacks. The rich are getting richer and the poor getting poorer.
One of the things we saw is firms are leaning more toward giving bonuses rather than straight pay increases. It's flashy, it makes you feel good, but it then doesn't stick around and compound year over year.
We are being played. This isn't news - the alarm that the tax cuts would cause exactly this were being sounded as it was being passed - the only question now is will the voting public at large realise it before the mid-terms and vote accordingly.
On an anecdotal basis, the Houston real estate market (Mrs Limey being a realtor) is mirroring this exaggeration of the wealth gap. Properties up to, say, $500k are moving roughly as usual. But between that and $1mm, the market is dead as a door nail; maybe a tenth of the volume of sales now over last summer, and not due to the inventory which is stacked with quality properties and desperate owners. Over $1mm, things are a little slower, but not much.
So here's the thing. Tax changes mean that only $10,000 of your property tax is deductible from federal taxes (equivalent to a home value of about $400 - 500k depending on your tax district), and mortgage interest is only deductible up to a loan value of $750k. So, if you're buying north of $500k, and you're financing, things just got a whole lot more expensive on top of interest rate increases. But, if you're doing well enough to be able to afford a home over $1mm, such things become incremental, rather than fundamental.
This is destroying home values in Houston.
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try explaining it to his supporters. republicans know if they don't give farmers money, their base is gone. democrats can't vote against it because then they'd be against supporting farmers. people are stupid and don't have a clue how economics work.
We are spending money on propping up dairy farmers, independent of the trade war issue, because people are switching to non-dairy milks. I agree with something like this in the short term, but there doesn't seem to be a plan beyond throwing money at the farmers and advertising that we all need to drink more cow's milk. That's not a strategy, that's cowshit.
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Slap a tariff on almonds and WHABAM problem solved. Wait a minute. The vast majority of almonds are produced in the US? Well! The American almond trade surplus is TREMENDOUS. Never been better. Everyone's talking about it.
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Remember how Republicans for decades relentlessly shouted/preached/campaigned that they were the party of family values and fiscal responsibility? They have now admitted they were lying the entire fucking time, which of course anyone with an ounce of sense knew all along. It’s just shocking to see them so gleefully promote their hypocrisy. Sad!
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I think that the among the supposed principles that these ignorant fucks have talked themselves into adopting or at least pretend to have, the only one they wouldn't sell at the drop of a MAGA hat is their opposition to abortion. I cannot wait to see the freakshow style contortions these cretins perform once it comes to light that Der Trump had paid off who knows how many whores to have abortions and human excrement like Franklin Graham run around stammering that it's no one's business and even so it really doesn't matter.
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Another front in the War on Trump just moved forward. A federal court just cleared the last hurdle (barring appeal) of a case brought against Trump (https://oag.dc.gov/release/statement-ag-racine-courts-historic-ruling) by the AsG of DC and MD under the emoluments clause. The courts have now decided that the two state AsG have standing and, in this latest ruling, WTF “emoluments” means.
The court upheld that it includes things like “profit” and “gain” of anything more than de minimis value. Ie exactly what Trump gets out of his DC hotel. It also includes “advantage”, which is something other DC venues have complained about - because if you need somewhere, it can’t hurt to use Trump’s place, because he may TwitterFuck you (at least) if you don’t.
Now, Trump World may appeal, and this ultimately may die if Trump gets to play his Kavanout of Jail Free card, but discovery is the next step which means that the AsG get to see Trump DC’s books.
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Trump’s CEO - Allen Wesselberg, who’s name came up more than once in the Cohen tape - has been subpoenaed to testify in front of a grand jury. He’s now been linked to both payoffs, and will be compelled to tell what he knows (or plead the 5th).
Slowly slowly catchee Trumpee...
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Well, they got there, which I'm hoping means that we're getting near the end. TrumpWorld (including, but not limited to Giuliani (https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/giuliani-says-hes-not-sure-collusion-is-a-crime-despite-mueller-investigation/ar-BBLg1mW?li=BBnb7Kz)), are now arguing that collusion with Moscow isn't a crime even if they did do it.
Umm, yes it is. It's a felony.
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The “it’s not a crime” bit was visible from light years away, the most predictable thing possible. What I’m looking forward to is their turning their crimes somehow into a virtue, which I’m sure we’ll see shortly.
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The “it’s not a crime” bit was visible from light years away, the most predictable thing possible. What I’m looking forward to is their turning their crimes somehow into a virtue, which I’m sure we’ll see shortly.
Yeah. The only place left to go is to say that these "non" crimes are actually smart politics, and it's why Trump won his historic victory etc. etc.
I just thought it notable that we've finally got here, which means they are expecting proof of collusion to come out pretty soon; maybe during Manafort's trial that starts this week.
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The “it’s not a crime” bit was visible from light years away, the most predictable thing possible. What I’m looking forward to is their turning their crimes somehow into a virtue, which I’m sure we’ll see shortly.
They've come a long way from "There was no communication between the campaign and any foreign entity during the campaign." in November 2016.
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They've come a long way from "There was no communication between the campaign and any foreign entity during the campaign." in November 2016.
While TrumpWorld has devolved to the "it's not a crime" defense, Trump himself will still blast out the original blanket denial at will. Any suggestion that he needed help to get his win is an anathema to Trump, even if he doesn't know what anathema means*.
* It's an antonym of "covfefe".
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Meanwhile, Russia has already started hacking attacks on individual democrats ahead of the mid-terms; the first confirmed victim (of any political stripe) being Claire McCaskill. Presumably, the Russians want her to win so badly they're prepared to try and break into her campaign's emails, I assume in order to leave helpful advice.
Jeanne Shaheen has also been hacked, but they have not yet said by whom.
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They've come a long way from "There was no communication between the campaign and any foreign entity during the campaign." in November 2016.
Isn't this what you lawyerin' types would call an "argument in the alternative"?
You weren't bitten by a dog
My dog was tied up
My dog doesn't bite
I don't even have a dog
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Isn't this what you lawyerin' types would call an "argument in the alternative"?
You weren't bitten by a dog
My dog was tied up
My dog doesn't bite
I don't even have a dog
The difference between alternative arguments and alternative facts.
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The difference between alternative arguments and alternative facts.
I love how Giuliani blurted out that there was a pre-meeting strategy session that included the entire campaign intelligentsia, sans Trump Sr., prior to this completely "nothing" meeting that no one cared about and from which nothing came. One of the people he name-checked as being there (while theatrically slapping his head as if he was struggling to remember because this was an event of no consequence - even though he wasn't there so he learned about it only recently) was Rick Gates, who's cooperating with Mueller.
So now we know that Mueller knows all about it. And Trump World knows he knows.
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Since most everything denied is now being revealed, I need to know if they have denied illegal financial dealings with Russian crooks, or simple quid pro quo arrangements with foreign entities?
Even without looking at all the probable money laundering in his business, we will likely learn of more "Give me money, and the USA policy will do this" type deals. Basically, selling out American policy for cash. Guiliani will one day say that is no big deal either and 30% of the country will agree. They'll say: "God Damn Patriots, every last one."
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Since most everything denied is now being revealed, I need to know if they have denied illegal financial dealings with Russian crooks, or simple quid pro quo arrangements with foreign entities?
Even without looking at all the probable money laundering in his business, we will likely learn of more "Give me money, and the USA policy will do this" type deals. Basically, selling out American policy for cash. Guiliani will one day say that is no big deal either and 30% of the country will agree. They'll say: "God Damn Patriots, every last one."
You know this is the case. In 2014, with interest rates at historic lows, the self-proclaimed "King of Debt" started buying properties cash, instead of with OPM. Eric Trump reportedly bragged (http://We don’t rely on American banks. We have all the funding we need out of Russia) that "We don’t rely on American banks. We have all the funding we need out of Russia." So Trump stopped borrowing from banks, from whom one can obtain bankruptcy protection if you can't pay it back, to borrowing from Russian oligarchs, from whom you can obtain any number of physical, emotional and financial injuries if you can't pay them back.
Trump has properties the world over that are hemorrhaging money, notably his Scottish golf courses that are complete black holes. So maybe, Godfather-like, Trump's Russian benefactors asked him to do a simple thing for them: run for President and generally run interference on western democracies. I'm sure there was no intention or expectation to win, which is why the tracks were so poorly covered, but win he did.
The evidence will be in his tax returns. If Democrats gain subpoena power in November, those returns have to be the very first thing they demand to see.
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So maybe, Godfather-like, Trump's Russian benefactors asked him to do a simple thing for them: run for President and generally run interference on western democracies. I'm sure there was no intention or expectation to win, which is why the tracks were so poorly covered, but win he did.
The best laid schemes of mice and men
Go often askew.
And leave us nothing but grief and pain,
For promised joy!
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The best laid schemes of mice and men
Go often askew.
And leave us nothing but grief and pain,
For promised joy!
Gang aft a-gley.
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Since most everything denied is now being revealed, I need to know if they have denied illegal financial dealings with Russian crooks, or simple quid pro quo arrangements with foreign entities?
Even without looking at all the probable money laundering in his business, we will likely learn of more "Give me money, and the USA policy will do this" type deals. Basically, selling out American policy for cash. Guiliani will one day say that is no big deal either and 30% of the country will agree. They'll say: "God Damn Patriots, every last one."
Manafort did this with Deripaska, just for a start.
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Manafort did this with Deripaska, just for a start.
He also got a bank - one primarily serving veterans - to lend him a ridiculous chunk of their capital in return for making the bank's owner Secretary of the Army.
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Manafort’s trial in Virginia is underway. His defense - remember this is the tax fraud trial - is to blame his underling, namely Rick Gates. The Rick Gates who has been cooperating with prosecutors for months. Good luck with that.
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Manafort’s trial in Virginia is underway. His defense - remember this is the tax fraud trial - is to blame his underling, namely Rick Gates. The Rick Gates who has been cooperating with prosecutors for months. Good luck with that.
His defense is to just wait for the pardon.
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His defense is to just wait for the pardon.
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The best defense is a good offense(ive piece of shit as a president).
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Trump is screaming at Sessions (over Twitter, of course) to end the Mueller investigation, just as the investigation's first trial is underway (with 4 convictions already in the bag). It's almost as if he's worried about something.
Also, he seems to be heeding the advice of counsel - Rudy Giuliani - who's opined that you can't obstruct justice in public.
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Also, he seems to be heeding the advice of counsel - Rudy Giuliani - who's opined that you can't obstruct justice in public.
He's also opined that breaking the law is not a crime. I don't know about you, but I'm starting to wonder if the mayor is receiving the best possible input from his paralegals.
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He's also opined that breaking the law is not a crime. I don't know about you, but I'm starting to wonder if the mayor is receiving the best possible input from his paralegals.
Seems that his paralegals are Jack Daniels and Angel Dust.
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Manafort's defense team seems to have put all its eggs in the basket that Rick Gates did everything and Manafort is innocent, therefore. So Mueller's team played Lucy to Manafort's Charlie Brown, and pulled the ball away. Gates may not testify, removing the defense's free hit at him.
Maybe the lawyers out there can shed some light on this, but it seems to me that the defense calling Gates with the prosecution able to clean-up thereafter is a much weaker position than the defense mounting a vigorous cross-examination of the prosecution's star witness.
Chess meeting checkers. Again.
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Trump is screaming at Sessions (over Twitter, of course) to end the Mueller investigation, just as the investigation's first trial is underway (with 4 convictions already in the bag). It's almost as if he's worried about something.
Also, he seems to be heeding the advice of counsel - Rudy Giuliani - who's opined that you can't obstruct justice in public.
Apparently this TweetStorm was set off because Mueller's team responded to the Trump/Giuliani interview offer in which no questions about obstruction could be asked, which is like searching Buffalo Bill's house but agreeing not to look in the basement. Mueller, apparently, really wants to ask about obstruction, and he made that clear in his counteroffer, which is what sent Trump off the deep end.
#StableGenius
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Interesting Texas Lyceum poll (https://www.texaslyceum.org/resources/Poll%202018/Day%202/Day%202%202018%20Texas%20Lyceum%20Toplines%20(2).pdf).
They have Cruz' lead over Beto at just 2 points: 41 to 39 of likely voters, but Abbot at +16 over Valdez, which suggests the poll isn't weighted against Republicans.
Interestingly, the question about the national economy has respondents thinking that it's better off by +19 (43 - 24), but when asked about Trump's performance as President, bad/very bad beats good/very good by +8 (52 to 44), with very bad getting the biggest share at 34%. So people think the economy is fine, despite Trump (which is a fair assessment, IMHO).
Both sides of the aisle in Congress get rightly hammered; Republicans at -41 and Democrats at -39 (so maybe vote the bums out this mid-term?).
Healthcare polls very highly as a priority. Single payer beat private insurance by +6. Medicare polls very well. If only there was a way all of us could get some of that Medicare...
One last, shocking, element of this poll: apparently they needed to help poll takers by spelling phonetically the word "denomination".
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They have Cruz' lead over Beto at just 2 points: 41 to 39 of likely voters, but Abbot at +16 over Valdez, which suggests the poll isn't weighted against Republicans.
It also suggests that people have no idea who the Dem gubernatorial candidate is. I didn't until I clicked on the link.
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It also suggests that people have no idea who the Dem gubernatorial candidate is. I didn't until I clicked on the link.
Yep.
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It also suggests that people have no idea who the Dem gubernatorial candidate is. I didn't until I clicked on the link.
Just your basic military veteran, lesbian, Hispanic law enforcement official. Kind of hard to keep all of them straight, to be honest.
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Just your basic military veteran, lesbian, Hispanic law enforcement official. Kind of hard to keep all of them straight, to be honest.
She's an awesome candidate, but she has zero presence in the media in Texas.
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She's an awesome candidate, but she has zero presence in the media in Texas.
That's because of all the fake news.
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Question of the day: Why would a man who is spending lavishly, flat broke, and struggling to make those ends meet, campaign for and take a job for no pay? Asking for a
Special Prosecutor friend.
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Just for reference, is anyone on this site one of those QAnon weirdos?
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Just for reference, is anyone on this site one of those QAnon weirdos?
I am Q.
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I am Q.
Sweet. Maybe you can help me score some Styx tickets.
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Sweet. Maybe you can help me score some Styx tickets.
Or acquire a pen that shoots knockout gas.
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Just for reference, is anyone on this site one of those QAnon weirdos?
Googled, read, brain bled. Can you imagine reporting on this ridiculous topic and then suffering the slings and arrows of internet trolls reviling “fake news” for hiding the truth?
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QAnon people are legit the biggest rubes in US history. Breathtaking stupidity. They are Trump’s base. Sad!
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They have to identify themselves with a single letter otherwise they’d spell it wrong.
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They have to identify themselves with a single letter otherwise they’d spell it wrong.
Why'd they pick such a difficult letter?
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Why'd they pick such a difficult letter?
Top-left on the keyboard. No need to have the read any other letters to find it.
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Aaaaaand here we are: Trump toilet-tweeting this morning that the 2016 Trump Tower meeting was about dirt on Hillary, but it wasn’t illegal. Maybe he meant to say “was”, not “wasn’t”.
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But the Trumps said it was about adoptions? Trump was lying, no way.
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By this time next week these people will, as I predicted, have turned this into a virtue somehow. Better Putin than Hillary sort of vibe. Hell, they may do that by this time tomorrow.
What I like is that none of this is driven by Mueller, just the inexorable drip drip drip of the truth coming to light. Of course the truth itself is irrelevant at best to these people; mostly it's inimical to their preferred narrative. And Trump, stupid as he is, correctly judges that if he says something enough his bovine supporters will believe it. 'What you're seeing and what you're reading is not what's happening.' And he knows that it doesn't really matter what Mueller eventually reports if he can turn this into a PR campaign rather than a criminal defense.
Which leads me to what I'm pondering in the wake of this morning's lunacy - will Fredo be indicted this week? Is that what this is all about?
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Which leads me to what I'm pondering in the wake of this morning's lunacy - will Fredo be indicted this week? Is that what this is all about?
Reportedly, he has not yet been interviewed by Mueller or anyone in law enforcement. That suggests strongly that he’s a target. Trump getting ahead of a forthcoming revelation - which is what all of the Giuliani nonsense has been - suggests strongly that he’s going to be indicted. The WaPo reported today that Trump was in a hissy fit over Jr’s legal jeopardy, which is rich considering he was using his own son as a cut out.
It was a nice touch at the end of the tweet that confirmed his own son’s felonious act, to reaffirm his own innocence. Father of the Year.
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They have to identify themselves with a single letter otherwise they’d spell it wrong.
Could you imagine them trying to spell queue?
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By this time next week these people will, as I predicted, have turned this into a virtue somehow. Better Putin than Hillary sort of vibe. Hell, they may do that by this time tomorrow.
What I like is that none of this is driven by Mueller, just the inexorable drip drip drip of the truth coming to light. Of course the truth itself is irrelevant at best to these people; mostly it's inimical to their preferred narrative. And Trump, stupid as he is, correctly judges that if he says something enough his bovine supporters will believe it. 'What you're seeing and what you're reading is not what's happening.' And he knows that it doesn't really matter what Mueller eventually reports if he can turn this into a PR campaign rather than a criminal defense.
Which leads me to what I'm pondering in the wake of this morning's lunacy - will Fredo be indicted this week? Is that what this is all about?
https://twitter.com/Popehat/status/1026174402130456576/photo/1
Notice the shirts?
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I want to ask a non-prejudice friend of mine if he would tell them to go to russia? That's what he thinks anyone supporting another country should do.
Idiots. This country is full of them and they good and vote.
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The Presidents buddy Alex Jones got banned from Facebook and YouTube today. So there is that.
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The Presidents buddy Alex Jones got banned from Facebook and YouTube today. So there is that.
He then tweeted he had been banned from the internet.
Yes, you read that correctly.
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He then tweeted he had been banned from the internet.
Yes, you read that correctly.
It's almost like his critical thinking skills might not be up to par.
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How much of what he says does he actually believe, and how much of what he says does his audience actually believe? This is not a rhetorical question; I truly have no idea. I mean, there are some people that think WWE is real so who knows.
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I know I shouldn’t be surprised that there are so many people that fall for Alex Jones shtick, but it is still amazing to me.
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He then tweeted he had been banned from the internet.
Yes, you read that correctly.
Al Gore runs a tight ship.
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Alex Jones's schtick was amusing for about two weeks in 97. His staying power is a sad commentary on the delusional paranoia of so many. He is at best a snake oil salesman who has seized upon the gullibility and the resentful nature of the directionless dregs for his own capitalistic gain.
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Because Trump is guilty of doing everything of which he accuses others; yesterday - after admitting to the actual nature of the Trump Tower meeting, which he had previously tried to obfuscate by concocting a cover story with Hope Hicks - Trump met with Hope Hicks on an plane on the tarmac.
She actually travelled with him to his Nuremberg Ohio rally, but it just reeks of the same stink he raised when Bill Clinton met with then Attorney General Rice on a plane on the tarmac during the campaign.
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How much of what he says does he actually believe, and how much of what he says does his audience actually believe? This is not a rhetorical question; I truly have no idea. I mean, there are some people that think WWE is real so who knows.
Alex Jones has asserted under oath that it's all an act; which would mean he's just a despicable douchebag rather than dangerously unhinged.
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The Presidents buddy Alex Jones got banned from Facebook and YouTube today. So there is that.
Banned for 30 days only. I'm sure he'll spend those 30 days preparing a series of posts of a positive and uplifting nature.
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UKIP: "Keep Britain White"
Cheddar Man: "Surprise bitches! (http://www.iflscience.com/editors-blog/scientists-reveal-one-of-the-first-britons-had-black-skin-and-racists-are-hilariously-confused/)"
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You go, Dale Murphy. https://dalemurphy.com/the-perils-of-baseballs-social-media-moment/
Touches on a number of recent issues, including l'affaire Osuna.
(I could have posted this in a number of different threads but decided to do so here because it's gonna be a trigger for some folks.)
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Regarding the tweets, nice to hear someone from baseball, even if they are one generation removed, to at least say something.
Didn't know Gray got wrapped up in this, and certainly didn't know of the standing ovation for Hader. Fucking inbreds. Reminds me of an old song title: Proud to be stupid. Didn't expect that phenomena to take such a hold in America.
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Didn't know Gray got wrapped up in this, and certainly didn't know of the standing ovation for Hader. Fucking inbreds.
David "Family Values" Vitter got a standing ovation from his fellow Senate Republicans when returning to "work" after taking time off for being busted for using hooker services, including at least one time he ordered up a hooker from his phone while voting on a bill in the Senate.
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The Ohio 12th may not be decided yet, but it has told us what we need to know about November:
1) Democrats can win big; and
B) Trump can rally his base to negate anything other than a tsunami.
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David "Family Values" Vitter got a standing ovation from his fellow Senate Republicans when returning to "work" after taking time off for being busted for using hooker services, including at least one time he ordered up a hooker from his phone while voting on a bill in the Senate.
To paraphrase Sterling Archer..."they're 'call girls' until they end up dead in your apartment...in which case, they're just 'HOOKERS'!"
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Apropos nothing, in his non-victory speech last night, Republican candidate Balderson vowed to "keep America great again." Think about that for a moment...
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US Rep. Chris Collins (R-NY) has been arrested for insider trading (https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/new-york-gop-rep-chris-collins-arrested-over-insider-trading-charges/ar-BBLENIL?li=BBnb7Kz). An early and devout Trumpist, he has already cleared his uncontested primary, so it will be interesting to see what the Republicans do about this one. Collins is in a district that voted for Trump +24.
Meanwhile, the campaign of US Rep. Scott Taylor (R-VA) is under investigation for a scheme to forge signatures on a petition to get an independent liberal on the ballot in November. Shaun Brown ran as a Democrat in 2016 and was trounced by Taylor by 23 points. Brown later was indicted on charges of fraud, but still tried to win the democratic nomination to run in 2018 (she lost). Brown was added to the 2018 ballot as an independent, partly due to help from the Taylor campaign in collecting the necessary signatures for her to qualify - dirty pool but not a crime. It is a crime to forge such signatures, though, which is what Taylor's campaign is being investigated for. +23 and still trying to gain an advantage illegally...?
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US Rep. Chris Collins (R-NY) has been arrested for insider trading (https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/new-york-gop-rep-chris-collins-arrested-over-insider-trading-charges/ar-BBLENIL?li=BBnb7Kz). An early and devout Trumpist, he has already cleared his uncontested primary, so it will be interesting to see what the Republicans do about this one. Collins is in a district that voted for Trump +24.
Allegedly, he's embraced Trumpism even more than originally thought; he's involved his son, his son's fiancee and her father in the scheme. He also appears to have been giving insider information to multiple friends and donors.
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If raping children doesn't disqualify a Republican from the support of the president and the party I don't see how a little insider trading will bother anyone.
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ProPublica @ProPublica 22 minutes ago
Kris Kobach's gubernatorial race in Kansas is too close to call. His current office is now responsible for a recount and there's no law stopping him from overseeing it. (via @KCStar)
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After he subtracts all the "illegals" who voted against him, he'll declare himself the victor.
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Good for him! I hope he wins the thing. Well earned.
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If raping children doesn't disqualify a Republican from the support of the president and the party I don't see how a little insider trading will bother anyone.
Probably not. He may still end up in jail though, which might impact his day job.
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ProPublica @ProPublica 22 minutes ago
Kris Kobach's gubernatorial race in Kansas is too close to call. His current office is now responsible for a recount and there's no law stopping him from overseeing it. (via @KCStar)
It's because irony has been on steroids for a few years now. The head of the fake voter fraud unit is going to be able to decide which votes count.
Remember Bush vs. Gore? When the Chairman of Bush's Florida campaign was also Florida's Secretary of State in charge of overseeing the election...which was supremely fucked up and decided when the Supreme Court just said "Fuck it! Give it to Bush"? Yeah; since then.
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Oh Lordy, there’s tapes...of Devin Nunes.
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Oh Lordy, there’s tapes...of Devin Nunes.
Do tell.
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Do tell.
http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow/watch/nunes-on-secret-tape-kavanaugh-vote-then-rosenstein-impeachment-1295170115625
If you just want to read about it:
https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/politics-news/secret-recording-shows-gop-s-nunes-saying-rosenstein-impeachment-would-n899031
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Do tell.
Explained away to his donors not impeaching Rosenstein by lying about the Senate’s duty to take it up immediately if they did (it doesn’t); described a very narrow example of what would be criminal collusion with a foreign power, which matched almost perfectly what happened around the Trump Tower meeting; and told them that they’re all fucked if they don’t hold the House majority.
Not as blockbuster as Romney’s secret tape, but still very enlightening. They aren’t just gaslighting the general public, they do it to their own donors too.
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Meanwhile, Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross is actually as big a piece of shit as you thought (https://www.forbes.com/sites/danalexander/2018/08/06/new-details-about-wilbur-rosss-businesses-point-to-pattern-of-grifting/). And Michael Cohen is also in bigger trouble, including pardon-resistant State trouble, to do with his dealings in the always honest N.Y. taxi medallion business.
At this point, is there anyone in the President’s orbit who isn’t in legal jeopardy themselves?
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Don't forget about the boys down at the club that helpfully offered to run the VA for us.
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Don't forget about the boys down at the club that helpfully offered to run the VA for us.
Remember when Trump claimed that bringing in rich businessmen to his administration would firewall it against corruption, because they're already rich and so impervious to bribes? Yeah, how's that working out.
Rich men (and I am being gender-specific here on purpose) to a man want to be more rich. Rich men with the opposite drive include Bill Gates and crickets. Many of them, especially those in Trump's administration, got rich through means that would barely pass the smell test if not be outright illegal (either by them or by their fathers). Putting them in charge of trillions of dollars of federal money is just asking for trouble which, it seems, they have been happy to supply.
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Oh Lordy, there's tapes...part eleventy-million.
Omarosa claims to have tapes of Trump using the N-word. This news is shocking...to no one. Apparently, outtakes from The Apprentice are a cess pool of Trump's racism, misogyny and harassment, so I assume that Omarosa's tapes are a sub-set of those. NBC have put those outtakes in the same box that Indy put the Arc, so we may never see or hear them but, at this point, there's such a full back catalog of Trump being a piece of shit that it would merely be piling on.
Maybe if Trump was being Trump behind the Resolute Desk, that might move the needle a little with some conservatives, but he maintains 88% approval among Republicans and 90% among those who voted for him, so his bigotry with these folks may be a feature, not a bug.
Probably the only person who could extract any real value from such recordings would be Melanie Melania, who could use them in the divorce proceedings that she's long been reported of desiring, and which now may happen as her parents have just completed their chain migration citizenship.
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I don't give a shit about Omarosa, or the fact that she was fired, or the fact that Trump is in a spat with her on Twitter. All of that is just baseline craptitude with this administration. What is interesting is this:
1) Omarosa claims that Kelly took her to the Situation Room to fire her;
2) Not the CNN show, the actual Situation Room - the most secure SCIF of all the SCIFs; and
3) Omarosa has a recording of the event on her phone.
Why are they using the Situation Room for routine personnel issues and how the fuck was she allowed inside the Situation Room with a phone? If true, this was General John Kelly - the man in charge of running the White House - pulling some seriously amateurish bullshit. What's next? Will we find out that Kislyak got a private tour and took some "selfies" in there? (I actually think this may well have happened and, if not, Uncle Vlad definitely gets a tour).
The people running the country are dangerously incompetent. I keep hearing that we've been lucky so far, in that they haven't been tested with a major disaster, but they have: Puerto Rico. And they failed miserably and continue to fail miserably. Without fanfare or much reportage, the official death toll in PR from "Maria" was upped from the initial ~60 to just under 1,500. One and a half THOUSAND people died as a direct result of the storm. The island remains without reliable power, which means they don't have reliable water, or schools, or hospitals, or stores, or offices, or street lighting, or emergency services or pretty much anything you can fucking think of. I'm sure Trump (and his base) thinks of them as Sea Mexicans, but they're American citizens, and they're being left to rot, out of sight and mind, on a devastated island.
EOR
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Omarosa keeps drip feeding the existence of a tape, dropping said tape and then drip feeding existence of the next tape. She previewed and dropped tapes of Kelly and Trump; now she’s previewing tapes of Jarvanka in private conversation. You’ll be able to tell who’s who because Ivanka has the more manly voice.
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I don't give a shit about Omarosa, or the fact that she was fired, or the fact that Trump is in a spat with her on Twitter. All of that is just baseline craptitude with this administration. What is interesting is this:
1) Omarosa claims that Kelly took her to the Situation Room to fire her;
2) Not the CNN show, the actual Situation Room - the most secure SCIF of all the SCIFs; and
3) Omarosa has a recording of the event on her phone.
Why are they using the Situation Room for routine personnel issues and how the fuck was she allowed inside the Situation Room with a phone? If true, this was General John Kelly - the man in charge of running the White House - pulling some seriously amateurish bullshit. What's next? Will we find out that Kislyak got a private tour and took some "selfies" in there? (I actually think this may well have happened and, if not, Uncle Vlad definitely gets a tour).
Did she see the big board?
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Did she see the big board?
You can’t fire in here! This is the war room!
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If people think that a tape where Trump uses the n word is somehow going to dim his support they must have missed the part where people voted for this motherfucker SPECIFICALLY BECAUSE HE IS A RACIST.
Similarly, if people think that stone cold proof that Trump conspired with Russia to subvert the elections, that he is currently conspiring with Russia to subvert future elections, that he launders money for and is generally involved in Russian organized crime is somehow going to dim his support, they must have missed the part where Russia is, in the fevered imaginations of the 1488 crowd, the last great bastion of whiteness and therefore any association with Russia is inherently laudable.
Maybe the psycho Nazi bikers that Trump hangs around with will eventually learn to respect the emoluments clause, you know, who knows.
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Is "El Tiempo" Spanish for "Red Hen"? The fallout from the restaurant publicizing a visit by Jeff Sessions has hit the British press (https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/aug/13/restaurant-boycott-jeff-sessions-us-attorney-general). Their conclusion?
It was once the case that visits from a high-ranking politician would boost a restaurant’s fortunes. When then president Obama visited La Hacienda, a Mexican restaurant in Nashville, in 2014, it immediately led to a boost in customers and a new dish was added to the menu honouring the occasion. Now it seems a restaurant’s best hope if a White House official wants to eat there is to hope no one notices, at least if they want to avoid protesters.
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El Real has chimed in (https://s.hdnux.com/photos/75/04/23/16008421/3/920x920.jpg). Last night's Montrose Monday there was the busiest we've seen since they dropped the Montrose discount from 50% to 30%.
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Anyone that goes to El Tiempo deserves what they get. Goddamn it that place is horrible. I've been telling you idiots that for years. El Tiempo bites more dick than Daniel Roberts.
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Anyone that goes to El Tiempo deserves what they get. Goddamn it that place is horrible. I've been telling you idiots that for years. El Tiempo bites more dick than Daniel Roberts.
What's a little crazy is that it was the Montrose location of El Tiempo that was visited by Sessions. Or maybe it wasn't crazy...
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What's a little crazy is that it was the Montrose location of El Tiempo that was visited by Sessions. Or maybe it wasn't crazy...
Maybe JR's was having another one of their Keebler theme nights.
It's sad to see the further desecration of a once proud eatery, La Jalisciense. Truly, you can't go home again.
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On a related note, if you ever come to Lafayette, stay the fuck away from Prejean's. You can't listen to the radio here for half an hour without hearing one of their ads with Rush Limbaugh telling everybody it's where conservatives go to eat...
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...it's where conservatives go to eat...
Huh. I always thought that was Luby's.
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Trump appears to have brought his ageing Android phone to a knife fight. He, ever so presidentially, tweeted at Omarosa this morning, calling her - amongst other insults - a dog. In response, Omarosa released another recording from the White House in which she and other staff members discuss Trump's use of the N-word as a real thing that they will probably have to deal with at some point as it will get out eventually.
Hillary, Comey, Mueller, Strozk, the Deep State, Merkel, Erdogan etc. etc., none of them will lay a glove on this guy. He's going to be brought down by Stormy Daniels and Omarosa.
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Wait a minute - what if Stormy Daniels and Omarosa ARE the deep state???
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Wait a minute - what if Stormy Daniels and Omarosa ARE the deep state???
Well, that's the movie title sorted.
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On a related note, if you ever come to Lafayette, stay the fuck away from Prejean's. You can't listen to the radio here for half an hour without hearing one of their ads with Rush Limbaugh telling everybody it's where conservatives go to eat...
Wow, that's a bummer to hear. Their pheasant, quail and andouille gumbo and crawfish enchiladas are a few of my must-haves at JazzFest.
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Wow, that's a bummer to hear. Their pheasant, quail and andouille gumbo and crawfish enchiladas are a few of my must-haves at JazzFest.
I got a tightness in my chest just reading that.
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In other news, Manafort's defense team rested without presenting a defense. Makes sense, given that mounting a defense meant putting Manafort on the stand, so they're going with the "prosecutors failed to make their case" defense (while peering out from behind a giant wall of documents).
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I got a tightness in my chest just reading that.
Stay far, far away from the food booths if you're ever at JazzFest.
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Stay far, far away from the food booths if you're ever at JazzFest.
I went once, over 10 years ago. Still trying to shed the pounds added.
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So now we're (long) past the point of debating if the President is a racist, or even if he's used the N-word out loud, and it's now just a question of whether he dropped that bomb within earshot of an active mic. Even SHS chose not to lie in the press briefing about it - her default ploy for every other scandal - only saying that she's never heard him use it but she's "not in every room".
Paraphrasing John Oliver, discussing a poll in which had 49% of respondents affirmed they believe the President is a racist, it's amazing that 49% of people think the President is a racist while simultaneously amazing that it's only 49%. As with all things Trump, the degradation of norms and standards is absolute.
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In other unpresidented news, SHS actually apologized for understating the number of jobs for African-Americans created during Obama's term in office. She claimed the total number - for 8 years, don't forget - was 195,000. The actual number is 1640% higher than that, so just a little off then.
However, here's the statement SHS had to walk back:
Just look at the economy alone. This president, since he took office, in the year and a half that he’s been here, has created 700,000 new jobs for African Americans. That’s 700,000 African Americans that are working now that weren’t working when this President took place.
When President Obama left, after eight years in office – eight years in office, he had only created 800 – or 195,000 jobs for African Americans. President Trump in his first year and a half has already tripled what President Obama did in eight years.
What's shocking/not shocking is that she was given these clearly ludicrous numbers and just ran with them, instead of thinking that they're obviously complete bollocks and maybe someone needed to check them. That's the level of incompetence that runs rife in this administration and, while relatively harmless here, it's the sort of seat-of-the-pants, conspiracy-theory-accepting, fact-free (and racist to the core) governing that's going on every single day.
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A Twitter account gets suspended for abuse, and it's Alex Jones not Donald Trump; a security clearance gets revoked, and its John Brennan not Donald Trump (or even Mike Flynn).
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All it would take is two Republican senators to put an end to this disgrace.
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All it would take is two Republican senators to put an end to this disgrace.
Cornyn and Cruz????
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Cornyn and Cruz????
I used to think that Steve Schmidt's very earnest commentary on the Trump administration was somewhat alarmist and over the top. Well, he turned out to be correct, and prescient, because the descending standards have caught up to his foresight. What he's saying now about the Republican Party is alarming, but I now listen to his comments with a different ear.
He expects a blue wave in November that will sweep Republicans out of power, at least in the House. He also thinks that, like what has happened to the Republican Party in California, as any Republican in a race that's closer than a +24 in their favor is in jeopardy, we'll be left only with Republicans from uber-safe +25 or better constituencies. Those candidates only get through their primary by out-crazying their Republican opponents, and then they cruise the general because the seat is so gerrymandered..
There will be less of them, but the party is about to unleash on the nation a clone army of Issas, Rohrabachers, McCarthys and Nuneses. They're going to get a lot worse before they get any better (if they ever do) just, hopefully, barking ineffectually in the minority.
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A Twitter account gets suspended for abuse, and it's Alex Jones not Donald Trump; a security clearance gets revoked, and its John Brennan not Donald Trump (or even Mike Flynn).
Trump issued a written statement - in writing - explaning the justifications for removing Brennan's security clearance. Trump says that Brennan:
* is guilty of "erratic conduct and behavior";
* is lacking in "objectivity and credibility";
* has made "unfounded and outrageous allegations";
* has made "wild outbursts on the internet and television"'
* has been caught "lying"; and
* has engaged in "frenzied commentary."
Wow.
It's also worth noting that the press release was dated back in July. So this was prepared then and has been on hold waiting for the moment to deploy it.
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No way Donnie wrote that, even if it fits his projection style to a tee.
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I'm relieved to know that frenzied commentary is a line in the sand the current White House will simply not abide. Gentle commentary is the order of the day. Make America Gentle Again.
By the time these slapdicks get done with things we'll be hoping to Make America Germane Again.
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By the time these slapdicks get done with things we'll be hoping to Make America Germane Again.
I think Stephen Miller wants to Make America German* Again.
* You know. Those kind of Germans...
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So Trump revoked the security clearance of John Brennan and threatened to do the same for an
enemies laundry list of former national security personnel because he and they have said bad things about Trump. That's it. That's the reason. Until, of course, he gave an interview a few hours (or weeks, depending on your understanding of the space-time continuum) after issuing said statement, in which he claimed it was because Brennan et al were all part of the conspiracy to fit him up in the Russia thing.
There's a reason why the Mueller probe is not wrapping up any time soon (apart from the fact they they will need an interview with Trump in order to get to the end), and it's because they keep creating new evidence to add to the pile.
But the thing about security clearances is, they're either the President's bailiwick or they're not. In this case, it's entirely up to the President - they claim - as to who gets and keeps clearances. The White House didn't even tell any of their own national security folks about what they were doing; they found out, like everyone else, when SHS stepped up to the podium and read the President's statement. Contrast this with the case of Dan Porter, who was unable to get security clearance - partly due to his habit of hitting women relationship issues - yet was allowed still to see classified information because handling such paperwork was basically his job description. When Porter was escorted off the premises left the White House, SHS et al claimed that they had no control of security clearances and such things were handled by the national security folks.
I know this is a single needle of an issue - in a giant pile of needles - but I think it's really important that people take a step back from each dumpster fire so that they can see that every dumpster is on fire, and for exactly the same reason.
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Omarosa drops another tape; this time catching Eric's wife Lara offering her a fake job on the campaign, the day after she had been fired from the White House, for $180k/year. Lara specifically references that Omarosa may have some dirt and such a job would mean her not saying any negative things about Trump.
Not sure if there's anything illegal here, but it's another example of the pattern of Trump paying off women.
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Judge Kavanaugh's potentially got a lot to hide in his work as Staff Secretary in the Bush administration. Precedent (and good practice) - including as recently as Justice Sotamayor's confirmation hearing - means that the Senate really needs to have access to all of Kavanaugh's work product from his White House days, but Republicans are trying to steamroller through his confirmation before even a single piece of paper from back then is produced. What does he have to hide?
Well, there's at least one felony lie to the Senate that we know of from his confirmation hearing for elevation to the DC appeals court. That would seem relevant, no? In that hearing in 2006, Kavanaugh was asked specifically by Dick Durbin if he had ever had any input into the administration's policy towards detainees in Guantanamo. It was relevant, because the DC circuit had jurisdiction over lawsuits working their way through the courts on that very subject. Kavanaugh gave an unequivocal "no" as his answer.
Later, Durbin came into possession of Bush administration documents relating to Guantanamo detainees, with Kavanaugh's name all over them. So he lied...or "misremembered". So Durbin asked him - officially, in writing - if he wanted to revise his answer to that question. In the 11 intervening years, Durbin hasn't even received an acknowledgement of the question.
Still, what are the chances that a lawsuit about Guantanamo detainees would end up in front of him as a DC appellant judge? How about the fact that one was the very first case he heard in his new position. Did he recuse himself? Nope.
Democrats remain powerless to stop Kavanaugh if Republicans remain in lock step. They need to keep hammering this point, though, because it could have an effect on the moderate Republicans if Kavanaugh's numbers fall any lower. He already polls behind Harriet Myers in polls regarding whether people think he should be a Justice. By 7 points. Seven! He is Bork levels of popular.
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Cruz v BETO is officially interesting. I gave Beto a 1in 20 chance 6 months ago. Now, 1 in3. Best part is the gop diverting money from other races to spend on a statewide TEXAS election. Win or lose, this is a win for Ds.
Then their is Canadian Ted. The person who, rightfully referred to Trump as a pathological liar, only to have Trump call his wife ugly and claim his dad killed JFK. Ted is now on his knees begging TRUMP to campaign for him. You can’t make this shit up.
Sad!
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One poll has Beto and Cruz tied, another gives Beto a 1 point lead. Either way, it’s tighter than a duck’s arse. The Texas Tribune poll also has Trump approval underwater at 54 to 44. I can only see that getting worse as he continues to chase every rabbit down a hole and get covered in shit in the process.
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I didn’t want to sully the dedicated thread with this but...behind their obit. of Aretha Franklin, Fox News had a photo of Patti LaBelle.
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"Truth isn't truth." claimed Rudy Giuliani yesterday on Meet the Press, presumably under the fearsome pummeling he was receiving from legendary firebrand...Chuck Todd. That's the meme-able moment form the interview, but the most notable moment was when Giuliani volunteered the the June 2016 Trump Tower meeting was initially all about getting dirt on Hillary Clinton.
Meanwhile, the NY Times is reporting that White House "councel" (sic) Don McGahn has given hours of testimony to Mueller's team. Trump tried to tweet it off as "I meant to do that" (spawning the above misspelling), but the Times also reported that McGahn was concerned that he was being set up as a fall guy, so he was sharing more with Mueller's team than was intended. The plan to have McGahn talk to investigators was dreamed up by John Dowd and Ty Cobb, so he probably wasn't wrong.
It's also Day #3 of deliberation in the Manafort trial. Trump weighed in over the weekend with negative comments about those prosecuting Manafort and positive comments about the defendant himself. Remember when Charles Manson nearly got a mistrial because Nixon commented publicly on his trial?
A lot going on in the news; your move Omarosa...
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Potentially big day today. Manafort jury asked the judge how to fill out the verdict form if they are hung on a single count. Clearly this suggests that they're not hung on the balance of the counts, so either he's guilty on the vast majority of the charges or acquitted on the vast majority of the charges. The judge sent them back to see if they can't break the impasse on the hung charge, but we may still see the verdict(s) being read today.
Meanwhile, reports claim that Cohen is working on a plea deal for all his alleged tax/bank fraud, and it could be completed as early as today.
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Meannwhile, reports claim that Cohen is working on a plea deal for all his alleged tax/bank fraud, and it could be completed as early as today.
"John D'oh!" due in court later today to enter a plea deal. No reportage yet as to what he's pleaded guilty and the extent of the quo for this quid.
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So, it's likely the meltdown will get louder (if that is possible) and the pardons will soon follow
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So, it's likely the meltdown will get louder (if that is possible) and the pardons will soon follow
Depends what Cohen pleads to; Trump can't pardon state crimes. However, there is also the problem that a pardon (1) affirms guilt and thus confirms crimes were committed; and (b) dissolves 5th amendment protections against self-incrimination like there's been a snap of Thanos' fingers, so Cohen can be compelled to testify or face new obstruction / perjury charges.
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WaPo: "Cohen has surrendered to the FBI."
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WaPo: "Cohen has surrendered to the FBI."
In court now, allocuting to whatever crimes to which he's pleading guilty. Proceedings expected to finish between 3 and 3:30 CDT.
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Verdict on 8 counts in Manafort trial; deadlocked on other 10. No idea yet which way on the 8 decided counts.
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I would assume the judge is going to tell them to keep deliberating, but who knows.
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https://twitter.com/PPVSRB/status/1032001688876527616
Cohen's guilty pleas:
Counts 1-5. Tax evasion 2012-2016
Count 6 false statement to financial institution Feb 2015-April 2016
Count 7 willful cause of unlawful corporate contribution June 2016-Oct. 2016
Count 8 excessive campaign contribution on Oct. 27, 2016
The payment to Stormy Daniels was apparently finalized on Oct. 27, 2016.
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WaPo: "Paul Manafort has been found guilty of 8 counts. The judge said he would declare a mistrial on the remaining 10 charges after the jury said it could not reach unanimous verdicts."
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/manafort-jury-suggests-it-cannot-come-to-a-consensus-on-a-single-count/2018/08/21/a2478ac0-a559-11e8-a656-943eefab5daf_story.html?utm_term=.9ae324577219
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Or not. Guilty on 8 counts. Mistrials on the other 10. I’m curious as to the vote breakdown for the mistrials.
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Why mistrials on the other 10, instead of not-guilty? Is that normal?
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Why mistrials on the other 10, instead of not-guilty? Is that normal?
Just because the jury could not come to a consensus does not mean the defendant is not guilty. They just couldn't agree. That's a hung jury. The judge will typically declare a mistrial.
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Why mistrials on the other 10, instead of not-guilty? Is that normal?
An acquittal has to be unanimous too.
So technically the feds get a second bite at the banana on the other 10 counts if they so choose.
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https://twitter.com/PPVSRB/status/1032001688876527616
Cohen's guilty pleas:
Counts 1-5. Tax evasion 2012-2016
Count 6 false statement to financial institution Feb 2015-April 2016
Count 7 willful cause of unlawful corporate contribution June 2016-Oct. 2016
Count 8 excessive campaign contribution on Oct. 27, 2016
The payment to Stormy Daniels was apparently finalized on Oct. 27, 2016.
He confessed that the campaign finance crime occurred "at the direction of a candidate."
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"Cohen just described, in court, how he violated campaign finance laws by arranging payment for Stormy Daniels and Karen McDougal. He said he violated federal law "in coordination with and at the direction of a federal candidate for office" Meaning Trump."
https://twitter.com/yashar/status/1032007263882424320
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Just because the jury could not come to a consensus does not mean the defendant is not guilty. They just couldn't agree. That's a hung jury. The judge will typically declare a mistrial.
I really did not know this. I just assumed that consensus was only needed for "guilty." So, for example, all the jurors in OJ's trial found him not-guilty, or was that just a hung jury where they decided not to prosecute again?
So, there are three outcomes: consensus on guilt = guilty, consensus on not-guilty = not guilty, and non-consensus = hung jury/mistrial?
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I really did not know this. I just assumed that consensus was only needed for "guilty." So, for example, all the jurors in OJ's trial found him not-guilty, or was that just a hung jury where they decided not to prosecute again?
So, there are three outcomes, consensus on guilt = guilty, consensus on not-guilty = not guilty, and non-consensus = hung jury/mistrial?
OJ was found unanimously not guilty. You are correct.
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So technically the feds get a second bite at the banana on the other 10 counts if they so choose.
And with Cohen in the fold, they're likely to have more fire power.
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This witch hunt sure is getting a lot of convictions.
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With the Cohen pleadings, Trump is achieving the Full Nixon by now being an unindicted co-conspirator.
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This witch hunt sure is getting a lot of convictions.
It’s a not a “witch hunt” if they really are witches.
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Reminder that Manafort has another trial in September on charges including conspiracy to defraud the United States, failing to register as a foreign agent, money laundering, witness tampering and making false statements.
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With the Cohen pleadings, Trump is achieving the Full Nixon by now being an unindicted co-conspirator.
He directed his lawyer to commit federal crimes in order to conceal information from damaging his campaign just days before barely winning the election. That is really fucked up. The Watergate break in probably didn't influence the '72 election at all. This crime, which Trump was directly involved in, arguably swung the election.
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He directed his lawyer to commit federal crimes in order to conceal information from damaging his campaign just days before barely winning the election. That is really fucked up. The Watergate break in probably didn't influence the '72 election at all. This crime, which Trump was directly involved in, arguably swung the election.
Exactly. Pundits seem to think that any ol’ maverick candidate can win under the new Trump paradigm, but the truth is that Trump was a candidate who came in with a relatively long history in politics (including a prior run as an independent) yet still needed the benefit of multiple illegal campaign efforts AND an opponent with record high negatives AND an ethical meltdown by the head of the FBI.
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So, are there enough at-risk Republicans in the House to consider impeachment? It only needs about 10% of them...
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So, are there enough at-risk Republicans in the House to consider impeachment? It only needs about 10% of them...
If any are in Iowa they might not be now.
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If any are in Iowa they might not be now.
What does this mean?
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What does this mean?
That college student who had been missing that the media has been obsessed about was found dead today. Her killer, the guy who led the police to the body, is an illegal immigrant.
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That college student who had been missing that the media has been obsessed about was found dead today. Her killer, the guy who led the police to the body, is an illegal immigrant.
Something doesn’t add up about that whole story. I think we’ll find out there is more to it. But yeah, Iowa needs that wall.
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The QAnon Trump supporting fruitcakes are having a real existential crisis. It is hysterical, fucking morons.
Oh and President dumbass is now a co-conspirator to a felony. Which should surprise nobody, this is who he has been his entire life, yet people are still stupid enough to fall for his BS.
I do give him credit for draining the swamp, of course all he has drained is the shit he threw in it. In the end, he’s a crook and a conman and always has been. Sad!
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The problem is the one and only thing that is keeping him out of jail is the job that he currently possesses. So I would expect things to get very, very ugly and that GOP tribalism will continue to outweigh national concerns and that defecting Republicans will be very thin on the ground.
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The problem is the one and only thing that is keeping him out of jail is the job that he currently possesses. So I would expect things to get very, very ugly and that GOP tribalism will continue to outweigh national concerns and that defecting Republicans will be very thin on the ground.
I almost don't want him out unless Pence goes with him. Better to keep reminding folks how awful this crew is.
But I sure hope that Donnie Jr. and Jared get perp-walked.
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The problem is the one and only thing that is keeping him out of jail is the job that he currently possesses. So I would expect things to get very, very ugly and that GOP tribalism will continue to outweigh national concerns and that defecting Republicans will be very thin on the ground.
It’s clear that his candidacy was successful solely due to multiple crimes. In any rational world he would be resigning by the end of the week. Unfortunately we don’t live in that world. We live in a world where the gop has been rewarded beyond measure by the same bad faith that resulted in this mess.
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Interestingly, the evidence in Count #8 against Cohen - the Stormy Daniels payment - implicated the Trump organization in the crime. While the law is not settled on whether you can indict (or even compel testimony from) a sitting President, you sure as fuck can subpoena and/or indict a company.
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Cohen is definitely cooperating, at least with the Southern District of NY. However, prosecutors laid out the evidence they have against him in the counts to which he pleaded guilty, which include hard documents, electronic devices and audio recordings. They clearly had Cohen by the short and curlies because of this evidence. Cohen testified under oath that Trump told him to commit the crimes related to election influence, which he would not have been allowed to do if there was evidence to the contrary in the trove of goodies prosecutors swept up in their raid on Cohen - about 3 million individual pieces.
So Trump is proper fucked as to the election influence felonies.
And then there's Manafort. He faces up to 40 years in prison - but more likely 8-10 years in real time - just from the 8 counts of which he was convicted. Prosecutors still have the option of re-trying the other 10, and they still have the DC trial in front of a judge almost certain to be less antagonistic to prosecutors and a jury typically more inclined to convict. Manafort is also broke and unlikely to get any more loans (even from the Federal Savings Bank of Chicago).
So what options does he have? Appeal the convictions, which takes time and cost money and will likely fail in no small part to the judge's thumb firmly on his side of the scale AND mount a defense in the re-trial of the other 10 counts in Virginia (which takes time and costs money) AND mount a defense in DC...which takes time and costs money. Or...
Now, I have long suspected that the reason Manafort hasn't flipped prior to now is that prosecutors haven't needed him (Gates was at his side throughout and also survived Manafort on the campaign, going on to serve in the transition) but, maybe, he just wouldn't accept the deal they were offering. The winds have shifted now, though, and he will almost certainly be going to Mueller, cap in hand, offering whatever they need to keep his sorry ass out of jail for the rest of his life. Gates knows a lot, but much of what he knows about the campaign may be hearsay. Manafort was in the room in Trump Tower in June 2016...
I remember a quote about Trump from an unnamed CIA officer, from back at the beginning of this when the intelligence community came out about the Russian efforts to throw the election Trump's way and Trump started going after the IC: "He will die in jail." Yesterday made me think that might actually come true.
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A couple more tidbits:
* Cohen claims to have proof that Trump knew of the Russian hacking efforts before even the Trump Tower meeting. Which means that, if true, Mueller has proof that Trump knew of the Russian hacking efforts before even the Trump Tower meeting. The quote from the email invitation to Don Jr read in part "This is obviously very high level and sensitive information but is part of Russia and its government's support for Mr. Trump" which still works and is even more damning when read in the context of there being prior knowledge of Russia's efforts by Trump.
* The extensive - sealed - sidebar that happened during Gates' cross-examination, when defense attorneys for Manafort strayed too close to the Russia investigation, gets unsealed if Manafort declines to appeal and prosecutors decline to re-try the 10 hung counts. (All the sealed sidebars do).
* The judge in the Stormy Daniels civil case ruled to allow discovery - including, potentially, a deposition of Trump - but stayed proceedings until the criminal case in New York was complete. As of yesterday, the criminal case in New York is complete and Michael Avenatti is on a mission to be "America's Lawyer" (and next President) by dethroning Trump.
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At Trump's rally last night in West Virginia, the audience chanted "Lock Her Up!" in reference to Hillary Clinton.
So the base is unmoved, which means Congressional Republicans will be unmoved, which is painfully apparent from their reactions this morning. Noted eunuch Paul Ryan put out a statement that was crushingly underwhelming even by his low standards. “We are aware of Mr Cohen’s guilty plea to these serious charges. We will need more information than is currently available at this point.” Are you fucking kidding me?
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At Trump's rally last night in West Virginia, the audience chanted "Lock Her Up!" in reference to Hillary Clinton.
So the base is unmoved, which means Congressional Republicans will be unmoved, which is painfully apparent from their reactions this morning. Noted eunuch Paul Ryan put out a statement that was crushingly underwhelming even by his low standards. “We are aware of Mr Cohen’s guilty plea to these serious charges. We will need more information than is currently available at this point.” Are you fucking kidding me?
Lindsay Graham is taking the position that conspiring to commit a felony in order to win an election is not an impeachable offense.
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Lindsay Graham is taking the position that conspiring to commit a felony in order to win an election is not an impeachable offense.
Didn't the same hypocrite vote for impeachment for lying about sex?
total piece of shit
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Didn't the same hypocrite vote for impeachment for lying about sex?
total piece of shit
Him and 15 other current members of Congress. In his impassioned speech in favor of impeaching Clinton (https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/lindsey-graham-impeachment_us_5b7cf009e4b0cd327df7d6f4), Graham argued:
You don’t have to be convicted of a crime to lose your job in this Constitutional Republic ... Impeachment is not about punishment. Impeachment is about cleansing the office. Impeachment is about restoring honor and integrity to the office.
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Lindsay Graham is taking the position that conspiring to commit a felony in order to win an election is not an impeachable offense.
I wish Ivan would just release the tape of that fucking pederast already and put us all out of our collective misery.
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I wish Ivan would just release the tape of that fucking pederast already and put us all out of our collective misery.
I doubt that would make any difference. Fox News is teasing a new interview with Trump in which he admits to paying the money that went to Daniels and McDougal, but he claims that it was all ok because it came from him and not the campaign.
So we're right past the point where the affairs didn't happen, and even though they did the payments didn't happen, and even though they did he didn't know about them...and arrived at "If the President does it, then it's not illegal." #StupidWatergate
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I wish Ivan would just release the tape of that fucking pederast already and put us all out of our collective misery.
A shooting in Fifth Avenue. The one thing the man got right.
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I was referring to the senator from the Palmetto State when I mentioned the tape. For some reason he exercises me and I am ready for him to go the fuck away.
I am well aware that literally nothing Trump does will impact his supporters or their ardor. When Mueller finally spills what he has, whichever of Trump's lawyers that isn't in jail at that time will go on all the talk shows sputtering about how conspiring with the Russians to pervert a national election was actually a good thing and his supporters will happily go along. I have always said that to them reality is irrelevant. And it is. But this sort of justification of bald criminality doesn't even require reality suspension, only the conclusion that having Trump as president outweighs any other consideration. And, obviously, for a significant percentage of US Americans, it does.
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It is like we are living in an Onion article. How the fuck can these QAnon rejects be real? Staggering stupidity... which is how we ended up with Trump.
https://youtu.be/VGrfN3v5JL8
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I am not being mean, but Sarah Huckabee Sanders looks like she hasn't slept in at least 24 hours. She also deferred even more than normal (and it's usually a lot) to "the President's prior statements". Almost makes me feel sorry for her. Almost.
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Cohen subpoenaed in the investigation into the Trump Foundation. It being a foundation with Don Jr. and Invanka on its board of directors. Prosecutors seem happy to just keep letting fly with the dick punches.
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David Pecker - head of AMI which publishes the National Enquirer who was implicated by Cohen along with Trump - is cooperating with prosecutors. In addition to corroborating Cohen, Pecker apparently has clued in prosecutors to the fact that the scheme to "catch and kill" stories from former Trump concubines was hatched in 2015 as Trump was moving towards announcing his candidacy. In addition to exploding any efforts by Trump to stretch the timeline in his favor, this also would show premeditation.
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If I ever got impeached, I think the market would crash,” Trump told Fox News. “I think everybody would be very poor.
The Messiah speaks. I suppose the North Korea "deal" would also collapse and the world would lose the Middle East peace Jared is negotiating.
However, I suppose it is progress that he is tacitly admitting that he committed impeachable offenses. Now, it is time to focus on jury persuasion.
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A new Fox News poll (http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2018/08/22/fox-news-poll-democrats-maintain-lead-in-race-for-house.html) shows support for Robert Mueller at 59%, up by 11% from just July, and now 40% of respondents think he will prove criminal or impeachable acts by the President, up by 5% from July.
Also, Trump's approval is still underwater (45-53), Obamacare is more popular than the tax cut (51-40) and Democrats are favored for Congress (49-38). In fact, Clinton voters are more engaged and likely to vote in the midterms (58-48) and when the focus in narrowed to those "extremely interested" the Democrats' advantage widens (56-38).
The more shit that sticks to Trump, the more these numbers will widen and the more likely that (a) a rout is coming in November; and (ii) Congressional Republicans will turn on Trump in order to save their own skins.
As a historic note, it was the prospect of dragging Nixon's dead carcass through the midterms in 1974 that had Congressional Republicans turning on the President from their own party. He was ousted in August but a blue wave still delivered 49 House seats and 4 Senate seats to the Democrats. In 1976, Congress remained largely unchanged but the Presidency flipped to the Democrats.
Current Congressional Republicans benefit from gerrymandering and Fox News, which acts as an umbilical cord delivering nurturing spin direct from the party to its base. However, that base is a tiny - and shrinking - minority of the overall voting pool and, if the base isn't 100% energized and present, they cannot survive for long solely by dint of the institutional advantages they've built into the system for themselves*.
* Unless they sit Kavanaugh on the Supreme Court, at which point they will fast track every piece of legislation they need to disenfranchise non-Republican voters for a generation. No pressure.
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However, I suppose it is progress that he is tacitly admitting that he committed impeachable offenses. Now, it is time to focus on jury persuasion.
This is how they've operated all along. They deny, deny, deny, well maybe, deny, deny, it's true, deny, deny, deny...
So the admission is out there, but you can never get them to come back to it. Just like the Press Briefing yesterday, when SHS claimed ad nauseam that Trump "had done nothing wrong" which is plainly untrue, especially as, at the same time, Trump was giving an interview to Fox News during which he fessed up to committing campaign finance violations. They fill the air with chaff and hope to escape in the confusion.
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Rep. Duncan Hunter (R-CA) was arrested for campaign finance violations - basically, he's accused of using campaign funds as his personal slush fund to buy him and his family stuff and to take vacations, to the tune of $250,000. He was arrested whilst on a golf outing that was paid for out of campaign funds. Hunter was the second sitting Congressional Republican to endorse Trump's run for President. The first was Rep. Chris Collins (R-NY), who was arrested and indicted last week on charges of insider trading.
Who was the third Congressional Republican to endorse Trump? Jefferson Beauregard Sessions III.
#TheBestPeople
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One more update for the morning...on Manafort. How hung was the jury on the 10 unresolved counts? 11-1 to convict (https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/aug/23/paul-manafort-juror-says-one-holdout-kept-jury-from-convicting-on-all-counts). Manafort was a single hold out away from being swept off the board on all 18 counts. The hold out was over whether prosecutors had achieved the standard of beyond reasonable doubt on those 10 counts.
This will not be encouraging news to Manafort and his defense team, who will surely face a re-trial on those counts.
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David Pecker of the National Enquirer has been granted immunity for providing information about Michael Cohen and Donald Trump.
https://www.wsj.com/articles/pecker-granted-immunity-in-cohen-case-1535041976
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David Pecker of the National Enquirer has been granted immunity for providing information about Michael Cohen and Donald Trump.
https://www.wsj.com/articles/pecker-granted-immunity-in-cohen-case-1535041976
What, Trump's Pecker isn't loyal.
This means that Trump's morning lies will soon morph into completely different afternoon lies.
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Also, the mob boss claims that 'flipping' "almost ought to be illegal."
https://www.mediaite.com/tv/trump-blasts-cohen-flipping-to-get-a-plea-deal-almost-ought-to-be-illegal/
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One more update for the morning...on Manafort. How hung was the jury on the 10 unresolved counts? 11-1 to convict (https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/aug/23/paul-manafort-juror-says-one-holdout-kept-jury-from-convicting-on-all-counts). Manafort was a single hold out away from being swept off the board on all 18 counts. The hold out was over whether prosecutors had achieved the standard of beyond reasonable doubt on those 10 counts.
This will not be encouraging news to Manafort and his defense team, who will surely face a re-trial on those counts.
MSNBC spoke with a juror today, who is a Trump-supporting, MAGA-hat owning (she admitted to leaving it in her car and being a little vague on her politics for jury selection), witch hunt-believer. She voted to convict Manafort on all counts. She explained that, while she believes that Manafort is being used as a pawn by Mueller to squeeze Trump, it was clear from the evidence that he was guilty AF of the crimes for which he was charged. She said she does not know the politics of the lone hold-out.
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MSNBC spoke with a juror today, who is a Trump-supporting, MAGA-hat owning (she admitted to leaving it in her car and being a little vague on her politics for jury selection), witch hunt-believer. She voted to convict Manafort on all counts. She explained that, while she believes that Manafort is being used as a pawn by Mueller to squeeze Trump, it was clear from the evidence that he was guilty AF of the crimes for which he was charged. She said she does not know the politics of the lone hold-out.
Holy shit. I read that interview but managed to miss the fact she WASN'T the holdout. Jesus.
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She said she does not know the politics of the lone hold-out.
I guess that will forever just be one of those puzzling mysteries.
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I guess that will forever just be one of those puzzling mysteries.
To be fair, she did convict on 8 of the 10. Notable among the charges that went undecided - i.e. the ones she alone could not come to a guilty vote - were the conspiracy charges, which relied heavily on the testimony of Gates. The MAGA-juror interviewed said that they universally considered Gates to be a giant, steaming pile of shit (paraphrasing).
It's important to remember that, among the cooperating witnesses, there are no heroes; just spineless villains.
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David Pecker of the National Enquirer has been granted immunity for providing information about Michael Cohen and Donald Trump.
The dominoes are falling and it seems to be accelerating.
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The MAGA juror said that they basically tossed out all of Gates' testimony entirely. It's hard to fault a jury for that approach, to be honest.
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The MAGA juror said that they basically tossed out all of Gates' testimony entirely. It's hard to fault a jury for that approach, to be honest.
I mean, which lying piece of shit do you trust?
Oh, right... None of them.
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David Pecker of the National Enquirer has been granted immunity for providing information about Michael Cohen and Donald Trump.
https://www.wsj.com/articles/pecker-granted-immunity-in-cohen-case-1535041976
This is all just so goddamn skeezy. I suppose soon enough Vince McMahon will be involved somehow.
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This is all just so goddamn skeezy. I suppose soon enough Vince McMahon will be involved somehow.
Oh please oh please oh please please please
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This is all just so goddamn skeezy. I suppose soon enough Vince McMahon will be involved somehow.
Worth it to see Jeff Sessions suddenly turn on Trump and hit him with a folding chair.
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I just don’t understand how supporting a piece of shit like Trump is worth it for the GOP. How do you decide to sink to THAT level. Did they think Mike Pence was gonna nominate Michael Moore for the SCOTUS? For some reason they decided to throw every last ounce of dignity down the shitter....for Donald Trump. They now have 40 years of having that shit thrown back in their face, for what?
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I just don’t understand how supporting a piece of shit like Trump is worth it for the GOP. How do you decide to sink to THAT level. Did they think Mike Pence was gonna nominate Michael Moore for the SCOTUS? For some reason they decided to throw every last ounce of dignity down the shitter....for Donald Trump. They now have 40 years of having that shit thrown back in their face, for what?
I could go on about this at some length but I won't, except to say that this is the inevitable result of allowing unlimited amounts of money to influence elections and allowing a significant amount of that money to be anonymously contributed.
What you end up with is the corrupt and corruptible party, always bereft of any actual policy ideas or any imagination whatsoever, beholden exclusively to its donors at the expense of its constituents and, crucially, the country. Also, you have to remember that when these idiots are eventually primaried out by some fuckwit even crazier and more stupid than they are thanks to the Buy GPS Tracking on My Rascal to Thwart Theft crowd and the wear camouflage to church crowd, they fully expect to get spit right out onto K Street and make five times more than they did when they were merely congressmen surviving on poverty rations so meagre they had to dip illegally into campaign funds to finance their Hawaiian vacations.
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I just don’t understand how supporting a piece of shit like Trump is worth it for the GOP. How do you decide to sink to THAT level. Did they think Mike Pence was gonna nominate Michael Moore for the SCOTUS? For some reason they decided to throw every last ounce of dignity down the shitter....for Donald Trump. They now have 40 years of having that shit thrown back in their face, for what?
Power. They know that, beyond all reason, Trump secures them 35-40% of the electorate and is (currently) made of political Teflon. Combine that with the "the enemy of my enemy is my friend" types on the right and you're pretty close to winning an election. And for all of the polling that shows gains made by Dem candidates in the midterms, I'm expecting a lot of GOP voters to "come home" to their R candidates once it's time to cast a ballot, just like what happened in 2016. I'm hoping for a different outcome, but I'm preparing for another GOP-controlled Congress.
Also, on a much more impish level, the folks on the right know that Trump, perhaps more than any R candidate in recent history, drives the left batty and so they'll put up with any amount of shit to get under the skin of liberals.
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Power. They know that, beyond all reason, Trump secures them 35-40% of the electorate and is (currently) made of political Teflon. Combine that with the "the enemy of my enemy is my friend" types on the right and you're pretty close to winning an election. And for all of the polling that shows gains made by Dem candidates in the midterms, I'm expecting a lot of GOP voters to "come home" to their R candidates once it's time to cast a ballot, just like what happened in 2016. I'm hoping for a different outcome, but I'm preparing for another GOP-controlled Congress.
Also, on a much more impish level, the folks on the right know that Trump, perhaps more than any R candidate in recent history, drives the left batty and so they'll put up with any amount of shit to get under the skin of liberals.
I hate your post because I believe your post. It amazes me how people are not willing to vote against their party. I just don't get it. Vote for a good candidate. If somehow Trump was a Democrat, there is no way I'd vote blue. NONE.
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I'm not as cynical, but I entertain the notion that I'm just naive. I'm expecting the electorate to give the Republicans a big kick in the balls in November, assuming the Russians don't rig the tallies.
I still see a distinction between hatred of elites/liberals/people OK with diversity and love of Trump. I agree with most of Waldo's insight:
Also, on a much more impish level, the folks on the right know that Trump, perhaps more than any R candidate in recent history, drives the left batty and so they'll put up with any amount of shit to get under the skin of liberals.
but I don't think they will put up with "any amount of shit." Most Trump supporters I know fit this description, but deep down, they don't really love, or even like Trump. They see that he's a piece of shit, and at the end of the day, it's always easier to rationalize dumping a piece of shit than rationalizing dumping someone you admire.
I'm not sure what how many more straws are needed, but we'll hit the final one one day
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Seems as if the CFO of the Trump organization has been granted immunity. Shit is going downhill fast.
Does he even have one truly loyal friend? Of course not. I bet his children would flip on him if given the opportunity. May have already, who knows, it's not even noon.
Being a piece of shit comes with a price.
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Seems as if the CFO of the Trump organization has been granted immunity. Shit is going downhill fast.
Does he even have one truly loyal friend? Of course not. I bet his children would flip on him if given the opportunity. May have already, who knows, it's not even noon.
Being a piece of shit comes with a price.
Birds of a feather flock together.
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This is all just so goddamn skeezy. I suppose soon enough Vince McMahon will be involved somehow.
Mr and Mrs McMahon were the single largest contributors to the Trump Foundation, which is under investigation by state and federal prosecutors for any number of crimes.
You're welcome.
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I'm not as cynical, but I entertain the notion that I'm just naive. I'm expecting the electorate to give the Republicans a big kick in the balls in November, assuming the Russians don't rig the tallies.
I still see a distinction between hatred of elites/liberals/people OK with diversity and love of Trump. I agree with most of Waldo's insight:
but I don't think they will put up with "any amount of shit." Most Trump supporters I know fit this description, but deep down, they don't really love, or even like Trump. They see that he's a piece of shit, and at the end of the day, it's always easier to rationalize dumping a piece of shit than rationalizing dumping someone you admire.
I'm not sure what how many more straws are needed, but we'll hit the final one one day
I attend an evangelical church, so I know plenty of people scattered throughout the spectrum of Trump support:
- The people who are only allying with Trump because, to them, voting for liberal values is worse (e.g. the "Supreme Court" Trump voters). My parents fell into this category in 2016 - they both hate the man and hated voting for him but did it anyway.
- The people who buy Trump's bullshit and don't care that he is immoral.
- The people who buy Trump's bullshit and actually believe that he is a moral man. I had a church deacon say this to me in 2016, ironically just a few hours before the Access Hollywood tape dropped. He stood by his comments afterward.
I can't claim to know what people think "deep down", but we'll have a pretty good idea by mid-November. The fact that Trump isn't already out on his ass when pretty much any other current or former politician would be green-glowing radioactive by now is pretty telling. The GOP in Congress may not buy all of his bullshit, but they do recognize that he's an instrument they can use to further their agenda. Unless this November is a massive referendum against Republicans, they won't force Trump out; they'll continue to be "concerned" or even "very concerned" about new developments in whatever Trump is up to, but in the end they'll look the other way. And in the end, "we" get the government we deserve.
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I'm not as cynical, but I entertain the notion that I'm just naive. I'm expecting the electorate to give the Republicans a big kick in the balls in November, assuming the Russians don't rig the tallies.
Special and local elections consistently point to an energized electorate on the left, and - outside of the Trump base (which is about 25% of the overall electorate) - an unmotivated electorate on the right. Trump can and does turn out his base, but his base is getting overrun by the broader coalition of liberals, progressives, moderates and people just tired of his shit. Also, the Republican party has a habit of devolving to the shittiest candidate they can find.
The media will continue to talk up the possibility that the blue wave is not real, and I am certainly not preaching complacency. But the media also talked up the narrowness of the race between Obama and McCain right up until one nanosecond after the polls closed in California.
Trump voters were always going to vote whether Trump was there or not; they're triggered to do so by Fox News et al regardless. What Trump also does, though, is motivate a significant portion of the electorate - normally indifferent or agnostic in elections - to come out and vote against Trump and his enablers. As Trump's legal woes deepen, and his enablers become more and more obvious and nonsensical in their defense of him - the anti-Trump vote will become ever larger.
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Seems as if the CFO of the Trump organization has been granted immunity. Shit is going downhill fast.
Does he even have one truly loyal friend? Of course not. I bet his children would flip on him if given the opportunity. May have already, who knows, it's not even noon.
Being a piece of shit comes with a price.
This is quietly enormous. The Trump organization has been a criminal enterprise for decades now, and this guy has, literally, all the receipts.
As to Trump's children flipping on him, that's nothing. What's really going to bake your noodle is when Trump flips on his children. And don't tell me that this could never happen; search your feelings, you know it to be true!
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The Q Anon guys that Navin likes so much are apparently experiencing a sort of existential crisis. Cohen's flipping (which ought to be illegal, really) casts into doubt their central thesis which is that Mueller is actually working WITH Trump in order to bring down a global child sex trafficking ring. It's starting to dawn on some of these folks that maybe Mueller isn't really working hand in hand with Sessions and Trump after all.
Of course after experiencing a crisis of faith many believers discover their faith rejuvenated and deepened. We can all hope for such a happy outcome in this worrisome case.
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The Q Anon guys that Navin likes so much are apparently experiencing a sort of existential crisis. Cohen's flipping (which ought to be illegal, really) casts into doubt their central thesis which is that Mueller is actually working WITH Trump in order to bring down a global child sex trafficking ring. It's starting to dawn on some of these folks that maybe Mueller isn't really working hand in hand with Sessions and Trump after all.
Of course after experiencing a crisis of faith many believers discover their faith rejuvenated and deepened. We can all hope for such a happy outcome in this worrisome case.
LOL, the QAnon folks are my favorites! I never imagined the fucking morons who fell for the Jade Helm bullshit could sink 392 times lower, but they proved me wrong. These people make flat earthers look rational. There is one theory out there that Sacha Barron Cohen is behind the QAnon stuff as a troll job. While Im sure that isn't true, but if it were it would be the greatest troll in History.
To Chuck's point about the Q conspiracy breaking down with the Cohen news. Some of the still believing dolts have hypothesized that the (unnamed) "candidate for Federal office," that Cohen paid off Stormy Daniels for was.....wait for it.....wait for it......you probably have it figured out by now.......that candidate was....HILLARY CLINTON!
ROTFLMAO. Honestly, I feel like they are actually trolling us, because there is no chance anyone could actually believe this shit.
And speaking of QAnon, guess who stopped by the White House today and met the President. Yep, a guy pushing the QAnon horseshit. Unreal.
https://twitter.com/willsommer/status/1033095001222328320
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Trump saying that flipping should be illegal. I know he’s a galactic dumbass, but that is breathtakingly stupid. He wants to make illegal the act of telling the truth. It’s both shocking and not shocking that this wasn’t a bigger story because he says crushingly dumb shit all the time and it was part of a shitnado of dumbassery.
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Now that the National Enquirer deals are gone, shit is hitting the fan. Doorman, who is no longer under an NDA reports trump has an illegitimate child with a trump tower housekeeper....
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Now that the National Enquirer deals are gone, shit is hitting the fan. Doorman, who is no longer under an NDA reports trump has an illegitimate child with a trump tower housekeeper....
Shades of Schwarzenegger.
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If this kid turns out to be an anchor baby....
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Now that the National Enquirer deals are gone, shit is hitting the fan. Doorman, who is no longer under an NDA reports trump has an illegitimate child with a trump tower housekeeper....
Well, amongst the boilerplate language of the Stormy Daniels NDA were clauses specifically about paternity, which was not an issue in the Stormy Daniels affair. Setting aside the fact that TrumpWorld had an NDA with boilerplate language about paternity, it had to have been relevant to at least one prior hush money payment.
As Cohen and Weisselberg were involved in the Daniels contract, it stands to reason that they were involved in at least one other hush money payment where paternity was a problem. And if those two knew, then now Mueller knows.
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As long as Trump isn't knocking up Hillary I doubt any of his supporters are going to give a shit.
I can't wait for the Grahams and the Swaggarts to decide that if you conceive with a fallen woman that doesn't count.
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As long as Trump isn't knocking up Hillary I doubt any of his supporters are going to give a shit.
It'll just prove that he's a manly man. It will improve his standing.
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I hate your post because I believe your post. It amazes me how people are not willing to vote against their party. I just don't get it. Vote for a good candidate. If somehow Trump was a Democrat, there is no way I'd vote blue. NONE.
Me neither. But dems are notoriously heterogeneous—it’s one of the things that makes us cool/greatest weakness/greatest strength.
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As long as Trump isn't knocking up Hillary I doubt any of his supporters are going to give a shit.
I can't wait for the Grahams and the Swaggarts to decide that if you conceive with a fallen woman that doesn't count.
I presume that fucking the housekeeper is the modern equivalent of fucking your African slaves: it’s all totally ok as long as the wife doesn’t catch you.
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I can't wait for the Grahams and the Swaggarts to decide that if you conceive with a fallen woman that doesn't count.
They'll point to the story of Onan..."well, you've seen what happens when you fail to impregnate your sister-in-law, imagine how angry God would be if you pulled out of the housekeeper..."
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First Cohen, then this. Trump repeatedly gets fucked by people in charge of cleaning up after him.
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First Cohen, then this. Trump repeatedly gets fucked by people in charge of cleaning up after him.
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That just made me think that Melania may have to eventually change his diapers.
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I'm waiting for Trump's heart-felt tribute to McCain.
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These people are just pure evil. Trump supporting Arizona senate candidate says timing of McCain’s death was to push a negative narrative against their campaign.
https://www.rawstory.com/2018/08/arizona-gop-senate-candidate-kelli-ward-accuses-john-mccain-dying-push-negative-narrative/
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So vain and so utterly pathetic, but who knows, it might help her win the nomination.
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I'm waiting for Trump's heart-felt tribute to McCain.
It was a cursory tweet. The background photo was of Trump.
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The QAnon loons are now claiming that McCain committed suicide to avoid facing a military tribunal.....
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The QAnon loons are now claiming that McCain committed suicide to avoid facing a military tribunal.....
Shut up. Are you serious?
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The QAnon loons are now claiming that McCain committed suicide to avoid facing a military tribunal.....
Surely somebody is trolling us.
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The QAnon loons are now claiming that McCain committed suicide to avoid facing a military tribunal.....
Don’t follow these people too closely. You might go all Donnie Brasco and get sucked in.
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I mostly get it from reporters who are following the nonsense.
https://twitter.com/willsommer/status/1033849430523502592?s=21
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The QAnon loons are now claiming that McCain committed suicide to avoid facing a military tribunal.....
I mean, obviously
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Honestly it was surprising they went there, I just assumed they’d blame it on Hillary
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The QAnon loons are now claiming that McCain committed suicide to avoid facing a military tribunal.....
This has to be Sasha Baron Cohen.... right?
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I'm waiting for Trump's heart-felt tribute to McCain.
It appears that Mr. Petty has put the White House flags back at full staff, not allowing the tribute to last one second longer than required.
U.S. code calls for flags to be lowered in the event of the death of a member of Congress “on the day of death and the following day.” But presidents have the power to issue proclamations extending that period and have done so routinely.
It must burn him up to witness all the respect for McCain, knowing that nothing like that will happen for him when his time comes.
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It must burn him up to witness all the respect for McCain, knowing that nothing like that will happen for him when his time comes.
I feel quite certain he doesn't think that far ahead.
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I feel quite certain he doesn't think that far ahead.
True.
Apparently, he’s relented, not because he realized he’s a piece of crap, but because even his crowd didn’t approve.
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True.
Apparently, he’s relented, not because he realized he’s a piece of crap, but because even his crowd didn’t approve.
Read some feedback from Arizonans on this. As one would imagine, Trump supporters are praising him for being cold as he and McCain were enemies. Respect for the deceased would have been out of character and a sign of weakness. Just another example of how he's making America great again in their eyes.
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McGahn was tweet-fired, apparently, as Trump was fed up with McGahn threatening to resign in order to stop Trump doing things that were, in theory, political (and perhaps legal) suicide. McGahn had 5 deputies, 3 of whom have already left the White House and one more due to leave very soon. There are no replacements for any of them, prompting the Washington Post to speculate that the Trump administration would be woefully unprepared for a Democratically controlled House.
By comparison, the Clinton White House had double the number of lawyers Trump has when it faced impeachment; and I suspect the individuals would have been of a higher calibre. For example, Trump repeatedly asked Rob Porter - yes, serial wife-beater Rob Porter - if he would take the job of WH Councel (sic). Porter had to rebuff the offer repeatedly by pointing out that he was completely unqualified for the job. Note the word "repeatedly". Recruitment is also an issue, due in no small part to the fact that White House lawyers tend to need lawyers. No one wants to take a job that comes with a $500,000 personal legal bill.
The WaPo story had 26 sources "familiar with the issue". Twenty-six! That's more people than the total head count of the WH legal staff. The leaks keep on coming and the more people Trump throws under the bus, the more the leaks will accelerate. If Democrats take the House and start "monkeying things up", expect to see a parade of staffers leaving the WH with cardboard boxes.
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It's worth noting that Democrats have a few former intelligence service personnel running as candidates in the mid-terms. One has already been doxxed by the White House, who released her full, unreacted, security clearance file to a PAC supporting her Republican opponent. The security clearance process is designed to be insanely intrusive so as to record any issues a candidate for clearance may have that could be used as leverage. Because of the intimate, personal details contained in any such files, they are guarded with incredible secrecy. Usually.
It is unclear whether this was simple - gross - incompetence on behalf of the White House, or if there was some intent behind the doxxing. Such a file would obviously be insanely useful to a political opponent, as it is in this case because the PAC immediately started using the information it now had in attack ads against the Democrat. The Democratic Party has taken the step of advising all such similarly credentialed candidates to prepare themselves to respond to intimate details from their security clearance files being used against them.
So, which government building is going to be firebombed in the first week of November?
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In new, truth isn't truth news, Trump is claiming that the tape of him confessing obstruction of justice to Lester Holt is "fudged".
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Did Trump say: "I said to myself. You know, this Lester Holt is a made-up story. I don't believes he even exists, and if he does, I sure haven't ever talked to him."
If Trump did actually say this, would it even move the needle?
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Would it even move the needle?
The needle was put in the mixer and poured with the concrete for the bunker that they buried the bar under, so no, it won't be moving anytime soon...
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It's worth noting that Democrats have a few former intelligence service personnel running as candidates in the mid-terms. One has already been doxxed by the White House, who released her full, unreacted, security clearance file to a PAC supporting her Republican opponent. The security clearance process is designed to be insanely intrusive so as to record any issues a candidate for clearance may have that could be used as leverage. Because of the intimate, personal details contained in any such files, they are guarded with incredible secrecy. Usually.
It is unclear whether this was simple - gross - incompetence on behalf of the White House, or if there was some intent behind the doxxing. Such a file would obviously be insanely useful to a political opponent, as it is in this case because the PAC immediately started using the information it now had in attack ads against the Democrat. The Democratic Party has taken the step of advising all such similarly credentialed candidates to prepare themselves to respond to intimate details from their security clearance files being used against them.
So, which government building is going to be firebombed in the first week of November?
Update: It's more than "a few" Democratic candidates with security clearances running for office this November, it's a couple of dozen. I'll leave it up to you to decide what might have motivated so many former national security personnel to run for office this year.
Abigail Spanberger was the doxxed Democrat. She used to work on national security for the USPS (and later for the CIA), and it is USPS who have raised their hand as being the entity that released her full, unredacted SF86 security clearance application to Paul Ryan's PAC. They also said there are a few more improperly released SF86s out there, and they're trying to clear it all up. In Spanberger's case, that horse has bolted as Ryan's PAC immediately used information in her SF86 in attack ads and even shared the entire document with media outlets.
A couple of things here. (1) Spanberger's campaign, sensibly, ran "opposition research" on herself, and made the same FOIA request to USPS for information on her as did Ryan's PAC; Ryan's PAC got the complete SF86 within 3 weeks but, 9 months later, Spanberger's campaign has yet to receive a response to their own request. (2) Just because Ryan's PAC received the full document from USPS didn't mean they had to use it; famously Gore's presidential campaign got given Bush's debate prep file prior to a debate whereupon they called the FBI and gave the file back.
Trump sucks up so much of the political oxygen, but let's not forget this very important point: Fuck Paul Ryan.
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Update: It's more than "a few" Democratic candidates with security clearances running for office this November, it's a couple of dozen. I'll leave it up to you to decide what might have motivated so many former national security personnel to run for office this year.
Abigail Spanberger was the doxxed Democrat. She used to work on national security for the USPS (and later for the CIA), and it is USPS who have raised their hand as being the entity that released her full, unredacted SF86 security clearance application to Paul Ryan's PAC. They also said there are a few more improperly released SF86s out there, and they're trying to clear it all up. In Spanberger's case, that horse has bolted as Ryan's PAC immediately used information in her SF86 in attack ads and even shared the entire document with media outlets.
A couple of things here. (1) Spanberger's campaign, sensibly, ran "opposition research" on herself, and made the same FOIA request to USPS for information on her as did Ryan's PAC; Ryan's PAC got the complete SF86 within 3 weeks but, 9 months later, Spanberger's campaign has yet to receive a response to their own request. (2) Just because Ryan's PAC received the full document from USPS didn't mean they had to use it; famously Gore's presidential campaign got given Bush's debate prep file prior to a debate whereupon they called the FBI and gave the file back.
Trump sucks up so much of the political oxygen, but let's not forget this very important point: Fuck Paul Ryan.
This is such a freaking outrage. I read about this yesterday and, still a little foggy at the end of the NYT article as to why the Postal Service was taking the blame, I decided against all my better instincts to peak at the comments--even though never read the comments because the comments add nothing to your life etc etc etc. Well what do I find rated pretty highly in this section but a seemingly sober and well organized rant from someone concerned that we're clearly missing the point and asking the wrong questions because the relevant information here is that this woman (a polyglot) was--while awaiting word as to whether or not she'd be getting a gov't gig--teaching in a private academy for Saudi Arabians, and therefore must have been running a CIA operation domestically, and therefore they're all fucking criminals.
I just don't see how it's possible to make a functioning country with these yahoos.
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I just don't see how it's possible to make a functioning country with these yahoos.
It's entirely possible if one of the two parties in a two party system doesn't need them to cling on to power, and rig the system to do so in such a way that their voices are amplified over the those of the sane majority.
Right now our country is hostage to 25% of the country that believes everything that Fox News et al pumps directly into their lizard brains. As Steve Schmidt has said, a forest fire is a cleansing event because it burns down the old and allows new to grow; he sees Trump and Trumpism as a forest fire that will burn down the Republican Party and allow it to grow anew.
I certainly hope so. Not because I'm a liberal and I want to see the Republican Party burn*, but because we need the tension between the two parties to have any chance of rational, effective government. Unfortunately, we're going to have to lurch from one-party rule one side to one-party rule on the other in order for the cleanse to take effect. Hopefully we'll swing back to the middle because, if drunk-on-power Democrats start pandering to liberal extremes, we're just going to hurtle back and forth across the political spectrum until we eventually spin off the rails altogether.
* Just a (too long) list of its elected representatives.
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It's entirely possible if one of the two parties in a two party system doesn't need them to cling on to power, and rig the system to do so in such a way that their voices are amplified over the those of the sane majority.
Right now our country is hostage to 25% of the country that believes everything that Fox News et al pumps directly into their lizard brains. As Steve Schmidt has said, a forest fire is a cleansing event because it burns down the old and allows new to grow; he sees Trump and Trumpism as a forest fire that will burn down the Republican Party and allow it to grow anew.
I certainly hope so. Not because I'm a liberal and I want to see the Republican Party burn*, but because we need the tension between the two parties to have any chance of rational, effective government. Unfortunately, we're going to have to lurch from one-party rule one side to one-party rule on the other in order for the cleanse to take effect. Hopefully we'll swing back to the middle because, if drunk-on-power Democrats start pandering to liberal extremes, we're just going to hurtle back and forth across the political spectrum until we eventually spin off the rails altogether.
* Just a (too long) list of its elected representatives.
I don't know. We've made some pretty big strides during one-party-rule in the past.
Also I think we're already off the rails. A country on the rails doesn't elect the carrot demon to the most powerful office in the world. A country on the rails I think doesn't look anything like what we've got.
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Trump's disapproval rating is 60%. 49% want Congress to start impeachment proceedings.
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Trump's disapproval rating is 60%. 49% want Congress to start impeachment proceedings.
And yet Congress is beholden to that other 25%.
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And yet Congress is beholden to that other 25%.
It's devolving into two distinct groups with almost no one undecided. That's not good, but at least the Trump side of the ledger is concentrating down and will end up as just that 25%.
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It's devolving into two distinct groups with almost no one undecided. That's not good, but at least the Trump side of the ledger is concentrating down and will end up as just that 25%.
But what would his share of ordinary Republican voters be in a re-election bid right now? I'm guessing he'd get about 95% of them.
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But what would his share of ordinary Republican voters be in a re-election bid right now? I'm guessing he'd get about 95% of them.
Trump's approval rating among likely Republican voters is in the high 80s. The thing is, those who identify as likely Republican voters is a shrinking number and thus more easily overruled by turnout from other constituencies. Basically, he's boiling down Republican voters to concentrated crazy.
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I wish there were people on this site who weren’t too chickenshit to defend QAnon and trump. Seems as if they have all slithered to their corner and refuse to talk about it.
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I wish there were people on this site who weren’t too chickenshit to defend QAnon and trump. Seems as if they have all slithered to their corner and refuse to talk about it.
I'll bite. I personally love what President Trump has done and continues to do. I love the make America great and the resurgence of American excellence.We're the greatest country on the globe, and we should pay hardball with our enemies and not let friends take advantage of us. The economy is doing great. We got a tax cut, and another one is promised soon. I love Justice Gorsuch and can't wait until Judge Cavenaugh is confirmed.
I don't quibble with most of what you all write in your little pathetic liberal echo chamber, but I read it all. You guys are delusional. The Republicans are going to hold onto control of the Congress. Resume your attacks. You're tilting at windmills. The bottom line is that the current iteration of the Democrat Party has become a marginalized, obtuse party of no without any real good ideas to advance the country. The Democrat Party is the party of Planned Parenthood, Antifa, gun control and the socialist resistance movement. One thing is clear, and that is the rumblings of civil disobedience and rioting are nothing to be taken seriously. Very few libs are armed with anything more than a megaphone, while ther opposition is armed to the teeth. I like our chances.
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The Democrat Party is the party of Planned Parenthood, Antifa, gun control and the socialist resistance movement.
Man, if only they were that cool.
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Meanwhile, Mueller has another henchman pleading guilty and flipping on Trump. This guy - Sam Patten - has, amongst other things, the road map as to how Russian money was laundered and dropped into the inauguration fund. He’s also connected to Cambridge Analytica, so he has the potential to fill in a lot of gaps.
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One thing is clear, and that is the rumblings of civil disobedience and rioting are nothing to be taken seriously. Very few libs are armed with anything more than a megaphone, while ther opposition is armed to the teeth. I like our chances.
I hope you’re joking because, otherwise, you’re talking about a civil war.
Trump raised the spectre of violence if Republicans lose in November but, if you think about it, who would be mad enough to resort to violence at that point? The Democrats who just took back at least one branch of government, or the Trumpanzees who now have to face the fact that “the libs” have subpoena power? Also, I don’t recall people getting attacked at Hillary’s campaign events.
The latest polls show Trump at 60% disapproval and only 36% approval. Obama had far better numbers when he got his ass kicked in 2010, so I wouldn’t sit too comfortably on your advantage in gerrymandering and voter suppression.
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I'll bite. I personally love what President Trump has done and continues to do. I love the make America great and the resurgence of American excellence.We're the greatest country on the globe, and we should pay hardball with our enemies and not let friends take advantage of us. The economy is doing great. We got a tax cut, and another one is promised soon. I love Justice Gorsuch and can't wait until Judge Cavenaugh is confirmed.
I don't quibble with most of what you all write in your little pathetic liberal echo chamber, but I read it all. You guys are delusional. The Republicans are going to hold onto control of the Congress. Resume your attacks. You're tilting at windmills. The bottom line is that the current iteration of the Democrat Party has become a marginalized, obtuse party of no without any real good ideas to advance the country. The Democrat Party is the party of Planned Parenthood, Antifa, gun control and the socialist resistance movement. One thing is clear, and that is the rumblings of civil disobedience and rioting are nothing to be taken seriously. Very few libs are armed with anything more than a megaphone, while ther opposition is armed to the teeth. I like our chances.
I figured you were reading. All your nonsense aside, what are your thoughts on the QAnon stuff.
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I hope you’re joking because, otherwise, you’re talking about a civil war.
I read a blog post he linked to from his Facebook account where he basically said the same thing. I don't think he is kidding.
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So is Happy a Qnon weirdo?
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I read a blog post he linked to from his Facebook account where he basically said the same thing. I don't think he is kidding.
The threats have come from the left. I wrote that the left hasn't played the violence game to its ultimate conclusion. Those on the right have a much higher incidence of gun ownership, which is why the left is so hellbent on gun control. Of course, if things deteriorate, the miltary is strongly pro-right and is unlikely to back the left. Simply put, the left can't win the game that it says it wants to play. I don't want a civil war, but, sadly, it's a distinct possibility.
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The threats have come from the left. I wrote that the left hasn't played the violence game to its ultimate conclusion. Those on the right have a much higher incidence of gun ownership, which is why the left is so hellbent on gun control. Of course, if things deteriorate, the miltary is strongly pro-right and is unlikely to back the left. Simply put, the left can't win the game that it says it wants to play. I don't want a civil war, but, sadly, it's a distinct possibility.
That's a pretty paranoid view.
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Welp, boys, shut 'er down. Hap's figured us out. Normal people don't want gun control because lunatics regularly wander in to schools and kill kids and so on. Nope. We want to neutralize the crazies' inherent advantage in firepower in advance of the upcoming civil war.
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The threats have come from the left. I wrote that the left hasn't played the violence game to its ultimate conclusion. Those on the right have a much higher incidence of gun ownership, which is why the left is so hellbent on gun control. Of course, if things deteriorate, the miltary is strongly pro-right and is unlikely to back the left. Simply put, the left can't win the game that it says it wants to play. I don't want a civil war, but, sadly, it's a distinct possibility.
You sound like a fucking crazy person.
I don't give a single fuck about Republican or Democrat, but the man you're supporting is a serial liar, and the continued support of his fucking insane rhetoric makes you look like a serial liar (at very best) as well.
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You sound like a fucking crazy person.
I don't give a single fuck about Republican or Democrat, but the man you're supporting is a serial liar, and the continued support of his fucking insane rhetoric makes you look like a serial liar (at very best) as well.
Don’t forget the racism and fascism.
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Don’t forget the racism and fascism.
And support for an obvious crook as long as it means they can get the lap-dog Supreme Court justices they want.
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And support for an obvious crook as long as it means they can get the lap-dog Supreme Court justices they want.
Hap's going to drop one day and his two boys will know that among other things their father was a partisan rather than an American.
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So is Happy a Qnon weirdo?
No need to be cute.
He's a fucking Nazi.
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Welp, boys, shut 'er down. Hap's figured us out. Normal people don't want gun control because lunatics regularly wander in to schools and kill kids and so on. Nope. We want to neutralize the crazies' inherent advantage in firepower in advance of the upcoming civil war.
The idiocy of this theory is that, if the left wanted to fight a war, why not just go and buy as many guns as they want? Surely that’s so much easier than trying to disarm your enemy through legislation.
Also, funny how those who rail against Jade Helm and the deep state run to the bosom of the authorities when they perceive a threat. The amount of cognitive dissonance required to be a Republican these days could create a black hole of paranoia.
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That college student who had been missing that the media has been obsessed about was found dead today. Her killer, the guy who led the police to the body, is an illegal immigrant.
https://www.desmoinesregister.com/story/opinion/columnists/2018/09/01/mollie-tibbetts-father-common-decency-immigration-heartless-despicable-donald-trump-jr-column/1163131002/
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The threats have come from the left. I wrote that the left hasn't played the violence game to its ultimate conclusion. Those on the right have a much higher incidence of gun ownership, which is why the left is so hellbent on gun control. Of course, if things deteriorate, the miltary is strongly pro-right and is unlikely to back the left. Simply put, the left can't win the game that it says it wants to play. I don't want a civil war, but, sadly, it's a distinct possibility.
Most of the gun owning right are nothing more than uneducated Barney Fifes. They like to wear their camo and get flags tattooed on their necks, dreaming about the day they get to put their bullet in their gun. But they’d piss their pants and shoot themselves in the foot at the prospect of actually having to use it.
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Most of the gun owning right are nothing more than uneducated Barney Fifes. They like to wear their camo and get flags tattooed on their necks, dreaming about the day they get to put their bullet in their gun. But they’d piss their pants and shoot themselves in the foot at the prospect of actually having to use it.
If they’re such these-colors-don’t-run, might=right, willing to die for their country patriots, they’d be in the military or retired military. They’d also have my undying respect.
Wrapping yourself in the flag, co-opting the valor of others and waving your guns at (or driving cars into) unarmed “libs” makes you a piece of shit.
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I feel like it wasn’t that long ago that some reasonable conservative would interrupt at this point to say, Well, Mr Happy doesn’t speak for all of us... And then go on to make an argument about the merits of limited government and judicial restraint and so on. I guess it speaks to Limey’s point about the GOP being boiled down to distilled batshittery that you don’t hear from that dude anymore (or if you do it’s under the banner of Never Trump). What a sad state of affairs.
He calls the dems the party of no after his team publicly and without shame engineered that position as a ploy to curtail as decent and generous a person as Barack Obama—as if Republicans have any ideas dems can oppose besides tax cuts (for which he is predictably and without evident reflection on its costs grateful). Then they go and elect the manifestly shittiest person to run for office, and suddenly the Obama recovery from the last immense Republican beshat diaper is the property of the expert in casino bankruptcy insulting his way through an ill-gotten term. He doesn’t “want” a civil war like he doesn’t “want” them to trade Correa. He parrots the Fox News line almost uncannily. Does he even notice that?
By the way, what did gun control have to do with anything? Because you cannot imagine that people are not all as small mean and cruel as you you contrive that their positions are held out of smallness meanness and cruelty, instead of actual human feeling regarding mass slaughter. There’s no living with these fools.
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By the way, what did gun control have to do with anything? Because you cannot imagine that people are not all as small mean and cruel as you you contrive that their positions are held out of smallness meanness and cruelty, instead of actual human feeling regarding mass slaughter. There’s no living with these fools.
The Republican mindset now is 100% projection. They accuse "the libs" of every petty, mean, disruptive, unhelpful and unhinged act that they can conjure while remaining ignorant - accidentally or on purpose - of their own behavior which is exactly the behavior of which they accuse others.
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If they’re such these-colors-don’t-run, might=right, willing to die for their country patriots, they’d be in the military or retired military. They’d also have my undying respect.
Wrapping yourself in the flag, co-opting the valor of others and waving your guns at (or driving cars into) unarmed “libs” makes you a piece of shit.
Like Ted Nugent. He loves to wrap himself in the flag and pound his chest, but when asked to actually serve his country, he shit himself trying to avoid it. He's not a patriot, he's a coward.
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Like Ted Nugent. He loves to wrap himself in the flag and pound his chest, but when asked to actually serve his country, he shit himself trying to avoid it. He's not a patriot, he's a coward.
See also Trump, Cheney, Bush (W)...
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No need to be cute.
He's a fucking Nazi.
The line. It’s way behind you.
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I was reading a review of one of my favorite movies, Children of Men, written by Roger Ebert back in 2007. A particular line in the review caught my attention:
"Often I fear it will all come to this, that the rule of law and the rights of men will be destroyed by sectarian mischief and nationalistic recklessness. Are we living in the last good times?"
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The line. It’s way behind you.
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Is that the plank in eye removal line?
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Might be the moral preening line.
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No need to be cute.
He's a fucking Nazi.
Fuck off. You have no idea about how truly cruel the Nazis were. I am definitely not a Nazi.
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Fuck off. You have no idea about how truly cruel the Nazis were. I am definitely not a Nazi.
Why do you support a man who wishes to push us toward more authoritarian rule and is nominating Supreme Court justices who will help achieve that aim? And by the way, this isn't just an anti-Trump thing, although Lord knows I detest the man with every fiber in my being. This is about thinking ahead. What happens if somehow a Maduro-type gets elected? Are you ready for some yo-yo like that to start nationalizing industries with the powers that you granted Trump to muzzle opposition?
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You have no idea about how truly cruel the Nazis were.
Neither do you. It might come as a surprise, but most Nazis didn't spend their time sawing puppies in half and jacking off to livestreams from Auschwitz. They just supported the state and the regime by showing up for their perfectly ordinary and boring jobs every day, coming home to their families every night and then telling them that the "truly cruel" people were doing all that nightmare shit because that's what it took to make Germany Great Again. And they didn't go from zero to Holocaust in 3.7 seconds. They started smaller. Smaller things, kind of like putting babies in cages, stealing people's citizenship and turning a hurricane into a weapon. Waiting for gas chambers before you're scared enough to do something is like not hitting the brakes or turning the wheel until the other car's grille is coming through your dashboard...
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Why do you support a man who wishes to push us toward more authoritarian rule and is nominating Supreme Court justices who will help achieve that aim?
It's going to take him a while to get back to you - he's busy cutting the Nike swooshes off of all the white tube socks he wears with his Rockports.
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I didn't realize that this would be a thing, even though I saw a scroll that they were going to use Kaepernick. I am so naive to continually underestimate the actions of simpletons.
Kudos to Nike for giving the middle finger to all those who say they value freedom, but really don't have a clue what it means.
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It's going to take him a while to get back to you - he's busy cutting the Nike swooshes off of all the white tube socks he wears with his Rockports.
So predictable, but still hilarious. I guess their Keurigs needed a break from being sacrificed on the altar of freedom.
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It's both hugely telling and hugely unsurprising that eulogies of McCain are seen as swipes at Trump.
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The Kavanaugh hearing is already breaking new ground with raucous protests inside the hearing room and the fact that he has years of legal work in the White House - on behalf of U.S. tax payers - that we are being barred from seeing without even the effort at claiming privilege (which has never before been allowed for a SCOTUS nominee with White House legal work in his past). Also, this nominee is also the only one who has previously been referred to the DOJ for investigation for lying to Congress in a previous confirmation hearing.
It will be interesting to see if Kavanaugh is able to execute the now customary Roe vs. Wade tap dance. With Kavanaugh, though, we have the case of Jane Doe; a pregnant 17-year old immigrant who sued the government to be allowed to leave the shelter where she was being housed (they were physically blocking her from leaving) to get an abortion for which she had already been adjudicated to have right to undergo. The case came to Kavanaugh when the administration appealed the lower court's ruling allowing her right to choose.
This girl was already 15 weeks pregnant when the case came to Kavanaugh's docket. Despite being told (repeatedly) of Texas' 20-week limitation on abortion, Kavanaugh tried to run out her clock by imposing another two weeks of trying to find a sponsor family (after 6 futile weeks of searching had already passed) and then - bizarrely - sending her back to the lower court who had already adjudicated her case in her favor. Then, presumably, after the lower court had no doubt reaffirmed its decision, the administration would have appealed it back to Kavanaugh's court at which point she would have been right up against the 20-week cut-off and in serious danger of being forced to carry an unwanted pregnancy to term.
Kavanaugh was overruled by his colleagues in the appellant court, and Jane Doe had her abortion the next day.
Kavanaugh wrote a blistering dissent which is not part of his embargoed work history. It will be interesting to see how he responds to the inevitable questions on this case. It'll also be interesting to see how he responds to the accusation of lying during his previous confirmation hearing, which I do not believe he has ever even bothered denying.
Kavanaugh is underwater in opinion polls as to his ascension to the Supreme Court, and has an historically low approval rating of 36%. Lower than Harriet Miers. At the end of the day, though, Kavanaugh is going to be confirmed and we will have two, Trump-tainted Justices on the court and a 5-4 conservative majority for a generation at least.
Elections matter. Vote in November.
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I get a kick out of these hearings and the unctuous ramblings of enfeebled octogenarians.
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These were excerpts from a CNN article on Bob Woodward's new book:
Chief of staff John Kelly describes Trump as an "idiot" and "unhinged," Woodward reports. Defense Secretary James Mattis describes Trump as having the understanding of "a fifth or sixth grader." And Trump's former personal lawyer John Dowd describes the President as "a fucking liar," telling Trump he would end up in an "orange jump suit" if he testified to special counsel Robert Mueller.
"He's an idiot. It's pointless to try to convince him of anything. He's gone off the rails. We're in crazytown," Kelly is quoted as saying at a staff meeting in his office. "I don't even know why any of us are here. This is the worst job I've ever had."
Don't know if these quaotes are accurate, but the content (idiot, fifth grade intellect and liar) is basically restating what we already know. Angry tweets will soon follow.
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Don't know if these quotes are accurate, but the content (idiot, fifth grade intellect and liar) is basically restating what we already know. Angry tweets will soon follow.
As fun as this kind of stuff is, all it does is reinforce for Trump opponents what they already believe about him, and reaffirm for Trump voters that the media is biased and lying about him.
How we get past this, I have no idea.
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As fun as this kind of stuff is, all it does is reinforce for Trump opponents what they already believe about him, and reaffirm for Trump voters that the media is biased and lying about him.
How we get past this, I have no idea.
obviously with a gun fight.
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obviously with a gun fight.
Civil wars are easy to win.
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Grassley is turning Kavanaugh's hearing into a joke. They dumped 40,000+ documents on the committee at 5:40pm last night and, when Blumenthal asked for a postponement to be able to review all this new information, Grassley claimed that his staff had already completed its review of every single page.
Grassley then denied Blumenthal's move for a committee vote on postponement, citing a rationale that does not exist in the rules, at one point even asking Blumenthal to cite where it says he can't do the thing that doesn't exist (which of course is nonsensical because it doesn't exist so there's no need to write rules against it). Blumenthal appealed and Grassley flat denied the appeal, citing his original nonsensical rationale.
Oh, and the photo of Kavanaugh looking confused and sheepish at the proffer of a handshake from Parkland parent Fred Guttenberg (https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/335ccb5985152a26b8b3417f3571606427dafd92/0_329_4976_2988/master/4976.jpg?width=620&quality=85&auto=format&usm=12&fit=max&s=bf13e78140173b63a46b119ff293dcce) is going to be a tragic meme. For the record, Kavanaugh walked off (or was ushered away by security, if you believe the White House version) without shaking that hand. Of course, if you do believe the White House version, WTF were they protecting Kavanaugh from?
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Oh, and the photo of Kavanaugh looking confused and sheepish at the proffer of a handshake from Parkland parent Fred Guttenberg (https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/335ccb5985152a26b8b3417f3571606427dafd92/0_329_4976_2988/master/4976.jpg?width=620&quality=85&auto=format&usm=12&fit=max&s=bf13e78140173b63a46b119ff293dcce) is going to be a tragic meme. For the record, Kavanaugh walked off (or was ushered away by security, if you believe the White House version) without shaking that hand. Of course, if you do believe the White House version, WTF were they protecting Kavanaugh from?
Looks like Kavanaugh walked off on his own (https://scontent-dfw5-2.xx.fbcdn.net/v/t1.0-9/41100566_10155764399051680_4657227416387715072_n.jpg?_nc_cat=1&oh=588589d972357a7ea1db2e0079e26f32&oe=5BEF725B), prior to any security intervention.
It's a little hard to reconcile the "supportive and strong and caring" man introduced by Secretary Rice and and this guy who walks away from a parent who lost his son in a school shooting (and who would bounce a desperate 17-year old girl around the court system for weeks instead of allowing her to exercise her constitutionally protected domain over her own body).
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A White House insider has had an op-ed published in the (failing) NY Times (https://www.nytimes.com/2018/09/05/opinion/trump-white-house-anonymous-resistance.html), basically saying that Trump is out of control and they are just trying to keep a lid on him, to try and make his administration successful.
Part whistleblower, part plea for credit (or at least forgiveness), how about you do your job and uphold the constitution!
Given the instability many witnessed, there were early whispers within the cabinet of invoking the 25th Amendment, which would start a complex process for removing the president. But no one wanted to precipitate a constitutional crisis. So we will do what we can to steer the administration in the right direction until — one way or another — it’s over.
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Let’s be clear: this internal “resistance” is bullshit.
If the President is incompetent, the Constitution presents exactly one remedy: removal via the 25th Amendment.
If you’re “resisting” an incompetent President via other means, you’re not upholding your oath.
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I am presuming that the identity of the author will come out, and I am presuming that it’s someone pretty fucking senior - otherwise why grant immunity.
We have had report after report after report of how fucked up Trump is, and yet - simultaneously - Republicans are ramming through a SCOTUS nominee, the latest act of their ongoing effort to provide cover to the president for they know not what.
Blumenthal made the point yesterday that the Kavanaugh papers they’re withholding will come out and they will then be judged in the light of such full disclosure. Same with Trump; the full extent of his criminality in his life will come out and Republicans will be judged at that time.
What’s clear is that we’re at a point of extreme danger both nationally, internationally, politically and physically. As chuck very smartly said earlier, all it takes to end this is for two Republican senators to wake up and smell the covfefe. I still hold out hope for that happening.
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I'm sure everyone here is registered, but in case you aren't (or would like to share with others who might not be), the last day to register to vote in Texas is October 9th. Early voting starts October 26th.
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If you’re “resisting” an incompetent President via other means, you’re not upholding your oath.
I don't either see how coming in to work at the White House every morning qualifies as resistance. Not even if you're doing a job somewhat independent of the president and crucial to national security, such as chasing the ghosts out of the Oval Office.
Writing a fucking anonymous op-ed is no different from disappointed tweets (VERY disappointed!) from Sasse and Flake and whoever else pretends to have a conscience on the internet.
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I don't either see how coming in to work at the White House every morning qualifies as resistance. Not even if you're doing a job somewhat independent of the president and crucial to national security, such as chasing the ghosts out of the Oval Office.
Writing a fucking anonymous op-ed is no different from disappointed tweets (VERY disappointed!) from Sasse and Flake and whoever else pretends to have a conscience on the internet.
It's completely pathetic. "He's horribly dangerous, unprincipled, undisciplined and has no moral compass other than his own self-aggrandizement, but he sure is useful in enacting reactionary policies, so we help him the best we can and hope for the best! This is so crazy y'all!" Fuck all the way off.
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I don't either see how coming in to work at the White House every morning qualifies as resistance. Not even if you're doing a job somewhat independent of the president and crucial to national security, such as chasing the ghosts out of the Oval Office.
Writing a fucking anonymous op-ed is no different from disappointed tweets (VERY disappointed!) from Sasse and Flake and whoever else pretends to have a conscience on the internet.
Interesting article about it: https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2018/09/this-is-a-constitutional-crisis/569443/
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Interesting article about it: https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2018/09/this-is-a-constitutional-crisis/569443/
Very well said.
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Maybe the people who remain in the administration despite thinking the president is a dangerous and stupid and dangerously stupid imbecile think that Pence is a closeted.... liberal?
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Maybe the people who remain in the administration despite thinking the president is a dangerous and stupid and dangerously stupid imbecile think that Pence is a closeted.... liberal?
They love the deregulation, they love the tax cuts, they love the rabidly conservative Supreme Court lapdogs. They're going to cling to it as long as they can and hope that nothing blows up (literally).
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Dan Coates?
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Dan Coates?
That's a good guess for any number of reasons, not least of which is that he is not a fan of Russia.
I don't really buy any of the other names being floated around. Kudlow? Come on, man.
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Decent argument in this twitter thread (https://twitter.com/blippoblappo/status/1037431663045828608) and a few subsequent posts that it's some asshole named Andrew Bremberg.
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Decent argument in this twitter thread (https://twitter.com/blippoblappo/status/1037431663045828608) and a few subsequent posts that it's some asshole named Andrew Bremberg.
If this is true, then The NY Times has just scored an own goal against the world. For all our sakes, it has to be someone properly senior; like cabinet senior.
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That's a good guess for any number of reasons, not least of which is that he is not a fan of Russia.
Not my own work, O’Donnell floated it on his show last night. It was quite compelling, given that the author bigs up national security as a hero here (in reality, there are none) and he is a fiscal conservative who would love the tax cuts and deregulation - both name checked as good things in the essay. Also, he’s 75 and so probably isn’t interested in anything other than a book deal and speaking gigs after this.
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If this is true, then The NY Times has just scored an own goal against the world. For all our sakes, it has to be someone properly senior; like cabinet senior.
This is the paper that gave Louise Mensch an op-ed. There's no reason to have faith in their judgment.
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That's a good guess for any number of reasons, not least of which is that he is not a fan of Russia.
I don't really buy any of the other names being floated around. Kudlow? Come on, man.
The only member of this White House with this level of knowledge and coherence is Baron.
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Decent argument in this twitter thread (https://twitter.com/blippoblappo/status/1037431663045828608) and a few subsequent posts that it's some asshole named Andrew Bremberg.
This argument could be made using McGahn also. It could be Pence. Basically, it could be a lot of people. Hell, they might have had a meeting one night and wrote it together.
Trump's reaction to it all is basically proof #897 of it's accuracy.
Also, I get the criticism of the author, and the abject spinelessness of what we see as enablers, but I can't completely discount the idea that they think if they all leave, worse shit will happen. I just assume these reports are their efforts to get Republicans off their chicken shit asses and do something, because they are the only ones who can.
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The only member of this White House with this level of knowledge and coherence is Baron.
Ironic. Given that he's half-immigrant.
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Watching the opening exchanges in the Kavanaugh hearing, Republicans seem unfazed by last night's op-ed, and are pressing on full bore with ramming through Trump's nominee. Cornyn is currently railing on Democrats for questioning Kavanaugh about documents that they would not let him read; knowing full well that Democrats have been prohibited from using such documents by Republicans.
As Booker said last night, they have seen about 10% of Kavanaugh's public service papers, and that he wouldn't hire an intern having seen only 10% of their resume.
UPDATE: Booker is saying that he is going to release emails to the public, knowing that the consequences are severe, up to and including expulsion from the Senate. Wow! THAT'S how it's done, Anonymous at NYT. Cornyn soiled his diaper.
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Democrats on the committee have been pretty feisty so far. This morning, someone appears to have slipped them an extra shot of espresso. This is how you win friends and...elections.
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Booker is saying that he is going to release emails to the public, knowing that the consequences are severe, up to and including expulsion from the Senate. Wow! THAT'S how it's done, Anonymous at NYT. Cornyn soiled his diaper.
Democrats are now unanimous saying that they're going to document-dump on Kavanaugh in advance of any full vote in the Senate.
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Democrats are now unanimous saying that they're going to document-dump on Kavanaugh in advance of any full vote in the Senate.
Feinstein with the closer. Grassley argued that this is the same process as was used for Kagen, and Feinstein is pulling his pants down. For example, 99% of Kagen's White House papers were made public and thus available to be discussed in her open confirmation hearing; contrasted to Kavanaugh where only 7% of his papers have been released and only 4% have been made public and thus available for use in the hearing.
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"Apply the rule. Bring the charges." - Booker
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"Apply the rule. Bring the charges." - Booker
That was pretty cool.
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Chuck Grassley is Grandpa Simpson with a slightly less pointy head.
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Leahy pointing out Kavanaugh lies...in this very hearing.
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In completely unrelated news, the NYT has got hold of leaked memos from Kavanaugh's time in the White House (https://www.nytimes.com/2018/09/06/us/politics/kavanaugh-leaked-documents.html). In one particular memo, Kavanaugh wrote:
I am not sure that all legal scholars refer to Roe as the settled law of the land at the Supreme Court level since Court can always overrule its precedent, and three current Justices on the Court would do so.
That was from 2003. Counting in 2018, Kavanaugh would be the 5th like-minded Justice.
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Leahy pointing out Kavanaugh lies...in this very hearing.
I believe there are three (at least) documentable examples of Kavanaugh lying under oath to the Senate Judiciary Committee the last time he sat before them for a confirmation hearing. The issue here is the word "documentable", because the Democrats have the documents and the Republicans are forbidding their use.
This whole process is so corrupt that they are now endangering their Senate majority in addition to their House majority.
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The only member of this White House with this level of knowledge and coherence is Baron.
You could probably include that lawnmower kid if he's still around.
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For those who didn't see it, here's the Washington Post's review of the Booker - Cornyn spat (https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/cory-booker%E2%80%99s-dramatic-violation-of-senate-rules-explained/ar-BBMXzq7?li=BBnb7Kz). For some reason, they omitted the "bring it" moment, but this basically boils it down.
True to his word, Booker released the memos (https://www.scribd.com/document/387988906/Booker-Confidential-Kavanaugh-Hearing) that had been ruled confidential, and it's really hard to see any justification for keeping this back, other than it impeaches Kavanaugh's testimony that he took no part in such discussions.
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It's amazing that the Federalist Society couldn't find someone to recommend who hadn't already fucking lied to congress under oath. But I guess if what you want aren't serious jurists but craven political operatives, this is what you have to work with.
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It's amazing that the Federalist Society couldn't find someone to recommend who hadn't already fucking lied to congress under oath. But I guess if what you want aren't serious jurists but craven political operatives, this is what you have to work with.
They had a whole list of 'em, and Kavanaugh was only added recently...at the bottom. Purely coincidentally, he's the only one on the list who has expressed an opinion as to whether the president can be subject to civil of criminal proceedings during his or her time in office. Guess which way his opinion fell? He has even mooted that US vs. Nixon was incorrectly decided.
McConnell urged against nominating Kavanaugh because of the huge document trail he had from his time in the White House. It seems they've figured a way around that problem though, just sit on them and shamelessly tough it out (see Garland, Merrick).
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Chuck Grassley is Grandpa Simpson with a slightly less pointy head.
If he wasn't sitting down, you'd know if he had an onion tied to his belt.
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Kamala Harris is a steely-eyed missile man.
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Trump is slurring again tonight. Stressed out much?
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So who caught Trumps speech this evening. He is an absolute loon, completely unhinged and off his rocker. But QAnon/Mr Happy thinks this Dotard is the mastermind behind bringing down some huge pedo ring that dates back to 3rd century. I guess I shouldn’t be surprised, I mean they voted for a guy who was a birther and has publicly stated what an upright outstanding journalist ALEX JONES is....
That’s even before we get to his litany of shady illegal business deals and paying off pornstars that he cheated on his wife with.
Congrats GOP/QAnon/Infowars!
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If the failing New York Times is going to continue publishing pieces from anomiss, anomiss sources, I think the government should take their lisense,
Remember when we used to laugh at that fuckwit Bush because he couldn't pronounce the word nuclear? Yeah, that was cute.
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I love how he tells his fans at his rallies that it's their fault if he gets impeached.
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I love how he tells his fans at his rallies that it's their fault if he gets impeached.
Well, it's their fault he got elected.
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Abigail Spanberger was the doxxed Democrat. She used to work on national security for the USPS (and later for the CIA), and it is USPS who have raised their hand as being the entity that released her full, unredacted SF86 security clearance application to Paul Ryan's PAC. They also said there are a few more improperly released SF86s out there, and they're trying to clear it all up. In Spanberger's case, that horse has bolted as Ryan's PAC immediately used information in her SF86 in attack ads and even shared the entire document with media outlets.
For the record, Ryan's PAC is still running ads against Spanberger featuring the information from her inappropriately obtained SF86.
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Well yeah, Ryan is a piece of crap.
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I thrust that Spanberger's campaign is pointing that out.
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QAnon now says McCain was actually murdered or committed suicide to avoid a military tribunal.
They also believe Donald Trump, the life long huckster and moron, is actually faking all his witch hunt narrative and is working in conjunction with a Mueller to bring down Hillary. Just let that marinate for a minute. At what level of idiocy do you have to be to even fathom that as a possibility. We are talking sub 60 IQ.
There are people stupid enough, like Mr Happy*, to believe this shit. Of course the second you offer to bet on it, they go stone cold silent. Trump has turned the GOP into the InfoWars party. Fucking Sad!
*If MH isn’t a QAnon fruitcake I apologize.
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Trump has turned the GOP into the InfoWars party. Fucking Sad!
I think that's back to front. Once Republican voters started embracing conspiracy theories, thanks to Fox News, and their elected officers went along with it in the moment to keep their individual jobs, they opened the door wide for Trump.
Palin was his harbinger; the face-hugger stage of this alien infestation, if you will. And it was McCain who let her in. So that means McCain was an android planted by Hillary and the deep state so that this terrifying organism could be used as a weapon against Republicans, but they couldn't control it and now it's going to kill us all.
Paul Ryan is, of course, Carter Burke in this scenario, and the Weyland-Yutani company is NewsCorp. We waste him...no offense. (https://youtu.be/FBRRJx8FKwQ)
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As an aside, looking for the Burke clip from Aliens, I found a deleted scene of which I was unaware until now that shows Burke's fate (https://youtu.be/4FCLyglO_QY). It's so short and satisfying (TWSS) that I can't see why it was left out of at least the extended cut.
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Not only should Kavanaugh not be confirmed to SCOTUS, he should be impeached and removed from his current position (https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2018/09/judge-brett-kavanaugh-should-be-impeached-for-lying-during-his-confirmation-hearings.html). He has lied now in three separate confirmation hearings, and Democrats have released the evidence to prove it.
If not now, he could be impeached down the road if Congress changes hands. The lifetime of his appointment could be the lifetime of the Republican majority.
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Trump is going to have to answer written questions - under peril of perjury - in the Summer Zervos defamation suit. He has 18 days to respond to the questions.
Meanwhile, TrumpWorld is trying to get out from under the competing Stormy Daniels suits by claiming that there never was a valid NDA, so no harm, no foul and no deposition. Michael Avenatti is having none of it, because paying for the publicity he gets for free out of this would be expensive. Trump is going to have to pay a lot more to get Avenatti...I mean Daniels... to go away.
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Does Michael Cohen have another house he can mortgage by any chance?
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Or maybe they can put some of Kavanaugh's Nats tickets up on StubHub.
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With Florence (aka Hugo II) bearing down on the Carolinas, it is revealed that the Trump administration has just pilfered $10 million from FEMA to give it to ICE. This also comes not long after the death toll in Puerto Rico from Maria was upped from 60-something to just under 3,000 - the government's response to which Trump described as the best ever. That's a bit like saying "heckuva job" to airport security after 9/11.
Brett Kavanaugh continues to be underwater in opinion polls, and his nomination is supported by fewer people than Harriett Miers - who withdrew from nomination - and Robert Bork who was...well...Borked (i.e. voted down by the full senate in the face of overwhelming evidence that he was a horrendous choice for the Supreme Court). Kavanaugh is now facing inquiries about his gambling habits - very relevant to someone who needs to be free of outside influence.
Lastly, in two new opinion polls, a generic Democrat for Congress is now favored over a generic Republican by double-digits: +12% in one and +14% in the other. Trump is bumping along at historic lows and Jon Cornyn is sounding the alarm about Ted Cruz' senate seat. It's worth remembering that the Democrats face the worst electoral landscape, perhaps ever; they are defending 24 seats compared to the Republican's 9. Two years ago, after Trump's win, the talk was of Republicans gaining a 60-vote super-majority in the senate; now they are in danger of dropping into the minority.
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With Florence (aka Hugo II) bearing down on the Carolinas, it is revealed that the Trump administration has just pilfered $10 million from FEMA to give it to ICE. This also comes not long after the death toll in Puerto Rico from Maria was upped from 60-something to just under 3,000 - the government's response to which Trump described as the best ever. That's a bit like saying "heckuva job" to airport security after 9/11.
Brett Kavanaugh continues to be underwater in opinion polls, and his nomination is supported by fewer people than Harriett Miers - who withdrew from nomination - and Robert Bork who was...well...Borked (i.e. voted down by the full senate in the face of overwhelming evidence that he was a horrendous choice for the Supreme Court). Kavanaugh is now facing inquiries about his gambling habits - very relevant to someone who needs to be free of outside influence.
Lastly, in two new opinion polls, a generic Democrat for Congress is now favored over a generic Republican by double-digits: +12% in one and +14% in the other. Trump is bumping along at historic lows and Jon Cornyn is sounding the alarm about Ted Cruz' senate seat. It's worth remembering that the Democrats face the worst electoral landscape, perhaps ever; they are defending 24 seats compared to the Republican's 9. Two years ago, after Trump's win, the talk was of Republicans gaining a 60-vote super-majority in the senate; now they are in danger of dropping into the minority.
I love your optimism.
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I love your optimism.
All of the numbers are consistent and pointing in the direction of a blue wave.
I know there's some skepticism about polls following 2016, or that Trump defies polls, but they were actually not wrong within the margin of error around the 2016 election. Further, the state-by-state polling was accurate, and the gap between Trump and Clinton closed dramatically in the final days thanks mostly to Comey's shenanigans. Every one of the states Trump won was predicted by the polls if you consider the margin of error - so that his razor-thin wins in MI, PA and WI were within that margin and so statistically correct.
This is the trick with all polls. A 6-point lead with a +/- 4-point MOE could mean that the lead could be as small as 2-points and, if it drops to a 4-point lead, it's potentially a toss-up. A lot of individual races are toss-ups this year, but there is a strong tendency with toss-ups to go disproportionately more in the direction of the party with momentum which, again, was consistent with 2016 where Trump was coming back as the election approached (thanks James).
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I'm trying to be optimistic, but then I talk to people around me and realize they are quite different than me.
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I
FIFM
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FIFM
You may want to try again because that does not make sense.
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I love laughlyour optimism.
In true Trumpian style, your "fix" was an incoherent non-sentence that flies in the face of all evidence and achieves nothing other than to make yourself feel superior.
#covfefe
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I'm trying to be optimistic, but then I talk to people around me and realize they are quite different than me.
I live in Montrose, which is awash with Beto signs, yet my district is represented by Ted Poe. I have no doubt that I will have a Republican as my congressman for the next two years, but the senate race is statewide, so gerrymandering has no impact. You wins the fights that are winnable...
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Wow..I looked up the district your represented in Limey...2nd District is Ted Poe's right?.
It's impossible for me to look at the 2nd district map and not agree it's gerrymandered to ridiculous proportions.
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I live in Montrose, which is awash with Beto signs, yet my district is represented by Ted Poe. I have no doubt that I will have a Republican as my congressman for the next two years, but the senate race is statewide, so gerrymandering has no impact. You wins the fights that are winnable...
I think Litton has a chance but the 7th is more likely to be competitive.
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Wow..I looked up the district your represented in Limey...2nd District is Ted Poe's right?.
It's impossible for me to look at the 2nd district map and not agree it's gerrymandered to ridiculous proportions.
The city of Houston is a hotbed of communism, so they've sliced it up like a pizza and buried each slice under swaths of suburbs. Yeah, I share my congressman with Kingwood, because...democracy?
With all the hand-wringing about the loss of bi-partisanship and civility in our politics, the one thing that could bring it back is eliminating gerrymandering. As the saying goes, voters should pick their representatives, not the other way around. Gerrymandering is more responsible than anything else for the extremism and tribalism in our politics, as well as the inability to work with the other side because doing so will get your chosen voters mad at you and likely kicked out in a primary.
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I think Litton has a chance but the 7th is more likely to be competitive.
It's less of a foregone conclusion with the incumbent not running, but vote totals in the Republican primary nearly doubled those in the Democratic primary, so it's still a long shot. Also, the Republican candidate - Dan Crenshaw (good name) - is a handsome, former Navy SEAL with a fucking eye patch (https://api.ballotpedia.org/v3/thumbnail/200/300/crop/best/Dan_Crenshaw.jpg) (lost an eye to an IED in Afghanistan). Lawyer / political operative "I'll die before we call our son Todd" Litton is going to have a hard time to get any attention in this race.
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Kathaleen Wall would've been an embarrassment in Congress, but Litton would've had a better shot against her. Crenshaw is a really good nominee for the GOP there.
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Kathaleen Wall would've been an embarrassment in Congress, but Litton would've had a better shot against her. Crenshaw is a really good nominee for the GOP there.
I think the 2nd is a done deal for Republicans of any stripe until it gets un-gerryfucked, so I'm happy to have the better Republican option running because he's going to be my rep.
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I think the 2nd is a done deal for Republicans of any stripe until it gets un-gerryfucked, so I'm happy to have the better Republican option running because he's going to be my rep.
I changed my registration to Independent last year in order to vote in Republican primaries. NC is a closed primary state but indys can choose which one to attend. A very reasonable Republican lady came and talked at the women’s march here a while back, challenging the very safe multitermer Patrick McHenry from the center. Asheville has been expertly gerrymandered to nullify her thriving blue oasis. Anyway, it makes so much sense to me that dems should be voting in republican primaries for reasonable(r) GOP candidates it drives me crazy. You can still go vote in November however you want, and in the meantime you’ve given the entrenched yahoos in the yahoo caucus something to think about. If McHenry moderates one view you’ve won something real.
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So Trumpy goes Alex Jones on the Puerto Rican death toll. It'll be fascinating to see what he does with this upcoming series of hurricanes. I don't think it particularly matters that Puerto Rico does not represent his base of voters. I think you'll see an extension of this same behavior in the Carolinas and anywhere else this season's tremendously wet storms happen to make landfall.
He views natural disasters not through the eyes of the affected, but as a personal affront to him and the image he wishes to project. And his response is tethered to that. He responds to natural disasters like he responds to personal insults. The results are predictable.
So, anyway, rotsa ruck, boys.
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So Trumpy goes Alex Jones on the Puerto Rican death toll. It'll be fascinating to see what he does with this upcoming series of hurricanes. I don't think it particularly matters that Puerto Rico does not represent his base of voters. I think you'll see an extension of this same behavior in the Carolinas and anywhere else this season's tremendously wet storms happen to make landfall.
He views natural disasters not through the eyes of the affected, but as a personal affront to him and the image he wishes to project. And his response is tethered to that. He responds to natural disasters like he responds to personal insults. The results are predictable.
So, anyway, rotsa ruck, boys.
The tweets today on Puerto Rico are gobsmacking, even for him. Grotesque is his default position, but as pressures mount from various directions, he will plumb new depths of depravity with each passing tweet storm.
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As if Trump's appointed head of FEMA didn't have enough on his hands with hurricanes coming in and money going out (to fund ICE*), he's also being investigated by DHS for corruption (https://www.politico.com/story/2018/09/13/trump-fema-administrator-under-investigation-821231) (#BestPeople), involving using government vehicles and drivers to ferry him to and from the office, including using government expenses to house the driver in a hotel near his home. He and DHS head Nielsen are at loggerheads, reportedly, which should make their working relationship really smooth over the trials to come.
* DHS has snaffled circa $170mm from other agencies under its control, including $10mm from FEMA and $30mm from the Coast Guard, to fund border detention and repatriation efforts. The fact that the number of children detained at the border has skyrocketed to 12,800 (https://www.nytimes.com/2018/09/12/us/migrant-children-detention.html) might have something to do with it (and you thought that was all over).
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I think Florence is going to have an interesting effect on the mid-terms. The Republicans cannot screw up something do big so close to the election to keep their people happy.
But, I do wonder if people effected by Harvey and Irma have changed their thoughts on their elected officials.
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I think Florence is going to have an interesting effect on the mid-terms. The Republicans cannot screw up something do big so close to the election to keep their people happy.
But, I do wonder if people effected by Harvey and Irma have changed their thoughts on their elected officials.
People from, or sympathetic to, Puerto Rico were unlikely to be Trump voters, so they were left to rot. Texas and Florida, by contrast, got a decent response: one solid red and the other a swing state.
This hurricane response will be something to watch as regards his support in the south, but Trump has already killed his support in much of the mid-west as his tariffs are absolutely crushing agriculture (https://www.weeklystandard.com/andrew-egger/midwestern-trump-voters-deal-with-tariffs).
On July 6, China slapped duties on $43 billion worth of U.S. goods, nearly $17 billion of it in agricultural products, including soybeans, sorghum, and pork. The move hit markets like a lightning bolt out of a clear sky: Soybean prices dropped a dollar a bushel when the tariffs were announced and another dollar when they were implemented, plummeting to a near-decade low below $9 a bushel.
Other farm commodities—corn, cotton, pork, and dairy—have suffered collateral damage from tariffs as well. And then there are the ripple effects through the farm production chain: suppliers, processors, packers, distributors. Nobody along the line is equipped to absorb the costs of the new tariffs.
On their face, the numbers are devastating for farmers, who operate with high overhead and slim profit margins in the best of times. It gets worse when you consider that tanking prices don’t just affect this year’s harvest: They retroactively damage income from last year, too.
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You say "yes, them" but the WS has been consistently destroying Trump pretty much since before he was elected. Bill Kristol (yes, him) has made his twitter a must-read.
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If you didn’t realize that the rush to complete Kavanaugh’s confirmation was to avoid an avalanche of bad news about him, then you should be left in no doubt now. Despite all Republican efforts, some of that shit is seeping out. Just today, the case of his disappearing credit card debt came into more stark relief and, oh yeah, he might be a date rapist. Honestly, how is this nomination still a fucking thing?
Also, a Manafort plea deal may be done. If it is, we’ll likely find out tomorrow morning when there’s a court appearance scheduled.
Also in the news tomorrow will be, of course, Flo’s landfall and the fact that dozens of houses in three Mass. towns spontaneously combusted (seriously). I think we made the Gods angry.
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Manafort's plea deal is done (https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/sep/14/paul-manafort-trumps-ex-campaign-chair-strikes-plea-deal-with-special-counsel), and he'll be in court to allocute etc. at 11am EDT this morning. Mueller's team has already filed its paperwork, and it suggests that he's going to cop to money laundering, tax evasion and witness tampering. He'll take some prison time, cough up a couple of houses and the contents of 5 bank accounts.
No word as to any cooperation agreement but, as I've said and suspected all along, I don't think Mueller ever needed Manafort's testimony because he had that walking bag of human garbage Rick Gates in his pocket. Gates had almost everything that Manafort had, plus Gates stayed in the Trump campaign through the election, into the transition and (I think) into office. He has a much more broad knowledge of what was going on with Trump than Manafort.
It's likely, therefore, that Manafort is just taking the plea to avoid the expense of a second trial (and probable re-trial of the hung charges from Virginia), without a cooperation agreement, particularly as his was likely to have a library's worth of books thrown at him. The Washington venue for this upcoming trial was never going to be as friendly to him as Virginia was, and he was 1 juror away from losing 18 of 18 there.
I'm sure he's in mortal fear of having to roll over on the Russians, who would absolutely have him or his family killed. On the flip side, that means that Trump is a fucking moron if he pardons Manafort, because then Manafort could be compelled to testify having had the possibility of self-incrimination rendered moot.
* According to Rex Tillerson, Trump is a fucking moron, so watch this space.
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I think a pardon is a hard sell. I mean, if you maintain that the guy has nothing to do with you and hell, you hardly know him, then you are just pardoning a super rich guy who didn't pay his taxes, on ill-gotten money.
But like you said, Trump is stupid and will likely pardon him.
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I think a pardon is a hard sell. I mean, if you maintain that the guy has nothing to do with you and hell, you hardly know him, then you are just pardoning a super rich guy who didn't pay his taxes, on ill-gotten money.
But like you said, Trump is stupid and will likely pardon him.
Trump also has no shame, so he wouldn't give a shit about the optics. However, Trump never does anything that isn't self-serving, so he won't pardon Manafort because it would be a nice thing for Manafort, he'd do it if it was better for Trump...or at least thinks it's better for Trump (he has a very good brain so doesn't listen to experts very much).
One story from Woodward's book seems apropos here: John Dowd told Woodward that Trump is unable to understand that the client of White House lawyers is the United States, not Trump. When Dowd told Trump that Ty Cobb wasn't his lawyer and could be called as a witness against him, Trump said "Jesus! I've been talking to him a lot!"
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Manafort is cooperating.
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Manafort is cooperating.
...and Trump is exploding.
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Manafort's cooperation agreement includes:
- interviews and briefings he'll give to the special counsel's office
- turning over documents
- testifying in other proceedings
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The accusation against Kavanaugh (https://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/a-sexual-misconduct-allegation-against-the-supreme-court-nominee-brett-kavanaugh-stirs-tension-among-democrats-in-congress?irgwc=1&source=affiliate_impactpmx_12f6tote_desktop_Viglink%20Primary&mbid=affiliate_impactpmx_12f6tote_desktop_Viglink%20Primary).
In the letter, the woman alleged that, during an encounter at a party, Kavanaugh held her down, and that he attempted to force himself on her. She claimed in the letter that Kavanaugh and a classmate of his, both of whom had been drinking, turned up music that was playing in the room to conceal the sound of her protests, and that Kavanaugh covered her mouth with his hand. She was able to free herself.
We may be barreling to another Anita Hill moment but, this time, at least there are some women on the Senate committee, not a Victorian town council of disapproving men*. Watch HBO's excellent movie "Confirmation" (https://www.hbo.com/movies/confirmation) on this event for a reminder, but you'll want to take a shower afterwards.
* Even Biden was guilty of treating Hill as some kind of hostile defendant, rather than a witness.
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Trump also has no shame, so he wouldn't give a shit about the optics. However, Trump never does anything that isn't self-serving, so he won't pardon Manafort because it would be a nice thing for Manafort, he'd do it if it was better for Trump...or at least thinks it's better for Trump (he has a very good brain so doesn't listen to experts very much).
One story from Woodward's book seems apropos here: John Dowd told Woodward that Trump is unable to understand that the client of White House lawyers is the United States, not Trump. When Dowd told Trump that Ty Cobb wasn't his lawyer and could be called as a witness against him, Trump said "Jesus! I've been talking to him a lot!"
The reason pardoning Manafort is in Trump's interest is that the republicans would let him get away with it and that would help lay the precedent for pardoning himself and his family members.
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Manafort gonna spill the beans on the Hillary/Obama child sex rings!
-Qanon/Trumpers
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Manafort gonna spill the beans on the Hillary/Obama child sex rings!
-Qanon/Trumpers
It's basically the plot to Face/Off.
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The reason pardoning Manafort is in Trump's interest is that the republicans would let him get away with it and that would help lay the precedent for pardoning himself and his family members.
There's the political track, in which Republicans continue to give cover to Trump for they know not what (or they know, but think we won't find out), and the legal track, which is federal prosecutors working to bring charges and gain convictions of those involved regardless of any smoke that is blown from Washington.
At the intersection of the two is Donald Trump. If Democrats take the House and/or Senate (which is now believed to be in play), the lame duck period between November and January is going to be a shit show of epic proportions as everyone scrambles to try and firewall themselves off from the coming subpoena apocalypse up to and including a Trump self-pardon.
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It's basically the plot to Face/Off.
I like the theory that Cage and Travolta actually switched faces and have spent the time since sabotaging the other’s career.
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While cooperation by Manafort is not in doubt, cooperation by Michael Cohen was. Until now. New reporting claims that Cohen is talking to Mueller's team.
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Womp womp.
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Womp womp.
Importantly, Mueller now has a first hand witness to the June 2016 Trump Tower meeting. Junior and Kushner just shit themselves.
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Most of my mom's family are idiots. I won't get too into it but you can imagine and you wouldn't be too far off. One sect in particular live their lives virtually devoid of foresight or consideration of possible consequences associated with the decisions they make.
When I was six or seven our grandfather took us to some carnival somewhere. We were regularly going to these barbecue / carnival things and they were generally associated somehow with the rodeo. Anyway, there was usually a kid-sized Ferris wheel. My older cousin and I were in one pod and my brother and another cousin, a guy from this no foresight family, they get into another. The goon in charge of the attraction of course stops the wheel periodically to get pairs of kids on and off the thing. During one such moment my brother and my cousin, let's call him Rick, were stopped at the greatest possible height. Rick decided that that would be an outstanding moment to spit down onto his mother who was of course standing below peering up at him.
RICK! STOP THAT! Spit, spit, more spit. STOP THAT RIGHT NOW OR I'LL Spit spit more spit.
Well, needless to say soon enough their number came up and Carney stopped the music and pulled them out. My aunt immediately grabbed Rick and drug him off to their car, beating his ass through the parking lot. I remember witnessing this from a privileged vantage point as Carney had stopped the wheel yet again.
Anyway, I was a child but I remember being struck by the thought, Does he not realize that the Ferris wheel is inevitably going to bring him down? Has he not thought that far ahead? Or does he simply not care?
I still don't know the answer to that question as it pertains to Rick. (And of course he's still spitting on people from the top of a Ferris wheel.) And I certainly don't know what or if the Trump gang is thinking. Like with Rick, we may never know.
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I still don't know the answer to that question as it pertains to Rick. (And of course he's still spitting on people from the top of a Ferris wheel.) And I certainly don't know what or if the Trump gang is thinking. Like with Rick, we may never know.
I believe Rick is currently the Deputy Secretary of State.
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I believe Rick is currently the Deputy Secretary of State.
I thought Rick became Secretary of Energy.
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My cousin's never been much of a dancer.
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Can he spin a record?
https://media.giphy.com/media/3o6ZtbbxOdJApeKbkI/source.gif
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Cruz - O’Rourke debate schedule set: first of three is on Friday 21st at SMU.
Opportunity for Beto to land some punches independent of spending power. Cruz is a slippery customer (because his skin secretes oil) so it will be a big test. At the same time Cruz is the definition of inauthentic, while Beto - as his viral video about kneeling NFL plays confirms - is honest, articulate and relatable.
Chalk vs. Cheese.
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Just cycling back, it's worth taking a look at the breadth of Manafort's plea deal. He will get reduced jail time, yes, but what he has to give up is breathtaking:
- he forfeits the contents of a number of bank accounts and 5 properties, totaling tens of millions (and this forfeiture is pardon-proof, it's gone for good);
- he had to fess up to having done everything of which he was accused, even the crimes for which charges were dropped as part of the plea deal and, yes, this includes the 10 hung counts from the Virginia trial;
- he has to cooperate, with everyone, about everything, no (Roger) stone will be left unturned, he has to be "forthright" meaning he cannot lie by omission without breaking the agreement;
- he has waived his right to have an attorney present in his interviews with law enforcement (unless there is prior written agreement);
- he has to testify when and where required;
- he has to stay in jail until prosecutors are done with him, which could be years.
He lost hard! As if to reinforce that we're being conned and held hostage by the dumbest people ever, it's hard to imagine that the deal he was offered - before he burned through a few mil. going into through the first trial - would have been worse than this one. It's truly spectacular how Manafort has fucked himself so completely.
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He lost hard! As if to reinforce that we're being conned and held hostage by the dumbest people ever, it's hard to imagine that the deal he was offered - before he burned through a few mil. going into through the first trial - would have been worse than this one. It's truly spectacular how Manafort has fucked himself so completely.
If not for the witness tampering, would he have been free until sentencing? Or would he be considered a flight risk to bolt to Russia? Then again, doesn't he still owe a LOT of money to some Russian oligarchs?
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With all the forfeiture I'm sure the outstanding folks on the Republican side of the aisle will quit bitching about the cost of the Mueller investigation, right?
Right?
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If not for the witness tampering, would he have been free until sentencing? Or would he be considered a flight risk to bolt to Russia? Then again, doesn't he still owe a LOT of money to some Russian oligarchs?
Probably would be out for now. I presume whatever time he spends in jail now will be deducted from his eventual custodial sentence.
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With all the forfeiture I'm sure the outstanding folks on the Republican side of the aisle will quit bitching about the cost of the Mueller investigation, right?
Right?
They don’t even recognize that crimes were committed!
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They don’t even recognize that crimes were committed!
Innocent if proven guilty.
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Innocent if proven guilty.
...and pleas don’t count as guilty.
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...and pleas don’t count as guilty.
Of course not, not if you're coerced into a plea by the deep state.
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Kavanaugh's accuser has come forward (https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/california-professor-writer-of-confidential-brett-kavanaugh-letter-speaks-out-about-her-allegation-of-sexual-assault/ar-BBNpIGR?li=BBnb7Kz). The accusation doesn't get any less credible and any less disturbing when you hear from the accuser - an upstanding successful, professional woman in her own right.
Christine Ford is a professor at Palo Alto University who teaches in a consortium with Stanford University, training graduate students in clinical psychology. Her work has been widely published in academic journals.
I thought he might inadvertently kill me. He was trying to attack me and remove my clothing.
In the years since, Ford has consulted therapists about her ongoing issues stemming from this assault. She provided copies of her therapists' notes for the Washington Post to examine.
This is a credible lady. I will be shocked / not shocked if Republicans continue to work to ram home this nomination (unfortunate connotations of the prior phrasing intentional).
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Apropos nothing, Stormy Daniels says that Trump’s penis is misshapen and smaller than average, and that her tryst with him was the least impressive sex she’s ever had.
In other news, Trump just nuked North Korea to prove that his totally normal-sized fingers can press such a big, beautiful button.
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So, as of now, the Republicans will only allow the accuser and the accused to testify. No investigation or witnesses will be allowed. Just what are they afraid of, and for that matter, if it's going to be that bogus, why have it all?
No inquiry remotely interested in the truth would ever proceed like this.
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So, as of now, the Republicans will only allow the accuser and the accused to testify. No investigation or witnesses will be allowed. Just what are they afraid of, and for that matter, if it's going to be that bogus, why have it all?
No inquiry remotely interested in the truth would ever proceed like this.
It's a pretty pathetic exercise of advise and consent.
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It's a pretty pathetic exercise of advise and consent.
The fact that their role involves "consent" is pretty ironic.
This whole process is completely craven and disgusting. The reason other witnesses are need is because you have two people with 100% opposite positions. Kavanaugh hasn't said he doesn't remember (like the other boy's non-denial/denial), or that he remembers the episode differently, i.e. it was consensual. No, he said it never happened and that he wasn't there. Well, other party-goers - there were 4 - could be contacted to confirm or deny Kavanaugh's presence at the party in question and also whether the elements of the event that they witnessed matches the accusers report or Kavanaugh's.
Oh, and let's not forget that they are still withholding hundreds of thousands of documents from Kavanaugh's time in the White House.
What have they got to hide? Everything! Kavanaugh isn't a judge who is also conservative; Kavanaugh is a Republican operative who got elevated to the courts only after waiting 3 years because of his prior partisan career.
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Apropos nothing, Stormy Daniels says that Trump’s penis is misshapen and smaller than average, and that her tryst with him was the least impressive sex she’s ever had.
"There's not enough liquor and therapy in the world to undo that."
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Senate Republicans are getting increasingly desperate in their covering up for Brett Kavanaugh. They wanted to run an Anita Hill on Kavanagh's accuser - Christine Ford - by bringing her in to testify in a purely he said/she said contest of credibility; a contest they have already decided that he has won based on their contemporaneous public statements (including Hatch saying that she's "mixed up"). Ford is having none of it, and has insisted on the FBI investigating the matter before any Senate hearing.
The defense has now devolved to the point where Hatch, Grassley and Trump, at least, are saying that the FBI doesn't do investigations. Yeah, really. The FBI absolutely does this for every Supreme Court nominee (i.e. investigate their background). The FBI did this in the Thomas confirmation after Anita Hill came forward; circumstances identical to what we face now - except that the accusation is far, far more serious.
It now looks like they're going to try and whistle past this cemetery, by eschewing the investigation and pressing on with voting in committee and then the full Senate. Will any Republicans have the balls (or ovaries) to stand in the way of Kavanaugh? The aptly named Jeff Flake has offered his customary objection that has, so far, always preceded his customary capitulation. Susan Collins has said that this would be exclusionary "if true", so she has given herself cover here knowing that there's unlikely to be any corroboration of Ford prior to voting. Lisa Murkowski is silent as far as I know.
So we are now facing the prospect that an accused sexual abuser and proven liar has nominated an accused sexual abuser and proven liar to the Supreme Court, and Republicans will confirm him so that he can overturn Roe and give a pass to Trump for his crimes. Yes, it's possible to impeach Kavanaugh and get him off the bench, but the damage he can do before that happens could be immense, generational and deadly.
ETA: Ford has been doxed by white supremacists and driven into hiding with her family following abuse and death threats. Kavanaugh has spent two days (and counting) kibitzing with lawyers in the White House. Who would be better prepared to testify in a rushed hearing on Monday?
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I have to admit that I doubt the GOP's sincerity when it comes to overturning Roe. They seem to be doing awfully well regulating it into irrelevance in the states they control, and in the meantime it's a great wedge issue for them in terms of generating revenue and voter enthusiasm. Easier to be against something than for something. And if you thought lib dander was raised by the Carrot Demon's election...
Not that any of that necessarily matters vis a vis the Supreme Court.
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I have to admit that I doubt the GOP's sincerity when it comes to overturning Roe. They seem to be doing awfully well regulating it into irrelevance in the states they control, and in the meantime it's a great wedge issue for them in terms of generating revenue and voter enthusiasm. Easier to be against something than for something. And if you thought lib dander was raised by the Carrot Demon's election...
Not that any of that necessarily matters vis a vis the Supreme Court.
Once there’s enough votes on the court to turn it over, it only takes a single lawsuit to do it; no legislative action required. There are hundreds of such cases ready to roll and many states with trigger laws that will collapse choice down to what the court allows the instant it rules. This court seat is the only place the overturn can be blocked.
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I'm assuming this is just high stakes poker, where Ford knows that a sham hearing will look terrible for Republicans, and knows that Republicans know that. Meanwhile, the Republicans have decided to bluff: if we stick to a sham hearing, she will wilt, refuse to testify and look like a false accuser.
Ford's current demand seems designed to both suck the Republicans in and significantly raise the stakes. She says that she won't testify unless there is a real investigation. The Republican reaction is: kiss my ass, this is our game, and our rules. Meanwhile, the public arises from their slumber and says "wait a second, this isn't fair, why isn't there going to be an investigation. What are they trying to hide" The Republicans will then sense that it really isn't just their game and their rules after all.
Then, the Republicans have two choices: either relent and allow a real investigation, which I doubt they will because they know there is real dirt to be uncovered, even if it stops short of provable sexual assault, or they continue with their game of "testify in our sham trial or wear that scarlet letter for eternity."
Ford, if she is willing to subject herself to the sham trial, holds a much better hand. After waiting a few days for the public to realize that without a real investigation, this is either unfair or an outrage, Ford can then say "OK, I'll participate in the trial everyone knows is bogus." At this point, I suspect the Republicans will likely withdraw Kavanuagh under some whiny pretext or proceed with the sham trial. If they proceed with the trial, the nation will pay close attention and the shaminess will be obvious to all. After that, I suspect a few Republicans refuse to confirm, stating that without a real investigation, they can't vote yes.
If Ford is actually unwilling to call the Republican bluff and refuses to testify in the sham trial, the Republicans get both the court and an argument that the Democrats are dirty liars.
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Once there’s enough votes on the court to turn it over, it only takes a single lawsuit to do it; no legislative action required. There are hundreds of such cases ready to roll and many states with trigger laws that will collapse choice down to what the court allows the instant it rules. This court seat is the only place the overturn can be blocked.
Yeah, I know. I'm just saying I'm skeptical that the party leaders would be happy about an overturn. I could be wrong.
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Yeah, I know. I'm just saying I'm skeptical that the party leaders would be happy about an overturn. I could be wrong.
Privately, sure. I mean, who wants to have to wear a condom when schtupping an intern or lobbyist? Publicly they’ll say it’s not their place to interfere with the court whilst dogwhistling to the base that this is great.
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Yeah, I know. I'm just saying I'm skeptical that the party leaders would be happy about an overturn. I could be wrong.
Could go either way. They might go the "thousand cuts" route and never explicitly overturn Casey. All they'd have to say in each case is "nope, no undue burden here," without ever saying "Roe and Casey were wrong when decided and are wrong today." From a purely hackish political perspective, that's their best move.
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"Bart O'Kavanaugh"? Was Mark Judge's book ghost written by George Lucas?
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Force ghost written?
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O'Kavanaugh cracks me up. It's almost as good as Father Michael O'Flatley.
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Republicans on the Senate Judiciary Committee are a mess. Their every move gets blown up, mostly by themselves, while Ford and her lawyers retain all the cards:
- The need-for-speed argument is patent nonsense, given that these exact same people held open Scalia's seat for over a year.
- The "it's not the FBI's place to investigate" argument is patent nonsense because it's the thing they do for every single confirmable nominee, and they've re-opened 10 such background checks following new information just in the last month.
- The "Senate investigators can do it" argument is patent nonsense because there are no such things as Senate investigators (that's why they have the FBI do it), and the senior guy in Grassley's office tasked with the job said that he is "unfazed and determined" to get Kavanaugh confirmed while shitting on Ford and her lawyers, all in tweets that have since been deleted but preserved by reporters.
So, instead of holding the committee vote on Kavanaugh yesterday, they've been grandstanding all week about a 10am EDT deadline for Ford to submit her written affidavit for them to pore over all weekend before she appears in front of the committee on Monday. Yeah, none of that is happening and the Senate Republicans are scrambling, even to the extent of hiring an outside - female - attorney (*cough* prosecutor *cough*) to question Ford because, belatedly, they've realized the optics of 11 wrinkly old white men trying to undermine the credibility of an alleged sexual assault survivor are not good*.
* They still don't seem to realize that the optics of a committee consisting only of wrinkly old white men is inherently bad and has been since about the 1920s.
Well, Ford and her lawyers are insisting that (1) the hearing needs to be fair; (b) it needs to be by the Senators themselves, not a hired gun; and (iii) it cannot be Monday because Ford and her family have been on the run for their lives most of this week. It's now impossible for this committee to move past this moment - with any credibility - without hearing from Ford. These arrogant, idiot Republicans are now all her base.
On the broader landscape, Kavanaugh's approval rating went from +6 at the start of September to -2 now (http://www.msnbc.com/sites/msnbc/files/styles/embedded_image/public/9.21.18.png?itok=wTqs497U). He's a rotting carcass of a nomination that they drag through to a full Senate vote at their peril. Cruz is now underwater to O'Rourke and, in Nevada, Heller is now underwater to Roslin. The House has always been in play but a Republican super-majority in the Senate was once thought to be a possibility because of the numbers game: 24 Dems vs. 10 GOP. The fact that the Senate is now in play for Democrats is evidence of how hard they've screwed this pooch.
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An interesting aside: the state of Maryland, where Ford claims that the assault on her by Kavanaugh took place, does not have a statute of limitations on rape, or attempt thereat. When asked why they haven't opened an investigation based on what they've seen, Maryland state prosecutors said that they are ready to do so should they receive a formal criminal complaint.
So, regardless of what happens with Kavanaugh's confirmation, at any time between now and either of their deaths, Ford can drop a dime and initiate a criminal investigation. Would getting fucked over by Republicans on the Senate Judiciary Committee be enough to push her that way? I mean, once they're through trying to tear her down, what embarrassments would be left?
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She, with her parents' loving support, should just do it. I'll file for a handgun license to protect her.
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She, with her parents' loving support, should just do it. I'll file for a handgun license to protect her.
I'm sure this has been a topic of conversation between the committee and Ford's lawyers. I.e. "do you want to have the conversation in your committee, or do you want to have it in a state criminal trial? Your choice."
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From the tenor of the reporting, I sense that it's shifting from "I wasn't there" to "No one can prove he did it" to "He was 17, and drunk." The background of this shifting is that at a minimum, this is another instance that he can't tell the truth. Can't the bar for inclusion to the court be that the person must be honest?
With me, I get that a conservative is going to fill the seat, but I'd rather have a conservative with integrity. This guy is slimy: he's already lied in confirmation hearings and more importantly, to me at least, he doesn't have core principle beyond "I'll rule in whatever way favors my party." Limey's description of him as an operative masquerading as a judge is spot on. I'd prefer a principled conservative over a fucking spineless weasel.
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I'm honestly surprised that more women haven't come out. I'm sure that wasn't the first and last time he was drunk at a party when girls were around.
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/onpolitics/2018/09/19/brett-kavanaugh-mark-judge-georgetown-prep-book/1357739002/
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From the tenor of the reporting, I sense that it's shifting from "I wasn't there" to "No one can prove he did it" to "He was 17, and drunk." The background of this shifting is that at a minimum, this is another instance that he can't tell the truth. Can't the bar for inclusion to the court be that the person must be honest?
With me, I get that a conservative is going to fill the seat, but I'd rather have a conservative with integrity. This guy is slimy: he's already lied in confirmation hearings and more importantly, to me at least, he doesn't have core principle beyond "I'll rule in whatever way favors my party." Limey's description of him as an operative masquerading as a judge is spot on. I'd prefer a principled conservative over a fucking spineless weasel.
That's exactly right. Regardless of what happened thirty years ago, the way he's handling the issue now is the exact opposite of the ethical standards that should be required of any jurist, much less a supreme court justice. Of course, that's completely in line with his involvement in the wildly unethical "memogate" scandal, and is subsequent lies about it under oath during previous confirmation hearings. And we've never received a satisfactory explanation of his sudden windfall of hundreds of thousands of dollars over the last year.
It's amazing to me that the republicans are continuing with this nomination. There's no shortage of replacement conservative jurists who believe government exists only for the benefit of white property-holding men but don't have all the baggage of Kavanaugh. Why are they so insistent on ramming this clown through?
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From the tenor of the reporting, I sense that it's shifting from "I wasn't there" to "No one can prove he did it" to "He was 17, and drunk." The background of this shifting is that at a minimum, this is another instance that he can't tell the truth. Can't the bar for inclusion to the court be that the person must be honest?
It screams loudly that only the (alleged) victim is calling for all witnesses to testify and for the Feds - lying to whom is a felony (ask Martha Stewart) - to investigate. The Judiciary Committee is acting as if they know he's guilty and they're trying to stop that from coming out. Their actions are so obvious and their logical contortions are embarrassing.
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It's amazing to me that the republicans are continuing with this nomination. There's no shortage of replacement conservative jurists who believe government exists only for the benefit of white property-holding men but don't have all the baggage of Kavanaugh. Why are they so insistent on ramming this clown through?
That's the mystery. McConnell is shameless so, despite the obvious hypocrisy, it's still totally within his power to push through a nominee in the lame duck session even if they've lost the Senate come January 2019. What's the investment with Kavanaugh? McConnell warned about nominating him in the first place so why not just dump him and ask for another?
They want a conservative judge, Trump is the only one who seems to need Kavanaugh in particular. I cannot imagine that they have such fealty to Trump that they're going on with this.
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Apropos nothing, Stormy Daniels says that Trump’s penis todger is misshapen and smaller than average, and that her tryst with him was the least impressive sex she’s ever had.
In other news, Trump just nuked North Korea to prove that his totally normal-sized fingers can press such a big, beautiful button.
FIFY
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Is it as simple as the fact that they have trashed the FBI so much that they cannot now call them in to investigate?
If they call them in, Kavanaugh is exonerated (or at least "not proven") and they accept that, they undercut the pre-loaded wailing over Mueller's report due later this year.
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I assumed through this whole process, even after the accuser agreed to testify, that confirmation was basically a sure thing.
Ed Whelan just doused that assumption in gasoline and tossed a hand grenade on it for good measure.
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From the tenor of the reporting, I sense that it's shifting from "I wasn't there" to "No one can prove he did it" to "He was 17, and drunk."
There was no collusion! What we did was not collusion! Collusion is not a crime!
With me, I get that a conservative is going to fill the seat, but I'd rather have a conservative with integrity.
You let me know when you find one.
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You let me know when you find one.
They’re all now ex-Republicans, and can be found on MSNBC.
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They’re all now ex-Republicans, and can be found on MSNBC.
Bill Maher on ex-Republicans (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bi5OPJ98laE).
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The NY Times says that Rod Rosenstein was looking to oust Trump last year under the 25th amendment (https://www.nytimes.com/2018/09/21/us/politics/rod-rosenstein-wear-wire-25th-amendment.html). Stand by for a firing in three...two...
The deputy attorney general, Rod J. Rosenstein, suggested last year that he secretly record President Trump in the White House to expose the chaos consuming the administration, and he discussed recruiting cabinet members to invoke the 25th Amendment to remove Mr. Trump from office for being unfit.
Mr. Rosenstein made these suggestions in the spring of 2017 when Mr. Trump’s firing of James B. Comey as F.B.I. director plunged the White House into turmoil. Over the ensuing days, the president divulged classified intelligence to Russians in the Oval Office, and revelations emerged that Mr. Trump had asked Mr. Comey to pledge loyalty and end an investigation into a senior aide.
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The NY Times says that Rod Rosenstein was looking to oust Trump last year under the 25th amendment (https://www.nytimes.com/2018/09/21/us/politics/rod-rosenstein-wear-wire-25th-amendment.html). Stand by for a firing in three...two...
Why would Trump fire Rosenstein over this article? After all, you can't trust anonymous sources.
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Why would Trump fire Rosenstein over this article? After all, you can't trust anonymous sources.
Unless it's John Barron or David Dennison.
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While I don't think that pro-Trump officials orchestrated the op-ed, I do suspect that the claims made in this ridiculous, third-hand sourced piece are false and leaked by the Trump people.
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While I don't think that pro-Trump officials orchestrated the op-ed, I do suspect that the claims made in this ridiculous, third-hand sourced piece are false and leaked by the Trump people.
It's got a certain...shine...to it.
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Well, who watched the debate? No reactions yet??
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Well, who watched the debate? No reactions yet??
I'd almost rather listen to Trump speak that that insincere human shitsmear but I did see that Beto worked in a line from a song on London Calling, which is of course the official album of the Talk Zone.
So plainly Beto must in turn receive the Talk Zone's official endorsement.
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I'd almost rather listen to Trump speak that that insincere human shitsmear but I did see that Beto worked in a line from a song on London Calling, which is of course the official album of the Talk Zone.
So plainly Beto must in turn receive the Talk Zone's official endorsement.
Ooh I missed it. What did he say? “He who fucks nuns will later join the church?”
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Ooh I missed it. What did he say? “He who fucks nuns will later join the church?”
Taking off his turban they said is this man a Jew cause they're...
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i was thinking it might have been: When they kick at your front door, how you gonna come? With your hands on your head, or on the trigger of your gun?
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Won't make a damn bit of difference because AZ-4 is about as solidly Republican as you can get but an extraordinary political ad nevertherless:
All 6 siblings of Paul "I Can Read Body Language Because I'm a Dentist" Gosar endorse his Democratic opponent.
https://twitter.com/kylegriffin1/status/1043291345048223744
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I did see that Beto worked in a line from a song on London Calling, which is of course the official album of the Talk Zone.
Entirely appropriate, as the titular track is about the breathless exaggeration of every minor perceived threat.
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Won't make a damn bit of difference because AZ-4 is about as solidly Republican as you can get but an extraordinary political ad nevertherless:
All 6 siblings of Paul "I Can Read Body Language Because I'm a Dentist" Gosar endorse his Democratic opponent.
https://twitter.com/kylegriffin1/status/1043291345048223744
Republicans seem to nominate simply the worst human being they can find. To be honest, you have to be craven to choose to be associated with the Republican brand these days.
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Looks as if there might be another woman coming out. Kavanaugh denies it, although there are reportedly witnesses. However, it remains to be seen whether the Senate will actually try to gather facts.
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Is it me or is it starting to get a little rapey in here?
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it remains to be seen whether the Senate will actually try to gather facts.
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
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Looks as if there might be another woman coming out. Kavanaugh denies it, although there are reportedly witnesses. However, it remains to be seen whether the Senate will actually try to gather facts.
Part of the defense of Kavanaugh is was that there was on,y one and, apparently, rapists are either Cosby-prolific or not rapists at all. The presence of at least one more alleged victim starts to erode that. If As more women come forward, that defense dissolves and it starts to look like evidence to the contrary.
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Michael Avenatti claims to have a third victim as a client.
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Trump couldn't hold his shit in any longer and went after Dr. Ford this weekend. Lindsey Graham said that he'll give her a hearing but this isn't the sort of thing that's worth ruining Kavanaugh's life over. Sen. Grassley had to fire a press adviser because the guy had been fired from a previous job for sexual harassment...in 2017.
Ford is due to testify on Thursday. I do not know if the Republicans still plan on drafting in female attorney to handle their questioning, but either way the optics will be horrendous. Democrats plan to rely heavily on any of the number of female members they have on the committee to question Ford. Moreover, those same women, including the fearsome - and accomplished prosecutor - Sen. Harris, get to question Kavanaugh.
While his other accusers won't be called, I hope Democrats hammer Kavanaugh on, not just these accusations, but the fact that he's an admitted underage drinker and appears not to be able to control himself when under the influence. Is he the "Bart O'Kavanaugh" of Judge's memoir? How many times did he drink whilst underage? Does he still drink? Will he commit to staying sober whilst on the Supreme Court? How can he rule impartially on cases involving alcohol when he has such a chequered past with it? On and on and on.
Nail that smug fucker!
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Remember when we had about eleventy-one years of analysis over Sotamayor's comment that she's a good judge because she's a "wise Latina"? That was supposed to be, according to Republicans, disqualifying because it was reverse racism. Now they are backs to the wall defending Kavanaugh over this. I know that the 10% of their behavior that isn't pure projection is hypocrisy, but this is a stretch.
The bottom line is that they cannot investigate Kavanaugh over this because to do so would mean that it's an appropriate thing to do. That would leave them raw and exposed over their refusal to investigate the accusations against Trump. It all goes back to him. Everything Trump touches...dies.
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I can barely keep up with the Kavanaugh stuff. Has he ever come up with a plausible explanation for how his $100s of thousands of debt just disappeared?
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I can barely keep up with the Kavanaugh stuff. Has he ever come up with a plausible explanation for how his $100s of thousands of debt just disappeared?
Nope. He says he paid it off himself, which is simply impossible on a circa $200k judge's salary.
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Reports say Rosensein is going to resign (as opposed to re-sign). The Mueller investigation is going to be blown up in three...two...
One thing we will then find out is just how many sealed indictments and plea deals that Mueller has. He has used this tool of prosecutors a number of times and to great effect. He's not stupid enough to think that he wasn't going to have his plug pulled at any moment, so I'm sure he's set up everything to come out upon his demise.
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Reports say Rosensein is going to resign (as opposed to re-sign). The Mueller investigation is going to be blown up in three...two...
One thing we will then find out is just how many sealed indictments and plea deals that Mueller has. He has used this tool of prosecutors a number of times and to great effect. He's not stupid enough to think that he wasn't going to have his plug pulled at any moment, so I'm sure he's set up everything to come out upon his demise.
Reports now are that he is not resigning, but expects to be fired. Apparently being fired has impact on how Trump replaces him.
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I can barely keep up with the Kavanaugh stuff. Has he ever come up with a plausible explanation for how his $100s of thousands of debt just disappeared?
Nor has he explained the extent of his involvement in Memogate and why he lied under oath about it.
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Nor has he explained the extent of his involvement in Memogate and why he lied under oath about it.
Ditto the torture memos.
At least he never described himself as a "wise cracka".
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Reports now are that he is not resigning, but expects to be fired. Apparently being fired has impact on how Trump replaces him.
Isn't the deputy position simply an appointment, not Senate-confirmable?
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Isn't the deputy position simply an appointment, not Senate-confirmable?
It is, but if he is fired and replaced with a lackey who then fires Mueller then it's seen as more obstruction.
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It is, but if he is fired and replaced with a lackey who then fires Mueller then it's seen as more obstruction.
The problem here is that the overzealousness of the NYT has given Trump plausible deniability as far as the rationale for firing Rosenstein. He successor will, of course, fire Mueller, but any potential obstruction accusation is muted because Rosenstein was fired for non-Russia-related issues.
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The problem here is that the overzealousness of the NYT has given Trump plausible deniability as far as the rationale for firing Rosenstein. He successor will, of course, fire Mueller, but any potential obstruction accusation is muted because Rosenstein was fired for non-Russia-related issues.
That's an extremely shaky rationale but I get where you're coming from. Now it looks like he might be staying...for now.
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Kavanaugh is now in the cross-hairs of both Ronan Farrow and Michael Avenatti. Basically he's now a extra in an Alien vs. Predator movie.
Avenatti seems to have some really salacious stuff (https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/what-does-michael-avenatti-have-on-brett-kavanaugh-what-we-know-so-far/ar-AAAAhNE?li=BBnb7Kz), being the interpretation of entries in Kavanaugh's yearbook, including: guys lining up outside a bathroom to each take turns with a drunk girl; the "Devil's Triangle" being a threesome involving 2 guys and one girl; and "FFFFFFFourth of July” with the Fs standing for Find, French, Feel, Finger, Fuck and Forget.
The more we see of Kavanaugh's past, the more predatory he looks. Avenatti is a sleaze, but he's shown with his handling of Stormy Daniels' case that he is not one to bluff without having the goods in his back pocket, and he claims that his client has a strong resume, including the State Dept, U.S. Mint, & DOJ, and that she's had multiple security clearances.
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Kavanaugh victim #4 comes forward (https://mont.thesentinel.com/2018/09/24/supreme-court-nominee-kavanaugh-faces-more-allegations/).
I respectfully suggest that we need to start using the hashtag "K-Too".
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You know, the last time these craven, soulless, shameless fuckfaces nominated a sexual harasser to the Supreme Court all I remember is garden variety workplace harassment, not accusations of gang rape. Inexorable march of modernity and that, I guess.
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You know, the last time these craven, soulless, shameless fuckfaces nominated a sexual harasser to the Supreme Court all I remember is garden variety workplace harassment, not accusations of gang rape. Inexorable march of modernity and that, I guess.
That’s because the previous guy was black, and so hadn’t been invited to the gang rape keggers.
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Kavanaugh victim #4 comes forward (https://mont.thesentinel.com/2018/09/24/supreme-court-nominee-kavanaugh-faces-more-allegations/).
I respectfully suggest that we need to start using the hashtag "K-Too".
He makes me sick. Literally sick, because many times the girl/woman really isn't consenting because they are not in their full capacity. Yet, after the fact they feel it is their fault for being in that situation. I hate that anyone can excuse it.
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He makes me sick. Literally sick, because many times the girl/woman really isn't consenting because they are not in their full capacity. Yet, after the fact they feel it is their fault for being in that situation. I hate that anyone can excuse it.
It worse than that. These guys are accused of targeting a particular girl in a drinking game to make sure she gets properly drunk. That's premeditation.
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Looks like Rosenstein is insisting that Trump fire him personally, instead of via tweet or proxy, which is his M.O. (because he's a coward).
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It worse than that. These guys are accused of targeting a particular girl in a drinking game to make sure she gets properly drunk. That's premeditation.
He needs to be in jail. But his defense would be she was asking for it. Satan is waiting for him. I have no doubt his white-privileged ass is going to hell. But the way many Republicans treat women, he'll probably end up on the Supreme Court.
And honestly, has no one wondered if anyone woman he had consensual sex with had an abortion. I'd rather go to hell than have his kid.
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Open Letter from Women of Yale (https://medium.com/@yalewomenforwomen/open-letter-from-women-of-yale-in-support-of-deborah-ramirez-685bf4bb84f0) in Support of [Kavanaugh Accuser] Deborah Ramirez.
We are coming forward as women of Yale because we have a shared experience of the environment that shaped not only Judge Kavanaugh’s life and career, but our own. We are committed to supporting all women who have faced sexual assault, not only at Yale, but across the country.
It had over 900 signatures as of a couple of hours ago.
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And honestly, has no one wondered if anyone woman he had consensual sex with had an abortion. I'd rather go to hell than have his kid.
There is usually a nod to victims of rape, allowing that as an exception. But there should be a giant asterisk on it, because rape is rarely reported and almost never prosecuted. Also, you have 20 weeks in which to report, investigate, prosecute and obtain a conviction in order to be able to abort your forced pregnancy.
What, you thought they'd make the rape exception easy?
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In a robotic, 15 minute interview with Fox News, Kavanaugh repeated that he'd never sexually assaulted anyone 7 times and that he just wants a fair hearing (for who?) 17 times. In 15 minutes. I suspect the target audience was a few Republican senators, but I don't think he convinced anyone of anything other than he's a bit creepy. Dragging the silent wife along and then answering questions for her is not a good look either.
Speaking of Fox News, a new poll by them has the Republican party underwater as to whether people think they put the party or the country first. Ouch!
Michael Avenatti is grandstanding the shit out of his new client, but we know that he has yet to fail to deliver the goods. His client is going to come forward today or tomorrow, and appears to have some serious dirt to dish. He described her as a witness and victim, and she will bring with her some impressive-seeming credentials and a few corroborating witnesses.
At least one of the 65 women who knew Kavanaugh in high school and vouched for him has removed her name from the letter. It appears that Kavanaugh's buddies had a "Renate Alumni" which they put all over the yearbook, referring to all of the doods who had - or claimed to have had - a good time with Renate. She only found out about it when it came out in the press (which was after she signed the letter) and now she's rightly pissed.
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In a robotic, 15 minute interview with Fox News, Kavanaugh repeated that he'd never sexually assaulted anyone 7 times and that he just wants a fair hearing (for who?) 17 times. In 15 minutes. I suspect the target audience was a few Republican senators, but I don't think he convinced anyone of anything other than he's a bit creepy. Dragging the silent wife along and then answering questions for her is not a good look either.
Speaking of Fox News, a new poll by them has the Republican party underwater as to whether people think they put the party or the country first. Ouch!
Michael Avenatti is grandstanding the shit out of his new client, but we know that he has yet to fail to deliver the goods. His client is going to come forward today or tomorrow, and appears to have some serious dirt to dish. He described her as a witness and victim, and she will bring with her some impressive-seeming credentials and a few corroborating witnesses.
At least one of the 65 women who knew Kavanaugh in high school and vouched for him has removed her name from the letter. It appears that Kavanaugh's buddies had a "Renate Alumni" which they put all over the yearbook, referring to all of the doods who had - or claimed to have had - a good time with Renate. She only found out about it when it came out in the press (which was after she signed the letter) and now she's rightly pissed.
He also claimed in his interview that nobody under 18 drank alcohol at these high school parties and that he's never been blacked out drunk, which are ludicrous claims. If you are lying about the inconsequential stuff (along with "no president has ever conducted a more thorough search for a supreme court nominee" ) it's hard to take you seriously on the important stuff. Especially on top of lying under oath about his involvement is a major ethical scandal.
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He also claimed in his interview that nobody under 18 drank alcohol at these high school parties and that he's never been blacked out drunk, which are ludicrous claims. If you are lying about the inconsequential stuff (along with "no president has ever conducted a more thorough search for a supreme court nominee" ) it's hard to take you seriously on the important stuff. Especially on top of lying under oath about his involvement is a major ethical scandal.
Yeah, the "under 18" clause screamed of a man who is lying about the small stuff.
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Yeah, the "under 18" clause screamed of a man who is lying about the small stuff.
Right. In a high school "drowning in booze", Kavanaugh waited until he was 18 before getting drunk for the balance of his education. He handed Kamela Harris et al a couple of new lines of questioning just from that interview.
One interesting tidbit, Neil Gorsuch went to the same Prep school as Kavanaugh and Judge. Apparently he managed to navigate this time without becoming famed for being a blackout drunk, raping anyone or writing about it all over his yearbook. Kida debunks the "boys will be boys" defense.
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I love Trevor Noah. https://youtu.be/zuudCxw1GdQ
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I love Trevor Noah. https://youtu.be/zuudCxw1GdQ
That's awesome. The focus group was a horror show.
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Delegates at the UN General Assembly - i.e. other world leaders - laughed out loud at Trump today.
That is all.
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Delegates at the UN General Assembly - i.e. other world leaders - laughed out loud at Trump today.
That is all.
Remember when Trump and his idiot followers that electing trump would make the world “Respect the USA again.”
Morons
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Delegates at the UN General Assembly - i.e. other world leaders - laughed out loud at Trump today.
That is all.
With all due respect, double fuck the UN. I'd cut their subsidies and kick those socialists out of the country. We don't need them.
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With all due respect, double fuck the UN. I'd cut their subsidies and kick those socialists out of the country. We don't need them.
Those were the leaders of other countries. Remember when Trump said everyone was laughing at us (they weren’t) and that with him as president they would stop (they just started)?
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With all due respect, double fuck the UN. I'd cut their subsidies and kick those socialists out of the country. We don't need them.
You are terrifyingly clueless.
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Making th USA, an actual laughingstock, to own the libs.
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One for every occasion....
https://twitter.com/realdonaldtrump/status/498008486551506945?s=21
Respect!
What a fucking dumbass our President is.
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One for every occasion....
https://twitter.com/realdonaldtrump/status/498008486551506945?s=21
Respect!
What a fucking dumbass our President is.
Proving yet again that there’s a Trump tweet upon which he hoists himself for every occasion.
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With all due respect, double fuck the UN. I'd cut their subsidies and kick those socialists out of the country. We don't need them.
It's funny that you only showed up because of the UN boogeyman
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It's funny that you only showed up because of the UN boogeyman
No shit. And at this point he has to be trolling. Why start with that “all due respect” bullshit otherwise?
Mr. Happy, you have a very admirable life story. I’ve read it here. I also know this thread appears to be an echo chamber but damn dude. Just respond from you... not regurgitated nonsense. I’m positive you know better and have some thoughtful commentary. I really do think that’s what people would like in this thread.
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No shit. And at this point he has to be trolling. Why start with that “all due respect” bullshit otherwise?
Mr. Happy, you have a very admirable life story. I’ve read it here. I also know this thread appears to be an echo chamber but damn dude. Just respond from you... not regurgitated nonsense. I’m positive you know better and have some thoughtful commentary. I really do think that’s what people would like in this thread.
His Facebook posts aren’t really much different from what he posts here. Last week he reposted the widely debunked meme listing a bunch of falsehoods about Blasey Ford in an attempt to discredit her. It’s no troll job.
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FYI, Maryland raised the drinking age from 18 to 21 before Brett Kavanaugh turned 18. So, in his admitted and alleged (and corroborated) stories of drinking at high school and during his early college career, he was drinking illegally.
In the grand scheme of things, underage drinking is nothing to get crazy about. However, the fact that he lies about the small things, the easily debunked things, impeaches his credibility about the big things.
No president has ever consulted more widely, or talked with more people from more backgrounds, to seek input about a Supreme Court nomination.
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In the grand scheme of things, underage drinking is nothing to get crazy about. However, the fact that he lies about the small things, the easily debunked things, impeaches his credibility about the big things.
Even his college buddies are calling bullshit on this. I guess the choir boy shtick was too much for them. I wonder if they also are saying: "maybe he really did do these other things."
It's fascinating that he is so bold/stupid/arrogant (not sure what is the right descriptor) to even try this tactic. I guess he and his handlers are trapped in the Trump universe where inhabitants don't believe in the power of truth and facts.
Anyways, fuck this lying piece of shit and all the enablers who seem content inhabiting such a world.
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Even his college buddies are calling bullshit on this. I guess the choir boy shtick was too much for them. I wonder if they also are saying: "maybe he really did do these other things."
Kavanaugh's freshmen college roommate is on the record that Kavanaugh was frequently incoherently drunk and that he and the guys he ran with were absolutely capable of doing the things that Ms Ramirez has alleged.
It's fascinating that he is so bold/stupid/arrogant (not sure what is the right descriptor) to even try this tactic. I guess he and his handlers are trapped in the Trump universe where inhabitants don't believe in the power of truth and facts.
Anyways, fuck this lying piece of shit and all the enablers who seem content inhabiting such a world.
You die with the lie.
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Not losing one's virginity until "many years" after high school / college does not make it less likely that one would be a sex pest...
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Four corroborators of Dr. Ford - i.e. people who she told of Kavanaugh's attack long before he was nominated to the Supreme Court - have presented sworn affidavits, under penalty of perjury, as to what they were told by Ford and when.
Brett Kavanaugh has offered up his fridge calendar, while Mark Judge is hiding out at a friend's beach house.
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"BOOOOOOOOOOM (https://twitter.com/MichaelAvenatti/status/1044960428730843136)."
--The Dynamite
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"BOOOOOOOOOOM (https://twitter.com/MichaelAvenatti/status/1044960428730843136)."
--The Dynamite
That's horrific.
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"BOOOOOOOOOOM (https://twitter.com/MichaelAvenatti/status/1044960428730843136)."
--The Dynamite
He and his friends deserve to go to jail. That is not a "boys will be boys" thing. That is premeditated rape. Fuck them all.
And those Republicans will probably confirm him. It truly makes me want to cry.
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Reminder: there is no statute of limitations for rape, or attempt thereat, in Maryland.
I completely understand the reticence to do so, but I sincerely hope that one or more of Kavanaugh's victims file a criminal complaint.
I am sick to my stomach.
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And now Trump's lawyer is hanging around white nationalists. There is no shame anymore. This is just the norm.
https://www.thedailybeast.com/rudy-giuliani-photographed-with-white-nationalist-mayoral-candidate
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And now Trump's lawyer is hanging around white nationalists. There is no shame anymore. This is just the norm.
https://www.thedailybeast.com/rudy-giuliani-photographed-with-white-nationalist-mayoral-candidate
The difference between Trump and Kavanaugh, is that there's a term limit to Trump's presidency. Kavanaugh, like herpes, is for life.
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Grassley released a statement to say the committee lawyers are looking at the declaration. What they do now is very, very important.
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Trump's comments this morning - that he would have preferred less scrutiny of Kavanaugh's background, and that this process should have been completed before now - didn't age well.
Also today, without even a whiff of evidence, Trump accused China of election meddling. #NoPuppet
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Brett Kavanaugh's (female) lawyer is on TV right now, with a new line of defense: there is soooooo much stuff here that it can't be true because it would've come out before now. #smh
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Brett Kavanaugh's (female) lawyer is on TV right now, with a new line of defense: there is soooooo much stuff here that it can't be true because it would've come out before now. #smh
I was anticipating this today. I was thinking, What a bunch of incompetent douchebags to foist someone with this much baggage on the American people.
Administrations used to be careful to put forward carefully vetted candidates, back when shame was.
Naturally, I thought, rather than take any blame for opportunistically advancing a probable dirtbag to a lifetime appointment of mindbending importance, they'll lay at conspiracy's feet what belongs to dicksteppery, thus affirming their supporters' all-corroding cynicism.
And to think they could've nominated a conservative Merrick Garland and owned--virtually without drama--the highest court in the land for thirty years.
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And to think they could've nominated a conservative Merrick Garland and owned--virtually without drama--the highest court in the land for thirty years.
They still will even if they ditch Kavanaugh, which is the weirdest part of this whole saga. Why are they so insistent on elevating this asshole?
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And to think they could've nominated a conservative Merrick Garland and owned--virtually without drama--the highest court in the land for thirty years.
There's a conspiracy theory - that requires excessive amounts of pro-active thinking and discretion on the part of the protagonists, so I do not subscribe to it - that has the insistence on the nominee being Kavanaugh all wrapped up in Justice Kennedy's son's work for Trump at Deutsche Bank. The only thing this would help explain is Kavanaugh's disappearing credit card debts and mortgage, but it still requires competence to pull off so - like the 9/11 truthers - it dies on that hill.
Kavanaugh is the guy because (1) sex pests flock together (Kavanaugh used to work for a judge ousted for sexual harassment); and (b) he was added to the Heritage Foundation's original list of potentials because of his overt statements about presidents being free from legal botheration while in office*. Republicans will keep trying, and may very well be successful, in ramming him through because they are most definitely Trump's party now.
* He is never going to leave office willingly. He will concoct some excuse to cancel the 2020 election or set aside a losing result; he will ignore a Democratic House and/or Senate and all the courts, and this Supreme Court will let him do it. Who is going to compel him to testify, let alone leave the White House? The military? He has joked about being president for life, but he's a humorless fucker, so it's just him saying the quiet part aloud as usual.
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His Facebook posts aren’t really much different from what he posts here. Last week he reposted the widely debunked meme listing a bunch of falsehoods about Blasey Ford in an attempt to discredit her. It’s no troll job.
Look, he's been down in his bunker, preparing for the imminent civil war. He just came out long enough to catch up with this thread and offer his wizened opinions.
Give the man a break.
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They still will even if they ditch Kavanaugh, which is the weirdest part of this whole saga. Why are they so insistent on elevating this asshole?
Agreed. It warms my heart that they are apparently deeply concerned about losing their senate majority, but wouldn't they have time now (especially seeing that they have already jettisoned all their inconvenient shame) to retract him and nominate someone else, even if they have to lame duck the fucker in?
I don't subscribe to all of Limey's speculations by any means (I don't think Handsy overstays his official welcome in D.C., for instance) but the insistence on O'Kavanaugh as a buffer against impeachment increasingly appears decisive.
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Agreed. It warms my heart that they are apparently deeply concerned about losing their senate majority, but wouldn't they have time now (especially seeing that they have already jettisoned all their inconvenient shame) to retract him and nominate someone else, even if they have to lame duck the fucker in?
I don't subscribe to all of Limey's speculations by any means (I don't think Handsy overstays his official welcome in D.C., for instance) but the insistence on O'Kavanaugh as a buffer against impeachment increasingly appears decisive.
Kavanaugh has lied under oath; the proof is plentiful and solid. If Democrats can take back the House, they can impeach him; upon which it would fall to the Senate to try him, something for which I understand there to be few rules governing the process (they can slow walk it forever, for one). He isn't certain to see out his lifetime appointment, and there's always the chance that he gets found guilty in a criminal proceeding.
They could drop him and bring forward another nominee. They could run that nominee through the process and get him/her confirmed in the lame duck session, perhaps even before the mid-terms. This is ALL about backstopping Trump with the Supreme Court.
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Give the man a break.
No.
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This is ALL about backstopping Trump with the Supreme Court.
I don't doubt that Kavanaugh holds an extreme judicial view on Presidential powers, or at least he does these days. However, I've never heard that the other four conservatives on the Court hold a similar view. So, without knowing for certain whether the others hold this view, I don't understand why they would go to the mat to lose 8-1 or 7-2 or something on cases involving Trump. There has to be a more persuasive explanation.
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I don't doubt that Kavanaugh holds an extreme judicial view on Presidential powers, or at least he does these days. However, I've never heard that the other four conservatives on the Court hold a similar view. So, without knowing for certain whether the others hold this view, I don't understand why they would go to the mat to lose 8-1 or 7-2 or something on cases involving Trump. There has to be a more persuasive explanation.
Republicans are losing the numbers game as the country gets younger and less white. There are 75 million millennials in the U.S. - they can out-vote every other demographic if they choose to. So, faced with the inevitable, they have been gaming the system for years now to hold on to power. Stacking the courts is one part of that strategy - it gave us the Bush presidency, after all - and they have been confirming lifetime appointments at breathtaking speed since Trump got in. It's basically the only thing they've been doing. They have been picking young candidates particularly.
They're going to lose election after election (they got two presidents who lost the popular vote, don't forget), but conservative judges on the appeals courts and on SCOTUS will keep a conservative thumb on the scale for a generation and keep ruling for business and against people to keep the money flowing up.
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Never mind. I misunderstood. I though your "backstopping Trump" comment meant that Kavanaugh's particular appeal and staying power during all this is his view that presidents are untouchable.
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Never mind. I misunderstood. I though your "backstopping Trump" comment meant that Kavanaugh's particular appeal and staying power during all this is his view that presidents are untouchable.
Oh, no, that's why I think it's Kavanaugh and not any one of the demonstrably more conservative judges on Heritage's list. But we are going to have a 5-4 conservative majority for a decade at least, with a majority that will turn itself into a pretzel to be pro-business (e.g. Citizens United).
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Naturally, I thought, rather than take any blame for opportunistically advancing a probable dirtbag to a lifetime appointment of mindbending importance, they'll lay at conspiracy's feet what belongs to dicksteppery, thus affirming their supporters' all-corroding cynicism.
The above paragraph deserves additional commendation to the reader.
Also, I enjoy being lectured on the evils of the UN by a fuckwit who does not own a passport.
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Oh, no, that's why I think it's Kavanaugh and not any one of the demonstrably more conservative judges on Heritage's list. But we are going to have a 5-4 conservative majority for a decade at least, with a majority that will turn itself into a pretzel to be pro-business (e.g. Citizens United).
Federalist Society, not Heritage.
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Federalist Society, not Heritage.
Thank you.
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The above paragraph deserves additional commendation to the reader.
Also, I enjoy being lectured on the evils of the UN by a fuckwit who does not own a passport.
What in the wide world of sports does not having a passport have to do with one's ability to see the UN for what it is: an anti-Semitic, jealous group of socialists who are constantly trying to get our money and our sovreignty. At its inception, given the nature of the world at that point, the UN made sense. But not anymore. Most of the member countries are lawless hamlets anyway and aren't worth saving. I love it that President Trump and Ambassador Haley are giving them all of the shit that they've deserved for years.
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And then there were 4.
He got drunk, grabbed a woman - in front of her friends and her daughter - pushed her up against a wall a tried to dry hump her. No pattern here...
This was in 1998 while he was working on the Starr investigation. No irony here...
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What in the wide world of sports does not having a passport have to do with one's ability to see the UN for what it is: an anti-Semitic, jealous group of socialists who are constantly trying to get our money and our sovreignty. At its inception, given the nature of the world at that point, the UN made sense. But not anymore. Most of the member countries are lawless hamlets anyway and aren't worth saving. I love it that President Trump and Ambassador Haley are giving them all of the shit that they've deserved for years.
You forgot to say that they’re trying to steal our essence.
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You forgot to say that they’re trying to steal our essence.
Sap and impurify all of our precious bodily fluids?
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What in the wide world of sports does not having a passport have to do with one's ability to see the UN for what it is: an anti-Semitic, jealous group of socialists who are constantly trying to get our money and our sovreignty. At its inception, given the nature of the world at that point, the UN made sense. But not anymore. Most of the member countries are lawless hamlets anyway and aren't worth saving. I love it that President Trump and Ambassador Haley are giving them all of the shit that they've deserved for years.
As I initially read this I didn’t look at the person posting and I was actually chuckling as I thought the poster had a pretty good sense of humor....
damn dude... whoa. Lots to unpack there.
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Just a fun fact for today:
Bush Jr. lost the popular vote (and the actual vote), but won the electoral college. He put Roberts and Alito on the Supreme Court.
Trump lost the popular vote, but won the electoral college. He put Gorsuch on the Supreme Court and now will put Kavanaugh or someone else on there too.
That's 4 of the 9 put on the court by presidents rejected by the majority of voters. #democracy
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Just a fun fact for today:
Bush Jr. lost the popular vote (and the actual vote), but won the electoral college. He put Roberts and Alito on the Supreme Court.
Trump lost the popular vote, but won the electoral college. He put Gorsuch on the Supreme Court and now will put Kavanaugh or someone else on there too.
That's 4 of the 9 put on the court by presidents rejected by the majority of voters. #democracy
Not that it matters, but Alito and Roberts were appointed during Bush's second term, for which he won the popular vote.
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aren't worth saving.
sort of like drug addicts and rapists?
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Not that it matters, but Alito and Roberts were appointed during Bush's second term, for which he won the popular vote.
True. But he doesn't get to run in 2004 if he doesn't "win" in 2000. Incumbent presidents are typically hard to unseat, and President Gore would have got the 9/11 bump that Bush got.
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Grassley opens by equating Ford's experience to Kavanaugh's.
And moves on to "lament" that these charges weren't brought up before now. [Dr. Ford checked her notes on that one]
Dick.
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I'm amazed at how weak men can be.
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I'm amazed at how weak men can be.
50-year old men coming forward about sexual assault by Catholic priests: heroes
50-year old women coming forward about sexual assault by Catholic schoolboys: liars
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Grassley has already pissed me off. He's not even attempting to be fair. Kavanaugh receiving death threats, it's all a secret plot by Feinstein, inappropriate sexual conduct, defending not calling witnesses, etc.
He's basically telling Ford to fuck off before she even speaks.
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Grassley is a bumbling old fool. This is embarrassing already. He can't even get his attacks on Ford out without stumbling over his written notes.
Bottom line: maybe Kavanaugh did this, maybe he didn't, but the Democrats are at fault and so we shouldn't be doing this. W...T...F?
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Grassley has already pissed me off. He's not even attempting to be fair. Kavanaugh receiving death threats, it's all a secret plot by Feinstein, inappropriate sexual conduct, defending not calling witnesses, etc.
He's basically telling Ford to fuck off before she even speaks.
He has already torpedoed the strategy of bringing in a woman to do his questioning.
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Dr. Ford is basically the smartest person in the room.
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Dr. Ford is basically the smartest person in the room.
She's pretty much the only woman in the room.
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She's pretty much the only woman in the room.
Four very smart, accomplished women on the Democratic side but, yes, it's pathetic how every room in Washington and most boardrooms in America are extreme sausage fests.
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Feinstein beating Grassley at his own game. She certainly wins in the game of having all of one's marbles.
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Feinstein beating Grassley at his own game. She certainly wins in the game of having all of one's marbles.
Agreed, Lahey, Grassley, and Hatch, all seem like feeble old men struggling to maintain a coherent thought.
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Dr. Ford is my new hero. I do not think a lot of people realize how hard it is to put a traumatic event in ones live out in the open for the whole world to judge.
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Dr. Ford is my new hero. I do not think a lot of people realize how hard it is to put a traumatic event in ones live out in the open for the whole world to judge.
This is heartbreaking.
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Ford is jamming Grassley's conspiracy theories farther and farther up his incontinent old backside.
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This is heartbreaking.
Yes it is. And so it was for Kathleen Willey, Jaunita Broaddrick, Paula Jones, and Leslie Milwee.
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Dr. Ford is my new hero. I do not think a lot of people realize how hard it is to put a traumatic event in ones live out in the open for the whole world to judge.
It's amazing the amount of grace she is able to muster under this environment.
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Yes it is. And so it was for Kathleen Willey, Jaunita Broaddrick, Paula Jones, and Leslie Milwee.
Correct. We haven't improved how we handle accusations of sexual assault. This process is putting that sad fact in stark relief.
ETA: Bill Cosby's reputation was sterling and unimpeachable for decades. He's in jail right now. Weinstein may join him.
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FTR, Grassley's ridiculous format of 5 minute windows for each Senator - all of which on the Republican side are being deferred to their pinch-vagina - got blown up during the very first 5-minute window. Grassley's own window.
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FTR, Grassley's ridiculous format of 5 minute windows for each Senator - all of which on the Republican side are being deferred to their pinch-vagina - got blown up during the very first 5-minute window. Grassley's own window.
Do they normally bounce from majority to minority sides in these hearings?
I think the 5 minute increments were a condition requested by Dr. Ford's attorneys.
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Do they normally bounce from majority to minority sides in these hearings?
I think the 5 minute increments were a condition requested by Dr. Ford's attorneys.
The hearings I have seen, they do bounce from one side to the other. The majority gets an extra go by dint of having an extra committee member.
My understanding is that the 5-minute format was the structure imposed by the Republican majority.
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Grassley ranting about the timeline again. Also, there are too many states.
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I don't see how the Republicans on the Judicial Committee can think this is going well and that having Kavanaugh deny that it happened for an hour will go any better.
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I don't see how the Republicans on the Judicial Committee can think this is going well and that having Kavanaugh deny that it happened for an hour will go any better.
I'm hoping/expecting that the Democrats ask him once and let him deny it once, and then hammer him on everything that disqualifies him, including lying under oath and having a mystery benefactor pay off his mortgage and credit cards debts.
How Mitchell is going to drag out 55 minutes of questioning of Kavanaugh is going to be interesting to watch. Maybe they have more Google maps for him to narrate.
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Grassley is more interested in defending his own handling of this debacle, than hearing from Ford.
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Ford is sooooooooooo much smarter than Mitchell.
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Mitchell is walking on eggshells and nibbling around the edges. She hasn't made a single dent or mark on the core allegation.
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The fear of flying part was pretty weak on Mitchell's end. You can be afraid of flying and still put on your big boy/girl pants and do it when you have to.
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The fear of flying part was pretty weak on Mitchell's end. You can be afraid of flying and still put on your big boy/girl pants and do it when you have to.
Seriously. WTF was that about? She lied about not wanting to fly so she lied about Kavanaugh?
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Klobuchar is on to a very important point: Ford came forward to her US Representative once Kavanaugh hit a short list. She wanted to let them know that they should pass him over and thus avoid everything that's happening now. That started the ball rolling and she only decided to come forward once she'd been outed by leaks from Washington.
It's worth noting that people started snooping around her private life within hours of Feinstein naming her to her Republican counterparts. Maybe that's a coincidence...
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The fear of flying part was pretty weak on Mitchell's end. You can be afraid of flying and still put on your big boy/girl pants and do it when you have to.
They're trying to wrap up the conspiracy of delay, delay, delay. It's the only defense they have.
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The whole acceptance of the polygraph was a joke and Grassley sounded like a condescending ass. Like he cares what gets entered into the record.
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They're trying to wrap up the conspiracy of delay, delay, delay. It's the only defense they have.
Which is amazing considering what they did (or didn't do) to Merrick Garland.
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Klobuchar is on to a very important point: Ford came forward to her US Representative once Kavanaugh hit a short list. She wanted to let them know that they should pass him over and thus avoid everything that's happening now.
She kind of got fucked over figuratively by her US Rep and the WP not reacting in a timely manner. So much irony.
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Which is amazing considering what they did (or didn't do) to Merrick Garland.
It's typically amazing.
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She kind of got fucked over figuratively by her US Rep and the WP not reacting in a timely manner. So much irony.
Coons now nailing home that timeline after Mitchell spent 5 minutes, basically, impugning her Rep and the WP for not reacting faster. Not sure if Mitchell has a point to make or if she's just running out the clock. It's pretty clear that they cannot go after her core accusation, because they didn't do an investigation so they have nothing to challenge Ford with.
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Ford is sooooooooooo much smarter than Mitchell.
One is a scientist. The other is a decider.
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The whole acceptance of the polygraph was a joke and Grassley sounded like a condescending ass. Like he cares what gets entered into the record.
Yep. And he got called on it but shame is something in short supply amongst Republicans these days.
FTR, I think polygraphs are junk science, their used in law enforcement as an interview tool and they are not admissible in court.
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Blumnethal debagging Lyndsey Graham on live TV.
ETA: then he planted a boot squarely on Trump's smaller-than-average, misshapen cock.
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Mitchell is all over the polygraph. I can see no point to this, other than to suggest that she was coached in "countermeasures" (which Ford shot down).
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I've only been able to catch bits and pieces, but is there some discernible narrative arising from the pinch hitter's questions?
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I've only been able to catch bits and pieces, but is there some discernible narrative arising from the pinch hitter's questions?
They're pounding at her recollections, timelines and insinuating deception and delay but nothing seems to take hold. The 5-minute framework is not working at all.
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I've only been able to catch bits and pieces, but is there some discernible narrative arising from the pinch hitter's questions?
Not that I can see. She is nibbling at peripheral things, perhaps trying to catch Ford in a lie. Mitchell was brought in at the last minute and sent out there with no data from an investigation, cannot berate the witness, and is trying to strike her out by lobbing softballs. It's embarrassing.
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From VF correspondent Gabriel Sherman:
Trump telling people he’s furious that WH aides didn’t have advance knowledge of how credible Ford would seem, per 2nd source
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
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Not that I can see. She is nibbling at peripheral things, perhaps trying to catch Ford in a lie. Mitchell was brought in at the last minute and sent out there with no data from an investigation, cannot berate the witness, and is trying to strike her out by lobbing softballs. It's embarrassing.
This is why baseball teaches you life lessons. Only lefties can thrive with soft tossing.
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
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From VF correspondent Gabriel Sherman:
Trump telling people he’s furious that WH aides didn’t have advance knowledge of how credible Ford would seem, per 2nd source
If only the Federal government had a bureau of people who are really good at investigating things...
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This is why baseball teaches you life lessons. Only lefties can thrive with soft tossing.
That is awesome!
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From VF correspondent Gabriel Sherman:
Trump telling people he’s furious that WH aides didn’t have advance knowledge of how credible Ford would seem, per 2nd source
I'm sure Kavanaugh has been vomiting into a bucket most of the day.
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I'm sure Kavanaugh has been vomiting into a bucket most of the day.
He's drunk already?
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He's drunk already?
Fantastic!
You and The Onion are on the same page today (https://politics.theonion.com/kavanaugh-scores-keg-for-christine-blasey-ford-testimon-1829348970).
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Lyndsey Graham just put his head down - literally and figuratively - and told a scrum (or maul) of reporters that he's going to vote for Kavanaugh tomorrow. I guess when McCain died, he took Graham's spine to the grave with him.
ETA: His entire justification was the timeline. It seems that's the hill their going to die on.
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As an aside, watching this 1 hour and 55 minutes of questioning crawling towards its 4th hour, I will never bitch about the last 2 minutes of an NBA game ever again.
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On Fox News, Bret Baier says hearing from Blasey Ford "is a totally different thing" than reading her allegations.
Chris Wallace: "This was extremely emotional, extremely raw, and extremely credible... This is a disaster for the Republicans."
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As they set back up after the break, I saw a wide shot of the room. Does anyone else find the optics of Mitchell having a tiny desk below the elevated position of her male overlords not a little ridiculous?
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Every time time I tune in, the prosecutor is flailing: focusing on who is going to pay for the polygraph, like it is some important revelation? WTF
Dr. Ford's responses all seem genuine, like an average citizen would, all while responding to apparently inane probing.
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This is why baseball teaches you life lessons. Only lefties can thrive with soft tossing.
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
Well done.
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ETA: His entire justification was the timeline. It seems that's the hill their going to die on.
"The Conscience of the Republican Party" (or lack thereof) indeed.
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Holy shit! Free lawyers!! She's lying!!
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I'm really liking her attorneys.
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Kavanaugh forgot to rape her at other parties they attended = innocent.
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Kavanaugh forgot to rape her at other parties they attended = innocent.
He was probably busy raping others.
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He was probably busy raping others.
Good point.
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Kamela Harris has my vote for president. Not least because all those people who lost their minds over a black man being president, will likely go a leap off a cliff.
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Ms. Mitchell seems to be asking questions which make me think she thinks the FBI should have interviewed her.
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Mitchell is shitting on Grassley’s hearing protocol as a way to impugn Ford’s testimony. That’s some bold horseshit right there.
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She seems to be covering ass, as to the committee not getting Dr. Ford to not fall apart.
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What a shit show.
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Cornyn accusing Democrats of being political and not asking questions. It’s only halftime, doucebag.
Graham is pricking on about the flights and the polygraph. He feels “ambushed”. Can a human being be really this unaware?!
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O...M...G
Lyndsey Graham just went full Trump.
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O...M...G
Lyndsey Graham just went full Trump.
That was unbelievable.
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Graham is pricking on about the flights and the polygraph. He feels “ambushed”. Can a human being be really this unaware?!
Graham is off the rails. Breathlessly desperate.
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Graham is off the rails. Breathlessly desperate.
We will get destroyed. And we will deserve it. (https://twitter.com/lindseygrahamsc/status/727604522156228608?lang=en)
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That was unbelievable.
What did he say? I'm watching the WaPo online stream.
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What did he say? I'm watching the WaPo online stream.
https://twitter.com/MSNBC/status/1045380443263184898
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That was unbelievable.
Not knowing certain facts as a rationale for not investigating is just the most insulting bullshit I’ve ever heard.
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Graham also threatened that Republicans will make false accusations against Democratic nominees in the future.
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What did he say? I'm watching the WaPo online stream.
You need to look it up online as there’s no way - like a Trump rant - to do it justice or even be able to reduce it to writing. He was spluttering nonsensical arguments as to why he’s not moved to change his mind. He didn’t jam his fingers in his ears and stomp his feet, but he was one degree short of that.
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Graham also threatened that Republicans will make false accusations against Democratic nominees in the future.
As with everything else, it was 100% projection. He was furious that Democrats might reap the reward of pre-election shenanigans. Really?
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https://twitter.com/MSNBC/status/1045380443263184898
Good God.
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Steeling myself to watch the Republicans running interference for Kavanaugh.
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Why is he yelling?
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Judge Ann Elk breaks out with a lie right from the go. “This is my statement that I wrote by myself with no help from anyone.” Even if true (it isn’t) why does it matter?
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Why is he yelling?
Trump wants him to be angry.
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Trump wants him to be angry.
Just this statement shows he's unfit for the Supreme Court.
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I didn't watch any of Kavanaugh's confirmation hearings until today. Dude talks like a politician.
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He's going to withdraw.
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Just this statement shows he's unfit for the Supreme Court.
This statement (all in his own words) is just the same Republican talking points that it’s a Democratic tactic. He’s wagging his junk in the faces of the Democrats in the committee.
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Jesus. He's derailed.
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A Clinton revenge reference. Nice.
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Good name built up over the years? Seriously, he must know that we know some of his history.
The man who gleefully participated in Starr's investigation "fears for our future." Really?
Dude, just say "I might be an asshole, but I didn't do this."
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I didn't watch any of Kavanaugh's confirmation hearings until today. Dude talks like a politician.
He’s a Republican operative who happens to have been elevated to the DC court after a 3-year confirmation process.
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A Clinton revenge reference. Nice.
I’m waiting for one of the Democrats to hit him with the questions he wanted to ask Clinton when he worked on Ken Starr’s team.
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OK, tears. I can't believe what I am seeing.
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Jesus. He's derailed.
...and is now in the ditch.
He won’t be able to keep this up.
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Is the whole argument that he's too famous to have gotten away with predatory behavior this long?
If so, Bill Cosby would like a word...
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Jeez...with the fucking tears. What a putz!
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Crying about Calendars?
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Crying about Calendars?
And football teams(?).
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Advisers to Ford: "Do your best not to cry."
Advisers to Kavanaugh: "CRY LIKE A BABY!"
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Trump doesn’t like crybabies.
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Advisers to Ford: "Do your best not to cry."
Advisers to Kavanaugh: "CRY LIKE A BABY!"
Advisers to Ford "Stay calm. Don't get over emotional."
Advisers to Kavanuagh "FLIP THE FUCK OUT!"
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"I'm not going to sit here and let you bad-mouth BEER!"
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Could any unbiased person think that this is going well? He has been a disaster.
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Wait, the Renate yearbook reference is just about being in the "friendship club," but you're sorry you put it in the yearbook?
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"I'm not going to sit here and let you bad-mouth BEER!"
Beer <> Rapist. Got it.
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Jeez, how embarrassing is this? I'm not sure even the Reps know what to think.
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Could any unbiased person think that this is going well? He has been a disaster.
He does not appear to have the emotional detachment to be a little league umpire, let alone a Supreme Court justice.
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Jeez, how embarrassing is this? I'm not sure even the Reps know what to think.
He's sobbing through this whole thing. It's bizarre.
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He's sobbing through this whole thing. It's bizarre.
He’s a guy watching his entire world burning in front of his eyes.
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He sounds so much like a Bro right now. *FIST BUMP*
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From Twitter: For someone crying this much he hasn't wiped away one tear.
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Opening statement approaching 40 minutes by my count.
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An accused sexual predator - and former clerk to the most rampant sexual harasser is DC court history - boasting about surrounding yourself with women is not necessarily exculpatory.
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Opening statement approaching 40 minutes by my count.
He passed protesting too much about 20 minutes ago.
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Trump hates displays of masculine weakness. He's done.
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Mark Judge; great guy; barely knew him.
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Trump hates displays of masculine weakness. He's done.
Yeah. He will have been smashing furniture over that display.
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Wow. This guy is fucked.
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Feinstein hits him up with his failure to want an FBI investigation. He demurred to the committee and then went on a further unhinged rant about his reputation.
Feinstein redirected; Kavanaugh spouts talking points.
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Wow. This guy is fucked.
Whiny little bitch.
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OMG.
Unhinged.
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God, if he's not the epitome of elite entitlement not getting his way, I don't know what is.
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He’s lying about the legal drinking age; they upped it to 21 before he was ever legal.
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He is now tripping over Mitchell’s softballs.
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We are witnessing an epic meltdown. No way in hell this guy sniffs the Supreme Court.
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He is now tripping over Mitchell’s softballs.
He's awful. The Dems should just pass their time over to the pinch hitter.
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We are witnessing an epic meltdown. No way in hell this guy sniffs the Supreme Court.
It's not quite the judicial temperament one expects from a supreme court justice.
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Mrs Banedoodle: “He basically just said If I can’t drink beer I don’t want this stupid job. And i’m like, Hey, me too, man!”
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The "Renata Alumnus" thing is ridiculous. Who would believe it was supposed to be complimentary, but the lady never knew about it until this month and was mortified and horrified at seeing it.
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Is it too soon to crack a beer and pour some out in honor of Kavanaugh’s career?
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Now we know why it’s 5 minute intervals. He wouldn’t last any longer than that with any adversarial questioning.
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He is filibustering, and Grassley is letting it happen.
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This martyr role is fucking annoying; it's also a tell, to me at least, that he's afraid to address the questions.
He has three modes, crying, whining or lying.
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His yearbook profile is the yearbook editor's fault, not his.
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I missed all of this because of a meeting? Ugh!!!!!!!!!
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There is no fucking way on this good green earth that this testimony is not coordinated. She is walking him through his defense.
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This is all so disgusting. Grassley in particular.
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Grassley on his white horse again.
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Grassley might just keel over in the middle of his incoherent babbling. Durbin in owning these guys.
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"One problem with Mitchell's questioning is that it only made sense if you are fluent in wingnut and only 27% of America speaks wingnut. To everyone else, it's gibberish." - Jeet Heer
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Lyndsey Graham wants to be the next Attorney General.
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Why the fuck is Lindsey Graham questioning him? What happened to the prosecutor?
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Jesus. Lindsey Graham is even more disgusting. "You have nothing to apologize for."
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This is all so disgusting. Grassley in particular.
Lindsey Graham: "Hold my beer."
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Oh boy. Graham is white-hot.
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Graham goes Cosby. He’s digging and digging.
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Graham must have had the same behavior in his youth if he thinks Kavanaugh did nothing wrong.
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"It's well known I have a weak stomach."
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This guy is a lying, entitled piece of shit
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Lots and lots of people are watching one of our weakest people, nominated by our worst person, being ramrodded onto the Supreme Court by their elected officials.
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FFFFFFFFFFFuck.
Now it makes sense.
What a fucking joke.
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and i find it amazing the details he remembers.
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So, now the Republicans have given up on the lady, and are going full martyrdom. McCarthyism? WTF. It's a hearing, that if there was any good faith, they would be trying to gather actual facts.
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They’ve ditched the female expert.
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So, now the Republicans have given up on the lady, and are going full martyrdom. McCarthyism? WTF. It's a hearing, that if there was any good faith, they would be trying to gather actual facts.
That's so disingenuous. They have a hired gun cross-examine her because they're too weak-kneed to do it, and when it's his term they spend the whole time fluffing it up. Cornyn going now.
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Cornyn, you would not bring the "witnesses" in to testify. So, how can she collaborate her story? What an asshole.
I cannot believe how they are building him up. They should be ashamed of themselves.
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Oh, the indignation!
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So, now the Republicans have given up on the lady, and are going full martyrdom. McCarthyism? WTF. It's a hearing, that if there was any good faith, they would be trying to gather actual facts.
It’s pure damage control now. No need to walk through a weak defense, it’s all exposition from the angry white men.
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OMG, he's a fucking idiot.
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The roommate has it out for him.
He won't let her ask her question. Time wasting asshole.
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OMG, he's a fucking idiot.
He’s projecting his drinking onto everyone else. He’s a mess.
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The roommate has it out for him.
He won't let her ask her question. Time wasting asshole.
Hence on,y 5 minute windows. He is trying to filibuster he way through each one.
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He’s projecting his drinking onto everyone else. He’s a mess.
That really pisses me off. Just answer the fucking question, don't ask the Senator if she or he likes to drink.
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I just wonder if the Senator said she had gotten black-out drunk if he would have thought she was asking to be assaulted.
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He just walked back his question to Klobuchar.
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Hatch goes straight for the schlong gorveling.
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Hatch decrying Avenatti as a “porn star lawyer” is hilarious, given the reason why we all know who he is.
Also, everything anyone (me) did in high school is off limits.
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He just walked back his question to Klobuchar.
Wait, asking a Senator who has spoken publicly about dealing with an abusive alcoholic father if she ever got blackout drunk is a BAD look for a potential Supreme Court justice?
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
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We can’t investigate because it makes Brett sad.
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Grassley, just postpone the vote and request the investigation. He's blaming everyone but himself.
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Democrats are losing steam. They need a shot of Kamela.
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Well, Grassley has the list of women Kavanaugh did not rape. Good for him getting them on the record. They must not be attractive.
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Well, Grassley has the list of women Kavanaugh did not rape. Good for him getting them on the record. They must not be attractive.
One of them is the Renate of the yearbook alumni, who has no idea that she was slut-shamed by these choirboys all over the book.
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Mike Lee decrying hypocrisy is very hypocritical.
Especially after Grassley decryed how long this is taking.
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Now Ben Sasse is going to blub?
One of these men needs to grow a pair of what Dr. Ford has.
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Wait, asking a Senator who has spoken publicly about dealing with an abusive alcoholic father if she ever got blackout drunk is a BAD look for a potential Supreme Court justice?
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I'm listening on the radio, and I don't know all their voices, but I thought it was a bit telling how Kavanaugh patiently tolerated the silly yearbook questions from the male Democratic senator, but adopted a 3rd-grade "I know you are, but what am I" posture to Klobuchar, who was actually polite and had relevant questions.
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Blumenthal getting it back on track by treating Kavanaugh with the contempt he deserves.
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Blumenthal getting it back on track by treating Kavanaugh with the contempt he deserves.
And then he lost it. Shut him the fuck up and get answers. He’s now recapping Red Sox games.
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One of them is the Renate of the yearbook alumni, who has no idea that she was slut-shamed by these choirboys all over the book.
I thought she pulled back her endorsement? Or did Kavanaugh just say they pieced it back together?
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I thought she pulled back her endorsement? Or did Kavanaugh just say they pieced it back together?
Roger Clemens called her.
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Mitchell is still sitting in her assistant’s chair even though they’ve fired her.
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The Republicans will strut and think that his and their bowing up was positive, but the Democratic narrative will still remain powerful and persuasive: If you are innocent, let the FBI do an investigation and gather facts; otherwise, we think you are hiding something.
Let's hope it is enough to convince two Republicans.
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The Republicans will strut and think that his and their bowing up was positive, but the Democratic narrative will still remain powerful and persuasive: If you are innocent, let the FBI do an investigation and gather facts; otherwise, we think you are hiding something.
Let's hope it is enough to convince two Republicans.
Criminal charges will be filed against him. Avenatti will see to it. This doesn’t end in a senate confirmation.
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Can we yield Ted Cruz time to watching a hippo have diarrhea? Thanks.
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And then he lost it. Shut him the fuck up and get answers. He’s now recapping Red Sox games.
George Brett played LF
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Go somewhere else please Kamela.
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This process petered out. The rigged process saved Kavanaugh’s ass.
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Please tell me that really huge guy who walked out with Blumenthal is called “Jonad” or at least “Tall McCartney”.
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Things to muse on this morning:
- Ford was incredibly poised, dignified and credible
- Kavanaugh was the opposite, and let his partisan flag fly with rantings about a hit job and revenge for the Clintons
- Kavanaugh got completely stymied over his refusal to support calls for an FBI investigation
- After the exchange with Durbin, when Kavanaugh seemed completely off the rails
- After that, Republicans abandoned their plan of having Mitchell do the talking for them and started serial ranting about the Democrats and their horrendous tactics (of adhering to the wishes of a sexual assault victim)
Ford's testimony was never impeached, while Kavanaugh was caught - again - lying about the small things. In addition to his veracity, his temperament and independence are now huge questions about him; the latter being why it took 3 years and two full hearings before he squeaked his way on to the DC court.
All Republicans on the committee, including Flake, are expected to vote "yes". If that goes through, the full Senate vote happens next week when all eyes will fall on Sens Collins and Murkowski, with Flake already a "yes" and Corker saying he's on board too. The committee vote is set for this afternoon, protests are raging in the halls outside the room and most of the Democrats have walked out of this mornings proceedings in protest.
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Flake catching merry hell (https://twitter.com/twitter/statuses/1045671067270836224) from sexual assault survivors.
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Things to muse on this morning:
- Ford was incredibly poised, dignified and credible
- Kavanaugh was the opposite, and let his partisan flag fly with rantings about a hit job and revenge for the Clintons
- Kavanaugh got completely stymied over his refusal to support calls for an FBI investigation
- After the exchange with Durbin, when Kavanaugh seemed completely off the rails
- After that, Republicans abandoned their plan of having Mitchell do the talking for them and started serial ranting about the Democrats and their horrendous tactics (of adhering to the wishes of a sexual assault victim)
Ford's testimony was never impeached, while Kavanaugh was caught - again - lying about the small things. In addition to his veracity, his temperament and independence are now huge questions about him; the latter being why it took 3 years and two full hearings before he squeaked his way on to the DC court.
All Republicans on the committee, including Flake, are expected to vote "yes". If that goes through, the full Senate vote happens next week when all eyes will fall on Sens Collins and Murkowski, with Flake already a "yes" and Corker saying he's on board too. The committee vote is set for this afternoon, protests are raging in the halls outside the room and most of the Democrats have walked out of this mornings proceedings in protest.
I think the full senate vote is tomorrow at noon.
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I think the full senate vote is tomorrow at noon.
I believe there are cloture votes set over the weekend, with full debate and voting on Monday and Tuesday. The weekend session may have been expedient to the timetable, but it will allow protesters galore to descend on the Capitol.
Meanwhile, the American Bar Association has said that they think this confirmation needs to be put on hold until a full investigation of Kavanaugh can be completed. His list of allies grows thin.
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I want to hear mark judge give testimony under oath.
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I want to hear mark judge give testimony under oath.
You heartless bastard. Mark Judge is a recovering alcoholic and making him give sworn testimony would be tantamount to a high-tech raping.
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Even some Catholic priests think he is bad.
http://www.foxnews.com/world/2018/09/28/magazine-jesuits-urges-withdrawal-kavanaugh-nomination.html
Yeah, it's a Fox news article.
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You heartless bastard. Mark Judge is a recovering alcoholic and making him give sworn testimony would be tantamount to a high-tech raping.
Agreed. And I want to watch.
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Agreed. And I want to watch.
He doesn't recall the Ford event, but that doesn't mean he has nothing to say. Also, the other attendees have not - as Kavanaugh and his Republican defenders have misrepresented over and over again - said it didn't happen. They have said they don't remember it, which is entirely different. Ford addressed this in her testimony; to the others at the party it was just an uneventful day.
Sheldon Whitehouse just dropped an ominous truth bomb on his opposition colleagues; that the truth will out and the sands of time are running through Kavanaugh's glass. He is not wrong.
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He doesn't recall the Ford event, but that doesn't mean he has nothing to say. Also, the other attendees have not - as Kavanaugh and his Republican defenders have misrepresented over and over again - said it didn't happen. They have said they don't remember it, which is entirely different. Ford addressed this in her testimony; to the others at the party it was just an uneventful day.
Sheldon Whitehouse just dropped an ominous truth bomb on his opposition colleagues; that the truth will out and the sands of time are running through Kavanaugh's glass. He is not wrong.
From what I saw, Kavanaugh saying the other alleged witnesses "say it didn't happen" is one of two easily provable lies, the other being the drinking age in Maryland. For someone who loves beer as that guy apparently does, moving the drinking age to 21 just before he turned 18 was probably a pretty memorable event.
The obvious lies were from his yearbook: Renate Alumnius, Devil's Triangle, Ralphing, and Boof. His explanations were ludicrous.
The fact that this guy so brazenly lies--under oath--about so many little things, and will still become a Supreme Court justice is sickening. His behavior and temperament yesterday alone should be disqualifying. It is astonishing that these Republicans are pretending to believe that there is nobody better for the job than this clown.
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The obvious lies were from his yearbook: Renate Alumnius, Devil's Triangle, and Boof. His explanations were ludicrous.
The fact that this guy so brazenly lies--under oath--about so many little things, and will still become a Supreme Court justice is sickening. His behavior and temperament yesterday alone should be disqualifying. It is astonishing that these Republicans are pretending to believe that there is nobody better for the job than this clown.
So true. I was trying to figure out what pissed me off so much about him and his Republican enablers. It's that I know he's lying, he knows he's lying, and he knows that I and everyone else knows that he's lying, but he's going to do it anyway, and do it with a fucking smirk for good measure. That motherfucking drunk has skated through life, and not only is the nation letting him skate further, they are rewarding him.
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So true. I was trying to figure out what pissed me off so much about him and his Republican enablers. It's that I know he's lying, he knows he's lying, and he knows that I and everyone else knows that he's lying, but he's going to do it anyway, and do it with a fucking smirk for good measure. That motherfucking drunk has skated through life, and not only is the nation letting him skate further, they are rewarding him.
Try knowing that and being a woman. It really sucks.
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His testimony is setting him up to be impeached if confirmed. Not happy about how much damage this would do to the court and our country. Frankly i hope trump pulls him. There are many many conversative judges who didn't have a drunken frat boy phase. I think of the personal integrity of Justice Roberts. Very similar to Kavanaugh on the surface. But only on the surface.
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Bet the dems are regretting using a filibuster on Gorsuch.
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Bet the dems are regretting using a filibuster on Gorsuch.
Wouldn't have made a lick of difference.
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Try knowing that and being a woman. It really sucks.
I tried being a woman once, but it didn't work out. I stayed at home and played with my tits all day.
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Wouldn't have made a lick of difference.
Correct. If they'd "saved" the filibuster, the Republicans would be nuking it now for SCOTUS nominees, instead of back then. Better to have them nuke it so it's not there once the balance shifts in the Senate.
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From what I saw, Kavanaugh saying the other alleged witnesses "say it didn't happen" is one of two easily provable lies, the other being the drinking age in Maryland. For someone who loves beer as that guy apparently does, moving the drinking age to 21 just before he turned 18 was probably a pretty memorable event.
The obvious lies were from his yearbook: Renate Alumnius, Devil's Triangle, Ralphing, and Boof. His explanations were ludicrous.
The fact that this guy so brazenly lies--under oath--about so many little things, and will still become a Supreme Court justice is sickening. His behavior and temperament yesterday alone should be disqualifying. It is astonishing that these Republicans are pretending to believe that there is nobody better for the job than this clown.
This is what Blumenthal was trying to get to with his questioning of the principle of being able to disbelieve all if you disbelieve a little bit. He asked Kavanaugh if he was familiar with the Latin phrase for this legal principle, and he pretended to not know it. The 5 minute window didn't give Blumnethal enough time to develop this line of questioning.
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Correct. If they'd "saved" the filibuster, the Republicans would be nuking it now for SCOTUS nominees, instead of back then. Better to have them nuke it so it's not there once the balance shifts in the Senate.
Gorsuch was qualified with no character issues I've ever heard of. It would look very different if they forced the republicans to go nuclear now.
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Gorsuch was qualified with no character issues I've ever heard of. It would look very different if they forced the republicans to go nuclear now.
Gorsuch was the stolen seat though, so to roll over on that one would've looked incredibly weak. There were no good outcomes and no good strategies then (or now).
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The Dean of Yale Law School has joined the ABA in calling for a full investigation. Meanwhile, at Harvard, where Kavanaugh teaches, students broke out into cheers and applause when he said that he may never be able to teach there again.
The legal profession, it seems, is coming down against Kavanaugh, so his only support is among politicos on the right. Not unsurprising for someone who's been a Republican operative for his entire career prior to getting foisted on the DC appeals court.
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BREAKING NEWS
Flake just derailed the confirmation process. Said he will move the nomination out of committee but will not vote to confirm until an FBI investigation has been completed.
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Nominating a lying, drunken serial rapist to the Supreme Court to own the libs.
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BREAKING NEWS
Flake just derailed the confirmation process. Said he will move the nomination out of committee but will not vote to confirm until an FBI investigation has been completed.
Classic Flake. He could not move the nomination out of committee if he actually wanted to. He's just grandstanding but will be a reliable yes vote when it actually happens.
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Classic Flake. He could not move the nomination out of committee if he actually wanted to. He's just grandstanding but will be a reliable yes vote when it actually happens.
As I'm am starting to understand it, this is a gentlemen's agreement that requires Mitch MuhFuckingConnell to be a gentlemen. So, yeah, Flake grandstanded (grandstood?) but relying on McConnell to do anything other than put this on the floor is a fool's errand.
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Nominating a lying, drunken serial rapist to the Supreme Court to own the libs.
...for 30 or 40 years.
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As I'm am starting to understand it, this is a gentlemen's agreement that requires Mitch MuhFuckingConnell to be a gentlemen. So, yeah, Flake grandstanded (grandstood?) but relying on McConnell to do anything other than put this on the floor is a fool's errand.
If it's just Flake who's flaking, then Pence breaks the 50-50 tie. If Flake has one other Republican on his side, then it's stalled in the full Senate. Expect McConnell to put this on the floor - like he did with the ACA repeal - and glare at his Senators as they vote.
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If it's just Flake who's flaking, then Pence breaks the 50-50 tie. If Flake has one other Republican on his side, then it's stalled in the full Senate. Expect McConnell to put this on the floor - like he did with the ACA repeal - and glare at his Senators as they vote.
The one thing Flake did was give the other swing votes very positive-PR excuses for delaying the vote as well. Whether that's enough remains to be seen but maybe we will find out if "skis with the boys" has any relevance.
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The one thing Flake did was give the other swing votes very positive-PR excuses for delaying the vote as well. Whether that's enough remains to be seen but maybe we will find out if "skis with the boys" has any relevance.
Chris Coons saying that Flake has support from more Republicans for his gambit.
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Chris Coons saying that Flake has support from more Republicans for his gambit.
Collins is one, reportedly.
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Collins is one, reportedly.
Murkowski has said she is in agreement with Flake.
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Very brave of Flake to give Collins & Murkowski cover to look at a few days' worth of polls before they all vote to confirm. I will be thrilled if it turns out I'm being overly cynical here.
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Very brave of Flake to give Collins & Murkowski cover to look at a few days' worth of polls before they all vote to confirm. I will be thrilled if it turns out I'm being overly cynical here.
The FBI will blow up the argument that witnesses have cleared Kavanaugh. Whether people will be allowed to know this is in question.
Also, this still takes the White House to instruct the FBI to go. Trump could block it then plead ignorance (convincingly), while McConnell says his hands are tied and so they just do it anyway.
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Very brave of Flake to give Collins & Murkowski cover to look at a few days' worth of polls before they all vote to confirm. I will be thrilled if it turns out I'm being overly cynical here.
We can only take what we're given at this point. Consider it lube.
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Also, this still takes the White House to instruct the FBI to go. Trump could block it then plead ignorance (convincingly), while McConnell says his hands are tied and so they just do it anyway.
That's a pretty risky gambit. The same reason they want to delay the vote is a very good reason to vote no.
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That's a pretty risky gambit. The same reason they want to delay the vote is a very good reason to vote no.
Trump has +/- 20 reasons not to want to set a precedent for investigating credible claims of sexual misconduct.
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Murkowski has said she is in agreement with Flake.
Manchin on board with the delay and investigate plan. Donnelly already in the "No" camp, so Heitkamp is silent thus far but now also moot.
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"Check out the big brain on Brett!" (https://twitter.com/heyitschili/status/1045718359713681408)
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In a normal investigation, they would be looking into whether Kavanaugh committed any perjury in the course of his denial, which he obviously did. I'm sure the process-foul obsessed GOP will make sure that doesn't happen.
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In a normal investigation, they would be looking into whether Kavanaugh committed any perjury in the course of his denial, which he obviously did. I'm sure the process-foul obsessed GOP will make sure that doesn't happen.
It's been called, "limited in scope" by it's backers.
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It's been called, "limited in scope" by it's backers.
So Mark Judge refuses to talk to the FBI and/or pleads the 5th. Then...?
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So Mark Judge refuses to talk to the FBI and/or pleads the 5th. Then...?
https://twitter.com/AP/status/1045753235129200641
Not sure how "confidentially" works.
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https://twitter.com/AP/status/1045753235129200641
Not sure how "confidentially" works.
He learned about the law from the best.
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"Check out the big brain on Brett!" (https://twitter.com/heyitschili/status/1045718359713681408)
That is the best thing I have ever seen. Even better than those two Boston jamooks.
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"Check out the big brain on Brett!" (https://twitter.com/heyitschili/status/1045718359713681408)
I love that.
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That is the best thing I have ever seen. Even better than those two Boston jamooks.
Agree to disagree
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Here is what I still don’t get. Why s getting BC appointed so important. There has to be a dozen other folks they could pick without the baggage. But now they have dug in to the point of no return. Now I’d rather him get confirmed than any of their other choices because there is at least an outside chance he could end up getting kicked off the court. Gorsuch is there for good, why not find someone else like him? Idiots
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Here is what I still don’t get. Why s getting BC appointed so important. There has to be a dozen other folks they could pick without the baggage. But now they have dug in to the point of no return. Now I’d rather him get confirmed than any of their other choices because there is at least an outside chance he could end up getting kicked off the court. Gorsuch is there for good, why not find someone else like him? Idiots
I'm doubtful if they can find anyone to fit their needs that has no baggage.
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I'm doubtful if they can find anyone to fit their needs that has no baggage.
Truth.
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Here is what I still don’t get. Why s getting BC appointed so important. There has to be a dozen other folks they could pick without the baggage. But now they have dug in to the point of no return. Now I’d rather him get confirmed than any of their other choices because there is at least an outside chance he could end up getting kicked off the court. Gorsuch is there for good, why not find someone else like him? Idiots
I see Kavanaugh as a high-risk, high-reward pick. It's pretty clear that he would look out for GOP interests on the court, and he would also probably protect Trump if it came to that. It's possible, even plausible, that they knew about his past w.r.t. sexual allegations and buried it as deeply as they could, whistling past the graveyard on the way to a bumpy but successful 51-49 confirmation.
Even now, I think they see this whole spectacle as a win-win scenario. If Kavanaugh gets confirmed (and make no mistake, I think he will), they win, and they've gotten to drag the Democrats through the mud while doing it. If Kavanaugh doesn't get confirmed, they get to rile up their base by continued demonization of the Democrats, weaponizing the fear of the possibility of a Dem-controlled Senate that (in their minds) will obstruct the SCOTUS pick until 2020, and promising to exact revenge against the next Democrat that occupies the White House (which Lindsey Graham all but did on Thursday)... and it'll probably work, which is a win. In reality, they know that if Kavanaugh gets torpedoed, Trump will just pick another conservative justice and the Senate - even a Dem-controlled Senate - will probably confirm him/her, which is still a win. OR they might just nominate another risk/reward candidate and keep the circus going while spitting more venom across the aisle. I really don't think the GOP is that stupid/crazy, but the last few years serve as significant evidence to the contrary.
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It's a win-win for Trump. Trump doesn't care about optics or about the party. He wants to keep his own ass out of jail. O'Kavanaugh is the best way forward with that. If O'K is shot down, he gets to have a field day with his rabid base of idiot pig fuckers shouting about how this was a Felosi Peinstein plot to sully the name of a good man.
McConnell simply doesn't want to show weakness. He does not want to cave to anything reasonable people or even Democrats might ask or demand. Because let's face it, where might that madness end?
If O'K gets negged then he may not have enough time to press someone else through, especially if more evidence comes to light and most especially if by some miracle a couple of Republicans decide that having a drunk ass lying ass raping ass motherfucker on the Supreme Court just might not be a great idea after all.
So Trump can't really be giving much of a fuck about any of this. He wants to win, of course, but his reptile brain must know that he wins either way. The turt's really got to be sweating this though.
Of course it's entirely possible that after all of this chaos one or two or three Democrats decide to vote for this motherfucker so who knows.
But again, it amazes me that they don't seem to have any ready alternatives that fit the bill. Hey, you, will you say that the president has to respond to a subpoena? No? Good. You ever rape anyone? No? Outstanding. Get in line over there.
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McTurtle will absolutely jam through another right wing judge onto the court during the lame duck session if he has to. This adherence to Kavanaugh is all about not looking bad by having his serpent-filled personality and past laid out for all to see; because that exposes their speed confirmation game.
None of this will impact the deplorables, but I’m not so cynical to think that it doesn’t move independents, or steel the resolve of them to vote. This process created no new friends but maybe a few new enemies.
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I'm doubtful if they can find anyone to fit their needs that has no baggage.
The baggage is important though, because conservatives can use it as a threat to keep their own judges and legislators in line. Not that lifelong ratfucker Kavanaugh is likely to flip on them, but it doesn't hurt to have some backup dirt just in case. They've known about his past all along; look how prepared they were to defend his treatment of women. They weren't surprised that it came out; in fact, they expected it. But I think they were surprised by the public reaction; compassion always surprises conservatives because it's unnatural to them.
They've probably got more dirt on their own Republicans than they do on Democrats. Example -- Lindsay Graham. Look how they've got him jumping through hoops now that John McCain can't protect him anymore.
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I liked Jimmy Kimmel's take on Donald Jr. last night:
“You are a dull-witted human canker sore who shoots baby hippos out of daddy’s helicopter because it’s the only way you can get an erection. Do us a favor, put the Twitter aside and go rub a tub of AXE Extreme Hold hair gel on your empty head, you chinless son of a circus peanut.”
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In more cheery news, Beto's rally with Willie Nelson drew 50-50,000 people (https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/beto-orourke-holds-largest-political-rally-since-2016/ar-BBNKI2u). It's the largest political rally for an individual candidate since the 2016 presidential election.
Game on.
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In less cheery news, the FBI investigation of Kavanaugh has been limited to the interviewing of four people. No looking into the Swetnick case and no investigation of his drinking.
On the latter, I don't think we need any more evidence to know that Kavanaugh was a pisshead a school / college. That's not the point. The point is his brazen lying about it under oath; all easily discoverable lies (more classmates have gone public saying he was a blackout drunk at school). His credibility on this is shot (pun intended), Republicans are ignoring a mountain of evidence here and so will just ignore anything the FBI could pile on top.
On the former: (1) WTF?; and (b) wagging Kavanaugh's penis in Avenatti's face is a bad idea. Avenatti is a horrendous publicity whore, but he has a track record of having the goods on the things about which he opines. He claims to have corroborating witnesses; I believe him. And he will not be ignored!
This week will be interesting.
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One last thing, which touches all issues with Kavanaugh: there's an entry in his 1982 calendar where he, Judge and PJ are having "skis" at "Timmy's" on a weekday (https://thehill.com/business-a-lobbying/409062-kavanaugh-1982-calendar-entry-could-be-examined-in-fbi-investigation). Kavanaugh claimed it couldn't have happened midweek because he was always either working or working out, and he didn't drink during the week.
Not only does his own calendar impeach his assertions in this regard, it also puts all of the named male protagonists in a house with beer at the same time. If the FBI can pull on that thread, find Timmy (is he the unnamed 4th boy?), go to his house, see if it's somewhere between the country club and Ford's house, has a bedroom - opposite a bathroom - at the top of narrow stairs, then we have significant (circumstantial) corroboration of Ford's account.
One other thing that just rankles my mind: does Kavanaugh have calendars for every year from 1982 (at least) onwards? If so, we need to see them to prove that he didn't just magic upon one for the summer in question, and also to see how many more entries there are for "skis", "ralphing", "boofing" and "devil's triangulation".
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Lindsey Graham and other Republicans made strong calls over the weekend for an investigation. Wow! [Looks closer] Into Diane Feinstein.
I don't know what's more sad: that they're doing this, or that it's so predictable that they would do this.
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While the scope of the FBI's remit is an ever-changing thing, Kavanaugh's college classmates have been calling the FBI tip line to get their reports logged. In one case, Kavanaugh is said to have started a bar fight (because he threw his drink at a guy who turned out not to be the lead singer of UB40) which got so out of hand that the police showed up. Reporters have unearthed a police report from the time which corroborates the report.
Republicans seem keen to keep Kavanaugh's drinking out of the scope of the investigation. One the surface, that seems less unreasonable than the rest of their behavior here, but you don't have to think too hard to realize why it's important. He lied consistently under oath to cover the extent of his drinking and his exploits when drunk (which should be disqualifying in and of itself) but, beyond that, he lied as a defense against the accusation that he was sexually aggressive when drunk, by claiming he'd never been that drunk.
So, his drinking is connected inextricably to the accusations of sexual assault. If you explode the "I'm not that drunk" defense, you get that much closer to the truth of his other behavior.
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In news of other Kavanaugh lies, it seems that he was aware of - and trying to suppress - the Ramirez accusation since July. That conflicts with his sworn testimony in front of the committee that he first heard about it when it was detailed in The New Yorker in September. There are texts.
Can we put him out of our misery soon, please?
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It's nuts to me (and it also makes sense, given the carrot demon's teetotaling) that they're getting friends of his to testify that they've never seen him blackout drunk. As if you know when someone else has blacked out.
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Meanwhile, in TrumpLand, the Stormy Daniels affair has busted (get it?) into the news again. It seems that, in his efforts to cover up the affair in the last days of the 2016 election campaign, Trump involved both son Eric and the Trump Organisation in his efforts to enforce the NDA he didn't sign. While those efforts themselves are not new news, the fact that his son - who now supposedly runs the Trump Organisation - and the Trump Organisation itself were involved blasts a hole through the firewall between Trump's campaign and his private business like a cauldron full of explosives at Helm's Deep (https://youtu.be/6V6cInKolRs).
Hopefully Mueller (remember him?) is marching his army of Uruk-hai through it as we speak.
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HuffPo has done the heavily shoveling of all the shit that Kavanaugh dumped on the Judiciary Committee (https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/brett-kavanaugh-lies_us_5bb26190e4b027da00d61fcd?ncid=other_facebook_eucluwzme5k&utm_campaign=share_facebook&guccounter=1&guce_referrer_us=aHR0cHM6Ly93d3cuZmFjZWJvb2suY29tLw&guce_referrer_cs=SVoQcEeEv5Mhcx7pJ6m5MA) last week. It's something of a long read, but still a handy reference guide to Kavanaugh's dissembling.
Both Flake and Collins have said that lying to the committee would be exclusionary, but both seem to be doing their best to ignore this steaming pile of dishonesty.
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HuffPo has done the heavily shoveling of all the shit that Kavanaugh dumped on the Judiciary Committee (https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/brett-kavanaugh-lies_us_5bb26190e4b027da00d61fcd?ncid=other_facebook_eucluwzme5k&utm_campaign=share_facebook&guccounter=1&guce_referrer_us=aHR0cHM6Ly93d3cuZmFjZWJvb2suY29tLw&guce_referrer_cs=SVoQcEeEv5Mhcx7pJ6m5MA) last week. It's something of a long read, but still a handy reference guide to Kavanaugh's dissembling.
Both Flake and Collins have said that lying to the committee would be exclusionary, but both seem to be doing their best to ignore this steaming pile of dishonesty.
They're lies but are they damned lies?
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Accidentally or purposely drowned out by the furor around Trump's grotesque one man show last night is the fact that the NY Times pulled back the curtain on Trump's financial world and found the rotting corpse of Fred Trump still holding the purse strings. The whole 40-page expose is available online, but here's a the 11 main takaways (https://www.nytimes.com/2018/10/02/us/politics/donald-trump-wealth-fred-trump.html).
Bottom line: Trump is a crook and a fraud.
[For ease of reference, when I refer to "Trump", I mean Donald Trump. All other Trumps (because they're all in it up to their shifty eyeballs) will be identified by their first name or suffix.]
His whole persona of a successful businessman is more of a sham than even his most ardent critics (i.e. me) could've imagined. Trump claimed only to have received a "small" loan of $1 million from his father, which he quickly repaid. The reality is that Fred Trump started paying his son a salary at age 3, and he was already a millionaire - in gifted money - by age 8. Throughout his life and continuing to this day, Trump received money from his father. The total, in today's valuation, of the funds given to Trump by his father is in excess of $400 million.
Much, if not all, of this wealth transfer was done using methods to evade paying the appropriate taxes. At his death, Fred Trump's estate was valued - for estate tax purposes - at $40 million, but that entire portfolio of properties was valued, a mere 5 years later, at $900 million.
Trump's brother Robert has corroborated some of the Times reporting regarding the estate tax avoidance schemes. Further, Trump's sister - Maryanne - also benefited from this tax fraud, and she's currently a sitting federal judge.
The main vehicle to milk Fred Trump's empire of wealth and distribute it to his spawn was a fake company set up to procure all equipment and services required to maintenance Fred Trump's real estate holdings, including rent controlled housing projects. The company had no office and no employees. All services rendered to Fred Trump's properties passed through this shell company, the cost of such services being massively inflated so that the residual cash sat in the shell company and passed to the owners - Fred's kids - as profit.
In a disgusting two-fer, Fred used the inflated invoices from the shell company to get permission to raise the rents on his rent-controlled tenants.
Trump's entire real estate business was bankrolled and bailed out repeatedly by his father. Tens of millions of dollars in loans were given; many were never repaid, further evading taxes. The evaded tax bill is estimated to be in excess of $500 million. That's half a billion dollars in Trump's pocket that should have been in ours. Moreover, his entire persona on which he traded through the years and on which he campaigned for president is a complete fraud.
Trump has spent his entire life cashing daddy's checks, and now he's in charge of the world's largest economy. Coincidentally, his administration is spending money like a drunk sailor on the first night of shore leave, and the debt is piling up to the tune of $1 trillion a year. A YEAR!
Trump's response to the report is an extended "fake news" rant as expected. Many of the crimes document by the Times have passed their statute of limitations, but many haven't. New York state regulators have already announced that it is taking up the report and will go after any and all prosecutable crimes.
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And yet many will not believe it.
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And yet many will not believe it.
I think even more will say Good for them.
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And yet many will not believe it.
What I always hear is "you're just jealous."
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I think even more will say Good for them.
I am waiting for the "death tax is evil" brigade to come stomping through here. But there's a big difference between tax avoidance and tax evasion - mostly because one is prudent financial planning and the other is a serious felony. The Trumps engaged in the latter.
Also, one of the reasons for having an estate tax, is to avoid the creation of dynastic wealth. It, in essence, is a capital gains tax applied to assets being transferred through an estate so that such wealth cannot be transferred from person to person within a family ad infinitum with nary a cent of tax paid on it. Now, we can argue about the amount of tax to charge, but arguing against it is to enshrine wealth among the few to the exclusion of the many.
Otherwise, welcome to feudal America.
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I'd love to know what amount the average voter thinks the estate tax kicks in at.
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I'd love to know what amount the average voter thinks the estate tax kicks in at.
I would, too. I wonder if they know that it has risen exponentially over the last ten years. Hopefully all those family farms are safe now.
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Even now, I think they see this whole spectacle as a win-win scenario. If Kavanaugh gets confirmed (and make no mistake, I think he will), they win, and they've gotten to drag the Democrats through the mud while doing it. If Kavanaugh doesn't get confirmed, they get to rile up their base by continued demonization of the Democrats, weaponizing the fear of the possibility of a Dem-controlled Senate that (in their minds) will obstruct the SCOTUS pick until 2020, and promising to exact revenge against the next Democrat that occupies the White House (which Lindsey Graham all but did on Thursday)... and it'll probably work, which is a win. In reality, they know that if Kavanaugh gets torpedoed, Trump will just pick another conservative justice and the Senate - even a Dem-controlled Senate - will probably confirm him/her, which is still a win. OR they might just nominate another risk/reward candidate and keep the circus going while spitting more venom across the aisle. I really don't think the GOP is that stupid/crazy, but the last few years serve as significant evidence to the contrary.
I still can't the question "Why the fuck do they stick with him; isn't there someone without his baggage?" out of my head. I assume there is and it's hard for me to digest that this entire spectacle is good for the GOP, but I increasingly misread this country. Anyways, as the events of the last few days have unfolded, I keep returning to the idea expressed in the bolded part of Waldo's post.
I figure Trump mocking Dr. Ford, and Trump ensuring that the FBI investigation is cursory at best are intended to raise the temperature for the holdouts and make it harder, rather than easier for them to vote yes. Furthermore, the statement from the prick Graham that Trump should renominate him if he fails seems like a tell to me. Basically that the GOP would prefer that he fails as it gives them an issue for their base.
As I said, I often misread this country, but this strategy seems like it is playing with fire.
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I would, too. I wonder if they know that it has risen exponentially over the last ten years. Hopefully all those family farms are safe now.
When this was last being hotly debated in Congress, Democrats called the bluff of Republicans who wanted to abolish the estate tax outright; they offered an amendment to increase the threshold to $100 million. Republicans voted it down.
It's not about family farms (it never was). It's about the Trump's and Koch's of the world who want to pass on their inherited wealth to their ever more useless offspring.
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I still can't the question "Why the fuck do they stick with him; isn't there someone without his baggage?" out of my head. I assume there is and it's hard for me to digest that this entire spectacle is good for the GOP, but I increasingly misread this country. Anyways, as the events of the last few days have unfolded, I keep returning to the idea expressed in the bolded part of Waldo's post.
I figure Trump mocking Dr. Ford, and Trump ensuring that the FBI investigation is cursory at best are intended to raise the temperature for the holdouts and make it harder, rather than easier for them to vote yes. Furthermore, the statement from the prick Graham that Trump should renominate him if he fails seems like a tell to me. Basically that the GOP would prefer that he fails as it gives them an issue for their base.
As I said, I often misread this country, but this strategy seems like it is playing with fire.
At least one Republican strategist has suggested withdrawing Kavanaugh and leaving the seat open through the mid terms. Then, if Democrats take the Senate, he can leave the seat open until after 2020 and use it as a wedge issue to drive voters to the polls. There's a lot of sense to the logic, but it is a horrendous way to govern: refusing to do the blocking and tackling of your job in order to preserve your job, country be damned.
In the meantime, this all really puts a lot of pressure on red state democrats, namely Manchin and Heitkamp. If they vote against Kavanaugh, they risk upsetting moderates (although I think that moderates are probably against Kavanaugh anyway, according to recent polling); if they vote to confirm, they will turn off the base which will mean, amongst other things, a lack of volunteers to help get out the vote.
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In the meantime, this all really puts a lot of pressure on red state democrats, namely Manchin and Heitkamp. If they vote against Kavanaugh, they risk upsetting moderates (although I think that moderates are probably against Kavanaugh anyway, according to recent polling); if they vote to confirm, they will turn off the base which will mean, amongst other things, a lack of volunteers to help get out the vote.
I simply cannot understand the logic that somebody in WV or ND would have voted for Manchin or Heitkamp, but won't because they didn't vote to confirm this wildly unpopular and loathsome person. I can absolutely see people that would have voted for Manchin or Heitkamp being turned off by them voting to confirm him.
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I simply cannot understand the logic that somebody in WV or ND would have voted for Manchin or Heitkamp, but won't because they didn't vote to confirm this wildly unpopular and loathsome person. I can absolutely see people that would have voted for Manchin or Heitkamp being turned off by them voting to confirm him.
It's an easy play. You say, Look, there is a long list of men and women that the president could nominate that I would vote to confirm more or less immediately, but I have serious concerns about this individual's truthfulness, character, and temperament. I don't know what happened at those parties and I am not basing my decision on that component of the testimony.
I would think that such an approach would be a net positive for senators in difficult areas.
I do understand their not wanting to tip their hand until the last minute because they will inevitably suffer a deluge of attacks from Trump's twitter and Russian bots, and nothing helpful will come from that sort of attention. But if you get those two Democrats and two or three Republicans, they can give each other enough cover I think to where they can withstand the fury until the next scandal appears and shifts public attention, which shouldn't take more than a couple of hours.
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I do understand their not wanting to tip their hand until the last minute because they will inevitably suffer a deluge of attacks from Trump's twitter and Russian bots, and nothing helpful will come from that sort of attention. But if you get those two Democrats and two or three Republicans, they can give each other enough cover I think to where they can withstand the fury until the next scandal appears and shifts public attention, which shouldn't take more than a couple of hours.
This is where Jeff Flake is the pivot; he needs to broker the deal with the potential Republican refuseniks.
The scary thing to me is that Manchin or Heitkamp will blink, and lose re-election because of a base backlash; all of which will serve to enhance the Republican senate majority.
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I simply cannot understand the logic that somebody in WV or ND would have voted for Manchin or Heitkamp, but won't because they didn't vote to confirm this wildly unpopular and loathsome person. I can absolutely see people that would have voted for Manchin or Heitkamp being turned off by them voting to confirm him.
They are both in significant fear of losing their seats, and that may drive them to make a desperate, bad choice.
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It's an easy play. You say, Look, there is a long list of men and women that the president could nominate that I would vote to confirm more or less immediately, but I have serious concerns about this individual's truthfulness, character, and temperament. I don't know what happened at those parties and I am not basing my decision on that component of the testimony.
I believe both Manchin and Heitkamp voted to confirm Gorsuch, so they can also point to that vote and say "give me any other right wing nominee - who is potty trained - and I'll confirm them in a heartbeat."
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I believe both Manchin and Heitkamp voted to confirm Gorsuch, so they can also point to that vote and say "give me any other right wing nominee - who is potty trained - and I'll confirm them in a heartbeat."
That's what I mean. It should be an easy play for these people. There is no one who is leaning towards voting for them but will switch at the last moment because they decided against a serial liar, rapist, drunk, entitled dickface. There are many, many people who will abandon them if they do vote to confirm this motherfucker.
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That's what I mean. It should be an easy play for these people. There is no one who is leaning towards voting for them but will switch at the last moment because they decided against a serial liar, rapist, drunk, entitled dickface. There are many, many people who will abandon them if they do vote to confirm this motherfucker.
My worry is that it's been opposite day every day for nearly two years now. At some point the streak of the most ridiculous and insane thing possible actually happening has to end.
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Flake and Collins reportedly are happy with the FBI report.
That's that then.
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Flake and Collins reportedly are happy with the FBI report.
That's that then.
An utterly shameful moment for the country and the court.
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An utterly shameful moment for the country and the court.
It's going to get more shameful as time goes on. Especially when Avenatti starts dropping lawsuits and filing criminal complaints.
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An utterly shameful moment for the country and the court.
There are sizeable demonstrations in Washington against this confirmation. As the votes are scheduled for tomorrow and over the weekend, I expect they will get larger and more unruly.
One truism of politics: when people show up a politician's office, it makes a difference. It's easy to play politics in a vacuum; but when confronted with the unwashed masses...not so much.
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The only chance of blocking this seat is impeachment. Seat him and then if something undefinable turns up, bye
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The only chance of blocking this seat is impeachment. Seat him and then if something undefinable turns up, bye
Impeachment will require a senate majority for democrats, which also means that democrats get to decide who replaces him. Both will be heavily lifts without a super-majority in the senate, so we shouldn't hold our breaths.
Of course, Ford or any other accuser has the option to file a criminal complaint in Maryland at any time. I doubt Kavanaugh would be allowed to stay on the Supreme Court as a convicted sex pest; it's within 500 ft of a Chuckie Cheese, I believe.
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SHOCKING
https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2018/10/1/17923178/washington-times-seth-rich-aaron-rich-trump-fox-news
The Seth Rich story is a bunch of shit. But people/rubes like Mr Happy ate that shit up. The folks who decry FAKE NEWS, absolutely devour it! They love it.
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They only retracted the story because Hillary threatened to kill the editor's parents and enslave his children. This "fact" will ease the pain of the believers.
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Flake and Collins reportedly are happy with the FBI report.
That's that then.
In my mind, there was never any outcome besides this one. Sorry for any of you that got your hopes up.
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Heitkamp announced she's a no on Kavanaugh. On the Democratic side of the aisle, that just leaves Joe Manchin as undecided. The cloture vote is in about an hour, and he has said that he won't know until the vote is opened. What a spineless piece of shit. He is waiting to see if any Republicans break ranks and, if they do, will use that cover the vote against; otherwise I'm sure he's gong to vote "Aye".
FTR, Flake, Collins and Murkowski are also unannounced (but maybe not undecided). Protests have been large and unruly (as they should be). Yesterday, over 100 protesters, mostly women, were arrested in the Capitol and, today, a crowd had an early morning kegger outside McConnell's residence, chanting "I Like Beer!" and "Chug! Chug! Chug!"
Meanwhile, assuming today's vote goes Kavanaugh's way, the actual vote will be this weekend. Problem is, one of the Republicans has to walk his daughter down the aisle on Saturday and so won't be present for a Saturday vote. That would mean that a single Republican "Nay" (along with all Democrats - that includes you, Manchin!) would sink the nomination. I think there's a timing issue such that they're now talking about having the vote in the wee hours of Sunday morning so that the absentee Republican can be back to cast his vote.
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Heitkamp announced she's a no on Kavanaugh.
She knows she's going to lose her seat so she's free to vote as she wants.
If Manchin votes yes then he's signalling a real attempt to keep his seat when his term expires.
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Just on that last point (above), the machinations required to confirm Kavanaugh have been extreme. But even Gorsuch, who we (now) remember as being smooth, was the product of the obstruction of Obama's nominee for almost a year and then the nuking of the filibuster for SCOTUS nominees. They are both the product of crippled and craven politics.
McConnell is the person most responsible for the current ultra-partisan state of politics. The Senate is supposed to be the grown ups, but he announced to his colleagues - at the exact moment as Obama was giving his victory speech in Grant Park - that they would simply obstruct everything that Obama proposed; good, bad or indifferent. McConnell has also said that obstructing Obama's SCOTUS nominee is his proudest moment in politics.
Seriously; fuck Mitch McConnell.
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She knows she's going to lose her seat so she's free to vote as she wants.
If Manchin votes yes then he's signalling a real attempt to keep his seat when his term expires.
Yep.
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She knows she's going to lose her seat so she's free to vote as she wants.
If Manchin votes yes then he's signalling a real attempt to keep his seat when his term expires.
Yep, polling on Heitkamp has her getting crushed.
Manchin, on the other hand, is up by 10 in recent polling. He has some wiggle room.
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Reports are that Collins will vote to proceed on Kavanaugh, but not announce her actual vote until later today when she gives a floor speech at 3pm. Maybe it's wishful thinking on my part, but such parsing wouldn't be necessary if she was a simple "Aye". Voting for cloture gives her the platform of a floor speech that should would not other wise have...
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Kavanaugh clears the cloture hurdle, notable votes being Manchin a "Yes" and Murkowski a :"No".
If Murkowski's vote indicates she's also "No" on the confirmation vote, and Collins goes that way too, then Manchin is out there all alone as the pivot vote. I hope he feels very uncomfortable about that.
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They only retracted the story because Hillary threatened to kill the editor's parents and enslave his children. This "fact" will ease the pain of the believers.
LOL. There are absolutely people out there who'd believe that. There is a whole slice of this country that is basically the Onion, in real life.
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LOL. There are absolutely people out there who'd believe that. There is a whole slice of this country that is basically the Onion, in real life.
and they vote.
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Just on that last point (above), the machinations required to confirm Kavanaugh have been extreme. But even Gorsuch, who we (now) remember as being smooth, was the product of the obstruction of Obama's nominee for almost a year and then the nuking of the filibuster for SCOTUS nominees. They are both the product of crippled and craven politics.
McConnell is the person most responsible for the current ultra-partisan state of politics. The Senate is supposed to be the grown ups, but he announced to his colleagues - at the exact moment as Obama was giving his victory speech in Grant Park - that they would simply obstruct everything that Obama proposed; good, bad or indifferent. McConnell has also said that obstructing Obama's SCOTUS nominee is his proudest moment in politics.
Seriously; fuck Mitch McConnell.
Along this line, a discussion on how Democrats seem to be losing the long game where Republicans obliterate norms and Democrats follow them and listen to the "both sides" concern trolls:
https://www.vox.com/2018/5/1/17258866/democratic-party-republicans-trump-election
This might have already been posted before in other forms. It's sad that things are this way, but it really is true to if they play dirty and you don't, you're the chump.
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Murkowski (sort of) confirms she's a "No" on Kavanaugh.
Flake says he's a "Yes", barring anything major happening between now and the vote (I suspect he'll be taking the stairs until it's over).
That brings it down to Manchin and Collins, who have promised to issue statements / make speeches which may or may not confirm their decision.
I'm hoping that Murkowski's move will give them cover / fortitude to vote "No".
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LOL. There are absolutely people out there who'd believe that. There is a whole slice of this country that is basically the Onion, in real life.
This was 20! years ago:
WASHINGTON, DC—Calling the unregulated flow of information "the single greatest threat to the emotional comfort and well-being of the American people," Congress passed the long-discussed Freedom From Information Act Monday.
The legislation—a response to widespread public demand to know less about the realities of the world around it—guarantees citizens protection from unpleasant information and imposes tough new restrictions on facts that federal authorities deem potentially damaging to the public's overall peace of mind.
https://politics.theonion.com/congress-passes-freedom-from-information-act-1819564667
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Murkowski (sort of) confirms she's a "No" on Kavanaugh.
Flake says he's a "Yes", barring anything major happening between now and the vote (I suspect he'll be taking the stairs until it's over).
That brings it down to Manchin and Collins, who have promised to issue statements / make speeches which may or may not confirm their decision.
I'm hoping that Murkowski's move will give them cover / fortitude to vote "No".
I'm surprised Doug Jones isn't more of a question mark.
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I'm surprised Doug Jones isn't more of a question mark.
That seat is gone, gone, gone in 2020. He's better off staying in Democrats' good graces to get himself some kind of appointment in the next administration.
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Collins is a yes on Kavanaugh. Game over, unless Flake gets turned again. Of course, Manchin is going to slime his way to hiding behind Collins, so even Flake might not be enough.
Washington is going to drown in pussy hats tomorrow.
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It's already drowning in pussies so why not.
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It's already drowning in pussies so why not.
Fucking Manchin.
You know him and Collins planned this to give each other cover. Trouble is, you can’t punish Manchin at the ballot box because it just hands a Senate seat to the Republicans.
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Fucking Manchin.
You know him and Collins planned this to give each other cover. Trouble is, you can’t punish Manchin at the ballot box because it just hands a Senate seat to the Republicans.
With Collins voting yes, I'm fine with him taking the chickenshit route to keep his seat. It is insane that the Dems have a WV seat at all. Fuck him, agreed, but the alternative is worse.
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With Collins voting yes, I'm fine with him taking the chickenshit route to keep his seat. It is insane that the Dems have a WV seat at all. Fuck him, agreed, but the alternative is worse.
My point is that I bet Manchin and Collins worked it together, to split the heat, because ache could point to the other to say their choice is irrelevant (Pence would split the tie).
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My point is that I bet Manchin and Collins worked it together, to split the heat, because ache could point to the other to say their choice is irrelevant (Pence would split the tie).
Tough shit, boys. Better luck next time. Not.
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Tough shit, boys. Better luck next time. Not.
Are you upset your Indians lost today? Tough shit.
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Tough shit, boys. Better luck next time. Not.
A not joke? Really?
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
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Tough shit, boys. Better luck next time. Not.
Go Team!
I am Jack's complete lack of surprise.
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Are you upset your Indians lost today? Tough shit.
Geaux Astros.
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Tough shit, boys. Better luck next time. Not.
I'm curious: leaving aside the fact that you love that the pick pisses us off, do you genuinely believe that Kavanaugh is fit to sit on the Supreme Court?
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Tough shit, boys. Better luck next time. Not.
Congrats on being a racist rapist enabler. The women in your life must be so proud.
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Tough shit, boys. Better luck next time. Not.
How many woman did you assault when you were high?
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How many woman did you assault when you were high?
Enough to get disbarred. In Louisiana.
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Enough to get disbarred. In Louisiana.
Ouch.
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Ouch.
TWSS
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Welp. This thread escalated quickly. So Happy who rails on Hillary, is a disbarred drunk with a history of sexual assault?
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Welp. This thread escalated quickly. So Happy who rails on Hillary, is a disbarred drunk with a history of sexual assault?
First of all, do your research. It's on the internet. I was not disbarred. I was never even threatened withh that. I am a recovering drug addict (I've been very honest about that here, and it's given me the opportunity to work with and help a few OWA folks who privately self-admitted a substance abuse problem-that's why I am public about it-to help others), and I was suspended for three years in large part because of that. The suspension ended in 2009. I have been eligible for reinstatement since then. Given that I was living in California in 2009, and I have no plans to ever practice law again or go back to Louisiana, I've never sought reinstatement. But I've been eligible to do so for almost ten years, folks.
Even when joking, the sexual assault comments crossed the line between humor and mean-spiritedness. I can understand Judge (soon to be Justice) Kavanaugh's anger when confronted with such baseless allegations. I am, and at all times have always been, a Southern gentleman, particularly with women. I deeply resent even your rude and snide, baseless comments about sexual assault.
I take on you sorry bastards because you're living in an echo chamber that bears no resenblance to reality. I get PM's from people indicating that I'm not alone in my beliefs, but others are too scared to take on your rude, snide gauntlet. Well, I'm not. Even at 58, I can still whip most of your asses. Now, go back to PMSNBC or whereever else you get your "news."
The thing that strikes me as funny is that as intelligent as most of you people are (Navin notwithstanding-you're an idiot), not one of you has demonstrated one iota of understanding why President Trump won. There's a significant percentage of people in this country who think differently than you, and these people vote.
President Trump has accomplished a lot in less than two years. All-time stock market highs. Record low unemployment. Got rid of NAFTA. Standing up to China. Progress with North Korea (President Trump arranged for the bodies of Korean Conflict veterans, something your hero, President Obama, or the rapist in chief, or even the sorry-ass Bushes didn't and couldn't do). I believe that he'll be reelected in 2020.
Finally, I want to thank you libtards for so vociferously challenging Judge Kavanaugh so close to the mid-term elections because it's energized the base. I believe that the Republicans will retain both the House and the Senate, while you geniuses remain stuck with Chuckie Schmucky Schumer, Crazy Nancy Pelosi, Pocohantas and, last but certainly not least, Comrade Feinstein. Thank you from the bottom of my heart.
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I'm curious: leaving aside the fact that you love that the pick pisses us off, do you genuinely believe that Kavanaugh is fit to sit on the Supreme Court?
Without question, Judge Kavanaugh is fit to serve on the Supreme Court. The ABA agreed with me about that.
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Congrats on being a racist rapist enabler. The women in your life must be so proud.
Fuck off, Mark. I'm neither a racist nor a rapist enabler. In fact, my wife is proud of me, and she backs Judge Kavanaugh despite herself having been the victim of sexual assault. Decades old charges where the complainant is fuzzy on the facts are just flimsy charges. And none of your so-called victims alleged that Judge Kavanaugh actually raped them.
Alright you hypocritical libtard apologists, I maintain that anyone who voted for President Clinton after clear actual rape allegations against him is a rapist enabler. Welcome to the club.
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How many woman did you assault when you were high?
Zero, even when I wasn't high.
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Enough to get disbarred. In Louisiana.
Wrong. Fuck off, you little weasel.
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Without question, Judge Kavanaugh is fit to serve on the Supreme Court. The ABA agreed with me about that.
No, you had the same opinion as the ABA. The difference is, the ABA withdrew their support after Kavanaugh’s unhinged, partisan performance in front of congress. As did his law school. As did hundreds of judges.
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Fuck off, Mark. I'm neither a racist nor a rapist enabler. In fact, my wife is proud of me, and she backs Judge Kavanaugh despite herself having been the victim of sexual assault. Decades old charges where the complainant is fuzzy on the facts are just flimsy charges. And none of your so-called victims alleged that Judge Kavanaugh actually raped them.
Alright you hypocritical libtard apologists, I maintain that anyone who voted for President Clinton after clear actual rape allegations against him is a rapist enabler. Welcome to the club.
Your hypocritical logos knows no bounds.
Just because other people don't agree with this thread doesn't make you any less crazy.
Your continued support of the criminal in chief and his old racist white bully politics is fucking disgusting, and if you had a single drop of true compassion in your personality, maybe you would see past the glaring, enormous double standards you project and echo from White Racist News Network. But you'll keep on screaming libtard instead, and keep on laughing while the total embarrassment of a president calls people names, throws temper tantrums, and generally sets the country back 50 years in race relations.
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First of all, do your research. It's on the internet. I was not disbarred. I was never even threatened withh that. I am a recovering drug addict (I've been very honest about that here, and it's given me the opportunity to work with and help a few OWA folks who privately self-admitted a substance abuse problem-that's why I am public about it-to help others), and I was suspended for three years in large part because of that. The suspension ended in 2009. I have been eligible for reinstatement since then. Given that I was living in California in 2009, and I have no plans to ever practice law again or go back to Louisiana, I've never sought reinstatement. But I've been eligible to do so for almost ten years, folks.
First of all, my only knowledge of you comes from what you have posted on this site over the last two decades. One fact is entirely clear based on that history: you are a loser. And, I honestly only mean that as a statement of fact and not in a pejorative way. You played college baseball and had enough intelligence, luck, connections, strong work ethic--or some combination of the four--to be accepted to Georgetown Law School. Those facts alone indicate that your life was off to an auspicious start. Your addiction and other personal issues derailed you. You were a negligent father and a shitty husband. You now seem to be relatively economically disenfranchised, a key symptom of many of those who support Trump, and something that our leadership and government needs to address for all demographics that are struggling to pay bills as the wealth gap continues to widen. And I applaud you for overcoming your struggle with addiction. However, rather than to use your struggles as a lens to view the world through, making you a more empathetic person, you have chosen to be bitter and angry, to revel in "owning libs," which I swear will never do anything to improve your own personal economic or social circumstances, and to be divisive on this board and, I'm sure, in your community.
The truth is, if you weren't white, you would be dead or in jail. The time you were standing on your wife or ex-wife's front yard with a baseball bat when the police showed up while she and your kids cowered inside? That doesn't end well for people who weren't born with the inherent privileges you were. It's ironic that I've read indirectly racist comments from you about young black men who lost their lives during encounters with police. Sure, maybe they were selling a loosie or standing on a corner, but how could you become so callous and out of touch given what you went through and all the second chances that you've had?
Anyways, I'm not here to try to win some message board chat; honestly, your posts in this thread only make me feel sad for you... and I'm not part of the "echo chamber" you think that you're enlightening with your right wing takes. And, I'm sorry that your addiction and personal demons derailed your life and career. My only point is that nothing Trump has ever done or will ever purport to do (or lie about doing) is ever going to make your life better. You aren't winning. You already lost many years ago, and I hope that you'll take that knowledge and use it to make your personal life as fulfilling and happy as it can be and to try to live with some empathy and compassion for others who are also struggling in varying and complicated ways that we can never truly understand as outsiders.
Even when joking, the sexual assault comments crossed the line between humor and mean-spiritedness. I can understand Judge (soon to be Justice) Kavanaugh's anger when confronted with such baseless allegations. I am, and at all times have always been, a Southern gentleman, particularly with women. I deeply resent even your rude and snide, baseless comments about sexual assault.
I take on you sorry bastards because you're living in an echo chamber that bears no resenblance to reality. I get PM's from people indicating that I'm not alone in my beliefs, but others are too scared to take on your rude, snide gauntlet. Well, I'm not. Even at 58, I can still whip most of your asses. Now, go back to PMSNBC or whereever else you get your "news."
Also, the juxtaposition of "all times have always been a southern gentlemen, particularly with women" and an overtly ugly misogynist comment like "PMSNBC" only really highlights the disconnect between who you THINK you are and who YOU REALLY ARE. Embrace the reality of it, stop projecting blame onto a society and economy that has largely left you behind, and try to be a better person during your remaining days.
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Gee. I hope all of you guys can still be friends.
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You played college baseball and had enough intelligence, luck, connections, strong work ethic--or some combination of the four--to be accepted to Georgetown Law School.
I am sad to say that you are extending him a line of credit for which he does not qualify. He attended law school at LSU. At some point thereafter he found his way to Georgetown where he received some sort of estate planning certificate.
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I am sad to say that you are extending him a line of credit for which he does not qualify. He attended law school at LSU. At some point thereafter he found his way to Georgetown where he received some sort of estate planning certificate.
It was an advanced law degree, an LL.M.
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Great day and great addition to the line up of nine....Congrats Justice Kavanaugh !!!!
And congrats Mr. Happy on your courage here at OWA, in this intolerable bastion of liberal thought.
Usually come here for only good Astro insight...
Let's Go Astros !
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Great day and great addition to the line up of nine....Congrats Justice Kavanaugh !!!!
And congrats Mr. Happy on your courage here at OWA, in this intolerable bastion of liberal thought.
Usually come here for only good Astro insight...
Let's Go Astros !
Enough of that. Back to the echo chamber.
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It was an advanced law degree, an LL.M.
I must have misremembered the academic credentials I noted when I was perusing the Louisiana Supreme Court's rejection of your petition for reinstatement.
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I must have misremembered the academic credentials I noted when I was perusing the Louisiana Supreme Court's rejection of your petition for reinstatement.
Might be interesting reading. Got a link?
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Great day and great addition to the line up of nine....Congrats Justice Kavanaugh !!!!
And congrats Mr. Happy on your courage here at OWA, in this intolerable bastion of liberal thought.
Usually come here for only good Astro insight...
Let's Go Astros !
Yeah, he's a hero. He was helped but doesn't think anyone else should be. Kind of like last one in shut the door. I see no reason to even try and be respectful towards him when he tries to offend with weak slang terms. They just show him and you all to be parrots.
And the allegations against your perfect judge are not baseless as they were never truly investigated.
BTW, you future Russians are welcome to start your own echo chamber.
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Might be interesting reading. Got a link?
Much like Hap himself the LA SC mistrusts foreigners and will not allow me to access the site. I don't feel like dealing with a VPN so I'm going to guess that this is what I was talking about. If not, just search the site (or google) and you'll be presented with full compliment of relevant matters that have been heard.
https://www.lasc.org/opinions/2009/09B0405.pc.pdf
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The point has been made by other commentators previously but the whole concept of "economic concerns" driving Trump voters is utterly bogus. It boils down to this: they're simply racist, bigoted shits (particularly the well-educated types like Mr. Happy who, whatever their economic circumstances once were, enjoy a lifestyle that most Americans would die for):
Both in the Republican primaries and in the general election, white voters’ attitudes about African Americans, Muslims and immigration were more closely associated with how they voted than were any strictly economic concerns. In fact, racial attitudes were the prism through which voters thought about economic outcomes — something we call “racialized economics.” For example, after Obama became president, attitudes toward blacks suddenly became linked with people’s views on the economy: the less favorable their view of blacks, the less favorable their view of the economy. Scholars who did extensive interviews with whites in Youngstown, Ohio, and rural Louisiana reported many racially loaded statements about economic circumstances. One Youngstown factory worker said people who received government assistance had “gold chains and a Cadillac, when I can barely afford a Cavalier.”
https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/five-myths/myths-about-the-2016-presidential-election/2018/10/05/4e07a22a-c808-11e8-b2b5-79270f9cce17_story.html?utm_term=.4d00bcfa84f0
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It boils down to this: they're simply racist, bigoted shits (particularly the well-educated types...
When all logic grows cold and all thinking gets done,
You'll be warm in the arms of the Mayor of Simpleton
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My favorite theme in this thread is the echo chamber, from folks who spend all their time watching Fox News and posting lame memes on Facebook and nodding their heads to Rush and Ingram and their ilk. I’d challenge any of you to go spend a day at D caucas and an R one. One looks like current America the other what y’all pretend it is. MAGA. By supporting a guy who is a carnival barker. You folks supporting this fraud are going down as 21st century Alexander Stephens.
As much grief as I give. I’d still sit down with any of y’all and have a beer and talk Astros. I’m just flabbergasted at the lack of empathy on certain issues. Especially from folks who have been on the receiving end their whole life.
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When all logic grows cold and all thinking gets done,
You'll be warm in the arms of the Mayor of Simpleton
Simpleton? Isn't that where all the Hillary conspiracy believers such as yourself reside?
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Simpleton? Isn't that where all the Hillary conspiracy believers such as yourself reside?
No, your geography is all fucked up. I believe that Hillary rode her husband coat tails, that's not a conspiacy. I believe that Hillary victim shamed Bill's accusers, that not conspiracy. I don't believe she had shit to do with Benghazi. I think she might have screwed Bernie Sanders but it's just a hunch not a belief. I don't even believe what those guys were saying about you that one time.
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I don't even believe what those guys were saying about you that one time.
Oh, that one you shoulda believed. They did hire me to kill that guy.
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Oh, that one you shoulda believed. They did hire me to kill that guy.
I'm talking about that other time, not the one time.
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I spent way too much time writing something that ultimately would have been “tldnr”. So here’s a summary:
Holy crap. Accusations of racism and domestic abuse on a sports forum about a memeber that most of us know very little about feels like a cheap shot and ultimately extremely unproductive. You can’t cry “you’re an extremist!” and then be guilty of the same thing. I’m not friends with anyone here on Facebook so I might not know 90% of the story but that brings me back to my original point - wrong forum. None of this makes anyone look good imo.
That being said...
Mr. Happy, personally, I whole heartedly disagree with you on pretty much everything you post on this thread. I feel like I started this current shitshow with my dig at you about your Indians fandom (2-0 btw! Tough shit!) but that wasn’t personal. If I could ask one thing... please speak from the heart and explain your positions. Basically, if it fits on a bumper sticker I’m not going to listen. If you lead with, or your main point is “libtards” I’m not going to listen. If your only reaction to a major political event is “haha! I win you lose” then nobody is going to listen. If your response to something you don’t agree with is making fun of the extremely normal and and evolutionarily required menstrual cycle (PMSNBC) then again, I won’t listen and you are clearly in the minority in attitude and basic human decorum.
Are you listening to this? Because I’m trying to talk to you, isn’t that what you want from the “other team”? (Don’t get me started on the team dynamics of current politics)
If you don’t care then so be it, I’d rather hear from someone like Limey who consistently presents well thought out and mostly thouroughly vetted summaries of the daily political machinations. I might even occasionally disagree with some of his posts, I’m pretty sure he doesn’t give two fucks. Please present your sources! Explain why you think what you think with that context and I think this thread could be far more interesting. Otherwise why are you here?
Sphinx: you’re obviously a bright fella. You’re input would be welcome if you have the interest. It might actually help some of the “team democrat” folks here. I think the key is that we all keep away from the instinct of getting mad when someone challenges our “team”. Make no mistake, we are all getting played by making us choose a team. Especially us sports fans. We love choosing a team and sticking with it through 100 loss seasons and 100 win seasons. Very applicable.
For the record, wtf on Kavanaugh. The guy already has a lifetime court appointment. Nobody was trying to “ruin his life”. His life is already going to be just fine. This was about selecting someone who should be in the top .01% of their profession. If there are major concerns regarding honesty or criminality or temperament then we can wait more than one week before pushing through a confirmation. If there’s too much smoke then move on. Surely there has to be at least one other candidate that can pass the smell test and still deliver what is expected. His life was never going to be ruined. Give me a break. As soon as the next news cycle hits and whatever the next shitshow is that we all get to witness, BK would have been forgotten within days. Who even remembers the last political boogeyman?
Meanwhile, a lady who really had nothing to gain gets to deal with death threats to her own self and her family. I genuinely hope the never ending shit news cycle buries her current situation and she can carry in with her life.
‘Murica!
This still ended up tldr...
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Accusations of racism and domestic abuse on a sports forum about a memeber that most of us know very little about feels like a cheap shot and ultimately extremely unproductive.
You might consider that a lot of us have been watching him act like a lunatic here for 20 years.
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As much grief as I give. I’d still sit down with any of y’all and have a beer and talk Astros. I’m just flabbergasted at the lack of empathy on certain issues. Especially from folks who have been on the receiving end their whole life.
Me too, regarding shit given and beer. I admit I'm kind of fucked up, hell, I'm a pacifist and an anarchist, but I don't really think Democrats are a bunch of namby pamby idealistic bleeding heart milk toast cream puff Pollyannas just waiting to be taken advantage, anymore than I think Republicans are stupid cold hearted cruel racist fear mongering women hating war hawk bastards waiting to destroy everyone but old white guys. It's all somewhere in between and it's woven in the fabric of this great country. We're all equally fucked and will remain so until people are willing to exercise give and take politics instead of tribal politics. All this whining and hand wringing may bring comfort to some but it solves nothing. We must all learn to love again. We must be willing to meet half way. Compromise is not a weakness. Yes people, love is the answer.
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Yes people, love is the answer.
I might agree with you but you've got a funny way of showing love.
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I might agree with you but you've got a funny way of showing love.
Yeah, I know. I just can't help my need to fuck with shit sometimes. But, if I didn't care about whom I'm fuckin' with I wouldn't bother in the first place.
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Sphinx: you’re obviously a bright fella.
Hahaha. I'm a fella, and what my dad calls an educated idiot.
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You might consider that a lot of us have been watching him act like a lunatic here for 20 years.
Well. I’ve been on the forum for at least 16 years (didn’t keep track and mostly lurking for most of that time) and I ignored anything non-baseball for a good chunk of it. So yeah, I have little context. This thread has been fascinating to me though. The biggest “concern” I hear from people I disagree with is that I just don’t understand them and am out of touch. So, I want to listen. Please provide something of substance.
I’ve been waiting and the substance is lacking so far.
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Me too, regarding shit given and beer. I admit I'm kind of fucked up, hell, I'm a pacifist and an anarchist, but I don't really think Democrats are a bunch of namby pamby idealistic bleeding heart milk toast cream puff Pollyannas just waiting to be taken advantage, anymore than I think Republicans are stupid cold hearted cruel racist fear mongering women hating war hawk bastards waiting to destroy everyone but old white guys. It's all somewhere in between and it's woven in the fabric of this great country. We're all equally fucked and will remain so until people are willing to exercise give and take politics instead of tribal politics. All this whining and hand wringing may bring comfort to some but it solves nothing. We must all learn to love again. We must be willing to meet half way. Compromise is not a weakness. Yes people, love is the answer.
This is constructive! Thank you. I’m totally fucked and so are you. Where do we go from here?
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This is constructive! Thank you. I’m totally fucked and so are you. Where do we go from here?
Politicians work together. It's 2018. The party of progress develops an app that can register people from a smart phone, and take their picture, then you tell the other guys who like the old ways best, that they can have their coveted voter IDs if they promise to never build that goddamn wall.
Now I know I'm over simplifying things and it's really just a pipe dream. But there's no effort, from either side. The gap is too far and there's too much damage. I blame most of the gap of on Trump, but not all, the shit has been stewing since Kennedy got shot by that one guy that one other time. There, how's that for a conspiracy.
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Politicians work together. It's 2018.
I'm not sure I could come up with a more diametrically opposed pair of sentences.
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Let me guess, Happy and all his fake DM/inbox crowd are all huge “personal responsibility” and limited government phonies
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No one is actually addressing the point Mr Hap made though, why is it that neither of the main parties can put up a candidate that is able to beat a guy who is not even a politician? You can drag out all the bumper sticker explanations with all the ‘isims’ you like, but I don’t think they explain it. When nearly half the voters in the country take him over whatever else was on offer, I don’t think you can just say it is just the lunatic fringe.
I may have made this observation before, but there appears to be very little objectivity in US politics (or this thread). I am not too savvy on how your political systems work but I know a partisan shit show when I see one. In 2018, you are either a smelly transgender hippy who is really a disguised communist or an evil old white guy that wants to revert to days of slavery and keep the women folk under control and in the kitchen. No middle ground, choose which camp you are in. If I am in one of these camps and you say something that doesn’t align to how I think, then fuck you, you are in the other camp and don’t even try to explain anything to me, I’m not listening.
In baseball discussions, folks seem to be somewhat skeptical, suspicious and cynical, not so much in this thread. So, back to original question how did Trump get elected?
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Let me guess, Happy and all his fake DM/inbox crowd are all huge “personal responsibility” and limited government phonies
Nothing fake about a couple of supporters, neither of whom said much about their politics.
First of all, my only knowledge of you comes from what you have posted on this site over the last two decades. One fact is entirely clear based on that history: you are a loser. And, I honestly only mean that as a statement of fact and not in a pejorative way. You played college baseball and had enough intelligence, luck, connections, strong work ethic--or some combination of the four--to be accepted to Georgetown Law School. Those facts alone indicate that your life was off to an auspicious start. Your addiction and other personal issues derailed you. You were a negligent father and a shitty husband. You now seem to be relatively economically disenfranchised, a key symptom of many of those who support Trump, and something that our leadership and government needs to address for all demographics that are struggling to pay bills as the wealth gap continues to widen. And I applaud you for overcoming your struggle with addiction. However, rather than to use your struggles as a lens to view the world through, making you a more empathetic person, you have chosen to be bitter and angry, to revel in "owning libs," which I swear will never do anything to improve your own personal economic or social circumstances, and to be divisive on this board and, I'm sure, in your community.
The truth is, if you weren't white, you would be dead or in jail. The time you were standing on your wife or ex-wife's front yard with a baseball bat when the police showed up while she and your kids cowered inside? That doesn't end well for people who weren't born with the inherent privileges you were. It's ironic that I've read indirectly racist comments from you about young black men who lost their lives during encounters with police. Sure, maybe they were selling a loosie or standing on a corner, but how could you become so callous and out of touch given what you went through and all the second chances that you've had?
Anyways, I'm not here to try to win some message board chat; honestly, your posts in this thread only make me feel sad for you... and I'm not part of the "echo chamber" you think that you're enlightening with your right wing takes. And, I'm sorry that your addiction and personal demons derailed your life and career. My only point is that nothing Trump has ever done or will ever purport to do (or lie about doing) is ever going to make your life better. You aren't winning. You already lost many years ago, and I hope that you'll take that knowledge and use it to make your personal life as fulfilling and happy as it can be and to try to live with some empathy and compassion for others who are also struggling in varying and complicated ways that we can never truly understand as outsiders.
Also, the juxtaposition of "all times have always been a southern gentlemen, particularly with women" and an overtly ugly misogynist comment like "PMSNBC" only really highlights the disconnect between who you THINK you are and who YOU REALLY ARE. Embrace the reality of it, stop projecting blame onto a society and economy that has largely left you behind, and try to be a better person during your remaining days.
Thanks for the analysis. You have been reading. Correction about the bat story. The reason why I violated the restraining order that evening was because my ex refused to let me tell the boys goodnight over the phone. I had just received a Louisville Slugger bat with my name on it as a gift from a law school classmate. I wanted to show it to the boys. There was never at any time any direct, indirect, overt or covert threats of any harm whatsoever. When the ADA saw the bat, he immediately dropped the felony charges, and to get it over with that day, so that I could return to California, I pled guilty to a count of disturbing the peace and one count of telephone harassment, both of which are misdemeanors. I got probation, which they commuted after one year.
I will take what you say, which was sad sincerely and in a polite way (which I deeply appreciate), under advisement. You may well be right about a couple of things.
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Gee. I hope all of you guys can still be friends.
Absotively, posilutely, Andy! I would jump in a foxhole immediately with Limey, Chuck, Navin or any of your glorious bastards, even though we disagree on most things. Even you, Sphinx!
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This could be a good metaphor for the "moving on, nothing to see here" shitshow of the Kavanaugh confirmation.
https://twitter.com/KamVTV/status/1048409672137363456
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As of today, two thirds of the men on the Supreme Court have been credibly accused of sexual misconduct by highly respected, successful, professional women. Happy Monday.
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As of today, two thirds of the men on the Supreme Court have been credibly accused of sexual misconduct by highly respected, successful, professional women. Happy Monday.
John Jay probably did bad things too.
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John Jay probably did bad things too.
At least Jay never got stuck in a bath tub.
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In completely unexpected and in no way predictable news, Joe Manchin got attacked by Trump Jr. after he helped put daddy's enforcer on the Supreme Court while, at the same time, Manchin is losing support and enthusiasm among his Democratic base.
That dumb fucking coward is going to gift his seat to the Republicans after gifting them control of the court for a generation. Was he really that stupid to think that they'd leave him alone after blasting off both feet?
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I really only read 2 forums online with any regularity. This forum is skewed liberal and demonizes the conservatives.
The other forum is conservative and demonizes liberals.
I read both "echo chambers" in that sometimes I get some good commentary about a political position. I skip over the name calling, characterizations, etc.
For me this quote sums up a root of the issue (It's not as simplistic as the quote but it's a start)
"The problem with Washington is that we've become Democrats and Republicans instead of Americans. Everything is aimed at enhancing political position instead of strengthening America."
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In completely unexpected and in no way predictable news, Joe Manchin got attacked by Trump Jr. after he helped put daddy's enforcer on the Supreme Court while, at the same time, Manchin is losing support and enthusiasm among his Democratic base.
That dumb fucking coward is going to gift his seat to the Republicans after gifting them control of the court for a generation. Was he really that stupid to think that they'd leave him alone after blasting off both feet?
Manchin is a coward and as corrupt as they come. I could care less which letter comes before whoever holds the seat here in WV. It’s the same “good ‘ol boy” club regardless.
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Manchin is a coward and as corrupt as they come. I could care less which letter comes before whoever holds the seat here in WV. It’s the same “good ‘ol boy” club regardless.
There's talk that he might switch parties after the election. I don't know if that's real, or just an old fashioned dirty trick to dampen Democratic turnout. Either way, he brings this on himself; he works hard to keep his job rather than doing his job.
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And...the right wing and left wing belong to the same bird.
MLK stated that if we can't learn to live together as brothers then we will perish together as fools.
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And...the right wing and left wing belong to the same bird.
MLK stated that if we can't learn to live together as brothers then we will perish together as fools.
This is 100 percent truth. I tend to lean a little liberal, but the money grubbing whoring and absolute disinterest in anything that doesn't involve personal gain from almost every current politician is fucking disgusting, and is just soul crushing from a human being that cares about the lives of other human beings.
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This is 100 percent truth. I tend to lean a little liberal, but the money grubbing whoring and absolute disinterest in anything that doesn't involve personal gain from almost every current politician is fucking disgusting, and is just soul crushing from a human being that cares about the lives of other human beings.
So what species are Joe West and Angel Hernandez then?
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So what species are Joe West and Angel Hernandez then?
Joe West is some form of bullfrog.
Angel Hernandez is only a small part human, and that part is known as "the asshole".
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Joe West is some form of bullfrog.
Angel Hernandez is only a small part human, and that part is known as "the asshole".
Baboon ass.
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So what species are Joe West and Angel Hernandez then?
Joe West puts the "cunt" in "country".
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I never though (or hoped) that I'd live to see the day that someone talked more nonsense in the Oval Office than Trump. And then it happened today. With Trump watching. Jeez.
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I never though (or hoped) that I'd live to see the day that someone talked more nonsense in the Oval Office than Trump. And then it happened today. With Trump watching. Jeez.
That’s just straight up mental illness. Sad to see regardless of who’s involved or what you think of his music. I hope he can get the help he needs without a media circus analyzing him. And for Trump to use him as a political prop...? This is one news story I’d be fine with if it disappeared tomorrow.
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What an absolute embarrassment. But remember that time Obama put his feet up on the desk. Yet not a peep from the people who were mad at that,,,,weird.
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What an absolute embarrassment. But remember that time Obama put his feet up on the desk. Yet not a peep from the people who were mad at that,,,,weird.
Plus, the obvious hypocrisy of telling LeBron to shut up and dribble, and Taylor Swift to stay in her lane, but no one on the right is telling Kanye to STFU and go back to making records and shoes.
And, in respect of the Obamas, remember when the right had a terminal case of the vapors over the First Lady's exposed...shoulders?
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So, U.S. resident, Washington Post journalist and outspoken critic of the new Saudi regime, Jamal Khashoggi, appears to have been lured to the Saudi embassy in Turkey, tortured, murdered, dismembered and disappeared. Trump - shadowed by security clearance dropout Jared Kushner - has been trying to avoid doing the right thing about this because the Saudis are going to buy $110 billion in weapons from us and he doesn't want to lose such a valuable customer.
Setting aside the gaping wide window into Trump's amoral soul, here's a few things to note:
- Trump and, notably, Kushner have been cosying up to the new Saudi regime while it has been systematically arresting and/or disappearing opponents and critics alike;
- Kushner has taken multiple meetings with the new regime;
- Completely coincidentally, Saudis pumped $100 million into Kushner's failing real estate business;
- Saudi delegations have made a habit of staying in, and spending lavishly at, Trump's hotel in Washington;
- Trump's Manhattan hotel has been on a losing streak for a few years, but has been guaranteed a profitable 2018 by dint of the stay of a large Saudi contingent there earlier this year;
- The $110 billion arms deal is unlikely to be anywhere near that amount when it's all said and done; and
- The Saudis have little choice in weapons suppliers - they're not like hotel bathroom fittings that you can swap out on a whim, there is the whole issue of compatibility, parts, maintenance and training.
The Senate (both sides) sent a letter to Trump demanding action against Saudi Arabia, specifically written in the manner necessary to compel action under the Magnitsky Act - named after Sergei Magnitsky, a Russian dissenter who was arrested and subsequently died in Russian custody. Trump is squealing now because, clearly, he doesn't want to do it.
Yet again, we have a situation Trump is flailing and failing to do his job because of personal greed. The mid-terms are so important because we need a check on this rampant corruption.
[Correction: Saudi investment in Kushner Cos was only $100 million, not billion]
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So, U.S. resident, Washington Post journalist and outspoken critic of the new Saudi regime, Jamal Khashoggi, appears to have been lured to the Saudi embassy in Turkey, tortured, murdered, dismembered and disappeared. Trump - shadowed by security clearance dropout Jared Kushner - has been trying to avoid doing the right thing about this because the Saudis are going to buy $110 billion in weapons from us and he doesn't want to lose such a valuable customer.
Setting aside the gaping wide window into Trump's amoral soul, here's a few things to note:
- Trump and, notably, Kushner have been cosying up to the new Saudi regime while it has been systematically arresting and/or disappearing opponents and critics alike;
- Kushner has taken multiple meetings with the new regime;
- Completely coincidentally, Saudis pumped $100 billion into Kushner's failing real estate business;
- Saudi delegations have made a habit of staying in, and spending lavishly at, Trump's hotel in Washington;
- Trump's Manhattan hotel has been on a losing streak for a few years, but has been guaranteed a profitable 2018 by dint of the stay of a large Saudi contingent there earlier this year;
- The $110 billion arms deal is unlikely to be anywhere near that amount when it's all said and done; and
- The Saudis have little choice in weapons suppliers - they're not like hotel bathroom fittings that you can swap out on a whim, there is the whole issue of compatibility, parts, maintenance and training.
The Senate (both sides) sent a letter to Trump demanding action against Saudi Arabia, specifically written in the manner necessary to compel action under the Magnitsky Act - named after Sergei Magnitsky, a Russian dissenter who was arrested and subsequently died in Russian custody. Trump is squealing now because, clearly, he doesn't want to do it.
Yet again, we have a situation Trump is flailing and failing to do his job because of personal greed. The mid-terms are so important because we need a check on this rampant corruption.
Jack Ryan is going to be busy for years!!!
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This exchange between a State Department official - "Mr. Palladino" and a reporter is hilarious (because it's fantastic when it finally dawns on Palladino that he's walked right into the reporter's trap) but also galling because it makes it so obvious about how completely the Trump administration is failing. The ambassadorships are not unoccupied because of Democratic obstruction, Trump hasn't bothered to even nominate candidates. We do not have ambassadors in South Korea, Saudi Arabia or Turkey, to name but three current vacancies.
Enjoy:
QUESTION: And then in terms of your high-level diplomatic talks, other than the calls you – other than the calls that you’ve read out here, presumably you have people on the ground in both Ankara, Istanbul – in Ankara, Istanbul, and Riyadh all pushing this, right?
MR PALLADINO: Our embassies overseas, absolutely.
QUESTION: Okay.
MR PALLADINO: Our diplomatic mission overseas.
QUESTION: Who again – what’s the name of the ambassador in Turkey right now?
MR PALLADINO: I don’t have that in front of me right now and I – Matt --
QUESTION: What’s the name of the ambassador in Saudi Arabia right now?
MR PALLADINO: I see what you’re getting at. Okay. We are confident in our diplomatic --
QUESTION: The answer is that you don’t have an ambassador in either place, right?
MR PALLADINO: We --
QUESTION: And in fact, the charge in Riyadh has now been nominated to be the ambassador to Yemen. So just is it correct that you do not have ambassadors in place in either Ankara or Riyadh?
MR PALLADINO: But we have diplomatic staff, senior diplomatic officials --
QUESTION: I’m sure you do.
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So, U.S. resident, Washington Post journalist and outspoken critic of the new Saudi regime, Jamal Khashoggi, appears to have been lured to the Saudi embassy in Turkey, tortured, murdered, dismembered and disappeared. Trump - shadowed by security clearance dropout Jared Kushner - has been trying to avoid doing the right thing about this because the Saudis are going to buy $110 billion in weapons from us and he doesn't want to lose such a valuable customer.
Setting aside the gaping wide window into Trump's amoral soul, here's a few things to note:
- Trump and, notably, Kushner have been cosying up to the new Saudi regime while it has been systematically arresting and/or disappearing opponents and critics alike;
- Kushner has taken multiple meetings with the new regime;
- Completely coincidentally, Saudis pumped $100 million into Kushner's failing real estate business;
- Saudi delegations have made a habit of staying in, and spending lavishly at, Trump's hotel in Washington;
- Trump's Manhattan hotel has been on a losing streak for a few years, but has been guaranteed a profitable 2018 by dint of the stay of a large Saudi contingent there earlier this year;
- The $110 billion arms deal is unlikely to be anywhere near that amount when it's all said and done; and
- The Saudis have little choice in weapons suppliers - they're not like hotel bathroom fittings that you can swap out on a whim, there is the whole issue of compatibility, parts, maintenance and training.
The Senate (both sides) sent a letter to Trump demanding action against Saudi Arabia, specifically written in the manner necessary to compel action under the Magnitsky Act - named after Sergei Magnitsky, a Russian dissenter who was arrested and subsequently died in Russian custody. Trump is squealing now because, clearly, he doesn't want to do it.
Yet again, we have a situation Trump is flailing and failing to do his job because of personal greed. The mid-terms are so important because we need a check on this rampant corruption.
[Correction: Saudi investment in Kushner Cos was only $100 million, not billion]
This is one of the most astonishing stories of our time. The Saudis murdered an American journalist in a foreign country and nobody will hold them to task. Combine that with Trump's lavish praise of autocrats in the Philippines, Turkey, Russia, and WSJ's endorsement of the Brazilian candidate, there is a growing trend of ennobling autocracy throughout the world, which used to be anathema to our democratic -- or in terms the right should understand "western" -- values.
Not to mention supporting the Saudis in a genocidal war in Yemen.
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This is one of the most astonishing stories of our time. The Saudis murdered an American journalist in a foreign country and nobody will hold them to task. Combine that with Trump's lavish praise of autocrats in the Philippines, Turkey, Russia, and WSJ's endorsement of the Brazilian candidate, there is a growing trend of ennobling autocracy throughout the world, which used to be anathema to our democratic -- or in terms the right should understand "western" -- values.
Not to mention supporting the Saudis in a genocidal war in Yemen.
...while stacking the courts with "yes men" (and only men), attacking the independent press, demanding parades in your honor and elevating unqualified family members to positions of power.
Another funny-if-it-wasn't-so-scary thing this week was Trump suggesting that Ivanka is the most qualified candidate to be U.N. Ambassador, but he can't put her up for the job because it would be illegal under nepotism laws. Presumably he discussed this whole nepotism thing with Ivanka and Jared when he walked a few feet down the corridor to their offices in the White House.
As for the Saudi war in Yemen, do you want those Yemeni killed by Russian weapons? Or Chinese? I think not!
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Meanwhile, ethical businesses and governments around the world are bailing on Prince Mohammed bin Salman's ego summit due to take place in Raiyadh in a couple of weeks. Some, like grinning beardo Richard Branson, have cancelled investments and future collaboration. In Branson's case, it was a $1 billion from Saudis in his Virgin Space project.
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Com'on Ted (https://www.texastribune.org/theblast/2018/10/15/?utm_campaign=trib-social&utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook&utm_content=1539629351)
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Com'on Ted (https://www.texastribune.org/theblast/2018/10/15/?utm_campaign=trib-social&utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook&utm_content=1539629351)
FTC. Sorta has a ring to it.
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FTC. Sorta has a ring to it.
Haha. That’s awesome.
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Com'on Ted (https://www.texastribune.org/theblast/2018/10/15/?utm_campaign=trib-social&utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook&utm_content=1539629351)
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Com'on Ted (https://www.texastribune.org/theblast/2018/10/15/?utm_campaign=trib-social&utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook&utm_content=1539629351)
Fake news. It's only 650 miles from Fort Worth to a White Castle in St. Louis.
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Fake news. It's only 650 miles from Fort Worth to a White Castle in St. Louis.
That is a lot of places I have zero interest in going to in one sentence.
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That is a lot of places I have zero interest in going to in one sentence.
It's only 460 miles from Texarkana to White Castle in Clarksville Tennesee.
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Given the senator's familiarity with the chain I am surprised to discover that there are no White Castle restaurants in Iowa.
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Com'on Ted (https://www.texastribune.org/theblast/2018/10/15/?utm_campaign=trib-social&utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook&utm_content=1539629351)
John Oliver tracked the guy down (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mRq8upbRoTw)
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Lots of stories right now from around the country about voter suppression. The two most outrageous examples are:
North Dakota: a new law - that took effect after the primaries so this is the first time it's been a thing at the polls - requires a street address on the voter's ID. Well, in rural areas - and particularly on native American reservations - people often don't have a street address but a P.O. Box. The new law means that IDs with P.O. Boxes only, are invalid. Native Americans vote for Democrats in ND at about a 75% clip.
Georgia: this one's well known, but it's so bare-faced it's almost beyond comprehension. Brian Kemp, the Secretary of State, has been systematically purging voter rolls and boxing new applications. The latter at a rate of 3-1 POC vs. whites, in a state that is 70% white. He has also purges over 1 million voter registrations since taking officer, including nearly 700,000 just last year. Oh, Brian Kemp is also the Republican candidate for Governor - a race that went to the Republican in 2014 by less than 200,000 votes. He's the ref in his own game, and he's also now eliminating people on the oppositions roster.
But let's not forget that up and down the country, Voter ID and roll purges are being used to tip the already tipped playing field even further in Republicans' favor. The good news is that these actions seem to be garnering a reaction that may be big enough to overwhelm the scale-thumbing going on. In ND, for example, Native American tribes are using their sovereign status to issue new IDs with a street address, and they literally burned their machine up doing it, such is the demand. People don't want to lose their vote, and they're working hard to make sure they don't get disenfranchised.
The irony here may well be that telling people who might not have voted that they can't vote, is more likely to make them more likely to vote.
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Given the senator's familiarity with the chain I am surprised to discover that there are no White Castle restaurants in Iowa.
I’m shocked Steve King hasn’t built a white castle.
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
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Lots of stories right now from around the country about voter suppression. The two most outrageous examples are:
North Dakota: a new law - that took effect after the primaries so this is the first time it's been a thing at the polls - requires a street address on the voter's ID. Well, in rural areas - and particularly on native American reservations - people often don't have a street address but a P.O. Box. The new law means that IDs with P.O. Boxes only, are invalid. Native Americans vote for Democrats in ND at about a 75% clip.
Georgia: this one's well known, but it's so bare-faced it's almost beyond comprehension. Brian Kemp, the Secretary of State, has been systematically purging voter rolls and boxing new applications. The latter at a rate of 3-1 POC vs. whites, in a state that is 70% white. He has also purges over 1 million voter registrations since taking officer, including nearly 700,000 just last year. Oh, Brian Kemp is also the Republican candidate for Governor - a race that went to the Republican in 2014 by less than 200,000 votes. He's the ref in his own game, and he's also now eliminating people on the oppositions roster.
But let's not forget that up and down the country, Voter ID and roll purges are being used to tip the already tipped playing field even further in Republicans' favor. The good news is that these actions seem to be garnering a reaction that may be big enough to overwhelm the scale-thumbing going on. In ND, for example, Native American tribes are using their sovereign status to issue new IDs with a street address, and they literally burned their machine up doing it, such is the demand. People don't want to lose their vote, and they're working hard to make sure they don't get disenfranchised.
The irony here may well be that telling people who might not have voted that they can't vote, is more likely to make them more likely to vote.
It's prime ratfucking season. They always come out in October after voter registration has closed. And they're especially emboldened this year since one of their own just got sworn onto the Supreme Court.
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It's prime ratfucking season. They always come out in October after voter registration has closed. And they're especially emboldened this year since one of their own just got sworn onto the Supreme Court.
Yeah. Challenges to stop voter suppression laws are going to die 5-4 at the Supreme Court for a good long while. Although, to be fair, North Dakota's new law was upheld 6-2, pre-Kavanaugh, because it was amended to have the fig leaf of a 6 week window to provide the street address that people don't have.
The real ratfucking was in 2015, when SCOTUS ruled (5-4) to invalidate the pre-approval requirements for southern states. The next fucking day - literally - multiple states enacted voter ID laws that had been previously denied or were under review by the DOJ. The court's view was that the pre-approval requirement was getting a bit long in the tooth and needed updating, so they just klilled that part and suggested Congress look at it. That's like saying that stop signs aren't the best way to regulate traffic through an intersection, so let's just rip them all down until we can put in place a better system. Nothing bad would happen in the meantime, right?
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OMG...this (https://img.thedailybeast.com/image/upload/c_crop,d_placeholder_euli9k,h_1440,w_2560,x_0,y_0/dpr_2.0/c_limit,w_740/fl_lossy,q_auto/v1539571755/181014-tani-trump-photo-hero_dgrxg4)!
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OMG...this (https://img.thedailybeast.com/image/upload/c_crop,d_placeholder_euli9k,h_1440,w_2560,x_0,y_0/dpr_2.0/c_limit,w_740/fl_lossy,q_auto/v1539571755/181014-tani-trump-photo-hero_dgrxg4)!
Where’s Hoover?
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
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Where’s Hoover?
It's his turn under the table.
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It's his turn under the table.
Well, with a name like that...
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I’m shocked Steve King hasn’t built a white castle.
A singeing burn.
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OMG...this (https://img.thedailybeast.com/image/upload/c_crop,d_placeholder_euli9k,h_1440,w_2560,x_0,y_0/dpr_2.0/c_limit,w_740/fl_lossy,q_auto/v1539571755/181014-tani-trump-photo-hero_dgrxg4)!
Fixed (https://twitter.com/BeardedGenius/status/1051920754974044160)
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The comments on that are outstanding!!
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Fixed (https://twitter.com/BeardedGenius/status/1051920754974044160)
Excellent, and totally merited.
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Not cool to leave Abe in place.
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
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Not cool to leave Abe in place.
Someone actually corrected that, replacing Honest Abe with Barfin' Bart.
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Not cool to leave Abe in place.
He had his say. (https://twitter.com/KindBounce/status/1052011383708094464)
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He had his say. (https://twitter.com/KindBounce/status/1052011383708094464)
Nice
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The irony here may well be that telling people who might not have voted that they can't vote, is more likely to make them more likely to vote.
FWIW, the first day of early voting in Georgia saw a 300% increase in voter turnout vs. the first day in 2014. Maybe everyone just wants to get in early causing a spike that will tail off as voting season progresses. Maybe it's an indicator of an electorate energized to vote. Maybe it's Republicans driving the numbers up; maybe it's Democrats...
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Not cool to leave Abe in place.
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
Abe was kind of a dick (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cvkBvzpbBPs)
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FWIW, the first day of early voting in Georgia saw a 300% increase in voter turnout vs. the first day in 2014. Maybe everyone just wants to get in early causing a spike that will tail off as voting season progresses. Maybe it's an indicator of an electorate energized to vote. Maybe it's Republicans driving the numbers up; maybe it's Democrats...
I live in Georgia, and I voted yesterday. There was a group of elderly white people in front of me, and it was clear, based on their conversations, they were voting Democrat. One guy had a Stacey Abrams sticker on his shirt, but was asked to remove it (as there can be no "campaigning" within 150 ft or so of the station). I was kind of surprised by them being obvious Democrats, as I live in a very conservative town. We'll see how it goes, though.
On a side note, I was wearing my Altuve shirt, and had several people tell me they hoped the Astros win it all. They all said they really like the team, even though they are Braves fans.
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I live in Georgia, and I voted yesterday. There was a group of elderly white people in front of me, and it was clear, based on their conversations, they were voting Democrat. One guy had a Stacey Abrams sticker on his shirt, but was asked to remove it (as there can be no "campaigning" within 150 ft or so of the station). I was kind of surprised by them being obvious Democrats, as I live in a very conservative town. We'll see how it goes, though.
On a side note, I was wearing my Altuve shirt, and had several people tell me they hoped the Astros win it all. They all said they really like the team, even though they are Braves fans.
Typically, high turnout favors Democrats. Here's hoping...
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Here's an interesting twitter thread speculating on the possibility that Nikki Haley's surprise resignation might be because of the murder of Jamal Khashoggi. The article linked on twitter requires a subscription, but he summarizes in the thread.
https://twitter.com/joshtpm/status/1052713542913323009
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Early voter turnout in Georgia continues to be high. Day 2 was higher than Day 1.
Anecdotal evidence suggests that Texas counties have been inundated with new voter registrations in the final days of the registration window. Beto wins by turning out new voters. It appears that may be happening.
The ND Native American voter suppression effort seems to be at DEFCON 1. The tribal councils will issue - as is their sovereign right - a letter affirming a street address to anyone showing up at polling stations on reservations without an ID that complies with the new, suppressive regulations. The state government is equivocating on whether they will accept them, but I'm sure it will be a legal fight if they don't (and the election is close). It may go all the way to the Supreme Court. Ah. Fuck.
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Early voter turnout in Georgia continues to be high. Day 2 was higher than Day 1.
Anecdotal evidence suggests that Texas counties have been inundated with new voter registrations in the final days of the registration window. Beto wins by turning out new voters. It appears that may be happening.
The ND Native American voter suppression effort seems to be at DEFCON 1. The tribal councils will issue - as is their sovereign right - a letter affirming a street address to anyone showing up at polling stations on reservations without an ID that complies with the new, suppressive regulations. The state government is equivocating on whether they will accept them, but I'm sure it will be a legal fight if they don't (and the election is close). It may go all the way to the Supreme Court. Ah. Fuck.
Don't count the Beto chicken until the egg hatches.
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Don't count the Beto chicken until the egg hatches.
Not at all. He's still notably behind in the polls of "likely voters". To win, he'll need to turn out the "unlikely voters". In droves.
The fact that Texas is one of only 13 states without online voter registration, and yet tens of thousands of people are registering to vote, suggests that they will follow through on the entire process and show up at the ballot box. It's a good sign, but it's also anecdotal and I have no idea how widespread the new voter surge is or, of course, if they're going to vote for O'Rourke or Cruz.
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Every vote counts. This is clearly understood by Kemp's thumb-on-the-scale crew in Georgia, where 40 black seniors were ordered off a bus taking them to vote early (https://politics.myajc.com/news/state--regional-govt--politics/black-senior-citizens-ordered-off-georgia-bus-taking-them-vote/42lZxIGOF1uFo637TEc9jP/).
Government officials in an east Georgia county told about 40 African-American senior citizens to get off a bus taking them to vote Monday, leading to complaints of voter suppression.
The bus, run by the group Black Voters Matter, was preparing to depart from a senior center operated by Jefferson County when the center’s director said they needed to disembark, said LaTosha Brown, a co-founder of Black Voters Matter.
A county clerk had called the senior center raising concerns about allowing the bus to take residents from the senior center in the city of Louisville, south of Augusta.
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From Twitter:
This is a real radio ad currently running in Arkansas in support of Republican Congressman French Hill on radio stations targeted to the African American community. I don't even have words to describe it.
https://twitter.com/notlarrysabato/status/1053023848772378625
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From Twitter:
I wonder how well that works. Pretty crazy even for Arkansas.
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From Twitter:
Holy fucking shit!
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Early voter turnout in Georgia continues to be high. Day 2 was higher than Day 1.
...and Day 3 was higher than either of the two previous days. In fact, each of the first three days of early voting in GA has seen more votes cast than the first three days of early voting in 2014 combined.
Absentee ballots in VA are up 240%, with the increase being higher in the more closely contested congressional districts.
People are voting; that is empirically a good thing. Moreover, high turnouts tend to favor Democrats because the Republican base is a more reliable voting bloc. This is all going to be very interesting because the thing that can defeat - or, at least, lay bare - voter suppression and election fraud, is high turnout.
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From Twitter:
How is anyone surprised at this point?
Suppress votes at ALL costs. Support a fucking piece of shit crook Donald Trump at ALL cost. These right wing kooks have gone off the rails.
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From Twitter:
One of the funders of the organization behind that ad is apparently Charles B. Johnson, principal owner of the SF Giants.
https://thinkprogress.org/san-francisco-giants-owner-bankrolling-racist-pac-5e1292058573/?utm_campaign=trueAnthem:+Trending+Content&utm_content=5bca4cee04d3017a8d167fbd&utm_medium=trueAnthem&utm_source=twitter
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So, is that fucker really going to fill up the Toyota Center with his braying hate-fueled bullshit, or will the place be half-full?
I seriously don't get it, maybe one of Mr. Happy's "silent majority" can chime in when they get back from the rally. I get that you hate the "other side" with a burning hot passion, but do you really believe the stuff he says? And, would you invite him into your living room?
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So, is that fucker really going to fill up the Toyota Center with his braying hate-fueled bullshit, or will the place be half-full?
I read where something like 75,000 "tickets" were sold. Of course, the place only holds like 30,000, so less than half the people with tickets will actually get in. You were purchasing a chance to get in. They were lined up starting last night on the first come/first in basis.
In short, the place will be packed, with YUGE crowds outside, something that I'm sure will be mentioned by Trump and his little buddy.
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While this one likely gets on TV, even Fox News has given up carrying Trump’s rallies live. He rambles on for an hour or more, spouting the same old crap, reliving his “historic” election, ragging on “Pocahontas “, etc etc. he might...MIGHT...even find time to say something nice about Cruz or even let him speak.
However, if Trump is getting fueled by a full house of baying acolytes, there’s no way he’s yielding the stage to anyone. The more they cheer, the more ridiculous and outrageous he gets. He’s a fucking child.
PS: Early voting started today.
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PS: Early voting started today.
Apparently lines at some places, not sure what that means here in Texas.
And I fully expect that rally to mess with traffic. Assholes.
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We’re watching the news as Trump gets off the plane, and Cruz is there to kiss his ass. My wife just asked “is Cruz’s wife there too?”
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Apparently lines at some places, not sure what that means here in Texas.
And I fully expect that rally to mess with traffic. Assholes.
Very long lines in San Antonio.
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We’re watching the news as Trump gets off the plane, and Cruz is there to kiss his ass. My wife just asked “is Cruz’s wife there too?”
Totally fucker up my commute home. I hate that.
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Apparently lines at some places, not sure what that means here in Texas.
And I fully expect that rally to mess with traffic. Assholes.
In the span of a year, downtown Houston got downgraded from a World Series parade to a Donald Trump circlejerk.
Womp womp.
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First day of early voting up over 300% of 2014 and 2010. It’s actually just a couple o’ thousand votes short of 2016.
Georgia early voting continues to run at 300% higher than 2014 through the first week.
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The results will be interesting. Either a huge amount of change or a lot more of what is going on now. I can't decide what I think is happening here in Texas.
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The results will be interesting. Either a huge amount of change or a lot more of what is going on now. I can't decide what I think is happening here in Texas.
Polls have shown voter enthusiasm to be high on both sides, but slightly higher for those voting Democratic.
Republicans are much more reliable voters, so it will come down to whether Democrats show up - which would be a new thing for a mid-term - and whether all this nonsense has caused non-voters actually to become voters which, because Republicans are voters already, will mean disproportionately more votes for Democrats from that pool.
Basically we won’t know shit until the dust has settled on Nov 7.
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Bombs sent to all the people who get demonized by Trump and Fox News (and Brett Kavanaugh): Obama, Clintons, Maxine Waters, Soros, CNN. It’s like the script for Hannity’s show.
Trump denounced it, but didn’t call it terrorism or call out right-wing nut jobs in general. I’m sure we’ll see him tonight, basking in the heat from a rally crowd screaming “Lock her up!”, while mouth breathing.
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This form Twitter:
“We just saw possible attempted assassinations of two former U.S. Presidents, a former Secretary of State, a former Attorney General, and multiple current members of Congress, but Trump is not going to let that national emergency get in the way of his opportunity to deliver yet another deranged rally speech tonight.”
That really puts a sharp perspective on this.
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This form Twitter:
“We just saw possible attempted assassinations of two former U.S. Presidents, a former Secretary of State, a former Attorney General, and multiple current members of Congress, but Trump is not going to let that national emergency get in the way of his opportunity to deliver yet another deranged rally speech tonight.”
That really puts a sharp perspective on this.
Are you really surprised? Why lock her up when can save the nation a lot of money by blowing her up? They are nuts.
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Are you really surprised? Why lock her up when can save the nation a lot of money by blowing her up? They are nuts.
But the Democrats are the mobs, don't you know.
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Kick Stan's anti-semitic ass back to Oklahoma. Dude should not be anywhere near voting machines.
http://re-elect.stanstanart.com/
"Make NO mistake, George Soros wants to control Harris County Elections and Stan Stanart is in his way. If Harris County, larger in population than 26 states, allows socialists like Soros to control our elections, then Texas is next."
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And now Biden and de Niro get bombs in the mail. It’s as if someone was out there constantly rattling off an enemies list and this guy (you know it’s a white male, right?) was listening.
If you demonize and dehumanize your political opponents, call the enemies of the people, it makes it easier for someone to see them as a legitimate target.
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Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. - Voltaire
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I'm beyond blaming Trump for this shit. He's just a tool who will do anything for adulation. I blame all the people who uncritically support him, that hypocritically chant "lock her up," who willingly accept one-sided reporting as facts and who are willing to let the country fall apart because it gets a rise out of someone they don't like or someone who may have slighted them in the past. I know too many of these people. It's like a game to them and I'm not sure they realize there are consequences to their actions.
The actions of these people, who at one time knew what decency was, are the real scourge on America.
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Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. - Voltaire
Doesn't make it any less true but he was referring to Christians, more specifically to Catholics.
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The actions of these people, who at one time knew what decency was, are the real scourge on America.
What really is sad is to realize that describes a large portion of one's family.
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What really is sad is to realize that describes a large portion of one's family.
Sure makes my Thanksgivings a hell of a lot simpler anymore.
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If there was a shadow government running things, they would definitely have a goon squad.
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If there was a shadow government running things, they would definitely have a goon squad.
I would also assume that they hired smarter people than this.
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Ever petty, Chuck Grassley has referred Avenatti and his client, Julie Swetnick, to the DOJ for prosecution on the grounds of attempting to obstruct the Judicial Committee. Ignoring the fact that Grandpa Simpson should’ve let this sleeping dog lie, what a ridiculous idea - just ahead of the midterms - to put Kavanaugh in the press again and give Avenatti a platform.
Of course, Avenatti is all over it already, lampooning Grassley for suddenly being interested again in investigations, and also that he welcomes to opportunity to delve into this subject. Avenatti called it “Christmas in October!” Pass the eggnog.
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Ok. Who had “arrested in the parking lot of an AutoZone in Florida” for the bombing suspect?
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Bombing suspect is a MAGA-hat wearing, Trump rally-attending, registered Republican, right wing conspiracy theorist.
Shocking.
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Bombing suspect is a MAGA-hat wearing, Trump rally-attending, registered Republican, right wing conspiracy theorist.
Shocking.
He's not a Deep State dupe after all.
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He's not a Deep State dupe after all.
I have seen the nom de plume ‘MAGA Bomber”. This absolutely has to stick.
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I believe that I saw that Williamson County (North Austin/Round Rock/Georgetown) has seen 22% of registered voters vote in the first four days of early voting. If this keeps up, we'll at least get a clearer understanding of how many people are on each side of the divide.
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I’m guessing this MAGABomber’s van looks eerily similar to some folks Facebook posts.
https://m.imgur.com/9kZplxg?r
This is what you get when 48% of the country elects the most partisan piece of shit, BY FAR, to the highest office, who is basically a combo of Alex Jones and Sean Hannity. But much dumber and an over the top narcissist.
The POTUS is a birther that constantly spreads easily refutable nonsense. Yet some people keep cheering him on! Remember the days of the GOP being for responsibility? Like most things they preach, it was 1000000% bullshit
There were assassination attempts on US Presidents and Trump is out campaigning and blaming THE MEDIA. Incredible times. Sad!
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There were assassination attempts on US Presidents and Trump is out campaigning and blaming THE MEDIA. Incredible times. Sad!
And now he's off to Pittsburgh, where he's mostly not welcome, to throw paper towels at commiserate with the victims and survivors of the synagogue massacre. You know, the ones who he blamed for getting shot because they don't post armed guards. Outside their church. In America.
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In other news, Trump wants to wipe-out the constitutional right to citizenship to those born here. He believes he can do this by executive order.
That's an interesting precedent to set...
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The Houston ballot is insanely long. I am a big believer in citizen engagement in such things, so I have worked through the whole damn thing. My last (first) vote in 2016 was a mixed ballot spanning at least 3 parties but, this time, I am of a mind to vote more in opposition of Republicans writ large by pushing the button for their Democratic opponent.
The Republican Party has embraced Trump fully, and far too many of its elected officials have abdicated all responsibility for governance in fealty to their Dear Leader. Any candidate identifying as Republican, therefore, is tarred very heavily with that brush in my book and, as hard as I try, I cannot fault myself for that generalization. This is a moment to make a statement against what the Republican Party has become, and punishing all of its candidates at the ballot box is the best (only?) way to do that.
The big races I'm cool on, but it's the myriad of judges that concern me. I know little about any of them, but I do not want to throw the baby out with the bathwater in a role where experience and knowledge trumps (get it) party perhaps more with judges than any other elected position. So, with that in mind, and knowing that practicing Houston attorneys are engaged in this thread: which Republican judges merit consideration for my vote over their Democratic rival?
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The Chronicle endorsements are a pretty good guide on judges, at least the ones I'm personally familiar with. Certainly not perfect but way way better than going by party alone. I'd say if they rate a judicial candidate four or five stars, not that there are many, you can feel comfortable voting for that candidate regardless of party.
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The big races I'm cool on, but it's the myriad of judges that concern me. I know little about any of them, but I do not want to throw the baby out with the bathwater in a role where experience and knowledge trumps (get it) party perhaps more with judges than any other elected position. So, with that in mind, and knowing that practicing Houston attorneys are engaged in this thread: which Republican judges merit consideration for my vote over their Democratic rival?
The Chronicle's endorsements (https://www.houstonchronicle.com/opinion/endorsements/) are very good. They endorsed all the Republican incumbents and Democrats for all the open seats (which is result of the local GOP primary system ferreting out the qualified middle of the road judges). They trend a bit too heavy in favor of incumbency, but I guess that's a fair consideration. The stand-out Republican civil judges (I won't speak to the criminal judges) are Randy Wilson (the 157th) and Wesley Ward (the 234th). Ward's opponent, Lauren Reeder, is incredibly impressive and I wish I could vote for both of them. I echo the chron's endorsement of Republican Clyde Leuchtag over the Democratic incumbent in County Civil Court of Law No. 1. I don't plan on following the Chron's incumbency based recommendation for the 113th Civil District Court or the 14th Court of Appeals, Place 8.
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Thank to you both.
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Judges being voted on, by folks who know nothing about them, seems absurd.
How is the average citizen supposed to know/understand who is and who isn’t a fair local judge.
I don’t know the answer, but there has to be a better way to put people on the bench. I’d be curious what Texas lawyers think.
I also wonder how many folks realize a judge doesn’t need a law degree, which is equally dumbfounding to me.
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JPs don't need a degree. All other state judges must be a member in good standing of the State Bar which, except in very rare circumstances, requires a degree from an accredited law school. Don't know about municipal judges.
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I don’t know the answer, but there has to be a better way to put people on the bench. I’d be curious what Texas lawyers think.
Still a year away from being a lawyer, but I'd be fine with Texas adopting the Missouri Plan (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Missouri_Plan?wprov=sfla1).
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I saw Trump's "caravan" ad during SNF last night. OMFG! CNN refused to air the "long form" version, that included the false claim that Democrats let in an oft-deported man who later went on to kill a cop (he was let back in for the last time under the Bush administration), but it's still a shocking and shockingly racist piece of shit.
Basically, this one man killed a cop, so therefore the caravan will kill you all. Vote Republican (https://youtu.be/mvmAa1cYZK4).
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Judges being voted on, by folks who know nothing about them, seems absurd.
How is the average citizen supposed to know/understand who is and who isn’t a fair local judge.
I don’t know the answer, but there has to be a better way to put people on the bench. I’d be curious what Texas lawyers think.
I also wonder how many folks realize a judge doesn’t need a law degree, which is equally dumbfounding to me.
The chron has the responsibility to report about these candidates and does a decent job of it.
I agree judicial elections are not ideal, but are certainly better than giving the governor authority to appoint whomever he/she wants. The Missouri Plan is the best developed alternative but only fifteen or so states use that type of mechanism. Another 20 or so states do nonpartisan elections. A couple of states have a legislative committee select all judges.
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Meanwhile, a Federal judge just slapped back Trump's lawyers and reaffirmed that the suit against him for violating the Emoluments Clause can go ahead (https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/judge-denies-trumps-request-for-stay-in-emoluments-case/2018/11/02/aa87611c-dec8-11e8-b3f0-62607289efee_story.html?utm_term=.7cac9fc7741b). The next phase is discovery, which is quite likely terrifying for TrumpWorld.
Trump's lawyers argued here, as they have elsewhere, that Trump is too busy being president to be able to respond to lawsuits. Hilariously though, Judge Messitte pointed out that Trump seems to both threaten and encourage litigation, so he can't be that busy.
Messitte noted Trump’s threats to sue author Michael Wolff and former adviser Stephen K. Bannon, and Trump’s taunting of former CIA director John Brennan in August. After Trump revoked Brennan’s security clearance, Trump wrote on Twitter: “I hope John Brennan, the worst CIA Director in our country’s history, brings a lawsuit.”
“It bears noting that the President himself seems to have had little reluctance to pursue personal litigation despite the supposed distractions it imposes on his office,” Messitte wrote.
The wheels are turning too slowly, but they are turning.
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Roger Angell on the vote following the most important vote of his lifetime: (https://www.newyorker.com/culture/cultural-comment/get-up-and-go)
In a New Yorker piece posted the week before the 2016 election, I wrote that my first Presidential vote was for Franklin Delano Roosevelt, in 1944, when I was a young Air Force sergeant stationed in the Central Pacific. I went on to say that, seventy-two years later, defeating Trump made that immediate election the most important of my life. Alarmed as I was, I had no idea, of course, of the depths of the disaster that would befall us, taking away our leadership and moral standing in the world.
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Whatever happens today, happens. Just remember, from tomorrow onwards, Mueller could drop his report at any time. Trump insiders are most concerned about what it means for Roger Stone and
Uday Don Jr.
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To help you through the day (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GJ8VV6TqeXI).
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Firefighters at the polling place across the street from me are a little overzealous, and don't seem to understand the reason why there's a sign delineating 100 ft from the polling place. They aren't even letting people get out of their cars before they engage.
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I’m too old for this shit.
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I'm ill.
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I'm ill.
Sucks.
I will enjoy the schaudenfraude when Cruz casts the deciding vote to cut Social Security and Medicare, and to kill Obamacare.
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I will enjoy the schaudenfraude when Cruz casts the deciding vote to cut Social Security and Medicare, and to kill Obamacare.
How will that happen if the Republicans don't hold the House?
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How will that happen if the Republicans don't hold the House?
The will do what the House Republicans have done dozens of times since 2010; hold symbolic votes safe in the knowledge that their terrible bills won’t ever see Trump’s desk.
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Beto did a great job and came closer than anyone else for a long time. I believe if he would have gone on record saying he was against tax payer funding of abortions, but still of course, pro-choice, he might have won.
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Beto did a great job and came closer than anyone else for a long time. I believe if he would have gone on record saying he was against tax payer funding of abortions, but still of course, pro-choice, he might have won.
Every independent I know who voted for Beto was actually voting against Cruz because he's so unlikable. The issues weren't all that important to them.
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Fletcher kicked her ass.
And kicked more ass tonight.
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Interesting outcome in Oklahoma 5th CD (that's OKC).
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Sucks.
I will enjoy the schaudenfraude when Cruz casts the deciding vote to cut Social Security and Medicare, and to kill Obamacare.
I do not look forward to reaping what idiots have sowed. If only I didn't have to lie way the costs of their decisions.
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I look forward to that crook Trumps tax returns getting released. And there being actual oversight into his family and cabinets grifting....you know, that draining the swamp thing, that trump lied about, that is now actually going to happen.
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Q1 2019 ought to be an interesting note in American history.
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Despite what Trump says, that was a seismic shift; the swing was bigger than the Tea Party wave in 2010 (Democrat’s retained the Senate then, too).
Last night, Democrats:
Flipped the House - knocking off some prominent Republicans
Flipped 7 state governorships - including Walker in Wisconsin and frikkin Kansas
Flipped 333 state legislature seats countrywide
It wasn’t ideal, and it won’t have the same breathless narrative as the Tea Party, but it was still a “shellacking”. There will now be serious people in charge of House committees, including Intelligence, Judiciary and Ways & Means. The latter already stating that they will subpoena Trump’s tax returns from the IRS*.
* I say this not out of animosity (although that’s definitely there) but because we need to know if, and by who, Trump is being influenced.
One important inside baseball stat: Independents broke for Democrats 54-42, the first time that they have favored Democrats since 2008. Trump held his base and turned off everyone else.
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Notable for 2020, 1.4 million former felons in Florida have had their voting rights restored.
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In local news, it was a Dem rout in Harris County. Not even Ed Emmett survived.
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In local news, it was a Dem rout in Harris County. Not even Ed Emmett survived.
There's a strong element of throwing the baby out with the bathwater (https://youtu.be/rQoAD2qUJSM), but that was some dank bathwater.
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Payback's a bitch (https://www.politico.com/story/2018/10/28/house-republicans-subpoena-trump-943265).
House Republicans changed the rules in 2015 to allow many of their committee chairmen to issue subpoenas without consulting the minority party, overriding Democrats objections that likened the tactic to something out of the McCarthy era.
Now the weapon that the GOP wielded dozens of times against President Barack Obama’s agencies could allow Democrats to bombard President Donald Trump’s most controversial appointees with demands for information. And many Democrats are itching to use it.
“The Republicans have set the standard and, by God, we’re going to emulate that standard,” Rep. Gerry Connolly (D-Va.) told POLITICO.
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Despite what Trump says, that was a seismic shift; the swing was bigger than the Tea Party wave in 2010 (Democrat’s retained the Senate then, too).
Last night, Democrats:
Flipped the House - knocking off some prominent Republicans
Flipped 7 state governorships - including Walker in Wisconsin and frikkin Kansas
Flipped 333 state legislature seats countrywide
You should probably check your math.
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You should probably check your math.
What part?
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Payback's a bitch (https://www.politico.com/story/2018/10/28/house-republicans-subpoena-trump-943265).
Womp womp
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Trump is currently explaining to the press corps how Congress works - at about a 3rd grade level.
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Sessions out as AG.
Surprised Trump didn't roust him out of bed at about midnight, chew his ass out, and fire him over the phone.
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Sessions out as AG.
Surprised Trump didn't roust him out of bed at about midnight, chew his ass out, and fire him over the phone.
That would take work. He normally tweet-fires people from the crapper.
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Interesting side note: if the DOJ now moves to fire Mueller, House Democrats can hire him as their Special Prosecutor to continue his work.
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Other interesting side note: Mueller has made significant use of sealed indictments to avoid tipping his hand to subjects and targets alike. If the DOJ now moves to shut him down, I think he's going to throw off indictments like Sonic the Hedgehog throwing off rings after hitting a spike.
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Dems just flipped the CA 49th, there will be literally only a handful of Republicans elected to national office after this is all said and done. In addition, Tester kept his seat in Montana, so the Senate bleeding is fire-walled at 3 and may be only 2 if the FL recount changes anything (which is unlikely).
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And the Wednesday afternoon massacre begins...
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And the Wednesday afternoon massacre begins...
It's going to be a long two months until the new Congress is sworn in.
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In local news, it was a Dem rout in Harris County. Not even Ed Emmett survived.
One judge shows how not to react (https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/crime/promise-not-to-kill-anyone-after-losing-election-tx-judge-wholesale-releases-juvenile-defendants/ar-BBPshIR?li=BBnb7Kz).
After losing his bench in a Democratic sweep, Harris County Juvenile Court Judge Glenn Devlin released nearly all of the youthful defendants that appeared in front him on Wednesday morning, simply asking the kids whether they planned to kill anyone before letting them go.
"He was releasing everybody," said public defender Steven Halpert, who watched the string of surprising releases. "Apparently he was saying that's what the voters wanted."
I'm not sure if he's a Juvenile Court judge, or a juvenile Court judge.
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Meanwhile, another mass shooting. This one in a bar in CA frequented by students. 12 dead, including the shooter and including a law enforcement officer who ran into the bar when he heard the shooting.
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One judge shows how not to react (https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/crime/promise-not-to-kill-anyone-after-losing-election-tx-judge-wholesale-releases-juvenile-defendants/ar-BBPshIR?li=BBnb7Kz).
I'm not sure if he's a Juvenile Court judge, or a juvenile Court judge.
Something that's not getting much attention. All 38 Judicial Districts in Harris County went Democrat. Half, 19 of them, are African-American women. Couple that with the unexpected win of Hidalgo, the Dem pickups in the Texas State House and Senate, and the booting of long-time good old boys Culberson and Sessions, and Texas just got really, really purple. Beto may not have won *his* race, but he certainly affected the down-ticket races in the Dems' favor.
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Something that's not getting much attention. All 38 Judicial Districts in Harris County went Democrat. Half, 19 of them, are African-American women. Couple that with the unexpected win of Hidalgo, the Dem pickups in the Texas State House and Senate, and the booting of long-time good old boys Culberson and Sessions, and Texas just got really, really purple. Beto may not have won *his* race, but he certainly affected the down-ticket races in the Dems' favor.
Agree with the basic point, but not sure I’d call it purple yet. Maybe, the potential to be purple.
The Dem surge looks like it will prevent the crazy right from dominating the upcoming Texas legislative session. That’s a good thing for all Texans, IMO.
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Something that's not getting much attention. All 38 Judicial Districts in Harris County went Democrat. Half, 19 of them, are African-American women. Couple that with the unexpected win of Hidalgo, the Dem pickups in the Texas State House and Senate, and the booting of long-time good old boys Culberson and Sessions, and Texas just got really, really purple. Beto may not have won *his* race, but he certainly affected the down-ticket races in the Dems' favor.
The State Senate was 21-10 in favor of Republicans and the State House was 95-55. Democrats flipped 2 senate seats and 12...TWELVE...house seats, shrinking the Republican majorities to 19-13 and 81-67 respectively. A lot of this was down to Beto's campaign energizing liberals and driving new voters to the polls and also to straight ticket voters looking to punish the Republican Party and/or flip the bird to Trump. There may have been a heavy overlap in the Venn diagram of those voting blocs.
Dallas County, Pete Sessions' former district, similarly washed out all Republican judges.
Don't let TrumpWorld gaslight you; Tuesday was a huge night for Democrats. It was the biggest swing to the Democratic Party since the election immediately post-Nixon. It was a bigger swing in the popular vote than the Tea Party revolution - the loss of Republican-held House seats being staunched by gerrymandering.
Democratic successes in the states - flipping Governorships, taking majorities, taking super-majorities, taking complete control of all three branches, removing Republican trifectas and erasing their super-majorities - means that the 2020 redistricting will be less partisan. Success in taking State AG roles means that the 2020 elections in those states will be less fraught with the nonsense we've seen in Georgia. Anti-suppression propositions passed up and down the country, meaning that it will be easier for the voters to vote in those states.
The US is a majority liberal country. Only once in the last 30 years has a Republican candidate for President won the popular vote - and that was W. riding his post 9/11 wave in 2004. Republicans maintain power by rigging the system with gerrymandering and voter suppression. Texas is huge in Presidential politics because, if Texas goes Democrat, it will herald the end of the ability of any Republican to win the electoral college.
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And of course, what happened to the fucking “caravan”? There are so many stupid dipshits in this country, happy as hell to be played by politicians.
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Something that's not getting much attention. All 38 Judicial Districts in Harris County went Democrat. Half, 19 of them, are African-American women. Couple that with the unexpected win of Hidalgo, the Dem pickups in the Texas State House and Senate, and the booting of long-time good old boys Culberson and Sessions, and Texas just got really, really purple. Beto may not have won *his* race, but he certainly affected the down-ticket races in the Dems' favor.
It was the best election night for Texas democrats since before 1994. In addition to all the victories you cited (especially the 12 state house pick-ups), Democrats won all the appellate judge spots in Houston (the area includes 10 surrounding counties), Dallas and Austin. Dems won the Fort Bend County district attorney and county judge races. Beto's coattails were long.
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The Dem surge looks like it will prevent the crazy right from dominating the upcoming Texas legislative session. That’s a good thing for all Texans, IMO.
As is true nationally, it's also true in Texas: as Republicans lose seats, they are boiling down to concentrated crazy. Democrats are taking away moderate seats and will (hopefully) keep chipping away, but they're chipping away from the center and so as it progresses it's going to be only the far-right Republicans who will be left. Unless and until Democrats can undo gerrymandering, this is going to be the case.
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The Ding-Dong the Witch is Dead list:
Paul Ryan (retired)
Darrell Issa (retired, and seat flipped)
Orin Hatch (retired)
Trey Gowdy (retired)
Ted Poe (retired)
Bob Goodlatte (retired)
Dean Heller (lost)
Scott Walker (lost)
Kris Kobach (lost)
On life-support:
Dana Rohrebacher
On the bubble:
Brian Kemp
Rick Scott
Ron DeSantis
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Meanwhile, in "Florida is still too fucking stupid to vote (https://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/politics/fl-ne-election-broward-turnout-thursday-20181108-story.html)" news, they have issues with 24,000 ballots from heavily-Democratic Broward county where votes were marked for Governor but not Senator. Also, any recount is going to be done using a Sinclair ZX81 (http://oldcomputers.net/zx81.html).
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And of course, what happened to the fucking “caravan”? There are so many stupid dipshits in this country, happy as hell to be played by politicians.
Trump knows his base is comprised of a bunch of rubes, he can sell them anything and they will buy it.
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In the Texas Statehouse, where the House is now split 83-67, there is some noise that the Ds intend to vote together for a Speaker candidate, meaning they’d only need nine Rs to vote with them to elect a new Speaker. There is further noise leaking that they intend to support one of the already-nominated candidates, but how hard would it be to find one with 8 or 9 friends who’d like some nice Committee chairmanships? That’d make life with the other two legislative branches pretty interesting.
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Democratic gain continue as close races get decided. As is normal in a wave election, the close races tend to fall more on the side with momentum, and Democratic House flips are now projected at 37 (currently sitting at 31). Also, the flips in state legislatures are pushing towards 400.
In the AZ senate race, Democrat Kirsten Sinema has taken the lead and, based on the source of the remaining uncounted ballots, is likely only going to extend that lead. And the FL races for Senator and Governor are all crazy with ballot confusion and slow counting. Machine recounts are going to happen in both and the probably hand counts. As more ballots are tallied, the race tightens. This ain’t over yet*. Republican senate flips may yet be capped at 2 which, given the historically tough map faced by Democrats, would be remarkable.
* In future elections, 1.4 million - mostly minority - former felons will have their voting rights back. Florida is unlikely to be close going forward.
ETA: FL Governor race margin is 0.4% in DeSantis' favor while the Senate race is 0.2% in Scott's favor. Scott has launched a lawsuit against Broward county, claiming that the Bush-appointed Supervisor of Elections is making up ballots for his opponent. Trump and "Profile in Courage" Marco Rubio jumped in on Twitter to echo Scott's, so far, baseless claims.
The ballots being counted are absentee and provisional, so this is nothing unusual. What is different is that the race is so close that they - for once - matter.
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* In future elections, 1.4 million - mostly minority - former felons will have their voting rights back. Florida is unlikely to be close going forward.
Are you implying that ex-cons are most likely to vote Democrat?
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Are you implying that ex-cons are most likely to vote Democrat?
I find it awesome that he thinks they will vote at all. Maybe they will but look how hard it is to get anyone to vote.
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Are you implying that ex-cons are most likely to vote Democrat?
Minorities make up a disproportionate share of the prison population; African-Americans make up 50% of the current Florida population. African-Americans skew heavily towards Democrats in elections (Trump's approval rating among this demographic currently sits at 8%). So, yes, I am extrapolating from that and positing that those 1.4 million ex-felons will lean Democratic.
Look at it this way: turnout of eligible Florida voters in this midterm was 53%. Being generous, say 50% of those newly restored voters turnout (I suspect it might be higher as they have been fighting for this for...well...ever), that's 700,000 new voters in the pool. Of those 700,000, say 50% - 350,000 - are African-Americans and they vote 90/10 for Democratic candidates. That's 315,000 "found" votes for Democrats.
Trump won Florida by just over 100,000; DeSantis currently leads Gillum by 36,000; Scott's lead is half of that.
Even if my logic is wonky, Republican margins in 2018 are wafer thin and evaporating as the vote count moves to its completion. It's just impossible to imagine that 1.4 million former felons are going to break Republican, and even a small break the other way wipes out Republican margins.
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Are you implying that ex-cons are most likely to vote Democrat?
Yes.
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I find it awesome that he thinks they will vote at all. Maybe they will but look how hard it is to get anyone to vote.
They have been campaigning to get their voting rights back forever. I think they will show up.
Even so, it doesn't take many. Scott is leading by < 20,000 votes, and that number has been shrinking.
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They have been campaigning to get their voting rights back forever. I think they will show up.
Even so, it doesn't take many. Scott is leading by < 20,000 votes, and that number has been shrinking.
I hope they do. If you've paid your debt to society, your rights should be there when done.
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If, as above, Florida moves out of the "battleground" camp and into the lean Democratic camp, and Texas moves from Republican to battleground, Republicans will be demographically fucked for statewide elections for generations to come.
New York (29), California (55), Texas (38) and Florida (29) would give Democratic presidential candidates a base of 151 electoral college votes towards the 267 winning post. They will also crush the popular vote, leaving Republicans with nowhere to go even with a reform of the system.
Taking the state legislatures and governorships will allow the continued undoing of gerrymandering and voter suppression. As this process moves forward, Republicans will become irrelevant in politics, unless they reform their hard line positions to appeal to more than just the 35% base.
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I hope they do. If you've paid your debt to society, your rights should be there when done.
Exactly. The likes of then-Gov. Scott had been holding this back (actually, he made it harder). They asked the people of Florida, and they returned a resounding result: 2-1 in favor of restoring voting rights to those who had completed their sentences.
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Two days after appointing him to be the top law enforcement officer in the United States, Trump claims not to know walking constitutional crisis Mike Whitaker:
Well, Matt Whitaker -- I don't know Matt Whitaker. Matt Whitaker worked for Jeff Sessions, and he was always extremely highly thought of, and he still is. But I didn't know Matt Whitaker. He worked for Attorney General Sessions.
Yeah. Blame the guy who just left.
Also, apart from being nonsense, it's also bullshit. Whitaker has been a frequent visitor to the Oval Office and has spoken with Trump on the phone...about replacing Sessions.
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Two days after appointing him to be the top law enforcement officer in the United States, Trump claims not to know walking constitutional crisis Mike Whitaker:
Yeah. Blame the guy who just left.
Also, apart from being nonsense, it';s also bullshit. Whitaker has been a frequent visitor to the Oval Office and has spoken with Trump on the phone...about replacing Sessions.
How many times was he on CNN criticizing the investigation? Whitaker lobbying the best way for the job, he got good ratings on tv.
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How many times was he on CNN criticizing the investigation? Whitaker lobbying the best way for the job, he got good ratings on tv.
...and said the things Trump wanted to hear. See Kavanaugh, Brett.
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Apropos nothing, the ratings for the "Today" show's third hour, until recently hosted by Megyn Kelly, have gone up since she was taken off the air.
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Are you implying that ex-cons are most likely to vote Democrat?
In 2008 an ex-con plumber named Rocco used to hang out at Griff's and we would shoot the shit as one does at a bar. He recounted to a group of us how he was getting his driver's license renewed and the DMV lady asked him if he wanted to be registered to vote. He replied that he was a convicted felon and couldn't vote, but she explained that under the law at the time his conviction and sentence was remote enough that he was now able to register. He was overcome with emotion and said that he hadn't felt more like a human and a part of society since before he was incarcerated. He was literally weeping as he told us this story, and I'll confess to getting a little teary eyed as well at how genuinely heartfelt and grateful he was.
Then someone asked who he was going to vote for and Rocco responded "I sure as shit ain't voting for the n*****."
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In 2008 an ex-con plumber named Rocco used to hang out at Griff's and we would shoot the shit as one does at a bar. He recounted to a group of us how he was getting his driver's license renewed and the DMV lady asked him if he wanted to be registered to vote. He replied that he was a convicted felon and couldn't vote, but she explained that under the law at the time his conviction and sentence was remote enough that he was now able to register. He was overcome with emotion and said that he hadn't felt more like a human and a part of society since before he was incarcerated. He was literally weeping as he told us this story, and I'll confess to getting a little teary eyed as well at how genuinely heartfelt and grateful he was.
Then someone asked who he was going to vote for and Rocco responded "I sure as shit ain't voting for the n*****."
That's fucking hilarious!
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In 2008 an ex-con plumber named Rocco used to hang out at Griff's and we would shoot the shit as one does at a bar. He recounted to a group of us how he was getting his driver's license renewed and the DMV lady asked him if he wanted to be registered to vote. He replied that he was a convicted felon and couldn't vote, but she explained that under the law at the time his conviction and sentence was remote enough that he was now able to register. He was overcome with emotion and said that he hadn't felt more like a human and a part of society since before he was incarcerated. He was literally weeping as he told us this story, and I'll confess to getting a little teary eyed as well at how genuinely heartfelt and grateful he was.
Then someone asked who he was going to vote for and Rocco responded "I sure as shit ain't voting for the n*****."
That’s a great story. Those poor ex-cons aren’t know for making good choices.
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That’s a great story. Those poor ex-cons aren’t know for making good choices.
Presumably, if you've been in jail, you've made at least one bad choice...
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Presumably, if you've been in jail, you've made at least one bad choice...
Yeah, you've had to work with a lawyer at some point.
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Yeah, you've had to work with a lawyer at some point.
...or in the White House.
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Texas Tribune (https://www.texastribune.org/2018/11/09/ted-cruz-beto-orourke-closest-texas-race-40-years/)
"Before Trump's visit, Cruz's internal numbers had him leading by double digits statewide. In the days after, his lead dropped to 5 points."
#Trump2020
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Texas Tribune (https://www.texastribune.org/2018/11/09/ted-cruz-beto-orourke-closest-texas-race-40-years/)
"Before Trump's visit, Cruz's internal numbers had him leading by double digits statewide. In the days after, his lead dropped to 5 points."
#Trump2020
I’ve been contemplating the O’Rourke autopsy since the election. Just tapping on the rural counties shows that he got smashed there, 80+% for Cruz in many counties. The ass whipping in rural counties seemed to be the difference. If he could have just got 30% there, he might have won. I’d have to see Clinton’s % in those counties and compare the turnout.
All this to say that I question the idea that Trump hurt Cruz and the idea that Beto should have tried to appeal to dissatisfied Republicans. Texas is still a ways away for the Dems, IMO.
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Texas is still +7~ R. Probably more when you factor in what a bunch of douchebags line the top of their ticket. Dan Goeb, Sid Miller, Rafael Cruz and that crook Paxton... if they ran actual decent Republicans they’d be +15. But the people that vote republican don’t want decent people, decent folks get primaried. The Texas GOP primary voter demands the most far right lunatic candidate. The Jade Helm believing, Obama is gonna steal your guns, Beto is a socialist and the caravan is gonna rape your aunt kinda stupid voters. It will catch up to them at some point, probably around 2024
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It will catch up to them at some point, probably around 2024.
If we're still allowed to vote by then.
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Trump cancelled his attendance at the memorial for those who served and died in WW1, due to rain.
Every day, a new horror.
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Matt Whitaker and the intriguing case of World Patent Marketing.
Your new Acting Attorney General... for the United States... Matt Whitaker, was on the advisory board to WPM, a company that was wound up by the FTC because it was a complete and utter fraud. WPM was fined $26 million...yeah, that big of a fraud. So that puts Whitaker at least fraud adjacent (unlike his boss who was running a fraud university). End of story, though, right? Nope.
However, in addition to the FTC investigation, WPM - who defrauded veterans of their entire life savings - is also under an active investigation by the FBI. It turns out that WPM was committing crimes in addition to the run-of-the-mill fraud racket. They threatened - legally and physically - their clients to scare them off from making formal complaints about the company's fraudulent practices. They would sent out threatening letters and also sent out a broadcast communique explaining that they retained, as security for their office, former Israeli special forces badasses who would eject anyone from the premises who was there to complain.
OK. But what has this to do with Whitaker; he was only on the advisory board, right? True. But he was also on promotional videos, and promotional flyers, lending his credibility as a former US Attorney to prop up WPM's dubious bona fides. Oh, and he also wrote one of the threatening letters to a customer, telling them to back off or he would bring down a world of civil and criminal legal hurt on them.
The FBI has refused to say whether Whitaker is a subject, or even target, in this investigation. What is known is that he has ignored a subpoena and also refused to return his earnings from WPM despite being instructed to do so by the FTC. It's almost as if he was expecting to be put in a position where he could shut all this down and make his own legal peril go away...
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Sounds like an outSTANding addition to the cabinet.
Sit that guy next to Wilbur at the next meeting and see what they can cook up together.
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I’ve been contemplating the O’Rourke autopsy since the election. Just tapping on the rural counties shows that he got smashed there, 80+% for Cruz in many counties. The ass whipping in rural counties seemed to be the difference. If he could have just got 30% there, he might have won. I’d have to see Clinton’s % in those counties and compare the turnout.
All this to say that I question the idea that Trump hurt Cruz and the idea that Beto should have tried to appeal to dissatisfied Republicans. Texas is still a ways away for the Dems, IMO.
2016 presidential election: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/a/a6/Texas_Presidential_Election_Results_2016.svg/350px-Texas_Presidential_Election_Results_2016.svg.png
2018 senate election: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/6/62/Results_of_the_2018_Senate_election_in_Texas.png/350px-Results_of_the_2018_Senate_election_in_Texas.png
Tarrant, Williamson, Hays, Brewster, Nueces, and Jefferson counties all went for Trump in 2016. Beto flipped all of them, but dropped Kenedy County (population: 417).
In counties with <10k votes cast (i.e. many of those dark red counties in north/northwest/hill country/panhandle Texas), Cruz won by a total of 75% to 24% compared to Trump's 74% to 23%. That tells me that there weren't many, if any, potential swing voters for Beto to begin with.
The biggest difference is in counties that cast >10k votes. Trump won those counties by a total of 51% to 45% in 2016. This year Beto won those counties 50% to 49%.
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Thanks. Looks like the 254 strategy might have not been so efficient. If he goes again, he should just drive through those small towns, unless there is some good BBQ or cool looking courthouses.
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Thanks. Looks like the 254 strategy might have not been so efficient. If he goes again, he should just drive through those small towns, unless there is some good BBQ or cool looking courthouses.
Only time will tell. Beto put in a lot of work and made people talk. We haven't been talking for a long time in Texas. But, he made the race closer than they have felt in decades. I felt like for the first time my vote might have mattered.
Give Trump four more years of fucking with farmers and they'll not care so much about God in school because they'll be wanting to feed their cows and water their plants. And personally, I don't think farmers should accept subsidies, after all that is just an entitlement and they don't think people should get help. They need to get a job and pay their taxes (unlike someone we all know_.
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I’ve been contemplating the O’Rourke autopsy since the election. Just tapping on the rural counties shows that he got smashed there, 80+% for Cruz in many counties. The ass whipping in rural counties seemed to be the difference. If he could have just got 30% there, he might have won. I’d have to see Clinton’s % in those counties and compare the turnout.
All this to say that I question the idea that Trump hurt Cruz and the idea that Beto should have tried to appeal to dissatisfied Republicans. Texas is still a ways away for the Dems, IMO.
The problem is that kids from rural counties leave for college and mostly don't return. This means that cities continue to get more liberal and rural counties continue to get more conservative. Fair redistricting is the solution, but that isn't coming to Texas any time soon.
Of course, Beto was running for Senate, where districts are irrelevant, so he still lost statewide. Trying to appeal to dyed-in-the-wool conservatives in rural counties is a fool's errand; his time is/was better spent courting liberals - wherever they may be - to actually show up to vote. In that regard, the minority vote was up, the female vote was up and the youth vote was way up. This effort is credited with the blue wave that washed over the state's congress and courts, but it wasn't enough to get past Ted fucking Cruz.
John Cornyn is up in 2020, where turnout should be even higher as it's a Presidential election year. He's less unlikable than Cruz (not hard) but he's going to have some headwinds. If the Democrats can run a decent candidate - maybe Wendy Davis with some actual resources behind her - then he's in big trouble. If there's a charismatic Democrat running for the White House, he's probably fucked.
Biden - O'Rourke 2020!
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Thanks. Looks like the 254 strategy might have not been so efficient. If he goes again, he should just drive through those small towns, unless there is some good BBQ or cool looking courthouses.
Gas up; move on.
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FYI, if you want to see something uplifting this morning, check out Sharice Davids' election ad (https://youtu.be/vGa5qQsYY-g). Davids is the female, gay, Native American former MMA fighter who came out of nowhere to win a House seat in frikkin' Kansas.
With the raft of female, LGBTQ, minority candidates who won this month, it's really just time to put good people on the ballot and let the voters figure it out. When given a legitimate choice, they often make the right one.
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Every day, a new horror.
I know that crazy is the new normal, but it is objectively insane that the president of the united states is making public groundless accusations of forged votes and election fraud. Especially in an election that his guys will probably win anyway.
Also, calling ballots "massively infected" is such an weird choice of words.
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The county-by-county tour was a big part of building Beto's publicity. It probably helped him more than it hurt—how many votes do we really think he lost by spending time outside urban areas? And more importantly, writing off/abandoning your constituents is a terrible thing to do regardless of electoral outcomes. Get out there, keep making the case, and let the other guy get caught taking those votes for granted. You never know what might happen over the long run.
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The county-by-county tour was a big part of building Beto's publicity. It probably helped him more than it hurt—how many votes do we really think he lost by spending time outside urban areas? And more importantly, writing off/abandoning your constituents is a terrible thing to do regardless of electoral outcomes. Get out there, keep making the case, and let the other guy get caught taking those votes for granted. You never know what might happen over the long run.
The tour was definitely part of his popular appeal. I doubt it cost him anything.
Here's a breakdown courtesy of Patrick Svitek (https://twitter.com/PatrickSvitek/status/1061871856096067584) of the Texas Tribune (summarizing a lot which as already been posted:
Texas' 191 rural counties contributed 11% of the #txsen vote; non-rural counties made up the remaining 89%. In rural counties, @TedCruz defeated @BetoORourke 75% to 24%. In non-rural counties, O'Rourke beat Cruz 51-48.
For comparison:
- 2016 (President): Vote was 12% rural counties/88% non-rural counties. Trump won rural counties 75%-23% and won non-rural counties 49%-46%.
- 2014 (Governor): Vote was 13% rural cos./87% non-rural cos. Abbott won rural cos. 76%-23% and won non-rural cos. 57%-41%.
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Election update:
Florida
Despite Trump's and Scott's baseless accusations of fraud, the Florida count continues at its customary glacial pace. Both the Senate and Governor's races are into a recount, with the Democrat in each case expected to gain ground as they continue to catch up with the mountainous backlog of absentee ballots from liberal-leaning Broward and West Palm. (Spoiler alert, old people vote by mail).
The Senate race is down to less than 0.2%, which means a hand recount. The Governor's race is down to 0.4%, which triggers a machine recount which, if it closes to within 0.25%, triggers a hand recount. There's also a state office race that's going to a recount, so expect this clusterfuck to continue for a few weeks yet.
Georgia
Abrams continues to fight to have all votes counted and refuses to concede. Kemp got his office to issue a statement saying he'd won, but no one believed them. If they can get the gap down to less than 0.5%, there'll be a runoff election in December. That would be an interesting affair...
Kemp is believed to have lost votes to a libertarian candidate, and those who voted libertarian may turn out for Kemp in a two-horse race. Possibly. It's also possible that they do not show up because they voted libertarian in protest at Kemp/Trump. On the other side, Abrams - operating without the distraction of other races going on around the country - may get a boost from the fact that she could actually fucking win, and because Democratic turnout was lagging until Obama and Oprah showed up in the state late in the race. You can bet your ass that the get-out-the-vote effort in a runoff will be immense.
Arizona
Sinema has hit the front and continues to stretch her lead incrementally. The count will take a while but, the remaining outstanding votes are in counties that are expected to lean liberal.
Mississippi
This one's going to a runoff later this month between the female, white incumbent Republican Cindy Hyde-Smith and her black, male Democratic opponent Mike Espy. Hyde-Smith was expected to prevail, but at the weekend, this happened:
"If he invited me to a public hanging, I'd be on the front row"- Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith says in Tupelo, MS after Colin Hutchinson, cattle rancher, praises her.
It is Mississippi, but still, that has to turn off a few people, right?
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The county-by-county tour was a big part of building Beto's publicity. It probably helped him more than it hurt—how many votes do we really think he lost by spending time outside urban areas? And more importantly, writing off/abandoning your constituents is a terrible thing to do regardless of electoral outcomes. Get out there, keep making the case, and let the other guy get caught taking those votes for granted. You never know what might happen over the long run.
It may have helped get him publicity, and sure, a Senator represents everyone and should listen to everyone, but every second you spend trying to convince the rural crowd to vote for you (they won't at this moment in time, especially after the ads come out) is a second you could be recruiting someone who will actually vote for you. I say this as someone who respects these peoples' opinions, but you can't talk them or implore them out of their worldview. They'll have to come out on their own volition, if they ever will at all.
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It may have helped get him publicity, and sure, a Senator represents everyone and should listen to everyone, but every second you spend trying to convince the rural crowd to vote for you (they won't at this moment in time, especially after the ads come out) is a second you could be recruiting someone who will actually vote for you. I say this as someone who respects these peoples' opinions, but you can't talk them or implore them out of their worldview. They'll have to come out on their own volition, if they ever will at all.
In my (limited) experience, Democrats have done well when they - as a party - compete everywhere. When they withdraw to their liberal strongholds, they lose.
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Election update:
Oh yeah: Dana Rohrebacher fucking lost.
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It may have helped get him publicity, and sure, a Senator represents everyone and should listen to everyone, but every second you spend trying to convince the rural crowd to vote for you (they won't at this moment in time, especially after the ads come out) is a second you could be recruiting someone who will actually vote for you. I say this as someone who respects these peoples' opinions, but you can't talk them or implore them out of their worldview. They'll have to come out on their own volition, if they ever will at all.
This was one thing people complained about in 2016 that no one went to see them and hear them. So they voted Republican. Beto learned that lesson. Regardless of the fact that many people still didn't change their vote, it honestly, gave courage to a lot of other people to talk about Beto. He totally got word of mouth on his side. It's hard to argue against someone going everywhere in Texas versus someone going every in Iowa.
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This was one thing people complained about in 2016 that no one went to see them and hear them. So they voted Republican. Beto learned that lesson. Regardless of the fact that many people still didn't change their vote, it honestly, gave courage to a lot of other people to talk about Beto. He totally got word of mouth on his side. It's hard to argue against someone going everywhere in Texas versus someone going every in Iowa.
Beto did far better against Cruz than other statewide Democratic candidates did against their Republican opponents. Some of that has to be down to the charisma gap, but I think a lot of it was down to the strategy to go everywhere, while Cruz held fund-raisers in BBQ joints in conservative strongholds.
Beto is the closest thing we've seen to Obama, since Obama.
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This was one thing people complained about in 2016 that no one went to see them and hear them. So they voted Republican. Beto learned that lesson. Regardless of the fact that many people still didn't change their vote, it honestly, gave courage to a lot of other people to talk about Beto. He totally got word of mouth on his side. It's hard to argue against someone going everywhere in Texas versus someone going every in Iowa.
I hear what y'all are saying and I'm definitely not in the "Screw those hicks, they'll never vote for you" crowd; I'm just in the "it's a waste of time, they'll never vote for you" crowd. It's simply tribalism in America politics at the moment.
My position on this is a result of two years of reading/hearing that Democrats have ignored the rural, working class voter (or the corollary that there really isn't a cultural component to the Trump base) and then frequently interacting with that base. Beto listened to them and engaged them with honesty and nuance, basically the way one should treat adults. However, as soon as bullshit ads come out about veterans/flags, Pelosi, caravans and oil, they all retreated to their corner and Beto became just another librul.
Bottom line: Beto gave a good faith effort. If he runs again, there's no need to go back to that well.
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I respectfully disagree. IMO, you shouldn't ignore a group of people in this country. Yeah, they aren't in urban areas, but to ignore them is as bad as ignoring any other group. Maybe I still have Beto afterglow (which I fully acknowledge) but I think that was the right move and may bring accountability to the one that won.
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Continuing to reach out to people even when you know they won't vote for you also shows authenticity. It shows you don't turn your back on people. That plays well everywhere, so things like the rural county tour can help you in the cities & suburbs as well.
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The Texas Tribune weighs in on Beto's campaign (https://www.texastribune.org/2018/11/09/ted-cruz-beto-orourke-closest-texas-race-40-years/).
One interesting tidbit: the NFL protest question that Beto answered so eloquently and became a national star as a result, was planted by Cruz' campaign. While Beto was being lauded around the country for his heartfelt, patriotic response, it was deemed a red line that conservatives - who hate the NFL protests - would never cross.
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Looks like the 254 strategy might have not been so efficient.
Maybe not. But maybe Beto doesn't flip Hays, Williamson, or Jefferson counties without that strategy.
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Continuing to reach out to people even when you know they won't vote for you also shows authenticity. It shows you don't turn your back on people. That plays well everywhere, so things like the rural county tour can help you in the cities & suburbs as well.
I agree.
It often irks me that only in the media outlets most associated with the left do you find column after column exhorting people to get out of their echo chambers and engage the other side honestly, but not doing so only exacerbates and reinforces the divide. The 254 strategy didn't win the whole enchilada this round but keep going back to that well each time and maybe some entrenched Republican's sons or daughters vote for you some day.
There's no religious diversity in one-church towns.
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Here's a pretty long, but fascinating, twitter thread by David Neiwert (author of Alt-America, The Rise of the Radical Right in the Age of Trump) about the Rise of Authoritarianism in the US and the psychology behind it.
https://twitter.com/DavidNeiwert/status/1062018162500153344
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Maybe not. But maybe Beto doesn't flip Hays, Williamson, or Jefferson counties without that strategy.
To be fair, all of those are relatively large counties, with populations that profile well for Beto, the exact places he should work the hardest. Hitting Scurry and Panola County is what I'm talking about.
Along those lines, I have a question for Sphinx: You live in Comal County, correct? I'm always a bit surprised by the relative conservative bent of that county, given all the growth that's occurred. It's vote is significantly more red than than the rest of the 35 corridor and more red than it's eastern neighbors. Who is moving into that county? Do y'all just get all of the Republicans from California?
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And more from twitter:
https://twitter.com/RobDownenChron/status/1062066362040967168
Houston Police are apparently searching the law office of Jared Woodfill, the former chairman of the Harris County Republican Party.
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Along those lines, I have a question for Sphinx: You live in Comal County, correct? I'm always a bit surprised by the relative conservative bent of that county, given all the growth that's occurred. It's vote is significantly more red than than the rest of the 35 corridor and more red than it's eastern neighbors. Who is moving into that county? Do y'all just get all of the Republicans from California?
My place is in Guadalupe County but with a New Braunfels zip code. I have no data but I get the feeling that there are a whole lot of the "Family Values" conservative types. The county has traditionally been populated since before statehood by Mexican-Americans (Tejanos) and since about the time of statehood by German-Americans families. There are also a lot of retired folks in New Braunfels, military and private sector both, especially around the Gruene neighborhood (saw mostly Cruz signs there, like 4 to 1 over Beto). I saw The Mavericks at jam packed Gruene Hall weekend before last and felt as if half the crowd was older than I am, and I'm 62. There are not a lot of black families in New Braunfels and they are mostly college educated middle class who moved out of San Antonio or from more rural areas of Texas. There are very few recent immigrants from Central America or Mexico. Very few Middle Easterners and very few Asians (we finally got a Pho house just last Spring!). There are a lot of shitkickers but you are more likely to see a rebel flag in Seguin than you are in New Braunfels.
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There are also a lot of retired folks in New Braunfels, military and private sector both, especially around the Gruene neighborhood (saw mostly Cruz signs there, like 4 to 1 over Beto). I saw The Mavericks at jam packed Gruene Hall weekend before last and felt as if half the crowd was older than I am, and I'm 62. There are not a lot of black families in New Braunfels and they are mostly college educated middle class who moved out of San Antonio or from more rural areas of Texas. There are very few recent immigrants from Central America or Mexico.
I’ve lived near downtown for 10 years and there were just as many Beto signs as Cruz signs up, but that may be because Cruz’s campaign manager doesn’t think they matter. Also, there are just as many recent immigrants here as anywhere else in Texas.
There is a lot of growth from out of state, but I think more people come from Harris county than anywhere else.
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Thanks for the replies. It’s just so different from a Bexar and Hayes:
Bexar - 59% Beto, 40% Cruz
Hayes - 57% Beto, 42% Cruz
Comal - 27% Beto, 72% Cruz
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Also, there are just as many recent immigrants here as anywhere else in Texas.
I don't think there are. Not to the extent of Houston, Austin, DFW, or San Antonio. But that just my observation. I could be wrong. If you know a mercado or carnecia in town besides the one by Big Lots, please let me know.
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Thanks for the replies. It’s just so different from a Bexar and Hayes:
Bexar - 59% Beto, 40% Cruz
Hayes - 57% Beto, 42% Cruz
Comal - 27% Beto, 72% Cruz
I think Bexar can be explained because of San Antonio.
I heard Karl Rove say there was a huge O’Rourke campaign at Texas State which would partially explain Hays and Williamson counties.
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I don't think there are. Not to the extent of Houston, Austin, DFW, or San Antonio. But that just my observation. I could be wrong. If you know a mercado or carnecia in town besides the one by Big Lots, please let me know.
I’m sure you’re right with regards to sheer numbers. The ratio seems about the same to me but who really knows.
There’s a panaderia on San Antonio St, south of Walnut. The best part of that place is that it opens up about 4AM. That’s really all I know.
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Recapping the week since the mid-terms, in which Republicans got slaughtered in the House, trounced for state offices up and down the country and may end up with a Senate net gain of +1 against the easiest field (for them) in a century, we have seen Trump:
* Fire his AG and appoint a literal stooge who, himself, is caught up in a serious FBI criminal investigation
* Blame Californians for the death and destruction wrought upon them by wildfires
* Fly to France for the 100th anniversary of the Armistice, only to:
- skip a service honoring the sacrifice of 2,400 US Marines because of rain
- skip the parade along the Champs Elysee which was lead by all the other attendant world leaders
- arrive late at the subsequent function
- pick a fight with French president Macron (still ongoing)
* Decline to visit Arlington National Cemetery on Veterans Day (when he had literally nothing on his schedule)
* Have his pants pulled down by his new love: Kim Jong Un, who has continued building nukes all along
* Signal boost unfounded (and disproved) conspiracy theories about election fraud in Florida
* Fail to mention the caravan
It's going to be a long two months until the new congress is sworn in...
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In Maine's 2nd Congressional District, Republican Bruce Poliquin is leading Democrat Jared Golden with all votes in. So, Poliquin's the winner, right? Nope. Poliquin doesn't have 50% of the vote so, like in many states, he doesn't get the win straight away. Unlike other states, that would have a runoff between the two most popular candidates, Maine uses a "ranked choice" system (also called "instant runoff"), where voters declare their second choice candidate on the original ballot, in case their first choice is eliminated and a runoff is needed.
Given that the reason neither major party candidate got to 50% was because of an ultra-liberal third party candidate siphoning off about 8% of the vote, most expect that much - if not all - of that 8% will switch to Golden and propel him past 50% and past his Republican opponent. The ranked choice recount is due to start tomorrow. But maybe not...
Because he's expecting to lose the instant runoff, Poliquin - who was totally fine with the process right up until the moment when the blue wave rose above his head - has filed suit claiming that the process is unconstitutional. Yep, my irony meter is broken now too.
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It's going to be a long two months until the new congress is sworn in...
Is that two months contingent on Florida being finished counting votes?
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Is that two months contingent on Florida being finished counting votes?
IMHO, the FL Governor's race is more important than the Senate race. While you never want to give up on a race as close as Nelson's, the difference of one more or less seat in the Senate is somewhat moot in the big picture (although it would be one less seat required to flip the Senate in 2020). However, Gillum would have the opportunity to fix a lot of what's wrong with Florida elections if he were elected, while Desantis is almost certain to make voting as hard as possible with Dr Evil to his Mini Me on the ballot in 2020.
Unfortunately, Gillum is less likely than Nelson to make a comeback through the recount, so it may be a wasted effort in all cases. And then there will be the grotesque victory lap by you-know-who...
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In case you thought Melania was a sympathetic figure in all of this, the Office of the First Lady has just officially called for the firing of one of John Bolton's top aides because of a dispute of flight seating arrangements on her recent trip to Africa.
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In case you thought Melania was a sympathetic figure in all of this, the Office of the First Lady has just officially called for the firing of one of John Bolton's top aides because of a dispute of flight seating arrangements on her recent trip to Africa.
And, two hours after attending an official White House event with no issues apparent, Mira Ricardel - the Bolton aide in question - was escorted from the White House by security.
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And, two hours after attending an official White House event with no issues apparent, Mira Ricardel - the Bolton aide in question - was escorted from the White House by security.
Den of snakes. No sympathy here.
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Den of snakes. No sympathy here.
Agreed. It's like when Rick Gates was testifying against Manafort; even though he was on "our side", it was important to remember that he's a steaming pile of walking excrement*. Anyone still in this White House after a couple of weeks, let alone a couple of years, is as undeserving of sympathy as any of the inner circle.
* One member of the jury felt very strongly this way, apparently, because that one person hung the verdicts on all the charges against Manafort where Gates was the principle purveyor of evidence.
In related news, Kelly and Nielsen are expected to be gone soon, leaving no one in charge of anything in America anywhere.
ETA: Ricardel is Croatian and Trump is Slovenian - both countries part of the former Yugoslavia, whose break up went very well, if I recall correctly. Eh? Oh.
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It is becoming more and more clear that Trump's disappearing act over the last week has as much to do with the results of the mid-terms as it does with rain being kryptonite to his hair. He's basically withdrawing into a cocoon of anger and frustration (https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/five-days-of-fury-inside-trump%E2%80%99s-paris-temper-election-woes-and-staff-upheaval/ar-BBPGakV?li=BBnb7Kz).
Give yourself a slap on the back, everybody.
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Democrats officially flipped another House seat today, bringing the total of flipped seats to 33, with 8 still to be called. If they run the table, they can get to a flip of 41, but 38 or 39 is the likely total. That's still a huge tally given the gerrymandering that took place after the Tea Party wave of 2010.
Speaking of which, that "shellacking" handed out to Obama in 2010 was the result of a 6.6% swing to Republicans. The swing to Democrats in 2018 is 7.1% and growing (because they're still counting mail-in ballots in California...as usual).
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Democrats officially flipped another House seat today, bringing the total of flipped seats to 33, with 8 still to be called. If they run the table, they can get to a flip of 41, but 38 or 39 is the likely total. That's still a huge tally given the gerrymandering that took place after the Tea Party wave of 2010.
Speaking of which, that "shellacking" handed out to Obama in 2010 was the result of a 6.6% swing to Republicans. The swing to Democrats in 2018 is 7.1% and growing (because they're still counting mail-in ballots in California...as usual).
6.6% and 7.1% of what?
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6.6% and 7.1% of what?
Of the total House vote. I.e., in 2010 Republicans got 6.6% more of the overall vote than Democrats; in 2018 Democrats got 7.1% more of the overall vote than Republicans.
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Of the total House vote.
I'm trying to decide if this is gaslighting or just hyperbole that muddies the waters of the discussion.
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I'm trying to decide if this is gaslighting or just hyperbole that muddies the waters of the discussion.
It’s just facts and data.
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So I'm in Washington, DC right now, and have a tour of the White House and the Capitol tomorrow. I doubt I'll have the opportunity to kick somebody in the nuts, but if I do...
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So I'm in Washington, DC right now, and have a tour of the White House and the Capitol tomorrow. I doubt I'll have the opportunity to kick somebody in the nuts, but if I do...
McConnel. He’s more the architect of the shit show in Washington than any other person.
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Democratic House flips now total 34, with 8 races still as yet undecided. Even if you want to dispute the percentages, it's impossible to ignore the swing in seats, including wins in places like Kansas, Arizona, Iowa and Texas. This is the biggest number of seats flipped by Democrats since the first election after Nixon resigned.
Also, during the Obama years, Democrats were cleaned out of state legislatures and governorships. They lost over 1,000 seats in state legislatures and lost countless governor's mansions to Republicans. Well, in this one mid-term, they got back 400 of those state seats and took back 7 governorships. The split of governorships is now 23 Dem to 25 Rep.
This success in the state races doesn't get well reported anywhere (and likely not at all on Fox), but it's a big fucking deal. These state Democrats will be able to control, or at least influence, things like redistricting and how elections are run(registration, early voting, allocation of polling stations etc.) all with a view to making it easier for eligible voters to vote. That will be important in 2020...
The undecided House seats include Mia Love's, which just got a little more interesting. Despite Trump proclaiming her a loser last week, the latest vote count shows that her deficit has shortened to ~800 votes. I am waiting for the outrage on the right over all these "found" votes being filled out in a back room somewhere...
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Bigger shit show right now: US or UK politics?
After the unveiling of the no exit Brexit deal, ministers are resigning in protest and there may well be a vote of no confidence in the government that. if lost, would likely trigger a general election (they can do that, you know). In any such election whether to have or not have a second Brexit referendum is going to be a big factor.
Meanwhile, there's no guarantee that the EU will even agree to the Brexit deal as proposed, so all this churn could be about nothing, and a hard Brexit may still fall.
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In Maine's 2nd Congressional District, Republican Bruce Poliquin is leading Democrat Jared Golden with all votes in. So, Poliquin's the winner, right? Nope. Poliquin doesn't have 50% of the vote so, like in many states, he doesn't get the win straight away. Unlike other states, that would have a runoff between the two most popular candidates, Maine uses a "ranked choice" system (also called "instant runoff"), where voters declare their second choice candidate on the original ballot, in case their first choice is eliminated and a runoff is needed.
Given that the reason neither major party candidate got to 50% was because of an ultra-liberal third party candidate siphoning off about 8% of the vote, most expect that much - if not all - of that 8% will switch to Golden and propel him past 50% and past his Republican opponent. The ranked choice recount is due to start tomorrow. But maybe not...
Because he's expecting to lose the instant runoff, Poliquin - who was totally fine with the process right up until the moment when the blue wave rose above his head - has filed suit claiming that the process is unconstitutional. Yep, my irony meter is broken now too.
A judge ruled against Poliquin, the ranked choice votes counted and Golden won. Another flip for Democrats, bringing the total to 35, with 7 remaining.
House Republicans are now extinct north east of New York, and they hold only Susan Collins' Senate seat in Maine (up for re-election in 2020). In New York (state) itself, Republicans hold 4 of 27 seats with 2 yet to be decided. They have only 1 of 12 house seats in New Jersey ans 1 of 8 in Maryland. The entire north east is a Republican desert, as is the west coast - they will likely have only 8 or 9 of California's 53 seats, 1 of 5 in Oregon and 3 of 10 in Washington. Other than the blue dot of Illinois, Republicans run riot in the flyover states and the south.
I would hate to see the population split between states represented by Democratic Senators vs. those represented by Republicans, because it would piss me off.
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A judge ruled against Poliquin, the ranked choice votes counted and Golden won. Another flip for Democrats, bringing the total to 35, with 7 remaining.
House Republicans are now extinct north east of New York, and they hold only Susan Collins' Senate seat in Maine (up for re-election in 2020). In New York (state) itself, Republicans hold 4 of 27 seats with 2 yet to be decided. They have only 1 of 12 house seats in New Jersey ans 1 of 8 in Maryland. The entire north east is a Republican desert, as is the west coast - they will likely have only 8 or 9 of California's 53 seats, 1 of 5 in Oregon and 3 of 10 in Washington. Other than the blue dot of Illinois, Republicans run riot in the flyover states and the south.
I would hate to see the population split between states represented by Democratic Senators vs. those represented by Republicans, because it would piss me off.
Gerrymandering preserved a great deal of GOP power. (https://www.cleveland.com/expo/news/erry-2018/11/0f32e762411182/ohio-democrats-outpolled-repub.html) Especially in Ohio:
The Democrats actually collected more total votes in the 116 Ohio House and Senate elections across the state, cleveland.com found in tabulating the unofficial returns….
But the Republicans scored their wins for 62 percent of the seats while collecting just under 50 percent of the total vote.
This is a lot like what happened in Ohio's 16 congressional districts, where Republicans won 75 percent of the seats with just 52 percent of the overall vote.
Fortunately, the good people of Ohio have overwhelmingly voted to prevent that from happening in the future:
Ohioans in 2015 voted to reform the way Statehouse districts will be drawn, beginning in 2021. Then, earlier this year, Ohio voters did the same for congressional districts going forward. The votes for change were not close, passing each time with more than 70 percent support.
The separate reforms carry their own set of rules, but the gist is the same - a new set of 10-year maps cannot be approved without buy-in from both major political parties.
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So, in bemoaning the idea that Texas isn't progressing towards fixing gerrymandering, I came across an article in the Texas Tribune and it seems as though Texans interested in a level playing field are fucked. Apparently, creating a fair districts requires a constitutional amendment, which requires a 2/3 consent of those elected in the crooked districts.
Implementing an independent citizens commission would require putting a constitutional amendment before Texas voters — a move that needs the support of more than two-thirds of both chambers of the Legislature.
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Fortunately, the good people of Ohio have overwhelmingly voted to prevent that from happening in the future
There were a number of ballot measures promoting voting rights around the country. In addition to Florida's "Amendment 4", Maryland, Michigan and Nevada voted to allow same-day registration. At the same time, though, Arkansas and North Carolina voted in favor of voter ID laws and North Dakota tied a set of braces to that belt by approving a measure that says only US citizens can vote. North Dakota has 750,000 people, two Senators, one House Rep. and time to waste, it seems.
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There were a number of ballot measures promoting voting rights around the country. In addition to Florida's "Amendment 4", Maryland, Michigan and Nevada voted to allow same-day registration. At the same time, though, Arkansas and North Carolina voted in favor of voter ID laws and North Dakota tied a set of braces to that belt by approving a measure that says only US citizens can vote. North Dakota has 750,000 people, two Senators, one House Rep. and time to waste, it seems.
NC also approved a measure to guarantee a constitutional right to hunt and fish. It's government by twelve-year-olds over here.
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NC also approved a measure to guarantee a constitutional right to hunt and fish. It's government by twelve-year-olds over here.
Good thing they did, cause after sneaking the caravan in, preventing those things was next up on Nancy's list.
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North Dakota tied a set of braces to that belt by approving a measure that says only US citizens can vote. North Dakota has 750,000 people, two Senators, one House Rep. and time to waste, it seems.
I am not sure what point you are trying to make.
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I am not sure what point you are trying to make.
Probably pointing out that it's already the law, and the political grandstanding by passing a law that basically says "we really mean it", as simply a way to spread fear among the rubes is a complete waste of time and government resources. Either that or they are really stupid up there.
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Probably pointing out that it's already the law, and the political grandstanding by passing a law that basically says "we really mean it", as simply a way to spread fear among the rubes is a complete waste of time and government resources. Either that or they are really stupid up there.
It think they see it as a pro-active measure to ensure when the challenge comes, non-US citizens can't vote in ND in the future. Just another result of the divisiveness, fear, reaction, and paranoia, that is American politics. Because we are really stupid everywhere. I'm just glad Trump hasn't nuked anyone yet--I think he's a year overdue if you go back 2 years on this thread.
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I am not sure what point you are trying to make.
Only US citizens can vote. Having a ballot measure simply to reiterate the existing law is ridiculous on its face and smacks of a fake issue to drive voting behavior.
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And now Broward County's recounts won't count, because they submitted the recount 2 minutes after the deadline. Ah, Florida. You are such a fucked up state.
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And now Broward County's recounts won't count, because they submitted the recount 2 minutes after the deadline. Ah, Florida. You are such a fucked up state.
Flori-duh!
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At the same time, though, Arkansas and North Carolina voted in favor of voter ID laws
Arkansas already had a Voter ID law, but the conservatives just wanted to show how super-serious they are by putting it in the Constitution too. So that meant I had to show my ID to vote against showing my ID.
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It think they see it as a pro-active measure to ensure when the challenge comes, non-US citizens can't vote in ND in the future. Just another result of the divisiveness, fear, reaction, and paranoia, that is American politics. Because we are really stupid everywhere. I'm just glad Trump hasn't nuked anyone yet--I think he's a year overdue if you go back 2 years on this thread.
Again...the law already exists. It’s like introducing a new law that makes murder illegal. This was simply an attempt to scare the people who aren’t very bright.
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This was simply an attempt to scare the people who aren’t very bright.
Again, this is politics in 2018, the whole country is not very bright.
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And now Broward County's recounts won't count, because they submitted the recount 2 minutes after the deadline. Ah, Florida. You are such a fucked up state.
Broward Co. is Florida’s Florida.
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The slow-moving wave continues. Democrats now +36 in the House, 6 races left to call.
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The slow-moving wave continues. Democrats now +36 in the House, 6 races left to call.
Senate update: Republicans are +1 with 2 races left, Florida and Mississippi.
Florida first: the hand recount is now underway, after Broward Co. screwed the pooch on the machine recount that meant the original machine count stood. Conspiracy theorists pounced on this because the machine recount found a couple-of-hundred extra votes for Scott. Regardless, Nelson's campaign claim that the weird shortfall in total votes for the Senate race vs. the Governor's race means there was a machine error.
The alternative explanation (and the more likely one, IMHO) is that Florida still can't put together a coherent ballot paper. The Senate race was at the bottom of the page, under a long vertical column of instructions that no one read and so was likely skipped by inattentive voters (i.e. Floridians). This was against the guidelines for ballot layout that came out after the last time Broward Co. fucked up an election - or the last time it became a national issue, at least - in 2000, where doing this exact thing was noted as a thing not to do. If Nelson's right, he'll win the hand recount; if he's wrong, Scott will win.
Now to Mississippi: why is this still even a thing? It's Missi-fucking-sippi! Trump won the state by 18 points! Well, a plethora of third-party candidates meant that neither Hyde-Smith (R) - defending the seat to which she was appointed - or Espy (D) got to 50%, so there's a runoff. How's that going? For Hyde-Smith, not so well. She was caught on tape last week joking about attending a public hanging...in Mississippi. She issued a statement and then hid behind it in an embarrassing press event where she referred reporters to the statement maybe a dozen times in a row.
Bad right? But bad enough to derail a Republican in R+18 Mississippi? How about layering on a joke about not letting "some people" vote? Yeah, she did that yesterday. So she's checked lynching and Jim Crow on her Mississippi racist bingo card, so what's next? Killing some civil rights protesters and giving the FBI the runaround when they show up to investigate? The RNC has jumped in with an ad buy featuring, of course, George Soros, and Trump is talking about holding a campaign rally there, because neither of those things stink of racism.
This is an interesting litmus test for Mississippi: is it still racist as fuck, or will they do an Alabama and turn away a clearly horrible person regardless of her political tribe? The special election in Nov 27, there is a debate scheduled for Nov 20. Pass the popcorn.
And here's a last, tantalizing, thought: Republicans are currently +1 in the Senate with these two racers left. If - and it's a big if - both outstanding races go to the Democrats, they will have gained a seat in the Senate against the worst electoral map in a century. Will that have people accepting the blue wave? It would mean the Senate would be poised at 51-49. The one over the 50 being Susan Collins - the sole Republican representative from New England in either chamber - who is up for re-election in 2020...
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Mueller finally made a mistake and let something slip. He has a sealed indictment against Julian Assange. Good.
Hopefully, he also has sealed indictments against Stone, Corsi, Uday, Jarvanka, Farage et al. That could be what Whitaker told Trump this week which sent him off the deep end, because firing Mueller won't expunge those indictments, it probably speeds their change of status from sealed to unsealed.
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Florida update: Broward Co. - which took three days and still failed to meet the deadline for a machine recount - somehow finished its hand recount overnight, and Nelson didn't pick up any votes. The no new votes thing isn't weird (see above), but getting the count done so quickly, is.
Anyway, looks like both the Governor's and Senate races will be called for the Republicans.
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Commenting on McConnell's mind-blowingly cynical op-ed calling for bipartisanship on the part of Dems...
David Simon @AoDespair Nov 13
Upon a just and living god having this read to him by a heavenly host, a dirigible-sized Merrick Garland should float over the Senate side of the Capitol, open its lower flap and, as you stare up its rubbered ass in abject wonder, cover you and all your works in human excrement.
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All congressional districts in Orange County, CA are represented by Democrats. Orange County!!
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Trump had an eventful weekend, even by his standards.
He recorded an interview with Fox News that aired over the weekend in which he:
- gave himself an "A+" grade because it's the highest (basically, he said he's gone to 11);
- attacked a decorated and storied Navy SEAL for being a "Hillary backer" (he wasn't),
- admitted that not going to the Arlington National Cemetery was a mistake, but said that he went the prior year (he didn't) and
- claimed all the news about him was fake, and said that people make up sources and then just say "sources said..." (apparently with a straight face and no fingers crossed).
He also went to California where he continued to blame the victims for not raking the forest floors like they do in Finland (the Prime Minister of Finland explained this to him, he said), apparently not being aware that:
- the Prime Minister of Finland has no idea what Trump's talking about;
- Finland is an arctic country that's under snow for much of the year so absolutely nothing at all like the drought-parched land of California (and the Finns came out to mock our President (https://gizmodo.com/finns-mock-president-trump-by-posting-forest-raking-pho-1830532120) as a result); and
- the lands that burned had either burned recently (Camp fire) so weren't strewn with tinder, or scrub land (Woolsey fire) which is not, you know, a forest.
Every day, a new low.
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Don't forget him calling Schiff "Little Adam Schitt."
The Trump crowd likely went wild.
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Don't forget him calling Schiff "Little Adam Schitt."
The Trump crowd likely went wild.
...and defending Melania's* decision to fire the deputy national security adviser.
* Melania, who is trying to stamp out cyber-bullying, ironically.
There's just so much to keep up with. Right now he is on Twitter, attacking McRaven (again), saying the hunt for bin Laden took too long and that the people doing it were fools, seemingly unaware that the hunt was carried out by the CIA and McRaven was brought in only to execute the Abbatabad raid, which he did with aplomb.
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The reality of the CA wildfires, that is getting lost in the Trump bullshitstorm, is a story well worth reading (https://www.latimes.com/local/california/la-me-camp-fire-tictoc-20181118-story.html) if your heart can take the breaking it will suffer.
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He also went to California where he continued to blame the victims for not raking the forest floors
They should also build a really high wall around all the forests to keep the wind out.
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These fires are such a tragic scenario and so foreign to my life experience. I immediately think about cities/homes having a bunker or safe buildings, similar to tornado threatened areas, but since I've never heard of such a thing, it must be more complicated than I envision.
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These fires are such a tragic scenario and so foreign to my life experience. I immediately think about cities/homes having a bunker or safe buildings, similar to tornado threatened areas, but since I've never heard of such a thing, it must be more complicated than I envision.
Seems to me that one of these storm shelters (https://youtu.be/wBG8AWY9KcI) could be adapted to be a fire shelter.
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These fires are such a tragic scenario and so foreign to my life experience. I immediately think about cities/homes having a bunker or safe buildings, similar to tornado threatened areas, but since I've never heard of such a thing, it must be more complicated than I envision.
It is much more complicated than a storm shelter due to the oxygen consuming nature of fire among other factors. Many people have lost their lives after seeking refuge from a fire in storm shelters when they oxygen was sucked out of the air in the bunker.
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It is much more complicated than a storm shelter due to the oxygen consuming nature of fire among other factors. Many people have lost their lives after seeking refuge from a fire in storm shelters when they oxygen was sucked out of the air in the bunker.
That was my initial concern, but a fire bunker would be designed for that.
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It is much more complicated than a storm shelter due to the oxygen consuming nature of fire among other factors. Many people have lost their lives after seeking refuge from a fire in storm shelters when they oxygen was sucked out of the air in the bunker.
That's how flame-throwers are used, not to burn (although that happens), but to incapacitate your enemy by consuming all the breathable oxygen.
An in-ground shelter would be ok with the heat as the surrounding dirt will insulate the occupants, so only the lid would need to be fireproofed. Make it airtight, include some form of compressed air breathing apparatus, and it should be survivable for a while. The in-garage shelters work well -for fire or wind - because no one has to go outside.
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The good thing about Democrats having control of the House is that they will be able to go after things like the rampant use of personal email accounts to conduct government business by Trump administration officials, especially those who fall into the crossover of the Venn between government employees and family members (Kushner has been busted doing this too).
All such things - which are serious infractions but have been rendered comical by Republican overreach - can be properly and appropriately investigated, so that we no longer have the spectacle of the story breaking, thew White House lying about it, and the issue dying on the vine because Congress can't be arsed to look into it.
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They should just assign the Ivanka e-mail case to the House Republican minority, and give them a due date. This will give them something to chew on during their downtime. At the due date, see what they have found and make them present it in front of the class.
They won't get bored or tired doing this project because the Trump base, being all into this issue, will run "lock her up" features 24/7 on Fox news.
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This statement (https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefings-statements/statement-president-donald-j-trump-standing-saudi-arabia/) from the White House, about the Khashoggi murder, is: (1) clearly written or heavily edited by Donald Trump; and (b) is a complete mess stylistically, grammatically and factually.
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Now to Mississippi: why is this still even a thing? It's Missi-fucking-sippi! Trump won the state by 18 points! Well, a plethora of third-party candidates meant that neither Hyde-Smith (R) - defending the seat to which she was appointed - or Espy (D) got to 50%, so there's a runoff. How's that going? For Hyde-Smith, not so well. She was caught on tape last week joking about attending a public hanging...in Mississippi. She issued a statement and then hid behind it in an embarrassing press event where she referred reporters to the statement maybe a dozen times in a row.
Bad right? But bad enough to derail a Republican in R+18 Mississippi? How about layering on a joke about not letting "some people" vote? Yeah, she did that yesterday. So she's checked lynching and Jim Crow on her Mississippi racist bingo card, so what's next? Killing some civil rights protesters and giving the FBI the runaround when they show up to investigate? The RNC has jumped in with an ad buy featuring, of course, George Soros, and Trump is talking about holding a campaign rally there, because neither of those things stink of racism.
This is an interesting litmus test for Mississippi: is it still racist as fuck, or will they do an Alabama and turn away a clearly horrible person regardless of her political tribe? The special election in Nov 27, there is a debate scheduled for Nov 20. Pass the popcorn.
I'll tell you what's next: a self-posted photo from 2014 of Hyde-Smith wearing a confederate hat.
We know what she is; Mississippians...what are you?
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This statement (https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefings-statements/statement-president-donald-j-trump-standing-saudi-arabia/) from the White House, about the Khashoggi murder, is: (1) clearly written or heavily edited by Donald Trump; and (b) is a complete mess stylistically, grammatically and factually.
He's so full of shit with his facts. You know he or his family is benefiting financially from SA. When Dems investigate, this is the kind of shit that goes day 1. E-mail stuff is number 137.
Also, there is a story about Whittaker receiving 1.2 mil in the last year or so from some group with an Orwellian name: Foundation for Accountability and Civic Trust (FACT). We know he is corrupt. preventing this is one of the primary reasons the constitution requires confirmation by the senate.
They are all fucking corrupt. The most corrupt administration in my lifetime for sure. Draining the swamp. Motherfuckers should all be in jail.
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Also, there is a story about Whittaker receiving 1.2 mil in the last year or so from some group with an Orwellian name: Foundation for Accountability and Civic Trust (FACT).
He was the only employee. How does he - an unknown, former main street lawyer* - generate that kind of revenue for himself?
* Yes, he served as the US Attorney for Utah, but he was unqualified for that job too when elevated to it. He also sucked at it (https://www.cnn.com/2018/11/09/politics/matthew-whitaker-matt-mccoy/index.html), and just drifted around for nearly a decade before being plucked from obscurity to be Sessions' CoS at the DoJ.
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He was the only employee. How does he - an unknown, former main street lawyer* - generate that kind of revenue for himself?
* Yes, he served as the US Attorney for Utah, but he was unqualified for that job too when elevated to it. He also sucked at it (https://www.cnn.com/2018/11/09/politics/matthew-whitaker-matt-mccoy/index.html), and just drifted around for nearly a decade before being plucked from obscurity to be Sessions' CoS at the DoJ.
And why hasn't the DOJ provided a copy of his financial disclosures?
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And why hasn't the DOJ provided a copy of his financial disclosures?
It’s out now, but it’s been revised 7 times (he’s only been acting AG about 7 days). FOIA requests have been made for all versions of the disclosure and there’s no reason not to grant them. That might be telling...
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We know what she is; Mississippians...what are you?
Something tells me you're not going to like the answer.
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Something tells me you're not going to like the answer.
As Bill Maher opines: Not every Republican is racist; but all racists are Republicans. This runoff will come down to those non-racist Republicans and independents who cannot stand with Hyde-Smith who is so racist that she is racist without even realizing it.
Doug Jones showed that there are Republican voters who'll put morality over tribe to at least not show up to vote for an undesirable candidate. Outside of her racist labia-stepping, Hyde-Smith has done nothing to demonstrate that she's an able politician, or anything better than a party-flunky who was appointed to a seat that she expected not to have to fight to keep. All Republicans should be insulted by that.
If that moderate group breaks for Espy or, at least, doesn't show up for Hyde-Smith, he'll win; if they go with tribe over fitness-for-office, he'll lose.
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The undecided House seats include Mia Love's, which just got a little more interesting. Despite Trump proclaiming her a loser last week, the latest vote count shows that her deficit has shortened to ~800 votes. I am waiting for the outrage on the right over all these "found" votes being filled out in a back room somewhere...
I guess they didn't find enough extra votes for Love, who has lost her re-election bid. That's another House seat flipped to the Democrats, bringing the net gain to 38, where it will likely end up (3 races remain undecided). The blue wave took a while to fully materialize, but it's undeniable and Republicans who celebrated early now look pretty foolish (https://youtu.be/1E09woGL7as).
The House vote margin is pushing +8% for Democrats and may end up at +9% by the time they're done counting all the absentee ballots in California. 60 million people voted for Democratic candidates for the House, which compares to 45 million who voted for Republican House candidates in the 2010 "Tea Party Revolution" (which resulted in a 6.6% vote margin for Republicans).
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I guess they didn't find enough extra votes for Love, who has lost her re-election bid. That's another House seat flipped to the Democrats, bringing the net gain to 38, where it will likely end up (3 races remain undecided). The blue wave took a while to fully materialize, but it's undeniable and Republicans who celebrated early now look pretty foolish (https://youtu.be/1E09woGL7as).
The House vote margin is pushing +8% for Democrats and may end up at +9% by the time they're done counting all the absentee ballots in California. 60 million people voted for Democratic candidates for the House, which compares to 45 million who voted for Republican House candidates in the 2010 "Tea Party Revolution" (which resulted in a 6.6% vote margin for Republicans).
CA-21 is still very much in play (https://twitter.com/Redistrict/status/1065273697169276935) despite it being "called" for the Republican incumbent after election day.
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That's another House seat flipped to the Democrats, bringing the net gain to 38, where it will likely end up
The net gain is currently at 39 with the possibility of 40 if CA-21 flips.
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The net gain is currently at 39 with the possibility of 40 if CA-21 flips.
Ah. I'm looking at a table of races "called", not races decided. 40 has a nice ring to it.
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Re: Kavanaugh
A Federal judge has dismissed a Mississippi law that would ban abortions after only 15 weeks with no exceptions for rape and incest*. This case will now likely be appealed to the Supreme Court, where Kavanaugh, not Kennedy (or Garland) will be the deciding vote. This is how Roe will die, not with a hammer blow, but by a thousand cuts.
* These exceptions have always been a fig leaf hiding a pile of bullshit. It is so hard to prove rape, because it's almost always literally a he said/she said as to whether sex was consensual. It's so hard to prove incest, because the victim is the ward of the attacker, and not able to control her own destiny. That makes it very hard for the impregnated victims of rape and incest to prove the exception at all, let alone with the 20-week clock ticking.
I would be more sympathetic to anti-abortion crusaders if they worked as hard to duct tape the baby to the father as they do the mother. By forcing only one party to be responsible, such laws smack of slut-shaming and punishment - of the female only - for the sin** of sex.
** Sex isn't a crime when between consenting adults. In fact, only 2 of the Ten Commandments are against the law while some are actively protected by the Constitution (Commandments 2 thru 5, to be precise).
I do not like abortions (pro-choicers are just that, pro-choice, not pro-abortion). States like Mississippi (and Texas) do their best to remove any chance that kids have to learn about safe sex practices and deny them access to contraception. Kids have sex anyway, and unwanted pregnancies result - the statistics on this are incredibly well developed and undeniable. If you don't give people what they need to be able to make safe choices, then you morally cannot punish them*** for the consequences.
*** By "them" I mean "her"; "he" gets to walk away.
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Re: Kavanaugh
A Federal judge has dismissed a Mississippi law that would ban abortions after only 15 weeks with no exceptions for rape and incest*. This case will now likely be appealed to the Supreme Court, where Kavanaugh, not Kennedy (or Garland) will be the deciding vote. This is how Roe will die, not with a hammer blow, but by a thousand cuts.
* These exceptions have always been a fig leaf hiding a pile of bullshit. It is so hard to prove rape, because it's almost always literally a he said/she said as to whether sex was consensual. It's so hard to prove incest, because the victim is the ward of the attacker, and not able to control her own destiny. That makes it very hard for the impregnated victims of rape and incest to prove the exception at all, let alone with the 20-week clock ticking.
I would be more sympathetic to anti-abortion crusaders if they worked as hard to duct tape the baby to the father as they do the mother. By forcing only one party to be responsible, such laws smack of slut-shaming and punishment - of the female only - for the sin** of sex.
** Sex isn't a crime when between consenting adults. In fact, only 2 of the Ten Commandments are against the law while some are actively protected by the Constitution (Commandments 2 thru 5, to be precise).
I do not like abortions (pro-choicers are just that, pro-choice, not pro-abortion). States like Mississippi (and Texas) do their best to remove any chance that kids have to learn about safe sex practices and deny them access to contraception. Kids have sex anyway, and unwanted pregnancies result - the statistics on this are incredibly well developed and undeniable. If you don't give people what they need to be able to make safe choices, then you morally cannot punish them*** for the consequences.
*** By "them" I mean "her"; "he" gets to walk away.
I swear I had almost the exact same type of conversation this morning. Regardless of consensual or non-consensual it is always the woman's fault. She is the only one responsible for the consequences. And yet, there are people that want to take away her say in the decisions to be made. (And the conversation started in regard to paternity leave.)
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Re: Kavanaugh
A Federal judge has dismissed a Mississippi law that would ban abortions after only 15 weeks with no exceptions for rape and incest*. This case will now likely be appealed to the Supreme Court, where Kavanaugh, not Kennedy (or Garland) will be the deciding vote. This is how Roe will die, not with a hammer blow, but by a thousand cuts.
* These exceptions have always been a fig leaf hiding a pile of bullshit. It is so hard to prove rape, because it's almost always literally a he said/she said as to whether sex was consensual. It's so hard to prove incest, because the victim is the ward of the attacker, and not able to control her own destiny. That makes it very hard for the impregnated victims of rape and incest to prove the exception at all, let alone with the 20-week clock ticking.
I would be more sympathetic to anti-abortion crusaders if they worked as hard to duct tape the baby to the father as they do the mother. By forcing only one party to be responsible, such laws smack of slut-shaming and punishment - of the female only - for the sin** of sex.
** Sex isn't a crime when between consenting adults. In fact, only 2 of the Ten Commandments are against the law while some are actively protected by the Constitution (Commandments 2 thru 5, to be precise).
I do not like abortions (pro-choicers are just that, pro-choice, not pro-abortion). States like Mississippi (and Texas) do their best to remove any chance that kids have to learn about safe sex practices and deny them access to contraception. Kids have sex anyway, and unwanted pregnancies result - the statistics on this are incredibly well developed and undeniable. If you don't give people what they need to be able to make safe choices, then you morally cannot punish them*** for the consequences.
*** By "them" I mean "her"; "he" gets to walk away.
The amount of ignorance you present as fact makes it hard to draw any distinction between you and Mr. Happy.
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The amount of ignorance you present as fact makes it hard to draw any distinction between you and Mr. Happy.
I would like to debate you on this (or anything else), but as usual, you lob an accusation without establishing the grounds on which it's based.
I mean, you could post a link to a Kaiser Family Foundation study (https://www.kff.org/womens-health-policy/fact-sheet/sexual-health-of-adolescents-and-young-adults-in-the-united-states/) that show that, while teen are still as horny as the cast of "American Pie", teen pregnancy rates are dropping countrywide. However, they are dropping notably more slowly in the "south central states" which - per the handy graphic - include Texas and Mississippi. But that wouldn't help your fact-free rebuttal at all. Neither would posting an article that 83% of Texas schools teach abstinence-only sex education (https://www.sacurrent.com/the-daily/archives/2017/02/14/83-percent-of-texas-school-districts-teach-abstinence-only-sex-ed-or-none-at-all), or one from Mississippi that says it's abstinence-only sex education law has been extended for another 5 years (https://mississippitoday.org/2016/03/29/mississippi-extends-abstinence-based-sex-ed/).
I mean, that takes time. It's why I didn't do it in the original post.
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I swear I had almost the exact same type of conversation this morning. Regardless of consensual or non-consensual it is always the woman's fault. She is the only one responsible for the consequences. And yet, there are people that want to take away her say in the decisions to be made. (And the conversation started in regard to paternity leave.)
It's like the old trope of when a man says that he has to go home to "baby sit" his kids. Ummm... that's parenting. We still treat the job of raising children as women's work when it should be equally charged to both parents (and the father has some catching up to do on day #1 outside the womb) and they, as responsible parents, can divvy it up as they see fit and as their own circumstances dictate.
If we do that, then things like paternity leave make more sense, while denying women promotions because they might have a baby don't.
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I would like to debate you on this (or anything else), but as usual, you lob an accusation without establishing the grounds on which it's based.
I mean, you could post a link to a Kaiser Family Foundation study (https://www.kff.org/womens-health-policy/fact-sheet/sexual-health-of-adolescents-and-young-adults-in-the-united-states/) that show that, while teen are still as horny as the cast of "American Pie", teen pregnancy rates are dropping countrywide. However, they are dropping notably more slowly in the "south central states" which - per the handy graphic - include Texas and Mississippi. But that wouldn't help your fact-free rebuttal at all. Neither would posting an article that 83% of Texas schools teach abstinence-only sex education (https://www.sacurrent.com/the-daily/archives/2017/02/14/83-percent-of-texas-school-districts-teach-abstinence-only-sex-ed-or-none-at-all), or one from Mississippi that says it's abstinence-only sex education law has been extended for another 5 years (https://mississippitoday.org/2016/03/29/mississippi-extends-abstinence-based-sex-ed/).
I mean, that takes time. It's why I didn't do it in the original post.
What do you think "abstinence-only" means?
Also, what about the other at least ten assertions you made?
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The amount of ignorance you present as fact makes it hard to draw any distinction between you and Mr. Happy.
Wait a minute. Just because my views differ from your views doesn't make my views ignorant, just different. You liberals are very disrespectful and intolerant of views that differ from what you think is the truth.
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What do you think "abstinence-only" means?
Also, what about the other at least ten assertions you made?
Why don’t you offer a comment instead of lobbing nebulous questions?
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Wait a minute. Just because my views differ from your views doesn't make my views ignorant, just different. You liberals are very disrespectful and intolerant of views that differ from what you think is the truth.
This is great.
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Wait a minute. Just because my views differ from your views doesn't make my views ignorant, just different. You liberals are very disrespectful and intolerant of views that differ from what you think is the truth.
Ssssssssssswing and a misssssssssssss
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Roger Stone and Jerome Corsi are duetting for Mueller.
Not one of these fucks will stand in front of Trump. It’s hilarious.
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Ssssssssssswing and a misssssssssssss
In what way?
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Strike two!
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In what way?
You root for the biggest liar in US history. Politicians always lie, but the current idiot is the fucking champion of dishonesty and phonies lie you won’t say shit. Sad!
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Strike two!
Nobody tell him, see if he figures it out on his own.
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Hap steps out of the box, squints down the line to the third base coach. Raup claps twice, briskly, encouragingly. Hap glances down, worries his velcro and steps back in.
chuck drags his fingertips quickly through the dirt, pounds the mitt, narrows his knees and flashes through the signs. Waldo gives a curt shake of the head but stays on the rubber. chuck leans forward onto his knees, glances into the dugout.
Count is oh and two, two outs, nobody on.
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In order to be morally and intellectually superior, there must be someone to be morally and intellectually superior to. That is the function you serve, Mr. H. You are the untermensch to their ubermensch.
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Word is that Stone has reached a plea agreement with Mueller, but Corsi is telling anyone who'll listen that he's rejected the offer he was given.
I suspect, if the latter is true, (the offer, not Corsi's blabbing which is ongoing and incessant) Corsi's just trying to negotiate a better deal. However, Mueller has an avalanche of evidence against him for perjury, so it's hard to see why he would cave to media pressure, especially when Corsi has been unable to generate any. On the flip side, an indictment of Corsi would be an interesting read...
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I'll tell you what's next: a self-posted photo from 2014 of Hyde-Smith wearing a confederate hat.
We know what she is; Mississippians...what are you?
The confederate hat story got worse, because it was at the Jefferson Davis museum, and Hyde-Smith captioned the photo of her in a confederate hat, holding a civil war musket, as "Mississippi history at its best!".
She also went to a private school that was created for whites only after integration of state schools in the 70s. Not her choice, of course, and we don't know if she would have chosen differently if she could have, but it suggests that - at best - she didn't get much of a progressive education.
The runoff election is today.
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Manafort is going to be sentenced for his crimes because he's been caught lying (a lot, I believe) to Mueller's team after he reached his plea agreement. As a result, Mueller has asked the judge to go ahead and sentence Manafort, which is what happens once a cooperating witness has finished being of use to prosecutors.
Mueller is not only not going to make a sentence recommendation - as he would, for leniency, if Manafort had cooperated fully - he is going to write up everything he knows of Manafort's criminal activity and give it to the judge. Now, I don't know if he'll be sentenced for only the 8 counts on which he was convicted, or all counts including those to which he plead guilty. I guess we'll find out soon enough.
Further, it's been speculated that Mueller might use his submission to the judge to speak to Trump's involvement in the Russian election interference. This is a document that would (a) be public record and (2) unable to be suppressed by Trump or his stooge in the DOJ, so it is an opportunity for him to get his findings out to the public unfiltered. Even if he doesn't use it to out any Trumps, it is expected to lay out - in glorious Mueller detail - everything that Manafort did. It would also, like Manafort's property forfeitures, survive any presidential pardon.
Given that reports are now surfacing that Manafort was meeting with Assange (https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/nov/27/manafort-held-secret-talks-with-assange-in-ecuadorian-embassy) in the run up to him taking over as Trump's campaign chair - a job he'd been begging to get for months - it may well include proof of actual collusion.
Buy stocks in popcorn*.
* They're cheap, the stock market has been tanking and is currently below where it finished in 2017.
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Based on all the detail they had on the Russians via whatever methods they have, I don't doubt that they know everything about all dealings with Assange.
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When answering questions about his tariffs - that have cost GM $1bn as the firm announces plant closures and layoffs - Trump confused them with interest rates. He was corrected by the reporter, Trump noted the correction, apologized for his error and then went right back to confusing tariffs with interest rates.
He also thinks the federal coffers are filling up with billions of dollars from China because of the tariffs.
How can anyone be this stupid?
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He also thinks the federal coffers are filling up with billions of dollars from China because of the tariffs.
How can anyone be this stupid?
Simple side effect of too much covfefe.
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The net gain is currently at 39 with the possibility of 40 if CA-21 flips.
The 40th seat flip (net, i.e. 41 flipped, 1 lost) appears to be in reach (https://www.latimes.com/politics/la-na-pol-midterm-valadao-cox-20181126-story.html). The Democrats margin of victory in the overall vote count for House seats is the largest in history. This is a truly significant electoral repudiation of the Republican party, but it happened so slowly (thanks, California) that it became old news before it was news.
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Mexico wants to know what the fuck we were doing lobbing tear gas into their country (https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-immigration-diplomacy/mexico-asks-us-to-investigate-use-of-tear-gas-at-border-idUSKCN1NW00L). They have a point. Tear gas is deemed a chemical weapon and thus banned from use in international conflicts; it is only legal to be used on home soil. Firing tear gas at Mexico, regardless of the motivation and target, could be a war crime.
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Wikileaks is offering a million dollar bet with the Guardian over the claim that Manafort met with Assange. Of course they denied any Assange Stone back channels until they were proved to be lying about that. Russian government probably just wants to know the Guardian's source, so they can murder that person too.
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Wikileaks is offering a million dollar bet with the Guardian over the claim that Manafort met with Assange. Of course they denied any Assange Stone back channels until they were proved to be lying about that. Russian government probably just wants to know the Guardian's source, so they can murder that person too.
If they win, how will they collect?
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If they win, how will they collect?
Bitcoin.
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Watching “The Vietnam War”, and MSNBC”s “Betrayall” and “Bagman”, I am constantly struck by the parallels between Nixon and Trump. The former was way smarter than the latter, but both were crooks, both colluded with a foreign power to help them win the presidency, both used foreigners as ubiquitous bogeymen and both relied on stoking white resentment to achieve and maintain power.
The Vietnam war split the country and had Americans fighting - and killing - each other on home soil. I truly fear that, before Trump is gone from office, we will see such things again. It’s what he wants.
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In other news, fuck Mississippi.
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Manafort is going to be sentenced for his crimes because he's been caught lying (a lot, I believe) to Mueller's team after he reached his plea agreement. As a result, Mueller has asked the judge to go ahead and sentence Manafort, which is what happens once a cooperating witness has finished being of use to prosecutors.
Turns out that lying snake Paul Manafort continued to be a lying snake while purporting to cooperate with the Russia investigation. He was feeding information on the investigation back to Trump's lawyers, presumably as part of a campaign to earn a presidential pardon. Mueller's team found out about it and, understandably, were a little miffed.
Hence the end of the cooperation agreement and Team Mueller's work to load the book catapult and point it at Manafort.
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All the current and future Trump jailbirds (and the Republican enablers) can take solace knowing that they did these things for a noble cause.
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In other news, fuck Mississippi.
They continue to fuck themselves. As if the poor white folk who vote solidly Republican have benefited from any Republican policy over the last, say, 20 years (likely more). Do you think any major employer is going to move to Mississippi now?
Results like this perpetuate and exacerbate the urban vs. rural divide in this country, as young people with college educations - who break hard for progressives - leave rural states looking for work and avocado toast, leaving behind predominantly older, non-college educated folks who break hard for conservatives. As Trump said: "I love the poorly educated."
This will also perpetuate a stalemate in the Senate as the red states will keep getting redder as their progressives leave for New York and California where they just help to run up the score. As Bill Maher regularly frets: the Dakotas have a population of 1.6 million and get four Senators while California has 40 million and gets two. As the rural states empty out of progressives, they will concentrate down to a tiny but solidly conservative voting bloc that will return enough Republican Senators that Democrats will never get a filibuster-proof majority. And vice versa, or course, but the ratio of voters to Senators will be crazily out of whack.
The Senate isn't supposed to be proportional representation, but the disproportionality is so off the charts already - and worsening - that something needs to be done. When the Senate was conceived, the ratio of voters from the smallest to the largest population was 10 to 1; now it's 72 to 1. Republicans have gerrymandered the House so that they win far more seats than they should and the Senate is now self-gerrymandering as progressives choose to leave the red states.
Democrats can boost their position in the Senate by pushing through statehood to DC and even Puerto Rico - which would give them 4 Senate seats that they don't have to fight for. But that's just deepening the divide and simply thumbing the scale rather than fixing the system. It's also only achievable behind a filibuster-proof majority in the Senate, which will likely never again happen under the current format (at least until minority population growth in states like Texas and Florida turns them purple).
Changing the make-up of the Senate would require a constitutional amendment or two*, which won't happen. Granting statehood for DC and PR is the right thing to do, regardless of party politics, IMHO, but that's a hard slog and likely only going to happen after time and demographics have change the color of the few red states that have big cities desirable to young folk. What it really needs is for everyone to get to at least the same "baseline of facts", as Obama discussed last night at Rice University. At least, then, the decisions made by voters would be based on facts that the candidates cannot twist or deny.
* I have seen a suggestion - not just from Grandpa Simpson - that we eliminate some states. Using a formula that requires any contiguous states, both of which are smaller in population than the 38th most populous state, would have to merge. If applied right now, this would merge Wyoming, South Dakota, and North Dakota; Montana and Idaho; and Vermont and New Hampshire; for a net reduction of 4 states (conveniently allowing room for DC and PR to come in and keep the Senate at 100 seats). The number 38 being picked as the threshold because it's the number of states it would currently take to ratify such an amendment, but...you know....good fucking luck on that.
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Turns out that lying snake Paul Manafort continued to be a lying snake while purporting to cooperate with the Russia investigation. He was feeding information on the investigation back to Trump's lawyers, presumably as part of a campaign to earn a presidential pardon. Mueller's team found out about it and, understandably, were a little miffed.
Hence the end of the cooperation agreement and Team Mueller's work to load the book catapult and point it at Manafort.
It's been speculated that Manafort's flip might have been planned with Team Trump. Once he was convicted of 8 counts in a federal court in Virginia, he was going to need a pardon to stay out of jail. So why not plead to everything else and get an inside look at what Mueller has, report it back to Team Trump, and then get a pardon? Well the reporting back part was done and Trump, today, when asked about a pardon, said it hadn't been discussed but was on the table.
Did Mueller just get played?
Meanwhile, the Senate looks set to pass a resolution that chops Trump off at the knees over assisting the Saudi war in Yemen. This will be an interesting standoff.
Pelosi is going to be the Democrats' nominee for House Speaker. She has said that she won't hold the job for too long - we'll see if she's good on that - but right now a skilled and experienced politician, 3rd in line to the presidency, has some comfort to it. If Trump goes, it's quite likely that Pence goes with him...
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It's been speculated that Manafort's flip might have been planned with Team Trump. Once he was convicted of 8 counts in a federal court in Virginia, he was going to need a pardon to stay out of jail. So why not plead to everything else and get an inside look at what Mueller has, report it back to Team Trump, and then get a pardon? Well the reporting back part was done and Trump, today, when asked about a pardon, said it hadn't been discussed but was on the table.
Did Mueller just get played?
Alternatively, Mueller went along so Manafort would feed Trump bad info about the investigation, which Trump provided back to Mueller in his written statement. Notice that Mueller didn't announce he was done with Manafort until after receiving Trump's written response to questions.
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Alternatively, Mueller went along so Manafort would feed Trump bad info about the investigation, which Trump provided back to Mueller in his written statement. Notice that Mueller didn't announce he was done with Manafort until after receiving Trump's written response to questions.
Yeah, I doubt these guys are outsmarting Mueller. There might be some clever ones in the background, but all the visible ones appear to be morons
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Alternatively, Mueller went along so Manafort would feed Trump bad info about the investigation, which Trump provided back to Mueller in his written statement. Notice that Mueller didn't announce he was done with Manafort until after receiving Trump's written response to questions.
I believe that's called the "long con". One side is smart enough to pull it off.
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It's been speculated that Manafort's flip might have been planned with Team Trump. Once he was convicted of 8 counts in a federal court in Virginia, he was going to need a pardon to stay out of jail. So why not plead to everything else and get an inside look at what Mueller has, report it back to Team Trump, and then get a pardon? Well the reporting back part was done and Trump, today, when asked about a pardon, said it hadn't been discussed but was on the table.
Did Mueller just get played?
https://www.rawstory.com/2018/11/fox-news-legal-analyst-stunned-at-how-mueller-made-it-impossible-for-trump-to-save-manafort/
Fox News legal analyst stunned at how Mueller made it impossible for Trump to save Manafort
On Tuesday, Fox News judicial analyst Andrew Napolitano revealed to host Shep Smith that Special Counsel Robert Mueller acted strategically to block President Donald Trump from pardoning Paul Manafort.
It is unclear exactly what he lied about, but Napolitano explained that Mueller designed the plea agreement in such a way that it is “pardon proof.”
“The guilty plea is 175 pages long. In my career, I have never seen one like this. It was so carefully crafted by Bob Mueller and signed by Paul Manafort, that at the time he pleaded guilty to the charges he was indicted for — which was basically bank fraud, money laundering, and some form of commercial bribery of foreign officials in federal court. He also pleaded guilty to uncharged state crimes in New Jersey, in Virginia and in California.”
He added, “Why did they do that? To make it pardon proof so if President Trump, which he can do, does pardon him for the federal crimes the state prosecutors in those states already have his guilty plea.”
Womp Womp
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https://www.rawstory.com/2018/11/fox-news-legal-analyst-stunned-at-how-mueller-made-it-impossible-for-trump-to-save-manafort/
Womp Womp
So Manafort et al are just as dumb as they appear. That makes me feel better this morning.
I think the big problem with the Special Counsel's investigation is that the targets continue to commit crimes even while under investigation, so every day they have to start a new file. I mean, dangling a pardon in return for intel about the investigation is obstruction of justice 101.
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Meanwhile, Cohen was back in court this morning, pleading guilty to a charge of lying to congress. It seems he lied when asked whether Trump was pursuing a Moscow development and Cohen said "no". It turns out Cohen was still working on it as late as June 2016 even though he (and Trump) had claimed it was dead in January 2016 - before the Iowa caucuses.
I'm not sure whether a campaign lie by Trump is a big deal (or a deal of any size at this point), but it does add weight to any demand for congress (and us) to see his tax returns. Not that congress needs such justification legally, as the "committee access" provision (https://taxprof.typepad.com/files/154tn1013-yin.pdf) authorizes congress to obtain the tax records of any taxpayer it sees fit without such taxpayer's consent. All it takes is for the chairman of the House Ways and Means committee to send the request to the Treasury Secretary, and that's it!
Of course, that wouldn't be it, because Trump would mobilize his zombie hoards to oppose the release. As far as I know, there is no legal way to block the release to congress because the 1924 law was specifically written that way. Still, with all the skeletons in those tax returns, along with the truth about his wealth and about his efforts to avoid - and maybe evade - taxes, Trump will expect his Trumpanzees to go to the mattresses for him on this.
However, the access provision was added specifically because prior to its enactment, the power to release tax returns to congress rested solely with the President. Because congress is a co-equal branch of government, the provision enabled it to get tax returns without anyone else's approval - especially not the president's. Would Trump be able to take this fight all the way to the Supreme Court? Would he get a favorable outcome? How much damage would a favorable ruling do to the process of government? Buckle up, kiddos!
ETA: Corrected the date of Cohen's Moscow Tower activity to June 2016. The August 2017 date was when he made the false statements to congress.
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As the dust settles on the new Cohen pleading, it seems that this is a big fucking deal. It confirms that Trump was pursuing Trump Tower Moscow deep into the campaign (and possibly into his term in office - there are conflicting timelines on this part), contemporaneously with Russia's election-interference campaign. But, it also connects TrumpWorld to the Kremlin because Cohen was in discussions with - and had a plane ticket to go and meet - high up officials in the Russian government.
It also brings back into play the sordid details about the Trump Tower Moscow, such that it was to be financed by a Russian government-controlled bank that has been sanctioned (so off-limits to US persons), as well as new reporting that Trump planned to give Putin the $50 million penthouse. So many crimes here that have nothing to do with collusion yet add weight to the accusations of collusion.
It also throws Don Jr. under the slow-moving Mueller freight train, because Uday testified to congress the same, now-debunked lie that there was no deal and what there was had died before the primaries began. Adam Schiff - to whom Jr told his lies - has already said that his committee will compare notes with Mueller to figure out who (how many) of TrumpWorld members similarly lied to congress. Cohen's conviction for this crime just adds to the peril faced by these folks because it shows his willingness to prosecute this crime.
It quite likely just pissed all over Trump's written response to Mueller's questions because, if Trump maintained the lie about the Moscow deal, he's just lied to Mueller. In writing. The timing of this coming immediately behind receipt of Trump's written answers could be a coincidence...
Meanwhile, the same day as Cohen's plea dropped, Deutsche Bank - the oft-busted laundromat for Russian money and coincidentally the only major bank who would keep lending to Trump despite him burning them (and everyone else) with multiple bankruptcies - was raided. As was the office of the Chicago official who handled the Trump Organisation's Illinois taxes.
This feels really big*. It feels like the beginning of the end*.
* TWSS
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It’s almost impossible to unpack everything that happened yesterday. And that’s if turns out the Deutsche Bank raid (who was lending trump money) and the late law firm who represented Trump for 15 years who was also raided by the feds, just happened to be wild coincidences and had nothing to do with Trump.
Now Trump is finally admitting (to what anyone with a lick of sense already knew aka non Trumpkins) that he did in fact have dealings with Russia during the campaign. He had the dealings, with a bank that is a
Sanctioned by the US government and illegal for US citizens to do business with AND while the Russian government was busy stealing data from US politicians and conducting a campaign to effect our election.
WITCH HUNT
Really, what level of stupid do you have to be to think this is a witch hunt, sadly about 40% of Americans fall into that category.
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Now Trump is finally admitting (to what anyone with a lick of sense already knew aka non Trumpkins) that he did in fact have dealings with Russia during the campaign.
Remember back - two years ago, I think - when there were no dealings with Russia and no one from TrumpWorld had ever spoken to a Russian? Those were the days. Now, everyone's had dealings with Russians - all lied about it, some under oath - and the biggest deal of Trump's life was with an adversarial government, ongoing during the campaign (at least) and it's ok because it never got consummated.
The pile of circumstantial evidence that is publicly available would reach the moon. What we're starting to get a glimpse of is the direct evidence that Mueller has compiled. The next big reveal is expected to be Manafort's sentencing, where Mueller has stated that he will reveal the full detail of all the crimes committed by Manafort. Expect "Individual 1' to have another bad day that day.
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This feels really big*. It feels like the beginning of the end*.
* TWSS
It likely is, but as NJ points out, it's stuff every thinking person already assumed was happening. To me, the legal stuff isn't nearly as important as the narrative. Trump is losing the narrative, and now it's up to the Democrats to make the story concise and understandable. Televised hearings will go a long way in this regard. Forget that he is a crook and a terrible human being, focus on national security. Once it sinks in that "Our president makes national security decisions solely based on his financial gain," he will be all but done. This rings like "treason" to most people, even without explicitly stating it.
I'm curious to the endgame though. The healthiest endgame is that Trump doesn't fire Mueller and doesn't go pardon happy. In this extremely unlikely scenario, the Democrats should focus on shining a light on Trump's national security corruption AND on the Republican collaboration. Just do it all the way to the election and let the country heal itself through the ballot box. This is the non-impeachment route.
However, the more likely scenario is that Trump will initiate a crisis by firing Mueller and issuing pardons, or the country will realize just how dangerous it is to have a President beholden to enemies. This becomes the impeachment route and it's harder for the Democrats to navigate. IMO, they must ensure that the burden is put squarely on the Republicans to clean up their mess and remove the danger they inserted in the White House. We can't have a scenario where the Republicans and Trump supporters are able to avoid responsibility for their deeds.
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Interestingly, re: Mueller, Whitaker wasn't involved in the decision-making process around the Cohen plea. He was informed of it, as a courtesy, before it happened.
I agree that Trump will try to burn the world - and will have to be forcibly removed form the White House - that's why the deliberate ring-fencing of Trump by Mueller has been so important. Once he starts crabbing towards the middle, it'll go really fast. There will be dead-enders, of course, who just won't believe it no matter what, but that's not the audience. Neither is Fox News. They just have to have the ducks lined up so that it's easy for the 60+% of non-die hards to follow along.
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It likely is, but as NJ points out, it's stuff every thinking person already assumed was happening. To me, the legal stuff isn't nearly as important as the narrative. Trump is losing the narrative, and now it's up to the Democrats to make the story concise and understandable. Televised hearings will go a long way in this regard. Forget that he is a crook and a terrible human being, focus on national security. Once it sinks in that "Our president makes national security decisions solely based on his financial gain," he will be all but done. This rings like "treason" to most people, even without explicitly stating it.
Just who do you think such hearings will move? Trump supports simply don't care what he did. Nothing...I mean NOTHING...from tax fraud, to obstruction, to sexual assault, to treason, to mass murder...he did or could ever do will affect Republicans and evangelicals. They have sold their souls for political power and will stop at absolutely nothing to hang on to it.
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Just who do you think such hearings will move? Trump supports simply don't care what he did. Nothing...I mean NOTHING...from tax fraud, to obstruction, to sexual assault, to treason, to mass murder...he did or could ever do will affect Republicans and evangelicals. They have sold their souls for political power and will stop at absolutely nothing to hang on to it.
+1
I think they could all declare bankruptcy and they'd still believe him.
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Just who do you think such hearings will move? Trump supports simply don't care what he did. Nothing...I mean NOTHING...from tax fraud, to obstruction, to sexual assault, to treason, to mass murder...he did or could ever do will affect Republicans and evangelicals. They have sold their souls for political power and will stop at absolutely nothing to hang on to it.
I agree with all that except treason. Treason over elections, I agree but treason in the sense that he can get away with selling American interests for his own coin, I don't agree. That is the story the Democrats must tell. It will change the required amount of minds.
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I agree with all that except treason. Treason over elections, I agree but treason in the sense that he can get away with selling American interests for his own coin, I don't agree. That is the story the Democrats must tell. It will change the required amount of minds.
I just don't agree. Trump could sell all US interests to Russia or North Korea, open the gates to their armies, and Republicans will still support him. They will convince themselves that their eyes are giving them fake news, or that they somehow deserve the oppression because Apostle Trump has spoken. They simply will not turn on him for any reason whatsoever.
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You might be right. I've had faith throughout this ordeal that we haven't devolved that much as a country, but I've been proven wrong at every turn. However, there are still more turns ahead.
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I just don't agree. Trump could sell all US interests to Russia or North Korea, open the gates to their armies, and Republicans will still support him. They will convince themselves that their eyes are giving them fake news, or that they somehow deserve the oppression because Apostle Trump has spoken. They simply will not turn on him for any reason whatsoever.
Do you think he would still get support from the Republicans if he hanged an opiate addicted black nun on the white house lawn while simultaneously raping a blind twelve year old gender dysphoric youth in the oval office during which he would be raising his right hand in a Nazi salute and flipping the bird with his left? Just trying to gauge how far is too far.
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Do you think he would still get support from the Republicans if he hanged an opiate addicted black nun on the white house lawn while simultaneously raping a blind twelve year old gender dysphoric youth in the oval office during which he would be raising his right hand in a Nazi salute and flipping the bird with his left? Just trying to gauge how far is too far.
"I don't agree with the President on everything, and I wish he'd tone down his rhetoric, but..."
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Do you think he would still get support from the Republicans if he hanged an opiate addicted black nun on the white house lawn while simultaneously raping a blind twelve year old gender dysphoric youth in the oval office during which he would be raising his right hand in a Nazi salute and flipping the bird with his left? Just trying to gauge how far is too far.
Does that fall into the category of "anything"? Then yes, he will still get support. Trump is a god to Republicans. I'm not sure why this is so hard for normal people to understand.
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On a side note...Trump has said he's cancelling his meeting with Putin at the G20 Summit. Putin has apparently rejected the cancellation and summoned Trump to meet with him anyway. We'll see.
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What if Trump decided he wanted Putin to bust a load of jizz upon his head as he played banjo with Johnny Cash's and Elvis's desiccated corpses on national TV, while wearing only a stylish sun dress made of human ears from everyone in states with populations less than the city of Portland Oregon--who had cut off their own damn ears and sent them by UPS to the White House where they were delicately hand stitched together by Paul Ryan into fashionably new presidential garments? Still not too far?
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What if Trump decided he wanted Putin to bust a load of jizz upon his head as he played banjo with Johnny Cash's and Elvis's desiccated corpses on national TV, while wearing only a stylish sun dress made of human ears from everyone in states with populations less than the city of Portland Oregon--who had cut off their own damn ears and sent them by UPS to the White House where they were delicately hand stitched together by Paul Ryan into fashionably new presidential garments? Still not too far?
Johnny Cash and Elvis were Antifa
Jizz is the antidote to soy, Putin's is especially high-T
lol hey lib does my ear hole trigger you
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Okay I know it's much more unlikely but what if Trump said that he finally realized that he was wrong about everything and that Obama was right about everything and from now on he would only do as Obama advised? You can't tell me that would go over well with the Republicans.
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On a side note...Trump has said he's cancelling his meeting with Putin at the G20 Summit. Putin has apparently rejected the cancellation and summoned Trump to meet with him anyway. We'll see.
The Russians said that Putin's itinerary still included an "impromptu" (their word) meeting with Trump. Doesn't the meeting being scheduled make it impossible to be impromptu? Regardless, the Russians seemed to be mocking Trump when they talked about the on again / off again meeting.
Was the provocation organized by Kiev in this region the real reason for cancellation? Publicly, we heard just such an explanation, we took note of it. Is this a reality?
Anyway, who in the world ever thought that, when Trump tweeted out that he was cancelling his meeting, that he was ever in a million years going to not have the meeting? Just add this one to the long list of meetings that TrumpWorld never had with Russians.
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Okay I know it's much more unlikely but what if Trump said that he finally realized that he was wrong about everything and that Obama was right about everything and from now on he would only do as Obama advised? You can't tell me that would go over well with the Republicans.
Obama was never a true Democrat, more of a Republican in black face disguise. He never tried to take our guns and healthcare away like Hillary did.
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Meanwhile, back in Washington, Wilbur Ross. Yeah, the Commerce Secretary...in Washington...during the G20 summit.
Acting AG Matt Whitaker may have lied to the FTC about what he did for WPM. This is on top of him potentially having Violated the Hatch Act by running a daycare while a US Attorney and, you know, being completely unqualified for the job.
Rep. Raul Grijalva, who will become the chairman of House Natural Resources Committee next year, called on Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke to resign over those horrible red Christmas trees. Ryan Zinke tweeted that Grijalva is a drunk and a fraud.
Speaking of awkward upcoming meetings, Devin Nunes is staying on as the ranking member on the House Intelligence Committee. I'm sure Adam Schiff is going to enjoy that.
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Speaking of awkward upcoming meetings, Devin Nunes is staying on as the ranking member on the House Intelligence Committee. I'm sure Adam Schiff is going to enjoy that.
"Devin, would you go get us some coffee?"
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Trump is a god to Republicans.
He is to the plutocrat wing of the party, and he is to the bigoted dickface wing of the party. But there is a huge group of religious lunatics who have somehow convinced themselves that their god is working through Trump. I am not making this up. An amoral abortion factory is by some mysterious means the chosen messenger of the the focus of their delusional fever dreams and is here to save babies unless of course they are Hispanic and already born in which case fuck them and where'd I put that tear gas?
There is surely significant overlap between the bigoted dickface group and the religious lunatic group in the Venn diagram of the purely contemptible, but I am generous enough to recognize that not every bigot is necessarily religious.
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Not that anyone who isn’t a complete dumbass needed it, but the evangelical support of DONALD TRUMP, is the last bit of evidence anyone should need to realize the evangelical crowd is a bunch of fucking shitass lying hypocrites.
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Not that anyone who isn’t a complete dumbass needed it, but the evangelical support of DONALD TRUMP, is the last bit of evidence anyone should need to realize the evangelical crowd is a bunch of fucking shitass lying hypocrites.
They’re done forever. Any time an evangelical starts waiving around their moral superiority underwear, they will be slapped into the quantum realm with their support for Trump.
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They’re done forever. Any time an evangelical starts waiving around their moral superiority underwear, they will be slapped into the quantum realm with their support for Trump.
I know what the dictionary says but that is your definition of evangelical? Does it include anyone of the Christian faith? Can you be a Jewish, Buddhist. Hindu, Muslim, agnostic, or atheist evangelical? Can you be a black evangelical or is it a white phenomena? I understand what chuck means when he refers to "religious lunatics" but are you and Navin saying that "evangelicals" equal "religious lunatics" also is there any overlap in the Venn with the Democratic Christians for Democracy, the evangelicals, and the bigoted dickface group?
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I know what the dictionary says but that is your definition of evangelical? Does it include anyone of the Christian faith? Can you be a Jewish, Buddhist. Hindu, Muslim, agnostic, or atheist evangelical? Can you be a black evangelical or is it a white phenomena? I understand what chuck means when he refers to "religious lunatics" but are you and Navin saying that "evangelicals" equal "religious lunatics" also is there any overlap in the Venn with the Democratic Christians for Democracy, the evangelicals, and the bigoted dickface group?
You’re right, the term “evangelical” is too broad. I’m referring to the Christians who vote Republican - even though Republicans oppose pretty much everything in the New Testament - because they think they have shared values. That group has, at best, sat on its hands about Trump yet would vote for him again.
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You’re right, the term “evangelical” is too broad. I’m referring to the Christians who vote Republican - even though Republicans oppose pretty much everything in the New Testament - because they think they have shared values. That group has, at best, sat on its hands about Trump yet would vote for him again.
Thanks.
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You’re right, the term “evangelical” is too broad. I’m referring to the Christians who vote Republican - even though Republicans oppose pretty much everything in the New Testament - because they think they have shared values. That group has, at best, sat on its hands about Trump yet would vote for him again.
They think Republicans are pro-life. And that pro-life only has to do with abortions.
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You’re right, the term “evangelical” is too broad. I’m referring to the Christians who vote Republican - even though Republicans oppose pretty much everything in the New Testament - because they think they have shared values. That group has, at best, sat on its hands about Trump yet would vote for him again.
The book What’s the Matter with Kansas is an interesting study and discussion of the origins of this political phenomenon and shift, although the Trump and his zealots are an extreme manifestation of what is covered in the book.
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The book What’s the Matter with Kansas is an interesting study and discussion of the origins of this political phenomenon and shift, although the Trump and his zealots are an extreme manifestation of what is covered in the book.
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The Trumpanzees are extreme everything, and “manifestation” is the best word for them.
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Over the weekend, the Kremlin confirmed Cohen’s statements about contact between Kremlin officials and the Trump organization during the campaign. Donnie is a blown asset now so they’re burning him in such a way to do maximum damage to the US. That was their goal all along but, like most of us, they never really thought he’d win so the last two years have been lagniappe.
Today, Mattis confirmed the Russians interfered with the mid-terms too. Fuck those guys.
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Well, here's some good news - turns out the Republicans were right all along, there IS serious voter fraud happening in the country! Of course, like literally every other example of organized voter fraud over the last who knows how many decades, it was perpetrated by and for the benefit of Republicans. This time they deployed to African American neighborhoods and set about stealing absentee ballots from elderly black voters.
What do them New York boys call that? Chutzpah?
At the same time, prominent Republicans are criss-crossing the republic expressing shock and outrage that certain states have the temerity to endeavor to count each and every vote correctly cast.
I doubt I have to spend too much time convincing anyone that I am not a huge admirer of the recently deceased President Bush, nor do I in any way celebrate his political legacy. But I don't have to squint too terribly hard to perceive stunning differences between the Republican party he led and the party of today.
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Meanwhile, flouting the apparently single use Garland Rule, electorally rebuked Republicans in the Michigan and Wisconsin state legislatures are busy in the lame duck session, rigging state laws to take power away from newly elected Democratic governors and AGs in both states and shifting it to themselves.
If you ain’t cheating you ain’t trying.
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Whatever happened to one party letting the other fuck-up and then getting their turn after that?
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A tale of two titties, both caught in a wringer. Manafort stonewalled, got convicted, tried to spin to save his skin, tampered with witnesses, continued to lie and so remains jail where he will likely end his days. Flynn cooperated hard, early and often, and is likely to walk.
This is a Shane Reynolds, squeeze bunt level of obvious signal.
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The Donald is promising a Rudy-led rebuttal to the Mueller Report (the "Witch Hunt Report" in his words). It's up to 87 pages already, I'm sure it will be fascinating reading.
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The Donald is promising a Rudy-led rebuttal to the Mueller Report (the "Witch Hunt Report" in his words). It's up to 87 pages already, I'm sure it will be fascinating reading.
87 pages of rebuttal to a report they haven’t seen yet. I’m sure it’s all well grounded in truth.
Meanwhile, Trump having a spat on Twitter, calling Tillerson “dumb as a rock” and that he “couldn’t wait to get rid of him,” seemingly missing the point that he promised to hire the best people, and hired Rex Tillerson.
Trump turns friends into enemies on a whim, and at his own very great peril.
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Interesting quotes from Tillerson in the Chron: https://www.chron.com/business/article/Rex-Tillerson-13448868.php
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Interesting quotes from Tillerson in the Chron: https://www.chron.com/business/article/Rex-Tillerson-13448868.php
Abiding by the law is hard.
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The Donald is promising a Rudy-led rebuttal to the Mueller Report (the "Witch Hunt Report" in his words). It's up to 87 pages already, I'm sure it will be fascinating reading.
This fucking cumstain can't fill out 280 characters coherently. The fuck is he writing that's 79 pages? This page intentionally left blank?
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87. Even better.
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By the way, my new favorite thing: perjury trap.
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At what point does Rudy start getting implicated in this shit show? I remember him suggesting implications of “the emails!!!!!omg!!!” Just two days before they were officially “leaked” by who we now know were Russian operatives. He knew what was coming.
Seriously wtf kind of swamp was drained?
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Lock him up! Lock him up!
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We are in the endgame now. (https://media1.tenor.com/images/805a738cad8c3a8da8234a2743f55c78/tenor.gif?itemid=12322919)
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Here’s a good digest (https://www.theatlantic.com/amp/article/577681/?__twitter_impression=true), by The Atlantic, on the three court filings that dropped yesterday.
Given the mounting pile of evidence in the public realm, let alone what Congress has seen in private, there is a growing swell among House Democrats that impeachment proceedings are inevitable. We’re certainly way past the point at which House Republicans have impeached previous presidents.
Impeachment, or the threat thereof, was one of the issues on which Republicans campaigned heavily. Voters considered that, and then voted for Democrats in record numbers - the level of total votes for House Democrats is a record in both pure numbers and margin. They have the mandate; will they now exercise it?
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The rats are jumping ship. Kelly is leaving and his touted replacement, Pence’s COS Nick Ayers, quit the administration instead. On Twitter, so it is official. Then a whole host of names was floated, all of whom responded with variations of “Fuck no!”
No one in their right mind will take this job knowing that subpoenas are coming.
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Here’s a good digest (https://www.theatlantic.com/amp/article/577681/?__twitter_impression=true), by The Atlantic, on the three court filings that dropped yesterday.
Given the mounting pile of evidence in the public realm, let alone what Congress has seen in private, there is a growing swell among House Democrats that impeachment proceedings are inevitable. We’re certainly way past the point at which House Republicans have impeached previous presidents.
Impeachment, or the threat thereof, was one of the issues on which Republicans campaigned heavily. Voters considered that, and then voted for Democrats in record numbers - the level of total votes for House Democrats is a record in both pure numbers and margin. They have the mandate; will they now exercise it?
I really don't see the point of impeachment at this moment for the Dems. Just let him rot in public view and become the shameful nominee of the Republican party. Impeaching him without the Republicans on board is bad politics: the crazies will be riled up and you'll likely just face a stronger candidate.
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I really don't see the point of impeachment at this moment for the Dems. Just let him rot in public view and become the shameful nominee of the Republican party. Impeaching him without the Republicans on board is bad politics: the crazies will be riled up and you'll likely just face a stronger candidate.
Not impeaching him, like not locking up bankers after 2008, makes it ok for someone to do it again. It’s one of the reasons we put people injail(or to death), to show to others thinking about it that it’s not worth it.
It doesn’t matter that Republicans won’t convict; they’ll end up wearing that. Impeachment in the House will lay bare all Trump’s crimes, which is a goal unto itself.
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Not impeaching him, like not locking up bankers after 2008, makes it ok for someone to do it again. It’s one of the reasons we put people injail(or to death), to show to others thinking about it that it’s not worth it.
It doesn’t matter that Republicans won’t convict; they’ll end up wearing that. Impeachment in the House will lay bare all Trump’s crimes, which is a goal unto itself.
This is just so, so wrong. Impeachment is political suicide for Democrats. I get that it's the right thing to do in the abstract, but it's also the biggest gift they could hand the GOP for 2020. Democratic candidates for House, Senate, and POTUS need to be able to make a positive case for their own policies. In particular, they need to keep the conversation on health care. Do you honestly think anyone will be able to break through with a positive message on health policy while everyone is screaming "IMPEACHMENT IMPEACHMENT IMPEACHMENT" on the airwaves 24/7? It's nonsense.
You have to offer an alternative to the circus. Offer a return to normalcy. Offer people a chance to go a day without being bombarded by the latest absurdity from Washington. Impeachment would do exactly the opposite.
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Not impeaching him, like not locking up bankers after 2008, makes it ok for someone to do it again. It’s one of the reasons we put people injail(or to death), to show to others thinking about it that it’s not worth it.
He'll be locked up, after he is voted out of office.
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Not impeaching him, like not locking up bankers after 2008, makes it ok for someone to do it again. It’s one of the reasons we put people injail(or to death), to show to others thinking about it that it’s not worth it.
It doesn’t matter that Republicans won’t convict; they’ll end up wearing that. Impeachment in the House will lay bare all Trump’s crimes, which is a goal unto itself.
What, exactly, do you think the Democrats should impeach on?
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This is just so, so wrong. Impeachment is political suicide for Democrats. I get that it's the right thing to do in the abstract, but it's also the biggest gift they could hand the GOP for 2020. Democratic candidates for House, Senate, and POTUS need to be able to make a positive case for their own policies. In particular, they need to keep the conversation on health care. Do you honestly think anyone will be able to break through with a positive message on health policy while everyone is screaming "IMPEACHMENT IMPEACHMENT IMPEACHMENT" on the airwaves 24/7? It's nonsense.
You have to offer an alternative to the circus. Offer a return to normalcy. Offer people a chance to go a day without being bombarded by the latest absurdity from Washington. Impeachment would do exactly the opposite.
Bingo. Impeachment is a no-go in the current political climate.
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Not impeaching him, like not locking up bankers after 2008, makes it ok for someone to do it again.
As others have indicated, impeachment is politically untenable and unwise. Indictment, on the other hand, is not a political act and should be free of political considerations. I'll leave it to the sagacious members of the nation's judiciary to decide whether a sitting president can be indicted (he can), but even in the unlikely event that Trump completes this term, he will surely be indicted immediately upon his departure from office. There are reportedly several RICO-type sealed indictments awaiting him already, and there is literally no end of criminal activity to which he will be made to answer.
Anyone who studies this sorry episode and determines that what Trump has done is safe to do again will discover himself a lamentably poor student of history.
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What, exactly, do you think the Democrats should impeach on?
High crimes and misdemeanors.
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This is just so, so wrong. Impeachment is political suicide for Democrats. I get that it's the right thing to do in the abstract, but it's also the biggest gift they could hand the GOP for 2020. Democratic candidates for House, Senate, and POTUS need to be able to make a positive case for their own policies. In particular, they need to keep the conversation on health care. Do you honestly think anyone will be able to break through with a positive message on health policy while everyone is screaming "IMPEACHMENT IMPEACHMENT IMPEACHMENT" on the airwaves 24/7? It's nonsense.
You have to offer an alternative to the circus. Offer a return to normalcy. Offer people a chance to go a day without being bombarded by the latest absurdity from Washington. Impeachment would do exactly the opposite.
Maybe my worldview is too simplistic, but if there were impeachable crimes committed then impeachment should follow. Although, as an Independent I’m not looking at this from the standpoint of what’s best for a Democrat or Republican. IMO, if crimes were committed then what is best for the country should precede what is best for a political party that serves the country. I see too much harm coming from allowing a potentially criminally guilty President to continue to direct the affairs of the nation, no matter the optics that happen to any of the political party’s. I agree with Limey, following suit with impeachment hearings would allow truth to be aired and that is important.
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Maybe my worldview is too simplistic, but if there were impeachable crimes committed then impeachment should follow. Although, as an Independent I’m not looking at this from the standpoint of what’s best for a Democrat or Republican. IMO, if crimes were committed then what is best for the country should precede what is best for a political party that serves the country. I see too much harm coming from allowing a potentially criminally guilty President to continue to direct the affairs of the nation, no matter the optics that happen to any of the political party’s. I agree with Limey, following suit with impeachment hearings would allow truth to be aired and that is important.
I agree it's the obsession with the horse race and partisanship rather than actual values that got us here in the first place. The legislature (not just Democrats) has a constitutional obligation to pursue impeachment if the facts so indicate.
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Maybe my worldview is too simplistic, but if there were impeachable crimes committed then impeachment should follow. Although, as an Independent I’m not looking at this from the standpoint of what’s best for a Democrat or Republican. IMO, if crimes were committed then what is best for the country should precede what is best for a political party that serves the country. I see too much harm coming from allowing a potentially criminally guilty President to continue to direct the affairs of the nation, no matter the optics that happen to any of the political party’s. I agree with Limey, following suit with impeachment hearings would allow truth to be aired and that is important.
I hear you. To me, the political concern and the concern for the greater good of the country are aligned. The only realistic way Trump gets ejected from office is if the voters oust him themselves, and I think impeachment significantly reduces the chances that happens. I also think impeaching him lessens the chance he resigns, knowing how he hates to "lose."
Believe me, I'd be all for impeachment if there were a chance he'd end up being removed.
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I know y'all all know this, but you seem to be ignoring it. Impeachment is political, so there is no defined threshold for the facts to support. The threshold is whatever the house decides.
For Republicans looking at Clinton, it was the absolute sacredness of grand jury testimony, about things unrelated to national affairs. Saw clips just the other day: Lindsay Graham and Bob Barr telling me how sacred testimony and the rule of law is. Given their threshold, I assume campaign finance felonies would have been more than enough for them. However, I hope Democrats raise the bar higher than that.
Bottom line, you only have to advance an argument and have a willing house majority to impeach, but it won't do the country any good if the Republicans don't step up.
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Maybe my worldview is too simplistic, but if there were impeachable crimes committed then impeachment should follow. Although, as an Independent I’m not looking at this from the standpoint of what’s best for a Democrat or Republican. IMO, if crimes were committed then what is best for the country should precede what is best for a political party that serves the country.
In a normal political climate you would be correct. But right now, down is up. Short of some seriously fucked up repugnant shit coming out of this investigation (I'm talking 100,000x worse than anything we've heard so far), there is zero chance of the Senate voting to convict. Knowing that, why even go through the circus of impeachment in the House? You could say that it would be symbolic, but the only thing it will do is further galvanize Republican voters and put a really bad taste in the mouth of independents. The wedge currently driven between everyone gets larger. That may be bad for the Democrats, but it's also bad for the country.
As backwards as it may seem, the Democrats need to play the next two years very carefully. They already lost on Kavanaugh, and impeachment is another guaranteed loss waiting to happen as soon as someone starts drawing up the articles.
If you believe Trump is bad for the country, you need to look for the best way to remove him from office. Impeachment is not that. If Trump is guilty of crimes, let the criminal proceedings determine his fate, even if that means he survives until the 2020 election at which point he can get voted out. If he's not guilty of crimes, the Dems can still hammer the shit out of Trump based on what we already know and he can still be voted out in 2020.
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What, exactly, do you think the Democrats should impeach on?
Any and all crimes of which he is accused following the completion of the Mueller investigation, including the two felonies in which he has already been implicated.
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Just for the record, the following are all currently under criminal investigation:
The Trump Campaign
The Trump Transition
The Trump Inauguration
The Trump Administration
The Trump Organisation
The Trump Foundation
Basically, the Trumps are a crime family and they have law enforcement all up in all of their business.
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The Trump family is every bit as 10 times as crooked as the Clinton's. And clearly much much dumber.
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The Trump family is every bit as 10 times as crooked as the Clinton's. And clearly much much dumber.
The documentary about this saga - which will be a saga, i.e. multiple movies - would be called "Icarus" if that hadn't already been used. However, in this case, I'm sure that the decision for him to run was being made somewhere far to the east of Trump Tower. He's dumb, but he's not so dumb as not to know that poking your head this far above the trench is going to get it blown off*.
* And in the next thought, I think he is this dumb...and arrogant. Then I switch back. Hurry up and make the fucking movie already!
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Just for the record, the following are all currently under criminal investigation:
The Trump Campaign
The Trump Transition
The Trump Inauguration
The Trump Administration
The Trump Organisation
The Trump Foundation
Basically, the Trumps are a crime family and they have law enforcement all up in all of their business.
What chapter of bankruptcy can he declare to weasel his way out of *this*?
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I certainly hope that at some point down the line judges take into consideration that if the Trumps all get put in the same correctional facility, that would make it a whole lot easier on Tiffany around those important and sentimental days that the entire family celebrates, like Vito Genovese’s birthday.
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What chapter of bankruptcy can he declare to weasel his way out of *this*?
Sixty-nine, dude!
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Just for the record, the following are all currently under criminal investigation:
The Trump Campaign
The Trump Transition
The Trump Inauguration
The Trump Administration
The Trump Organisation
The Trump Foundation
Basically, the Trumps are a crime family and they have law enforcement all up in all of their business.
Here's the thing with the inauguration, the committee raised an unbelievable amount - over $100 million - which is more than double Obama's committee's previous record-breaking haul of $43 million in 2008. Obama's committee spent the money lavishly on a star-studded inauguration celebration, and gave the excess to charity. Trump's inauguration was headlined by 3 Doors Down and some baton twirlers, the accounts have never been audited by anyone outside the committee, and where all that money went - assuming they didn't pay a 90's never-really-was band $50 million for an hour's work - has never been disclosed.
Now it seems, in addition to being awash with illegal foreign contributions from Qatar, Saudi Arabia and Russia (du'uh), some of the money at least was channeled into the Trump coffers in what has become SOP for the transfer of "Other People's Money" into Trump's skyrocket. The inauguration committee booked rooms, facilities and services at the Trump Hotel at what a committee staffer feared was at significantly inflated prices that would not survive an audit. Ivanka was in charge of this element of the scheme; lucky for her that there hasn't been a proper audit...until now. Oops.
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I certainly hope that at some point down the line judges take into consideration that if the Trumps all get put in the same correctional facility, that would make it a whole lot easier on Tiffany around those important and sentimental days that the entire family celebrates, like Vito Genovese’s birthday.
Tiffany and Melania are going to go on a tour of every Trump property, and piss on the beds.
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17 separate investigations into TrumpWorld. Seventeen! And this is before the Democratically-controlled House sits in January and starts firing subpoenas at the White House like confetti out of a canon.
On Sunday, Giuliani did his now customary shit-flinging act designed to cover up a nugget of information they want to seed before it comes out from another source. This week's nugget was that the Trump Tower Moscow project - that Trump swore was never a thing, and if it was (it was) it ended before the campaign started and then again before his nomination - was active up to November 2016. This means that they are now admitting that Trump was trying to get a real estate deal done with the Russians during the time that his campaign changed the party platform to be more pro-Russia (re Ukraine), while his campaign / family took multiple meetings with multiple Russians (https://youtu.be/5h56N_uwS7c), and all while he and his campaign were being warned by the FBI, the press and even Hillary fucking Clinton (https://youtu.be/-qIN1-z_JqQ) ("you're the puppet") that the Russians were interfering in the election on his behalf.
New polls show that 62% of the public think Trump is lying about his Russian ties (https://youtu.be/EYgi5MyMqCs). That's a strong platform for the Democrats to pursue investigations into Trump.
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The stock market is rallying a little today, but has still sloughed off about 6% just this month. It's one of the worse sell-offs in history, behind only the Great Depression, the '08 crash, the '87 crash and Pearl Harbor. Prior to today's rally, the S&P 500 was lower than it had been immediately before to the passage of Trump's big tax giveaway. Think about that.
Think about this too: reports say that investor confidence is at the lowest it's been in 10 years. That means it's lower today than at any time during the Obama presidency. They must be tired of winning.
Now, I don't believe that the blame for what happens on Wall Street sits at the feet of the president; there's little a president can do to influence directly a stock market one way or the other. However, as this president has taken victory lap after victory lap about the market's performance - mostly while lying about such performance - means that he has to wear this at least a little bit. Of course he won't, but he should be made to.
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Today, the NY AG dissolved the Trump Foundation (https://ag.ny.gov/press-release/ag-underwood-announces-stipulation-dissolving-trump-foundation-under-judicial), and will control the distribution of it's remaining assets.
Our petition detailed a shocking pattern of illegality involving the Trump Foundation – including unlawful coordination with the Trump presidential campaign, repeated and willful self-dealing, and much more. This amounted to the Trump Foundation functioning as little more than a checkbook to serve Mr. Trump’s business and political interests.
The investigation into the foundation - whose board members are Don Sr., Don Jr., Eric and Ivanka Trump - is ongoing. NY is seeking millions in restitution and penalties.
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Wait, what happens to all the money the foundation gives to those in need?
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Wait, what happens to all the money the foundation gives to those in need?
Converted to bail bonds.
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Wait, what happens to all the money the foundation gives to those in need?
Donald (https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trump-boasts-of-his-philanthropy-but-his-giving-falls-short-of-his-words/2016/10/29/b3c03106-9ac7-11e6-a0ed-ab0774c1eaa5_story.html?utm_term=.8a4d94d8e19d) will have to pay his bills with his own money.
The largest donation in the foundation’s history — a $264,231 gift to the Central Park Conservancy in 1989 — appeared to benefit Trump’s business: it paid to restore a fountain outside Trump’s Plaza Hotel. The smallest, a $7 foundation gift to the Boy Scouts that same year, appeared to benefit Trump’s family. It matched the amount required to enroll a boy in the Scouts the year that his son Donald Trump Jr. was 11.
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Holy shit moments at the Flynn sentencing. Despite the fact that Flynn has been charged with some very serious and egregious crimes, the FBI is recommending a very lenient sentence - including zero jail time. The judge wasn't impressed and, basically, grabbed the biggest book he could find, hoisted it ready to throw, and asked Flynn if he really wanted to be sentenced today, or if he wanted to go back and do some more good deeds with the FBI before judgement is passed.
Judge Emmet Sullivan, in charge of sentencing Flynn, spent around 15 minutes lambasting Trump’s former national security adviser, telling Flynn that “arguably, you sold your country out” and expressing “disgust” and “disdain”, at his offences.
“You were an unregistered agent of a foreign country while serving as the National Security Adviser to the president of the United States. Arguably this undermines everything this flag over here stands for.”
Flynn's lawyers have now asked for a delay in the sentencing of their client. Seems like a smart move.
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Lock him up! Lock him up!
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Lock him up! Lock him up!
That's actually one of the most amazing aspects of this thing. At the very moment that he was performing actual traitorous acts, he was up there spouting "lock her up".
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That's actually one of the most amazing aspects of this thing. At the very moment that he was performing actual traitorous acts, he was up there spouting "lock her up".
"If I'd done one tenth of the things Hillary Clinton has done, I'd be in jail right now!"
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Credit where credit's due, incompetence or just political kabuki?
The Trump administration is advancing regulations that will ban bump stocks, including making possession of one illegal, as of March 2019. This is an approach -using executive branch regulations - that was dismissed by White House lawyers under both the Obama and Trump administrations as one that will not survive a court challenge. Such a regulation will need Congressional legislative action, they believe.
Trump is doing it anyway, which means either: (a) he's committed to this cause, (2) he doesn't understand how government works so is doing it anyway; or (iii) he's posturing knowing that this won't happen.
It will be interesting to see if the NRA will go to bat for bump stocks, so this might turn out to be a genius move if they shy away from that fight. They're quite busy right now shredding any records of the money that Maria Butina funneled their way from Russia.
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Judge Emmet Sullivan, in charge of sentencing Flynn, spent around 15 minutes lambasting Trump’s former national security adviser, telling Flynn that “arguably, you sold your country out” and expressing “disgust” and “disdain”, at his offences.
“You were an unregistered agent of a foreign country while serving as the National Security Adviser to the president of the United States. Arguably this undermines everything this flag over here stands for.”
Apparently, he also asked if they could try him for treason. Seriously, kudos to this judge. Getting paid by a foreign government, and acting as mole within that government to change policy sounds awfully treasonous to me. Nice to know that there are still people in authority that see things clearly.
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Apparently, he also asked if they could try him for treason. Seriously, kudos to this judge. Getting paid by a foreign government, and acting as mole within that government to change policy sounds awfully treasonous to me. Nice to know that there are still people in authority that see things clearly.
Flynn is suspected of counselling Trump to lay off Syria at the behest of Erdogan. By "behest", I mean, "here's money, now go tell them what I want". There's no telling how many Syrians died during the months of inaction by Trump's administration at Flynn's recommendation.
Flynn may have served his country faithfully as a military man, but his post-military career is a horror show of crime, corruption, treason and death.
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Flynn may have served his country faithfully as a military man, but his post-military career is a horror show of crime, corruption, treason and death.
May have. His decision-making abilities are so obviously flawed that one wonders how many service people he unnecessarily endangered during his military stint.
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May have. His decision-making abilities are so obviously flawed that one wonders how many service people he unnecessarily endangered during his military stint.
I tend to agree but I did see a colleague of his recently interviewed. He wondered what the fuck happened to Flynn. Said years ago, he was a principled and disciplined military man.
I had read that a demotion by Obama may have started his downward slide (pride thing), but he sure acts like a man with serious financial troubles.
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I had read that a demotion by Obama may have started his downward slide (pride thing), but he sure acts like a man with serious financial troubles.
The still unanswered question (at least, publicly), is why did Flynn lie? He lied even when he knew they knew he was lying. It's just baffling. The Turks weren't paying him enough to throw his whole world into a burning dumpster.
Also still unanswered: why did Pence, Priebus and McGahn - all of whom were told that Flynn was double-dealing for the Turks while serving as NSA - do fuck-all about it? They coasted with Flynn in the inner circle for a month. A month!
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I tend to agree but I did see a colleague of his recently interviewed. He wondered what the fuck happened to Flynn. Said years ago, he was a principled and disciplined military man.
I had read that a demotion by Obama may have started his downward slide (pride thing), but he sure acts like a man with serious financial troubles.
After posting this, I see this article in Wapo
https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/2018/politics/michael-flynn-partisan-warrior/?utm_term=.1d3814df0435 (https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/2018/politics/michael-flynn-partisan-warrior/?utm_term=.1d3814df0435)
Basically, it sounds like my money angle is off base. There is no real conclusion in the article, just that he either tuned into a whackjob, or started to reveal himself as who he always was: a whackjob. Kind of like that character in Dr. Strangelove. Interestingly, his military superiors realized he was a fucking lunatic and presumably limited his access and responsibilities, but you know who elevated him into a position where he had access to the most closely held secrets.
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The still unanswered question (at least, publicly), is why did Flynn lie? He lied even when he knew they knew he was lying. It's just baffling. The Turks weren't paying him enough to throw his whole world into a burning dumpster.
Also still unanswered: why did Pence, Priebus and McGahn - all of whom were told that Flynn was double-dealing for the Turks while serving as NSA - do fuck-all about it? They coasted with Flynn in the inner circle for a month. A month!
First question:
I suspect he lied because he is an idiot who thought that the intelligence officers didn't have the hard evidence against him and that they were just bluffing. In other words, he really didn't think they could prove he was lying. Basically, he gambled and lost.
Second question:
This is harder to explain. Might be that they were inclined to do something, but the boss said no.
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but you know who elevated him into a position where he had access to the most closely held secrets.
And this after the outgoing president explicitly warned him off employing Flynn.
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And this after the outgoing president explicitly warned him off employing Flynn.
That's just like waving a red flag in front of a bull. Trump is far too shallow to think anything more nuanced than "Obama bad".
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That's just like waving a red flag in front of a bull. Trump is far too shallow to think anything more nuanced than "Obama bad".
In the words of Peter Quill: “b-b-b-bingo!”
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
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First question:
I suspect he lied because he is an idiot who thought that the intelligence officers didn't have the hard evidence against him and that they were just bluffing. In other words, he really didn't think they could prove he was lying. Basically, he gambled and lost.
I agree with the last part (gambled and lost). He tried that again in court yesterday, and lost. I don't think he's stupid though; maybe his judgment is clouded by indignation/rage/money.
Second question:
This is harder to explain. Might be that they were inclined to do something, but the boss said no.
I suspect it's more that they'd all, separately, made a Devil's bargain to ride the Trump train to pursue their own agendas. No one wanted to be the one to tell Trump about his man, so they all looked the other way waiting for someone else to say something. #TheBestPeople
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One amusing side note to the show yesterday was how so many of the great legal minds of the rwnj universe had talked themselves into believing that Flynn's judge was and is hostile to governmental overreach and thus was nearly certain to dismiss angrily these specious charges.
Welp.
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One amusing side note to the show yesterday was how so many of the great legal minds of the rwnj universe had talked themselves into believing that Flynn's judge was and is hostile to governmental overreach and thus was nearly certain to dismiss angrily these specious charges.
Welp.
The job done by the judge, intentionally or not, to pants the entire "Flynn was railroaded" theory was perfect. Of course, that didn't stop Sarah Sanders - three hours later - from clinging desperately to that same theory. I'm sure Hannity et al switched immediately to attack Judge Sullivan - appointed to different positions by Reagan, Bush Sr. and Clinton - as a librul activist judge who is in cahoots with Mueller and George Soros.
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The job done by the judge, intentionally or not, to pants the entire "Flynn was railroaded" theory was perfect. Of course, that didn't stop Sarah Sanders - three hours later - from clinging desperately to that same theory. I'm sure Hannity et al switched immediately to attack Judge Sullivan - appointed to different positions by Reagan, Bush Sr. and Clinton - as a librul activist judge who is in cahoots with Mueller and George Soros.
The judge's approach was outSTANding.
I can't wait to see what these people say when we inevitably hear the tape of Trump demanding his vig from Flynn's take for kidnapping that Gulen guy.
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The job done by the judge, intentionally or not, to pants the entire "Flynn was railroaded" theory was perfect. Of course, that didn't stop Sarah Sanders - three hours later - from clinging desperately to that same theory. I'm sure Hannity et al switched immediately to attack Judge Sullivan - appointed to different positions by Reagan, Bush Sr. and Clinton - as a librul activist judge who is in cahoots with Mueller and George Soros.
Can you imagine the incandescence at Fox News if this were Obama's NSA chief?
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Can you imagine the incandescence at Fox News if this were Obama's NSA chief?
They impeached Clinton for lying to the Feds about a blowjob while investigating his property deals (which were smelly but ultimately went without action). We are so past that point with Trump’s administration that it simply defies comparison.
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I can't wait to see what these people say when we inevitably hear the tape of Trump demanding his vig from Flynn's take for kidnapping that Gulen guy.
You can see from how Trump has blended his business, charity, campaign and inauguration committee into one giant pot of money for him to play with, and that he deems other people's money his birthright to take. I have no doubt that anyone as close to him as Flynn who was getting paid had to kick up to the boss.
He models himself on gangsters - creating a strange, crying, entitled, idiot, trust fund baby, wanna be gangster hybrid - so it stands to reason that he would adhere to the simplest of mob cash flow models. Of course, he's so dumb that he probably took the money by check (it's how he wanted to pay Stormy, after all, before a startled Cohen corrected him).
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One day after a judge tells Trump's former NSA to get the fuck outta his courtroom because his relationship with Turkey is potentially treasonous (FTR, prosecutors had to go check the statute to ensure that it doesn't rise to that level), Trump announces - in the face of things like facts, reality and his own administration's position - that ISIS is defeated in Syria and our troops will be withdrawn.
Seriously. How the fuck do Republicans still enable this traitor?
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The day after Trump said we could leave Syria because ISIS was defeated (past tense), he said that others can continue the fight against ISIS and we should not waste more American lives and money on this. Pretty weird considering that the fight would not continue if ISIS was already gone.
Trump also claimed that Russia and Turkey are not happy about this. Putin announced in a press conference that he was, in fact, happy about this while Turkey simply turned around and attacked the Kurds.
Trump is not playing for Team America.
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Meanwhile, principled conservative Paul Ryan is spending his principled swansong presiding over the world's dumbest government shutdown.
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Meanwhile, principled conservative Paul Ryan is spending his principled swansong presiding over the world's dumbest government shutdown.
Ryan has been proven to be the complete fraud he always was. The self-described Ayn Rand supporter and hater of debt and deficits has seen the debt and deficit balloon during his tenure as Speaker. A coward who quit rather than say "boo" to Trump, watch him get picked to be Pence's VP when Trump is ousted.
Meanwhile, with the Dow dropping like a stone (down about 10% for 2018), is Trump really going to spit on the CR and waddle off to Mar-a-Lago with the government shutting down?
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Meanwhile, principled conservative Paul Ryan is spending his principled swansong presiding over the world's dumbest government shutdown.
Trump had an offer of $20bn for his wall in return for DACA, on which he passed. Now he is going to shut down the government because he can't get $5bn. He is threatening to veto Democratic spending bills, demonstrating (yet again) that he doesn't understand how government works.
#ArtOfTheDeal
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Trump had an offer of $20bn for his wall in return for DACA, on which he passed. Now he is going to shut down the government because he can't get $5bn. He is threatening to veto Democratic spending bills, demonstrating (yet again) that he doesn't understand how government works.
#ArtOfTheDeal
Trump is Trump, but if Ryan just put the CR on the floor it would be veto proof.
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Trump is Trump, but if Ryan just put the CR on the floor it would be veto proof.
Yep. Ryan a coward to the very end.
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Mattis quits over Syria, and leaves monster truck tire marks on Trump on his way out.
I think we are seeing the desperate flailings of a weak and stupid man trapped in a nightmare of his own making that he cannot stop. It’s not a coincidence, IMHO, that this is all happening at the same time that we find out that Trump’s DOJ mole - Whitaker - went opinion-shopping about recusing himself from the Mueller investigation until he found the answer he wanted. Trump now knows what Mueller has, and has gone off the deep end.
Oh, and did you know that he took his Russian handler Deripaska off the naughty list? He’s getting his to-do (for Putin) list checked off while he still can.
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Mattis probably resigned because he doesn't want to go to jail like everyone else connected with Trump.
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Oh, and did you know that he took his Russian handler Deripaska off the naughty list? He’s getting his to-do (for Putin) list checked off while he still can.
In the press conference where Putin praised Trump for announcing the withdrawal from Syria, he also trolled the US for promising to get out of Afghanistan but never actually doing it. Hours later, Trump ordered a substantial draw down of forces in Afghanistan. Like half.
No puppet.
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Many, many congressional Republicans are on record that they are comfortable because Mattis was at Defense. Now he is leaving, what will they do? Will they rubber stamp the next nominee? What if it’s another clear Whitakeresque stooge? What if it’s a family member?
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What if it’s a family member?
Eric? Is Barron too young?
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Many, many congressional Republicans are on record that they are comfortable because Mattis was at Defense. Now he is leaving, what will they do? Will they rubber stamp the next nominee? What if it’s another clear Whitakeresque stooge? What if it’s a family member?
Mattis was one of the few who could/would say no to Trump. This may trigger some interesting things.
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After claiming, at length and on camera, that he would "happily" shut down the government over the wall, that he would wear the "mantle" of it and he would not blame Democrats for it...Trump is poop-tweeting this morning that it will be a "Democrat Shutdown" if Senate Democrats don't vote for the House bill and that McConnell should nuke the filibuster for spending bills to get this passed by a simple majority.
Ignoring all the usual Trumpian themes of hypocrisy and stupidity, we have a solid body of evidence to prove that making the Senate a "simple majority" chamber is a very, very bad idea. Republicans flirted with the idea of it during the tenure of Bush Jr. because Democrats were blocking his judicial nominees, but they backed away from it. Then, under Obama when Republicans were doing the same, Democrats actually did it, with disastrous results.
In the less than two years of the Trump administration, Republicans have used their tiny majority to pack federal courts with young, right wing nominees - some of whom are dangerously unqualified - who will be adjudicating our laws for decades to come. We saw a few weeks ago the first judicial nominee confirmed by the VP breaking the tie. Republicans also completed the job by nuking the filibuster for Supreme Court justices, using it to confirm Gorsuch and Kavanaugh.
But if you want to see the kind of catastrophe that can be invited by making fundamental policy decisions based on a simple majority, we have to look across the pond at Brexit. It seems ever more likely that Britain has set a course towards a cliff, jammed a cement block on the gas pedal, tied off the steering wheel and then locked itself inside. It was an entirely political decision to hold the vote - PM Cameron using it to maintain support for him in the job - but then it was taken so casually that they didn't even bother to set the same threshold to get out as they had to get in (60% IIRC).
Majority rule in the Senate AND the House will mean that policy might reverse course every two years. That's insane. It will piss off one half of the country for two years and the other half for the next two years, rinse, repeat. The filibuster forces consideration and compromise, which pisses off both sides equally and keeps the wheels attached.
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Mattis was one of the few who could/would say no to Trump. This may trigger some interesting things.
He was a veneer of sanity on an insane president. People are already saying that we will never know how many fucked up things his presence prevented. We are going to see how bad Republicans will let things get before they decide to do their job.
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This is torches and pitchforks stuff (https://apnews.com/ec2ed217357048ff998225a31534df12). Our foreign policy is being outsourced to those who would benefit from it.
President Donald Trump’s decision to withdraw American troops from Syria was made hastily, without consulting his national security team or allies, and over strong objections from virtually everyone involved in the fight against the Islamic State group, according to U.S. and Turkish officials.
Trump stunned his Cabinet, lawmakers and much of the world with the move by rejecting the advice of his top aides and agreeing to a withdrawal in a phone call with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan last week, two officials briefed on the matter told The Associated Press.
Erdogan told Trump that he was going to go after the Kurds and that US troops better not get in the way.
Pompeo, Mattis and other members of the national security team prepared a list of talking points for Trump to tell Erdogan to back off, the officials said.
But the officials said Trump, who had previously accepted such advice and convinced the Turkish leader not to attack the Kurds and put U.S. troops at risk, ignored the script. Instead, the president sided with Erdogan.
The "these colors do not run" folks should be apoplectic about this. We are leaving the Kurdish fighters - and circa 50,000 civilian Kurds currently under US protection - to be slaughtered. Most likely in horrible ways.
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In the less than two years of the Trump administration, Republicans have used their tiny majority to pack federal courts with young, right wing nominees - some of whom are dangerously unqualified - who will be adjudicating our laws for decades to come. We saw a few weeks ago the first judicial nominee confirmed by the VP breaking the tie. Republicans also completed the job by nuking the filibuster for Supreme Court justices, using it to confirm Gorsuch and Kavanaugh.
FYI, we found out today that Ruth Bader Ginsburg had surgery to remove malignant growths from her lungs (https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/zL48ecvX2NkW1cU0FEfgrCc7Rgo=/0x0:900x500/920x613/filters:focal(378x178:522x322):format(webp)/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/49493993/this-is-fine.0.jpg).
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Imagine being so fucking stupid that you thought...
1. DONALD TRUMP was less corrupt than the Clintons
2. DONALD TRUMP was going to drain the swamp
3. Mexico was going to pay for the wall.
Idiots
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Imagine being so fucking stupid that you thought...
1. DONALD TRUMP was less corrupt than the Clintons
2. DONALD TRUMP was going to drain the swamp
3. Mexico was going to pay for the wall.
Idiots
For once, I agree with Ann Coulter about something.
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Welcome back from your holiday festivities: the government is still shut down, another refugee child died in US custody, Trump phoned a random 7-year old and told her that Santa's existence is "marginal" and the new acting Defense Secretary has no foreign policy...or military...experience.
#Winning
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Trump phoned a random 7-year old and told her that Santa's existence is "marginal"
The one time you actually want the guy to lie...
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There is some brouhaha over Trump's switch from a "big beautiful wall" to "steel slats", with Trump tweeting out this image (https://akm-img-a-in.tosshub.com/indiatoday/images/story/201812/Steel-Slats.jpeg?YEvw3uQYTH72Ca4t.shDHztTu2JtUWjY) of the new design. I am waiting for a lumberjack...any lumberjack (https://youtu.be/XWANXyqk7Zc)...to point out the flaw here.
Apparently, this (http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-PWLIaQhW6oI/TmdvbfZC-qI/AAAAAAAAAJo/s7Fw-ttqR50/s640/The_Black_Gate%25286%2529.jpg) was deemed too costly.
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Credit where credit's due: Trump and Melania visited the troops in Iraq on Christmas night. It was a glaring omission - that this Commander-in-Chief had failed to visit any active deployment overseas - that he has now corrected.
Regularly scheduled chaos-tweeting will resume shortly.
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Probe of Trump's charity could crash 'like a Mack Truck' into his real estate empire (https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/donald-trump/probe-trump-s-charity-could-crash-mack-truck-his-real-n950576)
There's so much overlap between the foundation, the Trump Organisation and the Trumps themselves, that the NY state investigators will be able to penetrate Trump's world much deeper than a small, mushroom-headed penis. And it being state investigators, there's no way that Trump can stop them*.
* Until the deal is done with federal and state prosecutors to let all the Trumps go in return for him leaving office quietly due to a flare up with his bone spurs.
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* Until the deal is done with federal and state prosecutors to let all the Trumps go in return for him leaving office quietly due to a flare up with his bone spurs.
I really hope this is not the case. It’s almost the worst case scenario.
I’ve lived through two years and can hopefully do two more, but having the nation rebuke Trump (either through the ballot or impeachment) and revitalizing the notion of justice (seeing powerful criminals treated like powerless criminals) are far more important than crafting a deal to get him out.
Side note: watching clips of him bragging about himself in front of the servicemen is pathetic. It’s about them, not you, you piece of shit.
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I really hope this is not the case. It’s almost the worst case scenario.
I’ve lived through two years and can hopefully do two more, but having the nation rebuke Trump (either through the ballot or impeachment) and revitalizing the notion of justice (seeing powerful criminals treated like powerless criminals) are far more important than crafting a deal to get him out.
I was with you 100%, and now I vacillate between the two. Letting them off not only, you know, lets them off, but it sets a horrible precedent - like letting Nixon's post-Saturday Night Massacre appointees to the DOJ set the policy that a sitting president cannot be indicted or letting all the bankers off after 2008. However, as his adult supervision grows ever thinner, I fear for what he may do and want him out regardless of the deal. I don't want any more kids to die just so that I can get a satisfying payoff to this horror flick.
I think a nice middle ground would be to let him get a Nixon handshake on the way out and then let NY have at him - but he's not that dumb as to walk out of the White House and onto Riker's Island.
Side note: watching clips of him bragging about himself in front of the servicemen is pathetic. It’s about them, not you, you piece of shit.
And lying to them! He told a barrage of lies, including one they all know not to be true - that they got the first pay raise in a decade and it is 10%. They have received a raise every year for the last couple of decades, save a single year under Clinton, and Trump's touted raise was not 10%. They will know this because they can read the numbers in their paychecks.
They were props for a campaign speech - they even handed out MAGA hats and did other campaign-related promotions in a blatant and disgusting violation of the Hatch Act.
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Turns out that despite vehement denials and convincing tweets of the cover of a US passport, Mikey was in fact in Prague when it was alleged he was there to arrange clandestine payments to Russian hackers. You know, I’m beginning to think that there might be something to this Steele dossier after all.
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Turns out that despite vehement denials and convincing tweets of the cover of a US passport, Mikey was in fact in Prague when it was alleged he was there to arrange clandestine payments to Russian hackers. You know, I’m beginning to think that there might be something to this Steele dossier after all.
To my knowledge, not a single thing in the Steele report has been debunked.
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To my knowledge, not a single thing in the Steele report has been debunked.
Correct. While elements of it continue to be proved accurate.
In addition to Cohen's cell phone pinging off towers in Prague, they also have intercepts of Russians talking about Cohen being in Prague. Here's the full story (https://www.mcclatchydc.com/news/investigations/article219016820.html).
Of course, we're only finding this out now. I presume that Cohen spilled these beans to Mueller ages ago.
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Pee tape real, yall.
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Pee tape real, yall.
Trump denied this on the basis that he's a germaphobe, seemingly not understanding that watching - from across the room - hookers pee on the bed once used by his arch nemesis is exactly what a germaphobe would do.
Regardless, the peeing isn't the issue; it's the "being in the room with hookers" part that's the issue. #Kompromat
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Pee tape real, yall.
Of course it is but what’s funny, and I was thinking about this the other day, I don’t know if funny is the right word, but this motherfucker has done and presumably will do such unimaginably horrible shit that a video of hookers pissing on a bed or even on him in the bed won’t even move the needle. I mean, at this point it’s almost just irrelevant.
Religious nutcases would of course immediately claim that Trump was receiving some sort of baptismal sacrament.
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Side note: watching clips of him bragging about himself in front of the servicemen is pathetic. It’s about them, not you, you piece of shit.
Also, in true Trumpian fashion, he outed a Navy SEAL team in the process (https://www.newsweek.com/donald-trump-navy-seal-iraq-video-1272102). Usually their presence is kept secret and/or their faces blurred (so that if they're ever captured there isn't evidence as to exactly what they are in the public domain); the White House did neither in their eagerness to satisfy their uniform fetish.
Speaking of which, Twitter is having a field day over Trump's oversized flight jacket (https://twitter.com/search?q=trump%20jacket&src=typd). I wonder if they let him pretend-drive a tank (https://goo.gl/images/G3GwNp).
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Trump denied this on the basis that he's a germaphobe, seemingly not understanding that watching - from across the room - hookers pee on the bed once used by his arch nemesis is exactly what a germaphobe would do.
Regardless, the peeing isn't the issue; it's the "being in the room with hookers" part that's the issue. #Kompromat
Having unprotected sex with porn stars is hardly the mark of a germaphobe. There's a pretty obvious sexual exception to his germaphobia.
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Here's a long read from the New Yorker (https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2019/01/07/how-mark-burnett-resurrected-donald-trump-as-an-icon-of-american-success) about the creator of a bunch of reality shows - all of which he appears to have ripped off from shows on foreign TV - Mark Burnett. He's a British commando turned LA douche and you may feel a little manky after reading it (I did). There are some insights into Trump here though, that ring so true it's like having your head inside Big Ben at midnight.
“The Apprentice” was built around a weekly series of business challenges. At the end of each episode, Trump determined which competitor should be “fired.” But, as Braun explained, Trump was frequently unprepared for these sessions, with little grasp of who had performed well. Sometimes a candidate distinguished herself during the contest only to get fired, on a whim, by Trump. When this happened, Braun said, the editors were often obliged to “reverse engineer” the episode, scouring hundreds of hours of footage to emphasize the few moments when the exemplary candidate might have slipped up, in an attempt to assemble an artificial version of history in which Trump’s shoot-from-the-hip decision made sense.
Another anecdote from the article, referring to the 2016 Emmy's, held just before the election and hosted by Jimmy Kimmel.
“Television brings people together, but television can also tear us apart,” Kimmel mused. “I mean, if it wasn’t for television, would Donald Trump be running for President?” In the crowd, there was laughter. “Many have asked, ‘Who is to blame for Donald Trump?’ ” Kimmel continued. “I’ll tell you who, because he’s sitting right there. That guy.” Kimmel pointed into the audience, and the live feed cut to a closeup of Burnett, whose expression resolved itself into a rigid grin. “Thanks to Mark Burnett, we don’t have to watch reality shows anymore, because we’re living in one,” Kimmel said. Burnett was still smiling, but Kimmel wasn’t. He went on, “I’m going on the record right now. He’s responsible. If Donald Trump gets elected and he builds that wall, the first person we’re throwing over it is Mark Burnett. The tribe has spoken.”
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Here's a long read from the New Yorker (https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2019/01/07/how-mark-burnett-resurrected-donald-trump-as-an-icon-of-american-success) about the creator of a bunch of reality shows - all of which he appears to have ripped off from shows on foreign TV - Mark Burnett. He's a British commando turned LA douche and you may feel a little manky after reading it (I did). There are some insights into Trump here though, that ring so true it's like having your head inside Big Ben at midnight.
I never watched the show, but just from a production standpoint for this very reason it seems odd that Trump would be the one to decide who got fired rather than the producer/showrunner/whoever is in charge.
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I never watched the show, but just from a production standpoint for this very reason it seems odd that Trump would be the one to decide who got fired rather than the producer/showrunner/whoever is in charge.
I think the point was that the professionals had it all sorted out, and then Trump would do something stupid and rash that would throw everyone into chaos. They would then have to go nuts to try and make it as if Trump's decision had been the considered choice all along. This is exactly how the country is being run currently.
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Speaking of which, Twitter is having a field day over Trump's oversized flight jacket (https://twitter.com/search?q=trump%20jacket&src=typd). I wonder if they let him pretend-drive a tank (https://goo.gl/images/G3GwNp).
Did he hang his Purple Heart from the jacket. You know, the one he got the easy way.
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Also, in true Trumpian fashion, he outed a Navy SEAL team in the process (https://www.newsweek.com/donald-trump-navy-seal-iraq-video-1272102). Usually their presence is kept secret and/or their faces blurred (so that if they're ever captured there isn't evidence as to exactly what they are in the public domain); the White House did neither in their eagerness to satisfy their uniform fetish.
Speaking of which, Twitter is having a field day over Trump's oversized flight jacket (https://twitter.com/search?q=trump%20jacket&src=typd). I wonder if they let him pretend-drive a tank (https://goo.gl/images/G3GwNp).
I abhor that Lee Greenwood song. Abhor it.
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Trump just barfed up a word salad which Fox carried live. It was incoherent enough that even (some) Fox viewers would be concerned by it. He said that Russia used to be the Soviet Union until it went into Afghanistan, that Russia was right to go in to Afghanistan and that it was that fight that bankrupted them and turned them into Russia (at which point Reagan's memory fell to dust like he'd been Thanosed).
He also said that Syria was "lost" a long time ago and that all it is is "sand and death". "Little wealth" he added, in case you thought he didn't mean to completely write off the Syrians because they are poor.
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Conservatives are circulating (and probably jerking off to) a video (https://twitter.com/AnonymousQ1776/status/1080594276831047680) of college student "Sandy" Ocasio-Cortez recreating the dance from the Breakfast Club, trying to paint her as frivolous.
Clearly, she scares the living shit out of them.
In related news, when Pelosi was asked if she thinks that Trump considers her an equal, she replied "the Constitution does." (http://culvercitycrossroads.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/12-nancy-pelosi-sunglasses.w536.h536-536x381.jpg)
2019 might just be entertaining.
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They are so out of touch and bizarrely uptight; the video will just make her more popular. It's like Beto skateboarding at Whataburger or playing in his band.
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They are so out of touch and bizarrely uptight; the video will just make her more popular. It's like Beto skateboarding at Whataburger or playing in his band.
Maybe she should have stuck to traditional Republican values...like sexual assault.
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Maybe she should have stuck to traditional Republican values...like sexual assault.
Stolen from Twitter:
Accused of sexual assault at high school...that was so long ago.
Filmed dancing at college...set her on fire.
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They are so out of touch and bizarrely uptight; the video will just make her more popular. It's like Beto skateboarding at Whataburger or playing in his band.
They are becoming such a caricature of themselves that they’re now the town council from Footloose.
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Please tell me which conservatives are upset about that video. Other than some random guy with a twitter handle named anonymousq.
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Please tell me which conservatives are upset about that video. Other than some random guy with a twitter handle named anonymousq.
To be fair, the tweet got over 5 million views but only 7,000 likes.
Also to be fair, dozens of freshman representatives were sworn in today in congress. They included Republicans, Democrats, men and women of varying races and religions. Only one person was booed. Only Republicans did the booing. Guess who it was that was booed.
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A quick google search told me that Justin Amash was also booed. This entire thread needs some serious fact-checking.
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A quick google search told me that Justin Amash was also booed. This entire thread needs some serious fact-checking.
He was booed by his own side...for expressing his own opinion.
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He was booed by his own side...for expressing his own opinion.
When was Ocasio-Cortez booed?
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A quick google search told me that Justin Amash was also booed. This entire thread needs some serious fact-checking.
I can't speak for all (or any of them), but in my experience, Limey's facts, though certainly slanted toward his view, are usually correct from his point of view. Bottom line: Limey researches his stuff, and I say that as a loyal opponent who disagrees with him and the rest of this intolerable bastion of liberal thought.
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When was Ocasio-Cortez booed?
When casting her vote for Pelosi as Speaker.
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When casting her vote for Pelosi as Speaker.
Why do you think she was booed?
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When was Ocasio-Cortez booed?
I did see her booed (not by everyone of course, but it was audible) when she cast her vote for Pelosi as speaker. It's not a big deal to me, but there is some segment of the right that strangely seems to pay her a lot of attention.
If the other guy (Republican) was booed (I didn't see that), it was presumably because he was one of three Republicans to vote on the Paygo rules. I didn't see the booing, but I did see an interview with him where he acknowledged some in his party were pretty unhappy with his vote.
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Ocasio-Cortez is a beautiful, vibrant, earnest, intelligent and charming woman. But she has no gravitas (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m0LCTl3o2kY).
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Why do you think she was booed?
Because some of the Republicans in the House are classless pricks.
Why do you think she was booed?
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I did see her booed (not by everyone of course, but it was audible) when she cast her vote for Pelosi as speaker. It's not a big deal to me, but there is some segment of the right that strangely seems to pay her a lot of attention.
If the other guy (Republican) was booed (I didn't see that), it was presumably because he was one of three Republicans to vote on the Paygo rules. I didn't see the booing, but I did see an interview with him where he acknowledged some in his party were pretty unhappy with his vote.
Amash was booed for voting not for Kevin McCarthy as minority leader.
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Because some of the Republicans in the House are classless pricks.
Why do you think she was booed?
Reading your first post, and even the subsequent, one might infer that she was booed during her swearing in. Her tweet might also lead one to think the same. All by design, of course.
You excused the behavior for Amash, at least in part, because it was based on his 'for expressing his own opinion'. There is no distinction for Ocasio-Cortez.
Additionally, Ocasio-Cortez has been very vocal in her skepticism about Pelosi's leadership including protesting in her office in November. Perhaps some folks are unhappy with her ultimate capitulation.
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Additionally, Ocasio-Cortez has been very vocal in her skepticism about Pelosi's leadership including protesting in her office in November. Perhaps some folks are unhappy with her ultimate capitulation.
The protest outside Pelosi's office was to push for a climate plan. That was on 11/13. On 11/21 she announced her support for Pelosi as speaker. "So long as Leader Pelosi remains the most progressive candidate for Speaker, she can count on my support." -- Ocasio-Cortez
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Reading your first post, and even the subsequent, one might infer that she was booed during her swearing in. Her tweet might also lead one to think the same. All by design, of course.
You excused the behavior for Amash, at least in part, because it was based on his 'for expressing his own opinion'. There is no distinction for Ocasio-Cortez.
Additionally, Ocasio-Cortez has been very vocal in her skepticism about Pelosi's leadership including protesting in her office in November. Perhaps some folks are unhappy with her ultimate capitulation.
I did not intend to suggest that the booing of AOC was during her swearing in. I read it back and see that I did. Apologies. It’s been corrected in posts since. Are you suggesting that it was OK to boo her at any point during yesterday’s proceedings?
I never excused the booing of Amash. In case you missed it, by comment on that was drowning in sarcasm.
So it was ok for Republicans to boo her? You seem to be defending that behavior. To suggest that Republicans were simply crestfallen at her lack of consistency is laughable.
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In making America great again news, we are no longer responding to the UN (https://www.theguardian.com/law/2019/jan/04/trump-administration-un-human-rights-violations) when they ask us questions about potential human rights violations.
Quietly and unnoticed, the state department has ceased to respond to official complaints from UN special rapporteurs, the network of independent experts who act as global watchdogs on fundamental issues such as poverty, migration, freedom of expression and justice. There has been no response to any such formal query since 7 May 2018, with at least 13 requests going unanswered.
...
The silent treatment being meted out to key players in the UN’s system for advancing human rights marks a stark break with US practice going back decades. Though some areas of American public life have consistently been ruled out of bounds to UN investigators – US prisons and the detention camp on Guantánamo Bay are deemed off-limits – Washington has in general welcomed monitors into the US as part of a wider commitment to upholding international norms.
#Leadership
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In making America great again news, we are no longer responding to the UN (https://www.theguardian.com/law/2019/jan/04/trump-administration-un-human-rights-violations) when they ask us questions about potential human rights violations.
#Leadership
Given the makeup of the UN Human Rights Committee, I agree with the move. Until the UN gets serious about real human rights and starts going after the very members of that committee, all-stars all of them in human rights violations, we should pay them no mind.
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Given the makeup of the UN Human Rights Committee, I agree with the move. Until the UN gets serious about real human rights and starts going after the very members of that committee, all-stars all of them in human rights violations, we should pay them no mind.
If you can't lead by example, you can't lead.
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I did not intend to suggest that the booing of AOC was during her swearing in. I read it back and see that I did. Apologies. It’s been corrected in posts since. Are you suggesting that it was OK to boo her at any point during yesterday’s proceedings?
I never excused the booing of Amash. In case you missed it, by comment on that was drowning in sarcasm.
So it was ok for Republicans to boo her? You seem to be defending that behavior. To suggest that Republicans were simply crestfallen at her lack of consistency is laughable.
We don't know who booed her or why they did it. While Ocasio-Cortez revels in making herself a victim of 'haters', there are alternative explanations for folks disagreeing with her. She may be crestfallen to learn she's not the first to be booed in that chamber.
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If you can't lead by example, you can't lead.
Wrong. A million times wrong. He's leading hopefully by protesting the all-star rogue nation makeup of the committee. Sometimes, a leader has to go it alone for a while.
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We don't know who booed her or why they did it. While Ocasio-Cortez revels in making herself a victim of 'haters', there are alternative explanations for folks disagreeing with her. She may be crestfallen to learn she's not the first to be booed in that chamber.
So you are excusing the booing of her, then.
Presumably, therefore, you're ok with Rashida Tlaib calling Trump a "motherfucker"*.
* I'm not. She needs to show a level of decorum appropriate for her position, and that's far higher than Twitter...or OWA.
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Wrong. A million times wrong. He's leading hopefully by protesting the all-star rogue nation makeup of the committee. Sometimes, a leader has to go it alone for a while.
Trump negotiates by taking hostages. That might work when you're trying to get money for putting your name on a hotel in Uzbecki-becki-stan-stan, but not when you're the supposed leader of the free world.
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So you are excusing the booing of her, then.
Presumably, therefore, you're ok with Rashida Tlaib calling Trump a "motherfucker"*.
* I'm not. She needs to show a level of decorum appropriate for her position, and that's far higher than Twitter...or OWA.
No, I am not especially worked up about it. I think that if I had more information about the who and why I might have cause to care more.
Why does it offend you?
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Wrong. A million times wrong. He's leading hopefully by protesting the all-star rogue nation makeup of the committee. Sometimes, a leader has to go it alone for a while.
Honest question - to which members are you referring? Because in looking at the list of countries represented on the committee (https://www.ohchr.org/EN/HRBodies/CCPR/Pages/Membership.aspx), there are only 2-3 that really jump off the page for me. One of them is Israel, a perennial darling of the Republican party. But maybe I'm not completely up on current events.
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Wrong. A million times wrong. He's leading hopefully by protesting the all-star rogue nation makeup of the committee. Sometimes, a leader has to go it alone for a while.
The whole point of human rights is that they transcend governments and borders. You can't shy away from accountability until every other government has cleaned up its act.
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No, I am not especially worked up about it. I think that if I had more information about the who and why I might have cause to care more.
So many posts about it for someone who doesn't care.
Why does it offend you?
The booing of someone for legitimately executing the duties to which they have been democratically elected - by other democratically elected representatives - is unprofessional and childish. We should all expect and demand better from our elected leaders.
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Honest question - to which members are you referring? Because in looking at the list of countries represented on the committee (https://www.ohchr.org/EN/HRBodies/CCPR/Pages/Membership.aspx), there are only 2-3 that really jump off the page for me. One of them is Israel, a perennial darling of the Republican party. But maybe I'm not completely up on current events.
Montenegro (https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/jul/19/very-aggressive-trump-suggests-montenegro-could-cause-world-war-three).
Also, there's one country on there that has repeatedly tear-gassed refugees legally seeking asylum, violating international borders while doing so, separated children from parents and put them in freezing lockups for days and tent cities for months, some of whom have died in their custody. Eh? Oh.
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Honest question - to which members are you referring? Because in looking at the list of countries represented on the committee (https://www.ohchr.org/EN/HRBodies/CCPR/Pages/Membership.aspx), there are only 2-3 that really jump off the page for me. One of them is Israel, a perennial darling of the Republican party. But maybe I'm not completely up on current events.
There's a difference between the committee, which is the 18 independent experts you linked to and the human rights council, which is comprised of 47 member states serving staggered three year terms. Currently the council includes stalwarts as Somalia, Venezuela, Kyrgyzstan, UAE, China, etc... The council has been criticized for condemning Israel more than the rest of the world combined. My guess is Happy is conflating the two.
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So many posts about it for someone who doesn't care.
I'll try to be more efficient in my lack of caring in the future.
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There's a difference between the committee, which is the 18 independent experts you linked to and the human rights council, which is comprised of 47 member states serving staggered three year terms. Currently the council includes stalwarts as Somalia, Venezuela, Kyrgyzstan, UAE, China, etc... The council has been criticized for condemning Israel more than the rest of the world combined. My guess is Happy is conflating the two.
I think Venezuela, Kyrgyzstan and UAE drop off for 2019. Somalia is a freshly-minted member, though.
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I'll try to be more efficient in my lack of caring in the future.
You doth protest too much, methinks.
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There's a difference between the committee, which is the 18 independent experts you linked to and the human rights council, which is comprised of 47 member states serving staggered three year terms. Currently the council includes stalwarts as Somalia, Venezuela, Kyrgyzstan, UAE, China, etc... The council has been criticized for condemning Israel more than the rest of the world combined. My guess is Happy is conflating the two.
Negative. It was the larger council to which I was referring.
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Honest question - to which members are you referring? Because in looking at the list of countries represented on the committee (https://www.ohchr.org/EN/HRBodies/CCPR/Pages/Membership.aspx), there are only 2-3 that really jump off the page for me. One of them is Israel, a perennial darling of the Republican party. But maybe I'm not completely up on current events.
I was referring to the Human Rights Council, which is comprised of a lot of bad actor, which besmerches service with those countries when all they are doing is battling one of their enemies, Israel.
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Negative. It was the larger council to which I was referring.
You used the word "committee" and the article describes requests from experts, such as those on the committee (and other UN experts) rather than from the council, hence Waldo's confusion. Some of the experts, of course, ultimately report to the council, which may be what you're referring to, but it's all understandably confusing.
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Thanks all for clearing that up.
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Because each hour brings a fresh outrage these days, reports are surfacing that hundreds of administration senior appointees - up to and including Mike Pence - are about to get a $10,000 pay bump. This during a Federal shutdown (these guys are still getting paid, though) and just after Trump announced a freeze on Federal salaries.
Trump also just sent a letter to Congress, justifying his wall in part because rich people have them around their houses.
I'm starting to soften on whether it's appropriate for elected officials to refer to him openly as "motherfucker".
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Thanks all for clearing that up.
Just FTR, the UN Special Rapporteurs are who has been middle-fingered by the administration, and they operate under special procedures rules of the HRC. So they report (rapport? rappore?) to the larger body including its unseemly members.
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Also, the shutdown has shut down E-Verify, which actually WORKS to fight illegal immigration.
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Also, the shutdown has shut down E-Verify, which actually WORKS to fight illegal immigration.
Also, newly-furloughed Federal workers are unable to apply for unemployment assistance because the people who process new claims are Federal workers who have been newly-furloughed. Did I just blow your mind?
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Also, the shutdown has shut down E-Verify, which actually WORKS to fight illegal immigration.
*repeatedly smashing a mallet into my own testicles* ARE YOU OWNED YET? ARE YOU OWNED YET, LIBS?
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AOC is floating the idea of a 70% top tax rate, to pay for progressive initiatives. Presumably this is in response to the passing of PAYGO*, to which she objected. Trump may have just pissed in the bed himself.
For what it's worth, in the 1950s - when the U.S. built a middle class that turned it into an economic powerhouse the likes of which the world has never seen - the top rate was 91% (https://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2015/nov/15/bernie-s/income-tax-rates-were-90-percent-under-eisenhower-/). According to the linked article, the 1950s top rate would kick in at the equivalent of $1.7mm individual / $3.4mm couple in 2015 dollars. Maybe that's $2mm / $4mm in now dollars.
* PAYGO would have spared us some of the more reckless legislation in recent years, like the last tax cut, the one before that, the one before that, the Iraq war and Medicare Part D (Obamacare omitted from this list because if was fucking paid for), but that doesn't make it good policy. Conservatives talk about running the country like a household which means we can't just keep borrowing money to pay for things. True. But a household, if it wanted things it can't afford now, has the option of getting another job, or a better job. Federal income can go up as well as down, which is one of the reasons why the conservative argument fails. Another is that households go into debt all the time - serious debt - for important things like houses, cars, education and cancer treatment.
PAYGO only makes sense if you have idiots in charge. Eh? Oh.
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Because each hour brings a fresh outrage these days...
In the Rose Garden, Trump is lying his considerable ass off about things as diverse as the whereabouts of Mitch McConnell - "he's running the Senate", says Trump, when the Senate had long adjourned for the weekend - to declaring a national emergency (https://abcnews.go.com/beta-story-container/Politics/trump-declaring-national-emergency-secure-wall-funding-sources/story?id=60164759) and using the "military version of eminent domain" to get the wall built.
Does he really think he can send the army down to the Texas border to seize private land and hold it while he builds the wall? Isn't this what militia folks think the 2nd Amendment is there to prevent? Are conservatives going to have to eat a Texas-sized shit sandwich about eminent domain? Seriously what the fucking fuck?
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In the Rose Garden, Trump is lying his considerable ass off about things as diverse as the whereabouts of Mitch McConnell - "he's running the Senate", says Trump, when the Senate had long adjourned for the weekend - to declaring a national emergency (https://abcnews.go.com/beta-story-container/Politics/trump-declaring-national-emergency-secure-wall-funding-sources/story?id=60164759) and using the "military version of eminent domain" to get the wall built.
Does he really think he can send the army down to the Texas border to seize private land and hold it while he builds the wall? Isn't this what militia folks think the 2nd Amendment is there to prevent? Are conservatives going to have to eat a Texas-sized shit sandwich about eminent domain? Seriously what the fucking fuck?
I don't think that's going to happen.
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I don't think that's going to happen.
0.0% chance. DJT is, as usual, talking straight out of his ass.
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In the Rose Garden, Trump is lying his considerable ass off about things as diverse as the whereabouts of Mitch McConnell - "he's running the Senate", says Trump, when the Senate had long adjourned for the weekend - to declaring a national emergency (https://abcnews.go.com/beta-story-container/Politics/trump-declaring-national-emergency-secure-wall-funding-sources/story?id=60164759) and using the "military version of eminent domain" to get the wall built.
Does he really think he can send the army down to the Texas border to seize private land and hold it while he builds the wall? Isn't this what militia folks think the 2nd Amendment is there to prevent? Are conservatives going to have to eat a Texas-sized shit sandwich about eminent domain? Seriously what the fucking fuck?
Jade Helm!
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I don't think that's going to happen.
0.0% chance. DJT is, as usual, talking straight out of his ass.
The wall is his sharpie-written signature issue - has been since 2015 - and he still doesn't know how it works in 2019. I don't understand why everyday outside the White House doesn't look like the last day outside Enron. At what point do you stop being a guardrail and start being an enabler?
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Mueller's DC grand jury was just re-upped for another 6 months.
In not completely unrelated news, Adam Schitt Schiff has said he will make available to Mueller all the official transcripts of testimony in front of the House Intelligence Committee, so that Mueller can look for any acts of perjury that may have been committed.
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Also, the shutdown has shut down E-Verify, which actually WORKS to fight illegal immigration.
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The National Transportation Safety Board would normally send a team to help with the investigation, but cannot because of the federal government shutdown. Riordan said Friday that will not impede the highway patrol's efforts, which could take months.
Fiery crash kills 7. (http://www.tampabay.com/news/florida/crash-on-i-75-in-alachua-county-creates-ball-of-flames-killing-seven-20190104/)
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For what it's worth, in the 1950s - when the U.S. built a middle class that turned it into an economic powerhouse the likes of which the world has never seen - the top rate was 91% (https://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2015/nov/15/bernie-s/income-tax-rates-were-90-percent-under-eisenhower-/). According to the linked article, the 1950s top rate would kick in at the equivalent of $1.7mm individual / $3.4mm couple in 2015 dollars. Maybe that's $2mm / $4mm in now dollars.
I would like to see someone with a strong view of US tax history discuss this with regard to the volume of deductions that no longer exist.
Alternatively i recall hearing an economic speech by JFK in 62 advocating for reducing the tax rate to improve economic health. At least that's how I remember it.
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I would like to see someone with a strong view of US tax history discuss this with regard to the volume of deductions that no longer exist.
Alternatively i recall hearing an economic speech by JFK in 62 advocating for reducing the tax rate to improve economic health. At least that's how I remember it.
There is plenty of economic theory and real world evidence that raising marginal tax rates gooses the economy; and zero evidence that cutting taxes on the wealthy does the same and decades of evidence to the opposite.
See also wage, minimum.
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There is plenty of economic theory and real world evidence that raising marginal tax rates gooses the economy; and zero evidence that cutting taxes on the wealthy does the same and decades of evidence to the opposite.
See also wage, minimum.
I suppose I could have looked it up and posted it: https://www.jfklibrary.org/asset-viewer/archives/JFKWHA/1962/JFKWHA-148/JFKWHA-148
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I’d love to hear from anyone who use to trumpet that Obama was the most divisive president ever, but that now supports the fucking moron in office.
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I’d love to hear from anyone who use to trumpet that Obama was the most divisive president ever, but that now supports the fucking moron in office.
There is substantial evidence that President Obama was in fact divisive. Was he the most divisive? I don't know and don't want to make such an argument. Do I support President Trump? Absolutely.
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There is substantial evidence that President Obama was in fact divisive. Was he the most divisive? I don't know and don't want to make such an argument. Do I support President Trump? Absolutely.
Why? This is the thing that confuses me. The guy is clearly out of his element, and completely lacking in any sort of ability to assess a situation. Is the desire to keep Republican control of power so extreme that you're willing to support an obvious moron?
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There is substantial evidence that President Obama was in fact divisive. Was he the most divisive? I don't know and don't want to make such an argument. Do I support President Trump? Absolutely.
If there is “substantial evidence” that President Obama was divisive then please provide it. It can’t be hard if it’s so “substantial”. I’d like to hear what you have to say.
I don’t have to lift a finger to provide evidence that President Trump is nothing but devisive.
I’ll start with “bad hombres” or how about “nasty women”?... maybe a little “look at her... I don’t think so”. Classic.
We can even go to “locker room talk” or even the classic “lock her up” which I can tell you, plays very well amongst women with careers and like... self respect.
How about “some vets can’t handle coming back from war”? I’m sure in /Chicken Hawk Land/ PTSD is a liberal construct. I’m sure Trumps feet were awefully sore. Poor guy.
Let’s return to politicians that he might disagree with... in addition to “lock her up” (not sexist at all for sure) we have “disarm Clinton’s bodyguards”. That was a dandy! Or... “Obama is the founder of ISIS”. Seriously, we as a species should be able to look back way beyond 4-8 fucking years and make coherent judgements of how our societies are unfolding. So many people to blame, including ourselves....
How about actual calls for “division”? “2nd Amendment people, maybe there is' something you can do”. WTF....!?!
Or... “I hope you're able to find the 30,000 emails that are missing," he said. "I think you will probably be rewarded mightily by our press." Referring to Russia... that’s not divisive at all, right?
Belittling a vet in Khizr Kahn... not divisive?
Muslim ban?
“Thousands of Muslims cheering on 9/11”? (!)
“Mexican immigrants are bringing crime. They’re rapists”
But yeah... you don’t know if Obama was divisive or not... sure.
I’ll leave you with this, about a well respected republican ffs:
"He is a war hero because he was captured“ “I like people who weren’t captured”
I can’t wait to hear all the things Obama said that are this shitty. Can’t wait!
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There is 0% chance that Happy can reply to WV in any sort of substance way. Period. Sad!
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Why? This is the thing that confuses me. The guy is clearly out of his element, and completely lacking in any sort of ability to assess a situation. Is the desire to keep Republican control of power so extreme that you're willing to support an obvious moron?
For me, it was anybody but Hillary Clinton, so I voted for President Trump and didn't know how he'd do, but I've been pleasantly surprised. I disagree with your conclusion that President Trump is out of his element. I think He's done some very good things. The press has been ruthless and unfair to him. I hate the main stream media because of their now obvious bias, so that simply pushs me more toward the President.
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For me, it was anybody but Hillary Clinton, so I voted for President Trump and didn't know how he'd do, but I've been pleasantly surprised. I disagree with your conclusion that President Trump is out of his element. I think He's done some very good things. The press has been ruthless and unfair to him. I hate the main stream media because of their now obvious bias, so that simply pushs me more toward the President.
What good things do you think he has done?
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What good things do you think he has done?
Appointed two conservative justices, tax cut, new trade agreements, hopefully reinvigorating the border security after eight years of nothing, reinvesting in the military, etc.
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You do understand that your “border security” issue is bogus, correct? People crossing the border illegally has been dropping for decades. The government is closed and the media can’t talk about anything else, but it’s a made up issue.
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Appointed two conservative justices, tax cut, new trade agreements, hopefully reinvigorating the border security after eight years of nothing, reinvesting in the military, etc.
The justices were fortuitous (as they are for all presidents).
The tax cut is not doing what it was sold as doing.
The new trade agreements? Plural? He rebranded NAFTA and withdrew from the TPP - handing China a big win. Jobs are still being moved to Mexico and elsewhere.
Hoping for better border security is not an achievement. Also, illegal entry has been at net zero or even net negative for years. Obama deported more illegals than any other president in history. Terrorists aren’t coming across the southern border - per DOJ - and drugs aren’t either - per DEA. They come in through regular ports of entry.
So you’re basically at “he lucked into two SCOTUS nominees and picked names off a list he was given.” Also, McConnell had to nuke the SCOTUS filibuster to get them through. Congrats on owning the libs, though.
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You do understand that your “border security” issue is bogus, correct? People crossing the border illegally has been dropping for decades. The government is closed and the media can’t talk about anything else, but it’s a made up issue.
Trump wants $5.6 billion for his wall because he wants it. He’s spent less than 10% of the funds appropriated for border security in 2017, so why give him any more now?
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You do understand that your “border security” issue is bogus, correct? People crossing the border illegally has been dropping for decades. The government is closed and the media can’t talk about anything else, but it’s a made up issue.
I couldn't disagree more with you here. When hordes organized by rabble rousers and infiltrated by gangs and other radical Muslim extremists are approaching our border, like is the case now (just heard another horde is organizing now), I'm damn glad that Donald Trump is president and no sniveling Democrats peddling free stuff for all has much to say about that.
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I couldn't disagree more with you here. When hordes organized by rabble rousers and infiltrated by gangs and other radical Muslim extremists are approaching our border, like is the case now (just heard another horde is organizing now), I'm damn glad that Donald Trump is president and no sniveling Democrats peddling free stuff for all has much to say about that.
All that stuff you said about hordes being infiltrated by gangs and Muslim extremists is completely false. Think about it: why would they? To think otherwise is to believe that someone from ISIS is going to go to Honduras - obviously after having learned Spanish with a pitch-perfect Honduran accent - to join a caravan, slowly to walk thousands of miles under the gaze of the world media apparatus, to get to the US. All of this instead of buying a plane ticket. The alternative to believing all of that inconceivable nonsense is to believe that brown people are universally interchangeable.
In the meantime, the people actually in the caravan are asylum-seekers risking life and limb to make a better life for themselves and their families. US law allows them to cross the border and - as long as they present themselves to US authorities at the earliest opportunity - their crossing of the border is entirely legal.
As for the free stuff comment, you should know better. Immigrants - like myself - drive the economy. We buy goods and services that drive demand. We supply labor. What we don’t get is free stuff. You are completely ignorant - willfully or otherwise - of what you speak. Maybe that’s why you love Trump so much.
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I laugh, but you are serious. Hordes, caravans, terrorists? Are they carrying long eradicated diseases too?
This is why compromise can’t happen. One side is basing everything off delusions. The press needs to ignore Trump and his fact-deprived base, put pressure on the Senate to pass it, and override the veto. It’s how the constitution is designed and the only rational path forward.
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I laugh, but you are serious. Hordes, caravans, terrorists? Are they carrying long eradicated diseases too?
This is why compromise can’t happen. One side is basing everything off delusions. The press needs to ignore Trump and his fact-deprived base, put pressure on the Senate to pass it, and override the veto. It’s how the constitution is designed and the only rational path forward.
The Senste passed a clean CR like two weeks ago 100-0. McConnell now refuses to allow that same CR to a vote because he says Trump won’t sign it. At that point, Trump is irrelevant because it’s veto-proof. I am fed up with that significant fact being ignored in discussions of this shutdown.
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The Senste passed a clean CR like two weeks ago 100-0. McConnell now refuses to allow that same CR to a vote because he says Trump won’t sign it. At that point, Trump is irrelevant because it’s veto-proof. I am fed up with that significant fact being ignored in discussions of this shutdown.
As much of a joke as Trump is, I'm becoming convinced that McConnell is the real problem here.
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As much of a joke as Trump is, I'm becoming convinced that McConnell is the real problem here.
McConnell is The Godfather of the partisan shitshow we’ve been living through. Ever since he called a meeting of Congressional Republicans - on the very night of Obama’s election - and vowed simply to obstruct everything and anything he did, be it good, bad or indifferent, he changed the game for the disastrous.
McConnell is far worse than Trump. McConnell begat Trump.
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McConnell is far worse than Trump.
Agree, but only because he is actually not stupid, he’s just weak and puts himself over the country. Trump probably actually believes the stuff Happy states, but McConnell doesn’t. He knows it’s complete bullshit, but he’s too cowardly to speak the truth.
He better grow a pair, cause he’s our only way out of this mess.
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He better grow a pair, cause he’s our only way out of this mess.
Yep. The only way this ends is when enough Republican Senators make him put the clean CR on the floor.
What Democrats in the House can do is keep passing bills to fund the government - breaking it out into multiple bills if necessary - and send them to the Senate and have them explain why they won’t pass them.
In reality, it’s only the DHS funding to which wall money is relevant. They can fund everything else independently of the wall so, if Senate Republicans balk, it’s clear that they’re holding 800,000 Americans hostage for the wall.
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All that stuff you said about hordes being infiltrated by gangs and Muslim extremists is completely false. Think about it: why would they? To think otherwise is to believe that someone from ISIS is going to go to Honduras - obviously after having learned Spanish with a pitch-perfect Honduran accent - to join a caravan, slowly to walk thousands of miles under the gaze of the world media apparatus, to get to the US. All of this instead of buying a plane ticket. The alternative to believing all of that inconceivable nonsense is to believe that brown people are universally interchangeable.
In the meantime, the people actually in the caravan are asylum-seekers risking life and limb to make a better life for themselves and their families. US law allows them to cross the border and - as long as they present themselves to US authorities at the earliest opportunity - their crossing of the border is entirely legal.
As for the free stuff comment, you should know better. Immigrants - like myself - drive the economy. We buy goods and services that drive demand. We supply labor. What we don’t get is free stuff. You are completely ignorant - willfully or otherwise - of what you speak. Maybe that’s why you love Trump so much.
You're telling me with a straight face that the Democrats don't promise things to the poor to get them to vote for them? Ha. We want immigrants like you because somehow you're a productive member of society because we gave you a hand up. What we don't need are more people who are poorly educated, who don't wish to assimilate like you have and who need hand outs because we can't afford it in my opinion.
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You're telling me with a straight face that the Democrats don't promise things to the poor to get them to vote for them? Ha. We want immigrants like you because somehow you're a productive member of society because we gave you a hand up. What we don't need are more people who are poorly educated, who don't wish to assimilate like you have and who need hand outs because we can't afford it in my opinion.
You completely ignored the destruction of your hordes argument but are sticking to the free shit argument, which is nonsense. Also, Republicans offer - and deliver - billions of free dollars in tax breaks to their corporate donors in return for PAC money, so don’t even fucking start on that.
The tax cut - that’s exploded the deficit and debt - was used by corporations to buy back about $1 trillion in stock. That makes rich people even richer and does absolutely fuck all good to the country. A Honduran asylum-seeker gets no hands outs, nothing, other than the opportunity to do a really shitty, really low-paid job. And pay taxes, he or she gets to pay taxes.
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AOC’s proposal of a 70% top marginal tax rate has had any number of conservatives - including Norquist and Scalise - self-owning by misrepresenting how marginal tax rates work and getting called on it. Meanwhile, the Overton window has been thrown wide open as the media has been explaining this issue to their consumers and pointing out the 90% rate under Eisenhower, the 70% rate under Nixon and the 50% rate under St. Reagan.
The conservative freak out to AOC is going to be their undoing.
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"Give me your strong, your rich, your Christian masses yearning to be white, the best your shithole country has to offer. Send these, the able-bodied earners tossed to me. I lift my lamp to light the border fence."
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You're telling me with a straight face that the Democrats don't promise things to the poor to get them to vote for them? Ha. We want immigrants like you because somehow you're a productive member of society because we gave you a hand up. What we don't need are more people who are poorly educated, who don't wish to assimilate like you have and who need hand outs because we can't afford it in my opinion.
Dude. You’re nuts.
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Dude. You’re nuts.
He's more standard typical older white Trump voter than nuts, but they're basically the same.
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He's more standard typical older white Trump voter than nuts, but they're basically the same.
I don't know...I'm pretty sure Limey is a member of a horde. A rabble rousing one at that.
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I don't know...I'm pretty sure Limey is a member of a horde. A rabble rousing one at that.
He does watch "football." Bunch of ruffians.
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If there is “substantial evidence” that President Obama was divisive then please provide it. It can’t be hard if it’s so “substantial”. I’d like to hear what you have to say.
It's kind of like conservatives blame Obama for "worsening race relations in the country." It's an assertion that not only has no basis in fact but is directly refuted by actual history, but it gets repeated enough they convince themselves it's true.
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What we don't need are more people who are poorly educated...
Well, you do have a point there. We do seem to be enjoying a surfeit of the uneducated.
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I'll have to raise my hand since I had to look up what surfeit meant...
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I don't know...I'm pretty sure Limey is a member of a horde. A rabble rousing one at that.
The barbarian horde! (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jU_85TQ1SDw)
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I’m curious how the decision by all broadcast networks plays into the “biased mainstream media” narrative? After all, they refused to air a similar address by President Obama in 2014.
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I'll have to raise my hand since I had to look up what surfeit meant...
That wave’s way too big, there’s no way you can surfeit.
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It's kind of like conservatives blame Obama for "worsening race relations in the country." It's an assertion that not only has no basis in fact but is directly refuted by actual history, but it gets repeated enough they convince themselves it's true.
I recall President saying some pretty irresponsible racial things about the police in the Trayvon Martin incident. It's perfectly okay for you libs to be silent after the NY socialist's followers threatened my friend, Steve Scalise, who **was** shot in a politically motivated act, with more violence. Did she try to walk that back? Nope. Did any of you express outrage about that? Again. Crickets...
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I recall President saying some pretty irresponsible racial things about the police in the Trayvon Martin incident...
What, exactly, did he say?
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What, exactly, did he say?
This article has the highlights. (https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/national/obama-legacy/racism-during-presidency.html?noredirect=on)
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This article has the highlights. (https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/national/obama-legacy/racism-during-presidency.html?noredirect=on)
All I get with that link are a bunch of popups. Care to elaborate?
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All I get with that link are a bunch of popups. Care to elaborate?
It was a link to a Washington Post article/editorial. It mentioned the "police acted stupidly" in the arrest of Henry Louis Gates comment. Some of his Trayvon Martin comments like if I had a son, he'd probably look like Trayvon. He had other disparaging comments about law enforcement. The few folks I know who are in the military now loathed President Obama for his lack of respect.
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It was a link to a Washington Post article/editorial. It mentioned the "police acted stupidly" in the arrest of Henry Louis Gates comment. Some of his Trayvon Martin comments like if I had a son, he'd probably look like Trayvon. He had other disparaging comments about law enforcement. The few folks I know who are in the military now loathed President Obama for his lack of respect.
Seriously? That’s what you got?
Just say it: I was gonna hate him, no matter what he said or did.
Who talked about hurting Scalise?
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Never mind. I checked with Fox News. AOC debated Scalise on Twitter. Other people said something. Scalise, being a snowflake, acts like those people are equivalent to AOC and demands an apology.
Absolutely pathetic. There was a time, a long long time ago when most Republicans had a spine.
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It was a link to a Washington Post article/editorial. It mentioned the "police acted stupidly" in the arrest of Henry Louis Gates comment
Which was absolutely spot on
. Some of his Trayvon Martin comments like if I had a son, he'd probably look like Trayvon.
Which was spot on.
He had other disparaging comments about law enforcement.
Which was?
I'm still waiting for the irresponsible things he said...
The few folks I know who are in the military now loathed President Obama for his lack of respect.
The military folks I know love him. We must know different people.
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There was a time, a long long time ago when most Republicans had a spine.
The Republican Party of Ronald Reagan is long, long gone. They'd run him out of the party now.
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Mr. Happy,
In regard to your stated support of the current President, I truly have lost respect for you. If you can support a President that holds a country hostage to get his way to build a wall, that only he and his followers want, then I'm done with you. In no way, should one individual or party hold the country hostage. He blatantly lies about the support for the wall by former Presidents - ALL of the living ones have come out against it - and yet you probably believe him still. No amount of facts will sway you. He does not negotiate (even though he says he's a great negotiator!) with anyone well. When he does the USA does not come out on top - regardless of what he says.
This shutdown of the government will effect you at some point. While I want to say I hope you experience pain for it, I just can't do that. But, you should be ready for a HUGE backlash when refund checks aren't processed. That's not the government's money. So, you may truly have a revolt on your hands then. And you won't want a wall to stop you from being able to run away.
At some point TSA workers are going to stop working if they don't get paid, then business will stop being done. How are big businesses going to like that? There goes his great economy.
I pray you stop watching Fox News and reading Breibart and look at the things that are really happening.
ETA: My bad, refunds apparently are going to be processed but this article shares many of the ways the shutdown is hurting people and the economy. https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/07/us/politics/govenment-shutdown-impact-effects.html
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It was a link to a Washington Post article/editorial. It mentioned the "police acted stupidly" in the arrest of Henry Louis Gates comment. Some of his Trayvon Martin comments like if I had a son, he'd probably look like Trayvon. He had other disparaging comments about law enforcement. The few folks I know who are in the military now loathed President Obama for his lack of respect.
Valid criticism of law enforcement and/or their actions does not equal a lack of respect.
This is probably the thing I hate most about modern political rhetoric: eschewing nuance and shades of gray for binary positions.
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I’m curious how the decision by all broadcast networks plays into the “biased mainstream media” narrative? After all, they refused to air a similar address by President Obama in 2014.
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This is bothering me more and more. Not the double standard regarding Obama, not the fact that the networks know that they are being used for his propaganda, but that they know this, and still don't have the courage to act responsibly, even in the most obvious of instances.
Since the 80s, Republicans have pulled a remarkable con job on the press and the public, convincing the average American that the press was slanted left. The press, lacking self confidence, didn't fight that shaky premise and have essentially been on the defensive for decades. To this day, most Americans can't distinguish between the idea that while many reporters may tilt left, the press as a whole tilts right. The most glaring example is what will occur tonight.
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TSA staged at “sickout” at LGA today. Expect this to continue and grow. It really shouldn’t be called a “sickout” as they’re not being paid, but they have to call in sick to avoid being fired. Land of the free etc. etc.
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TSA staged at “sickout” at LGA today. Expect this to continue and grow. It really shouldn’t be called a “sickout” as they’re not being paid, but they have to call in sick to avoid being fired. Land of the free etc. etc.
I hope so. Once people start getting effected by the shut out then our representatives will do their job.
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ETA: My bad, refunds apparently are going to be processed but this article shares many of the ways the shutdown is hurting people and the economy. https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/07/us/politics/govenment-shutdown-impact-effects.html
Which in itself is likely unconstitutional (https://twitter.com/tribelaw/status/1082384054895431681) (Lawrence Tribe is a Harvard Law Professor and one of the preeminent constitutional scholars in America).
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I hope so. Once people start getting effected by the shut out then our representatives will do their job.
I feel like this doesn't end until federal workers march on the white house and capitol.
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I feel like this doesn't end until federal workers march on the white house and capitol.
It's not the workers they care about. Be honest, they don't care if someone like me doesn't get paid by what they are doing. They've already shown they don't care. It's the businesses that are going to have to call their Congress.
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Which in itself is likely unconstitutional (https://twitter.com/tribelaw/status/1082384054895431681) (Lawrence Tribe is a Harvard Law Professor and one of the preeminent constitutional scholars in America).
I saw that too but felt there was only one ETAs I should include.
But I really don't understand how people can support this. I think people are going to say give him the money so he'll shut up. But in all honesty, when the kid in the checkout line is crying/screaming for the candy bar, don't most of us think they parent should not give in? That's what Trump's behavior is like to me.
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But I really don't understand how people can support this. I think people are going to say give him the money so he'll shut up. But in all honesty, when the kid in the checkout line is crying/screaming for the candy bar, don't most of us think they parent should not give in? That's what Trump's behavior is like to me.
There is of course an entire procedure in the government expressly designed for appropriating money and earmarking it for a particular purpose that could be followed.
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Which in itself is likely unconstitutional (https://twitter.com/tribelaw/status/1082384054895431681) (Lawrence Tribe is a Harvard Law Professor and one of the preeminent constitutional scholars in America).
I haven't looked at this in particular, but Tribe has gone off the deep end the past couple years. It's best to take him with a grain of salt these days.
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TSA staged at “sickout” at LGA today. Expect this to continue and grow. It really shouldn’t be called a “sickout” as they’re not being paid
So just like vendors that did business with Trump Inc.
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Here's a quote from a (former?) Trump supporter I saw on Twitter. As the guy who retweeted it said, "it's Trumpism in one tweet"
“I voted for him, and he’s the one who’s doing this,” she said of Mr. Trump. “I thought he was going to do good things. He’s not hurting the people he needs to be hurting.”
The quote comes from this NY Times article: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/07/us/florida-government-shutdown-marianna.html
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So just like vendors that did business with Trump Inc.
A long history of not paying the people who work for him and not giving a fuck about the consequences.
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This is bothering me more and more. Not the double standard regarding Obama, not the fact that the networks know that they are being used for his propaganda, but that they know this, and still don't have the courage to act responsibly, even in the most obvious of instances.
Since the 80s, Republicans have pulled a remarkable con job on the press and the public, convincing the average American that the press was slanted left. The press, lacking self confidence, didn't fight that shaky premise and have essentially been on the defensive for decades. To this day, most Americans can't distinguish between the idea that while many reporters may tilt left, the press as a whole tilts right. The most glaring example is what will occur tonight.
Yeah, this is the crowning achievement of right-wing talk radio demagogues. They constantly preach about bias in the media, which destroys the credibility of the mainstream press among their followers. What I really don't get is that the talk radio hosts, who are universally more biased and less educated on the facts than the mainstream media, never get scrutinized or called out for their own very apparent bias.
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So Manafort sent polling data to the Russians prior to the election. It'll be entertaining to watch the NO COLLUSION! crowd do a Sammy Davis Jr tap dance around this latest nugget.
We know this, by the way, because Manafort's crack attorneys don't know how to redact documents.
Only the best people.
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Yeah, this is the crowning achievement of right-wing talk radio demagogues. They constantly preach about bias in the media, which destroys the credibility of the mainstream press among their followers. What I really don't get is that the talk radio hosts, who are universally more biased and less educated on the facts than the mainstream media, never get scrutinized or called out for their own very apparent bias.
IMO radio doesn't get called out for it's bias (it is biased) because it's barely relevant in the greater conversation.
What I find interesting from this thread is that many of you don't see media as a whole more liberally biased. To me it's obvious. Equally obvious that Fox News is conservatively biased.
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IMO radio doesn't get called out for it's bias (it is biased) because it's barely relevant in the greater conversation.
What I find interesting from this thread is that many of you don't see media as a whole more liberally biased. To me it's obvious. Equally obvious that Fox News is conservatively biased.
I try to draw a distinction between reporting and commentary whenever possible. I think, on average, "the media" does a pretty fair job of reporting (some outlets are obviously better than others), while of course the average commentator will have a liberal bias.
I also don't watch cable news, where the two are too easily blended.
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IMO radio doesn't get called out for it's bias (it is biased) because it's barely relevant in the greater conversation.
What I find interesting from this thread is that many of you don't see media as a whole more liberally biased. To me it's obvious. Equally obvious that Fox News is conservatively biased.
As the great political philosopher, Stephen Colbert, once said, "Reality has a well-known liberal bias."
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IMO radio doesn't get called out for it's bias (it is biased) because it's barely relevant in the greater conversation.
What I find interesting from this thread is that many of you don't see media as a whole more liberally biased. To me it's obvious. Equally obvious that Fox News is conservatively biased.
Damn, I could go on forever on this, but some recent ones and some important ones:
1. The airing of his thing tonight. The only reason they are airing what they fully expect to be propaganda and lies is because they are afraid of the right characterizing them as left leaning or unfair to Trump. They didn't air Obama's, probably since they didn't view it as news-worthy. I get that, and have no problem with that; just don't have a double standard;
2. For about a year or longer, the press was cowed into not calling Trumps lies for what they were: lies. All types of euphemisms were used, justified by a shitload of bad rationales. Hell, Maggie Haberman (NYT) is still probably trafficking in those bogus rationalizations;
3. Just look at a typical CNN panel. Since they are scared to not have a Trump supporter, they have one alongside some Democrat. It normally proceeds with a complete lie or distraction by the Trump supporter and the resulting "discussion" revolves around that. If this scenario doesn't ring a bell, just think about Kelly Anne Conway, or Sarah Huckabee, and ask yourself "why do they still give airtime to these lying sack of shits?" They've dumbed down real and necessary discussion just to accommodate the fear that they'll be called "unfair to Trump;"
4. This example always burns me up. That motherfucker still hasn't released his tax returns. The press asked for it for a few weeks during the election, met some transparently bogus resistance, and just flat gave up. They still don't ask him. You think Hillary would have been treated that way? No fucking way;
5. The NYT relaying the bogus story, right before the election and sticking to it for over a year, that the FBI had cleared Trump; and, mostly since I am tired
6. The writeup before the Iraq war
There are likely hundreds of examples more. It's difficult to see through the fog, or step outside accepted norms of thought, but the paradigm of liberal bias will crash one day too.
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Damn, I could go on forever on this, but some recent ones and some important ones:
1. The airing of his thing tonight. The only reason they are airing what they fully expect to be propaganda and lies is because they are afraid of the right characterizing them as left leaning or unfair to Trump. They didn't air Obama's, probably since they didn't view it as news-worthy. I get that, and have no problem with that; just don't have a double standard;
2. For about a year or longer, the press was cowed into not calling Trumps lies for what they were: lies. All types of euphemisms were used, justified by a shitload of bad rationales. Hell, Maggie Haberman (NYT) is still probably trafficking in those bogus rationalizations;
3. Just look at a typical CNN panel. Since they are scared to not have a Trump supporter, they have one alongside some Democrat. It normally proceeds with a complete lie or distraction by the Trump supporter and the resulting "discussion" revolves around that. If this scenario doesn't ring a bell, just think about Kelly Anne Conway, or Sarah Huckabee, and ask yourself "why do they still give airtime to these lying sack of shits?" They've dumbed down real and necessary discussion just to accommodate the fear that they'll be called "unfair to Trump;"
4. This example always burns me up. That motherfucker still hasn't released his tax returns. The press asked for it for a few weeks during the election, met some transparently bogus resistance, and just flat gave up. They still don't ask him. You think Hillary would have been treated that way? No fucking way;
5. The NYT relaying the bogus story, right before the election and sticking to it for over a year, that the FBI had cleared Trump; and, mostly since I am tired
6. The writeup before the Iraq war
There are likely hundreds of examples more. It's difficult to see through the fog, or step outside accepted norms of thought, but the paradigm of liberal bias will crash one day too.
I don't think any of this supports a claim that the press slants conservative. Rather, I think it shows how the press has to walk a fine line to prove Trump and his supporters wrong. After all, it's not like the press doesn't want Trump supporters to be buying their newspapers or watching their networks.
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I don't think any of this supports a claim that the press slants conservative. Rather, I think it shows how the press has to walk a fine line to prove Trump and his supporters wrong.
I maintain if they feel like they have to walk a fine line, their conservative bias is already baked in. The idea that they even consider what people might think flies in the face of true journalism where one ferrets out the story and reports it. I can't think of any esteemed journalist who self-censored themselves based on what one political party would think.
After all, it's not like the press doesn't want Trump supporters to be buying their newspapers or watching their networks.
There is certainly merit in this statement, and while explaining the actions of the media, it doesn't really address whether they have bias.
My gut feeling is that most reporters are left leaning by nature, and they know it. Therefore, the argument that they are therefore biased resonates with them. It shouldn't, but it does. Instead of realizing that objectivity is mostly bias free and standing on that edifice (I don't fully subscribe to the theory that observers are inherently biased), they cower to the false charge and then go out of their way not to be biased, which naturally pulls lefties to the right.
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Damn, I could go on forever on this, but some recent ones and some important ones:
1. The airing of his thing tonight. The only reason they are airing what they fully expect to be propaganda and lies is because they are afraid of the right characterizing them as left leaning or unfair to Trump. They didn't air Obama's, probably since they didn't view it as news-worthy. I get that, and have no problem with that; just don't have a double standard;
I agree that some of the airing could be for fear of the rights characterization of bias. They aren’t going to use the airing to promote the wall. They’re airing to refute afterwards. The airing to refute should be telling. Also, me thinks they’re airing it for the same reason that Fox News gives so much coverage to Ocasio-Cortez (I don't have a high opinion of her). Both say dumb stuff and give soundbites the network can use.
2. For about a year or longer, the press was cowed into not calling Trumps lies for what they were: lies. All types of euphemisms were used, justified by a shitload of bad rationales. Hell, Maggie Haberman (NYT) is still probably trafficking in those bogus rationalizations;
I don't know what you're referring to for this, and you didn’t give examples so I’ll just have to take your word that it happened.
3. Just look at a typical CNN panel. Since they are scared to not have a Trump supporter, they have one alongside some Democrat. It normally proceeds with a complete lie or distraction by the Trump supporter and the resulting "discussion" revolves around that. If this scenario doesn't ring a bell, just think about Kelly Anne Conway, or Sarah Huckabee, and ask yourself "why do they still give airtime to these lying sack of shits?" They've dumbed down real and necessary discussion just to accommodate the fear that they'll be called "unfair to Trump;"
I don’t watch Fox News, but my father n law has it on 24/7. After our house flooded we lived with him for a short while. I’m going to be real careful that I don’t get dragged into defending Fox News here…I’ll say this only to refute your point. Fox News does have panels that include other viewpoints than the hosts.
4. This example always burns me up. That motherfucker still hasn't released his tax returns. The press asked for it for a few weeks during the election, met some transparently bogus resistance, and just flat gave up. They still don't ask him. You think Hillary would have been treated that way? No fucking way;
I can agree with the burn of dropping the release of Tax returns. Although, do you mean the Hillary Clinton that was being fed debate questions ahead of time that a network was going to ask? That Hillary was given a few free passes
5. The NYT relaying the bogus story, right before the election and sticking to it for over a year, that the FBI had cleared Trump; and, mostly since I am tired
This is a good example
6. The writeup before the Iraq war
You lost me here...
There are likely hundreds of examples more. It's difficult to see through the fog, or step outside accepted norms of thought, but the paradigm of liberal bias will crash one day too.
Ok, when you're not so tired you can enlighten me.
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The major media outlets are all owned by mega-corporations. The suggestion that they are liberally biased is laughable. The Colbert quote above is so perfect in its satire because it’s lampooning the taking point with the truth using their own linguistic style.
See also “truthfulness”, which became a spittle-flecked blurt from the mouth of Trump’s lawyer Rudy Giuliani when he said “truth isn’t truth”. This had been preceded by Trump telling a rally crowd that what they are seeing and reading isn’t happening.
The right lost the platform to complain about media bias when they completely abandoned facts and reality as a basis for a legitimate debate.
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The major media outlets are all owned by mega-corporations. The suggestion that they are liberally biased is laughable.
Their real preference is for finance/monopoly-friendly Democrats, but they’ll take Republicans if they have to. Anyone who doesn’t threaten the bottom line.
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So Manafort sent polling data to the Russians prior to the election. It'll be entertaining to watch the NO COLLUSION! crowd do a Sammy Davis Jr tap dance around this latest nugget.
We know this, by the way, because Manafort's crack attorneys don't know how to redact documents.
Only the best people.
It is pretty bombshelly, but Trump is going to lie about immigration tonight, so who cares. Where did you read about it being a mistake by his attorneys?
All I read was in a Wapo article stating:
The information is in a filing that appears to inadvertently include details not intended to be made public and indicates a pathway by which the Russians could have had access to Trump campaign data.
I read that and my conspiratorial hat came out, assuming it was a breadcrumb left by Mueller, being as he is under the thumb of the two-bit offensive lineman from Iowa.
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From another WaPo article:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2019/01/08/new-link-between-trump-campaign-russian-intelligence-thats-more-evocative-than-definitive/?utm_term=.efd7964b5a15
The relevant part being in the opening paragraphs:
"Imagine that you had a document that included sensitive information. So, before handing the document to someone, you very carefully cut out pieces of black paper and Scotch-tape them on top of the parts of the document you want to keep private. Foolproof.
You probably see the problem here. And yet someone, perhaps attorneys working for Paul Manafort, appears not to have done so. A document filed with the court on Manafort’s behalf tried to obscure important information by overlaying black boxes on the text, giving the appearance of a redacted document but offering all of the security of those little bits of black paper."
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Thanks. I understand now and it appears that it’s like Chuck stated, that his attorneys aren’t too good at using software.
I can’t remember exactly, but it seems like Manafort or Gates previously had a issue using software, making it easier to catch them. I can relate to their incompetence; it’s one of the reasons I’ve stayed out of international espionage.
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Rosenstein to be out of the DOJ once Trump’s latest stooge takes over. This is a slow-moving coup.
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So Manafort sent polling data to the Russians prior to the election. It'll be entertaining to watch the NO COLLUSION! crowd do a Sammy Davis Jr tap dance around this latest nugget.
We know this, by the way, because Manafort's crack attorneys don't know how to redact documents.
Only the best people.
So like everything else our lying, crooked, grifter of a President does, this will play out exactly the same....
1. Accusation
2. Trump vehemently denies it (and his rube followers believe him)
3. Trump claims others did it
4. Trump lies to try and discredit accusers.
5. Evidence comes out to support the accusation
6. Trump claims, even if it is true, he knew nothing about it
7. Evidence shows that Trump knew about it and/or partook in it (where we are about to be, in regards to the Russia investigation)
8. Trump lies to try and discredit the evidence.
9. Evidence proves was involved and has been lying the entire time.
10. Trump claims that it isn't a crime.
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Quote
6. The writeup before the Iraq war
You lost me here...
Not to open a can of worms, but I think JBM is referring to the American mainstream media's (almost) universal support for making war on Iraq (which was true of the Democratic party as well).
The supposedly liberal American mainstream media has had war fever at least since Hearst and the Spanish-American war. That doesn't mean your left-leaning, muckracker reporters don't exist, just that they are the exception and have a much smaller platform within the larger MSM.
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Not to open a can of worms, but I think JBM is referring to the American mainstream media's (almost) universal support for making war on Iraq (which was true of the Democratic party as well).
The supposedly liberal American mainstream media has had war fever at least since Hearst and the Spanish-American war. That doesn't mean your left-leaning, muckracker reporters don't exist, just that they are the exception and have a much smaller platform within the larger MSM.
Extremely true. See also the MSM’s slobbering response when Trump ordered the missile strike in Syria. They get off on that shit.
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Not to open a can of worms, but I think JBM is referring to the American mainstream media's (almost) universal support for making war on Iraq (which was true of the Democratic party as well).
The supposedly liberal American mainstream media has had war fever at least since Hearst and the Spanish-American war. That doesn't mean your left-leaning, muckracker reporters don't exist, just that they are the exception and have a much smaller platform within the larger MSM.
No can of worms necessary, and thanks for clearing that up. My brain was more or less locked into a thought pattern of more recent media bias examples.
To me, America and the media were completely different in the early 2000's. After the attacks on the WTC and the Pentagon the country was fairly unified in actions against terrorism...Not that that the war was successful on that front.
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Yes, Gizzmonic's explanation of my point #6 is is a better demonstration of my point and Moriartp's example is #7 on the list of hundreds.
Related to the topic and my prediction that the "media liberal bias" paradigm will crumble, witness the backlash against AP's fact-check tweet related to Trump's address.
https://www.vox.com/2019/1/9/18175186/trump-oval-office-speech-fact-check-failures (https://www.vox.com/2019/1/9/18175186/trump-oval-office-speech-fact-check-failures)
It's not exactly on point, since it is more about false equivalence and fact checking, but it's related in that shows a perceived lack of even-handness by the media. I'd argue it's an example that more of the public is holding the media to account and further eroding the liberal bias narrative.
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NYT reporting that - after the firing of Comey, the admission that it was about the Russia investigation, the admittance of the Russian Ambassador and Foreign Minister, including Russian press crew/spy equipment engineers to the Oval Office, without telling us for us to find out from Russian media, the confirmation to them that firing Comey was to take the heat off and the divulgence of foreign intel from Israel (all in the space of two days, folks!) - the FBI thought that Trump might not be playing for the home team.
They opened an investigation into whether Trump is a witting or unwitting agent of Russia.
Let me say that again...
The FBI opened an investigation into whether the sitting President of the United States is an agent of an enemy power.
What's more, that investigation was rolled into the Mueller investigation so, for all we know, it's still active.
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https://twitter.com/kellyannepolls/status/792172280327630848?s=21
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She said most, not all.
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https://twitter.com/sarahhuckabee/status/794255968448020480?s=21
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I’m not saying this shows the depths of collusion, but if not, I’d love to know a better explanation.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/trump-has-concealed-details-of-his-face-to-face-encounters-with-putin-from-senior-officials-in-administration/2019/01/12/65f6686c-1434-11e9-b6ad-9cfd62dbb0a8_story.html
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Holy shit, what is that on Ted Cruz's face?
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Holy shit, what is that on Ted Cruz's face?
Dude is such a cowardly piece of shit. When asked if he’s concerned that we have no record of Trump/Putin private conversations, Cruz says that he has to gather more facts before he can answer. Think about that, he has to fucking mull it over. He can’t even give a resounding “of course” or “yes” to that question.
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Dude is such a cowardly piece of shit. When asked if he’s concerned that we have no record of Trump/Putin private conversations, Cruz says that he has to gather more facts before he can answer. Think about that, he has to fucking mull it over. He can’t even give a resounding “of course” or “yes” to that question.
The crazy truth is that Congressional Republicans are covering up for Trump who has done they know not what. They are blindly - literally - protecting him without any fucking clue as to the depths of his criminality and betrayal. I hope they all burn for it (politically, of course).
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I think most congressional Republicans have a very clear idea of what Trump has done, especially those on key committees such as intelligence. They cover for him because they themselves are compromised either by money or who knows what else, and/or because they fear the base and have reasoned that no revelation is going to impact the base's point of view.
And on this last point, I think they are completely correct. There is plenty of wrongdoing already uncovered, plenty of indictments submitted, plenty more sealed. But if it turns out that the Trump campaign and then the Trump administration and even Trump himself acted illegally myriad ways conspiratorial and otherwise that are far more serious and more damaging than anything we have conjured in our most elaborate fantasies, well, I can't see that having any sort of impact on any Trump supporter. These are people who think the earth is 5,000 years old. These are people to whom, as I often say, reality is irrelevant.
These are people to whom Trump's constant lying (and, presumably, his irrepressible criminality) is a point of attraction rather than any sort of negative. His willingness to say whatever baldly false, lunatic shit he feels like and his willingness to violate the norms of the office and the laws of the republic, in their eyes, gives him stature. They actually LIKE this about him, the power they think this demonstrates. It's classic authoritarian behavior. I got a hole in one every hole the very first time I ever played golf! It is precisely the same thing, and it appeals to precisely the same sort of addled, ignorant, incurious brain that has been swayed by cheap nationalism in modern history.
It is quite terrifying to see a significant appetite for despotic authoritarianism in the US and A, but here we are.
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As far as that base, remember that they almost entirely watch Fox News, so they have no clue about any of these revelations.
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While I agree with a lot of what Chuck said, especially relative to Trump supporters and authoritarianism, if the Mueller report has even the half of what most expect (and it will likely have more), Trump is toast. Just watching Tapper talk to this Republican Senator from Wisconsin, I see the beginnings of change. Even milquetoast reporters like Tapper are asking harder questions and the angry tone of the Senator’s evasions/rationalizations is a tell that even apologists like him sense that the times are changing.
In sum, I see a distinction between the idiotic Trump supporter that will just bow up and doesn’t have any real responsibility and politicians that will eventually be on the historic record. We’re still a ways away, but the train is rolling in that direction.
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As far as that base, remember that they almost entirely watch Fox News, so they have no clue about any of these revelations.
Incredibly, Fox News is the best case scenario for these people. A lot of them diet on American Family Radio or Alex Jones or who knows what else.
But yes, authoritarians need a reliable, obedient, ubiquitous source of shameless propaganda. Fortunately for Trumpy, he arrived with that piece already in place.
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Oh, and speaking of Fox News, that reminds me - you'd think that someone who lies as much as Trump does would at least be half competent at it by now.
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As far as that base, remember that they almost entirely watch Fox News, so they have no clue about any of these revelations.
Chuck Schumer said this about Trump himself. Schumer gave Trump some sobering stories from Trump country of people struggling with the shut down and, apparently, Trump had no clue. His sycophant advisers tell him his base loves it and that’s all he knows.
It’s a human centipede of willful ignorance.
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While I agree with a lot of what Chuck said, especially relative to Trump supporters and authoritarianism, if the Mueller report has even the half of what most expect (and it will likely have more), Trump is toast. Just watching Tapper talk to this Republican Senator from Wisconsin, I see the beginnings of change. Even milquetoast reporters like Tapper are asking harder questions and the angry tone of the Senator’s evasions/rationalizations is a tell that even apologists like him sense that the times are changing.
In sum, I see a distinction between the idiotic Trump supporter that will just bow up and doesn’t have any real responsibility and politicians that will eventually be on the historic record. We’re still a ways away, but the train is rolling in that direction.
The thing is, we shouldn’t be waiting for the Mueller Report; there is so much in the public domain already. Waiting for the report is a punt by Democrats. I accept that they have only just taken the reins in the House, but they should already have a plan for systematic and comprehensive investigation of all things Trump. Anything else is a betrayal of the tens of millions of us who made that blue wave happen.
Here’s a comprehensive thread (https://twitter.com/djrothkopf/status/1084469093674242048?s=21) on Twitter that details the myriad impeachable offenses outside of “collusionl.
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In sum, I see a distinction between the idiotic Trump supporter that will just bow up and doesn’t have any real responsibility and politicians that will eventually be on the historic record. We’re still a ways away, but the train is rolling in that direction.
While I admire your optimism, I think you're delusional. Ted Cruz, Lindsey Graham, Mitch McConnell, etc will never, ever, under any circumstances, no matter how illegal, immoral, appalling or egregious it may be, go against Trump. They will go to the gallows and sell every single American into Russian slavery before they ever *not* toe Trump's line.
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So Houston Airport System has closed the ticket counter and security checkpoint at Terminal B at IAH due to lack of TSA agents. All passengers will have to route through Terminal C and E. Get there early folks. Fun, fun, fun.
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While I admire your optimism, I think you're delusional. Ted Cruz, Lindsey Graham, Mitch McConnell, etc will never, ever, under any circumstances, no matter how illegal, immoral, appalling or egregious it may be, go against Trump. They will go to the gallows and sell every single American into Russian slavery before they ever *not* toe Trump's line.
"The buck stops with everybody."
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While I admire your optimism, I think you're delusional. Ted Cruz, Lindsey Graham, Mitch McConnell, etc will never, ever, under any circumstances, no matter how illegal, immoral, appalling or egregious it may be, go against Trump. They will go to the gallows and sell every single American into Russian slavery before they ever *not* toe Trump's line.
This is spot on. People’s media memories go back one week. People’s political memories don’t even go back the minimal required 4 years. They (Trump supporters) have decided to embrace this.
Why apologize for something that people will forget in a week? Why admit guilt to a crime that people will forget about in 3 months?
I appreciate the nostalgic ideal that there will be some kind of “historical reckoning” but that shit is gone. People that give two shits about that are about to start dying, are dying already, or, are already dead. We all play for teams now. .
Just like my fading memory of the Bush(1) administration “issues”, shit is moving on and keeps moving on faster and faster. . We’re in a new political epoch. Buckle up. We can’t even keep track of all the bullshit that happened yesterday.
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NYT reporting that - after the firing of Comey, the admission that it was about the Russia investigation, the admittance of the Russian Ambassador and Foreign Minister, including Russian press crew/spy equipment engineers to the Oval Office, without telling us for us to find out from Russian media, the confirmation to them that firing Comey was to take the heat off and the divulgence of foreign intel from Israel (all in the space of two days, folks!) - the FBI thought that Trump might not be playing for the home team.
They opened an investigation into whether Trump is a witting or unwitting agent of Russia.
Let me say that again...
The FBI opened an investigation into whether the sitting President of the United States is an agent of an enemy power.
What's more, that investigation was rolled into the Mueller investigation so, for all we know, it's still active.
Quoting myself may be somewhat Trumpian, but I have an update:
If you can see through the blizzard of of tweets comparing a Warren campaign ad to the massacre at Wounded Knee, tone deaf and ignorant slights of AOC for being 30 and not being able to afford an apartment in both NYC and Washington (what has she been doing with her life to leave herself so destitute...), and the hue of CBS' news team, there's some important shit.
To wit, Trump has gone to extraordinary lengths to conceal from everyone the content and nature of his 5...FIVE! face-to-face meetings with Putin. After one meeting, Trump personally confiscated the notes made by his interpreter.
His every move is that of an incredibly guilty person who knows how incredibly guilty he is. House Democrats are working up subpoenas for the White House interpreter, which may explain the overnight unhinged tweeting.
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So Houston Airport System has closed the ticket counter and security checkpoint at Terminal B at IAH due to lack of TSA agents. All passengers will have to route through Terminal C and E. Get there early folks. Fun, fun, fun.
If you thought this would end any time soon (and I doubt you did), in the January 4th meeting with Congressional leaders, Trump "Walter Sobchaked" his on-the-job-for-two-days Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney. When Mulvaney asked if there was middle ground between Trump's $5.7bn and Democrats' $1.6bn, Trump screamed "You're out of your element, Mickey!". Hahaha, no he didn't. That would be ridiculous. No, he screamed "Stop, stop, just stop -- What are you doing? You're f---ing it all up, Mick."
This was in front of the entire Congressional leadership*.
* Except McConnell, who retreated into his shell a week ago and hasn't come out since.
Over the weekend, Trump jumped into the briar patch that is Fox News for an interview. They tossed up a softball - "Are you working for Putin?" and Trump whiffed. “I think it’s the most insulting thing I’ve ever been asked,” Trump said. “I think it’s the most insulting article I’ve ever had written, and if you read the article you’ll see that they found absolutely nothing.”
So asked if he'd been involved in criminal wrongdoing, Trump went dime store gangster and answered "They ain't got nuthin' on me!"
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This guy (https://twitter.com/andrewsweiss/status/1084802080051736577) just overlaid the timeline of Trump's record-free face-to-face meetings with Putin and the cascading revelations about the Trump Tower meeting.
Intriguing.
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CNN has a story out that the FBI was worried that Trump was following directions in the Comey firing. One obvious possibility is that they had intercepts of something prior to the firing. Probably a puppet-string intercept, and when the puppet moved as ordered, they said "oh fuck."
I realize that the NYT story and the new CNN story all come from Baker's House testimony, and that the Wapo hide-the-evidence story was basically already known, but I'm not a big believer in coincidences. Seems like somebody, probably House Dems, are prepping the public, starting to tell the story.
I've always thought that crafting a coherent story was going to be crucial to the final end for the nation. It's like an attorney making their case. I imagine it is difficult, so many ways to approach the story. Anyways, stating that the FBI thought Trump might be a Russian agent is a pretty good opening line.
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Quoting myself may be somewhat Trumpian, but I have an update:
If you can see through the blizzard of of tweets comparing a Warren campaign ad to the massacre at Wounded Knee, tone deaf and ignorant slights of AOC for being 30 and not being able to afford an apartment in both NYC and Washington (what has she been doing with her life to leave herself so destitute...), and the hue of CBS' news team, there's some important shit.
To wit, Trump has gone to extraordinary lengths to conceal from everyone the content and nature of his 5...FIVE! face-to-face meetings with Putin. After one meeting, Trump personally confiscated the notes made by his interpreter.
His every move is that of an incredibly guilty person who knows how incredibly guilty he is. House Democrats are working up subpoenas for the White House interpreter, which may explain the overnight unhinged tweeting.
Trump confiscated the interpreter’s notes.
Anyone else recall Rep. Schiff trying to subpoena those notes and getting blocked by the GOP committee members?
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Trump confiscated the interpreter’s notes.
Anyone else recall Rep. Schiff trying to subpoena those notes and getting blocked by the GOP committee members?
Matter of fact, I do.
I'm sure I've mentioned this before, but when I was a kid my cousins and I went to a fair of some sort where there was a child sized Ferris wheel. My brother was in a pod with cousin Rick while I was in a pod with cousin Ken. Rick was never the most far-sighted fellow, and this was illustrated neatly when, as their pod was suspended at maximum height for a passenger exchange in another pod, he decided to spit down upon his mother. Aunt Judy scolded him sharply, but Rick couldn't resist. He kept spitting on his mother. It was too perfect an opportunity to pass up, I guess.
Well, obviously, not long thereafter their pod is the one due for a passenger exchange and you had better believe that Judy was there to receive poor Rick. My final memory of that episode was being suspended at maximum wheel height ourselves and watching Judy furiously drag Rick through the parking lot whomping him on the ass with her free hand. (Whomping children on the ass or anywhere else is frowned upon these days, and, at least in Rick's case, didn't really seem to do too much good.)
Every time I encounter an example such as, say, Devin Nunes, I wonder, Don't these people know that the Ferris wheel is going to circle back down at some point? Don't they know that?
On another note, it is absolutely astounding to me to discover that we are in a place where the following question is asked not on fringe Twitter but on the front page of the Times:
"Questions about whether President Trump is a Russian agent made clear that the shutdown may be just a preliminary skirmish in this new era of divided government."
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Trump confiscated the interpreter’s notes.
Anyone else recall Rep. Schiff trying to subpoena those notes and getting blocked by the GOP committee members?
Schiff does (https://thehill.com/homenews/house/425131-schiff-floats-possibility-of-renewing-demand-for-interpreters-notes-from-trump).
I doubt they exist; Trump would've trashed them. Of course, Trump is also lazy so he may have barked at an underlying (Pence, for example) to trash them, and then said underlying kept them because, you know, the Presidential Records Act. Either way, they should now and forever be known as the "Schiff Notes".
Regardless, the interpreter still exists, so they can subpoena him/her.
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Regardless, the interpreter still exists...
I cannot possibly imagine why you would be sure of this and I am not joking.
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This guy (https://twitter.com/andrewsweiss/status/1084802080051736577) just overlaid the timeline of Trump's record-free face-to-face meetings with Putin and the cascading revelations about the Trump Tower meeting.
Intriguing.
That's what jumped out to me. The first unsupervised meetings with Putin immediately preceded the president of the United States fabricating a statement for his kid who is supposed to be operating completely separately from his father in which they lied about the nature of a meeting predicated on Russian operatives providing dirt on Hillary to the campaign as "part of Russia and its government’s support for Mr Trump.” Of course, that was after repeatedly lying that the meeting never took place.
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That's what jumped out to me. The first unsupervised meetings with Putin immediately preceded the president of the United States fabricating a statement for his kid who is supposed to be operating completely separately from his father in which they lied about the nature of a meeting predicated on Russian operatives providing dirt on Hillary to the campaign as "part of Russia and its government’s support for Mr Trump.” Of course, that was after repeatedly lying that the meeting never took place.
I saw a news piece recently where they claimed that there we are now aware of over 100 separate contacts between members of Team Trump and Russians. Every single one of those now documented contacts was denied initially.
I mention this only because it continues to boggle my mind that these people are given any credence whatsoever; the scale of their mendacity being too broad to take in, perhaps.
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Clint Watts has a stab (https://twitter.com/selectedwisdom/status/1084498964114821120) at laying out the circumstantial evidence of collusion between Trump and Russia. It's a lot.
Of course, for non-circumstantial evidence of collusion, you just have to look at the emails Don Jr. released about the Trump Tower meeting. He was told that Russians had dirt on Hillary that they wanted to give him, he said "I love it" and took the meeting with bro-in-law and the Trump Campaign Chairman. That, on its own, is collusion...really conspiracy...in a federal crime.
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Back to the wall: In a Quinnipiac University poll released today:
- 63% of voters say they oppose shutting down the government to force funding for the wall
- 56% say Trump and Congressional Republicans are responsible for the shutdown
- 36% say Democrats are responsible.
Voters support, by a 63%-30% margin, reopening parts of the government that aren’t related to border security while negotiating on wall funding. A CNN poll has Trump's approval rating at 37% and, notably, has him underwater with non-college educated white men for the first time.
Perhaps the most devastating numbers from the Quinnipiac poll: Did Trump's recent televised address to the nation change your mind about building a wall along the border with Mexico, or not?
Yes: 2% (not a typo)
No: 89%
Meanwhile, airport chaos is spreading and the NYT says it's time for the TSA to strike (https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/14/opinion/its-time-for-tsa-workers-to-strike.html). McTurtle is going to have to do something about this sooner or later.
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Because of the shutdown, Trump had to go out of pocket to feed the Clemson football team at their WH visit tonight. He bought them McDonald's, Wendy's and Burger King.
https://twitter.com/robertarampton/status/1084947012003471361
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Because of the shutdown, Trump had to go out of pocket to feed the Clemson football team at their WH visit tonight. He bought them McDonald's, Wendy's and Burger King.
https://twitter.com/robertarampton/status/1084947012003471361
Presumably, no Taco Bell, because Mexicans.
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The only thing remotely surprising about this is that it wasn't White Castle.
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The only thing remotely surprising about this is that it wasn't White Castle.
KFC
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Presumably, no Taco Bell, because Mexicans.
There are few things less Mexican than Taco Bell.
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I know it's not important, but it's part of Trump's inability to tell the truth about anything, any time. He tweeted that he bought over 1,000 "hamberders" for the Clemson Tigers, and they were all eaten in less than an hour.
Think about the math of this: if the Clemson party was 100 people, that's 10 "berders" each. If it was 200 people, that's still 5 each. In an hour. Certainly doable as a food challenge, but when a guest at the White House?
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I don't know if that is a lie, I mean people are likely saying that it's true.
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I don't know if that is a lie, I mean people are likely saying that it's true.
If it's true, I hope White House plumbers aren't part of the shutdown.
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https://www.thedailybeast.com/mueller-probes-an-event-with-nunes-flynn-and-foreign-officials-at-trumps-dc-hotel?ref=home (https://www.thedailybeast.com/mueller-probes-an-event-with-nunes-flynn-and-foreign-officials-at-trumps-dc-hotel?ref=home)
Nunes info. No real fire, but some smoke. More about raising funds for an inaugural (slush) fund.
“If you’re a prosecutor, all of the right players are there,” said former federal prosecutor Paul Pelletier, referring to the breakfast. “In a lot of ways breakfasts like this are totally normal. It happens all the time in Washington. So, they wouldn’t be investigating it if they weren’t following the money. The big question would be who is paying for it? It’s got to be part of the broader scheme of who is trying to use money to influence the White House.”
Nunes’ office did not respond to repeated requests for comment. A lawyer for Flynn declined to comment, as did the Southern District of New York and the Special Counsel’s Office.
Also interesting to me at least is the ties between Nunes and Flynn that I didn't know of.
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I know it's not important, but it's part of Trump's inability to tell the truth about anything, any time. He tweeted that he bought over 1,000 "hamberders" for the Clemson Tigers, and they were all eaten in less than an hour.
Think about the math of this: if the Clemson party was 100 people, that's 10 "berders" each. If it was 200 people, that's still 5 each. In an hour. Certainly doable as a food challenge, but when a guest at the White House?
It was 300 hamburgers (https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2019/01/15/president-trumps-extravagant-sandwich-celebration-clemson-university/?utm_term=.39b6ac0aff2a&wpisrc=nl_most&wpmm=1), something he apparently said himself, which makes the 1,000 figure he made up that much dumber.
As Trump repeatedly makes clear, it is indeed a lot of food, but perhaps not a lot of food in the context of a hungry college football team. In his comments, he claims that there are 300 burgers total...
...There is one other asterisk worth noting. In other comments, Trump — in true Trump fashion — suddenly more than tripled the hamburger count.
Trump is GOB exaggerating the cost of his suit (http://GOB exaggerating the cost of his suit).
Also love the tongue-in-cheek tone of that article.
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Tomorrow, “evangelicals” will claim he divided five Big Macs and two Filet-o-fish to feed the Clemson masses.
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Wait, a salad at Wendy's costs NINE DOLLARS?
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Wait, a salad at Wendy's costs NINE DOLLARS?
Don't ask for a biggie,
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Tomorrow, “evangelicals” will claim he divided five Big Macs and two Filet-o-fish to feed the Clemson masses.
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Christian satire is already on the case (https://babylonbee.com/news/trump-miraculously-feeds-multitudes-with-just-5-cheeseburgers-2-filet-o-fish-sandwiches)
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Seems like Trump is calling 50,000 more workers back, to work without pay, thereby swelling the number who must work without pay. Seriously, people need to step back and get a grip on the sheer folly of this: "You are needed, but we are not going to pay you." This absurdity is underpinning the shutdown and absolutely has no nexus to whether a wall should be funded.
Conservatives love to say that the government should be run like a business. What fucking business owner says to their workers "I expect you to show up to work, but I'm not going to pay you, all because my cousins are scared and the town won't hire a new constable. Until we hire a constable, I'm not paying you." Huh?
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Seems like Trump is calling 50,000 more workers back, to work without pay, thereby swelling the number who must work without pay. Seriously, people need to step back and get a grip on the sheer folly of this: "You are needed, but we are not going to pay you." This absurdity is underpinning the shutdown and absolutely has no nexus to whether a wall should be funded.
Conservatives love to say that the government should be run like a business. What fucking business owner says to their workers "I expect you to show up to work, but I'm not going to pay you, all because my cousins are scared and the town won't hire a new constable. Until we hire a constable, I'm not paying you." Huh?
The shutdown has nothing to do with a wall. The wall is a joke.
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There’s a word for people who are forced to work without pay...
It’s illegal for TSA, ATC etc. to strike. Obviously. But if they’re not being paid, are they on strike if they refuse to work? Coming to a federal courtroom soon.
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The shutdown has nothing to do with a wall. The wall is a joke.
Agreed. If it was about the wall it would have been funded during the 2 years that Republicans controlled the House and Senate.
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There’s a word for people who are forced to work without pay...
Slavery? Ha. There are a lot of words. Two that come to mind are, back pay.
Excepted workers, the employees who are being forced to work without pay, are automatically given back pay when the government reopens. Still the hardships mount. Those same workers are already more than $400 million behind on their mortgages. Politicians are evil.
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Agreed. If it was about the wall it would have been funded during the 2 years that Republicans controlled the House and Senate.
Or during the Obama administration when Democrats were for border security.
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Or during the Obama administration when Democrats were for border security.
Democrats offered to fund additional border security. Just not a wall.
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Agreed. If it was about the wall it would have been funded during the 2 years that Republicans controlled the House and Senate.
Chris Hayes has made it his business to post this as a question to every conservative accusing Democrats of blocking the wall. He's very busy.
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If you thought - from the pre-released excerpts from his opening statement for his confirmation hearing - that William Barr was going to protect the Mueller investigation, then his responses to questions dusted that hope like a snap from Thanos' gloved fingers. He:
- Referred to the investigation as "The A.G's investigation"
- He would not commit to making the complete report public
- He would openly defy career DOJ ethics officials over recusal
- He would fire the Special Counsel if instructed to do so by the president with or without good cause
He's a more polished, less obviously crooked stooge than Matt Whitaker. He also was one of the architects of the targeted pardoning by then President Bush that effectively ended further investigation into Iran-Contra, an investigation that was at that point closing in on Bush himself.
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As with a government shutdown that is morphing into government merely stiffing it's workers, Trump is also flailing on his racist messaging. Where it used to be vile and coherent, it is now just vile, inconsistent and incoherent
“It is becoming more and more obvious that the Radical Democrats are a Party of open borders and crime,” he claimed in a tweet. “They want nothing to do with the major Humanitarian Crisis on our Southern Border. #2020!”
Really, how is that MS 13 killers and rapists pouring into our neighborhoods is suddenly a humanitarian crisis?
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As with a government shutdown that is morphing into government merely stiffing it's workers, Trump is also flailing on his racist messaging. Where it used to be vile and coherent, it is now just vile, inconsistent and incoherent
Really, how is that MS 13 killers and rapists pouring into our neighborhoods is suddenly a humanitarian crisis?
Also, why aren't we all dead?
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Getting at Trump where he lives: Pelosi has suggested to Trump that, due to the shutdown, he postpone his SOTU address or submit it in writing.
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Also, why aren't we all dead?
Because we live in Texas and they think everyone walking around has a gun and will protect themselves.
Quick question, who manufactures these guns which are being obtained illegally?
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Because we live in Texas and they think everyone walking around has a gun and will protect themselves.
Quick question, who manufactures these guns which are being obtained illegally?
Mexicans?
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Getting at Trump where he lives: Pelosi has suggested to Trump that, due to the shutdown, he postpone his SOTU address or submit it in writing.
I think it might be a bit more strongly worded than that. I think she's telling him it IS postponed (by Pelosi). The suggestion is to simply get together to determine another date (or submit in writing). I think it's telling she emphasizes right in the first sentence that she invited him to give the SOTU on the 29th. Invitation rescinded. She's not leaving it to him to postpone it.
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I think it might be a bit more strongly worded than that. I think she's telling him it IS postponed (by Pelosi). The suggestion is to simply get together to determine another date (or submit in writing). I think it's telling she emphasizes right in the first sentence that she invited him to give the SOTU on the 29th. Invitation rescinded. She's not leaving it to him to postpone it.
Yep (https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DxCl62QX4AEE7oo.jpg:large).
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Or during the Obama administration when Democrats were for border security.
They are still for border security.
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Agreed. If it was about the wall it would have been funded during the 2 years that Republicans controlled the House and Senate.
Or there would be engineering proposals and designs and budgets and land analysis and all the things one does to actually prepare a construction project.
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Or during the Obama administration when Democrats were for border security.
A wall has nothing to do with border security, beyond being the most expensive and least effective way of going about it.
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Getting at Trump where he lives: Pelosi has suggested to Trump that, due to the shutdown, he postpone his SOTU address or submit it in writing.
This doesn’t have to be a suggestion. The Speaker must invite the President. The Constitution requires an update, but doesn’t not require it to be an address to a joint session.
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This doesn’t have to be a suggestion. The Speaker must invite the President. The Constitution requires an update, but doesn’t not require it to be an address to a joint session.
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Trump, being the despot that he is, will still probably get on national television and address the nation, likely from one of his hotel lobbies.
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Trump, being the despot that he is, will still probably get on national television and address the nation, likely from one of his hotel lobbies.
If we know anything about Trump, we know that he sucks at reading pre-written, staged speeches into camera.
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If we know anything about Trump, we know that he sucks at reading pre-written, staged speeches into camera.
Let's not give him too much credit - he sucks at off-the-cuff remarks as well.
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Let's not give him too much credit - he sucks at off-the-cuff remarks as well.
True, but he enjoys doing that. He clearly hates reading.
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Netflix is making a workplace TV comedy series, with Steve Carell, about the guys charged by Trump to create a Space Force (https://youtu.be/5QgJR4pAPlE).
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Stent Hoyer confirmed that Pelosi wasn’t asking, she was telling. SOTU is cancelled.
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Slavery? Ha. There are a lot of words. Two that come to mind are, back pay.
Two more words: cash flow. If this goes on a long time, the eventual back pay isn't going to be a lot of consolation to folks who couldn't pay bills.
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Two more words: cash flow. If this goes on a long time, the eventual back pay isn't going to be a lot of consolation to folks who couldn't pay bills.
Two more words: credit score.
Missing one mortgage payment can slash up to 100 points off you credit score that will make credit, if given at all, more expensive. For at least 7 years.
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So like everything else our lying, crooked, grifter of a President does, this will play out exactly the same....
1. Accusation
2. Trump vehemently denies it (and his rube followers believe him)
3. Trump claims others did it
4. Trump lies to try and discredit accusers.
5. Evidence comes out to support the accusation
6. Trump claims, even if it is true, he knew nothing about it
7. Evidence shows that Trump knew about it and/or partook in it (where we are about to be, in regards to the Russia investigation)
8. Trump lies to try and discredit the evidence.
9. Evidence proves was involved and has been lying the entire time.
10. Trump claims that it isn't a crime.
Rudy on CNN last night.
Rudy Giuliani, on CNN: "I never said there was no collusion between people in the campaign" and Russians.
And on Trump, "He said *he* didn't (collude with Russians.) He didn't say nobody."
————.
And we have officially hit #6 and are on the way to #7
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The shutdown is eroding Trump’s base. In an NPR simple approval pol (https://www.npr.org/2019/01/17/685539207/poll-trump-approval-down-slips-with-base)l, the difference between last month and this is:
-7% among Republicans
-6% among white men w/o college degree
-7% among white evangelicals
-9% among suburban men
-11% among white women w/o college
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The shutdown is eroding Trump’s base. In an NPR simple approval pol (https://www.npr.org/2019/01/17/685539207/poll-trump-approval-down-slips-with-base)l, the difference between last month and this is:
-7% among Republicans
-6% among white men w/o college degree
-7% among white evangelicals
-9% among suburban men
-11% among white women w/o college
Pelosi's got him by the beans.
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Pelosi's got him by the mushroom .
Fify
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These guys never fail to entertain. It would be hard to make it up. From a Daily Beast summary of a WSJ report:
Michael Cohen hired an IT firm to rig online polls in favor of Donald Trump ahead of the 2016 election and instructed the company to create the @WomenForCohen Twitter account to laud how sexually attractive he is, the Wall Street Journal reports.
Gauger disclosed the work to the Wall Street Journal after he received much less money for his efforts than he expected. Gauger believed he was due $50,000 for it—alongside a promise of lucrative work with the president-elect—but Cohen reportedly handed him “a blue Walmart bag containing between $12,000 and $13,000 in cash and, randomly, a boxing glove that Mr. Cohen said had been worn by a Brazilian mixed-martial-arts fighter.”
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The shutdown is eroding Trump’s base. In an NPR simple approval pol (https://www.npr.org/2019/01/17/685539207/poll-trump-approval-down-slips-with-base)l, the difference between last month and this is:
-7% among Republicans
-6% among white men w/o college degree
-7% among white evangelicals
-9% among suburban men
-11% among white women w/o college
Holy hell, those numbers are astounding. What's the way out of this? Keep up the fight and continue to bleed support? Take the loss and come away with nothing?
I have no doubt those numbers will find their way back to normal before the next election, but damn.
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Pelosi's got him by the beans.
David Frum tweeted about her SOTU letter to Trump that "every line draws blood."\
Re-reading it, he's right. It's vicious!
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Holy hell, those numbers are astounding. What's the way out of this? Keep up the fight and continue to bleed support? Take the loss and come away with nothing?
I have no doubt those numbers will find their way back to normal before the next election, but damn.
He has no way out of the shutdown disaster; as it was described yesterday, he's caught in a trap of his own making, Pelosi just locked the door. This is from whence the whole "national security" argument came - they would declare the emergency, open the government, lose in court and bitch about activist judges to the base. That's all they've got.
Eventually, McConnell - who is MIA and being stalked throughout the Capitol by AOC - is going to have to allow a vote. I hope it happens before there's a major disaster (airline crash or something) but, unfortunately, it may take something like that for it to happen. Or a TSA strike - which should happen tomorrow trapping them all in Washington for the weekend. But Trump had an opportunity to keep the government open and he balked, choosing to bow to talk radio pressure, and now he can't go back for fear of a worse backlash from the base.
I agree his numbers will likely recover; but all the way back? Will the base be quicker to erode next time something happens? A couple of weeks ago I said that this feels like the beginning of the end; well now it feels like the middle of the end. With his base eroding and the shutdown coming down on Republicans as a whole, Pelosi's (and AOC's) stars rising, the Russia scandal's noose tightening, it will soon be time for Congressional Republicans to throw him under the bus.
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Stent Hoyer confirmed that Pelosi wasn’t asking, she was telling. SOTU is cancelled.
The White House has yet to respond to Pelosi's letter, but it's now being reported that Trump may give the speech in the Senate.
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The White House has yet to respond to Pelosi's letter, but it's now being reported that Trump may give the speech in the Senate.
Will the Senators in attendance be wearing MAGA hats and chanting "Lock her up"?
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Will the Senators in attendance be wearing MAGA hats and chanting "Lock her up"?
53 of them.
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I found this interesting, even had a few wall arguments I had not thought of: https://medium.com/s/story/what-happened-when-a-trump-supporter-challenged-me-about-the-wall-e54e86a5edd1?fbclid=IwAR3cuz3I6IatWcSzJ35aClCAjCQpuw-z_XmMSgeWCgI4bdDsNaGN0LdHfQY
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I found this interesting, even had a few wall arguments I had not thought of: https://medium.com/s/story/what-happened-when-a-trump-supporter-challenged-me-about-the-wall-e54e86a5edd1?fbclid=IwAR3cuz3I6IatWcSzJ35aClCAjCQpuw-z_XmMSgeWCgI4bdDsNaGN0LdHfQY
It was a great pantsing of "the wall". So much so that Mexico not paying for it was an aside in the last point.
He missed that Republicans have had two years to fund the wall, and didn't. They had one last go in December and shit that bed. Then, suddenly, it's Democrats who are obstructing and it's a national emergency. It's not subtle.
Also, Trump has only spent 60% of what was appropriated for border security in 2017. Again, if it was a dire emergency, that money would be all gone.
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What’s your source on the spending of the appropriated money?
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I found this interesting, even had a few wall arguments I had not thought of: https://medium.com/s/story/what-happened-when-a-trump-supporter-challenged-me-about-the-wall-e54e86a5edd1?fbclid=IwAR3cuz3I6IatWcSzJ35aClCAjCQpuw-z_XmMSgeWCgI4bdDsNaGN0LdHfQY
Noted liberal elitist Rick Perry: “If you build a 30-foot wall from El Paso to Brownsville, the 35-foot ladder business gets real good."
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What’s your source on the spending of the appropriated money?
Here's the Politifact assessment (https://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2019/jan/04/chris-murphy/has-trump-administration-spent-only-6-percent-bord/): 6% spent, only 60% committed.
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Meanwhile, looking past the filet o fish, here's a casual reminder of how truly disgusting these people are: The Trump administration separated thousands more migrant kids at the border than it previously acknowledged, and the separations began months before the policy was announced, according to a federal audit released Thursday morning. (https://www.politico.com/story/2019/01/17/report-trump-administration-migrants-1093242)
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Noted liberal elitist Rick Perry: “If you build a 30-foot wall from El Paso to Brownsville, the 35-foot ladder business gets real good."
If they do steel slats, people can shimmy up and down them like lumberjacks to get over, and they can pass drugs through the gaps. Also, tunnels (https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/immigration/trump-claims-walls-work-discovery-border-tunnels-says-otherwise-n959311).
It's just such a dumb idea it makes my head hurt.
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Thousands more kids separated from parents at the border than originally thought. Thousands.
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The White House has yet to respond to Pelosi's letter, but it's now being reported that Trump may give the speech in the Senate.
The White House responded. In a (grammatically grating) letter to Pelosi, they told her they're pulling her military aircraft for her upcoming trip to multiple destinations including Afghanistan. The military is not shutdown and is getting paid, unlike the federal workers required to stage the SOTU.
He did suggest that the woman, 2nd in line to the Presidency, could fly commercial if she wanted. To Afghanistan.
Forever petty.
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Thousands more kids separated from parents at the border than originally thought. Thousands.
Are you saying this administration lied?
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The White House responded. In a (grammatically grating) letter to Pelosi, they told her they're pulling her military aircraft for her upcoming trip to multiple destinations including Afghanistan. The military is not shutdown and is getting paid, unlike the federal workers required to stage the SOTU.
He did suggest that the woman, 2nd in line to the Presidency, could fly commercial if she wanted. To Afghanistan.
Forever petty.
They had a whole day, and this is what they came up with? To be a fly on the wall and hear all the ones they turned down.
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They had a whole day, and this is what they came up with? To be a fly on the wall and hear all the ones they turned down.
You should read the letter (https://cbsnews3.cbsistatic.com/hub/i/r/2019/01/17/78ffb93f-ecd8-4825-b431-8b5f1c858271/thumbnail/620x876/44a0770528c52936159477629ed9e0db/unnamed.jpg); it's a piece of work (not in a good way).
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Apparently, Pelosi was pretty much on her way to the airport when this dropped. Also, the Afghanistan part of the trip - to visit servicemen and women - was supposed to be secret.
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You should read the letter (https://cbsnews3.cbsistatic.com/hub/i/r/2019/01/17/78ffb93f-ecd8-4825-b431-8b5f1c858271/thumbnail/620x876/44a0770528c52936159477629ed9e0db/unnamed.jpg); it's a piece of work (not in a good way).
I'm looking 'even more forward' to seeing the video: taking a full minute to sign with his giant sharpie, then holding out his masterpiece for all corners of the room to see, beaming out his stupid man grin.
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You should read the letter (https://cbsnews3.cbsistatic.com/hub/i/r/2019/01/17/78ffb93f-ecd8-4825-b431-8b5f1c858271/thumbnail/620x876/44a0770528c52936159477629ed9e0db/unnamed.jpg); it's a piece of work (not in a good way).
Wow, he told her.
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Wow, he told her.
Pelosi's spokesperson replied. Said that the Brussels stop was a mandated crew rest stop, where the delegation would meet with key NATO allies (hmmmmmmmm) and then on to Afghanistan to meet commanders on the ground and honor those serving in a war zone, Egypt was't on the list, and Trump took a Republican delegation to Iraq over Christmas during the shutdown.
Meanwhile, the administration's boondoggle to hob-nob with the rich and even richer at Davos next week, is still on.
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Wow, he told her.
Only Trump would think he accomplished anything other than looking like a boob.
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Meanwhile, the administration's boondoggle to hob-nob with the rich and even richer at Davos next week, is still on.
...and a military jet took off just minutes ago to take the First Lady to Mar-a-fucking-Lago.
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Meanwhile, the administration's boondoggle to hob-nob with the rich and even richer at Davos next week, is still on.
Trump announced this, too, is canceled. We shall see.
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Buzzfeed has a story that claims Mueller has multiple witnesses, electronic communications and a cache of documents that prove Trump told Cohen to lie to Congress about Russia. That, ladies and gents, is a smoking gun. Suborning perjury is obstruction of justice 101, and they have Trump dead to rights on it. Obstruction was article 1 of both Nixon’s and Clinton’s impeachments.
As an aside, a likely in-the-know Amy Klobuchar got Trump’s pick for AG to testify under oath that suborning perjury is obstruction and thus a crime.
We’re in the endgame folks. Schff is all over this already (I bet Trump wishes Schiff was in Afghanistan right now) and the clarion call for impeachment proceedings to be initiated is loud and clear.
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We’re in the endgame folks. Schff is all over this already (I bet Trump wishes Schiff was in Afghanistan right now) and the clarion call for impeachment proceedings to be initiated is loud and clear.
Endgame, indeed. Chris Murphy (Connecticut Senator) tweeted this:
Listen, if Mueller does have multiple sources confirming Trump directed Cohen to lie to Congress, then we need to know this ASAP. Mueller shouldn't end his inquiry, but it's about time for him to show Congress his cards before it's too late for us to act.
Today should be fun.
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Also, Trump's first tweet after this breaking news:
Border rancher: “We’ve found prayer rugs out here. It’s unreal.” Washington Examiner People coming across the Southern Border from many countries, some of which would be a big surprise.
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Today should be fun.
I forgot to add that the Russia project involved Jr. and Ivanka, too. Yes, fun.
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And after reading his tweet, I'm reminded of Pink Floyd's The Wall. Pink has been building this wall around himself throughout the album, as Trump seems to be building his (imaginary) wall to shield him from his crumbling presidency.
From The Trial:
The evidence before the court is
Incontrovertible, there's no need for
The jury to retire
In all my years of judging
I have never heard before
Of someone more deserving
Of the full penalty of law
The way you made them suffer
Your [fellow citizens]
Fills me with the urge to defecate
Since, my friend, you have revealed your
Deepest fear
I sentence you to be exposed before
Your peers
Tear down the wall
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Oh yeah, and this week's cover of The New Yorker sort of adds to the imagery:
https://twitter.com/DylanByers/status/1086024969971064832
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Also, Trump's first tweet after this breaking news:
Prayer rugs? It took me a while to connect the supposed dots and reach Trump's desired conclusion, and I can only imagine the Texas rancher, looking at a rug out in the barren landscape and saying "Damn, that looks like the rugs I saw the last time I was at a mosque."
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Prayer rugs? It took me a while to connect the supposed dots and reach Trump's desired conclusion, and I can only imagine the Texas rancher, looking at a rug out in the barren landscape and saying "Damn, that looks like the rugs I saw the last time I was at a mosque."
Yes, and as Matthew Yglesias just tweeted:
Why do the terror migrants take their prayer rugs all the way to Mexico and then across the border only to abandon them in random ranches in Texas?
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I'm waiting to see if another outlet independently confirms the story before I trust the authority for the 20 best celebrity nip slips. WaPo, for example, will usually confirm news from other outlets with their own sources, but they didn't say anything as such in their article on the story.
I just hope that someone didn't shoot their wad on this and it turns out to be incorrect. In today's climate, that would probably translate to an approval rating bump for Trump.
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I'm waiting to see if another outlet independently confirms the story before I trust the authority for the 20 best celebrity nip slips.
We should at least wait until the National Enquirer weighs in on the story.
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We should at least wait until the National Enquirer weighs in on the story.
My initial thought was Waldo was looking for sources for the prayer rugs...I think he was looking for additional sources to Trump ordering Cohen to lie to congress.
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I'm waiting to see if another outlet independently confirms the story before I trust the authority for the 20 best celebrity nip slips. WaPo, for example, will usually confirm news from other outlets with their own sources, but they didn't say anything as such in their article on the story.
I just hope that someone didn't shoot their wad on this and it turns out to be incorrect. In today's climate, that would probably translate to an approval rating bump for Trump.
This IS a good point.
Anyway, Cohen is scheduled to testify February 7th. Congress is already stated to be looking into the accusations in the story, so we'll see.
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BuzzFeed’s news division is (shockingly) pretty good—they’re not McClatchy—but waiting for a second outlet to confirm the story is wise.
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Pelosi's Deputy Chief of Staff just revealed on Twitter that the delegation was prepared to fly commercial after Trump revoked the use of military aircraft to Afghanistan. This morning, the delegation learned the Administration leaked the commercial travel plans as well. The delegation has now decided to postpone the trip altogether.
Thread: https://twitter.com/Drew_Hammill/status/1086271188056399872
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Also, Trump's first tweet after this breaking news:
Yep, he's tweeting dubious, unattributed, news stories from the Washington Examiner, and also about Caravan 2.0.
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Yep, he's tweeting dubious, unattributed, news stories from the Washington Examiner, and also about Caravan 2.0.
Supposedly, the prayer rug thing was in the Sicario sequel. I only saw the first one.
https://twitter.com/mattyglesias/status/1086268116848517120
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BuzzFeed’s news division is (shockingly) pretty good—they’re not McClatchy—but waiting for a second outlet to confirm the story is wise.
Yeah, I was reading the head of investigative journalism at Buzzfeed News (Mark Schoofs) worked over a decade as an investigative journalist for The Wall Street Journal, then was a senior editor at ProPublica for a couple years (first online news organization to win a Pulitzer), before taking the job at Buzzfeed News.
Edit: And thanks, Wikipedia, for that info!
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BuzzFeed’s news division is (shockingly) pretty good—they’re not McClatchy—but waiting for a second outlet to confirm the story is wise.
Agreed but, in the meantime, one of the byline reporters went on CNN and said:
"I am rock solid. My sourcing on this goes beyond the two on the record. It's 100%."
The fact that the flying monkeybots are out in force trying to discredit the story and distract from it, suggests that TrumpWorld is worried about it. Also, the report states that Mueller had the evidence and Cohen confirmed it, not the other way around.
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Agreed but, in the meantime, one of the byline reporters went on CNN and said:
"I am rock solid. My sourcing on this goes beyond the two on the record. It's 100%."
The fact that the flying monkeybots are out in force trying to discredit the story and distract from it, suggests that TrumpWorld is worried about it. Also, the report states that Mueller had the evidence and Cohen confirmed it, not the other way around.
Meanwhile Trump has resumed his witness tampering by threatening Cohen's father in law again.
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Also, DNC reports Russians tried to hack them after the midterms:
https://abcnews.go.com/beta-story-container/Politics/dnc-alleges-targeted-phishing-attack-midterms-part-ongoing/story?id=60456187
Remember this:
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/05/15/technology/white-house-cybersecurity.html
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Another angle on the Buzzfeed story: if true, then this is also evidence of Russian kompromat on Trump. Trump was lying all along about Trump Tower Moscow, and instructed Cohen (and probably others) to lie to authorities about that. The Russians knew the truth, and so had this, at least, to hold over Trump. As the Moscow deal also involved Jr. and Ivanka, that stick had some weight to it.
Also, the fact that Mueller got to this from Trump Organisation texts, emails and a "cache of documents", we have to assume that he has a metric shit-ton of other stuff too. These aren't smart people, they're not used to dealing with grown ups, they cannot buy their way out of this*.
* The one thing that Trump has to offer, that politicians have used to get out of jail free through the ages, is resignation. "I will resign if you drop all charges." That worked even for Nixon, on the assumption that his pardon was pre-agreed. But even so, everyone but Nixon went to jail because they did not have the same high-value resignation to offer. In this case, many of those around Trump are family members, so he would have to cut a deal that would also absolve them, and for all of them this would have to extend down to all the state crimes, associated business crimes, Foundation crimes etc. etc.. That's a very unbalanced deal for prosecutors who have the lot of them dead to rights.
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In other news (remember the shutdown?)...
BREAKING: New York Federal Reserve President John Williams says shutdown could cut U.S. economic growth by 1 percentage point
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In other news (remember the shutdown?)...
BREAKING: New York Federal Reserve President John Williams says shutdown could cut U.S. economic growth by 1 percentage point
You forgot the #MAGA
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According to a NYT story last fall, one of the written questions to Trump from Mueller was, “What communication did you have with Michael D. Cohen, Felix Sater, and others, including foreign nationals, about Russian real estate developments during the campaign?”
Who else wants to see that answer?
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Watching some news this morning, the tap-dancing by TrumpWorld, around the simple question of whether Trump told Cohen to lie, is spectacular. This gives me hope that we're near the end because no one is prepared to be the last to die for an unjust cause. It's all non-denial denials a la Watergate. Even Trump won't flat-out deny it.
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Supposedly, the prayer rug thing was in the Sicario sequel. I only saw the first one.
https://twitter.com/mattyglesias/status/1086268116848517120
It's also recycled bullshit. Here's David Dewhurst making the same baseless claim (https://www.politifact.com/texas/statements/2014/oct/19/david-dewhurst/david-dewhurst-says-prayer-rugs-found-texas-brush-/) in 2014.
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It's also recycled bullshit. Here's David Dewhurst making the same baseless claim (https://www.politifact.com/texas/statements/2014/oct/19/david-dewhurst/david-dewhurst-says-prayer-rugs-found-texas-brush-/) in 2014.
One of those 2014 "prayer rugs" turned out to be a soccer shirt.
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Pelosi's Deputy Chief of Staff just revealed on Twitter that the delegation was prepared to fly commercial after Trump revoked the use of military aircraft to Afghanistan. This morning, the delegation learned the Administration leaked the commercial travel plans as well. The delegation has now decided to postpone the trip altogether.
Thread: https://twitter.com/Drew_Hammill/status/1086271188056399872
Reporting this morning says that the White House was seeking to put Pelosi "in her place".
It's important to note, however, how much of a self-own this was. Not only was there the issue of denying a plane to Pelosi while giving a plane to Melania to fly to their vacation home, there was the subsequent cancellation of the Davos boondoggle and, presumably, the continued denial (or hypocritical allowance) of administration travel by military flight. What about Individual Air Force One?
They. Are. So. Dumb.
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You forgot the #MAGA
Trump took care of it:
https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1086292025744474112
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Trump took care of it:
https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1086292025744474112
That all-caps Tweet only makes sense if he was screaming it when cornered by the Feds on, say, the Hoover Dam, before leaping into the roiling waters below.
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Watching some news this morning, the tap-dancing by TrumpWorld, around the simple question of whether Trump told Cohen to lie, is spectacular. This gives me hope that we're near the end because no one is prepared to be the last to die for an unjust cause. It's all non-denial denials a la Watergate. Even Trump won't flat-out deny it.
Video:
https://twitter.com/AlexThomasDC/status/1086295189944176640
Even the FoxNews host: "That was not a denial." Imagine a world where Trump actually begins to lose FoxNews.
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Video:
https://twitter.com/AlexThomasDC/status/1086295189944176640
Even the FoxNews host: "That was not a denial." Imagine a world where Trump actually begins to lose FoxNews.
Does Trump do everyone's hair now?
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That all-caps Tweet only makes sense if he was screaming it when cornered by the Feds on, say, the Hoover Dam, before leaping into the roiling waters below.
“That guy pulled a Peter Pan, right here off this dam.”
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That all-caps Tweet only makes sense if he was screaming it when cornered by the Feds on, say, the Hoover Dam, before leaping into the roiling waters below.
Also now can’t stop picturing him as Inspector Javert.
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Also now can’t stop picturing him as Inspector Javert.
Which makes me think of Russel Crowe singing, so fuck you!
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Which makes me think of Russel Crowe singing, so fuck you!
You mean Russel Crowe “singing”.
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Pelosi, when asked if she viewed the CODEC cancellation as payback for her SOTU letter:
“I would hope not. I don’t think the president would be that petty, do you?"
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And the news just keeps coming!
https://twitter.com/courtneyknorris/status/1086315657749319682
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Also, the report states that Mueller had the evidence and Cohen confirmed it, not the other way around.
This is very important in that it implies, as many of us have always suspected, that Mueller has an inconceivable amount of evidence that he has not disclosed, which makes the He hasn't found any evidence of wrongdoing so let's just wrap this up crowd appear even more idiotic than they normally would.
Also, Mueller alluded to this in the sentencing memo: "Cohen described the circumstances of preparing and circulating his response to the congressional inquiries, while continuing to accept responsibility for the false statements contained within it."
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Aeromexico's new ad is, well, pretty great:
https://twitter.com/ianbremmer/status/1085980480078598146
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This is very important in that it implies, as many of us have always suspected, that Mueller has an inconceivable amount of evidence that he has not disclosed, which makes the He hasn't found any evidence of wrongdoing so let's just wrap this up crowd appear even more idiotic than they normally would.
It also dusts the rebuttal that Cohen is a liar. There is evidence independent of him, so Cohen's corroboration is almost irrelevant.
Also, it's a little dodgy to tell someone to lie and then, when they tell people you told them to lie, you say "don't trust him, he's a liar."
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Wired just broke down the Cohen story (https://www.wired.com/story/trump-impeachment-mueller-cohen/). Detail in the article, but the main issues are:
1. Mueller has the receipts
2. The politics just changed in a big way
3. The obstruction case could be much bigger than Comey
4. The president's family is potentially in lots of legal trouble
5. Trump's incoming attorney general already said it's a crime
6. Trump's defense team is rattled
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Wow, that didn’t take long:
https://twitter.com/Evan_Rosenfeld/status/1086391477456883713
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
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Wow, that didn’t take long:
https://twitter.com/Evan_Rosenfeld/status/1086391477456883713
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
That is some Gene-Kelly-and-Donald-O’Connor level tap dancing.
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That is some Gene-Kelly-and-Donald-O’Connor level tap dancing.
It's more like drunk limbo (https://youtu.be/Fmi5S7V_LCc).
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"Major" Trump announcement tomorrow at 3pm ET concerning the "Humanitarian" crisis at the border and the shutdown.
Any guesses?
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Not a guess, but it’s going to be self-serving and disingenuous.
Interesting how his continual spewing of shit has noticeably weakened him. For example, few seem to care about his major “announcement” on this most pressing issue. His relevance is waning.
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"Major" Trump announcement tomorrow at 3pm ET concerning the "Humanitarian" crisis at the border and the shutdown.
Any guesses?
I’ll bet all the money in my pocket he declares a
State of Emergency.
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
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RUH ROH:
https://twitter.com/BuzzFeedNews/status/1086419880025284608
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Yep, and: https://twitter.com/RonanFarrow/status/1086425618802241536
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Ronan Farrow? Never knew he was viewed as knowledgeable on this.
At any rate, Mueller’s statement is pretty damn vague and can be read various ways, at least by a non lawyer like me. Breaking those clauses out into separate sentences would help. Does “regarding MC’s Congressional testimony” apply to both of the things preceding it? For that matter, after finally reading the article, I’m having trouble squaring just what part of it would fit as “specific statements to the SC’s office.”
At any rate, concluding that Mueller is saying “Trump didn’t direct MC to lie” might be an erroneous conclusion to draw from this statement.
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And just like that, even if only a little bit, Trump’s “enemy of the people” rhetoric has been validated in his mind and the minds of those who support him.
Fucking Buzzfeed. What a worthless piece of shit web site.
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Ronan Farrow? Never knew he was viewed as knowledgeable on this.
At any rate, Mueller’s statement is pretty damn vague and can be read various ways, at least by a non lawyer like me. Breaking those clauses out into separate sentences would help. Does “regarding MC’s Congressional testimony” apply to both of the things preceding it? For that matter, after finally reading the article, I’m having trouble squaring just what part of it would fit as “specific statements to the SC’s office.”
At any rate, concluding that Mueller is saying “Trump didn’t direct MC to lie” might be an erroneous conclusion to draw from this statement.
It’s intentionally vague. “Some of the BuzzFeed report is wrong, but we’re not saying which parts.”
ETA: it also pretty clearly means substantial parts of the report are incorrect. I don’t think they’d put out this statement over a minor inaccuracy.
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Some of the dossier is wrong, but most of it is correct.
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And just like that, even if only a little bit, Trump’s “enemy of the people” rhetoric has been validated in his mind and the minds of those who support him.
Fucking Buzzfeed. What a worthless piece of shit web site.
You warned everyone.
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Some of the dossier is wrong, but most of it is correct.
The way I see it, Buzzfeed was wrong enough, or they were wrong on important-enough details, that it took less than 24 hours to get a fairly rare rebuke from Mueller. And them standing by their reporting is worth nothing when a spokesman for the investigation itself is calling their claims into question, however cryptically.
The way to combat the #fakenews idiots is to dot every i, cross every t, and make sure that you are completely factual in your reporting. As skeptical as I was after the initial article, I became even more so when WaPo made no claims to its veracity by confirming with their own sources, and as far as I could tell the NYT didn’t even run the story.
So what do we have now? Perception is reality. Go look on Twitter and you’ll see that Trump supporters are claiming a decisive victory against fake news, and I’m finding it hard to disagree with them. It doesn’t even matter how good or bad of a news outlet Buzzfeed News is (although some of you here were lending them more than a little credibility).
“We” need to be more careful.
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Nah. Good outlets are still going to get things wrong. Even the most careful ones. I promise you, there is no level of “careful” that will convince the other side that a media organization is credible if it reports a story critical of Trump.
An outlet gets a story wrong and “we” decide “ah fuck, can’t trust them ever again.” An outlet in a different media bubble reports shit like prayer rugs in the desert and its readers think “yes, this is the truth.” This is a losing game.
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I understand people are embarrassed as this doesn’t appear to be an unarguable article of impeachment and more significantly, that they have to take shit off Trump supporters. However, it’s more like a 13-1 loss to your rivals in a season where your team is breezing to an eventual championship.
Besides, who thinks Trump telling folks to lie is high on his list of misdeeds.
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Those are fair points. I still hate it though. Every misstep like this proves them right all along in their own minds, and I’d rather not let them have scoreboard at all.
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I don't see where the statement the OSC put out gives any reason to believe that the president did not either directly or through an intermediary instruct Cohen to lie to congress. Again, they alluded to this in the sentencing memo. I think that the OSC had to release a statement taking issue with the Buzzfeed News report because it had to establish immediately that the leak did not come from them but from the SDNY. The OSC cannot give the office of the AG any reason to force the closure of the investigation, and the perception that the OSC is leaking privileged information would certainly be such a reason.
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I don't see where the statement the OSC put out gives any reason to believe that the president did not either directly or through an intermediary instruct Cohen to lie to congress. Again, they alluded to this in the sentencing memo. I think that the OSC had to release a statement taking issue with the Buzzfeed News report because it had to establish immediately that the leak did not come from them but from the SDNY. The OSC cannot give the office of the AG any reason to force the closure of the investigation, and the perception that the OSC is leaking privileged information would certainly be such a reason.
Buzzfeed has reiterated its reporting, stands by it, and has asked the SCO to qualify what they believe is inaccurate. I hope they’re right and Mueller is merely trying to control the narrative so that he can do his work in his own order and time.
The adage about coming for the King is apt here.
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I think that the OSC had to release a statement taking issue with the Buzzfeed News report because it had to establish immediately that the leak did not come from them but from the SDNY. The OSC cannot give the office of the AG any reason to force the closure of the investigation, and the perception that the OSC is leaking privileged information would certainly be such a reason.
Bingo (https://www.emptywheel.net/2019/01/19/peter-carr-speaks/).
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A bit of background on the OSC’s statement
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/inside-the-mueller-teams-decision-to-dispute-buzzfeeds-explosive-story-on-trump-and-cohen/2019/01/19/d89dba5b-fa0f-445b-9fd3-72f0e911e28d_story.html?utm_term=.3ca60701298e (https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/inside-the-mueller-teams-decision-to-dispute-buzzfeeds-explosive-story-on-trump-and-cohen/2019/01/19/d89dba5b-fa0f-445b-9fd3-72f0e911e28d_story.html?utm_term=.3ca60701298e)
The reporter informed Mueller’s spokesman, Peter Carr, that he and a colleague had “a story coming stating that Michael Cohen was directed by President Trump himself to lie to Congress about his negotiations related to the Trump Moscow project,” according to copies of their emails provided by a BuzzFeed spokesman. Importantly, the reporter made no reference to the special counsel’s office specifically or evidence that Mueller’s investigators had uncovered.
We’ll decline to comment,” Carr responded, a familiar refrain for those in the media who cover Mueller’s work
The gist of the story didn’t seem to bother the OSC, but they objected when they realized it was attributed to testimony given to or obtained by the OSC. Their lack of shooting down the initial pitch doesn’t make it true, but it was interesting.
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The symbolism of the wall was laid bare when those MAGA hat-wearing douches chanted “Build the Wall!” at Vietnam veteran Nathan Phillips...who is Native American. It’s not about immigration, security or even drugs, it’s about white power.
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Giuliani says that Trump May have spoken to Cohen about his testimony, but “So what?”
Link (https://thehill.com/homenews/administration/426202-guiliani-says-trump-might-have-talked-to-cohen-about-his-testimony-so?amp&__twitter_impression=true)
Yep. We’re definitely getting towards the end.
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Damn, just saw Rudy with Tapper. Rudy is a fucking train wreck. Frantically claiming this and that, all while likely implicating himself and Trump in more shit. Dude is a lunatic, braying out a lunatic defense.
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Damn, just saw Rudy with Tapper. Rudy is a fucking train wreck. Frantically claiming this and that, all while likely implicating himself and Trump in more shit. Dude is a lunatic, braying out a lunatic defense.
We also know that Trump signed the Moscow Tower letter of intent in October 2015, while Trump Jr. told Congress that it died of "deal fatigue" in 2014. This is the crux of it all: Trump wanted his tower in Moscow - by far the biggest deal of his real estate career - and he was willing to go along with what the Kremlin wanted in order to get it. This is why Manafort came on board as the unpaid campaign chairman, despite him being out of US politics for decades and up to his eyeballs in debt. This is why Manafort was giving the Russians internal polling data and Deripaska personal briefings on the campaign.
This is the crime at the heart of the entire thing - the corrupt quid pro quo to get a tower in Moscow - that they're all lying about to cover up.
I heard it described as the plot of "The Producers": Trump's campaign wasn't meant to be successful, it was just to fuck with Hilary and the U.S., he'd lose, get his tower and no one would care beyond November 2016. But he won, and in doing so, brought upon the entire criminal enterprise the klieg-lit scrutiny that comes with being President. They've been flailing ever since because they - including the Russians - never really tried to cover their tracks.
The big difference is that the Russians don't care if they get caught - it's almost like that was part of the strategy so that everyone knew that they did this to us and there's nothing we can do about it. TrumpWorld, however, will end up in jail because of it, and the Russians don't care about that either.
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The symbolism of the wall was laid bare when those MAGA hat-wearing douches chanted “Build the Wall!” at Vietnam veteran Nathan Phillips...who is Native American. It’s not about immigration, security or even drugs, it’s about white power.
You stepped in some fake news.
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You stepped in some fake news.
How so?
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The symbolism of the wall was laid bare when those MAGA hat-wearing douches chanted “Build the Wall!” at Vietnam veteran Nathan Phillips...who is Native American. It’s not about immigration, security or even drugs, it’s about white power.
The media may have jumped to conclusions with the narrative of events here.
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/nathan-phillips-nick-sandmann-encounter-a-viral-video-shows-a-different-side/ar-BBSwz7n?li=BBnb7Kz
https://www.yahoo.com/news/student-trump-hat-denies-mocking-native-american-activist-032440995.html
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The media may have jumped to conclusions with the narrative of events here.
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/nathan-phillips-nick-sandmann-encounter-a-viral-video-shows-a-different-side/ar-BBSwz7n?li=BBnb7Kz
https://www.yahoo.com/news/student-trump-hat-denies-mocking-native-american-activist-032440995.html
One can argue that wearing the MAGA hats in the first place was antagonistic in and of itself. However, my only comment on the matter was that chanting "Build the Wall!" to a Native American (or even African Americans who may have thrown verbal insults previously) simply shows that the wall is about racism, not security. A wall, at any time during known history, would not keep out someone born here or someone dragged here in chains.
The accusation that I "stepped in some fake news" is a weak jab at a point I was not making.
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One can argue that wearing the MAGA hats in the first place was antagonistic in and of itself. However, my only comment on the matter was that chanting "Build the Wall!" to a Native American (or even African Americans who may have thrown verbal insults previously) simply shows that the wall is about racism, not security. A wall, at any time during known history, would not keep out someone born here or someone dragged here in chains.
The accusation that I "stepped in some fake news" is a weak jab at a point I was not making.
You can watch the video(s) and see that it wasn't said by anyone.
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Trump yesterday.
Everybody knows that walls work. If you look at different places they put up a wall -- no problem. If you look at San Antonio, if you look at so many different places, they go from one of the most unsafe cities in the country to one of the safest cities immediately. Immediately. It works. We have to put them up and we will put them up. We got to.
Umm...
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You can watch the video(s) and see that it wasn't said by anyone.
You can watch a video from a single smartphone, or you can watch the interview with Nathan Phillips (https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/jan/20/outcry-after-kentucky-students-in-maga-hats-mock-native-american-veteran) where he wipes away tears as he tells of hearing kids say "build that wall" to him.
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One can argue that wearing the MAGA hats in the first place was antagonistic in and of itself. However, my only comment on the matter was that chanting "Build the Wall!" to a Native American (or even African Americans who may have thrown verbal insults previously) simply shows that the wall is about racism, not security. A wall, at any time during known history, would not keep out someone born here or someone dragged here in chains.
The accusation that I "stepped in some fake news" is a weak jab at a point I was not making.
Did they chant "Build the Wall"? There's a 2 hour video of the incident. The more recent articles imply that in this 2 hour video it wasn't said.
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Did they chant "Build the Wall"? There's a 2 hour video of the incident. The more recent articles imply that in this 2 hour video it wasn't said.
Nathan Phillips claimed it was said to him as he walked through the crowd. So, not chanted as was reported (and I repeated here). The sentiment still applies, that the wall is a metaphor for racism, San Antonio be damned.
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Apropos nothing, President Trump has no official activities scheduled today.
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Nathan Phillips claimed it was said to him as he walked through the crowd. So, not chanted as was reported (and I repeated here). The sentiment still applies, that the wall is a metaphor for racism, San Antonio be damned.
Appreciate you clearing it up as originally stated. Now, I'm not saying it didn't happen some other time, but the video is clear that as Phillips approached the boys and as they stood facing each other there was no chanting about the wall. I've seen nothing showing that it did happen.
As far as your statement that the wall is a metaphor for racism...That's a broad brush you're painting with. I'm for building a wall. Not at the stakes of the government shutdown as is now happening. (I'm additionally annoyed that last years budget towards the wall was unused)
Could the wall be used by some with racist intent? Absolutely! Guess my point is that if the boys were chanting build the wall while at DC, I don't see any need to point to racism. If the boys confronted Mr Phillips and chanted build the wall, then yea, that's indefensibly racist...and would show gross ignorance.
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Appreciate you clearing it up as originally stated. Now, I'm not saying it didn't happen some other time, but the video is clear that as Phillips approached the boys and as they stood facing each other there was no chanting about the wall. I've seen nothing showing that it did happen.
As far as your statement that the wall is a metaphor for racism...That's a broad brush you're painting with. I'm for building a wall. Not at the stakes of the government shutdown as is now happening. (I'm additionally annoyed that last years budget towards the wall was unused)
Could the wall be used by some with racist intent? Absolutely! Guess my point is that if the boys were chanting build the wall while at DC, I don't see any need to point to racism. If the boys confronted Mr Phillips and chanted build the wall, then yea, that's indefensibly racist...and would show gross ignorance.
I am curious, what purpose do you think the wall serves for it to garner your support?
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As far as your statement that the wall is a metaphor for racism...That's a broad brush you're painting with. I'm for building a wall. Not at the stakes of the government shutdown as is now happening. (I'm additionally annoyed that last years budget towards the wall was unused)
Could the wall be used by some with racist intent? Absolutely! Guess my point is that if the boys were chanting build the wall while at DC, I don't see any need to point to racism. If the boys confronted Mr Phillips and chanted build the wall, then yea, that's indefensibly racist...and would show gross ignorance.
Are you just like “for the wall” or chanting “build that wall”?
To me, the wall is like the confederate flag, some people might honestly say that it’s not a racist symbol to them, but certainly can’t convince me that it’s not a racist symbol to many. Similarly, if the wall isn’t a racist symbol and it’s just about border security, why mention the wall at all and not first recognize that border crossings are at recent historical lows. Then after acknowledging that FACT, discuss why its so pressing that a wall is at the center of our national discourse.
After that, discuss why we need to shut down the government to discuss border security.
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After that, discuss why we need to shut down the government to discuss border security.
Lest we forget, there's also the elephant in the room about Mexico paying for it.
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I am curious, what purpose do you think the wall serves for it to garner your support?
I'm against a wall but I think it would serve as a metaphor for fighting windmills in one's head.
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To me, the wall is like the confederate flag, some people might honestly say that it’s not a racist symbol to them, but certainly can’t convince me that it’s not a racist symbol to many.
I encourage anyone who feels this way about Confederate iconography to read Battle Cry of Freedom. Actually, I encourage everyone to read Battle Cry of Freedom.
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Lest we forget, there's also the elephant in the room about Mexico paying for it.
Do you think Trump's supporters will care if the wall is built and Mexico doesn't pay for it?
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Do you think Trump's supporters will care if the wall is built and Mexico doesn't pay for it?
Not a whit.
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Do you think Trump's supporters will care if the wall is built and Mexico doesn't pay for it?
They should, because it was a symbiotic promise that Trump would build a wall and Mexico would pay for it.
And everyone else does, which is why the government is currently shut down because we won't pay for the wall that Trump promised Mexico would pay for, so he's holding hostage the paychecks of 800,000 government workers, plus the well-being of those who rely on government services, plus the livelihoods of all those businesses who make a living by providing services to the government and the people who work for it. It's cost a half-point in growth already, and it's barely a month old.
Still, MAGA, eh?
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They should, because it was a symbiotic promise that Trump would build a wall and Mexico would pay for it.
And everyone else does, which is why the government is currently shut down because we won't pay for the wall that Trump promised Mexico would pay for.
Should? Did he pinky swear? Well, then it doesn't count.
The government shutdown is not about money.
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Should? Did he pinky swear? Well, then it doesn't count.
The government shutdown is not about money.
He didn't pinky-swear to build the wall, either, so why all the fuss?
If the shutdown is not about money, what is it about?
Also, why was this not taken care of during the two years of unified Republican control of government?
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He didn't pinky-swear to build the wall, either, so why all the fuss?
If the shutdown is not about money, what is it about?
Also, why was this not taken care of during the two years of unified Republican control of government?
Your projection onto Trump supporters about how they should feel is a pointless exercise.
The shutdown is about politics.
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Should? Did he pinky swear? Well, then it doesn't count.
The government shutdown is not about money.
“But he said Mexico would pay!” is the dumbest fucking line. I think about it this way: if some Democratic candidate ran on “we’re doing Medicare for All and we’ll make the health insurance CEOs pay for it,” would I give half a shit about the second part? Of course I wouldn’t.
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Are you just like “for the wall” or chanting “build that wall”?
I'm for the wall. I have never and have no reason to chant build that wall. If someone wants to waste their breath chanting about it, that's up to them.
To me, the wall is like the confederate flag, some people might honestly say that it’s not a racist symbol to them, but certainly can’t convince me that it’s not a racist symbol to many. Similarly, if the wall isn’t a racist symbol and it’s just about border security, why mention the wall at all and not first recognize that border crossings are at recent historical lows. Then after acknowledging that FACT, discuss why its so pressing that a wall is at the center of our national discourse.
It's multi-factoral that border crossings have dropped. Some of it could be lent to perception of a tougher immigration policy of Trump compared to Obama. March of last year they were up again...
https://thehill.com/homenews/administration/381796-border-crossings-increased-in-march-after-falling-to-historic-low
After that, discuss why we need to shut down the government to discuss border security.
Are you asking me to discuss this?
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I am curious, what purpose do you think the wall serves for it to garner your support?
To be clear, I don't just give outright support for building a wall at any cost. I don't support the government shutdown for the wall (I agree that the government shutdown is more than just the wall).
I support immigration. I do not support masses of illegals coming into the country. I am glad that there was a wall and border security to uphold the laws of the land in San Diego (Let's not delve into the shooting tear gas canisters please) with one of the more recent caravans. This same caravan busted through the northern border of Mexico. They for the most part were unsuccessful in San Diego.
I am for a longer more budgetary sustainable building of walls along the border. Yea, this would be done over a longer period of time.
Does that help?
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The symbolism of the wall was laid bare when those MAGA hat-wearing douches chanted “Build the Wall!” at Vietnam veteran Nathan Phillips...who is Native American. It’s not about immigration, security or even drugs, it’s about white power.
I wondering what the importance/relevance is of Nathan being a Viet Nam veteran. Is it to give cachet to his persona or is it as a multiplier of the social disability he suffers on account of his race?
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To be clear, I don't just give outright support for building a wall at any cost. I don't support the government shutdown for the wall (I agree that the government shutdown is more than just the wall).
I support immigration. I do not support masses of illegals coming into the country. I am glad that there was a wall and border security to uphold the laws of the land in San Diego (Let's not delve into the shooting tear gas canisters please) with one of the more recent caravans. This same caravan busted through the northern border of Mexico. They for the most part were unsuccessful in San Diego.
I am for a longer more budgetary sustainable building of walls along the border. Yea, this would be done over a longer period of time.
Does that help?
I helps me understand your support, sure. Thanks.
A couple of things to unpack here, though.
Illegal entry is at a near 50-year low, it's been at net zero (entries and exits) for a while now. Security in general - electronic surveillance, border patrols, drones etc. - is one of the main reasons why illegal entry currently is so low. The smart play is more of that, rather than trying to build a wall that is far less effective than the techniques currently deployed. Democrats are fine having a budget discussion to fund border security, and have voted consistently for years to fund administration budget requests - including the one Trump made in 2017 (that he hasn't entirely spent yet).
The caravan isn't illegal entry; it's refugees seeking legal asylum. US and international law allows them to cross into the country without documentation as long as they present themselves to the authorities to have their claim validated or rejected. In 2017, the acceptance rate was 20%, so it's not like it's an EZ Pass into the country. But, to be clear, even if they walk through the desert or swim the Rio Grand, as long as they present themselves for asylum, that entry is legal. What the caravans are doing is legal, under US law. Legal.
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Your projection onto Trump supporters about how they should feel is a pointless exercise.
On this we agree - probably for different reasons, though.
The shutdown is about politics.
On this we agree - probably for different reasons, though.
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I wondering what the importance/relevance is of Nathan being a Viet Nam veteran. Is it to give cachet to his persona or is it as a multiplier of the social disability he suffers on account of his race?
He went to war for this country. That earns him deference from those of us who haven't.
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It's multi-factoral that border crossings have dropped. Some of it could be lent to perception of a tougher immigration policy of Trump compared to Obama. March of last year they were up again...
https://thehill.com/homenews/administration/381796-border-crossings-increased-in-march-after-falling-to-historic-low
Yes, it's multi-factorial but, if it were Trump's immigration stance, we wouldn't be seeing an increase last March. It's due to increased border security, improvements in technology and increased deportations. Obama deported more people than any previous President, for example.
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Yes, it's multi-factorial but, if it were Trump's immigration stance, we wouldn't be seeing an increase last March. It's due to increased border security, improvements in technology and increased deportations. Obama deported more people than any previous President, for example.
I agree with what you wrote...I think the initial decrease was due to perception though.
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He went to war for this country. That earns him deference from those of us who haven't.
Deference for being a vet, not for being a drum circle reject.
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Illegal entry is at a near 50-year low, it's been at net zero (entries and exits) for a while now.
Before I get to your other points can you help me with the above? I can't understand how we could have usable data on illegal entry. Illegal entry would be undocumented, right?
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I encourage anyone who feels this way about Confederate iconography to read Battle Cry of Freedom. Actually, I encourage everyone to read Battle Cry of Freedom.
You're defending usage and display of that flag? How does a book that discusses the two decades leading up to the Civil War and the war itself and not the 150+ years of racism and terrorism since make you feel comfortable with said iconography?
If I read the book, am I supposed to feel differently about slavery afterwards?
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Before I get to your other points can you help me with the above? I can't understand how we could have usable data on illegal entry. Illegal entry would be undocumented, right?
Pew Research lays out their methodology here (http://www.pewhispanic.org/2018/11/27/unauthorized-immigration-estimate-methodology/); says it's very similar to that used by the DHS.
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You're defending usage and display of that flag? How does a book that discusses the two decades leading up to the Civil War and the war itself and not the 150+ years of racism and terrorism since make you feel comfortable with said iconography?
If I read the book, am I supposed to feel differently about slavery afterwards?
Exactly the opposite—I meant if anyone feels the way jbm described ("it's not racist to me").
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Pew Research lays out their methodology here (http://www.pewhispanic.org/2018/11/27/unauthorized-immigration-estimate-methodology/); says it's very similar to that used by the DHS.
Thanks Limey. Reading through it now...It certainly is not a simple methodology that was used.
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The most fascinating component of this episode to me, by far, is the nutjob community's declaring the horrified reactions of normal people to the initial videos FAKE NEWS! It doesn't take great effort to find examples of this. Indeed, we've seen it in this thread more than once.
It fascinates me that these people would point to a video and then distort what it plainly, inarguably shows in order to pervert the fact that these little maga shitheads in their mob mentality mocked and attempted to intimidate and humiliate an elderly Native American man.
It doesn't surprise me that the nutjob community would seek to pervert reality. That is what they do all day, every day. What amazes me (and probably shouldn't) is that they will point to a video that shows one thing and claim that it shows something entirely the opposite.
Again, one can hardly be surprised at this. Their false idol is after all a fellow who said "What you're seeing is not what's happening." Their world view is impregnable by fact. It's really something. Show them recent immigration statistics and trends, show them that there already IS a wall, show them that huge amounts of funding for border security have been unspent, etc. - BUILD THE WALL!
The reason this is so interesting to me is that this is precisely what we're going to see when Trump's corruption and criminality are brought out into the light whether it happens via Mueller, Congress, the SDNY, other areas of law enforcement... Those of us living in reality will see evidence and witness many convictions and so on, much more than what we've already seen, and the Trump monkeys will scream FAKE NEWS!
That's another thing I often chuckle at, now that I mention it, their hilarious misappropriation of the term fake news. but that's a rant for another day. For now I'm going to go back to somber contemplation of some of Mike Pence's favorite MLK quotations.
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Deference for being a vet, not for being a drum circle reject.
Most Viet Nam vets I know (and I know plenty) would be appalled that a direct action they took in exercising their legal right to protest might lead to injury or harm to another person. In fact, an innocent person. It defeats what "defending this country" is all about. You have a right to protest, that is what vets go fight for... our freedoms. But just like you don't have a "right" to yell "FIRE" in a crowded cinema, you don't have a "right" to embellish a narrative because you want to either protect your involvement "as an adult" in the situation or you just can't keep your story straight. The incident has sparked *others* to take up the cause of Mr. Phillips and provide their own kind of justice/karma and they have targeted young men for injury and harm. Repeat: threats of injury and harm are now the result of a false narrative.
As humanitarian as we want to be towards others, we should practice the same for all... cap or no cap. Else you have *NO* "right" to stand on.
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Repeat: threats of injury and harm are now the result of a false narrative.
Amazing.
Actually, not at all amazing.
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For now I'm going to go back to somber contemplation of some of Mike Pence's favorite MLK quotations.
For the record, Trump and Pence made an unannounced pit stop at the MLK memorial today. I call it a pit stop because it was fast enough to make any NASCAR pit crew proud. Less than 2 minutes in actuality, which is enough time for Mike Pence to run through his favorite MLK quotes.
Further, when Pence was saying "Now is the time to make real the promises of democracy", I thought he meant that he was going to oust Trump and put Hillary in in Oval Office. She got 3 million more votes than did Trump, so what's more democratic than that?
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Also, yay! Benghazi (https://thehill.com/homenews/senate/426249-graham-angers-dems-by-digging-into-clinton-obama-controversies)!
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Amazing.
Actually, not at all amazing.
BTW - I do not believe that narratives that quickly "go to press" (sorta speak) are generally about political leanings. It is about being *first* in the now very competitive world of journalism/reporting. Blogging is considered source material now as is any tweet that comes down the twitter pipe. Responsible reporting versus being first is being blurred to the point that it is only about being first. An act now verify later approach is far too common these days and the fact that reports put people in harms way probably should not amaze us any more. That is why leaking information to the press is such a good game to play because the sharks will circle that bait every time. It's the world we live in.
People want to believe they are being told factual truth at every turn rather than reading what someone wants to spread over the reporting mediums first, fact checking be damned with a grain of salt or at minimum restraint. Perhaps a good rule of thumb is for the reading public to have a 24 hour delay button at the ready similar to the media's 7 second delay on radio and television. But still won't stop *other* media to jump on-board quickly to avoid being left behind the parade marching down the street. All this does not have left or right leaning because both get harmed equally.
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For now I'm going to go back to somber contemplation of some of Mike Pence's favorite MLK quotations.
In an apparent reaction to being criticized for doing nothing for MLK day, Trump and Pence are hustled to the MLK Memorial by a throng of security, spend two minutes in silence as a wreath is laid by someone else, then are quickly hustled out.
It’s not a slap against MLK per se, as his indecency extends to almost all who should be honored. The exception is Lincoln, who Trump honors for the fact that Lincoln might have done more for the country than Trump. Might have.
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I helps me understand your support, sure. Thanks.
A couple of things to unpack here, though.
Illegal entry is at a near 50-year low, it's been at net zero (entries and exits) for a while now. Security in general - electronic surveillance, border patrols, drones etc. - is one of the main reasons why illegal entry currently is so low. The smart play is more of that, rather than trying to build a wall that is far less effective than the techniques currently deployed. Democrats are fine having a budget discussion to fund border security, and have voted consistently for years to fund administration budget requests - including the one Trump made in 2017 (that he hasn't entirely spent yet).
The caravan isn't illegal entry; it's refugees seeking legal asylum. US and international law allows them to cross into the country without documentation as long as they present themselves to the authorities to have their claim validated or rejected. In 2017, the acceptance rate was 20%, so it's not like it's an EZ Pass into the country. But, to be clear, even if they walk through the desert or swim the Rio Grand, as long as they present themselves for asylum, that entry is legal. What the caravans are doing is legal, under US law. Legal.
That's all true. Although, the US and international laws were written with far different circumstances in mind than the country is currently facing. The current laws were established with the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965. This was originally set up for the dangers of Communist regimes and state sponsored ethnic cleansing. This act was to be a guide for assigning refugee or asylum status.
According to the act refugees are processed outside the US. The reason asylum seekers were allowed in and remained to stay until the claim is processed is for the real dangers that could happen if they return to their country of origin. As a government we are now struggling with a new situation that the original act never intended to mitigate.
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The exception is Lincoln, who Trump honors for the fact that Lincoln might have done more for the country than Trump. Might have.
Well, Abraham Lincoln is an example of somebody who's done an amazing job that is being recognized more and more, I notice.
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Well, Abraham Lincoln is an example of somebody who's done an amazing job that is being recognized more and more, I notice.
Yet there are some who beg to differ on what role Lincoln played, for instance, in the emancipation of slaves. He was more of an opportunist than a leader. In the minds of some, Lincoln was still a racist white man who decided it was in his own interest to ride the train of emancipation (http://www.abrahamlincolnonline.org/lincoln/news/bennett.htm)because it was politically astute to do so.
Since I've studied the Civil War (purely as an amateur) and done some exploration of Civil War sites and talked to many park rangers and alike, the opinion on Lincoln is varied and in some cases very strong. But I've come to my own conclusion that Lincoln was very sincere in his desire to "save the union" and preserve what was the great experiment in democracy that the fore fathers dreamt of. And yes, I believe that he believed it was time to finish the job the fore fathers did not address, and that was that "all men were created equal". It could not have been for any other reason that Lincoln took up such a monumental task to continue our countries destiny as what we set it out to be.
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As humanitarian as we want to be towards others, we should practice the same for all... cap or no cap. Else you have *NO* "right" to stand on.
Ah yes, the cap. Some see it as just the expression of a (perhaps unpopular) political view. But for many it's come to be seen as a representation of hate and oppression and most especially a lack of humanitarianism. The culture at Covington Catholic also seems to be more than problematic with a number of stories surfacing of bullying of gays and others. So yes there's a learning experience here but I'm not quite sure folks have quite grasped the totality of it if the takeaway is simply "oh how mean people on twitter were to those Covington kids".
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Ah yes, the cap. Some see it as just the expression of a (perhaps unpopular) political view.
By a young man who is what, 16 years of age? That allows adults to confront them? If I were to go around and use my opinion on proper dress code for young people, I would fear what I would do to young men who wear their pants around their ankles. They're kids for goodness sake. We seem to forget we were young once.
But for many it's come to be seen as a representation of hate and oppression and most especially a lack of humanitarianism.
True. But does not give anyone license to confront them with their own morality. I would not confront a Crip or a Blood because their headwear represent violence and think for a minute I was doing anything of any good. Most of the people who work with those young people tell you that it is best to walk away and let them handle situations involving these young people.
The culture at Covington Catholic also seems to be more than problematic with a number of stories surfacing of bullying of gays and others.
Hands up if at your high school a gay student was bullied? How about a fat person or a person with a mohawk or a person with... you get the drill. There is no such thing as a high school with "zero tolerance" about bullying. It happens and you do the best you can to make sure your child knows they can come to you at any point and time with any situation that calls for talking about being picked on because you're different. I have two sons who were bullied in high school, both of them severely. I talked to both the vice-principle and principle at their school and both said "well maybe your son provoked it by.... ". Tell me a school that doesn't have a bullying problem and I'll tell you that is a school that is lying to you.
So yes there's a learning experience here but I'm not quite sure folks have quite grasped the totality of it if the takeaway is simply "oh how mean people on twitter were to those Covington kids".
Mean on twitter is not the issue. This isn't Trevor Bauer picking on an Astros fan. This is people wanting to harm innocent people for something they did not do. In the spirit of MLK, he said "I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character." Seems to me, people were willing to hurt these young men based on 15 seconds of video and the word of a man who misrepresented what went on during a confrontation. Perhaps to avoid being bullys ourselves, we should learn to not allow our prejudce over a stupid cap to drive us to the dark side of us and yet rather look to the better angels of our nature.
And least anyone think so, I'm not a Trump supporter nor ever will be. But I'm not going to let my less than favorable impression of this man drive me to lose my own dignity.
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That's all true. Although, the US and international laws were written with far different circumstances in mind than the country is currently facing. The current laws were established with the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965. This was originally set up for the dangers of Communist regimes and state sponsored ethnic cleansing. This act was to be a guide for assigning refugee or asylum status.
According to the act refugees are processed outside the US. The reason asylum seekers were allowed in and remained to stay until the claim is processed is for the real dangers that could happen if they return to their country of origin. As a government we are now struggling with a new situation that the original act never intended to mitigate.
Asylum seekers have been returned to Honduras, and killed shortly thereafter. They’re not fleeing regime violence, but they are fleeing violence.
"Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!"
If we start parsing such values, we destroy them.
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Seems to me, people were willing to hurt these young men based on 15 seconds of video and the word of a man who misrepresented what went on during a confrontation.
He didn't misrepresent anything. Quit lying.
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He didn't misrepresent anything. Quit lying.
Tell me what he said and did and what is now being reported as not being true then.
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Wait, you’re saying the man is misrepresenting the encounter. Why are you asking others to cite the specifics of what you’re claiming?
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Wait, you’re saying the man is misrepresenting the encounter. Why are you asking others to cite the specifics of what you’re claiming?
He made a statement that *I* am lying. Tell me where I lied. You just can't call someone a liar and walk away without proving your statement... unless, of course, you can't prove it. Simple.
Go ahead since you jumped in, where am *I* lying?
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By a young man who is what, 16 years of age? That allows adults to confront them?
True. But does not give anyone license to confront them with their own morality.
Personally, I think it's an abdication of moral responsibility to not confront those who are wearing symbols of hate. But maybe that's just me.
Perhaps to avoid being bullys ourselves, we should learn to not allow our prejudice over a stupid cap to drive us to the dark side of us and yet rather look to the better angels of our nature.
I'd like to think that I am looking to the "better angels of our nature" by speaking out about the prejudice represented by the cap.
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Personally, I think it's an abdication of moral responsibility to not confront those who are wearing symbols of hate. But maybe that's just me.
Fair enough.
I'd like to think that I am looking to the "better angels of our nature" by speaking out about the prejudice represented by the cap.
Again, very fair. But violence being justified? I personally do not have that threshold. For example, if I'm pro-lifer (ardent) do I justify groups that advocate violence against doctors because we hold similar views on life? I would hope not, it's not that clear cut. I would distance myself from those prone to violence (*righteous indignation*) because they think the other person deserves it.
It's just not right.
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He made a statement that *I* am lying. Tell me where I lied. You just can't call someone a liar and walk away without proving your statement... unless, of course, you can't prove it. Simple.
Go ahead since you jumped in, where am *I* lying?
You said, or implied, that this man misrepresented his encounter with the students. Seems to follow that you have examples of that misrepresentation. I’m curious as I’ve heard that the story is larger and more nuanced than this man and the students, but I haven’t heard that he misrepresented anything.
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Personally, I think it's an abdication of moral responsibility to not confront those who are wearing symbols of hate. But maybe that's just me.
I'd like to think that I am looking to the "better angels of our nature" by speaking out about the prejudice represented by the cap.
I think the cap is a symbol of ignorance. The thing about the symbolism of the cap is that some see 4 capitol letters and others see what they want to see.
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Again, very fair. But violence being justified? I personally do not have that threshold. For example, if I'm pro-lifer (ardent) do I justify groups that advocate violence against doctors because we hold similar views on life? I would hope not, it's not that clear cut. I would distance myself from those prone to violence (*righteous indignation*) because they think the other person deserves it.
It's just not right.
Where did violence come in?
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You said, or implied, that this man misrepresented his encounter with the students. Seems to follow that you have examples of that misrepresentation. I’m curious as I’ve heard that the story is larger and more nuanced than this man and the students, but I haven’t heard that he misrepresented anything.
I did not. however, lie. Again, prove I was lying, show me your evidence of such.
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I think the cap is a symbol of ignorance. The thing about the symbolism of the cap is that some see 4 capitol letters and others see what they want to see.
Eggszactly. Sorta like a Yankee cap.
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Where did violence come in?
The young men and their families were threatened with violence over the weekend. There is no righteous justification for that.
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The young men and their families were threatened with violence over the weekend. There is no righteous justification for that.
I certainly might have missed it, but I didn't see anyone on this thread make or defend any threat of violence. I'm not sure who you are arguing with.
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But violence being justified? I personally do not have that threshold. For example, if I'm pro-lifer (ardent) do I justify groups that advocate violence against doctors because we hold similar views on life? I would hope not, it's not that clear cut. I would distance myself from those prone to violence (*righteous indignation*) because they think the other person deserves it.
It's just not right.
I spent hours upon hours this weekend reading comments and I didn't see one that suggested violence or even hinted at it. Having said that, I have no doubt in the charged environment we live in that such comments were made. The *righteous anger* I referred to earlier was a very strong pushback against the MAGAs and the perceived culture the Covington kids were growing up in. Nearly all the folks I read on twitter have concerns about violence being perpetrated on them and aren't exactly the type to go out and look for fights themselves.
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I certainly might have missed it, but I didn't see anyone on this thread make or defend any threat of violence. I'm not sure who you are arguing with.
Yeah, I wasn't getting that either.
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Eggszactly. Sorta like a Yankee cap.
No, not even remotely like a Yankees cap.
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I certainly might have missed it, but I didn't see anyone on this thread make or defend any threat of violence. I'm not sure who you are arguing with.
I made a statement that the reaction initially stoked violence as a substantive measure. It was what I said in terms of the *cap*. I've had a good debate with Nate about what the cap represents to others and to me, the cap and also the idea that the school advocates bullying against gay young men is in no way justifying violence against the young men and family (as has been reported). Go read again what Nate and I debated and you'll see while we are not far off in terms of what this silly cap represents, it is not a righteous anger that should be the response.
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I spent hours upon hours this weekend reading comments and I didn't see one that suggested violence or even hinted at it. Having said that, I have no doubt in the charged environment we live in that such comments were made. The *righteous anger* I referred to earlier was a very strong pushback against the MAGAs and the perceived culture the Covington kids were growing up in. Nearly all the folks I read on twitter have concerns about violence being perpetrated on them and aren't exactly the type to go out and look for fights themselves.
Cool. I was referring to the cap in terms of the eggszactly how the whole initial incident was spurring violence as a response. I don't care if the cap represents nazi-ism or ignorance, it does not justify violence as a response. We probably agree on that and that was what I was saying, perhaps not too eloquently, in terms of the cap in that last sentence you picked out.
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No, not even remotely like a Yankees cap.
Tell that to a BoSox fan who doesn't mind beating the crap out of a Yankee wearing fan at Fenway.
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Tell that to a BoSox fan who doesn't mind beating the crap out of a Yankee wearing fan at Fenway.
Hard to disagree when you qualify it like that.
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Yeah, I wasn't getting that either.
This is the context of what I said (in regard to the cap that you singled out):
Most Viet Nam vets I know (and I know plenty) would be appalled that a direct action they took in exercising their legal right to protest might lead to injury or harm to another person. In fact, an innocent person. It defeats what "defending this country" is all about. You have a right to protest, that is what vets go fight for... our freedoms. But just like you don't have a "right" to yell "FIRE" in a crowded cinema, you don't have a "right" to embellish a narrative because you want to either protect your involvement "as an adult" in the situation or you just can't keep your story straight. The incident has sparked *others* to take up the cause of Mr. Phillips and provide their own kind of justice/karma and they have targeted young men for injury and harm. Repeat: threats of injury and harm are now the result of a false narrative.
As humanitarian as we want to be towards others, we should practice the same for all... cap or no cap. Else you have *NO* "right" to stand on.
Essentially, as a veteran (which was my reaction to what Limey said was his right), using said right does not allow us to use a situation that was one thing to mean another and thus have the cause and effect it did of violence and harm threats over the weekend to these young men. I don't care if the "cap" drove you to it, it's not right.
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This is the context of what I said (in regard to the cap that you singled out):
Essentially, as a veteran (which was my reaction to what Limey said was his right), using said right does not allow us to use a situation that was one thing to mean another and thus have the cause and effect it did of violence and harm threats over the weekend to these young men. I don't care if the "cap" drove you to it, it's not right.
What's the false narrative? It seems pretty straightforward to me that a bunch of white teenagers were jeering an elderly native american with racist taunts. They were tomahawk chopping and doing the Braves chant to mock his drumming and singing. I really don't understand the manufactured confusion about who approached whom. The native american guy could have sat down at their restaurant table to take their order while wearing a hat and it still wouldn't justify the disrespectful abuse these kids heaped on him.
And why would anonymous theoretical threats of harm excuse the disrespectful racist behavior these kids actually engaged in? Those kids behaved deplorably and should be ashamed of themselves. Why is there anything more to discuss?
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I find it tremendously telling that Noe is defending a bunch of racist little cunts, future Bart O'Kavanaughs, and lying about Phillips misrepresenting what happened while he does it.
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He went to war for this country. That earns him deference from those of us who haven't.
It's good to see the rehabilitation of the Viet Nam veteran formerly loathed as a racist killer and tool of imperialism, feared as a dangerous psychotic and pitied as a homeless drug addict.
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What we have here with all the other different viewpoints and conclusions about a group of teen (Catholic, Pro-Life, MAGA hat wearing) boys engagement with Nathan (Native American, Viet Nam Vet, drum circle reject) Phillips, is a perfect example of how bias, perspective, and agenda, will result in a manifestation of the Rashomon effect.
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He went to war for this country. That earns him deference from those of us who haven't.
We aren't in danger of fetishization of the military, are we?
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Twitter is not news... (https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/twitter-suspends-account-that-helped-ignite-controversy-over-viral-encounter/ar-BBSz1yo?ocid=spartandhp)
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What's the false narrative? It seems pretty straightforward to me that a bunch of white teenagers were jeering an elderly native american with racist taunts. They were tomahawk chopping and doing the Braves chant to mock his drumming and singing. I really don't understand the manufactured confusion about who approached whom. The native american guy could have sat down at their restaurant table to take their order while wearing a hat and it still wouldn't justify the disrespectful abuse these kids heaped on him.
And why would anonymous theoretical threats of harm excuse the disrespectful racist behavior these kids actually engaged in? Those kids behaved deplorably and should be ashamed of themselves. Why is there anything more to discuss?
Are you sure about who approached whom and what really happened and if he was getting mocked and taunted to the extend of what he said really happened. Did you even read what he said happened in the Detroit Free Press or are you just happy making shit up? If so, good luck justifying anything you said. If you say "it doesn't excuse the disrespectful racist behavoir...." then why is the fact that the Black Isrealites screaming homophobic and racial slurs at the young men not an issue in it of itself and why then did Phillips decide to confront the young men who were being subjected to racial and homophobic slurs? I don't really understand how what is now the story is now being backshelved by you and others for the sake of wanting to keep this to the initial story that a bunch of white kids wearing a stupid red cap were treatening an Native American veteran. The truth is vastly different even if you don't want to believe it.
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I find it tremendously telling that Noe is defending a bunch of racist little cunts, future Bart O'Kavanaughs, and lying about Phillips misrepresenting what happened while he does it.
Defending who? When did I say they were defenseless? To me, there was much that could have been done to diffuse the situation like simply walking away from the hostile area. And quit calling me a liar Mr. Prosecutor unless you're willing to show me your evidence that this is right. You're playing very loose with your facts, including about me... or is it because you're a racist white privileged man doing what all you white men do against a Hispanic like me?
See how you don't have to prove anything any more, you can just say it and it is so. It's easy, as you can very well atest to since you practice it so well.
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What we have here with all the other different viewpoints and conclusions about a group of teen (Catholic, Pro-Life, MAGA hat wearing) boys engagement with Nathan (Native American, Viet Nam Vet, drum circle reject) Phillips, is a perfect example of how bias, perspective, and agenda, will result in a manifestation of the Rashomon effect.
That's why facts are so important.
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I think the cap is a symbol of ignorance. The thing about the symbolism of the cap is that some see 4 capitol letters and others see what they want to see.
Frankly, this is an underrated comment.
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Defending who? When did I say they were defenseless? And quit calling me a liar Mr. Prosecutor unless you're willing to show me your evidence that this is right. You're playing very loose with your facts, including about me... or is it because you're a racist against a Hispanic like me? See how you don't have to prove anything any more, you can just say it and it is so.
Your takes on this are characteristically incoherent, but I'll do the best I can.
... you don't have a "right" to embellish a narrative because you want to either protect your involvement "as an adult" in the situation or you just can't keep your story straight.
Repeat: threats of injury and harm are now the result of a false narrative.
People want to believe they are being told factual truth at every turn rather than reading what someone wants to spread over the reporting mediums first, fact checking be damned with a grain of salt or at minimum restraint.
Yet there are some who beg to differ on what role Lincoln played, for instance, in the emancipation of slaves. He was more of an opportunist than a leader.
That doesn't really have anything to do with anything, I'm just including it because it is fucking hilarious.
This is people wanting to harm innocent people for something they did not do.
Seems to me, people were willing to hurt these young men based on 15 seconds of video and the word of a man who misrepresented what went on during a confrontation.
The truth is vastly different even if you don't want to believe it.
Your argument, such as it is, vigorously delivered, asserts that what manifestly did happen in fact did not happen and so you lie about it. Repeatedly. The video is there. Anyone can watch it. No one who is disturbed by what those little pricks were doing is confused about what happened or how it happened. You keep implying that we are. You keep saying outright that Phillips is misrepresenting what happened. He is not. You are fucking lying, and I am not going to let you skate on this. Stop lying.
And another thing, before the amen chorus shows up waving copies of tomorrow's edition of the Pinhead Picayune, I could give a fuck if this guy really is a Vietnam veteran, and I could give a fuck if this guy really is a Native American. Nothing in his background changes what happened, no matter how much people try to lie about it.
Defending who?
Ha ha, good one.
Are you sure about who approached whom and what really happened and if he was getting mocked and taunted to the extend of what he said really happened. Did you even read what he said happened in the Detroit Free Press or are you just happy making shit up? If so, good luck justifying anything you said. If you say "it doesn't excuse the disrespectful racist behavoir...." then why is the fact that the Black Isrealites screaming homophobic and racial slurs at the young men not an issue in it of itself and why then did Phillips decide to confront the young men who were being subjected to racial and homophobic slurs? I don't really understand how what is now the story is now being backshelved by you and others for the sake of wanting to keep this to the initial story that a bunch of white kids wearing a stupid red cap were treatening an Native American veteran.
Also, yes, I am a racist who hates hispanics. You finally figured it out. You got me. Oh, the shame.
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Your takes on this are characteristically incoherent, but I'll do the best I can.
Finally.
That doesn't really have anything to do with anything, I'm just including it because it is fucking hilarious.
Okay, onward...
Your argument, such as it is, vigorously delivered, asserts that what manifestly did happen in fact did not happen and so you lie about it.
Really, that's what you read? You said I was lying about what Phillips said happened. What he said to the Detroit Free Press (https://www.freep.com/story/news/local/michigan/2019/01/20/native-american-leader-nathan-phillips-recounts-incident-video/2630256002/) is on record. And now it has been debunked as not entirely true. When he called the young men "predators" and the four black old men as "prey", then he set the narrative up to be that the young men in their red caps were looking for a fight. Hey, it's easy to do because the wearing of stupid red cap gives all the right in the world to label someone as the villain in anything we want, even if it's not true. Hopefully in your white priviledged world you'll never be singled out a low-life villian simply because you're white or something... that would be wrong, huh Chuck? He failed to call the Black Hebrew Israelites (so called because they believe they are the true decendents of the tribe of Israel, a similar theory held by many white supremist groups) the instigators nor say that they were the one hurling racial and homphobic slurs with the intent to harm (these guys are a piece of work and by proxy protected as "prey" because they failed to don a red cap that had MAGA on it), the last one provoked the initial response from one young man who chastised the four men for using such appalling language. He instead decided the young men were the ones who were going to escalate, and of course, he was wrong. Phillips appeared on the scene and marched into the young men's assembly on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial and he said it was to keep these young men from attacking the four black older men (which is not backed up by the video evidence that any of that was happening nor in the process of happening). Phillips later went on to provide his own interpretation of what he thought he was doing because he saw "in the face of these young men a hatred that I have seen before". Yet there is no evidence to back up that assertion either. So all in all, what a longer 2 hour video has proven is that what Mr. Phillips both conveniently left off and also inserted into the narrative were very hard to prove as a correct view. Hence he was mistaken.
Now, call me a liar again, because racist white men like you do this all the time.
Repeatedly. The video is there. Anyone can watch it. No one who is disturbed by what those little pricks were doing is confused about what happened or how it happened. You keep implying that we are. You keep saying outright that Phillips is misrepresenting what happened. He is not. You are fucking lying, and I am not going to let you skate on this. Stop lying.
The Media Wildly Mischaracterized That Video of Covington Catholic Students Confronting a Native American Veteran (https://reason.com/blog/2019/01/20/covington-catholic-nathan-phillips-video)
Again, all the evidence suggests that Phillips got it backward.
He also claimed that he heard chants of "build the wall." While I cannot rule out the possibility that some of the kids indeed chanted this—those who were wearing MAGA hats are presumably Trump supporters—I did not hear a single utterance of the phrase in the nearly two hours of video footage I watched. Admittedly, the kids do a lot of chanting and it's not always possible to tell what they are saying. Their stated explanation is that they engaged in a series of school sports chants: That's what one student told a local news reporter. His account largely tracks with the video.
"We are an all-male school that loves to get hyped up," said this student. "And as we have done for years prior, we decided to do some cheers to pass time. In the midst of our cheers, we were approached by a group of adults led by Nathan Phillips, with Phillips beating his drum. They forced their way to the center of our group. We initially thought this was a cultural display since he was beating along to our cheers and so we clapped to the beat." According to this student, the smiling student was grinning because he was enjoying the music, but eventually became confused, along with everyone else. (Indeed, multiple people can be heard to shout, "what is going on?")
It would be impossible to definitively state that none of the young men did anything wrong, offensive, or problematic, at some point, and maybe the smiling student was attempting to intimidate Phillips. But there's shockingly little evidence of wrongdoing, unless donning a Trump hat and standing in a group of other people doing the same is now an act of harassment or violence. Phillips' account, meanwhile, is at best flawed, and arguably deliberately misleading.
Seems to me the two hour video does have some conclusive evidence that what Phillips said about "predators and prey" and such was just a tad misleading, eh Chuck. But keep it up Mr. White Priviledge racist, you know you want to put me down just because you don't like me. Right?
And another thing, before the amen chorus shows up waving copies of tomorrow's edition of the Pinhead Picayune, I could give a fuck if this guy really is a Vietnam veteran, and I could give a fuck if this guy really is a Native American. Nothing in his background changes what happened, no matter how much people try to lie about it.
Now EVERYONE is lying about it but you. Good going Mr. I'm Right All the Time Because I said SO! Spoken like a true white priviledged male. Shall I stop mischaracterizing you or am I right for a change?
Also, yes, I am a racist who hates hispanics. You finally figured it out. You got me. Oh, the shame.
Same shame I feel being called a liar by you for no apparent reason. One thing you are though is a complete asshole of a person. That much you've proven over and over again.
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Really, that's what you read? You said I was lying about what Phillips said happened. What he said to the Detroit Free Press (https://www.freep.com/story/news/local/michigan/2019/01/20/native-american-leader-nathan-phillips-recounts-incident-video/2630256002/) is on record. And now it has been debunked as not entirely true. When he called the young men "predators" and the four black old men as "prey", then he set the narrative up to be that the young men in their red caps were looking for a fight. Hey, it's easy to do because the wearing of stupid red cap gives all the right in the world to label someone as the villain in anything we want, even if it's not true. Hopefully in your white priviledged world you'll never be singled out a low-life villian simply because you're white or something... that would be wrong, huh Chuck? He failed to call the Black Hebrew Israelites (so called because they believe they are the true decendents of the tribe of Israel, a similar theory held by many white supremist groups) the instigators nor say that they were the one hurling racial and homphobic slurs with the intent to harm (these guys are a piece of work and by proxy protected as "prey" because they failed to don a red cap that had MAGA on it), the last one provoked the initial response from one young man who chastised the four men for using such appalling language. He instead decided the young men were the ones who were going to escalate, and of course, he was wrong. Phillips appeared on the scene and marched into the young men's assembly on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial and he said it was to keep these young men from attacking the four black older men (which is not backed up by the video evidence that any of that was happening nor in the process of happening). Phillips later went on to provide his own interpretation of what he thought he was doing because he saw "in the face of these young men a hatred that I have seen before". Yet there is no evidence to back up that assertion either. So all in all, what a longer 2 hour video has proven is that what Mr. Phillips both conveniently left off and also inserted into the narrative were very hard to prove as a correct view. Hence he was mistaken.
I'm going to do what I can not to get sucked any further into your vortex of stupid beyond this response, but virtually everything you post here is either wrong or irrelevant.
No one that I know of has said that the disgusting freaks you're defending were hoping to fight the man. That is, as you would say, a false narrative.
Everyone knows that the 'Israelites' are homophobic lunatics. In retrospect it's tragic, really, that the crusaders and the Israelites couldn't have had a calmer face-to-face because I am quite sure they could have found some very solid common ground what with hating gays and loving the idea that Armageddon is soon approaching. Ships passing silently in the night and so on, I suppose.
Phillips has said repeatedly that he went into the crowd of kids in order to instill a peace in them. I don't know whether that was his objective or not. The Israelites certainly thought so, and said so in real time, which you would know if you had watched the video. Bizarrely, you keep disputing what Phillips says his reaction was, that he saw hatred in those boys. Why is that? Why do you want to protect these boys from the scrutiny they merit?
You want to make this about Phillips, of course, because you hope that he'll be caught in some sort of misrepresentation. Lie, I think is what a lot of us call it. Many people are outraged at what those boys did that day, and it does not matter who approached whom or which group of lunatics was shouting what at whom or who went to Vietnam or who didn't. And in order to push back against that outrage you try to arrange reality to reflect your preferred outcome. Lie, I think is what a lot of us call it.
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I'm going to do what I can not to get sucked any further into your vortex of stupid beyond this response, but virtually everything you post here is either wrong or irrelevant.
Because, of course, you say so. Very privileged attitude of course.
No one that I know of has said that the disgusting freaks you're defending were hoping to fight the man. That is, as you would say, a false narrative.
Did you read what Phillips said to the Washington Post initially about fearing for his well-being because they young men approached him and blocked him in. That was... ahem... a lie. (https://nypost.com/2019/01/21/case-of-the-covington-kids-is-a-perfect-example-of-media-bias/) He changed that narrative when he interviewed with the Detroit Free Press. And even then, he mischaracterized the situation. Why are kids supposed to act like adults and adults are allowed to act like kids and thus this is the only way we can see this narrative as painted originally by Phillips? And once again, you accused me of lying... not the other way around. You told me to quit lying about Phillips but now you're changing your opinion. Hmmmm... very white priviledge of you.
Everyone knows that the 'Israelites' are homophobic lunatics.
Well Phillips left them out of the original story he gave to the WaPo and then only mentioned them as "prey" to the Detroit Free Press. Once again, I said that Phillips misrepresented the entire situation to his benefit because of whatever reason he may have. But that has been now corrected. To which you said I was lying about Phillips and clearly I was not.
In retrospect it's tragic, really, that the crusaders and the Israelites couldn't have had a calmer face-to-face because I am quite sure they could have found some very solid common ground what with hating gays and loving the idea that Armageddon is soon approaching. Ships passing silently in the night and so on, I suppose.
Wow, you're now backpeddling so hard its amazing to watch. You go from calling me a liar to deciding you want to have a discussion about the Crusaders for scoreboard purposes! Nice going Chuck, you do a great job of moving those pedals so quickly.
Phillips has said repeatedly that he went into the crowd of kids in order to instill a peace in them.
Ahum, no Chuck, he didn't. From the New York Post column about the situation that takes a shot at the WaPo:
Ideally, the kids would have ignored him and walked away. Until about 10 minutes ago, though, it was broadly agreed in our culture that kids are allowed to do some dumb things because they are kids.
Should these kids’ lives be ruined because some of them responded to obnoxious provocation by being a bit rude themselves? I would say their reaction was, if anything, more restrained than you would expect from teenagers.
Phillips, on the other hand, is an adult, and he repeatedly lied about what happened to The Washington Post and other prestige outlets, which reported everything he said uncritically.
He told the WaPo an entirely different story. WaPo has since written another article and replaced Phillips account with a different version that he went into the crowd not the other way around. That is after he told the Detroit Free Press he was trying to keep the "predators" from reaching the "prey". That account is false as well. Phillips told the Detroit Free Press he could see hate in the eyes of the young men. The video shows absolutely nothing like that and it was adults preying on these kids with their whack opinions and aggression, including followers of Phillips. The only reason they get a pass is because they're not wearing a red cap.
From the New York Times with a link to the original WaPo story given by Phillips: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/19/us/covington-catholic-high-school-nathan-phillips.html
Mr. Phillips could not be reached for comment on Saturday. He told The Washington Post that he noticed the teenagers taunting participants at the Indigenous Peoples March.
“It was getting ugly, and I was thinking: ‘I’ve got to find myself an exit out of this situation and finish my song at the Lincoln Memorial,’” Mr. Phillips told The Post. “I started going that way, and that guy in the hat stood in my way and we were at an impasse. He just blocked my way and wouldn’t allow me to retreat.”
In a video by Kaya Taitano, posted to Instagram, Mr. Phillips stood outside the Lincoln Memorial and wiped his eyes. “I heard them saying ‘Build that wall! Build that wall!’” he said. “This is indigenous land. We’re not supposed to have walls here.”
I don't know whether that was his objective or not.
He stated his objective in the Detroit Free Press article. He identified the young men as a mob ready to attack. It's simply not true. And if you don't know something, you might want to hold back on calling people liars. It's unbecoming.
The Israelites certainly thought so, and said so in real time,
Like they're a bastion of truth and honesty, right.
which you would know if you had watched the video.
The video, once again, disputes Phillips own account to the Detroit Free Press. Meaning he misrepresented the first time to the WaPo and then again to the Detroit Free Press. The kids were not getting ready to attack anyone. And his own followers (Phillips) tried to inflame the situation as well, as evidenced by this video https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=1&v=npX801xLSFY . If Phillips says he was trying to diffuse the situation, his followers forgot the memo or did not know what the heck he was doing either because they were looking for a fight. A fight that did not come from these so-called "angry mob ready to attack". In fact Chuck, in the video I am linking in this response, the young man villiafied as the poster child of hate is doing *EXACTLY* what Phillips said he was trying to do... diffuse the situation. Phillips never once tells his people to shut up, but the young man with the cap does. It is to the credit of one of Phillips followers that he chasties the man who decided to pick a fight with kids. The man says repeatedly that he had Phillips back and it worked, to the dismay it seemed of the other man who carried a drum into the crowd with Phillips. The same man who tried to pick a fight later yells out "We did it Grandpa" and Phillips raises his arms in victory as the kids march off to board their buses. Yes, that angry mob of MAGA cap wearers are seen just marching away laughing as if something weird just happened. If Phillips and his group is now saying in narrative three in the New York Times that they were singing a spiritual song to invade the hearts of the young men, they might want to have said so in the beginning and perhaps have a little more credibility that this is spin that fits more along with the actual videos show. So don't give me this revisionist crap that Phillips never lied... his own words don't match up to his actions as he explained it to WaPo and later to the Detroit Press. Now, it is another man who is seen in this video who is explaining it entirely differently as a spritual healing song and not even a confrontation at all.
Head. Spinning.
Bizarrely, you keep disputing what Phillips says his reaction was, that he saw hatred in those boys. Why is that? Why do you want to protect these boys from the scrutiny they merit?
Because they're kids Chuck. Plain and simple. They are not the adults in the room, Phillips and others are. Expecting 16 year old boys to act any differently than they did is being entirely naive and maybe just a tad stupid. But they did not at any point look like a mob ready to attack anyone. They were waiting for a freaking bus when they had insults hurled at them. 16 freaking year olds. We want them to be nazi children because of a cap. We are, at this point, the unruly mob who are acting less and less than like adults and more like petulant assholes who want a pound of flesh where none should be given. If their biggest offense to you is a cap they're wearing and thus you want to crucify them (or make them die like a reporter for the Vulture said, or doxx them like a reporter for GQ said... and then apologized for), you've got some issues.
You want to make this about Phillips,
Because it is Phillips and Sandmann (a 16 year old boy) who were the main characters in the whole original situation that inflamed passions. And from the very onset when I got involved was because of Phillips the Viet Nam veteran that Limey alluded to. I said he should know better, but apparently they're finding out this man has done this before. Phillips this time told his story differently twice before it unravelled. To which you called me a liar. So Chuck, why do you think this is about Phillips? Why would you say to quit lying about him and then say I want to make this about Phillips. I thought we were talking about Phillips all along. Your backpeddals are confusing sometimes.
You would only call me a liar because you want it to not be so that Phillips never misrepresented himself and the situation. You want Phillips to be clean as a whistle, you want to hate 16 year old ignorant boys, you want a pound of flesh. Who is next for you Chuck? Who do you want to vilify next at the expense of truth? Because that certainly seems to be your intent instead of being objective about this whole grey matter. You want black and white villians and heros. And then you want all the ill to happen to your villians because it suits you... including me. That's why you need to call me a liar.
Well, go ahead. That's what assholes do.
of course, because you hope that he'll be caught in some sort of misrepresentation. Lie, I think is what a lot of us call it. Many people are outraged at what those boys did that day, and it does not matter who approached whom or which group of lunatics was shouting what at whom or who went to Vietnam or who didn't. And in order to push back against that outrage you try to arrange reality to reflect your preferred outcome. Lie, I think is what a lot of us call it.
Because it is very convenient in your small, bigoted world to do so. 16 year olds wear a red cap, end of story... they're the villians. Story and narrative is not true, you clasp your hands to your ears and scream out "YOU'RE LYING, YOU'RE LYING" because you already decided to hate someone and the truth gets in the way of that. Carry on asshole. Hate away.
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I'm not going to slog my way through Noe's response as Chuck's response above was pretty much final. I also read Brooks' column last night and thought of Noe. Brooks, like Noe, somehow reads the Wapo and Detroit Free Press articles and concludes they are different narratives, probably vastly different narratives told by a man who was initially caught in a lie. Of course, this reading supports the "Oh, those poor boys, taken by some liberal hoax" narrative. It doesn't surprise me that Brooks has reading comprehension issues, as that reading of the two articles fits his lazy, yet oh so confident way of seeing issues in America.
I read both of those articles twice now. Nowhere did this man "change his narrative", and even based on the video I've seen, I don't get where the"He misrepresented things" comes from. I get that "There's more to the story than the original video," but acting like it was a scheme by this man to create a situation when there was none is lazy and disingenuous.
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Trump did not tell Cohen to lie, because Giuliani says he listened to all the tapes and it’s not there. Oh, Lordy! There are tapes? No, no, no tapes, says Rudi. The ones I’ve listened to are about other things.
Seriously (https://www.newyorker.com/news/the-new-yorker-interview/even-if-he-did-do-it-it-wouldnt-be-a-crime-rudy-giuliani-donald-trump-robert-mueller-moscow-buzzfeed/amp?__twitter_impression=true).
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Noe, in all of your writing you seem to ignore the fact the reaction of these kids to whatever the situation may have been was to hurl racist taunts. That seems to be the central fact that gets lost in all the noise about who approached whom and why.
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… the fact the reaction of these kids to whatever the situation may have been was to hurl racist taunts.
What, or where on the tape, is the reaction that you deem as a factual act of racism? Is it the couple of guys doing the tomahawk chop and/or humming of Seven Nation Army? Is that factual or nuanced? Implied fact or inferred fact? Or just an alternative fact?
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Put the red hat on Nathan and give the kid the drum and see how fast the perceptions and the commentary change.
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What, or where on the tape, is the reaction that you deem as a factual act of racism? Is it the couple of guys doing the tomahawk chop and/or humming of Seven Nation Army? Is that factual or nuanced? Implied fact or inferred fact? Or just an alternative fact?
Mocking a singing native american by doing the tomahawk chop and accompanying chant (not seven nations army) while laughing at him is about as nuanced as throwing a banana at a black soccer player.
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Mocking a singing native american by doing the tomahawk chop and accompanying chant (not seven nations army) while laughing at him is about as nuanced as throwing a banana at a black soccer player.
Where on they tape is that happening? Maybe he inspired them to chant along in harmony. I have heard you and a few other people mention it but can't find it. Also if an asshole or two throw a banana at a black soccer player is the whole section of the stadium guilty of the act?
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Put the red hat on Nathan and give the kid the drum and see how fast the perceptions and the commentary change.
Part of that counter-factual is interesting: American Indians using the "Make America Great Again" slogan. However, as a whole, the counter-factual is lacking and doesn't work: no individual, wearing a MAGA hat and beating a drum, without saying a word to antagonize anyone is going to be reviled by any meaningful amount of people.
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Wow, I didn't know about the kid that had stripped down to his underwear and did a powwow dance while slapping his palm against his mouth and chanting woo woo woo woo. Or the other kid that held two fingers up behind Nathans head. Let me see if I can find that clip.
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Where on they tape is that happening? Maybe he inspired them to chant along in harmony. I have heard you and a few other people mention it but can't find it. Also if an asshole or two throw a banana at a black soccer player is the whole section of the stadium guilty of the act?
https://twitter.com/TalbertSwan/status/1087522206387765249
There's one clip. That's not just an asshole or two.
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Noe, in all of your writing you seem to ignore the fact the reaction of these kids to whatever the situation may have been was to hurl racist taunts. That seems to be the central fact that gets lost in all the noise about who approached whom and why.
I was called a liar. Do you think I lied about Phillip's changing his story not once but twice?
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I read both of those articles twice now. Nowhere did this man "change his narrative", and even based on the video I've seen, I don't get where the"He misrepresented things" comes from. I get that "There's more to the story than the original video," but acting like it was a scheme by this man to create a situation when there was none is lazy and disingenuous.
I never said I knew his motive. I just said as a former Viet Nam Veteran, he should be a little more careful about what he says and does to inflame things. His words caused a brush-fire of reactions on Saturday night. Now, with time and a little more restraint and investigation as to what really happened, many of those who originally ran with the story as it was put out there are walking back their reaction.
So you contend that I am liar for saying that Phillips misrepresented his story in the WaPo when he said this:
“It was getting ugly, and I was thinking: ‘I’ve got to find myself an exit out of this situation and finish my song at the Lincoln Memorial,’” Mr. Phillips told The Post. “I started going that way, and that guy in the hat stood in my way and we were at an impasse. He just blocked my way and wouldn’t allow me to retreat.”
This was the basis of the whole indignation on Saturday night that launched the 1,000 knives. Was the narrative put out through Mr. Phillips entirely true? No it wasn't and that is what I said that helped escalate villianization. I'm not a liar nor am I lying. But some here seem to want their pound of flesh regardless and are bending over backwards doing their best impression of Sara Sanders covering for Rudy Guilliani's latest warped observations about things. Go ahead and have your Ox-Bow lynching, I won't stand in your way, it's an impossible task to convince a lynch mob it's better to wait and keep their integrity intact sometimes.
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https://twitter.com/TalbertSwan/status/1087522206387765249
There's one clip. That's not just an asshole or two.
Oh wow. You call that disrespectful, mocking, and racist. Others say Mr. Phillips was unifying and inspirational to the youths while diffusing a potential conflict between the kids and the real hate group. Rashomon effect. Maybe you are projecting your feelings upon the kids, you have no idea what they were thinking. They looked like they were rocking out to Mr. Phillips in that clip. Back in my rock band days, I spent more than a few nights on a stage wishing I could be disrespected like Mr. Phillips.
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https://twitter.com/TalbertSwan/status/1087522206387765249
There's one clip. That's not just an asshole or two.
I thought you were going to link the playoff game on Sunday night with the Kansas City Chiefs fans at full force.
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Oh wow. You call that disrespectful, mocking, and racist. Others say Mr. Phillips was unifying and inspirational to the youths while diffusing a potential conflict between the kids and the real hate group. Rashomon effect. Maybe you are projecting your feelings upon the kids, you have no idea what they were thinking. They looked like they were rocking out to Mr. Phillips in that clip. Back in my rock band days, I spent more than a few nights on a stage wishing I could be disrespected like Mr. Phillips.
Funny, you say I have no idea what they might be thinking, then you proceed to tell me what they might be thinking. And what *I* might be thinking.
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I thought you were going to link the playoff game on Sunday night with the Kansas City Chiefs fans at full force.
Nah, I'd pick asshole Braves fans for that.
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Oh wow. You call that disrespectful, mocking, and racist. Others say Mr. Phillips was unifying and inspirational to the youths while diffusing a potential conflict between the kids and the real hate group. Rashomon effect. Maybe you are projecting your feelings upon the kids, you have no idea what they were thinking. They looked like they were rocking out to Mr. Phillips in that clip. Back in my rock band days, I spent more than a few nights on a stage wishing I could be disrespected like Mr. Phillips.
In an official statement by the Indigenous Peoples Movement, they said this:
But in its statement, the Indigenous Peoples Movement also said that there was more to the rally at steps of the Lincoln Memorial — and the encounter with the high school students — than was shown in the videos.
“What is not being shown on the video is that the same youth and a few others became emotional because of the power, resilience and love we inherently carry in our DNA,” another organizer, Nathalie Farfan, said. “Our day on those steps ended with a round dance, while we chanted, ‘We are still here.’”
Another statement from another drummer at the incident:
In separate interviews, Mr. Frejo and Mr. Phillips said they heard the students making noises that seemed to mock Native American chanting. (Some students also appear to make the tomahawk chop gesture popularized at certain sporting events.) But Mr. Frejo also said he heard some of the students sing along. “Regardless of their ignorance and bigotry,” he said, the “spirits moved through them.”
Moments later, the group of students disbanded. But to many, the interaction — and the disparate way it was perceived — reflected the national mood.
Mr. Frejo, who works with youths to prevent suicide and alcohol abuse, saw this as “a teachable moment” to help show what can happen when you push past anger and hatred.
“We chose to go over there,” he said, “to sing a song to hopefully change something.”
Mr. Freijo is a good man. He knew these were 16 year old ignorant kids and felt he reached them instead of crying that he was mocked and insulted by racist chants. But you know, people want their good old fashion lynching. You can't reason with people when the show must go on.
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Nah, I'd pick asshole Braves fans for that.
Deservedly so too.
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Oh wow. You call that disrespectful, mocking, and racist. Others say Mr. Phillips was unifying and inspirational to the youths while diffusing a potential conflict between the kids and the real hate group. Rashomon effect. Maybe you are projecting your feelings upon the kids, you have no idea what they were thinking. They looked like they were rocking out to Mr. Phillips in that clip. Back in my rock band days, I spent more than a few nights on a stage wishing I could be disrespected like Mr. Phillips.
Seriously, this is your position: those poor kids were just showing reverence to the man, like he was their favorite rock star?
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Funny, you say I have no idea what they might be thinking, then you proceed to tell me what they might be thinking. And what *I* might be thinking.
See how stupid it is yet?
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Meanwhile, the Supreme Court just declined to do anything about a lower court's stay on Trump's effort to end DACA. So DACA is now in place until at least 2020 (the earliest SCOTUS could rule if they take it up at a later date).
So in the Shutdown Standoff, that leaves Trump holding his mushroom dick and nothing else.
An important point to remember (and remind people) in the "both sides" world of politics in which we live is that Trump is demanding money for his wall while holding hostage the Dreamers (well, he was), government employees, recipients of government services (that includes you if you get on a plane or eat lettuce), and peripheral contractors/service providers. Conversely, House Democrats want to re-open the government and are demanding nothing else. Just open the government. Dreamers aren't at risk any more. The border isn't a national emergency and, if it was, building a wall is slow way of responding to it. Just open the government. Not really "both sides" here.
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See how stupid it is yet?
Yeah, I'm sure this was a teaching moment, and not being a fucking hypocrite.
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Seriously, this is your position: those poor kids were just showing reverence to the man, like he was their favorite rock star?
My position is that people are stupid.
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Oh wow. You call that disrespectful, mocking, and racist. Others say Mr. Phillips was unifying and inspirational to the youths while diffusing a potential conflict between the kids and the real hate group. Rashomon effect. Maybe you are projecting your feelings upon the kids, you have no idea what they were thinking. They looked like they were rocking out to Mr. Phillips in that clip. Back in my rock band days, I spent more than a few nights on a stage wishing I could be disrespected like Mr. Phillips.
Was Napoleon right for Josephine?
Was nausea right for Dramamine?
Were the 80's right for the drum machine
Who's to say?
Who's to say?
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I was called a liar. Do you think I lied about Phillip's changing his story not once but twice?
I think that's your opinion.
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This was the basis of the whole indignation on Saturday night that launched the 1,000 knives.
No, this is totally untrue. What Phillips said was not what sparked the initial outrage. It was instead the behavior of those kids that you defend that is plainly seen on any one of the dozen videos that are out there.
People are outraged by their behavior and you insisted that the behavior simply did not happen. You lied. Then you decided to attack Phillips' description of events, looking for inconsistencies that would allow you to shift the focus away from the reprehensible behavior and onto him, and then, of course, the end game for idiots like you, shift the blame from the perpetrators to the victims.
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Meanwhile, the Supreme Court just declined to do anything about a lower court's stay on Trump's effort to end DACA. So DACA is now in place until at least 2020 (the earliest SCOTUS could rule if they take it up at a later date).
So in the Shutdown Standoff, that leaves Trump holding his mushroom dick and nothing else.
An important point to remember (and remind people) in the "both sides" world of politics in which we live is that Trump is demanding money for his wall while holding hostage the Dreamers (well, he was), government employees, recipients of government services (that includes you if you get on a plane or eat lettuce), and peripheral contractors/service providers. Conversely, House Democrats want to re-open the government and are demanding nothing else. Just open the government. Dreamers aren't at risk any more. The border isn't a national emergency and, if it was, building a wall is slow way of responding to it. Just open the government. Not really "both sides" here.
Watching the coverage over the last week has been fascinating: very few Republicans on the airwaves and reporters decrying both sides while hounding every Democrat with some variant of "People are hurting, when are you going to give in." Of course, if the Democrats do give in, then next time, those same stupid fucking reporters will be hounding them with "Well, what did you expect, you encouraged Trump by giving in to his extortion last time."
I hope the Dems hold tight as this is a prime opportunity to drive a small stake into the "governing by extortion" model that's become too common, but I'm sort of expecting them to fold. Damn compassion and acting responsibility always get in the way.
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Seriously, this is your position: those poor kids were just showing reverence to the man, like he was their favorite rock star?
Watch this video when Phillips stands face to face with Sandmann. Tell me if you see disrespect from Sandmann as he was originally protrayed on Saturday night. What was said was two-fold:
1. The entire kids surrounded Mr. Phillips
2. Sandman stood in his way and would not let him pass and had a smirk on his face.
The Indigenous People's Movement, you know Phillip's organization, has said officially now that their group went to the crowd of kids. The kids, some screaming and chanting school chants as if they were at a football game (you know, like Kansas City Chief fans did). At no time can anyone hear "chanting" as Mr. Phillips described "BUILD THE WALL". However, now the narrative from IPM is that it was a spiritual prayer song and they heard some (not all) kids disrespect the moment with tomahawk chants. They said that other kids were respectful and sang along with them. This is from Phillip's own group. This video shows exactly what happened during the moment Phillips is singing over the kids to change their hearts (the IPM's word, not mine): https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=1&v=npX801xLSFY
So this video does not show Sandmann as disrespectful nor standing in Mr. Phillip's way nor should he be the poster boy for villianization (continued or not) that he should recieve death threats nor his family. In fact, Sandmann, while one of Phillip's group decides to interrupt the spiritual song of Mr. Phillips to scream at the kids and accuse them of stealing his land and that they should go back to Europe, it was Sandmann that gestures to kids wanting to engage this man that it is better to stay silent, as he was doing. It is another man from Phillip's group who chastises the man from their group that wanted to fight or engage in stupid discourse with inflamed but not angry kids (Remember, in the Detroit Free Press, Mr. Phillips called them an angry mob ready to pounce and that is just not true... it's a bunch of kids no angrier than any other group of kids that gather a mall or football stadium... their loud and basically stupid kids who adults decided to engage with hateful rhetoric that basically confused the kids). THIS is the face of the kid that represented everything that is EVIL in this whole scene on Saturday night through that twitter feed (that has since been removed by Twitter for violation of placing a photo or video of someone without their permission). So for every kids doing a tomahawk chop, there are others like Sandmann allowing with respect Mr. Phillips to do his thing. And this is exactly what Sandmann said he did in his press release , where he said this too:
The protestor everyone has seen in the video began playing his drum as he waded into the crowd, which parted for him. I did not see anyone try to block his path. He locked eyes with me and approached me, coming within inches of my face. He played his drum the entire time he was in my face.
I never interacted with this protestor. I did not speak to him. I did not make any hand gestures or other aggressive moves. To be honest, I was startled and confused as to why he had approached me. We had already been yelled at by another group of protestors, and when the second group approached I was worried that a situation was getting out of control where adults were attempting to provoke teenagers.
I believed that by remaining motionless and calm, I was helping to diffuse the situation. I realized everyone had cameras and that perhaps a group of adults was trying to provoke a group of teenagers into a larger conflict. I said a silent prayer that the situation would not get out of hand.
During the period of the drumming, a member of the protestor's entourage began yelling at a fellow student that we "stole our land" and that we should "go back to Europe." I heard one of my fellow students begin to respond. I motioned to my classmate and tried to get him to stop engaging with the protestor, as I was still in the mindset that we needed to calm down tensions.
I never felt like I was blocking the Native American protestor. He did not make any attempt to go around me. It was clear to me that he had singled me out for a confrontation, although I am not sure why.
The engagement ended when one of our teachers told me the busses had arrived and it was time to go. I obeyed my teacher and simply walked to the busses. At that moment, I thought I had diffused the situation by remaining calm, and I was thankful nothing physical had occurred.
I never understood why either of the two groups of protestors were engaging with us, or exactly what they were protesting at the Lincoln Memorial. We were simply there to meet a bus, not become central players in a media spectacle. This is the first time in my life I've ever encountered any sort of public protest, let alone this kind of confrontation or demonstration.
I was not intentionally making faces at the protestor. I did smile at one point because I wanted him to know that I was not going to become angry, intimidated or be provoked into a larger confrontation. I am a faithful Christian and practicing Catholic, and I always try to live up to the ideals my faith teaches me – to remain respectful of others, and to take no action that would lead to conflict or violence.
I harbor no ill will for this person. I respect this person's right to protest and engage in free speech activities, and I support his chanting on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial any day of the week. I believe he should re-think his tactics of invading the personal space of others, but that is his choice to make.
I am being called every name in the book, including a racist, and I will not stand for this mob-like character assassination of my family's name. My parents were not on the trip, and I strive to represent my family in a respectful way in all public settings.
I have received physical and death threats via social media, as well as hateful insults. One person threatened to harm me at school, and one person claims to live in my neighborhood. My parents are receiving death and professional threats because of the social media mob that has formed over this issue.
I love my school, my teachers and my classmates. I work hard to achieve good grades and to participate in several extracurricular activities. I am mortified that so many people have come to believe something that did not happen – that students from my school were chanting or acting in a racist fashion toward African Americans or Native Americans. I did not do that, do not have hateful feelings in my heart, and did not witness any of my classmates doing that.
For the Col. Spinx:
Go ahead and hate your neighbor,
Go ahead and cheat a friend.
Do it in the name of heaven,
You can justify it in the end.
There won't be any trumpets blowing,
Come the judgment day,
On the bloody morning after
One tin soldier rides away.
This theme song from the 60s was an anthem to effect change the right way. No lynch mobs, no loss of dignity, integrity fully intact. MLK also stood for non-violence even in the face of bigotry and hate. Now these kids receive no justice from some, but they do get it from the IPM and others who countered the misrepresentation of a Twitter feed and Mr. Phillip's original account that lead to headlines in the WaPo and NYT saying these kids surrounded the older Viet Nam Vet, as if they instigated the whole thing (and they did not, they were told to show up there to get on buses as the video I posted clearly shows).
But you know what, go ahead and hate your neighbors... because you can justify it the end.
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Meanwhile, the Supreme Court just declined to do anything about a lower court's stay on Trump's effort to end DACA. So DACA is now in place until at least 2020 (the earliest SCOTUS could rule if they take it up at a later date).
That is good news. I'm glad when adults take over the room. Seriously.
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of course, the end game for idiots like you, shift the blame from the perpetrators to the victims.
I blame all forms of media. Sadly, including sports forums. Naughty bad media.
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My position is that people are stupid.
Eggszactly! And hands up if you were not more than stupid at 16 years of age?
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I think that's your opinion.
So you're saying I'm NOT lying just forming a different opinion than yours... correct? So as a lawyer, what separates the two opinions presented in court? Facts or the view on said fact? Or perhaps corroboration of facts to avoid just opinions? Why then can one be passionate about facts as much as the other? Am I not laying out my facts before the court of opinion here while other choose to just villianize and keep pressing forward with less than presentation of facts? Or maybe you have the Perry Mason moment where you're going to pull out the smoking gun and the issue is settled.... right?
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Eggszactly! And hands up if you were not more than stupid at 16 years of age?
And hands up if you could have learned from those experiences to not be as stupid as you were but instead decried people pointing out your stupidity and asking you to learn from it as a lynching?
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And hands up if you could have learned from those experiences to not be as stupid as you were but instead decried people pointing out your stupidity and asking you to learn from it as a lynching?
And hands up if learning from your experience included death threats.
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So you're saying I'm NOT lying just forming a different opinion than yours... correct? So as a lawyer, what separates the two opinions presented in court? Facts or the view on said fact? Or perhaps corroboration of facts to avoid just opinions? Why then can one be passionate about facts as much as the other? Am I not laying out my facts before the court of opinion here while other choose to just villianize and keep pressing forward with less than presentation of facts? Or maybe you have the Perry Mason moment where you're going to pull out the smoking gun and the issue is settled.... right?
I don't have an opinion on the consistency of Phillip's statements as I have not read them nor do I intend to. My simple point is that many of these kids were largely disrespectful, some were outright racist, and the impropriety of their actions shouldn't be coddled or justified.
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And hands up if learning from your experience included death threats.
Again, I have no idea who you are arguing with.
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Just sweet, innocent boys. (https://twitter.com/girlsreallyrule/status/1087733862283776003?s=21)
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I blame all forms of media. Sadly, including sports forums. Naughty bad media.
Said it before, the media now includes a wider range of source material, including twitter and the rush to print is more prevalent. There's is not a job to wait for a story to unfold, theres is a job to go to print before the other news outlet beats you to it.
And this is why you get two different stories on this matter. The Saturday Night version that launched the vitrol against these nazi kids and the Sunday night version that said "wait... ahum... sorry".
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Just sweet, innocent boys. (https://twitter.com/girlsreallyrule/status/1087733862283776003?s=21)
I liked beer. I still like beer.
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I don't have an opinion on the consistency of Phillip's statements as I have not read them nor do I intend to.
Ignorance is bliss.
My simple point is that many of these kids were largely disrespectful, some were outright racist, and the impropriety of their actions shouldn't be coddled or justified.
But the one kid who was the Saturday night poster child as the leader who was in Mr. Phillips way with his MAGA cap and demonic smirk turned out to be anything but because... the original narrative was not true. It is what I was saying about Mr. Phillips helping to inflame that twitter feed with his *own* account of the situation that some still want to justify. And the IPM is even saying through the NYT that they heard some but not all of the kids chanting as if they were in a pow-wow dance (what you're saying is disrepectful and racist). But this is about one MAGA cap wearing kid who did nothing to have himself thrust into the limelight as the embodiment of evil.
Justice is when truth carries the day, not innuendo.
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Ignorance is bliss.
But the one kid who was the Saturday night poster child as the leader who was in Mr. Phillips way with his MAGA cap and demonic smirk turned out to be anything but because... the original narrative was not true. It is what I was saying about Mr. Phillips helping to inflame that twitter feed with his *own* account of the situation that some still want to justify. And the IPM is even saying through the NYT that they heard some but not all of the kids chanting as if they were in a pow-wow dance (what you're saying is disrepectful and racist). But this is about one MAGA cap wearing kid who did nothing to have himself thrust into the limelight as the embodiment of evil.
Justice is when truth carries the day, not innuendo.
All I know is... Putin is winning.
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There is culpability by all involved and to say those kids have none is irresponsible. At least it seems to me like you are absolving them of any responsibility.
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Again, I have no idea who you are arguing with.
You, of course. You don't want to recognize that this is not a bunch of racist kids who form a Nazi posse to go after anyone. It is much more about stupid kids who chanted school chants and then when approached by Mr. Phillips some (not all) did the tomahawk chant. Disrespectful? Of course. Did these kids invent this chant? No, they see adults at football and baseball stadiums do this all the time.
Answer me this, why do you want to hate these kids? Because of a red cap or because you really think they went to the steps of the Lincoln Memorial looking to do this to Mr. Phillips and others? It is my contention, given the facts that these kids went to where they were told to meet to catch a bus. As 16 year old males congregating together, they are bound to start to act a bit foolish regardless of whether they being a catalyst. They might see a young lady walk by and as 16 year old males, they will become peacocks and strut their stuff. But in this case, while they congregated as a group, they were accosted by adults who shouted obscenities at them. Now, picture this in your mind... as 16 year olds, what do you think is a normal reaction when someone calls you a "faggot" or a "nigger"? Mr. Phillips sees this and decides that the young men, who have not really reacted that much to the insults other to act in a surprised manner, are indeed getting ready to pounce and attack. He said to the Detroit Free Press that as a former Marine he was taught that when men get scared they can kill. So he reacted. The video however does not show scared kids, in fact, they decided to drown out the vile homophobic slurs and taunts (that the Black Israelites said they did not do even though it is on the video) with school chants.
Repeat, with school chants.
It is at this point Mr. Phillips and others (not initially reported that there were others with Phillips in either WaPo or NYT or even the Detroit Free Press) came into the crowd with their drums. Were the kids seeking him out to make fun of and/or do racist tomahawk chops? No. Mr. Phillips steps into the fray and in the words of many of the kids, confused them. You can hear on the videos some kids say "What is going on? What is he doing?" So some kids sang along with his chants and others did the tomahawk chant? Evil? Hardly, evil would have been to attack the man for invading their space because they felt threatened. If anything, they did not feel threatened and in the second video I posted, many stood in silence and refused to mock Mr. Phillips. However, one man in Phillips group decides that the kids deserve his warp wisdom. When he engaged them, it was not to dialogue peacefully as Mr. Phillips said was his intent, but to argue with 16 year old boys.
Adults decided it was a good idea to argue with 16 year olds. Imagine that.
But it was the act of one of the 16 year old, the actual kid that was made out to be the face of evil on Saturday night, who was the peacemaker and told his friends to shut up and let Mr. Phillips finish his song. For his actions he got rewarded with death threats.
It's up to you Bench, but you might want to cut these kids a break as I will cut Mr. Phillips a break too. Because it's not as cut and dry as you might want to indict these kids as anything other than being kids. Will the appropriate adults help them understand better ways to handle these situations? I sure hope so, but I do know one thing, social media doxxing and death threats aren't teachable strategies.
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All I know is... Putin is winning.
Polarization, good. Unity, bad.
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Just sweet, innocent boys. (https://twitter.com/girlsreallyrule/status/1087733862283776003?s=21)
Stupid kid (singular). When you were 16, did you ever say anything really, really, really stupid?
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There is culpability by all involved and to say those kids have none is irresponsible. At least it seems to me like you are absolving them of any responsibility.
I'm not, I'm saying they are kids waiting for a bus when adults approached them simply because of a red cap. Think back when you were 16 and if someone approached you and shouted insults to you. How would you react? Probably in the same manner as these kids. But that was *NOT* what was originally put out about these kids. That is the point, there was a misrepresentation about what happened by a twitter feed and also the story given originally by Mr. Phillips.
It should never be ready, fire, aim. "We're all better than that". - Sen. John McClain.
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Stupid kid (singular). When you were 16, did you ever say anything really, really, really stupid?
Not about rape or race.
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Not about rape or race.
But about *other* things... right?
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I'm not, I'm saying they are kids waiting for a bus when adults approached them simply because of a red cap. Think back when you were 16 and if someone approached you and shouted insults to you. How would you react? Probably in the same manner as these kids. But that was *NOT* what was originally put out about these kids. That is the point, there was a misrepresentation about what happened by a twitter feed and also the story given originally by Mr. Phillips.
It should never be ready, fire, aim. "We're all better than that". - Sen. John McClain.
I don't care what was originally put out about the kids. I don't care that there were adults being jackasses. I said they all need to be held accountable but you seen to be letting those kids off because someone approached them. I'm so sick of people letting boys off with the "they are only 16" excuse. So tired of it. There is nothing wrong with holding teenagers accountable for their actions.
And you're asking me? A white girl, who was kind of petite back then if I would have engaged? No, no I wouldn't have. And to have some kid make that rape comment tells me he heard that shit at home.
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I don't care what was originally put out about the kids. I don't care that there were adults being jackasses. I said they all need to be held accountable but you seen to be letting those kids off because someone approached them. I'm so sick of people letting boys off with the "they are only 16" excuse. So tired of it. There is nothing wrong with holding teenagers accountable for their actions.
And you're asking me? A white girl, who was kind of petite back them if I would have engaged? No, no I wouldn't have. And to have some kid make that rape comment tells me he heard that shit at home.
If the #metoo movement heard all the things most of the males (not all) in the OWA said about girls when we were 16 year olds, we'd be headed to some sort of accountability. But most of us did not live with cell phone cameras and social media outlets, so we're left with the "we were just stupid kids, we didn't know anything about women and life". So you, as a woman, how would you feel if you knew what most (not all) of the guys in here said about girls at 16 years of age?
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I don't care what was originally put out about the kids. I don't care that there were adults being jackasses. I said they all need to be held accountable but you seen to be letting those kids off because someone approached them. I'm so sick of people letting boys off with the "they are only 16" excuse. So tired of it. There is nothing wrong with holding teenagers accountable for their actions.
And you're asking me? A white girl, who was kind of petite back then if I would have engaged? No, no I wouldn't have. And to have some kid make that rape comment tells me he heard that shit at home.
Boys will be boys, right?
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Because it's not as cut and dry as you might want to indict these kids as anything other than being kids.
I completely agree with you here!
Not directed at you Noe, but for the greater conversation what is cut and dry is this. The obvious racist in the crowd were the Black Hebrew Israelite's. Any other claim of racism is inferred by viewing perception of a video.
I feel the interactions between Phillips and Sandmann could easily be a misunderstanding.
This is how I see it…
I believe Mr Phillips when he said he intended to calm the situation between the 2 groups. Watching the video, I agree with him that it seemed to be escalating, tensions rising (Between the Hebrew Israelites and the Covington kids).
Mr Phillips walks into the crowd. Walking through, Mr Phillips stops in front of Sandmann drumming (Probably not the most intelligent choice to diffuse anything...yeah it's odd Lol). I really don’t think Sandmann nor any of the other kids understood why Mr Phillips did as he did. The reactions were varied. Some expressed their confusion. Some reactions where to chant w/ the drum on beat. A few did the tomahawk (Do the kids know that this is a racist gesture?). Mr Phillips intentions were obviously not understood by one of his own, as it can be heard him telling kids to go back to Europe.
For Sandmann’s part I see no racist intent. In the other video from a different angle he’s not looking at Mr Phillips, but looking ahead…he described his intent here as hoping to diffuse the situation. Same intent as Mr Phillips. I see no reason to side with one and pit against the other. They stated they had the same intent...
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Just sweet, innocent boys. (https://twitter.com/girlsreallyrule/status/1087733862283776003?s=21)
I think he was repeating a punchline to a bad joke not actually advocating anything. Maybe he heard it from his big sister. Who knows.
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If the #metoo movement heard all the things most of the males (not all) in the OWA said about girls when we were 16 year olds, we'd be headed to some sort of accountability. But most of us did not live with cell phone cameras and social media outlets, so we're left with the "we were just stupid kids, we didn't know anything about women and life". So you, as a woman, how would you feel if you knew what most (not all) of the guys in here said about girls at 16 years of age?
I know what they say about women now, do you believe I have no clue what a 16 year old says? Does that mean it is acceptable? Does it mean that parents can't teach their sons differently?
A man shouldn't say something about a woman that he wouldn't say about his daughter/wife/mother. And yeah, there have been things said in this forum that have been inappropriate. But, I have a hard time being pretty much the only woman posting in here to stand up to everyone else.
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Ignorance is bliss.
But the one kid who was the Saturday night poster child as the leader who was in Mr. Phillips way with his MAGA cap and demonic smirk turned out to be anything but because... the original narrative was not true. It is what I was saying about Mr. Phillips helping to inflame that twitter feed with his *own* account of the situation that some still want to justify. And the IPM is even saying through the NYT that they heard some but not all of the kids chanting as if they were in a pow-wow dance (what you're saying is disrepectful and racist). But this is about one MAGA cap wearing kid who did nothing to have himself thrust into the limelight as the embodiment of evil.
Justice is when truth carries the day, not innuendo.
Damn, you are hard-headed. You just keep asserting
1. that this guy changed his story; and
2. his story is behind the reaction
The first is false, or vastly open to interpretation and the second presupposes that you know why people find the children's behavior troubling. But just keep on keeping on.
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If the #metoo movement heard all the things most of the males (not all) in the OWA said about girls when we were 16 year olds, we'd be headed to some sort of accountability. But most of us did not live with cell phone cameras and social media outlets, so we're left with the "we were just stupid kids, we didn't know anything about women and life". So you, as a woman, how would you feel if you knew what most (not all) of the guys in here said about girls at 16 years of age?
There was also not a #metoo movement to learn from when we were 16. If you're a 16 year old today, and say something like "it's not rape if you enjoy it," that's on you. Not on the cell phone cameras that picked it up.
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If the #metoo movement heard all the things most of the males (not all) in the OWA said about girls when we were 16 year olds, we'd be headed to some sort of accountability. But most of us did not live with cell phone cameras and social media outlets, so we're left with the "we were just stupid kids, we didn't know anything about women and life". So you, as a woman, how would you feel if you knew what most (not all) of the guys in here said about girls at 16 years of age?
Rape is wrong, Noe. That doesn't seem too hard of a concept to grasp.
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I know what they say about women now, do you believe I have no clue what a 16 year old says? Does that mean it is acceptable? Does it mean that parents can't teach their sons differently?
A man shouldn't say something about a woman that he wouldn't say about his daughter/wife/mother. And yeah, there have been things said in this forum that have been inappropriate. But, I have a hard time being pretty much the only woman posting in here to stand up to everyone else.
I agree with this but I've heard some pretty raunchy things come out of the mouths of women too. Not here, of course.
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But about *other* things... right?
Movies, homework, drinking, sports...
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I said they all need to be held accountable
Just curious, what kind of accountability would you have in mind?
If I saw a video of my kids (teenagers) doing a tomahawk in front of Native Americans, I would certainly use it (I'd be disappointed at them and myself as a parent) as a teachable moment.
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But just keep on keeping on.
Oh, don't worry, he will.
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Just curious, what kind of accountability would you have in mind?
If I saw a video of my kids (teenagers) doing a tomahawk in front of Native Americans, I would certainly use it (I'd be disappointed at them and myself as a parent) as a teachable moment.
They aren't my kids but if they were I'd probably do my best to put some sense into them. If that were my spouse/brother, etc. I'd have a discussion.
After all, my brother already says inappropriate things so it's not a new concept for me. There's no reason you can't learn something regardless of the age.
Do I think they should be held accountable by going to jail? No, but they (all of them)need to realize they were lucky this didn't turn into something violent. But, they are all sitting there probably laughing at the attention they are getting for being a bunch of dumbasses.
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But, they are all sitting there probably laughing at the attention they are getting for being a bunch of dumbasses.
Probably a few high-fives going around for not having to go to school today.
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I know what they say about women now, do you believe I have no clue what a 16 year old says?
Objectification of any kind is wrong. It is worse in some sense than a tomahawk chop. But again, do you believe what most males in the OWA said at 16 years of age about women was wholesome and non-objectification or was just plain stupidity on part of stupid 16 year old males? Because we'll all line up and face what ever accountability we are supposed to be accountable for as males who did objectify woman at one point in our lives. Oh yes, when we were 16 years of age, that's when.
Does that mean it is acceptable?
No. So who do you want to be at the head of the line, me or Limey? I no longer have my playboy magazines, I threw them in the trash when I turned 21, but I'm still guilty every once and awhile of remembering stuff I did at 16 that I'm really ashamed of as an adult. So where do you want us to form a line?
Does it mean that parents can't teach their sons differently?
*DING, DING, DING* You nailed it. Parents or adults can certainly teach better than social media shaming... right Limey? I mean the stupid singular kid who made that comment needs to be talked to... but all the comments in that twitter feed. Or maybe by his parents or pastor or significant adult in their life. See, that is the big difference between me being 16 years of age without twitter and cell phone videos and kids today with all sorts of social media in their lives. Stupidity isn't more blantant, it's more out there as news by adults who decide they need to shame and hold them accountable in some form or fashion. Maybe we all need to step back from our high horse and thank the powers that be we never had social media mobs coming after me for looking at porn and objectifying women.
A man shouldn't say something about a woman that he wouldn't say about his daughter/wife/mother.
Very spot on. So why is porn still so prevalent today in a young males as it was in my teenage years? It is ironic this very discussion board is dedicated to Scarlett Johannsen, no?
And yeah, there have been things said in this forum that have been inappropriate.
Dare I say "stupid"?
But, I have a hard time being pretty much the only woman posting in here to stand up to everyone else.
I know, I believe it is very tough for you to bite your tongue when we males act like we're still 16 years of age and can easily objectify women. One a personal note, my wife sat me down one day and gave me a really life changing heart to heart conversation about the pain she's been carrying in our marriage when I willing participate in said objectification with friends. I got a glimpse of her heart and I knew it was time to "grow-up". The best thing the males in this forum could do instead deciding these kids deserve punishment and ridicule is to get involved in the life of teenage males. Like this story in the Dallas Morning News (https://www.dallasnews.com/news/dallas/2017/12/14/dallas-needs-nearly-600-men-answer-call-mentor-south-dallas-students).
I think Jesus had it right when he told a crowd of willing participants to carry out justice (as the law said it should be) and cast stones at a woman. All Jesus asked was this "You that have no sin, cast the first stone". Everyone walked away.
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Damn, you are hard-headed. You just keep asserting
1. that this guy changed his story; and
2. his story is behind the reaction
The first is false, or vastly open to interpretation and the second presupposes that you know why people find the children's behavior troubling. But just keep on keeping on.
I'm just presenting my facts. Bench says it is a difference of opinion. Why do you believe I'm lying or are in need of being convinced what I'm saying is not true. If it's an opinion, am I not allowed to have it? Can all of you get your responses to me straight, you're all confusing me.
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There was also not a #metoo movement to learn from when we were 16. If you're a 16 year old today, and say something like "it's not rape if you enjoy it," that's on you. Not on the cell phone cameras that picked it up.
So we can *excuse* how we grew up Tom but 16 year old males can't today? Porn was okay back then because we didn't know better. Porn not okay today because we now know better? Is that it?
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Oh, don't worry, he will.
Thanks Mr. Asshole. I am.
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Rape is wrong, Noe. That doesn't seem too hard of a concept to grasp.
It is Bench and so is objectifying women. Want the spot in line ahead of me or behind me?
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Objectification of any kind is wrong. It is worse in some sense than a tomahawk chop. But again, do you believe what most males in the OWA said at 16 years of age about women was wholesome and non-objectification or was just plain stupidity on part of stupid 16 year old males? Because we'll all line up and face what ever accountability we are supposed to be accountable for as males who did objectify woman at one point in our lives. Oh yes, when we were 16 years of age, that's when.
No. So who do you want to be at the head of the line, me or Limey? I no longer have my playboy magazines, I threw them in the trash when I turned 21, but I'm still guilty every once and awhile of remembering stuff I did at 16 that I'm really ashamed of as an adult. So where do you want us to form a line?
*DING, DING, DING* You nailed it. Parents or adults can certainly teach better than social media shaming... right Limey? I mean the stupid singular kid who made that comment needs to be talked to... but all the comments in that twitter feed. Or maybe by his parents or pastor or significant adult in their life. See, that is the big difference between me being 16 years of age without twitter and cell phone videos and kids today with all sorts of social media in their lives. Stupidity isn't more blantant, it's more out there as news by adults who decide they need to shame and hold them accountable in some form or fashion. Maybe we all need to step back from our high horse and thank the powers that be we never had social media mobs coming after me for looking at porn and objectifying women.
Very spot on. So why is porn still so prevalent today in a young males as it was in my teenage years? It is ironic this very discussion board is dedicated to Scarlett Johannsen, no?
Dare I say "stupid"?
I know, I believe it is very tough for you to bite your tongue when we males act like we're still 16 years of age and can easily objectify women. One a personal note, my wife sat me down one day and gave me a really life changing heart to heart conversation about the pain she's been carrying in our marriage when I willing participate in said objectification with friends. I got a glimpse of her heart and I knew it was time to "grow-up". The best thing the males in this forum could do instead deciding these kids deserve punishment and ridicule is to get involved in the life of teenage males. Like this story in the Dallas Morning News (https://www.dallasnews.com/news/dallas/2017/12/14/dallas-needs-nearly-600-men-answer-call-mentor-south-dallas-students).
I think Jesus had it right when he told a crowd of willing participants to carry out justice (as the law said it should be) and cast stones at a woman. All Jesus asked was this "You that have no sin, cast the first stone". Everyone walked away.
Fine, you think those kids are just stupid. But, I also think kids learn from the actions of the adults around them. So, if you think they are going to be taught a lesson at home, you have more faith in their families than I do.
And saying the action of someone is wrong doesn't mean you are throwing a stone (judging) them.
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They aren't my kids but if they were I'd probably do my best to put some sense into them. If that were my spouse/brother, etc. I'd have a discussion.
Ok, thought you were only talking about accountability to the original confrontation. I haven't seen the sexual harassment video yet, so it wasn't were my mind went.
After all, my brother already says inappropriate things so it's not a new concept for me. There's no reason you can't learn something regardless of the age.
As the twig is bent the tree inclines. Young twigs are easy to mold. As the tree matures it's tougher to bend. It'll resist sometimes to the point of breaking.
Do I think they should be held accountable by going to jail? No, but they (all of them)need to realize they were lucky this didn't turn into something violent. But, they are all sitting there probably laughing at the attention they are getting for being a bunch of dumbasses.
Could some of them be laughing, sure. No need to judge all these kids as you did though. But from what can be seen at this point, I don't agree all of them acted like dumbasses.
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I agree with this but I've heard some pretty raunchy things come out of the mouths of women too. Not here, of course.
Kind of confusing, eh? I had a walk up Enchanted Rock with my youngest son. He confided in me that some very aggressive girls at school wanted to get him to sleep with them. I gave him the best consul I could as a Dad. He was of course confused how girls could be as horny (his words) as his male friends.
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Movies, homework, drinking, sports...
Women?
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Just curious, what kind of accountability would you have in mind?
If I saw a video of my kids (teenagers) doing a tomahawk in front of Native Americans, I would certainly use it (I'd be disappointed at them and myself as a parent) as a teachable moment.
Because parents, not social media, is the best way to handle this situation. The. Best.
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They aren't my kids but if they were I'd probably do my best to put some sense into them. If that were my spouse/brother, etc. I'd have a discussion.
After all, my brother already says inappropriate things so it's not a new concept for me. There's no reason you can't learn something regardless of the age.
Do I think they should be held accountable by going to jail? No, but they (all of them)need to realize they were lucky this didn't turn into something violent. But, they are all sitting there probably laughing at the attention they are getting for being a bunch of dumbasses.
I agree with the argument you're making except you interjected your own opinion on these kids based on a bias and predisposition without knowing exactly what they are sitting there doing. You may be right about what you said in the last sentence, but have you considered that you just might be wrong too?
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As the twig is bent the tree inclines. Young twigs are easy to mold. As the tree matures it's tougher to bend. It'll resist sometimes to the point of breaking.
“In a garden, things grow . . . but first, they must wither; trees have to lose their leaves in order to put forth new leaves, and to grow thicker and stronger and taller. Some trees die, but fresh saplings replace them. Gardens need a lot of care. But if you love your garden, you don’t mind working in it, and waiting. Then in the proper season you will surely see it flourish.”
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Probably a few high-fives going around for not having to go to school today.
Or maybe hiding in the basement today because of death threats. Maybe not, then again, maybe so. Social media, what a great thing this is.
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I agree with the argument you're making except you interjected your own opinion on these kids based on a bias and predisposition with know exactly what they are sitting there doing. You may be right about what you said in the last sentence, but have you considered that you just might be wrong too?
We've all interjected our own opinion based on a bias and predisposition, even you. Have you considered that you may be wrong?
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“In a garden, things grow . . . but first, they must wither; trees have to lose their leaves in order to put forth new leaves, and to grow thicker and stronger and taller. Some trees die, but fresh saplings replace them. Gardens need a lot of care. But if you love your garden, you don’t mind working in it, and waiting. Then in the proper season you will surely see it flourish.”
I grow tomatoes. You always cut-off the suckers. Pruning is painful but produces the greatest yield.
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Fine, you think those kids are just stupid. But, I also think kids learn from the actions of the adults around them. So, if you think they are going to be taught a lesson at home, you have more faith in their families than I do.
Based on what BG, a cap? Are you projecting some sort of family life that is spurring these kids on to be stupid? I do no like the cap either, but this was not a Nazi rally and social media took it and ran with it as if the people who posted opinions knew these kids intimately. They could be right and then again, they could be very, very, very wrong about these stupid kids. Perhaps? Maybe? If so, can we just all step away from tossing stones at kids we do not know personally and take a minute to remember how we were as 16 year olds and how we needed help to grow by significant people in our lives, not some social media mob?
And saying the action of someone is wrong doesn't mean you are throwing a stone (judging) them.
You used the word punishment as many have said on social media. Go ahead and punish away if you feel justified that they deserved it. Ridicule is a form of punishment, but probably more in line with bullying tactics. Like I said, I'm not getting in the way of mob who wants to punish these kids, it's already gone too far for common sense and decency to take hold. That is the social media we all live in.
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But from what can be seen at this point, I don't agree all of them acted like dumbasses.
[sarc meter]Careful, you're lying when you don't say they are all "young racist freaks"! [/sarc meter]
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Based on what BG, a cap? Are you projecting some sort of family life that is spurring these kids on to be stupid? I do no like the cap either, but this was not a Nazi rally and social media took it and ran with it as if the people who posted opinions knew these kids intimately. They could be right and then again, they could be very, very, very wrong about these stupid kids. Perhaps? Maybe? If so, can we just all step away from tossing stones at kids we do not know personally and take a minute to remember how we were as 16 year olds and how we needed help to grow by significant people in our lives, not some social media mob?
You used the word punishment as many have said on social media. Go ahead and punish away if you feel justified that they deserved it. Ridicule is a form of punishment, but probably more in line with bullying tactics. Like I said, I'm not getting in the way of mob who wants to punish these kids, it's already gone too far for common sense and decency to take hold. That is the social media we all live in.
yes
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We've all interjected our own opinion based on a bias and predisposition, even you. Have you considered that you may be wrong?
Agreed! Finally! We all agree we don't know shit about these kids, we all just have our predisposition to dislike or excuse stupidity. What a great world we live in when we understand each other fully.
Nothing is true, everything is opinion.
So, why don't we all stay out and let adults in their lives handle this teachable moment as it should be. We can't call them Nazis nor can we call them Saints.
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So we can *excuse* how we grew up Tom but 16 year old males can't today? Porn was okay back then because we didn't know better. Porn not okay today because we now know better? Is that it?
I don't exactly get your point. What does porn have to do with anything? Are you on a crusade against porn? What's wrong with porn?
And I wasn't excusing anything about how I grew up. I didn't make jokes about rape when I was 16, either. I'm saying it's even MORE ridiculous now, in light of the #metoo movement. You seem to just want to hand out get out of jail free cards to all 16 year olds, because hey, they're young. They have absolutely no responsibility for what they say or do. It's that damn social media and cell phone cameras. Shame on them!
Go out and do whatever the fuck you want, 16 year olds! There are NO repercussions.
Don't get me wrong, I certainly am not advocating hunting him down and threatening with violence, but if the little fucker get shamed a bit on social media, so be it.
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Fine, you think those kids are just stupid. But, I also think kids learn from the actions of the adults around them. So, if you think they are going to be taught a lesson at home, you have more faith in their families than I do.
Exactly. They learn bigotry at home, it gets reinforced at school (where they obviously get a extra serving of misogyny), so by all means let's rely on the parents and authority figures in these boys' lives to mold them into compassionate adults.
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Fine, you think those kids are just stupid. But, I also think kids learn from the actions of the adults around them. So, if you think they are going to be taught a lesson at home, you have more faith in their families than I do.
This.
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I don't exactly get your point. What does porn have to do with anything? Are you on a crusade against porn? What's wrong with porn?
What's wrong with porn? Are you serious?
And I wasn't excusing anything about how I grew up. I didn't make jokes about rape when I was 16, either.
So you want to only concentrate on rape comments when you were sixteen, all other stupidity is hands off, I was just a kid? I don't understand this, we want to use one item as reasonable to condemn but not other? Look for all I know you never said anything to objectify women or said anything like "nigger" to a black friend or called someone a "faggot" (in Limey's case, it's excusable, because "faggot" means cigarette). If so, yeah, you're good, go ahead and throw a stone at the rape commenting kid, he deserves it from you.
I'm saying it's even MORE ridiculous now, in light of the #metoo movement. You seem to just want to hand out get out of jail free cards to all 16 year olds, because hey, they're young. They have absolutely no responsibility for what they say or do. It's that damn social media and cell phone cameras. Shame on them!
I'm saying we forget we were 16 once and said as hateful things as these stupid kids did. Is that a wrong statement? So as such, can we remember what it was like to be 16 and stupid and maybe use that a light to cast on these kids. And accountability and punishment (if there is any to come) is better served by people in their lives who mean something to them, not a social media mob.
Go out and do whatever the fuck you want, 16 year olds! There are NO repercussions.
Yeah, wasn't growing up in our day great!
Don't get me wrong, I certainly am not advocating hunting him down and threatening with violence, but if the little fucker get shamed a bit on social media, so be it.
So you've made my point, we didn't get shamed on social media for being "little fuckers" at 16 because there was nothing to hold us accountable to the free world other than our friend Billy telling our Moms what we said about his Mom and such. We were lucky Tom. And we get to participate in shaming little fuckers too, as if we never did the same! Great world we live in. I love Social Media!
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Exactly. They learn bigotry at home, it gets reinforced at school (where they obviously get a extra serving of misogyny), so by all means let's rely on the parents and authority figures in these boys' lives to mold them into compassionate adults.
In your narrow view of the world. So did you learn to be an asshole at home? I don't think so, I won't dare presume I know that for a fact. But I do know you are an asshole.
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Fine, you think those kids are just stupid. But, I also think kids learn from the actions of the adults around them. So, if you think they are going to be taught a lesson at home, you have more faith in their families than I do.
And saying the action of someone is wrong doesn't mean you are throwing a stone (judging) them.
The man that makes and sells the MAGA hats is piss-poor example of a human being...and their hero.
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I wonder what would make someone go out of their way to defend these youths for their actions, regardless of the snippet or angle or length of the video you chose to view. These are high school kids bussed to DC to take part in a political act, the March for Lives, sponsored by a private Catholic school. They chose to make political statements by wearing their MAGA hats, which are decidedly pro-Trump (spare me the fake wonderment about the baked-in symbolism) and then decided it was a good idea to mesh with an Indigenous People's March. What amount of youthful indiscretion would make anyone think this was a good idea if not for malicious intent? You really have to reach pretty far to think that what these kids did was just hijinks.
Oh, I know why some will reach those lengths. Because they can; they feel emboldened. Had these been kids from an inner-city public school peppered with ebony and shade, the overwhelming narrative from these same people would have been to crush and condemn. It's so transparent.
Maybe you're for Donald Trump. Maybe you're against abortion rights. Maybe you're Catholic. Maybe you just like being contrary. Defending the actions of these youths is dangerous and wrong and most people deep-down know this. If you honestly believe they were "just being kids" then I really don't know what to say. I suppose we get the society we deserve.
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This.
Social media is the better solution. It takes a village.
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What's wrong with porn? Are you serious?
So you want to only concentrate on rape comments when you were sixteen, all other stupidity is hands off, I was just a kid? I don't understand this, we want to use one item as reasonable to condemn but not other? Look for all I know you never said anything to objectify women or said anything like "nigger" to a black friend or called someone a "faggot" (in Limey's case, it's excusable, because "faggot" means cigarette). If so, yeah, you're good, go ahead and throw a stone at the rape commenting kid, he deserves it from you.
I'm saying we forget we were 16 once and said as hateful things as these stupid kids did. Is that a wrong statement? So as such, can we remember what it was like to be 16 and stupid and maybe use that a light to cast on these kids. And accountability and punishment (if there is any to come) is better served by people in their lives who mean something to them, not a social media mob.
Yeah, wasn't growing up in our day great!
So you've made my point, we didn't get shamed on social media for being "little fuckers" at 16 because there was nothing to hold us accountable to the free world other than our friend Billy telling our Moms what we said about his Mom and such. We were lucky Tom. And we get to participate in shaming little fuckers too, as if we never did the same! Great world we live in. I love Social Media!
No, I did not do the fucking same, Noe. Get over it. Stop trying to project whatever awful thing you must have done at 16 on everyone else to make yourself feel better. Not all 16 year olds are assholes.
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It takes a village.
I had thought earlier about posting something along those lines. Except my post wouldn't have required turning on the sarc meter.
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I wonder what would make someone go out of their way to defend these youths for their actions, regardless of the snippet or angle or length of the video you chose to view. These are high school kids bussed to DC to take part in a political act, the March for Lives, sponsored by a private Catholic school. They chose to make political statements by wearing their MAGA hats, which are decidedly pro-Trump (spare me the fake wonderment about the baked-in symbolism) and then decided it was a good idea to mesh with an Indigenous People's March.
Wrong. The IPM decided to mesh with them as they waited for their bus. The IPM said they did this because another group also decided to assault these kids verbally. Just trying to keep facts in the equation so as to make it much more truthful than just a viewpoint of an event based on bias over a stupid cap worn by stupid kids.
What amount of youthful indiscretion would make anyone think this was a good idea if not for malicious intent? You really have to reach pretty far to think that what these kids did was just hijinks.
This narrative has been proven wrong. They did not approach nor mesh nor engage anyone. They were engaged by two adult groups, one of which spewed hate and vile insults. Most of them homophobic. But it seems it is better to talk about 16 year olds with MAGA caps than to talk about Black Men who spew hate and the IPM whose leader did not correctly talk about what happened until much later. The IPM does not say that they were in any way accosted by the young cap wearers, they say they went into their crowd to sing over them. Period.
Oh, I know why some will reach those lengths. Because they can; they feel emboldened. Had these been kids from an inner-city public school peppered with ebony and shade, the overwhelming narrative from these same people would have been to crush and condemn. It's so transparent.
Actrually, I'm glad you brought this up. I've worked as a volunteer for inner city kids in Houston. One I didn't reach and is serving a life sentence in jail for murdering a man. Another I did reach and the proudest day in my life was when I read in the Chronicle that this kid donated bone marrow to help others. Great kid who grew up in the most horrible of situations. Yet I was able, along with others to reach him.
So 16 year olds who wear crip colors or MAGA caps are still just kids who need help from significant people in their lives. I'm glad social media wasn't around to condemn my kid who donated bone marrow simply because he was a gang member.
Maybe you're for Donald Trump. Maybe you're against abortion rights. Maybe you're Catholic. Maybe you just like being contrary. Defending the actions of these youths is dangerous and wrong and most people deep-down know this. If you honestly believe they were "just being kids" then I really don't know what to say. I suppose we get the society we deserve.
Yeah, lets go round up all the Crips, Bloods, and M13 kids right now and toss them away. Those people who work with them don't know better than us on Social Media! We are the arbitrators of truth and justice.
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The man that makes and sells the MAGA hats is piss-poor example of a human being...and their hero.
My uncle was my hero growing up. He was also a wife beater and assaulted my cousin many times. He stopped being my hero. Because I grew up. He died two weeks ago and I cried because of it.
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No, I did not do the fucking same, Noe. Get over it. Stop trying to project whatever awful thing you must have done at 16 on everyone else to make yourself feel better. Not all 16 year olds are assholes.
Cool, cast the first and even last stone if you'd like.
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I had thought earlier about posting something along those lines. Except my post wouldn't have required turning on the sarc meter.
No sarc meter needed. There are some social reformers who do believe this. As a parent, this might be the one thing that would make me prone to violence if because of a social mandate, my parenting is overridden by a social media scorecard.
Sounds like a dystopian future, doesn't it?
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Perhaps one's time is better spent reaching kids than arguing on social media.
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Perhaps one's time is better spent reaching kids than arguing on social media.
OH MAN, this!!!!!!!
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As a parent, this might be the one thing that would make me prone to violence if because of a social mandate, my parenting is overridden by a social media scorecard.
Mandate? Since when did sharing opinions morph into a mandate?
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I don't exactly get your point. What does porn have to do with anything? Are you on a crusade against porn? What's wrong with porn?
There's no arguing with him. You must only submit to the education he condescends to give. If you are meek enough and lucky, you may even get a ding ding ding in return.
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Mandate? Since when did sharing opinions morph into a mandate?
Things become actionable on social media nowadays in case you did not notice. The reaction on Saturday night was indeed over the top and it eventually included death threats. This social media experiment, it isn't as fall-safe as one might think.
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There's no arguing with him.
So don't. Simple enough.
You must only submit to the education he condescends to give. If you are meek enough and lucky, you may even get a ding ding ding in return.
Better than the delightful circle jerking off of each other I see in this. Facts? No, we donn need no stinkeen facts!
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Shitting on the board doesn't make you win at chess but it sure ends the game.
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Shitting on the board doesn't make you win at chess but it sure ends the game.
Opinion or fact? Do you want me to leave, just say so and I will. Sorry to offer a difference of opinion on this and interject some facts as I read them. Say the word, I'm out. Hey, lets have a social media vote on it!
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This social media experiment, it isn't as fall-safe as one might think.
After the manipulation of an election, I think we all kinda get that by now.
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After the manipulation of an election, I think we all kinda get that by now.
DING, DING, DING... oh wait, did I just insult you by doing that? Sorry. But because I do not like Trump (at all), I hold true that Trump used social media to rally his base by villianizing others. He knows as well as anyone else how to play this social media game. And he will continue to do so. And people will do the same because you need to fight fire with fire... whoever gets hurt be damned. Trumpters who rally to everything he says on social media will then react without taking time to realize that the story isn't as cut and dry as they may think. That now we want to do the same speaks to how we can be duped into being just like the evil we hate.
So we agree entirely on this, no?
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Better than the delightful circle jerking off of each other I see in this.
Colorful...yes. Insulting, painting with the broadest of brushes and completely inaccurate...also yes.
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Colorful...yes. Insulting, painting with the broadest of brushes and completely inaccurate...also yes.
Agree, being called a liar for no reason isn't fun when trying to discuss something.
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Here's a fun fact: the country's national security apparatus is in the shitter and already half way around the bend. Forget (for now, more below) that FBI agents are working without pay, it also means that they aren't able to run drug stings; they can't pay gang informants; their translators are furloughed, so intel intercepts are piling up without anyone knowing what the fuck criminals and terrorists are saying to each other; federal prosecutors can't get grand jury subpoenas or indictments.
And this may be a feature, not a bug. Every FBI agent, and many levels of federal employees, have to pass a background check. A big part of that is to make sure that they are financially healthy, and thus less susceptible to bribery and corruption. It's for this reason that Jared fucking Kushner can't pass the background check. So, if you take all the FBI, and don't pay them for a month or two, what do you think that does to their finances?
We are seeing the truth of the American Dream being laid bare here. Even federal employees - the poster children for middle class, white collar workers - are one or two paychecks away from a crippling financial disaster and a shitstain on their credit record that will last a lifetime. But what happens to these people when their next background check refresh comes along? There's going to be a number who will now fail because their finances got shit on by Trump, and now they're out.
This is how you force people out of federal employment. This is how you empty out the FBI. This is how you suppress recruitment of good candidates. This is how you tilt the scale in favor of the lawless. This is how you give Papy Putin and pill-free boner.
#MAGA
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Here's a fun fact: the country's national security apparatus is in the shitter and already half way around the bend. Forget (for now, more below) that FBI agents are working without pay, it also means that they aren't able to run drug stings; they can't pay gang informants; their translators are furloughed, so intel intercepts are piling up without anyone knowing what the fuck criminals and terrorists are saying to each other; federal prosecutors can't get grand jury subpoenas or indictments.
And this may be a feature, not a bug. Every FBI agent, and many levels of federal employees, have to pass a background check. A big part of that is to make sure that they are financially healthy, and thus less susceptible to bribery and corruption. It's for this reason that Jared fucking Kushner can't pass the background check. So, if you take all the FBI, and don't pay them for a month or two, what do you think that does to their finances?
We are seeing the truth of the American Dream being laid bare here. Even federal employees - the poster children for middle class, white collar workers - are one or two paychecks away from a crippling financial disaster and a shitstain on their credit record that will last a lifetime. But what happens to these people when their next background check refresh comes along? There's going to be a number who will now fail because their finances got shit on by Trump, and now they're out.
This is how you force people out of federal employment. This is how you empty out the FBI. This is how you suppress recruitment of good candidates. This is how you tilt the scale in favor of the lawless. This is how you give Papy Putin and pill-free boner.
#MAGA
It's not and never has been about the wall. It is about the subversion of democracy.
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Cool, cast the first and even last stone if you'd like.
Just wanted to note, you are in effect calling me a liar.
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Perhaps one's time is better spent reaching kids Black Hebrew Israelites than arguing on social media.
FIFY
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It's not and never has been about the wall. It is about the subversion of democracy.
I agree with this. I also think both sides are guilty.
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DING, DING, DING... oh wait, did I just insult you by doing that?
Oh you don't know how proud I am to be among the meek and lucky.
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I also think both sides are guilty.
Bull and shit, sir.
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I agree with this. I also think both sides are guilty.
Not even fucking close. The President has decided to inflict harm on the country in order to force a co-equal branch of government to bend to his will, and not that of the people who don’t want the wall and just gave Democrats the biggest mid-term mandate in history.
This is one side not handling reality at all.
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Not even fucking close. The President has decided to inflict harm on the country in order to force a co-equal branch of government to bend to his will, and not that of the people who don’t want the wall and just gave Democrats the biggest mid-term mandate in history.
This is one side not handling reality at all.
One side hasn't handled reality since the introduction of Fox News.
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Failing to recognize the culpability of both parties is failing to understand the dynamics of politics and the history that got us to this point. You're the better dancer so you blame your dance partner for losing the dance contest.
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Failing to recognize the culpability of both parties is failing to understand the dynamics of politics and the history that got us to this point. You're the better dancer so you blame your dance partner for losing the dance contest.
Don't get me too wrong, Trump is the kid that doesn't like who the teacher assigned for him to dance with so he dances around like a shit throwing chimp.
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Failing to recognize the culpability of both parties is failing to understand the dynamics of politics and the history that got us to this point. You're the better dancer so you blame your dance partner for losing the dance contest.
More like "you're the better dancer so you blame your partner for poisoning the judges."
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More like "you're the better dancer so you blame your partner for poisoning the judges."
I'll take that. That is even better.
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I'll take that. That is even better.
Of course, your partner did poison the judge.
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Of course, your partner did poison the judge.
It didn't kill the judge, just made him crazy in a couple of three swing states.
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What's judge even mean? I think everybody is equally flawed. I can't begin to distinguish between things. How would one do that anyway? Does it take effort?
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What's judge even mean? I think everybody is equally flawed. I can't begin to distinguish between things. How would one do that anyway? Does it take effort?
Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing and rightdoing there is a field. I'll meet you there. When the soul lies down in that grass
the world is too full to talk about.
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From the Washington Post:
Correction: Earlier versions of this story incorrectly said that Native American activist Nathan Phillips fought in the Vietnam War. Phillips served in the U.S. Marines from 1972 to 1976 but was never deployed to Vietnam.
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State Department cancels border security conference due to shutdown over border security
https://www.cnn.com/2019/01/22/politics/state-dept-border-security-conference-postponed/index.html
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Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing and rightdoing there is a field. I'll meet you there. When the soul lies down in that grass
the world is too full to talk about.
That's a really lovely sentence and a nice sentiment. The problem with your policy of enforced-equivalence and nonengagement is that while you're lying in the field the billionaires are helping themselves to the rest of the money, the world is melting and the poor are caught in the outflow, the workers can't unionize for a better shot, they're drilling for mass shootings between Algebra-I and Not-the-Arts Class that Meant So Much to You because They Don't Offer that Class Anymore in Part Because Assholes who Benefited from Extraordinarily Well-Subsidized Educations Decided They Wanted Tax Cuts, rampant cynicism about public service and civic duty is causing millions to self-disenfranchise, and on every single one of these issues Republicans actively court Drift and Inaction while Democrats are left in the increasingly tenuous position of being the only adults in the room trying to make things work. Honestly, the energy you must spend forcing all the actors into the same cast...
It strikes me that your entire politics is amazingly decadent. Your grandparents knew the difference between Hoover and Roosevelt. I hope someday I'm as safe from the world as you apparently are. And I hope if I get there I'll remember that there's one group out there actively trying to keep people from voting, and I won't pretend that they're politically, ethically and actionably the equal of the group that's trying to empower those same folks.
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Just wanted to note, you are in effect calling me a liar.
No I'm not. I'm saying I believe you.
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Oh you don't know how proud I am to be among the meek and lucky.
Glad to be of service. My work is done here, I have blessed yet another one! Onward to other victories! Goodbye social media (again)!
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That's a really lovely sentence and a nice sentiment. The problem with your policy of enforced-equivalence and nonengagement is that while you're lying in the field the billionaires are helping themselves to the rest of the money, the world is melting and the poor are caught in the outflow, the workers can't unionize for a better shot, they're drilling for mass shootings between Algebra-I and Not-the-Arts Class that Meant So Much to You because They Don't Offer that Class Anymore in Part Because Assholes who Benefited from Extraordinarily Well-Subsidized Educations Decided They Wanted Tax Cuts, rampant cynicism about public service and civic duty is causing millions to self-disenfranchise, and on every single one of these issues Republicans actively court Drift and Inaction while Democrats are left in the increasingly tenuous position of being the only adults in the room trying to make things work. Honestly, the energy you must spend forcing all the actors into the same cast...
It strikes me that your entire politics is amazingly decadent. Your grandparents knew the difference between Hoover and Roosevelt. I hope someday I'm as safe from the world as you apparently are. And I hope if I get there I'll remember that there's one group out there actively trying to keep people from voting, and I won't pretend that they're politically, ethically and actionably the equal of the group that's trying to empower those same folks.
I understand that you think I'm some kind of a goon, though that's never been my intention. I think you are naïve but I'm sure that was not your intention. We really don't know each other at all, though someday if we meet I'm sure we'll get along fine.
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No I'm not. I'm saying I believe you.
Really? Then why the "cast the first and 2nd (and whatnot) stone?"
Most people use that sarcastically to basically say you're full of shit. If I misinterpreted, however, I do apologize.
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Really? Then why the "cast the first and 2nd (and whatnot) stone?"
Most people use that sarcastically to basically say you're full of shit. If I misinterpreted, however, I do apologize.
Because if you don't have flaws from your past, you can indeed say things about 16 year olds because you said you never did anything like them. You have that right in America. Of course, me personally, I would never run for office, too many skeletons in my teenage years, just so you know. "No sir, I did try marijuana once, but I never inhaled!"
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Because if you don't have flaws, you can indeed say things about 16 year olds because you said you never did anything like them. You have that right in America. Of course, me personally, I would never run for office, too many skeletons in my teenage years, just so you know.
I never said I don't have flaws. Did I say that? I said I wasn't a fucking asshole when I was 16. So once again, I doubt your sincerity, and we're back to you calling me a liar. You can now flower it up all you want, but let's get real. You just don't want to outright call me a liar because it will reveal your hypocrisy.
As far as your skeletons, whatever they may be, exactly.. as I said, you're projecting your own bullshit on everyone else.
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You know I think it's funny that I'm looked at as some kind of Republican apologist. I'm a registered Democrat who voted for Bernie in the primaries. I would like to vote for John Hickenlooper in 2020. Maybe Kamala Harris. Otherwise I might vote Green Party again.
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I never said I don't have flaws. Did I say that? I said I wasn't a fucking asshole when I was 16. So once again, I doubt your sincerity, and we're back to you calling me a liar. You can now flower it up all you want, but let's get real. You just don't want to outright call me a liar because it will reveal your hypocrisy.
As far as your skeletons, whatever they may be, exactly.. as I said, you're projecting your own bullshit on everyone else.
Okay, I'll be more exact then... since you weren't a fucking asshole when you were 16 years of age, go ahead and do what you want with these kids. It's fair game. That is all I was saying. Me? Can't do it, I know what I was at 16 and stupidity was an all-time high.
Why are you getting so upset? It's not worth it nor am I. Cool?
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You know I think it's funny that I'm looked at as some kind of Republican apologist. I'm a registered Democrat who voted for Bernie in the primaries. I would like to vote for John Hickenlooper in 2020. Maybe Kamala Harris. Otherwise I might vote Green Party again.
Hickenlooper will get the vote from any older pot smoker every time! Not that I'm calling you a older pot smoker, just making a general observation. I have a way of not typing clearly.
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Hickenlooper will get the vote from any older pot smoker every time! Not that I'm calling you a older pot smoker, just making a general observation. I have a way of not typing clearly.
Clearly you are projecting.
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Clearly you are projecting.
I apologize to all older former pot smokers (and current ones too) for including you in my own bullshit. Move along, nothing to see here, keep moving.
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You know I think it's funny that I'm looked at as some kind of Republican apologist. I'm a registered Democrat who voted for Bernie in the primaries.
If you tell us Jill Stein was next on your ballot your bothsidesism will be complete.
ETA:
And re-reading your post I see the word "again" so I'll take the Stein vote as a given.
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I apologize to all older former pot smokers (and current ones too) for including you in my own bullshit. Move along, nothing to see here, keep moving.
What bullshit? You didn't go on for god knows how many pages trying to convince everyone and their mother that potheads vote for Hickenlooper.
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What bullshit? You didn't go on for god knows how many pages trying to convince everyone and their mother that potheads vote for Hickenlooper.
I can if you want me to. Shall I? I shutter to think who'd I vote for had I inhaled. Or maybe not. Maybe it would have made me stop projecting my bullshit on others. Maybe it would have allowed others to project their bullshit on me instead... and like it!
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I can if you want me to. Shall I? I shutter to think who'd I vote for had I inhaled. Or maybe not. Maybe it would make me stop projecting my bullshit. Maybe it will allow others to project their bullshit on me instead!
Heh. I'm fine with you not doing that. :)
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Heh. I'm fine with you not doing that. :)
eeek! I used an emoji.
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Heh. I'm fine with you not doing that. :)
Actually me too. We totally agree! :)
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Actually me too. We totally agree! :)
Yay! How much longer til spring training???
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If you tell us Jill Stein was next on your ballot your bothsidesism will be complete.
Yes, I voted for Jill Stein. I couldn't make myself vote for Clinton. And I sure wasn't going to vote for that goofball Johnson. So I stand humbly in the presence of your exalted judgement, a bothsideismist. Also as a bald man who is jealous of guys with good hair.
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eeek! I used an emoji.
Me two. Me? Because I'm not good at this whole genre of posting opinions. Not good at all. I'm glad I withheld my clapping hands and thumbs up emojis and went with the "DING, DING, DING" instead. Bad, verrah bad.
Hey anytime you're in town (Austin) and want to go get a beer with me, I'm game. Nothing is serious enough in here to make people out to be what they type. Sometimes you'll find people are polar opposites of what they boldly (and in my case, longly... is there such a word) type in here.
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Yay! How much longer til spring training???
Not soon enough brother... not soon enough!
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I would like to vote for John Hickenlooper in 2020. Maybe Kamala Harris. Otherwise I might vote Green Party again.
I definitely could see myself voting for Hickenlooper if he runs. Harris, not so sure. My eight years living in Cali turned me from a Democrat to an independent and I still have a residual distrust for politicians from that state.
I'd vote Libertarian before I ever voted Green Party. And I'll never vote Libertarian.
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Me two. Me? Because I'm not good at this whole genre of posting opinions. Not good at all. I'm glad I withheld my clapping hands and thumbs up and went with the "DING, DING, DING" instead. Bad, verrah bad.
Hey anytime you're in town (Austin) and went to go get a beer with me, I'm game. Nothing is serious enough in here to make people out to be what they type. Sometimes you'll find people are polar opposites of what they boldly (and in my case, longly... is there such a word) in here.
I'd definitely take you up on that offer, but I'm in Georgia, and don't see myself getting out that way anytime in the foreseeable future. And yes, one of my *flaws* is probably getting worked up a bit more than I should.
And I actually like emoji's, but I know they are :( upon here.
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I'd vote Libertarian before I ever voted Green Party. And I'll never vote Libertarian.
I used to think the same way, but as a bald man, I feel disenfranchised by the two major political parties. I like the idea of more than two choices.
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So I stand humbly in the presence of your exalted judgement, a bothsideismist.
Pick a lane, dude, pick a lane. With Trumpelstiltskin and his braying acolytes, it ain't that hard.
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I definitely could see myself voting for Hickenlooper if he runs. Harris, not so sure. My eight years living in Cali turned me from a Democrat to an independent and I still have a residual distrust for politicians from that state.
I'd vote Libertarian before I ever voted Green Party. And I'll never vote Libertarian.
I voted Independent for the first time in my life in the last Presidential election. I was clearly on the "Anyone but Trump" bandwagon. I was preparing myself to vote for Hillary until a last minute Independent stood up that caught my attention. Some say I wasted my vote, it would have helped the "anyone but trump" movement, but I actually found myself liking my candidate more than just giving away my vote because I hated Trump.
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I'd definitely take you up on that offer, but I'm in Georgia, and don't see myself getting out that way anytime in the foreseeable future. And yes, one of my *flaws* is probably getting worked up a bit more than I should.
And I actually like emoji's, but I know they are :( upon here.
Dude, you're alright. I like your contributions. Anytime Tom, the offer stands.
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Dude, you're alright. I like your contributions. Anytime Tom, the offer stands.
Thanks, Noe. Much appreciated.
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Thanks, Noe. Much appreciated.
8)
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Pick a lane, dude, pick a lane. With Trumpelstiltskin and his braying acolytes, it ain't that hard.
I'll wait until I know where the road goes. Then I'll pick a lane. And when I need to change lanes because of all the shit on the road up ahead, I'll change lanes. Also the most scenic lane is usually not the path of least resistance.
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I voted Independent for the first time in my life in the last Presidential election. I was clearly on the "Anyone but Trump" bandwagon. I was preparing myself to vote for Hillary until a last minute Independent stood up that caught my attention. Some say I wasted my vote, it would have helped the "anyone but trump" movement, but I actually found myself liking my candidate more than just giving away my vote because I hated Trump.
I reached the point where not voting at all was a better choice than voting for who I hated the least among Clinton and Trump. I didn't have thanks to a third party.
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Just FYI, it was reported that the Russians, being intelligent in their deviousness, had to decide where to invest in their disinformation campaigns. They concluded that their best odds were with the unhinged, basically because they were passionate and lacked critical thought. Well, the NRA was a natural place to mine, hate groups were another and of course, Jill Stein. Seriously, I’m not just being an asshole here, that was their conclusion.
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Just FYI, it was reported that the Russians, being intelligent in their deviousness, had to decide where to invest in their disinformation campaigns. They concluded that their best odds were with the unhinged, basically because they were passionate and lacked critical thought. Well, the NRA was a natural place to mine, hate groups were another and of course, Jill Stein. Seriously, I’m not just being an asshole here, that was their conclusion.
I had heard that too. I have no hinges to be undone, so I don't think your being an asshole, as I explained it was Clinton and Trump not Russians that influenced my decision.
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Don't get me too wrong, Trump is the kid that doesn't like who the teacher assigned for him to dance with so he dances around like a shit throwing chimp.
This is a fundamental misunderstanding of the situation.
The President has shut down the government because democratically elected co-equal representatives aren’t abdicating their jobs and letting him do whatever he wants. There isn’t a “both sides” argument here. If Democrats roll over, Trump doesn’t build his wall - the money in dispute isn’t enough and he still hasn’t spent 2017 money. If they don’t roll over, Trimp doesn’t build his wall. Either way, there’s no wall. The only variable is Trump.
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He went to war for this country. That earns him deference from those of us who haven't.
If we give him deference for going to war for his country, what do we give him for lying about it and stealing the valor of those who did?
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If we give him deference for going to war for his country, what do we give him for lying about it and stealing the valor of those who did?
He was a Viet Nam era vet, I honor him for that. If he ever misrepresented himself as being a combat veteren, he has no credibility. None. Just another poliical pawn.
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He was a Viet Nam era vet, I honor him for that. If he ever misrepresented himself as being a combat veteren, he has no credibility. None. Just another poliical pawn.
I haven't seen where Phillips himself claimed to be a combat veteran. Several media accounts reported that he was a Vietnam veteran but gives no quotes that Philips stated this or that he was claiming combat veteran status.
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Do you see what happened here? We - and the media - are now debating the reputation of the man who was - at best - mocked by a bunch of high school students, instead of the behavior of said high school kids which is what projected this story into the public sphere.
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If we give him deference for going to war for his country, what do we give him for lying about it and stealing the valor of those who did?
I conflated "veteran" with "combat veteran". That's on me, not him.
Still, he served, and you typically don't get to choose of you get sent into a combat zone or not. For that you need a friendly doctor who owes your dad a favor.
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I had heard that too. I have no hinges to be undone, so I don't think your being an asshole, as I explained it was Clinton and Trump not Russians that influenced my decision.
Russian propaganda was shared on social media billions of times and became newsworthy because of its profile. You may have already decided far in advance - I know I had - but the entire thing swung on 77,000 voters across three states. States that were targeted by the Russians who seemed to have a sophisticated understanding of the demographics there. It's almost as if someone was feeding them data...
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Do you see what happened here? We - and the media - are now debating the reputation of the man who was - at best - mocked by a bunch of high school students, instead of the behavior of said high school kids which is what projected this story into the public sphere.
No, I don't see that. That is your spin. I see the instigators, the Black Hebrew Israelites, getting a free pass and people vilifying/defending some kids' immature behavior and questioning the degree of involvement of a veteran's military service during the Viet Nam war..
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Do you see what happened here? We - and the media - are now debating the reputation of the man who was - at best - mocked by a bunch of high school students, instead of the behavior of said high school kids which is what projected this story into the public sphere.
It really is an amazing spin. Kids behave in a manner that can at best be described as obnoxious and disrespectful with a sliding scale towards racist, and they're the heroes and an old man who was beating a drum and singing is the villain.
Meanwhile, this petty debate has overshadowed the fact that we're over a month into an actual societal crisis.
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No, I don't see that. That is your spin. I see the instigators, the Black Hebrew Israelites, getting a free pass and people vilifying/defending some kids' immature behavior and questioning the degree of involvement of a veteran's military service during the Viet Nam war..
Spin is questioning the veteran's war record (see Kerry, John and McCain, John and Khan, Humayun). The interaction between the Covington students and the Black Hebrew Israelites is an interesting aside, as it was this interaction that Phillips says he was trying to diffuse. The fact that the students pivoted from their exchange with the one group to mocking Phillips is all on them.
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It really is an amazing spin. Kids behave in a manner that can at best be described as obnoxious and disrespectful with a sliding scale towards racist, and they're the heroes and an old man who was beating a drum and singing is the villain.
Meanwhile, this petty debate has overshadowed the fact that we're over a month two years into an actual societal crisis.
FIFY
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No, I don't see that. That is your spin. I see the instigators, the Black Hebrew Israelites, getting a free pass and people vilifying/defending some kids' immature behavior and questioning the degree of involvement of a veteran's military service during the Viet Nam war..
The Black Hebrew Israelites are known lunatics, disgraceful people, and not worth the breath it takes to type.
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FIFY
As soon as I hit post I realized that was a massive understatement. But I'd say the societal crisis reaches back further than two years.
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Trump's disapproval rating hit a new low (high?) today, with 57% saying they disapprove (https://morningconsult.com/2019/01/23/trumps-disapproval-hits-record-high-amid-government-shutdown/).
According to the latest Morning Consult/Politico poll, conducted Jan. 18-22, 57 percent of registered voters disapprove of Trump’s job performance — more than any other survey in Trump’s two years in office — while 40 percent approve. The 17-percentage-point deficit matches two previous lows of the Trump presidency: in the first weekend of the shutdown, which began on Dec. 22, and in the wake of his comments regarding the fatal riots in Charlottesville, Va., in August 2017.
He's back to praising-Nazis-after-they-just-killed-someone bad.
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I find it fascinating people can see the same thing and have very different interpretations of it.
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It's a stupid story, told by stupid people, signifying that we are doomed.
Stupid school, raising kids to be proud of their stupidity and riling up stupid Americans to proudly defend the cycle of stupidity. They all probably call it winning.
Oh, and for the defenders of stupidity, the black whatever nutjobs are obviously stupid pieces of crap, but they are powerless and irrelevant, that's why no one spends time railing on them.
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As soon as I hit post I realized that was a massive understatement. But I'd say the societal crisis reaches back further than two years.
Republicans unleashed the crazy on Obama and the ACA in 2010. It had always been there, but they weaponized it and then lost control of the weapon. They lost control when McCain picked Palin as his running mate; also 2010.
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I find it fascinating people can see the same thing and have very different interpretations of it.
You don't see the students' behavior as mocking?
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Republicans unleashed the crazy on Obama and the ACA in 2010. It had always been there, but they weaponized it and then lost control of the weapon. They lost control when McCain picked Palin as his running mate; also 2010.
The key preceding events to me are the debt ceiling crises of 2011 and 2013, the 2013 shutdown which were dipping toes into anti-democratic waters, and then Merrick Garland which profoundly undermined the entire system. One political party put themselves over the country and the constitution.
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Trump's disapproval rating hit a new low (high?) today, with 57% saying they disapprove (https://morningconsult.com/2019/01/23/trumps-disapproval-hits-record-high-amid-government-shutdown/).
He's back to praising-Nazis-after-they-just-killed-someone bad.
A CBS poll has Trump at 36% approve / 59% disapprove. Oof! Also, 7 out of 10 do not believe it is worth shutting down the government over the wall. Zowie!
This is why this won't end. Public support is on the side of the Democrats and Trump doesn't care. McConnell is waiting (in hiding) for the Democrats to cave, but they have nothing to lose by holding out and everything to gain. With the debt ceiling coming up in March (maybe later now), if they allow Trump to hold his breath and stomp his feet to get his wall money, then he will do it again and again over anything and everything. It would end Congress as a co-equal branch of government, and leave us with King Trump.
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And so, it begins (https://oversight.house.gov/sites/democrats.oversight.house.gov/files/2019-01-23.EEC%20to%20Cipollone-WH%20re%20Security%20Clearances.pdf). The House Oversight Committee - replete with new members Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Ayanna Pressley and Rashida Tlaib - is investigating White House staff and Trump transition team security clearances. The link above is to the (long) letter laying out the subject of the investigation and the documents they are requesting.
Flynn and Kushner are of particular interest.
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You don't see the students' behavior as mocking?
Are you mocking me again? Are you? Mocking is obviously subjective. Where is the line? When people throw insults at Mr Happy, are they mocking him? Have you never mocked anyone? Am I mocking you now?
I don't think there was any malicious intent to their behavior. I don't think they had decided to try to humiliate Mr. Phillips. It sure looked as it some were lifted by the spirit of the drumming and bouncing with the beat. I don't think their behavior was harsh enough to cause the reaction that it has. I don't know why it is such a big deal to condemn the whole group if you think a few individuals behaved improperly. I think some people love to make mountains out of mole hills and others try to smooth them down. Didn't you at one time go to an all boys school? In your experience was every classmate guilty of each individual's act?
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And so, it begins (https://oversight.house.gov/sites/democrats.oversight.house.gov/files/2019-01-23.EEC%20to%20Cipollone-WH%20re%20Security%20Clearances.pdf). The House Oversight Committee - replete with new members Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Ayanna Pressley and Rashida Tlaib - is investigating White House staff and Trump transition team security clearances. The link above is to the (long) letter laying out the subject of the investigation and the documents they are requesting.
Flynn and Kushner are of particular interest.
I really like AOC. I really hope she can raise taxes on the wealthy. I think everyone should have to pay 70% on everything they earn after the first $68,000.00 until we have a budget surplus.
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I really like AOC. I really hope she can raise taxes on the wealthy. I think everyone should have to pay 70% on everything they earn after the first $68,000.00 until we have a budget surplus.
Is that individually or total household? That's pretty low of a total income to me.
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Is that individually or total household? That's pretty low of a total income to me.
He's mocking.
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Are you mocking me again? Are you? Mocking is obviously subjective. Where is the line? When people throw insults at Mr Happy, are they mocking him? Have you never mocked anyone? Am I mocking you now?
I don't think there was any malicious intent to their behavior. I don't think they had decided to try to humiliate Mr. Phillips. It sure looked as it some were lifted by the spirit of the drumming and bouncing with the beat. I don't think their behavior was harsh enough to cause the reaction that it has. I don't know why it is such a big deal to condemn the whole group if you think a few individuals behaved improperly. I think some people love to make mountains out of mole hills and others try to smooth them down. Didn't you at one time go to an all boys school? In your experience was every classmate guilty of each individual's act?
There were plenty of kids in the video who seemed appropriately mortified by the whole situation. I'm not sure why you're painting with such a broad brush.
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Yeah, he's trolling. Soon however, he might say that AOC is like Hitler
https://www.yahoo.com/huffpost/ben-stein-ocasio-cortez-promising-102755528.html (https://www.yahoo.com/huffpost/ben-stein-ocasio-cortez-promising-102755528.html)
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Is that individually or total household? That's pretty low of a total income to me.
It's more than people in poverty make, why should they have to be humiliated all they time? Some of them work really really really hard, they can't spend their working hours on a computer vapidly gabbing on a forum because they use their hands and brains to work with and they can't afford to take their families to movies or ballgames or rock concerts. It's not fair that they should be left out of the "Dream" because of all the greedy people wanting to hoard their money.
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Yeah, he's trolling. Soon however, he might say that AOC is like Hitler
https://www.yahoo.com/huffpost/ben-stein-ocasio-cortez-promising-102755528.html (https://www.yahoo.com/huffpost/ben-stein-ocasio-cortez-promising-102755528.html)
Wrong.
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There were plenty of kids in the video who seemed appropriately mortified by the whole situation. I'm not sure why you're painting with such a broad brush.
My friend, my brush is a fine point. You have a roller.
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It's more than people in poverty make, why should they have to be humiliated all they time? Some of them work really really really hard, they can't spend their working hours on a computer vapidly gabbing on a forum because they use their hands and brains to work with and they can't afford to take their families to movies or ballgames or rock concerts. It's not fair that they should be left out of the "Dream" because of all the greedy people wanting to hoard their money.
I asked, sincerely, because i don't disagree with AOC and that income level isn't far from mine. So, you can say what you want but I'd like to see that upper 1% pay the same portion in taxes that I do. I'd feel better about a lot of things then. But the 99% can't lobby like that 1% so we're at a disadvantage.
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Are you mocking me again? Are you? Mocking is obviously subjective. Where is the line? When people throw insults at Mr Happy, are they mocking him? Have you never mocked anyone? Am I mocking you now?
Well, I wasn't before; but now...
I don't think there was any malicious intent to their behavior. I don't think they had decided to try to humiliate Mr. Phillips. It sure looked as it some were lifted by the spirit of the drumming and bouncing with the beat. I don't think their behavior was harsh enough to cause the reaction that it has. I don't know why it is such a big deal to condemn the whole group if you think a few individuals behaved improperly. I think some people love to make mountains out of mole hills and others try to smooth them down. Didn't you at one time go to an all boys school? In your experience was every classmate guilty of each individual's act?
I was fortunate enough never to attend an all-boys school. I agree that not everyone in the student group was mocking Phillips, but a sizable number clearly were. I was always taught that we all represented the school and the bad behavior of an individual reflected on all of us. I'm not saying that no one ever misbehaved, but it was never lauded by the balance of the students because it made us all look bad. Retribution form the school was routinely swift and severe.
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I really like AOC. I really hope she can raise taxes on the wealthy. I think everyone should have to pay 70% on everything they earn after the first $68,000.00 until we have a budget surplus.
Eisenhower taxed income above $400,000 at 72%.
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It's more than people in poverty make, why should they have to be humiliated all they time? Some of them work really really really hard, they can't spend their working hours on a computer vapidly gabbing on a forum because they use their hands and brains to work with and they can't afford to take their families to movies or ballgames or rock concerts. It's not fair that they should be left out of the "Dream" because of all the greedy people wanting to hoard their money.
You have fallen into the Republican trope of not understanding or misrepresenting marginal tax rates.
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I asked, sincerely, because i don't disagree with AOC and that income level isn't far from mine. So, you can say what you want but I'd like to see that upper 1% pay the same portion in taxes that I do. I'd feel better about a lot of things then. But the 99% can't lobby like that 1% so we're at a disadvantage.
At the Davos summit, they announce each year how many of the wealthiest people it takes to equal the wealth of the bottom 3.5 billion people in the world. Last year it was 80; this year it is 26. This is not an accident.
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Eisenhower taxed income above $400,000 at 72%.
I'd do this today, but I guess I'd have to settle for it being inflation-adjusted.
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I'd do this today, but I guess I'd have to settle for it being inflation-adjusted.
That's roughly over $3.5 million.
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Phillips also described coming back to the U.S. as a veteran of the Vietnam era.
“People called me a baby killer and a hippie girl spit on me.”
Quote from December 5, 2008 article by Vincent Shilling in Indian Country Today. This was an interview conducted at Arlington National Cemetery at an event honoring American Indian veterans.
Quote from Nathan's CNN interview over the weekend:
When I was there and I was standing there and I seen that group of people in front of me and I seen the angry faces and all of that, I realized I had put myself in a really dangerous situation. Here's a group of people who were angry at somebody else and I put myself in front of that, and all of a sudden, I'm the one whose all that anger and all that wanting to have the freedom to just rip me apart, that was scary. And I'm a Vietnam veteran and I know that mentality of "There's enough of us. We can do this."
Quote from Nathan's April 18, 2018 interview in Vogue:
You know, I’m from Vietnam times. I’m what they call a recon ranger. That was my role. So I thank you for taking that point position for me.
Quote from Nathan in January 20, 2019 inter view with Vincent Shilling in Indian Country Today:
You know, when I was in Vietnam times and when I was in the Marine Corps times, that's what I was. I was expendable. Expendable to corporate greed. You know, in all wars, especially the ones that are going down for the oil, you know, we're fighting against — the pipelines.
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I'd do this today, but I guess I'd have to settle for it being inflation-adjusted.
That's roughly over $3.5 million.
$400k is the inflation-adjusted figure. 98% of households make less than that.
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$400k is the inflation-adjusted figure. 98% of households make less than that.
Nice. Anyone in the 2%, feel free to vote against. But I feel like the numbers are probably on our side.
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Phillips also described coming back to the U.S. as a veteran of the Vietnam era.
“People called me a baby killer and a hippie girl spit on me.”
Quote from December 5, 2008 article by Vincent Shilling in Indian Country Today. This was an interview conducted at Arlington National Cemetery at an event honoring American Indian veterans.
Quote from Nathan's CNN interview over the weekend:
When I was there and I was standing there and I seen that group of people in front of me and I seen the angry faces and all of that, I realized I had put myself in a really dangerous situation. Here's a group of people who were angry at somebody else and I put myself in front of that, and all of a sudden, I'm the one whose all that anger and all that wanting to have the freedom to just rip me apart, that was scary. And I'm a Vietnam veteran and I know that mentality of "There's enough of us. We can do this."
Quote from Nathan's April 18, 2018 interview in Vogue:
You know, I’m from Vietnam times. I’m what they call a recon ranger. That was my role. So I thank you for taking that point position for me.
Quote from Nathan in January 20, 2019 inter view with Vincent Shilling in Indian Country Today:
You know, when I was in Vietnam times and when I was in the Marine Corps times, that's what I was. I was expendable. Expendable to corporate greed. You know, in all wars, especially the ones that are going down for the oil, you know, we're fighting against — the pipelines.
FWIW - I'm glad that this story is now moving towards a coming together of people and minds to have rational and necessary conversations between the two groups. Whatever anyone says about Phillips now is a non-issue. He thrust himself into the spotlight as did Sandmann and the Covington kids. No talks about lawsuits (that I know of) but I have heard that there is a distinct possibility that Phillips will be invited or has asked to be invited to give a talk at a general assembly at the school (that closed yesterday because of threats). I say that is the proper way to handle this and leave all of us out of it. Good can come of this and I too believe that mocking and insensitive behavior by some of the punky stupid 16 year olds did happen... but nothing violent nor malcious (predators? hardly) did in any way shape or form in terms of the initial reports. Now is the time to do some good from both sides and I say let them handle it... the adults in the room that matter. If all sides stay entrenched, that will continue a polarization that is needless and will continue to feed the social media beast as we know it.
Also, I think the IPM is doing some good in this situation trying to keep the focus on what they stood for and continue to stand for when they decided to exercise their first ammendment right that day (as were the Covington kids while attending the March for Life rally). If at an assembly at the school, this is the theme and focus, believe some kids will listen and learn. But if it is blame and shame (doxx and lock and load too), then as good ol' Bum Phillips (ironic eh, Phillips!) once said "I was taught that if you point a finger at someone, remember you got four pointing right back at' ya". Go speak at Covington Mr. Phillips. Covington, let the man share. Then everyone involved decide how deep this can penetrate in your very young lives. Many times, a young person will point to a pivotal time in their lives when a situation changed them and that can happen too if we let them work it out the right way.
Social media stay out.
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Nice. Anyone in the 2%, feel free to vote against. But I feel like the numbers are probably on our side.
It’s like the estate tax: the right-wing noise machine will scare conservatives not voting against it, when they could aggregate generations of wealth and never be close to paying it.
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Cohen has postponed his upcoming congressional testimony citing threats by Trump against his family, according to Haberman.
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Cohen has postponed his upcoming congressional testimony citing threats by Trump against his family, according to Haberman.
He was due to testify voluntarily; that may be about to change. His attitude is likely to be different if under subpoena, so job done. Also, he’s due to report to prison on March 6, so the clock is running.
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Trump has sent Pelosi a letter saying that he will give the SOTY address as scheduled, in the House chamber.
This is what they took a week to come up with?
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Well, I wasn't before; but now...
I am charmed by your mocking.
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Cohen has postponed his upcoming congressional testimony citing threats by Trump against his family, according to Haberman.
yeah, this is a bullshit made-up excuse, but it was becoming evident over the last weeks if you listed to Lanny Davis closely. Personally, I've never trusted Cohen to be a viable snitch and I just don't trust Davis, so I've been skeptical of hanging much on Cohen. I distrust him so much, that I almost wonder if compelling him through a subpoena might be stepping into a trap. But, I'm often wrong on these things.
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yeah, this is a bullshit made-up excuse, but it was becoming evident over the last weeks if you listed to Lanny Davis closely. Personally, I've never trusted Cohen to be a viable snitch and I just don't trust Davis, so I've been skeptical of hanging much on Cohen. I distrust him so much, that I almost wonder if compelling him through a subpoena might be stepping into a trap. But, I'm often wrong on these things.
Good instinct, imo.
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Trump has sent Pelosi a letter saying that he will give the SOTY address as scheduled, in the House chamber.
This is what they took a week to come up with?
Pelosi wrote back and, politely, told him to go fuck himself.
They have to pass a bill to allow the President to enter the chamber, and she will not bring that to the floor while the government is shut down.
He will give a speech somewhere, and it’s going to be a doozy.
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Pelosi wrote back and, politely, told him to go fuck himself.
They have to pass a bill to allow the President to enter the chamber, and she will not bring that to the floor while the government is shut down.
He will give a speech somewhere, and it’s going to be a doozy.
Trump is having trouble understanding consent? Go figure.
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How Two Jewish Guys from America Created the George Soros Anti-Semitic Conspiracy Theory. (https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/hnsgrassegger/george-soros-conspiracy-finkelstein-birnbaum-orban-netanyahu)
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Fascinating article there. I always first jump to ridicule and condemn people like that, but it's all the willing dupes who really deserve the blame. My biggest criticism against someone like that is not all the harm they caused, or the evil they've spread, it's just their bad taste: they had a unique god-given talent, and were so weak that they chose that path. One is still so weak that he can't recognize he chose the wrong path.
When I read that they were associated with Netanyahu, my reaction was "of course."
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Pelosi wrote back and, politely, told him to go fuck himself.
They have to pass a bill to allow the President to enter the chamber, and she will not bring that to the floor while the government is shut down.
He will give a speech somewhere, and it’s going to be a doozy.
And Trump just said they will look for an alternative venue. Of the dumb sideshows hovering around this entire shit show, this was one of the more amusing.
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Perhaps this is what the fake in fake news is all about:
https://gizmodo.com/president-trump-posts-altered-photos-to-facebook-and-in-1831909849
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I conflated "veteran" with "combat veteran". That's on me, not him.
Still, he served, and you typically don't get to choose of you get sent into a combat zone or not. For that you need a friendly doctor who owes your dad a favor.
He didn't say he was a veteran, he said he was a Viet Nam veteran. He also said that he was a recon ranger. The Army has Rangers, the Marine Corps has Force Recon. He was claiming to be a member the Marine Corps' elite combat unit. The last Marine combat unit left Viet Nam in 71.
Here is the latest from the Washington Post:
In reality, Phillips served from June 1972 to May 1976 in the Marine Corps Reserve, a service spokeswoman, Yvonne Carlock, said Wednesday. He did not deploy, and he left the service as a private after disciplinary issues. From October 1972 to February 1973, he was classified as an antitank missileman, a kind of infantryman, Carlock said. He then became a refrigerator technician for the majority of his service.
The FOIA release shows that Nathan was on active duty for training from May - November 72. Then there is a gap in service and he is on active duty form August 74 through May 76. AWOL 3 times. Refrigerator mechanic.
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then as good ol' Bum Phillips (ironic eh, Phillips!) once said "I was taught that if you point a finger at someone, remember you got four pointing right back at' ya".
How many fingers?
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Back to the original question. What is the importance/relevance of his veteran status. The answer is: None.
The pro-Nathanites will prop him, make excuses and adore him even if he was court martialed for treason. Te anti-Nathanites will revile him even if he is Audie Murphy.
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Do you think the students knew he was a fraud? Is it central to the story?
If he has truly posed as something he is not, I get the criticism, just not sure how it's supposed to change what I saw and heard in the video.
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And Trump just said they will look for an alternative venue. Of the dumb sideshows hovering around this entire shit show, this was one of the more amusing.
...and he'll still have to give Congress a SOTU at some point later, because the constitution says he has to. If he gives a speech next week, I bet Pelosi has him do it in writing.
The important point is that he doesn't get to stand in Congress, with Pelosi seated behind him and his sycophant horde cheering him on, while he lies and lies and lies about everything - particularly the shutdown.
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...and he'll still have to give Congress a SOTU at some point later, because the constitution says he has to. If he gives a speech next week, I bet Pelosi has him do it in writing.
The important point is that he doesn't get to stand in Congress, with Pelosi seated behind him and his sycophant horde cheering him on, while he lies and lies and lies about everything - particularly the shutdown.
Honestly, I don't care if Nancy fucks with him. I mean, people shouldn't back down to a loser bully, but I'm not sure she's not helping him out here. I think his act is wearing thinner and thinner and having him drone on about his wall in front of Congress, using arguments few buy, would just make him look smaller than he presently does.
Of course, the next day, the White House footage will show everyone in the crowd cheering wildly, breathlessly jealous of his intellect and long fingers.
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And Trump just said they will look for an alternative venue.
There's a Cracker Barrel in Manassas that ought to work a treat.
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Do you think the students knew he was a fraud? Is it central to the story?
This is the bullshit idiots like this pull every time someone does something fucked up and then acts outraged that anyone thusly entitled could possibly be taken to task for it. I'm no great seer, but I said this was coming five pages ago.
It happens every time some prick from a rich family rapes someone or runs somebody over. It happens every time they nominate a serial sexual harasser to the highest courts. It even happens when a bunch of little turds are out misogyning for sport and have the incredible good luck to happen upon a frail looking dude beating a drum.
One idiot is trying to deny millions of people their honest reaction by lying that what we're basing our reaction on didn't happen. (Then, bizarrely, he starts talking about porn.) Another idiot wants to see this guy's birth certificate.
They obviously want to derail the conversation from the essential truth of the matter and distract people with their convoluted bullshit.
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Do you think the students knew he was a fraud? Is it central to the story?
If he has truly posed as something he is not, I get the criticism, just not sure how it's supposed to change what I saw and heard in the video.
That is exactly the point. It has nothing to do with the story. That is why I asked the question to begin with.
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And here I was thinking Sphinx was the one leading this conversation irretrievably into the absurd.
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And here I was thinking Sphinx was the one leading this conversation irretrievably into the absurd.
I was trying to lead it into a discussion of the Rashomon Effect. But everyone has their own take... Was there a big celebration in Panama for Rivera?
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I was trying to lead it into a discussion of the Rashomon Effect. But everyone has their own take... Was there a big celebration in Panama for Rivera?
I tolt yall about how no one else in the super knew who the hell he was. Imagine that. 100% and he can grocery shop totally unmolested if you don't count me.
So, no.
The Pope, on the other hand, turns out that dude is pretty big here. I'm pretty sure he'd get recognized in the Rey even without his white robe and the pope mobile smoking outside.
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White smoke, probably need to get the engine checked.
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White smoke, probably need to get the engine checked. there's a new car in your future.
FIFY.
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New AP poll has Trump’s approval rating at 34%.
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One idiot is trying to deny millions of people their honest reaction by lying that what we're basing our reaction on didn't happen. (Then, bizarrely, he starts talking about porn.)
I thought we were done asshole. I guess not. Ready, set... prepare for ten more pages of me calling you an asshole. Because you are.
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I thought we were done asshole. I guess not. Ready, set... prepare for ten more pages of me calling you an asshole. Because you are.
Jaja, sigue siendo el rey de los inútiles, ahuevao. Nos burlamos mucho de ti, siempre ha sido así, y ta bien merecido. En serio, sigue, loco, me diviertes demasiao.
No vas a deshacerte de mi tan fácil, pendejo - sigue con la payasería, cha. Me haces reír. Diez páginas mas de pura paja? Dale, pue. Tenemos diez mil anteriores. Que chucha cambiaría?
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There's a Cracker Barrel in Manassas that ought to work a treat.
That’s Bull Run according to his base.
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That’s Bull Run according to his base.
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Other way around actually.
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And Trump just said they will look for an alternative venue.
Last night he tweeted that he’d wait until the government was open before doing the SOTU. Complete cave.
Meanwhile, the shutdown shitshow continues...
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Last night he tweeted that he’d wait until the government was open before doing the SOTU. Complete cave.
Meanwhile, the shutdown shitshow continues...
And Pelosi walks graciously to the net to shake the hand of her defeated opponent.
As you know last night the president accepted the fact that the State of the Union should be at a time when we can talk about the State of the Union. I’m glad we got that off the table.
Tomorrow she's going to unveil a funding proposal that includes $5billion for border security - drones, customs agents and judges etc. - but not a penny for a wall. Seems to me that, if there's truly a crisis at the border*, the things can be deployed a lot faster than building a wall for which the design isn't ready and the land isn't acquired.
* There is, just a different one than the president claims there to be. It's the fact that we do not have the manpower and technology deployed to screen effectively for the drugs flooding through our ports of entry and we cannot process asylum claims fast enough (about 80% of which are rejected) so we end up with a huge backlogs on both sides of the border leading to the chaos we see today. Also, none of the people manning the border are getting paid right now, so there's that too.
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Jaja, sigue siendo el rey de los inútiles, ahuevao. Nos burlamos mucho de ti, siempre ha sido así, y ta bien merecido. En serio, sigue, loco, me diviertes demasiao.
No vas a deshacerte de mi tan fácil, pendejo - sigue con la payasería, cha. Me haces reír. Diez páginas mas de pura paja? Dale, pue. Tenemos diez mil anteriores. Que chucha cambiaría?
Nos? Aye Dios Mio, tengo mucho verguensas que todos tenen esa opinion de mi. jaja.
Cuantas veces tenes que ser el buey hasta que intendes que no me importa tu opinion de mi? Es mejor que me digas que todavia tenes rencor contra mi and vas a sequir con ese rencor proque so yo y no lo que digo. Esta bien, no soy tu favorito... no hay problema con eso. Pero este amenaza es de ninos y no adultos. Tenes esa oportunidad aqui, sigue adelante con tu deseo de burla porque ese es tu personaje. Asi son las cosas, no puedo esperar otra cosas mas que eso. Es tu decision. Para mi, no hay mas que decir o hablar con tigo. No tengo buena opinion de ti, y tu de mi. Hasta ayi quendan las cosas.
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Other way around actually.
Dammit.
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What is this about Puppies of Chicago, google translate?
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Warren raises the stakes after seeing how AOC's tax proposal polled. (https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2019/01/24/elizabeth-warren-propose-new-wealth-tax-very-rich-americans-economist-says/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.03e5765a0cbc)
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Warren raises the stakes after seeing how AOC's tax proposal polled. (https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2019/01/24/elizabeth-warren-propose-new-wealth-tax-very-rich-americans-economist-says/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.03e5765a0cbc)
This is fucking stupid. First, calling it a wealth tax is about the dumbest fucking thing you could call it. I understand that that's an actual economic term, but the branding sucks ass. Second, trying to tax assets rather than income is crazy and will invite unimaginable amounts and kinds of cheating.
Also, I don't think the economic case for a wealth tax is anywhere near as strong as the economic case for higher marginal tax rates.
Just impose high marginal rates on very high amounts of earned income and be done with it.
There is a lot to like about Elizabeth Warren but to me this seems like a terrible idea both politically and economically.
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Agreed. The higher marginal rates on high income are intended to drive down executive pay and theoretically direct those funds to worker salaries. Wealth taxes don’t accomplish those economic goals and as you said, just encourage massive evasion schemes. It would be a move back towards the pre-1986 tax avoidance models.
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Disagree on branding. "Wealth tax" is way better than "income tax." How many voters consider themselves wealthy? Branding it a wealth tax signals it doesn't apply to most people.
Enforcement is obviously a nightmare, but the real problem is constitutionality. IMO it's nothing more than a way of signaling "I'm an enemy of the rich."
ETA: it also might be a way of bringing Bernie people into her camp. Her odds go down if he gets into the race, so she's got to try to box him out.
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What is this about Puppies of Chicago, google translate?
I got something about a central gardener stealing Chuck's mangoes?
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Just impose high marginal rates on very high amounts of earned income and be done with it.
Increase the rates at the top margin for long term capital gains as well?
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Increase the rates at the top margin for long term capital gains as well?
I don't know. I'm not nearly as eager to monkey with long term capital gains as I am with marginal income tax rates, carried interest and the treatment of dividends, to which I would apply marginal tax rates.
I guess if I saw evidence that a marginal increase in long term gains had no negative impact on investing activity I would find a way to support it, but I guess I'm just skeptical that that evidence exists. If it does, I would love to evaluate it.
What do you think?
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FFS!
https://talkingpointsmemo.com/news/kudlow-unpaid-federal-workers-volunteering-allegiance-to-trump
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I don't know. I'm not nearly as eager to monkey with long term capital gains as I am with marginal income tax rates, carried interest and the treatment of dividends, to which I would apply marginal tax rates.
I guess if I saw evidence that a marginal increase in long term gains had no negative impact on investing activity I would find a way to support it, but I guess I'm just skeptical that that evidence exists. If it does, I would love to evaluate it.
What do you think?
I haven't seen any evidence one way or the other either. I can imagine having a significant gap between the existing 20% margin ($450,000) and a much higher margin (in the millions) but I'd have to read about it. For all I know it could be a horrible idea.
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This is fucking stupid. First, calling it a wealth tax is about the dumbest fucking thing you could call it. I understand that that's an actual economic term, but the branding sucks ass. Second, trying to tax assets rather than income is crazy and will invite unimaginable amounts and kinds of cheating.
Also, I don't think the economic case for a wealth tax is anywhere near as strong as the economic case for higher marginal tax rates.
Just impose high marginal rates on very high amounts of earned income and be done with it.
There is a lot to like about Elizabeth Warren but to me this seems like a terrible idea both politically and economically.
It doesn’t matter what she calls it, because the media will go with whatever rebranding the right wing puts on it. As an effort to eliminate dynastic wealth, it’s a start. It’s also - as you point out - impossible to institute without a complete overhaul of the tax system.
So, the smart way would have been to start with the latter. Get income properly defined (to include things like carried interest) so that everyone - wealthy or not - pays what they owe. This also applies to AOC’s proposal too - if you don’t properly capture income as a metric, you can’t properly tax it.
Perhaps more importantly, the corporate tax system needs an enema. Businesses who park themselves offshore but still operate in the US are stealing from all of us - the spoils of which go only to shareholders who pay tax on that at a fraction of the rates at which you and I pay tax on our income. We need to capture that tax revenue too. I think these things would turn around the deficit in as much time as it takes Thanos to snap his fingers.
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Increase the rates at the top margin for long term capital gains as well?
Capital gains is a form of income. I see no reason why it is taxed differently.
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The only people who complain about a "wealth" tax are the ones who would have to pay it. Everyone else would welcome the chance to be in their situation.
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I got something about a central gardener stealing Chuck's mangoes?
The clown ox will make a mockery of the 10,000 straws.
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Capital gains is a form of income. I see no reason why it is taxed differently.
There is no evidence that higher marginal tax rates act as a disincentive to high earners. There is evidence that higher capital gains rates acts as a disincentive to long term investment.
Perhaps that disincentive is less impactful at eight or nine figure income levels, I don't know, I haven't seen anything broken down like that.
Another reason not to tax gains as income is the impact of inflation.
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Capital gains is a form of income. I see no reason why it is taxed differently.
All taxes serve to both raise income for the government and to incentivize/disincentivize behavior.
The capital gain tax rate is intended to keep savings in the capital markets instead of banks. If you tax it at marginal rates, you get a big move out of the market.
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The clown ox will make a mockery of the 10,000 straws.
Jimmy has big plans and fancy pants to match.
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The clown ox will make a mockery of the 10,000 straws.
I will not buy this record; it is scratched.
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Cool education on capital gains. Thanks fellas.
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I'd vote for him. (https://www.newsandguts.com/video/colorado-senator-obliterates-ted-cruz-on-senate-floor/?fbclid=IwAR3DrAeb9g5NBYnp34cz_RpCJnIMMmUxy95LloztLhjPd9ZTM8rFbOp0iFw)
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The only people who complain about a "wealth" tax are the ones who would have to pay it. Everyone else would welcome the chance to be in their situation.
How do you and Limey define "dynastic wealth"?
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Roger Stone woke up to the FBI at his door this morning and an indictment on 7 counts.
Mueller has the emails of Stone and “Person 1” coordinating the WikiLeaks releases.
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How do you and Limey define "dynastic wealth"?
For me, it’s like porn: you know it when you see it.
Bill Gates was once asked if his kids were upset that he seemed to be bent on giving away their inheritance through his foundation. He answered: “I want to leave them enough money to do something, but not enough to do nothing.”
Economists and lawmakers can figure out the details, but yesterday’s parade of suggestions that furloughed federal works simply eat cake, that they can get for free from the grocery store, was the best commercial possible for Warren’s proposal.
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Roger Stone woke up to the FBI at his door this morning and an indictment on 7 counts.
Mueller has the emails of Stone and “Person 1” coordinating the WikiLeaks releases.
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I wonder if the other inmates will understand his Nixon tattoo
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How do you and Limey define "dynastic wealth"?
I'm not sure. My statement was from the perspective of someone who is definitely not wealthy.
I am more concerned with the rate of pay to CEOs and such. Last year AT&T' stock lost nearly a quarter of its value. I know there are some things one can't control, yet AT&T CEO Randal Stevenson still made around $30MM. He didn't invent the phone, or television or the internet. He isn't related to Alexander Graham Bell. He isn't that special. There are thousands of people who can do his job. And that is true for most corporations.
If you tax the super wealthy's assests how will that impact their capital gains too? How will that account for inflation. There are a lot of unanswered questions still.
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Roger Stone woke up to the FBI at his door this morning and an indictment on 7 counts.
Mueller has the emails of Stone and “Person 1” coordinating the WikiLeaks releases.
So, once again, Count Rudi’s seemingly gaffed comments were actually him just socializing the fact that there is evidence of collusion involving the Trump campaign, but not (as yet) involving Trump himself.
However, the senior campaign official diected to reach out to Stone to find out what else Wikileaks had reportedly is Bannon. Who was in a position to direct Bannon to do something when, at the time, he was head of the campaign?
The net is being closed. Don Jr. and Kushner are the next two to get perp-walked
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At some point, the Democrats need to push back against Rudy and his parsing Trump out of this shit. I, as a citizen, don't fucking care if they can convict Trump in a court of law of collusion/conspiracy. The standard for impeachment IS NOT the standard for a court of law. I only care whether there is evidence that the campaign run by Trump worked with an adversary; that's enough for me.
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At some point, the Democrats need to push back against Rudy and his parsing Trump out of this shit. I, as a citizen, don't fucking care if they can convict Trump in a court of law of collusion/conspiracy. The standard for impeachment IS NOT the standard for a court of law. I only care whether there is evidence that the campaign run by Trump worked with an adversary; that's enough for me.
We are past the point at which Republicans turned on Nixon and the point at which they actually had an impeachment trial of Clinton is about 12 hyperspace jumps behind us.
There is some fear amongst pundits is that impeachment is political suicide, but I don’t see it. Republicans got electorally thumped after the Clinton effort because it was ridiculous to have gone through all of that when all they had in the end was that he lied about a blowjob. They got electorally thumped after Nixon because they were of his party and had spent the months and years leading up to his resignation defending him and running interference for him (sound familiar?) and then pardoned him afterwards.
Neither of those things apply here. However, I do think they need to do what they’re doing now first, because just like getting rid of Agnew before moving to remove Nixon, we can’t leave the White House still in the slimy grasp of all those Trumpanzees. Pence is up to his judgmental eyeballs in Flynn’s shit at least.
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If I was asked last night about impeachment, I would have said it was too early because they hadn’t yet established a core offense such as “the Trump campaign enlisted the Russians to cheat on an American election.” While there are likely other more egregious offenses that will later be established, this particular offense is enough.
I’m also OK if the Senate won’t convict. By the time is makes it to the Senate, we will be close enough to the election anyway and most importantly, the Republicans will be forced to go on the record that sleeping with a real enemy is hunky dory with them.
In a broad sense, it will be the Democrats saying “We give shit about our democracy, and will act to protect it.” If the Republicans want to send a different message, that’s their choice.
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Trump running through his xenophobic greatest hits to make himself feel better after getting his arse handed to him by Pelosi for the second time this week.
Four women are in a car being trafficked across the border - turning right or left - because of the internet. These are prepared, scripted remarks. What the fucking fuck is he talking about?
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So it sounds to me like there will be three weeks of feckless negotiations for Trump's "wall" (which he now says was never meant to be concrete nor continuous) with unreasonable demands designed to avoid agreement. Then, instead of going down the disastrous route of shutting down the government (again) he'll declare a national emergency to build the wall. The courts will either allow it or immediately block it, in which case he can blame the democrats and "liberal judges."
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If I was asked last night about impeachment, I would have said it was too early because they hadn’t yet established a core offense such as “the Trump campaign enlisted the Russians to cheat on an American election.” While there are likely other more egregious offenses that will later be established, this particular offense is enough.
I’m also OK if the Senate won’t convict. By the time is makes it to the Senate, we will be close enough to the election anyway and most importantly, the Republicans will be forced to go on the record that sleeping with a real enemy is hunky dory with them.
In a broad sense, it will be the Democrats saying “We give shit about our democracy, and will act to protect it.” If the Republicans want to send a different message, that’s their choice.
One doesn't start with articles of impeachment. There need to be congressional investigations and hearings. Start those and see what facts come to light.
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So it sounds to me like there will be three weeks of feckless negotiations for Trump's "wall" (which he now says was never meant to be concrete nor continuous) with unreasonable demands designed to avoid agreement. Then, instead of going down the disastrous route of shutting down the government (again) he'll declare a national emergency to build the wall. The courts will either allow it or immediately block it, in which case he can blame the democrats and "liberal judges."
He can’t declare a national emergency with the government shut down because who is going to be there to act on it?
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Ann Coulter just tweeted that Trump is the biggest wimp ever to be POTUS. 🤣🤣🤣
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One doesn't start with articles of impeachment. There need to be congressional investigations and hearings. Start those and see what facts come to light.
Wait, a constitutional coequal branch of government fulfilling its obligations? What sorcery is this?
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Ann Coulter just tweeted that Trump is the biggest wimp ever to be POTUS. [emoji1787][emoji1787][emoji1787]
“Truman was too much of a wimp to drop the bomb on real cities” - Ann Coulter, probably
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One doesn't start with articles of impeachment. There need to be congressional investigations and hearings. Start those and see what facts come to light.
I basically agree, but it’s sematics to me at this point. When I say impeachment, I mean hearings to publicly establish the facts and educate the public on an offense that has now been outlined through Mueller and public reporting.
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Ann Coulter just tweeted that Trump is the biggest wimp ever to be POTUS. 🤣🤣🤣
Her actual words were "Good news for George Herbert Walker Bush: As of today, he is no longer the biggest wimp ever to serve as President of the United States."
I don't think it qualifies as "too soon" but holy shit is that extra obnoxious.
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Her actual words were "Good news for George Herbert Walker Bush: As of today, he is no longer the biggest wimp ever to serve as President of the United States."
I don't think it qualifies as "too soon" but holy shit is that extra obnoxious.
Especially as Bush was a decorated combat veteran.
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Yes he is.
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Yes he is.
/golf clap
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Yes he is.
He was going to stand firm on his demands but his bone spurs flared up.
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It’s funny how fast these dipshits fold once the workers stand up to them. The air traffic controllers and flight attendants and TSA just handed Trump his ass. And kudos to the Dems for holding the line.
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He was going to stand firm on his demands but his bone spurs flared up.
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I assumed Geezerdonk was referencing the is he/isn't he a combat veteran discussion about the Native American elder.
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I would love to know the percentage of you assfucks who have ever, in fact, been within 50 miles of the Tex/Mex border.
It seems to me like a whole bunch of people from Iowa talking about stuff that really does not concern them.
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I would love to know the percentage of you assfucks who have ever, in fact, been within 50 miles of the Tex/Mex border.
It seems to me like a whole bunch of people from Iowa talking about stuff that really does not concern them.
Well, I’ve made multiple trips to the border, and across. But do I still get to be a, how you say, assfuck?
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Well, I’ve made multiple trips to the border, and across. But do I still get to be a, how you say, assfuck?
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Sure, you're in.
It just galls me to hear "middle america", Michigan, etc... cry about this "crisis" when it really has zero effect on them....other than the availability of produce and the cutting of lawns and the building of homes and infrastructure.
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It just galls me to hear "middle america", Michigan, etc... cry about this "crisis" when it really has zero effect on them....other than the availability of produce and the cutting of lawns and the building of homes and infrastructure.
Who is gonna clean their homes?
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“Truman was too much of a wimp to drop the bomb on real cities” - Ann Coulter, probably
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“Truman was too much of a pussywimp to let MacArthur go in there and blow out those commie bastards!” - Thornton Melon
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Ann Coulter is a real piece of work. What made her so bitter?
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Ann Coulter is a real piece of work. What made her so bitter?
They botched his sex change operation?
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“Truman was too much of a pussywimp to let MacArthur go in there and blow out those commie bastards!” - Thornton Melon
SAY IT! SAY IT! SAY IT!
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They botched his sex change operation?
You’d think she’d do more do support trans rights.
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SAY IT! SAY IT! SAY IT!
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I'll be watching you.
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I'll be watching you.
He really seems to care... about what, I have no idea.
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Pelosi doesn’t mind kicking a man when he’s down (https://twitter.com/speakerpelosi/status/1088990533731733504?s=21).
Meanwhile, Trump is flailing (https://twitter.com/realdonaldtrump/status/1088958154791100417?s=21) and getting no sympathy.
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Ann Coulter is a real piece of work. What made her so bitter?
Money
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I understand that you think I'm some kind of a goon, though that's never been my intention. I think you are naïve but I'm sure that was not your intention. We really don't know each other at all, though someday if we meet I'm sure we'll get along fine.
I don't think you're a goon. I'm a partisan: I have a harder time processing intelligent people who stand on the sidelines and think both sides are equally shit than people who just flat see things differently. My mother- and father-in-law are good Dems who always only ever blame non-voters for all the bad outcomes, never the people who voted (however mysteriously) for the other side. I'm always annoyed by their attitude but at bottom I get it--I feel it, even. Anyone who'd vote for Trump is, to me, politically unknowable and probably irredeemable, while a Colonel Drummond lobbing equivalence grenades, preaching love and hating on Hilary poses a more morally vexing dilemma.
And I understand why smart people would conclude that I'm naive. I have a complicated relationship with the concept, influenced in the main by my suspicion that cynicism is the chief ailment of our age. Once innocence is lost, it seems in my view a defensible position that it should be reasserted a bit. I tend to think that we become what we think we are, thus that thinking we might be (or could be) better than evidence might suggest is actually not just a good idea, but a necessary one.
I could go on and on and on about this stuff, and I'm sure that if we do ever meet we'd have a good time talking about it, and I have no doubt whatsoever that we'd get along very well.
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If you wanted any more proof - aside from decades of economic data - that the game is rigged for the wealthy; Howard Schultz just put a spotlight on it. With Trump plumbing the depths of the Mariana Trench with his poll numbers and a Democratic field that is espousing - and getting significant traction on - wealth taxes, a billionaire jumps into the race.
Not as a Republican to challenge Trump and not as a Democrat to challenge - and having to debate - the Democrats; as an independent. This way he spends some of his money to skip the primaries and still achieves his goal of preventing a Democrat from raising his taxes. If he runs, he won’t win, but he’ll siphon off votes from the Democrat and that’s fine for him either way.
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A Schultz advisor was just on tv. His rationale for running is “Hey! Donald Trump did it.”
A couple of points here:
1) Schultz’ arguments thus far have all be against Democrats, so it’s clear he doesn’t think Trump is a factor; and
2) He says he’s a lifelong Democrat.
Fuck you Howard Schultz! You have said that Democrats can’t raise taxes and that Medicare-for-All is unaffordable. You are just trying to protect your own wealth, and if we get 4 more years of Trump to do it, so be it. If I didn’t already avoid Starbucks as much as possible, I’d start right now. Fuck you!
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I'm beginning to rethink my stance on taxing long term capital gains.
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I'm beginning to rethink my stance on taxing long term capital gains.
Don’t worry; Trump is going to default on the national debt in order to get his wall, and everyone’s shit will be worthless.
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From what little I've seen of Schultz' interviews, my first impression was "wow, he really considers(ed) himself a Democrat. Sounds more like a Republican." His passion appears primarily focused on one issue: keep your taxes off my wealth. Not surprisingly, he doesn't view wealth disparity as a problem, or if he has to grudgingly accept it is, then the obvious solution is to raise others up (modern version of trickle down). However, he doesn't have any real idea about how to do it. He scoffs at ideas such as medicare for all or some form of free education. He also doesn't want a lot of immigrants from the south. You know, they lead to more of the welfare stuff he hates. He's basically the rich Republican who is not comfortable with the Evangelical stuff and he hates Trump because he is a vulgar buffoon.
I can see his candidacy changing the dynamic in a way that benefits Trump, but who knows if Trump will even be around by then. In that case, his candidacy might just serve to elect someone antithetical to his passion.
In a related note, people like him and Bloomberg need to open their eyes. Keeping up the pressure to secure this insane income disparity might well lead to catastrophic consequences for them.
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From what little I've seen of Schultz' interviews, my first impression was "wow, he really considers(ed) himself a Democrat. Sounds more like a Republican." His passion appears primarily focused on one issue: keep your taxes off my wealth. Not surprisingly, he doesn't view wealth disparity as a problem, or if he has to grudgingly accept it is, then the obvious solution is to raise others up (modern version of trickle down). However, he doesn't have any real idea about how to do it. He scoffs at ideas such as medicare for all or some form of free education. He also doesn't want a lot of immigrants from the south. You know, they lead to more of the welfare stuff he hates. He's basically the rich Republican who is not comfortable with the Evangelical stuff and he hates Trump because he is a vulgar buffoon.
I can see his candidacy changing the dynamic in a way that benefits Trump, but who knows if Trump will even be around by then. In that case, his candidacy might just serve to elect someone antithetical to his passion.
In a related note, people like him and Bloomberg need to open their eyes. Keeping up the pressure to secure this insane income disparity might well lead to catastrophic consequences for them.
Schultz' roll-out has been a disaster. For example, he declined to answer a question on tax policy because he doesn't want to discuss hypotheticals. WTF? At this point, that's your only job!
But you're right, he's a corporatist, pretending to be a social liberal, running to stop actual liberals from increasing his taxes. He's also the only way that Trump gets a second term, and it's scaring the living shit out of me right now.
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Schultz' roll-out has been a disaster. For example, he declined to answer a question on tax policy because he doesn't want to discuss hypotheticals. WTF? At this point, that's your only job!
But you're right, he's a corporatist, pretending to be a social liberal, running to stop actual liberals from increasing his taxes. He's also the only way that Trump gets a second term, and it's scaring the living shit out of me right now.
It's telling that his logo is his printed name with his signature on top of it. He seems to have little regard for anything that he doesn't perceive as affecting him.
I can imagine a scenario where he draws votes away from Trump for people who think the Democratic candidate is too liberal and would otherwise begrudgingly vote for Trump. But the fact is that a billionaire running a hopeless independent campaign is purely a vanity project.
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They all seem like Ross Perots to me.
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Anyway, who in the world ever thought that, when Trump tweeted out that he was cancelling his meeting, that he was ever in a million years going to not have the meeting? Just add this one to the long list of meetings that TrumpWorld never had with Russians.
Yeah, about that. The meeting with Putin at the G20 in Argentina that was cancelled...happened (https://www.ft.com/content/61842ec4-23a0-11e9-8ce6-5db4543da632).
Donald Trump sat down with Vladimir Putin for several minutes of conversation at the end of an evening event at the G20 summit in Buenos Aires in November, with no translator or note-taker from the US side to record the dialogue between the leaders, according to people who had direct knowledge of the encounter or were briefed on it.
Follow-up reporting says the conversation was about 15 minutes.
Yesterday, the heads of the intelligence community were in front of Congress or a regularly scheduled briefing. In between completely debunking all of Trump's statements about what is and what isn't a security threat (N. Korea is, the southern border isn't), Haspel (CIA) and Coates (NSA) were asked if Trump taking meetings with Putin - from which the US has no record of what was discussed but Russia does - made it harder to do their job, they declined to answer in open session. Clearly, the answer cannot be "no".
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Medicare-for-All looks like it's going to get a proper airing in the 2020 process - at least on the Democratic side. Kamala Harris said recently that she doesn't see private insurers being involved going forward. This got some pushback from Michael Bloomberg, saying it would bankrupt the country. It's an interesting and, dare I say it, naive take.
The simple truth is that if you add up all the healthcare premiums paid to private insurers, plus all the deductibles and copays etc. that come out of the pockets of policyholders, you get to roughly the same number as the $32 trillion scare-number that is used against M4A. The difference being that the M4A proposal insures everyone, while the private insurance number includes trillions of dollars of corporate profit.
I don't understand the business objection to M4A. Providing health insurance to its employees is a massive cost to an employer and, because the ACA was a private insurance hybrid, the law had to take steps to stop employers of a certain size from throwing their employees off their own insurance and onto the exchanges. So employers clearly would be happy to be relieved of the burden.
Maybe it comes down to the tax policy that would pay for it, or the fact that people unshackled from their employers' plans would be more free to change jobs or break out and start up their own businesses. I really don't know. But the Bloombergs of this world misunderstand the process (accidentally or on purpose) because they speak as if no new money would be put into Medicare to pay for its new beneficiaries. That's not how this works.
If you'd forgotten how much you hate Joe Lieberman, here's a little reminder: the ACA was going to allow a Medicare buy-in for people aged 55 or older. That meant that those eligible could buy health insurance from Medicare as a competing insurer to Kaiser Soze Permanente etc. That would be a powerful option both to control the cost of insurance for older Americans and allow people to do things like retire early. The vote to enact this fell one short in the Senate; that vote being Joe Lieberman's.
But the blueprint is there. Allow people 55 and older to buy-in; then 45 and older; then 35 and older. You get the picture. Creeping appropriation of the private insurance market into the wildly popular, wildly cost-effective Medicare system. Yes, this sucks for health insurance company employees and HR staff (sorry Zipp) but that's no reason to leave millions without access to healthcare and tens of millions more on the brink - or actually plummeting into - bankruptcy because of an illness.
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Medicare-for-All looks like it's going to get a proper airing in the 2020 process - at least on the Democratic side. Kamala Harris said recently that she doesn't see private insurers being involved going forward. This got some pushback from Michael Bloomberg, saying it would bankrupt the country. It's an interesting and, dare I say it, naive take.
The simple truth is that if you add up all the healthcare premiums paid to private insurers, plus all the deductibles and copays etc. that come out of the pockets of policyholders, you get to roughly the same number as the $32 trillion scare-number that is used against M4A. The difference being that the M4A proposal insures everyone, while the private insurance number includes trillions of dollars of corporate profit.
I don't understand the business objection to M4A. Providing health insurance to its employees is a massive cost to an employer and, because the ACA was a private insurance hybrid, the law had to take steps to stop employers of a certain size from throwing their employees off their own insurance and onto the exchanges. So employers clearly would be happy to be relieved of the burden.
Maybe it comes down to the tax policy that would pay for it, or the fact that people unshackled from their employers' plans would be more free to change jobs or break out and start up their own businesses. I really don't know. But the Bloombergs of this world misunderstand the process (accidentally or on purpose) because they speak as if no new money would be put into Medicare to pay for its new beneficiaries. That's not how this works.
If you'd forgotten how much you hate Joe Lieberman, here's a little reminder: the ACA was going to allow a Medicare buy-in for people aged 55 or older. That meant that those eligible could buy health insurance from Medicare as a competing insurer to Kaiser Soze Permanente etc. That would be a powerful option both to control the cost of insurance for older Americans and allow people to do things like retire early. The vote to enact this fell one short in the Senate; that vote being Joe Lieberman's.
But the blueprint is there. Allow people 55 and older to buy-in; then 45 and older; then 35 and older. You get the picture. Creeping appropriation of the private insurance market into the wildly popular, wildly cost-effective Medicare system. Yes, this sucks for health insurance company employees and HR staff (sorry Zipp) but that's no reason to leave millions without access to healthcare and tens of millions more on the brink - or actually plummeting into - bankruptcy because of an illness.
Isn't there still a fairly robust private health insurance market in places like Canada and the UK?
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I can imagine a scenario where he draws votes away from Trump for people who think the Democratic candidate is too liberal and would otherwise begrudgingly vote for Trump. But the fact is that a billionaire running a hopeless independent campaign is purely a vanity project.
This.
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Isn't there still a fairly robust private health insurance market in places like Canada and the UK?
Yes, but they provide supplemental plans that, for example, plug the gaps that open when you take your gubmint insurance to a private hospital. I doubt they have the same staffing needs as the death panels private health insurers in the US.
The UK has the National Health Service, which is separate from, but has a symbiotic relationship with, National Health Insurance. It's like being in-network and out-of-network with your insurance here: an NHS provider will give you healthcare that is completely devoid of any cost to you whatsoever, save a small copay for take-home prescriptions, while a private healthcare provider will mean you incur deductibles and other out-of-pocket costs that the state insurance doesn't cover. Supplemental plans - often provided as a perk by larger employers - cover those gaps allowing you to skip any line and have a nicer, private room. These plans are quite cheap because they are never needed to pay for primary or emergency care.
The complaint about long lines is a straw man. If you have the money (or insurance) you can go private and get your healthcare done on your own schedule. If you don't, you may be subjected to a wait for non-emergency procedures (e.g. hip replacements) but in the end it gets done for absolutely no cost to you. This is still preferable than never being able to have your hip replaced because you can't afford it.
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Looks like Schultz is flaming out spectacularly. He just tried to delete tweets calling Warren “fauxcahontas” and Harris “shrill”. It also turns out that he rarely, if ever, votes. He’s not getting better in interviews, he’s getting worse (said that Reagan was a great president because he never took his jacket off in the Oval Office.
He’s done. Thank the maker.
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Correction: Schultz tweeted an article that said those things about Warren and Harris, he didn’t say them himself. However, his personal brand is still sinking like a stone because of this and his other prior public statements.
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Internal polling by Howard Schultz’ campaign shows him getting only 17% of the vote. The same polling shows Trump beating a hypothetical Democrat 33 to 32. It’s not an unknown what his campaign will do if he takes it to the polls in 2020: re-elect Donald Trump.
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So, the dipshit is going to have a rally next week in El Paso, presumably to build support for his wall. He spoke/lied last night that El Paso was one of America's most dangerous cities before the barrier law in 2006. It wasn't, and unless I'm mistaken, the barrier in the parts of El Paso I'm familiar with, would not commonly be called a wall. It's fencing as one can clearly see across to Juarez.
Most importantly, most everyone who resides in El Paso or any border town, can attest to the fact that there is no national emergency. People come across, legally and illegally (at a much slower pace than in the past) and life goes on. No fucking emergency.
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And while I'm at it, remember the recent story about 95,000 voters that were voting illegally in Texas? Yeah, it was false. Total bullshit, created by people trying to twist facts to fit their preconceptions. When called to justify the data, they hem-haw, acknowledge that it's not accurate but maintain that they are still trying to ascertain the "correct number."
Just like the "border emergency," "illegal voting" is a complete fucking lie told by immoral pieces of crap to keep the torches of their ignorant followers fully ablaze.
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And while I'm at it, remember the recent story about 95,000 voters that were voting illegally in Texas? Yeah, it was false. Total bullshit, created by people trying to twist facts to fit their preconceptions. When called to justify the data, they hem-haw, acknowledge that it's not accurate but maintain that they are still trying to ascertain the "correct number."
Just like the "border emergency," "illegal voting" is a complete fucking lie told by immoral pieces of crap to keep the torches of their ignorant followers fully ablaze.
Limey were you on the list?
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Limey were you on the list?
Not that I'm aware of.
The problem with all these lies is that they turn into zombies. They can't be killed. You can play whackamole day-in, day-out and they will just come back from some re-share from some idiot (or Russian bot) that just puts it back out there. People see the same story over and over again, and think it's another example, not the same example.
Russians are already promoting Tulsi Whatsherface just for shits and giggles. We are so fucked.
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Russians are already promoting Tulsi Whatsherface just for shits and giggles.
So is David Duke. What a time to be alive.
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So is David Duke. What a time to be alive.
I bet Duke even took the time to learn her last name before trying to make her a mockery.
Well, ok maybe not.
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Big news yesterday out of the House Intelligence Committee:
1) Adam Schiff is the Chairman, so no longer is there a need to put quotation marks around the word "intelligence";
2) They gathered up over 50 transcripts of congressional testimony, put a big, red, fucking bow on them, and gave them to Mueller; and
3) They rolled out a series of investigation threads on which they are going to pull.
The transcripts are a big deal, because everyone who has testified in front of the committee is now going to be investigated for perjury and obstruction of justice. Mueller has the facts and now he has the official transcripts - that Devin Numbnes and his cronies were sitting on - in order to prosecute where appropriate.
The investigations are an even bigger deal because, even though the overlap Mueller to a large extent, they are much wider in scope. For example, they are looking into whether any foreign power or person has any influence over any member of the Trump administration. They are looking into all of the contacts between Russians and TrumpWorld before, during and after the election. They are looking into any obstruction of the committee's investigation, by word or deed, which means that this thread will be pulling on the unraveling blanket covering the actions of the likes of Devin Nubmnes.
Trump's bomb of a rhyme in the SOTU about investigations just gives more weight and urgency to the need for same. He is terrified by the House committees and it's showing. As I have said before, we're in the endgame now. Only Virginia's clusterfuck of an executive branch is keeping this stuff off the TV...for now.
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Oh, and the SDNY just shoved it's hand so far up the arse of the Trump Inaugural Committee that it came out of Putin's mouth. They want to know where the money came from, where it went, and who got any special treatment as a result of a donation; the inauguration events were rife with random Russians, for example. Subpoenas have been issued and pants have been filled.
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For example, they are looking into whether any foreign power or person has any influence over any member of the Trump administration.
Turkey, Saudi, China, the list goes on.
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Severe flop-sweat warning:
When the Senate postponed the confirmation vote on Trump's nominee for AG, there was an interesting side effect. Acting AG Wilson Fisk Matthew Whitaker had been called to testify to the House Judiciary Committee on 2/8, but he was expected to be able to body-swerve that appearance when the new AG was put in place. Once that didn't happen, Whitaker's date became set and now he's scrambling because he's going to be on the spot and he has no clue what he is doing.
Oh, and the ramp up the pressure, Chairman Nadler has announced that he has subpoenas already drafted and will use them on Whitaker during his testimony if they think he is being evasive or untruthful. Whitaker may spend more time in jail than he spent as Acting AG.
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Turkey, Saudi, China, the list goes on.
Trump, Trump Jr, Jared, Ivanka, Bannon*...the list goes on.
* I laughed out loud when I heard that name in the mix. Fuck that scabby piece of shit.
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Limey, do you realize how many people would still vote for him?
When that man said he could murder someone on Fifth Avenue and get away with it, he was telling the truth. Many people believe whatever he says. Those people are not going to believe any real facts. When someone tells you lies for so long, you start to believe them. Just ask abused women how it works.
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Limey, do you realize how many people would still vote for him?
When that man said he could murder someone on Fifth Avenue and get away with it, he was telling the truth. Many people believe whatever he says. Those people are not going to believe any real facts. When someone tells you lies for so long, you start to believe them. Just ask abused women how it works.
Oh trust me, I know that his base is as solid (and as dumb) as a rock. However, he cannot outrun Congress - if it chooses to do its job - and he cannot outrun the SDNY because he has no authority over a state entity. Schultz can fuck up the 2020 election (or Democrats can do it all by themselves - see the nonsense already starting with Klobachar), but the legal process is - at this point - a homing glacier that's coming for Trump. There is just far too much illegal shit that's far too obviously and stupidly perpetrated for his criminal liability not to be substantial and provable.
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Oh trust me, I know that his base is as solid (and as dumb) as a rock. However, he cannot outrun Congress - if it chooses to do its job - and he cannot outrun the SDNY because he has no authority over a state entity. Schultz can fuck up the 2020 election (or Democrats can do it all by themselves - see the nonsense already starting with Klobachar), but the legal process is - at this point - a homing glacier that's coming for Trump. There is just far too much illegal shit that's far too obviously and stupidly perpetrated for his criminal liability not to be substantial and provable.
SDNY is a Federal entity.
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Oh trust me, I know that his base is as solid (and as dumb) as a rock.
You sell them short. Dumb is not what makes the base rock-solid.
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Severe flop-sweat warning:
When the Senate postponed the confirmation vote on Trump's nominee for AG, there was an interesting side effect. Acting AG Wilson Fisk Matthew Whitaker had been called to testify to the House Judiciary Committee on 2/8, but he was expected to be able to body-swerve that appearance when the new AG was put in place. Once that didn't happen, Whitaker's date became set and now he's scrambling because he's going to be on the spot and he has no clue what he is doing.
Oh, and the ramp up the pressure, Chairman Nadler has announced that he has subpoenas already drafted and will use them on Whitaker during his testimony if they think he is being evasive or untruthful. Whitaker may spend more time in jail than he spent as Acting AG.
From CNN:
The Justice Department told the House Judiciary Committee Thursday afternoon that acting Attorney General Matt Whitaker will not appear at Friday's closely-watched oversight hearing unless he receives a written assurance by 6 p.m. ET Thursday that he will not be served with the subpoena the committee pre-emptively authorized to use if he avoids questions.
Damn, just like one of Trump's criminal associates. What does he have to hide? Crooked motherfuckers, all of em.
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From CNN:
Damn, just like one of Trump's criminal associates. What does he have to hide? Crooked motherfuckers, all of em.
Doesn't really seem like a good strategy going forward. How does the "acting" AG and his team not know how subpoenas work?
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Doesn't really seem like a good strategy going forward. How does the "acting" AG and his team not know how subpoenas work?
He likely just guaranteed being hit with a subpoena. Nadler might as well serve him now and compel his appearance tomorrow.
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He likely just guaranteed being hit with a subpoena. Nadler might as well serve him now and compel his appearance tomorrow.
As of now, Whitaker is going to appear.
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I thought the vote was to overturn the LA law.
The hearing has started. The meathead is in his chair and some Republican is squealing, about what I can't really understand.
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I thought the vote was to overturn the LA law.
The hearing has started. The meathead is in his chair and some Republican is squealing, about what I can't really understand.
I deleted my post because I'd got the result back-to-front: the LA law's implementation was postponed by dint of Chief Justice Roberts' swing vote along with the 4 "liberal" Justices. Yes, Roberts is now the swing vote. However, Kavanaugh broke with SCOTUS precedent - which Collins claimed Kavanaugh pinky-swore that he'd never do - at the very first opportunity to do so when an abortion case came before the court.
Re: Whitaker, Nadler laid down the law in his opening address - telling Whitaker that the time of stonewalling is over and, even if he reverts to being a private citizen, he will not escape oversight. Then, Rep Collins rebutted by channeling his inner Lindsey Graham, getting red faced, screaming, and demanding a vote to adjourn the proceeding. He lost it...both ways.
Your failure to respond fully to our questions here today in no way limits the ability of this committee to get the answers in the long run – even if you are a private citizen when we finally learn the truth. And although I am willing to work with the department to obtain this information, I will not allow that process to drag out for weeks and months. The time for this administration to postpone accountability is over.
We have laid all of the groundwork for this hearing out in the open. We have given you months to prepare. We have publicly documented every request we have made to you. We have provided our Republican colleagues with a meaningful opportunity to weigh in on the process. We have nothing to hide from you. We hope you have nothing to hide from us.
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Whitaker literally called "time" on Nadler, refusing to answer a question because he was told that it would be 5-minutes per questioner and Chairman Nadler had gone over his allotment. There were gasps and guffaws from the gallery.
That's going to come back to bite him. Ted Lieu has been baiting Whitaker for weeks now and I'm sure is itching to get at him. He's trying to pull a Kavanaugh but he doesn't have a friendly chairman to protect him like Beery Brett.
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He's trying to pull a Kavanaugh but he doesn't have a friendly chairman to protect him like Beery Brett.
Nor does he have the protection of lifetime tenure by getting through the process.
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In a moment that would put MENSA to shame, Louis Gohmert (R-BFE), read part of Whitaker’s opening statement back to him, and Whitaker said that he was not familiar with the comments.
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Trump's Bedminster golf course employed so many undocumented workers for so long that there's an entire village in Costa Rica built on those paychecks. (https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/my-whole-town-practically-lived-there-from-costa-rica-to-new-jersey-a-pipeline-of-illegal-workers-for-trump-goes-back-years/2019/02/08/8cdbc1dc-2971-11e9-97b3-ae59fbae7960_story.html?utm_term=.1ddb2577aed3)
“My whole town practically lived there.”
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In a moment that would put MENSA to shame, Louis Gohmert (R-BFE), read part of Whitaker’s opening statement back to him, and Whitaker said that he was not familiar with the comments.
I almost don't believe you.
Almost.
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I almost don't believe you.
Almost.
It's not as if Louie has ever had an original thought himself.
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In a moment that would put MENSA to shame, Louis Gohmert (R-BFE), read part of Whitaker’s opening statement back to him, and Whitaker said that he was not familiar with the comments.
I wish you would post links to a lot of the stuff you post here. Not saying anything about the veracity at all, it's just nice to read a bit more detail and if I want to share it with someone I know where to find it. I do appreciate your and other's running commentary in this thread.
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I wish you would post links to a lot of the stuff you post here. Not saying anything about the veracity at all, it's just nice to read a bit more detail and if I want to share it with someone I know where to find it. I do appreciate your and other's running commentary in this thread.
The Link (https://www.thedailybeast.com/matthew-whitaker-house-judiciary-hearing-opens-with-fireworks-over-subpoena-threat?ref=home)
Whitaker found a friendly face in Rep. Louis Gohmert (R-TX), who seemed to question why he was even testifying.
“I don’t know what kind of suicide wish you had or whatever but it’s good to see you,” he said.
Gohmert then read Whitaker portions of his opening statement about crime and the southern border, which the acting attorney general failed to recognize.
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The Link (https://www.thedailybeast.com/matthew-whitaker-house-judiciary-hearing-opens-with-fireworks-over-subpoena-threat?ref=home)
Whitaker found a friendly face in Rep. Louis Gohmert (R-TX), who seemed to question why he was even testifying.
“I don’t know what kind of suicide wish you had or whatever but it’s good to see you,” he said.
Gohmert then read Whitaker portions of his opening statement about crime and the southern border, which the acting attorney general failed to recognize.
Thanks. Ol' Gohmert is always good for unintentional comedy.
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Tax refunds are starting to show up - low income earners tend to file early - and you’ll never guess. They’re paying more in taxes this year so their refunds are shrinking or even turning into invoices.
$1,500,000,000,000 in tax cuts and the poorest of us are paying more. This is not an accident.
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Tax refunds are starting to show up - low income earners tend to file early - and you’ll never guess. They’re paying more in taxes this year so their refunds are shrinking or even turning into invoices.
$1,500,000,000,000 in tax cuts and the poorest of us are paying more. This is not an accident.
My refund was less but my tax "break" was throughout the year. Regardless I paid the same. So I got no break. I didn't expect to get screwed this year I thought it was going to be next year.
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Tax refunds are starting to show up - low income earners tend to file early - and you’ll never guess. They’re paying more in taxes this year so their refunds are shrinking or even turning into invoices.
$1,500,000,000,000 in tax cuts and the poorest of us are paying more. This is not an accident.
It may not precisely be that they’re paying more. The administration directed the IRS to reduce withholding levels to “properly reflect” the new rates, and they went too far (of course) resulting in a nasty surprise.
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It may not precisely be that they’re paying more. The administration directed the IRS to reduce withholding levels to “properly reflect” the new rates, and they went too far (of course) resulting in a nasty surprise.
People are looking at the raw numbers - not just the amount of the refund (or lack thereof) - and seeing that they're paying more overall. I am expecting to pay more because the cap on the property tax deduction is going to raise my taxes more than the increased allowances reduce them because I itemize, so I don't benefit from the increased allowances.
Again, there's $1.5 trillion less taxes being taken - some of that should have trickled down to me but they aren't even bothering with that any more.
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From
Fake NBC News (https://www.nbcnews.com/business/taxes/tax-code-changes-leave-americans-asking-what-happened-my-refund-n969366?fbclid=IwAR16IzH-me9OeEhWzZhY8UMTs843XGJ87Mk8lLIbSC2bFUg7z-ENIIwJ358):
Jason Marques, a postal worker, pizza delivery driver and student in Massachusetts said that, since his income didn’t change, he was expecting a similar refund to the roughly $6,000 he got last year — money he said would go towards his student loans or paying off credit card debt.
Marques said he was hurt by the cap on student loan interest deduction and the elimination of non-reimbursed business expenses, which he used to deduct the out-of-pocket costs he incurred as a delivery driver. “My jaw hit the floor,” he said, when he learned his 2018 refund would be under $500.
Anecdotal for sure, but there's no finagling of allowances and withholdings that's going to reduce the refund of someone with everything otherwise unchanged by 90%. Ninety fucking percent. Another example in the article talks about a lady who engineers her taxes to owe a little - maybe $100 - but this year owes $1,000. I know mine are higher; and as more of us file our taxes more of us will find how we're all getting fucked so that Trump's Mar-a-Lago buddies get more disgustingly rich.
While some people likely noticed an uptick in their take-home pay, the amount might have been small enough that people didn’t notice, especially those who get direct deposit and might not look at their pay stubs. What’s more, workers who had an increase in their health insurance premiums or other paycheck deductions might have missed the bump entirely.
Postal worker Marques said he didn’t notice a change in his take-home pay after the new withholding rules took effect. “It looks like it was a bunch of gimmicking,” he said. “I didn’t know how badly it was actually going to hurt.”
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A new Washington Post poll (https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/polling/americans-view-mueller-credible-trump/2019/02/12/0e02bb76-2ebd-11e9-8781-763619f12cb4_page.html) has responders 2:1 in favor of impeachment if Trump obstructed justice or colluded with Russia As far as whether that has been proven yet or not, the response is pretty much 50:50, but almost everyone - 81% - wants to see Mueller’s report.
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Here's a counter-argument about Trump and collusion. It's still Hillary's fault. (https://www.investors.com/politics/editorials/russian-collusion-hillary-clinton/?fbclid=IwAR1zZgB0ly1giAs4C9SoqqD2BjiWCgXN_oKHuYMV_g9S6vk8GdggmkPFbs8)
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I'm sure that I should know something about Investors Business Daily, but I didn't. However, I hope they give daily investing advice of the same quality to all Trump supporters.
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A new Washington Post poll (https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/polling/americans-view-mueller-credible-trump/2019/02/12/0e02bb76-2ebd-11e9-8781-763619f12cb4_page.html) has responders 2:1 in favor of impeachment if Trump obstructed justice or colluded with Russia As far as whether that has been proven yet or not, the response is pretty much 50:50, but almost everyone - 81% - wants to see Mueller’s report.
There's a 90% chance that no one, including Congress, will ever see Mueller's report. It is not public information, and release is subject to the discretion of the Attorney General who was just appointed by....you guessed it...who has already indicated that he will likely not share it.
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I'm sure that I should know something about Investors Business Daily, but I didn't. However, I hope they give daily investing advice of the same quality to all Trump supporters.
They are a wingnut conspiracy theory outlet. Nothing to see here.
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There's a 90% chance that no one, including Congress, will ever see Mueller's report. It is not public information, and release is subject to the discretion of the Attorney General who was just appointed by....you guessed it...who has already indicated that he will likely not share it.
House Democrats claimyhecan subpoena it and/or testimony from Mueller. They will get the findings out one way or another.
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House Democrats claimyhecan subpoena it and/or testimony from Mueller. They will get the findings out one way or another.
Trump would certainly fight a subpoena, and if he lost in court claim executive privilege for another go around. He's got at least 4 to 6 years of court battles before any information gets released. Who knows what the House will look like in 2025. Mueller is on record as saying he will not go outside the chain of command and provide any information or testimony to anyone other than the Attorney General. Don't expect a bombshell during Trump's turn in the White House.
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Trump would certainly fight a subpoena, and if he lost in court claim executive privilege for another go around. He's got at least 4 to 6 years of court battles before any information gets released. Who knows what the House will look like in 2025. Mueller is on record as saying he will not go outside the chain of command and provide any information or testimony to anyone other than the Attorney General. Don't expect a bombshell during Trump's turn in the White House.
The can subpoena Mueller to testify in person. I’m not sure how the White House fights that, and they can then choose to release whatever they want.
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More on how it’s not our fault (https://m.huffpost.com/us/entry/us_5c671dcee4b033a799429900/amp?__twitter_impression=true) on why our taxes are fucked up.
I am in exactly the same boat as the example couple in the article: I set my exemptions to 0, and I may well have underwitheld as a result. Republicans couldn’t organize a piss-up at a brewery.
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FYI, the (apparently former) Trump-supporting lady in the article is getting slaughtered on Twitter for seemingly being ok with the lying, corruption, racism, dead kids in cages and treason, but jumping ship when her taxes went up. I can see the point.
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Maxine Waters is going after Deutschdramat’s records regarding Trump Org business. I hope she’s wearing protective garments because that is an ocean of nasty shit.
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More "Tales from the Swamp"
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/top-trump-appointees-promoted-selling-nuclear-power-plants-to-saudi-arabia-over-objections-from-national-security-officials-house-democratic-report-says/2019/02/19/6a719762-3456-11e9-af5b-b51b7ff322e9_story.html?utm_term=.dc194269cdcd (https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/top-trump-appointees-promoted-selling-nuclear-power-plants-to-saudi-arabia-over-objections-from-national-security-officials-house-democratic-report-says/2019/02/19/6a719762-3456-11e9-af5b-b51b7ff322e9_story.html?utm_term=.dc194269cdcd)
Basically, Trump associates, including our ex-gov, trying to sell nuke plants over the objections on national security folks in the admin. Follow the money through the most corrupt landscape in presidential history.
The Cummings report notes that one of the power plant manufacturers that could benefit from a nuclear deal, Westinghouse Electric, is a subsidiary of Brookfield Asset Management, the company that provided financial relief to the family of Jared Kushner, the president’s son-in-law and adviser. Brookfield Asset Management took a 99-year lease on the family’s deeply indebted New York City property at 666 Fifth Avenue.
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I see where Senator Warren is now calling her proposal an 'Ultra Millionaire Tax.' Not quite as catchy as I had hoped, but I suppose we're moving in the right direction.
Which, of course, is to SOCIALISM like VENEZUELA!
So be sure to remain mindful of that or those downtrodden billionaires might see their taxes raised to, I don't know, where they were a year ago.
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It’s interesting that Warren’s 2% wealth tax is far more lucrative than Cortez’ 70% marginal tax rate. It’s just that 2% sounds less than 70%. Of course, I’m not saying that it’s either/or...
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Speaking of wealth and taxes and douchebags, Bregman squares one up (https://twitter.com/AnandWrites/status/1098290072401649664).
Well, I guess that's the other Bregman...
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It turns out that much of the appropriated funds that Trump is planning to redirect to his wall under his emergency declaration...has already been spent.
They’re really bad at this.
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It's amazing the different stripes of corruption on display in this administration. Trump's secretary of labor broke federal law in order to cover up for Trump's millionaire serial child molester buddy.
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It's amazing the different stripes of corruption on display in this administration. Trump's secretary of labor broke federal law in order to cover up for Trump's millionaire serial child molester buddy.
How the corruption Trump brought with him spread so easily through the upper eschlons of society is shocking. It’s like the only thing that was holding back their inner scumbag was lack of permission. I have read that the Epstein deal may now get set aside and he can be actually prosecuted. That would be nice.
The deal is amazing in that it effectively pardons all Epstein’s fellow travelers. Let’s hope they all get rounded up, including any British royals and any sitting presidents (Trump was a frequent guest at Epstein’s parties and has commented openly about the volume of young girls at those events).
Epstein is a horror. His lawyers and the prosecutors who made this bargain are forever stained with Epstein’s crimes. Trump is a collection of every single negative trait possible in a human being.
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Cohen has receipts for election fraud and tax fraud. If nothing else, this is justification to subpoena Trump’s financial records.
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Cohen has receipts for election fraud and tax fraud. If nothing else, this is justification to subpoena Trump’s financial records.
That confuses me. Wouldn't this have been part of Mueller's work?
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That confuses me. Wouldn't this have been part of Mueller's work?
I haven't been following the Cohen testimony, but if the election fraud is Stormy Daniels type campaign finance fraud, I think that would fall outside the purview of Mueller's investigation which is focused on foreign interference in the election.
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Yeah, all the election fraud/payoff stuff was transferred from Mueller to SDNY.
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Every time I get a chance to listen to Cohen's testimony, it's a Republican raving about the messenger. If there is one Republican, who actually asks Cohen a substantive question in a real effort at Congressional oversight, it should be front page, top fold material in all the major rags. Seems as if the entire party is grifters, grovelers and clowns.
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Every time I get a chance to listen to Cohen's testimony, it's a Republican raving about the messenger. If there is one Republican, who actually asks Cohen a substantive question in a real effort at Congressional oversight, it should be front page, top fold material in all the major rags. Seems as if the entire party is grifters, grovelers and clowns.
The next time a Republican congressman seeks to do anything other than gorvel Trump's schlong it'll be the first.
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Every time I get a chance to listen to Cohen's testimony, it's a Republican raving about the messenger. If there is one Republican, who actually asks Cohen a substantive question in a real effort at Congressional oversight, it should be front page, top fold material in all the major rags. Seems as if the entire party is grifters, grovelers and clowns.
What's funny to me is that they are trying to dismiss Cohen as a "convicted liar" when the lie he was convicted for is "Trump did nothing wrong."
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Not watching but reading along at the Guardian. Cohen seems to be at least holding his own against efforts by Republicans to somehow discredit an already discredited man. One of them even tried the “black friend” (or in this case, “black employee”) defense of the racism accusations, and got bitch slapped by Cohen.
Also, don’t forget that Jim Jordan for years had the locker next to a coach who molested numerous college athletes, and knew nothing about it. How would that look if he was the one testifying?
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What's funny to me is that they are trying to dismiss Cohen as a "convicted liar" when the lie he was convicted for is "Trump did nothing wrong."
Stolen and sprinkled on Twitter like pixie dust. Stolen pixie dust.
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Cohen just owned the entire Republican side of the committee by telling them, essentially, that everything Trump touches...dies. He’s still an odious douche, but he’s pantsed the lot of them so far today. None of them landed a punch and he has them bleeding like poor ol’ ‘Enry Cooper (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muhammad_Ali_vs._Henry_Cooper).
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Yeah, all the election fraud/payoff stuff was transferred from Mueller to SDNY.
So there's an active investigation with SDNY? Or did they not pick it up?
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So there's an active investigation with SDNY? Or did they not pick it up?
Cohen intimates it's active and ongoing.
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What's funny to me is that they are trying to dismiss Cohen as a "convicted liar" when the lie he was convicted for is "Trump did nothing wrong."
Also, while making the case that Cohen is a low-life cheat and crook, do any of these Republican interrogators ever wonder why Trump hired him as his personal attorney, and kept him on for over a decade?
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Also, while making the case that Cohen is a low-life cheat and crook, do any of these Republican interrogators ever wonder why Trump hired him as his personal attorney, and kept him on for over a decade?
Another apt joke making the rounds is along the lines of "if you think Cohen is sleazy just wait till you hear about his clients!"
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What's funny to me is that they are trying to dismiss Cohen as a "convicted liar" when the lie he was convicted for is "Trump did nothing wrong."
“Convicted of lying to Congress discredits you for life” is an admirable sentiment for the party bowing and scraping to NRA President Oliver North.
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“Convicted of lying to Congress discredits you for life” is an admirable sentiment for the party bowing and scraping to NRA President Oliver North.
See also Abrams, Elliot.
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So Trump has now palled around with North Korea’s murderous dictator for a second time and walked away with his mushroom-headed dick in his tiny hand for a second time. Meanwhile, Kim has received the recognition of now two summits with the American President, a cessation of military exercises with South Korea - which are both valuable and cheap (cheaper than Trump’s golf trips) - and been absolved of the abuse of a US citizen in a North Korean prison that lead to that man’s very untimely death.
Art of the Deal my ass.
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So Trump has now palled around with North Korea’s murderous dictator for a second time and walked away with his mushroom-headed dick in his tiny hand for a second time. Meanwhile, Kim has received the recognition of now two summits with the American President, a cessation of military exercises with South Korea - which are both valuable and cheap (cheaper than Trump’s golf trips) - and been absolved of the abuse of a US citizen in a North Korean prison that lead to that man’s very untimely death.
That's all true enough and, let's face it, worrisome. But do you know what terrifies and outrages me, keeps me up at night? I believe Michael Cohen may well at some point in the future get a book deal.
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Undoubtedly, and a reality TV show and several pod casts to boot.
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Correct. While elements of it continue to be proved accurate.
In addition to Cohen's cell phone pinging off towers in Prague, they also have intercepts of Russians talking about Cohen being in Prague. Here's the full story (https://www.mcclatchydc.com/news/investigations/article219016820.html).
Of course, we're only finding this out now. I presume that Cohen spilled these beans to Mueller ages ago.
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So Trump has now palled around with North Korea’s murderous dictator for a second time and walked away with his mushroom-headed dick in his tiny hand for a second time. Meanwhile, Kim has received the recognition of now two summits with the American President, a cessation of military exercises with South Korea - which are both valuable and cheap (cheaper than Trump’s golf trips) - and been absolved of the abuse of a US citizen in a North Korean prison that lead to that man’s very untimely death.
Art of the Deal my ass.
I guess the good news is, Trump finally got to see Vietnam.
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I guess the good news is, Trump finally got to see Vietnam.
https://politics.theonion.com/trump-solemnly-lays-wreath-at-site-where-he-would-have-1832907992
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So Trump has now palled around with North Korea’s murderous dictator for a second time and walked away with his mushroom-headed dick in his tiny hand for a second time. Meanwhile, Kim has received the recognition of now two summits with the American President, a cessation of military exercises with South Korea - which are both valuable and cheap (cheaper than Trump’s golf trips) - and been absolved of the abuse of a US citizen in a North Korean prison that lead to that man’s very untimely death.
Art of the Deal my ass.
The clip of him grinning ear to ear and waving a tiny North Korean flag with childlike enthusiasm was such a clown show. If you’re going to negotiate with a murderous villain of a dictator, at least try to avoid looking like you’re on vacation at Disney world and your parents handed you a fresh pair of Mickey Mouse ears only minutes before.
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It would have been really special if Kim had let Donny engineer his train around for a while. Make believe engineer, I mean. Maybe give him a nice hat and one of those heavy coal aprons. Both would probably go over big in swing states at home, now that I think about it, even if they do have the Nork flag on them. Of course a lot of the voters would probably just mistake it for Ohio.
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The clip of him grinning ear to ear and waving a tiny North Korean flag with childlike enthusiasm was such a clown show.
But Obama nodded to a another head of state once! And wore a tan suit!
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Via Twitter:
Sean Hannity to Trump in tonight’s interview, on Michael Cohen and the hush-money payments: “I can tell you personally, he said to me at least a dozen times, that he made the decision on the payments and he didn’t tell you.”
It takes a special kind of stupid to not only talk yourself into a subpoena but ALSO inadvertently waive attorney-client privilege.
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It's really disappointing that people like Hannity insist in prolonging this spectacle. I was really hoping we could turn the page on this shameless, pointless political theater and go back to the nation's important matters like Benghazi and uranium.
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https://politics.theonion.com/trump-solemnly-lays-wreath-at-site-where-he-would-have-1832907992
Died? I think “fragged” would be the appropriate description.
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Via Twitter:
Sean Hannity to Trump in tonight’s interview, on Michael Cohen and the hush-money payments: “I can tell you personally, he said to me at least a dozen times, that he made the decision on the payments and he didn’t tell you.”
It takes a special kind of stupid to not only talk yourself into a subpoena but ALSO inadvertently waive attorney-client privilege.
The day that Hannity, Don Jr, Kushner and Ivanka get subpoenaed...I’ll be in my bunk.
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Chairman Elijah Cummings demands documents on security clearances:
“Over the past five weeks, the White House has stalled, equivocated, and failed to produce a single document or witness to the committee...I am now writing a final time to request your voluntary cooperation."
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I follow Rep. Dan Crenshaw (R-TX) on Twitter. I am disappointed to say that he is a relentless shill and apologist for Trump.
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I follow Rep. Dan Crenshaw (R-TX) on Twitter. I am disappointed to say that he is a relentless shill and apologist for Trump.
I’m as shocked as you are.
Well, keep an eye on him for us.
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I follow Rep. Dan Crenshaw (R-TX) on Twitter. I am disappointed to say that he is a relentless shill and apologist for Trump.
It's incredibly disillusioning to see that morons like this can get elected.
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I follow Rep. Dan Crenshaw (R-TX) on Twitter. I am disappointed to say that he is a relentless shill and apologist for Trump.
He is my rep. He is nothing but an AM radio conspiracy loon. Gym Jordan with an eye patch. After the SNL shit he seemed like a somewhat genuine guy, but he is a fucking clown. Can’t wait to vote that cretin out of office. What a fucking phony
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I follow Rep. Dan Crenshaw (R-TX) on Twitter. I am disappointed to say that he is a relentless shill and apologist for Trump.
One might say he has chosen to turn a blind eye towards Trump.
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He is my rep. He is nothing but an AM radio conspiracy loon. Gym Jordan with an eye patch. After the SNL shit he seemed like a somewhat genuine guy, but he is a fucking clown. Can’t wait to vote that cretin out of office. What a fucking phony
He is my rep too. He seemed like a fairly measured guy during the campaign. I was not that disappointed thinking "hey, they could have elected someone a lot crazier than this guy". I guess not.
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Should’ve nominated Kathaleen Wall smdh
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He is my rep too. He seemed like a fairly measured guy during the campaign. I was not that disappointed thinking "hey, they could have elected someone a lot crazier than this guy". I guess not.
A friend of mine lost the primary to him. I was fine with it until I went through the process you describe, to the letter.
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Happy Monday everybody (http://Happy Monday everybody). You get a subpoena! You get a subpoena! You get a subpoena! Everybody gets a subpoena!
On Monday the House judiciary committee, which is on the front line of renewed Democratic efforts to hold the president accountable, will issue demands for documents from more than 60 people and entities. The targets include the president’s son Donald Trump Jr and the chief finance officer of Trump’s business empire, Allen Weisselberg, both of whom have been implicated in payments made to an adult film actor on Trump’s behalf in violation of campaign finance laws.
Other possible targets are John Kelly, Trump’s former chief of staff, and former White House counsel Don McGahn.
The Democratic document grab was revealed on Sunday by Jerrold Nadler, the judiciary committee’s chairman. He told ABC’s This Week the request for information would be going out to the White House, the justice department and other agencies and individuals.
An updated list of recipients includes Jarvanka and Eric.
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The list is out, and it’s as long as it is beautiful (https://pbs.twimg.com/media/D00_DOQWkAAf8sL?format=jpg&name=900x900). No Ivanka, but everyone else you’d expect and a few you’d forgotten about (Steve Bannon, anyone?).
Oh, and of course, Matthew Calimari. Because why the fuck not.
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NRA. Nice.
The list should include Devin Nunes. Might be against the rules, but any obstruction investigation needs to include him.
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"We're not turning stuff over," says the White House to Dems.
https://www.politico.com/story/2019/03/05/jared-kushner-security-clearance-1204984 (https://www.politico.com/story/2019/03/05/jared-kushner-security-clearance-1204984)
Privacy concerns, of course. Apparently, Jared's privacy is more important than overseeing national security concerns.
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The depths of the depraved entanglements of Trump know no bounds. The Miami Herald reports that Trump watched Kraft’s Patriots win the SuperBowl alongside the founder of the spa where Kraft was busted for getting a happy ending. I shit you not.
As wealth gets concentrated into fewer and fewer pockets, they are becoming like medieval royal dynasties, where they’re all connected by family ties, shared bodily fluids or, often, both.
I got next with the Lysol...🤮
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"Founder" is a rather glorified term for that business
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The depths of the depraved entanglements of Trump know no bounds. The Miami Herald reports that Trump watched Kraft’s Patriots win the SuperBowl alongside the founder of the spa where Kraft was busted for getting a happy ending. I shit you not.
As wealth gets concentrated into fewer and fewer pockets, they are becoming like medieval royal dynasties, where they’re all connected by family ties, shared bodily fluids or, often, both.
I got next with the Lysol...🤮
Surely everyone knew that Trump was the other associate or whatever that guy was described as when the report first broke. I cannot believe this is a shock to anyone.
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"Founder" is a rather glorified term for that business
Judge: "Your client is accused of being a drug dealer and running a crack house"
Lawyer: "He's an entrepreneur who founded a pharmaceutical laboratory"
Judge: "Oh, well when you put it THAT way..."
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Surely everyone knew that Trump was the other associate or whatever that guy was described as when the report first broke. I cannot believe this is a shock to anyone.
The lady who co-founded massage parlors that are staffed with trafficked women turns out to be a doyen of right wing gatherings, and the host of events for Chinese business folk at Mar-a-Lago where they were promised they would get to...erm...press the flesh with the President.
I know all right wing rhetoric is projection, but I had no idea that this principle extended even to PizzaGate.
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The lady who co-founded massage parlors that are staffed with trafficked women turns out to be a doyen of right wing gatherings, and the host of events for Chinese business folk at Mar-a-Lago where they were promised they would get to...erm...press the flesh with the President.
I know all right wing rhetoric is projection, but I had no idea that this principle extended even to PizzaGate.
The fact that trafficked women were involved is unspeakably horrible enough but unless you have some evidence that they were also underage then I would suggest you go easy on the Pizzagate references.
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The fact that trafficked women were involved is unspeakably horrible enough but unless you have some evidence that they were also underage then I would suggest you go easy on the Pizzagate references.
Really? Pizzagate was made up nonsense that ended up with someone walking into the establishment with guns demanding answers. Luckily no one was shot. There weren’t any actual kids involved. There wasn’t even a fucking basement.
Madame Massage Parlour ran a bunch of establishments, at least one of which was staffed with trafficked women. Do you think it’s a coincidence that of all the rub ‘n’ tug shops in all the world Bob Kraft walked into that one?
This whole thing is sleazy as fuck and also - like everything else in the Trump administration- potentially a gargantuan security risk. I think the fake child slaves would be ok with some outrage about that.
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Really? Pizzagate was made up nonsense that ended up with someone walking into the establishment with guns demanding answers. Luckily no one was shot. There weren’t any actual kids involved. There wasn’t even a fucking basement.
Madame Massage Parlour ran a bunch of establishments, at least one of which was staffed with trafficked women. Do you think it’s a coincidence that of all the rub ‘n’ tug shops in all the world Bob Kraft walked into that one?
This whole thing is sleazy as fuck and also - like everything else in the Trump administration- potentially a gargantuan security risk. I think the fake child slaves would be ok with some outrage about that.
I think there's a failure to communicate here because you misunderstand what the word projection means.
I don't need a lecture from you about how sleazy and corrupt this whole Cindy Yang/Bob Kraft/Trump thing is. That's obvious on its face.
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Pizzagate was promulgated by bad actors in order to deflect attention from the Epstein cesspool where, among other things, Trump was credibly accused of raping an underaged girl.
It’s unclear to me that the word projection is misapplied here whether it turns out that there were underaged women working at the Florida jack-o-rama or not.
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I think there's a failure to communicate here because you misunderstand what the word projection means.
I don't need a lecture from you about how sleazy and corrupt this whole Cindy Yang/Bob Kraft/Trump thing is. That's obvious on its face.
Projection, being that they accuse others of what they, themselves are doing. No, there is no reportage on the age of the women at the parlors, but running sex slaves for an elite cabal is exactly what pizza gate...and this latest shower-requiring episode...are about. Except this episode rolls in a terrifying sub-plot of having the President on down compromised now by China as well as Russia.
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The biggest difference between pizzagate and Orchids of Asia is, one is pure foxnews far right fan fiction (consumed and targeted to the most gullible rubes in the count) the other is real.
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The biggest difference between pizzagate and Orchids of Asia is, one is pure foxnews far right fan fiction (consumed and targeted to the most gullible rubes in the count) the other is real.
The point being that, if you wonder where they dream up this shit, it’s because it’s what they’re actually doing.
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Pizzagate was promulgated by bad actors in order to deflect attention from the Epstein cesspool where, among other things, Trump was credibly accused of raping an underaged girl.
It’s unclear to me that the word projection is misapplied here whether it turns out that there were underaged women working at the Florida jack-o-rama or not.
It's confusing because there are two separate sex slave/prostitution investigations in Florida, but they intersect at Mar-A-Lago. There's the Epstein case, which included minors who were working at Mar-A-Lago being recruited into Epstein's pedo ring.
And now there's the Chinese madam running the rub-and-tug chain, also allegedly with sex slaves, who comes and goes from Mar-A-Lago like she owns the place, and takes selfies with every Republican who shows up.
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It's confusing because there are two separate sex slave/prostitution investigations in Florida, but they intersect at Mar-A-Lago. There's the Epstein case, which included minors who were working at Mar-A-Lago being recruited into Epstein's pedo ring.
And now there's the Chinese madam running the rub-and-tug chain, also allegedly with sex slaves, who comes and goes from Mar-A-Lago like she owns the place, and takes selfies with every Republican who shows up.
Exactly. And as we're still batting 1.000 on projection, it's terrifying to think of all the things of which Obama and Clinton were accused, because that is exactly what's going on behind closed doors on the right (or, at least, they're thinking about it).
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So, this whole Boeing thing. It turns out to be a confluence of numerous tributaries of shit, running together into the swamp.
The Max 8 flies very differently to other 737 models so, when Boeing was pushing it out to its airline customers, it had to tweak the autopilot settings to fake its handling to be like that of its predecessors. That way airlines, otherwise reluctant to invest in the new model because of pilot retraining time and expense, could roll it out (no pun intended) quickly, easily and cheaply. But they didn’t tell pilots about the new override parameters and since day 1 this plane has been trying to crash itself against the wishes of the pilots. This has been happening fleet-wide, worldwide; we’re lucky that it’s been only the two crashes thus far.
So, the world knows this plane is inherently unsafe at any altitude and it has been grounded or denied even overfly permission pretty much everywhere. Everywhere except the US, that is. Why is that?
Could it be that, after Trump nominated his own pilot to run the FAA (a pilot who couldn’t even keep the one plane he was flying for Trump properly registered) and his nomination went down like a... Trump hasn’t bothered to propose anyone else for the job. The top three positions at the FAA are prefaced with “acting”. Maybe this is the problem, but likely not as any Trump nominee is going to be worse than any random civil servant.
The Transportation secretary has the power to ground the Max 8s, but that’s Elaine Chao, wife of SwampKing and enemy of democracy Mitch McConnell, so there’s no way she is going to buck the White House.
Oh yeah, the White House. Boeing’s CEO has frequented Swamp-a-Lago numerous times and donated $1 million to Trump’s under-investigation inaugural committee. Moreover, Trump spoke with him on the phone this very morning where Boeing’s guy gave a strong denial against accusations that he screwed with the election tortured Otto Warmbier to death hacked up Kashoggi there is anything wrong with the Max 8.
So the Max 8 still flies over the US, dipping it’s nose when it feels like it. Meanwhile, despite the denials that there’s a problem, Boeing is rolling out a software patch to fix the non-problem. They have been working on it since the first Max 8 crash, but it was delayed by about a month due to the US government shut down.
If you count back a month from the likely roll out date of the patch, it would have preceded the Ethiopia crash.
Those people died because of Trump, Boeing and shitty US politics. I hope they’re the last, but I fear they won’t be.
PS Any US airline still running unpatched Max 8s is now culpable in any deaths resulting therefrom.
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Who knew heavier than air flight was so complex?
And Trump has assured me that he has done more for passenger safety than any President in history. Why, there no commercial airline fatalities in the US last year. So put that in your crack pipe and smoke it.
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Manafort gets a proper dressing down at his sentencing hearing, where the judge torched all his “I’m sorry I got caught” excuses. She gave him decent sentences for the two verdicts; one concurrent, one consecutive.
In all, Manafort’s going to federal prison for 7 1/2 years. There is no parole from federal prison.
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BOOM! NY just indicted Manafort of state charges. I guess they were waiting for the federal desk to be over, but I’m sure this has been cocked and ready since EDVA let him slide on the bulk of the federal crimes.
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So, this whole Boeing thing. It turns out to be a confluence of numerous tributaries of shit, running together into the swamp.
The Max 8 flies very differently to other 737 models so, when Boeing was pushing it out to its airline customers, it had to tweak the autopilot settings to fake its handling to be like that of its predecessors. That way airlines, otherwise reluctant to invest in the new model because of pilot retraining time and expense, could roll it out (no pun intended) quickly, easily and cheaply. But they didn’t tell pilots about the new override parameters and since day 1 this plane has been trying to crash itself against the wishes of the pilots. This has been happening fleet-wide, worldwide; we’re lucky that it’s been only the two crashes thus far.
So, the world knows this plane is inherently unsafe at any altitude and it has been grounded or denied even overfly permission pretty much everywhere. Everywhere except the US, that is. Why is that?
Could it be that, after Trump nominated his own pilot to run the FAA (a pilot who couldn’t even keep the one plane he was flying for Trump properly registered) and his nomination went down like a... Trump hasn’t bothered to propose anyone else for the job. The top three positions at the FAA are prefaced with “acting”. Maybe this is the problem, but likely not as any Trump nominee is going to be worse than any random civil servant.
The Transportation secretary has the power to ground the Max 8s, but that’s Elaine Chao, wife of SwampKing and enemy of democracy Mitch McConnell, so there’s no way she is going to buck the White House.
Oh yeah, the White House. Boeing’s CEO has frequented Swamp-a-Lago numerous times and donated $1 million to Trump’s under-investigation inaugural committee. Moreover, Trump spoke with him on the phone this very morning where Boeing’s guy gave a strong denial against accusations that he screwed with the election tortured Otto Warmbier to death hacked up Kashoggi there is anything wrong with the Max 8.
So the Max 8 still flies over the US, dipping it’s nose when it feels like it. Meanwhile, despite the denials that there’s a problem, Boeing is rolling out a software patch to fix the non-problem. They have been working on it since the first Max 8 crash, but it was delayed by about a month due to the US government shut down.
If you count back a month from the likely roll out date of the patch, it would have preceded the Ethiopia crash.
Those people died because of Trump, Boeing and shitty US politics. I hope they’re the last, but I fear they won’t be.
PS Any US airline still running unpatched Max 8s is now culpable in any deaths resulting therefrom.
Trump just issued an emergency executive order grounding the Max 8 immediately. No word on whether or not he's still flummoxed by aerodynamics or how a thermos works.
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Trump just issued an emergency executive order grounding the Max 8 immediately. No word on whether or not he's still flummoxed by aerodynamics or how a thermos works.
How do it know?
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Beto just announced his candidacy for (vice) President.
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Agree on the VP implication. I like Beto, but IMO, he needs to step up his game to have a real chance at the top spot.
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Agree on the VP implication. I like Beto, but IMO, he needs to step up his game to have a real chance at the top spot.
He’s not ready for the big chair, but he’d add to the ticket whom ever is at the top of it.
A Beto vs. Pence debate would be must see tv.
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Trump announced that Beto's candidacy is illegitimate because 1) he doesn't have experience and 2) he lost his last election bid and once you lose an election, that should be it, you shouldn't get to run for office again. He didn't elaborate on his own failed candidacies and lack of success, but he's already denied he ran for President in 2000. So there's that.
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Trump announced that Beto's candidacy is illegitimate because 1) he doesn't have experience and 2) he lost his last election bid and once you lose an election, that should be it, you shouldn't get to run for office again. He didn't elaborate on his own failed candidacies and lack of success, but he's already denied he ran for President in 2000. So there's that.
In an interview this morning, Trump speculated that Beto is “crazy” because he moves his hands too much while speaking. This is real.
Projection. All of it.
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Manafort’s lawyer - who has spent two trials defending Trump from accusations of colluding with Russia while his client got sent up the river for over 7 years - has had bar association complaints filed against him in multiple states.
Everything Trump touches, dies.
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Manafort’s lawyer has had bar association complaints filed against him in multiple states.
Which one?
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https://www.thestar.com/news/world/2019/03/14/trump-issues-warning-to-opponents-it-would-be-very-bad-if-his-military-police-and-biker-supporters-got-tough.html
I understand some of the reticence to move towards impeachment, but this shit is unacceptable in the US. "Threatening democracy and democratic institutions" should be the first article of impeachment.
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In case you were wondering what put Trump into such a Twitter tailspin this weekend, I give you The NY Times:
A Mar-a-Lago Weekend and an Act of God: Trump’s History With Deutsche Bank (https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/18/business/trump-deutsche-bank.html)
Investigators are elbow-deep in Trump’s dealings with DoucheBank.
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In case you were wondering what put Trump into such a Twitter tailspin this weekend, I give you The NY Times:
A Mar-a-Lago Weekend and an Act of God: Trump’s History With Deutsche Bank (https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/18/business/trump-deutsche-bank.html)
Investigators are elbow-deep in Trump’s dealings with DoucheBank.
To me, this is emblematic of the broader investigation in that it's hard to imagine that with all the smoke, there is no underlying fire.
No other business that I can think of intentionally seeks out or willingly accepts big losses, and that is what you have to believe here if there is no underlying corruption. You have to believe that each loan officer and executive signing off said to themselves: "I know these documents are fraudulent, I know he will likely default on the loan and he might even sue us, but hey, he's Donald Trump and all that will ultimately be good for the company."
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To me, this is emblematic of the broader investigation in that it's hard to imagine that with all the smoke, there is no underlying fire.
One thing's for sure though; the public perception is turning with every day that Mueller doesn't release something. The majority of Americans now believe it *is* a witch hunt, simply because it's been two years, and squat. It'd better be a fucking historic bombshell, or this investigation secures Trump 2020.
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One thing's for sure though; the public perception is turning with every day that Mueller doesn't release something. The majority of Americans now believe it *is* a witch hunt, simply because it's been two years, and squat. It'd better be a fucking historic bombshell, or this investigation secures Trump 2020.
For the record, that was a badly framed question in that it asked, paraphrasing, "do you think it's a witch hunt and do you think Trump has been investigated more than any other president?" To that question, I would answer "yes". The rest of the poll showed strong interest in seeing the Mueller report. People aren't turning on it, pollsters just ask stupid questions.
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Manafort’s lawyer - who has spent two trials defending Trump from accusations of colluding with Russia while his client got sent up the river for over 7 years - has had bar association complaints filed against him in multiple states.
Everything Trump touches, dies.
What is the lawyer's name? Which bar associations were the complaints filed with? What are the nature of the complaints; that is what is the lawyer accused of? Did any of the complaints result in disciplinary action against the lawyer? Typically, complaints are not made public unless disciplinary action is initiated so what is the source of this information?
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https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/19/us/politics/devin-nunes-twitter-lawsuit.html (https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/19/us/politics/devin-nunes-twitter-lawsuit.html)
Is this what "snowflake" means?
Though absorbing criticism comes with the territory for politicians, the complaint described the objectionable tweets from the three users as something “that no human being should ever have to bear and suffer in their whole life.”
To make his case, he cited a wide variety of tweets that included accusations of criminal misconduct, crude jokes at his expense and relatively banal criticism. The complaint says the tweets “falsely stated” that Mr. Nunes had brought “shame” to his family and that he was voted “Most Likely to Commit Treason” in high school, and that one of them included a cartoon image of a sexual act with Mr. Trump and President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia. The complaint lists dozens of other tweets he found insulting.
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https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/19/us/politics/devin-nunes-twitter-lawsuit.html (https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/19/us/politics/devin-nunes-twitter-lawsuit.html)
Is this what "snowflake" means?
It wasn't a sexual act, it was a "diagram of the relationship" between Putin, Trump and Nunes in Human Centipede form.
And Devin Nunes' Cow's twitter account had some good stuff on it last night.
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https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/19/us/politics/devin-nunes-twitter-lawsuit.html (https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/19/us/politics/devin-nunes-twitter-lawsuit.html)
Is this what "snowflake" means?
It also sounds like the textbook definition of a nuisance lawsuit the type of which R's have always railed against.
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It also sounds like the textbook definition of a nuisance lawsuit the type of which R's have always railed against.
The same type of lawsuit that Trump has, for decades, used to bully his former business associates, contractors, detractors, etc. Nunes is just following his master's lead.
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It also sounds like the textbook definition of a nuisance lawsuit the type of which R's have always railed against.
Nunes co-sponsored the "Discouraging Frivolous Lawsuits Act" in 2017
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Nunes co-sponsored the "Discouraging Frivolous Lawsuits Act" in 2017
Ha!
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For the record, that was a badly framed question in that it asked, paraphrasing, "do you think it's a witch hunt and do you think Trump has been investigated more than any other president?" To that question, I would answer "yes". The rest of the poll showed strong interest in seeing the Mueller report. People aren't turning on it, pollsters just ask stupid questions.
Maybe. But I think there's growing frustration, and people want to see some results, one way or another. The longer it goes with no information, the more and more people will start to believe there's nothing there, irrespective of the poll questions. That's just human nature.
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Maybe. But I think there's growing frustration, and people want to see some results, one way or another. The longer it goes with no information, the more and more people will start to believe there's nothing there, irrespective of the poll questions. That's just human nature.
That is certainly a danger, and it's also eminently possible that the report, whenever it's issued, will not contain any major revelations that aren't already known by anyone who follows this closely. Of course, it's also possible that the AG will elect not to make the report public.
That's why I think it's a good political move to advance impeachment proceedings immediately in order to get everything out in the open. Will the senate vote to impeach? Fuck no. I don't think that matters.
My thought is that the various sealed indictments are going to be very revealing and that the report eventually will advance the pursuit of truth and justice considerably. But to rely on it in any way as a political fulcrum is fucking idiotic. So of course that appears to be what a lot of the Democrats are content to do.
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What is the lawyer's name? Which bar associations were the complaints filed with? What are the nature of the complaints; that is what is the lawyer accused of? Did any of the complaints result in disciplinary action against the lawyer? Typically, complaints are not made public unless disciplinary action is initiated so what is the source of this information?
Dude’s name is Kevin Downing, the statement about having filed a bar complaint - in NY and LA - came from a purported lawyer on Twitter.
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My thought is that the various sealed indictments are going to be very revealing and that the report eventually will advance the pursuit of truth and justice considerably. But to rely on it in any way as a political fulcrum is fucking idiotic. So of course that appears to be what a lot of the Democrats are content to do.
Pelosi is a smart operator. The freak out over her recent dismissal of impeachment was a misinterpretation, IMHO, as she listed off - as prerequisites - a number of things that are already in the record plus one that isn’t: Republican support. She knows a lot of what is coming, and I think she expects that (at least some) Republicans will have to get on board when the whole criminal enterprise is laid bare for the public.
Meanwhile! Swalwell - House intel member - says he believes there are sealed indictments against Trump.
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Devin Nunes has just under 400k Twiiter followers. He sued Twitter for $250 million for allowing people such as “Devin Nunes’ Cow” to take the piss out of him. Devin Nunes’ Cow had 1200 followers before the lawsuit; it now has over 400,000 (more than Nunes himself).
After his midnight cab ride shenanigans, it’s very clear that this fucktard is the king of the self-own.
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ETA: For a world of “fail” gifs, check out #ThisIsDevinNunes.
🤣🤣🤣🤣
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Mueller report done. Submitted to AG. We'll see
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Mueller report done. Submitted to AG. We'll see
This explains the weekend meltdown and all the negative Mueller stories from the White House and Fox News.
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This played out perfectly for Trump. Releasing the conclusions, without the underlying evidence, has allowed the press and Republicans to craft a narrative that nothing happened at all. Complete exoneration!!!!
I want to see all the evidence before I cut him some slack on collusion. It's quite possible that there might have been some collusion-like activities or some seriously stinky shit, but shit that doesn't rise to a crime. It's also possible that most of the dots can be connected, but the final ones can't be due to obstruction or Manafort holding tight.
The no-obstruction claim by Barr appears to be his personal call, not the conclusion of Mueller. Of course, I want to see the underlying evidence on collusion before I get worked up about the obstruction stuff. If there was truly no unseemly stuff to hide, then Congress should leave the obstruction stuff alone, IMO.
Anyways, if they are going to crow about complete exoneration, than they logically have to release everything, just to justify that conclusion. Otherwise, it looks like a rigged system.
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This played out perfectly for Trump. Releasing the conclusions, without the underlying evidence, has allowed the press and Republicans to craft a narrative that nothing happened at all. Complete exoneration!!!!
I want to see all the evidence before I cut him some slack on collusion. It's quite possible that there might have been some collusion-like activities or some seriously stinky shit, but shit that doesn't rise to a crime. It's also possible that most of the dots can be connected, but the final ones can't be due to obstruction or Manafort holding tight.
The no-obstruction claim by Barr appears to be his personal call, not the conclusion of Mueller. Of course, I want to see the underlying evidence on collusion before I get worked up about the obstruction stuff. If there was truly no unseemly stuff to hide, then Congress should leave the obstruction stuff alone, IMO.
Anyways, if they are going to crow about complete exoneration, than they logically have to release everything, just to justify that conclusion. Otherwise, it looks like a rigged system.
Look, Trump said, in writing, that he didn’t do it. What more proof could you possibly want?
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I honestly do not know which is worse. Thinking a candidate for President may have enlisted a foreign adversary for assistance, or having to listen the "Cheeto" gloat.
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The fact that Barr stretched the English language to breaking point to try to say that Trump is innocent - and couldn’t - is all the reason we need to see the whole report. I’m sure Barr has a hearing invitation coming his way, where his parsing skills will be stress-tested.
Meanwhile, at the risk of being pilloried for engaging in whataboutery, imagine if Comey had stood in front of Congress and said that he could not exonerate Clinton of all wrongdoing regarding her emails, but Eric Holder says he’s not going to press charges. I’m sure Chaffetz and Nunes and Issa would’ve taken that as read and gone on about their regular business.
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Also, let’s not forget that Trump lives in the same orbit as mobsters (real estate), talks like one and clearly thinks of himself as one. If he learned one thing from them, it would be how to employ cut outs and to have your family run the business. If he learned two, two things...I’ll come in again.
Seriously, collusion was achieved through Manafort and Stone and Page and Papadopolous and Prince and Kushner working as cut outs. This is why Trump isn’t charged but not exonerated. It’s why RICO statutes exist.
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The fact that Barr stretched the English language to breaking point to try to say that Trump is innocent - and couldn’t - is all the reason we need to see the whole report. I’m sure Barr has a hearing invitation coming his way, where his parsing skills will be stress-tested.
So after a triumphant weekend for TrumpWorld, the real world started to come to the realization the Barr memo is not the Mueller report - now known to be over 300 pages not including the grand jury testimony and other appendices. The questions came harder and harder until, on Friday, Barr completely walked back his memo.
While Barr is working hard to redact everything he can from the actual report, forces are aligning against him that may make impossible for him to keep the unredacted report out of the hands of Congress (at least). Faced with that, he could not let his “summary” stand, which could well mean that the report is far more damning than he tried to let us believe.
It turns out that the release of the report wasn’t the end, or even the beginning of the end. It is just the end of the beginning.
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Jerry Nadler is prepping a subpoena for the full, unredacted Mueller report. Queue the slow, inexorable march towards a 5-4 SCOTUS decision in Trump’s favor.
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Jerry Nadler is prepping a subpoena for the full, unredacted Mueller report. Queue the slow, inexorable march towards a 5-4 SCOTUS decision in Trump’s favor.
Good for them. They shouldn't trust Barr or any of the Republicans. It is not beyond them, in fact it is usually their MO, to play dirty, so removing all the bad shit, under whatever pretext is sadly within their wheelhouse.
Seriously, if you're completely exonerated, release the whole fucking thing, at least to Congress. They can cut out the Grand Jury and classified stuff for the public.
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Meanwhile, a whistblower informed the house oversight committee that the white house has overturned security clearance denials for 25 people who were initially denied security clearances (https://www.usnews.com/news/politics/articles/2019-04-01/career-official-raises-concerns-about-wh-security-clearances) for reasons such as conflict-of-interest and foreign influences. The whistleblower is an 18 year veteran of the security clearance process who has served both republican and democratic administrations, recognizing what she perceives to be a threat to national security after her concerns fell on deaf ears within the administration:
Newbold said she raised her concerns up the chain of command in the White House to no avail. Instead, she said, the White House retaliated, suspending her in January for 14 days without pay for not following a new policy requiring that documents be scanned as separate PDF files rather than one single PDF file.
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Meanwhile, a whistblower informed the house oversight committee that the white house has overturned security clearance denials for 25 people who were initially denied security clearances (https://www.usnews.com/news/politics/articles/2019-04-01/career-official-raises-concerns-about-wh-security-clearances) for reasons such as conflict-of-interest and foreign influences. The whistleblower is an 18 year veteran of the security clearance process who has served both republican and democratic administrations, recognizing what she perceives to be a threat to national security after her concerns fell on deaf ears within the administration:
Newbold said she raised her concerns up the chain of command in the White House to no avail. Instead, she said, the White House retaliated, suspending her in January for 14 days without pay for not following a new policy requiring that documents be scanned as separate PDF files rather than one single PDF file.
Just waIt until Fox News outs and doxes her. Brave lady.
ETA: from the indefatigable Natasha Bertrand: concerns included “foreign influence, conflicts of interest, concerning personal conduct, financial problems, drug use, and criminal conduct.”
And that’s just Trump!
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Good for them. They shouldn't trust Barr or any of the Republicans. It is not beyond them, in fact it is usually their MO, to play dirty, so removing all the bad shit, under whatever pretext is sadly within their wheelhouse.
Seriously, if you're completely exonerated, release the whole fucking thing, at least to Congress. They can cut out the Grand Jury and classified stuff for the public.
The thing with this administration is that they do everything in public, over time, so the public doesn’t feel the temperature of the water rising. Any number of Trump’s tweets - if discovered by the press or investigators as the subject of a private email or phone call - would cause outrage. But because it’s on Twitter, we all eye roll and move on. Nixon fired his way to Bork to fire the SC in one night; Trump fired Yates and Comey and McCabe and Sessions over the span of two years, so we don’t see it as what it is: a slow-moving Saturday Night Massacre.
Barr is Bork with less crazy hair.
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Instead, she said, the White House retaliated, suspending her in January for 14 days without pay for not following a new policy requiring that documents be scanned as separate PDF files rather than one single PDF file.
We're putting cover sheets on the PDF reports now, you know.
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We're putting cover sheets on the PDF reports now, you know.
Did you not get the memo?
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Did you not get the memo?
Yeaaaaaah, if you just approve the security clearances for the felons, that’d be great.
Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk
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Yeaaaaaah, if you just approve the security clearances for the felons, that’d be great.
I'm gonna need you to go ahead and come in tomorrow. So if you could be here at around....9 that'd be great. Ahhhh, I almost forgot... I'm also going to need you to go ahead and come in on Sunday, too. We, uhhh, lost some people this week (to jail) and we sorta need to play catch-up. Mmmmmkay? Thaaaaaanks.
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But if you want to see the kind of catastrophe that can be invited by making fundamental policy decisions based on a simple majority, we have to look across the pond at Brexit. It seems ever more likely that Britain has set a course towards a cliff, jammed a cement block on the gas pedal, tied off the steering wheel and then locked itself inside. It was an entirely political decision to hold the vote - PM Cameron using it to maintain support for him in the job - but then it was taken so casually that they didn't even bother to set the same threshold to get out as they had to get in (60% IIRC).
Brexit...bloody hell! 3 days into a 14-day extension, parliament held a series of "indicative votes" on 4 Brexit-smoothing proposals, and each went down in flames. They have already voted down the "hard Brexit" option of just crashing out without any agreements in place, but that's exactly what will happen in 11 days unless some sanity prevails. Alas, sanity is the one thing that is completely missing from the whole issue. This is some epic shit.
Brexit came about because of a confluence of effluence from (in no particular order) Rupert Murdoch, Russia, racism sanitized as nationalism and weak, self-serving politicians. We have all of the exact same issues here, with a giant helping of corruption dolloped on top. When Trump closed the border crossing near San Diego for a few hours recently, aside from the riot hoses and tear gas that were illegally deployed over the fence by CBP, the US lost about $5mm in trade. One crossing...for a few hours.
Closing the border to any one of the three Mexicos (https://www.snopes.com/tachyon/2019/03/foxmexico.jpg?resize=865,452)* won't be as gargantuan a self-own as Brexit, but it will cost the US billions and severely hurt people on both sides of the border.
* This is real.
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https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/woman-with-chinese-passports-malware-arrested-at-trumps-mar-a-lago-resort/2019/04/02/3399e426-5583-11e9-814f-e2f46684196e_story.html?utm_term=.e7019f514295 (https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/woman-with-chinese-passports-malware-arrested-at-trumps-mar-a-lago-resort/2019/04/02/3399e426-5583-11e9-814f-e2f46684196e_story.html?utm_term=.e7019f514295)
After Zhang was stopped and questioned, a search of her belongings turned up four cell phones, a laptop, a hard drive, and a thumb drive which contained “malicious malware,” according to the criminal complaint. The document says she told Secret Service agents that a Chinese friend instructed her to travel from Shanghai to the president’s Florida resort and make contact with a member of Trump’s family.
I have no idea if this amounts to anything at all, but these bumbling idiots have no peer. Almost all of Trump's connections are stupid: his children, his staff (both White House and campaign), his attorneys, even the foreign agents he mixes with. In fact, I can only think of two who didn't fit the mold: Rex and Haley, and they both quickly bailed.
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I have no idea if this amounts to anything at all, but these bumbling idiots have no peer. Almost all of Trump's connections are stupid: his children, his staff (both White House and campaign), his attorneys, even the foreign agents he mixes with. In fact, I can only think of two who didn't fit the mold: Rex and Haley, and they both quickly bailed.
Well Haley is still cheerleading Trump a little, so she's not completely out.
Meanwhile, this lady is clearly a false-flag plant by the Trump administration to cover up for the actual major security breach that is ongoing ever since Trump opened a link in a text to his unsecured, ancient Android phone labeled "Boobs".
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Trump gave a critique of the Mueller report in off the cuff remarks today, which is weird because he hasn't seen what's in it...
Weirder, he tried on multiple occasions to say the word "origins" and it came out "oranges". He knew he was saying it wrong because each time he clarified the remark by saying "the start" or "the beginnings", but he kept coming back to it, trying to say it, and have it come out "oranges" every time. He also talked wistfully about the lovely place in Germany where his father was born*.
* Fred Trump was born in New York.
I don't know if he challenged the number of states; I didn't see the whole press spray.
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Well, at least HE loves the Apple mouse.
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Well, at least HE loves the Apple mouse.
Better than the salmon mousse (https://youtu.be/7m1SXSdeWVY).
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Tonight, Trump stated that the noise from windmills causes cancer.
Whew! He found his marble.
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Well. Well. Well. I just wanted to check in now that Mueller's report was a bust, and it appears that the wheels are grinding slowly toward prosecuting some of these criminals, e.g., Comey, Clapper, Ohr, McCabe, etc. and putting them in jail where they belong. Karma is a beautiful thing.
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Well. Well. Well. I just wanted to check in now that Mueller's report was a bust, and it appears that the wheels are grinding slowly toward prosecuting some of these criminals, e.g., Comey, Clapper, Ohr, McCabe, etc. and putting them in jail where they belong. Karma is a beautiful thing.
Except that none of what you just said is, you know, real.
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Except that none of what you just said is, you know, real.
Since when has that ever stopped the yahoos?
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Yeah, I guess it's not just a MH persona but the real deal. It's must be hard to navigate through life with that naivete weighing one down.
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Yeah, I guess it's not just a MH persona but the real deal. It's must be hard to navigate through life with that naivete weighing one down.
What is MH? Mad Hatter? Mental Health? Meat Head? Monster Hunter?
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Well. Well. Well. I just wanted to check in now that Mueller's report was a bust, and it appears that the wheels are grinding slowly toward prosecuting some of these criminals, e.g., Comey, Clapper, Ohr, McCabe, etc. and putting them in jail where they belong. Karma is a beautiful thing.
What have you read in the report to say it is a bust?
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Well. Well. Well. I just wanted to check in now that Mueller's report was a bust, and it appears that the wheels are grinding slowly toward prosecuting some of these criminals, e.g., Comey, Clapper, Ohr, McCabe, etc. and putting them in jail where they belong. Karma is a beautiful thing.
You showed astonishing restraint in waiting as long as you did to post this. I expected this about a week ago.
You should have shown more restraint.
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What have you read in the report to say it is a bust?
Well apart from the 199 criminal counts, 37 different people and entities charged, 7 guilty pleas, 1 trial conviction, 5 jail sentences and near $30 million received in forfeiture...what has Mueller ever done for us?
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What have you read in the report to say it is a bust?
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Probably the same thing as the rest of us. Nothing as they haven't released it. (have they??) Just regular MAGA behavior.
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Probably the same thing as the rest of us. Nothing as they haven't released it. (have they??) Just regular MAGA behavior.
Happy isn't keeping up with Bill Barr's missives; he walked back his original memo claiming that his summary wasn't a summary and shouldn't be taken as such. So even that fig leaf of exoneration that they wore whilst victory-lapping DC last week has been taken away. Since then, they've all been streaking (https://youtu.be/20g3QIUnOgY).
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Well apart from the 199 criminal counts, 37 different people and entities charged, 7 guilty pleas, 1 trial conviction, 5 jail sentences and near $30 million received in forfeiture...what has Mueller ever done for us?
But he didn’t get the target, which was a duly elected president. You libs know that you’re upset that Mueller didn’t find anything concerning collusion with the Russians. The other convictions were just about meaningless.
I noticed that none of you addressed the fate of the treasonous folks in the CIA, FBI and DOJ who had the unmitigated gall to try to topple a presidency. If this happened in just about any other country, the treasonous would have already been rounded up and executed. I am against the death penalty, but I could see some life sentences come out of it for Comey, Rosenstein, Ohr, Brennan, Clapper, Strzok and/or Page. I am not saying that all will get that life sentence, but some clearly deserve it.
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This is one of those times where I want to type a response to crazy and I think to myself, don't. Just don't.
So, I won't respond. I'll just reply with a response saying I won't respond to bat-shit crazy posts.
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But he didn’t get the target, which was a duly elected president.
The Mueller investigation targeted the topic of Russian interference in the 2016 election. He was not appointed to target the President. The President’s own actions resulted in investigation of him resulting.
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But he didn’t get the target, which was a duly elected president. You libs know that you’re upset that Mueller didn’t find anything concerning collusion with the Russians. The other convictions were just about meaningless.
That is something that you don't know. What Barr quoted Mueller as saying was very specific: "[T]he investigation did not establish that members of the Trump Campaign conspired or coordinated with the Russian government in its election interference activities." The bracketed "T" at the start of the quote is from Barr, indicating that it's a sentence fragment. Contrary to your assertion, all you've got is that tiny snippet from 400 pages plus voluminous underlying documentation. That's some very slim pickings.
I noticed that none of you addressed the fate of the treasonous folks in the CIA, FBI and DOJ who had the unmitigated gall to try to topple a presidency. If this happened in just about any other country, the treasonous would have already been rounded up and executed. I am against the death penalty, but I could see some life sentences come out of it for Comey, Rosenstein, Ohr, Brennan, Clapper, Strzok and/or Page. I am not saying that all will get that life sentence, but some clearly deserve it.
Seriously, get a grip. Who runs the CIA, FBI and DOJ? It's been under Republican control for over two years. Rosenstein was a registered Republican. Mueller was a registered Republican. McCabe was a registered Republican. Sessions was a fucking Republican Senator. Comey was a registered Republican. Pompeo is Trump's Secretary of State (and a registered Republican). These were/are the people in charge. You are looking under rocks while getting kicked up the backside by your own people.
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What is MH? Mad Hatter? Mental Health? Meat Head? Monster Hunter?
Mother Humper.
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This is one of those times where I want to type a response to crazy and I think to myself, don't. Just don't.
So, I won't respond. I'll just reply with a response saying I won't respond to bat-shit crazy posts.
More than a couple of times someone has written me off-list asking, Is this guy Hap really as crazy as he seems?
Well, there's little to no evidence to indicate that it's any sort of an act.
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More than a couple of times someone has written me off-list asking, Is this guy Hap really as crazy as he seems?
Well, there's little to no evidence to indicate that it's any sort of an act.
He's a real MAGA person. If they need additional verification, I'll give it.
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More than a couple of times someone has written me off-list asking, Is this guy Hap really as crazy as he seems?
Well, there's little to no evidence to indicate that it's any sort of an act.
You could tell them, not as crazy as he used to be?
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He's a real MAGA person. If they need additional verification, I'll give it.
He seemed okay in person, a real polite guy, almost a little shy. He comes off to me here as someone who watches FOX News for the content (and listens to Hannity and Rush), has his views affirmed and buys in 100%. It takes all kinds to define the norm. I'm last person to judge deviations from it.
MH... I get it now.
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More than a couple of times someone has written me off-list asking, Is this guy Hap really as crazy as he seems?
If anyone writes or has written you off-list to question if I'm as crazy as I seem, I hope you respond/ed with, "crazier."
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If anyone writes or has written you off-list to question if I'm as crazy as I seem, I hope you respond/ed with, "crazier."
I tell them that you seem okay in person, a real polite guy, almost a little shy.
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I tell them that you seem okay in person, a real polite guy, almost a little shy.
If they need additional verification, I'll give it.
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I tell them that you seem okay in person, a real polite guy, almost a little shy.
I tell people the same about Trump.
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The House Ways and Means Committee Chairman just demanded 6 years of Trump's tax returns from the IRS. He did so under a 1924 "committee access" law that was put in place after the infamous Teapot Dome scandal, where members of Harding's administration created giant conflicts of interest by refusing to divest their business interests. The request goes straight to the Treasure Secretary, and the law requires they cough up the goods, no questions asked.
However, the law is so rarely used that it has never faced a challenge in federal court. Expect that to change.
Meanwhile, there are many Democratic nominee contestants who have yet to release any tax returns. There is no excuse for this; it should have been part of the campaign prep, prior to announcing. It gifts Trump and his cronies a valid "whatabout". Only Gillebrand, Inslee and (of course) Warren have released a number of years of full returns. Some others have released summaries, but not full returns, which is not good enough. Sanders hasn't released any tax returns ever, despite running for the nomination 4 years ago, after which time his excuses are as thin as his hair.
Time to put up on this topic. They should all start dropping their tax returns right now so that TrumpWorld can't use their reticence as an excuse for him to shirk the W&M demand.
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I don’t want to freak anyone out or anything, but some of Mueller’s investigators are saying that Barr’s take on the report (that he has since disavowed) does not accurately reflect the team’s findings (https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/03/us/politics/william-barr-mueller-report.html). I know...right?
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You showed astonishing restraint in waiting as long as you did to post this. I expected this about a week ago.
You should have shown more restraint.
I bet he now wishes he’d waited one more day.
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I don’t want to freak anyone out or anything, but some of Mueller’s investigators are saying that Barr’s take on the report (that he has since disavowed) does not accurately reflect the team’s findings (https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/03/us/politics/william-barr-mueller-report.html). I know...right?
It’s worth noting that this is the first ever news report on the Muelker probe that’s sourced to members of Mueller’s team; such a tight ship it has been...until now.
It’s also worth noting that the report was prepared in such a way that each section had an executive summary that was carefully written so that it was ready for public consumption, ie pre-redacted. So all this delay by Barr is just to keep the truth from the public while letting his fake summary cement in the minds of potential jurors voters.
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The House Ways and Means Committee Chairman just demanded 6 years of Trump's tax returns from the IRS. He did so under a 1924 "committee access" law that was put in place after the infamous Teapot Dome scandal, where members of Harding's administration created giant conflicts of interest by refusing to divest their business interests. The request goes straight to the Treasure Secretary, and the law requires they cough up the goods, no questions asked.
However, the law is so rarely used that it has never faced a challenge in federal court. Expect that to change.
Apparently, the law has been used a number of times to obtain tax returns - including for the likes of Nixon, Ford and Rockefeller - and, notably, the IRS has never ever ever denied a demand under the law. Trump has said he won't allow his returns to be released, but the law doesn't require his approval, it requires only the written demand from the W&M Chairman (or the Senate Finance Chairman), which the IRS now has.
I don't know what the time frame is for their performance under the law. If they deny the request, I can see some IRS executives getting hauled in front of Congress, slapped with subpoenas and maybe even fines if they try and hold out. They have the returns, there's no process under which they are vetted or redacted, they just need to be copied and submitted.
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More news of the "du-uh" variety: White House Senior Advisor #1, who was given a security clearance over the strong objection of the people whose job it is to handle these things, is Jared Kushner. He was given the highest level of clearance by the stroke of Trump-appointee Carl Kline's pen, despite the career professionals denying such clearace because Kushner had had too many "significant disqualifying factors", including "foreign influence, private business interests and personal conduct". Ivanka was given clearance by Kline too...the same day.
At the risk of redundancy, it goes without saying that Trump, Kushner and Ivanka are all on record as saying that this never happened.
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Apparently, the law has been used a number of times to obtain tax returns - including for the likes of Nixon, Ford and Rockefeller - and, notably, the IRS has never ever ever denied a demand under the law. Trump has said he won't allow his returns to be released, but the law doesn't require his approval, it requires only the written demand from the W&M Chairman (or the Senate Finance Chairman), which the IRS now has.
I don't know what the time frame is for their performance under the law. If they deny the request, I can see some IRS executives getting hauled in front of Congress, slapped with subpoenas and maybe even fines if they try and hold out. They have the returns, there's no process under which they are vetted or redacted, they just need to be copied and submitted.
I not familiar with the exact statutes authorizing the ability to require the release of a President's taxes, but I was somewhat concerned about the reason I heard. Some guy on the committee stated that they needed them to see if the IRS was treating Trump properly, and to see if they are/were under audit. Previously, I had heard that the law allowed Congress to obtain the records, but it was more for the purpose to see if the President was violating the emoluments clause.
At any rate, while it is important to know that he is getting favorable treatment by the IRS, it is far more important to know if his policy decisions are leading to his personal financial gain.
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I not familiar with the exact statutes authorizing the ability to require the release of a President's taxes, but I was somewhat concerned about the reason I heard. Some guy on the committee stated that they needed them to see if the IRS was treating Trump properly, and to see if they are/were under audit. Previously, I had heard that the law allowed Congress to obtain the records, but it was more for the purpose to see if the President was violating the emoluments clause.
At any rate, while it is important to know that he is getting favorable treatment by the IRS, it is far more important to know if his policy decisions are leading to his personal financial gain.
I'm not sure that there is an need for an underlying reason to demand the returns but, in this case, there are multiple legitimate reasons from the the emoluments issue to the potential for influence by foreign investors. The question of whether there's an ongoing audit was a supplementary one, because Trump has claimed that he's under perpetual audit. Regardless, Trump has filed his all requested returns so, audit or no, they exist to be provided to Congress (which is why his claim about an audit preventing him releasing his returns during the campaign were always bullshit, see also Sanders, Bernie).
Chairman Neal gave the IRS a deadline of April 10. Legally, he cannot release them to the public; also legally, he can have them submitted to the full Congress and read into the record, after which they become available to the public.
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Chuck Grassley is feeling his oats/heading for retirement, because he's stepping out of the Trump channel a little these days. I.e. acknowledging reality.
He called Trump's claims that wind turbine noise gives you cancer "idiotic" and, today, said that he supports the release of the Mueller report. It's worth noting here that the House voted 420-0 to release the report publicly too. Trump's list of allies grows thin.
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I don't know if this is in additional to the nomination of the perpetually wrong, deadbeat dad, tax-defaulter and self-described unqualified person Stephen Moore, but Trump has also/instead nominated Herman Cain to the Fed board. Cain ran for president in 2012, where his bid fell apart amid credible accusations of sexual abuse, as well as him lifting his tax plan from a video game and using the lyrics of the Pokemon theme song in a debate answer.
#TheBestPeople
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Speaking of releasing taxes, for 2017, our effective federal income tax rate (total tax / total income) was 18.15%. Having just completed our 2018 tax return, I can now report that our effective federal income tax tax rate is 19.36%. That's a 6.667% increase in our tax rate. Thank Obama.
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Speaking of releasing taxes, for 2017, our effective federal income tax rate (total tax / total income) was 18.15%. Having just completed our 2018 tax return, I can now report that our effective federal income tax tax rate is 19.36%. That's a 6.667% increase in our tax rate. Thank Obama.
Perhaps you need a new CPA. I have a card...
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Perhaps you need a new CPA. I have a card...
Nope. She does a great job. There's no getting around the cut in the property tax allowance, which completely fucked our gross-to-taxable income ratio.
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The Mueller team, that was such a tight ship for so long, sprang a leak yesterday which has turned into a torrent. The latest reporting, sourced to the Mueller team, is that there was no finding of any
criminal conspiracy for collusion, because the Trump campaign was actually being manipulated by a sophisticated Russian intelligence operation. So, even if they thought they were being clever - hence all the lying about the contacts with Russians - they were simply being duped. It's an interesting twist, yet makes complete sense, that they were too dumb to commit the crime they thought they might have committed.
Oh, and as to those Russian contacts, the full Mueller report has detailed files.
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Apparently, DOJ said today that every page of the Mueller report has information which must be redacted. It's a cover up, or the DOJ version of obstruction of justice.
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Apparently, DOJ said today that every page of the Mueller report has information which must be redacted. It's a cover up, or the DOJ version of obstruction of justice.
The DOJ said that every page had a alert that it may contain confidential Grand Jury materials. Washington Post reports claim that the lead for each section was written in such a way as to avoid disclosing any sensitive information - Grand Jury or otherwise - with the intent that they could be lifted and released to the public as is. That doesn't mean, though, that there wasn't a stamp, header, footer or watermark with the Grand Jury caution on those pages too.
Of course, the DOJ has a couple of options here:
(1) it could review those section leads first, and clear them for public release; or
(b) like it did with the Watergate Special Prosecutor's report, get a court order allowing the release of the Grand Jury materials to Congress. The DOJ did this immediately upon receipt of the Watergate report and Barr could have and can get this done very quickly at any time he chooses.
He has chosen not to do either of these things, which makes it disingenuous to use the Grand Jury materials as a defense for not releasing the report to anyone.
The fact that Mueller's team handed the report to Barr on a plate, since which time Barr has acted to obfuscate its core findings and is working to render the entire thing dead by redaction, appears to be what's sparking the heretofore unthinkable leaks. They didn't do all this work for 2 years for Barr to deep six it.
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The DOJ said that every page had a alert that it may contain confidential Grand Jury materials. Washington Post reports claim that the lead for each section was written in such a way as to avoid disclosing any sensitive information - Grand Jury or otherwise - with the intent that they could be lifted and released to the public as is. That doesn't mean, though, that there wasn't a stamp, header, footer or watermark with the Grand Jury caution on those pages too.
Of course, the DOJ has a couple of options here:
(1) it could review those section leads first, and clear them for public release; or
(b) like it did with the Watergate Special Prosecutor's report, get a court order allowing the release of the Grand Jury materials to Congress. The DOJ did this immediately upon receipt of the Watergate report and Barr could have and can get this done very quickly at any time he chooses.
He has chosen not to do either of these things, which makes it disingenuous to use the Grand Jury materials as a defense for not releasing the report to anyone.
The fact that Mueller's team handed the report to Barr on a plate, since which time Barr has acted to obfuscate its core findings and is working to render the entire thing dead by redaction, appears to be what's sparking the heretofore unthinkable leaks. They didn't do all this work for 2 years for Barr to deep six it.
There's also a difference between releasing the report to the public versus congress. There's absolutely no justification to provide congress with any redacted materials.
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There's also a difference between releasing the report to the public versus congress. There's absolutely no justification to provide congress with any redacted materials.
Well, except that they're (probably rightfully) concerned that it will leak from Congress.
I'm not sure how I feel about all of this. I understand the concern about revealing methods and sources. And I also understand the concern about disparaging material about individuals appearing without giving them a chance to rebut. But this is serious shit, and these guys work for us, and we have a right (and a need) to understand just how complicit and corrupt the various parties are (or are not, as the case may be).
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Well, except that they're (probably rightfully) concerned that it will leak from Congress.
Even with a court order to allow the release of Grand Jury materials to Congress, they would still be barred from letting it go further.
I'm not sure how I feel about all of this. I understand the concern about revealing methods and sources. And I also understand the concern about disparaging material about individuals appearing without giving them a chance to rebut. But this is serious shit, and these guys work for us, and we have a right (and a need) to understand just how complicit and corrupt the various parties are (or are not, as the case may be).
This is the bit that often gets forgotten, and appears to be being completely ignored by the administration. I mean, their job is right there in that word "administration". We paid for the report, it was done on our behalf. So, subject to necessary intel and Grand Jury redactions, we should see it.
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DHS Sec. Nielsen showed up to a 5pm, Sunday night meeting with Trump with a resignation letter in hand. Reportedly, Trump has become more and more unhinged about the fact that asylum-seekers show up at the southern border seeking, you know, asylum, and Nielsen has failed to stop them from doing this act with is both legal under US and international law. So she quit/was fired and Trump tweeted it out before she could release her letter publicly. No sympathy here; she belongs in jail (don't forget that the very white, very blond, blue-eyed Kirsjen Nielsen once tried to argue that she didn't realize that Norway was over 90% white while defending Trump's "shithole countries" nonsense.
As we have come to realize with Trump now, there is no celebration at her demise (she'll get a lucrative job in the private sector somewhere, even after this shit-show), the concern should be who comes next. He usually picks someone worse. In this case, he's supposedly going to nominate Kevin McAleenan, the current Commissioner of the CBP and about whom we know very little at this time.
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He usually picks someone worse. In this case, he's supposedly going to nominate Kevin McAleenan, the current Commissioner of the CBP and about whom we know very little at this time.
Maybe Cruella De Vil couldn't obtain the necessary security clearance.
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Maybe Cruella De Vil couldn't obtain the necessary security clearance.
President Trump, some of these people on your list for positions are dead...
THEN CROSS THEM OFF THE LIST!
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Maybe Cruella De Vil couldn't obtain the necessary security clearance.
She’s already running the Dept. of Education (https://youtu.be/Bca9d5A-Y_U).
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Now that Nielsen is out - her resignation was effective immediately - we have a Department of Homeland Security without a Senate-confirmed secretary. According to the DHS leadership page, there will also be no Senate-confirmed deputy secretary, no Senate-confirmed Secret Service director (Trump fired him too), no Senate-confirmed FEMA chief, no Senate-confirmed head of ICE, and no Senate-confirmed DHS inspector general.
Meanwhile, the woman who breached the wet paper towel of security at Mar-a-Lago recently turned out to have a ton of proper spy kit in her hotel room, including a signal detector capable of detecting hidden cameras.
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He also canned the head of the Secret Service. Don't know if it was for not catching her, or catching her.
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He also canned the head of the Secret Service. Don't know if it was for not catching her, or catching her.
Apparently, he used to call him”Dumbo” because of his ears.
Smart move to insult the guy in charge of those who will stand between you and bullets.
Trump is not the worst person in the world, but he would be if it wasn’t for our pesky laws.
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Barr is testifying to Congress this morning, which should be interesting. In his opening statement, he said that the Mueller report will be available to the public next week, with color-coded redactions so that we can know what type of information we're not being allowed to see. I expect the thing with be a 400-page Rothko painting.
I understand and accept that reports like this need to be redacted. The chicken-and-egg problem with redactions is that, when you can't see what you can't see you have no way to know if the redactions are appropriate. For that you have to trust the redactor, and in this case I really, truly don't. This is why Congress needs to see the full, unredacted report; that's how oversight by a co-equal branch of government works. They can then decide if the redactions are appropriate, but they also have the responsibility of acting on what's in the report if it implicates the president.
After all, the reason the DOJ won't indict a sitting president is because that's Congress' job through the impeachment process. The DOJ can't say that it can't do anything and then withhold from the body that it says has that duty the information with which to perform that duty. Today Barr has already reaffirmed that Congress doesn't get the full report, which I'm sure will spark some lively questions*.
* Dear God please ask some questions; don't testify from the committee platform and then run out of time! Can they give everyone remedial question-asking classes - hosted by AOC? Thank you.
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First question should be: Why haven't you gone to the judge in order to release the grand jury testimony to Congress? Next one: Where did you get the ridiculous category of harming third parties from?
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First question should be: Why haven't you gone to the judge in order to release the grand jury testimony to Congress? Next one: Where did you get the ridiculous category of harming third parties from?
First questions appear to be about the ACA and the decision not to defend it. Barr says that it doesn't matter because the administration's position is so outlandish that they can't win. WT fucking F? Yes, and an OWA softball team has no prayer of beating the Yankees, but we would (probably) if they didn't show up!
Also, re the line of questioning, I get it. Barr is on the clock to release the full Mueller report to Congress and, failing to do so, faces a subpoena. No need to waste valuable questioning minutes to litigate that issue right now.
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Oh, someone did ask Barr if the White House had seen the report, and he refused flat out to answer that question. (1) so that's a yes, and (b) how does he get away with not answering that question?
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First question should be: Why haven't you gone to the judge in order to release the grand jury testimony to Congress? Next one: Where did you get the ridiculous category of harming third parties from?
He was asked this specifically, to which his answer was (paraphrasing) “Nuts!”
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Here is Trump's (small) hand-picked stooge to be the IRS commissioner (https://twitter.com/cspan/status/1115716726979735552?utm_source=hive&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=hive_email_id_30000&h_sid=5ecc613150-5ad6404d532dfadfa1a76cdd), physically shaking while under very polite, very simple questions from Congress as to why he isn't complying with the order to cough up Trump's tax returns.
I really cannot get my head around as to why, after 2 years of anyone coming within Trump's orbit getting savaged and, at best, leaving with their reputation in tatters, anyone chooses to take these posts. Jumping in now just heightens the chance that you'll end up in jail. Like this guy, quivering in his seat because discussing the order to release the tax returns with the White House - which you know has absolutely happened multiple times already - is a crime punishable by up to 5 years with Manafort.
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In an ironic twist, in order to obtain the full, unredacted Mueller report, Congress may have to open impeachment proceedings (https://youtu.be/eVF4kebiks4) in order to establish its legal claim to the document.
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They're not going to do that. The democrats have shown themselves to be cowards. Most recent evidence: I haven't seen a clip of any of them tell Bob Barr that he is a motherfucking partisan hack (or in more polite public terms) who every step of the way has chosen a path most likely to obstruct the people of America (or the Representatives) from seeing the truth. He is such a transparent partisan, and the Dems treat him like he some public servant deserving respect.
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They're not going to do that. The democrats have shown themselves to be cowards. Most recent evidence: I haven't seen a clip of any of them tell Bob Barr that he is a motherfucking partisan hack (or in more polite public terms) who every step of the way has chosen a path most likely to obstruct the people of America (or the Representatives) from seeing the truth. He is such a transparent partisan, and the Dems treat him like he some public servant deserving respect.
To be fair, he only really let his MAGA flag fly today, with the spying nonsense and an impromptu "build the wall" chant. This evening, Pelosi said that he's supposed to be the AG for the USA, not the AG for Trump. At least there's no longer a veil of respectability about the man or the work he is doing. That will make him easier to deal with, as he doesn't seem to grasp the fact that he won't be the AG forever and Trump won't be president forever.
He's a lot more like Giuliani than we could ever have expected.
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Yeah, but do you guys hear about Obama giving 87 bigillion dollars to Iran and then ordering pizzagate on uber eats using Seth Rich’s phone?
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Assange arrested in the UK, “on behalf of the United States.”
Cat, meet pigeons.
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I just saw the little clip of him being evicted from his safe room. I guess he's going for the "I'm so far gone, give me sympathy" defense.
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I just saw the little clip of him being evicted from his safe room. I guess he's going for the "I'm so far gone, give me sympathy" defense.
Yeah, ask Manafort how that goes.
Meanwhile, the EDVA has unsealed indictments of Assange for his involvement in the hacking element of the Chelsea Manning case. Notably, he is not being charged with anything related to the dissemination of the hacked materials, which should calm concerns about 1st amendment rights. Of course, while he's here, they may as well go ahead and discuss another hacking operation in which he was allegedly involved...
Oh, and Sweden isn't done on the rape allegations either, quite rightly. Maybe we'll play Rök Pypr Sîßőŗŝ for him.
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Hopefully he'll hit Sîßőŗŝ first because did you see that beard?
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Hopefully he'll hit Sîßőŗŝ first because did you see that beard?
He's going to play himself off as Steven Avery and try to get Kathleen Zellner to spring him from jail.
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Meanwhile Trump's sister retired from her (inactive) position (https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/10/us/maryanne-trump-barry-misconduct-inquiry.html) as a federal appellate judge amid evidence she participated in a tax fraud scheme with her siblings (including DJT).
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People like Mr Happy actually think Trump is draining the swamp. It’s hard to imagine how fucking stupid/brainwashed you have to be to think DONALD TRUMP is draining the swamp. Morons.
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Meanwhile Trump's sister retired from her (inactive) position (https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/10/us/maryanne-trump-barry-misconduct-inquiry.html) as a federal appellate judge amid evidence she participated in a tax fraud scheme with her siblings (including DJT).
SDNY is still looking at all this. In the words of Agent Smith: "She's not out yet."
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From the Washington Post (https://www.washingtonpost.com/immigration/white-house-proposed-releasing-immigrant-detainees-in-sanctuary-cities-targeting-political-foes/2019/04/11/72839bc8-5c68-11e9-9625-01d48d50ef75_story.html?noredirect=on&utm_term=.8b00e059ffc7):
White House officials have tried to pressure U.S. immigration authorities to release detainees onto the streets of “sanctuary cities” to retaliate against President Trump’s political adversaries, according to Department of Homeland Security officials and email messages reviewed by The Washington Post.
There's so many abhorrent elements to this. They are pushing to use asylum-seekers as human pawns in their evil game. They are pushing to inflict what they believe is a wave of drugs, crime and rape (plus maybe some good people) onto cities they consider to be their political enemies. They really do believe that these asylum-seekers are some form of brown crime bomb that they can drop on their enemies. They believe that elements of the US population are their enemies.
The more I think about this, the more my head explodes, like a firework display finale that just keeps getting bigger.
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As everyone heard, or at least surmised, when asked "Do you still love Wikileaks," the pathological liar now says he knows nothing about Wikileaks, it's not his thing. No big deal; it's to be expected. Now the press is asking Republicans about Trump's love of Wikileaks and they defer, saying "you need to ask him."
Instead, the press should be pressuring Republicans about why Assange's extradition is being sought for his role with Manning, but apparently not in his role as a Russian cutout in the 2016 election. We know Trump doesn't want him charged with that, but the Republicans should also have to be on record about this.
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From the Washington Post (https://www.washingtonpost.com/immigration/white-house-proposed-releasing-immigrant-detainees-in-sanctuary-cities-targeting-political-foes/2019/04/11/72839bc8-5c68-11e9-9625-01d48d50ef75_story.html?noredirect=on&utm_term=.8b00e059ffc7):
There's so many abhorrent elements to this. They are pushing to use asylum-seekers as human pawns in their evil game. They are pushing to inflict what they believe is a wave of drugs, crime and rape (plus maybe some good people) onto cities they consider to be their political enemies. They really do believe that these asylum-seekers are some form of brown crime bomb that they can drop on their enemies. They believe that elements of the US population are their enemies.
The more I think about this, the more my head explodes, like a firework display finale that just keeps getting bigger.
I get what you are saying Limey and it's shameful to make these migrants pawns in a political game but on the flip side, If I had just risked my life traveling from Central America through Mexico to migrate to the US, I might prefer a city that welcomed me over a hostile one.
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I did want to add that I hope the irony is not lost of Mr. Assange: his work in helping to elect Trump eventually might lead to his own extradition. Obama was hesitant to pursue his extradition over the Manning deal, and Clinton might have been the same. However, Trump's group wants to go after leaks and has chosen to pursue Assange on the charge that he helped Manning steal the secrets and not on the charge that he disseminated the secrets.
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I get what you are saying Limey and it's shameful to make these migrants pawns in a political game but on the flip side, If I had just risked my life traveling from Central America through Mexico to migrate to the US, I might prefer a city that welcomed me over a hostile one.
That's the most amazing thing to me. Unless they are combing through the population of migrant families to find the rare particularly vicious sort to inflict upon random people who happen to live in places that Trump perceives to be his political enemies, the reaction should be "so what?" Houston has one of the largest populations of refugees in the country. The more the merrier.
But Trump and his cronies' motives are so fucked up.
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But Trump and his cronies' motives are so fucked up.
That’s the point. It’s not necessarily what they’re doing, it’s why they’re doing it. And, just to remove all doubt, Trump crowed on Twitter that this is exactly what he wants to do.
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I get what you are saying Limey and it's shameful to make these migrants pawns in a political game but on the flip side, If I had just risked my life traveling from Central America through Mexico to migrate to the US, I might prefer a city that welcomed me over a hostile one.
I think they should send them to the same cities their kids are in. Oh wait, they don't know where their kids are.
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Trump told CBP head he'd pardon him if he were sent to jail for violating immigration law (https://amp.cnn.com/cnn/2019/04/12/politics/trump-cbp-commissioner-pardon/index.html)
Just another obviously impeachable abuse of power.
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Trump told CBP head he'd pardon him if he were sent to jail for violating immigration law (https://amp.cnn.com/cnn/2019/04/12/politics/trump-cbp-commissioner-pardon/index.html)
Just another obviously impeachable abuse of power.
A new one every day; like an evil, four-year advent calendar.
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A new one every day; like an evil, four-year advent calendar.
Here's an [https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1116811681462616065.html]unrolled tweet thread[/url] from David Rothkopf summarizing the most recent disgraces.
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yet shit stains like Mr Happy cheer him on Sad!
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The White House is preparing a 200-page rebuttal to the report it hasn’t seen that “totally exonerates” Trump.
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Will Barr release a two page summary?
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Given that the Mueller report - looking like it had been left on an elementary school desk next to a full pack of magic markers, no doubt - may be released this week, let's have a little fun with one of the sentence fragments that Barr chose to include in his not at all a summary (some 4 weeks ago now). Here it is:
[T]he investigation did not establish that members of the Trump Campaign conspired or coordinated with the Russian government in its election interference activities.
The import part here is the "[T]" at the start, which means that there was a word or words ahead of this phrase. So, what do you think precedes this phrase?
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"Because we cannot clearly establish that members of the Trump Campaign knew that Wikileaks was an arm of the Russian government,"
or
"Though they clearly were receptive to Russian assistance to their ccampaign and did not report Russian interference to the FBI,"
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Due almost entirely to the Trump campaign's staggering incompetence at even basic tasks...
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Mueller report to be dumped on Thursday - I’m assuming late in the day - on the long Easter weekend and right ahead of one of Congress’ longest recesses. Reports claim that the White House has at least been briefed on the report and is concerned about what’s in it.
#Transparency
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I like Trump's tweet advising the Paris authorities that they "Must act quickly!" to put out the horrible fire at Notre Dame.
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That tweet was after offering this sage advice:
but if I were Boeing, I would FIX the Boeing 737 MAX, add some additional great features, & REBRAND the plane with a new name.
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President Trump really capturing the tragedy of the fire at Notre Dame:
"Renovations - what's that all about?"
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President Trump really capturing the tragedy of the fire at Notre Dame:
"Renovations - what's that all about?"
No one should ever look to him for reassuring comments.
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Now he is going to award Tiger the Presidential Medal of Freedom for his Masters victory. The guy is fucking insane. I like Tiger, and it was great seeing that yesterday, but come on. I bet he heard that Obama congratulated or talked with Tiger, so Trump, being a blustery asshole who has to one-up Obama, decided he had to do something, and of course it follows that he would award the Medal of Freedom for winning a golf tournament.
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Never mind, I see that this is relatively common, even though there appears to be a big mismatch between the name of the award and the achievements by many who receive it.
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Now he is going to award Tiger the Presidential Medal of Freedom for his Masters victory. The guy is fucking insane. I like Tiger, and it was great seeing that yesterday, but come on. I bet he heard that Obama congratulated or talked with Tiger, so Trump, being a blustery asshole who has to one-up Obama, decided he had to do something, and of course it follows that he would award the Medal of Freedom for winning a golf tournament.
It’s not for a particular event, but a body of work. I have no problem with Tiger getting it. Many athletes have, and it’s hard to argue that Tiger is not if one the most famous and notable athletes of the 21st century.
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No one should ever look to him for reassuring comments.
I’m willing to give him the benefit of the doubt that his sentiments are genuine. But he just needs to shut the fuck up.
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President Trump really capturing the tragedy of the fire at Notre Dame:
"Renovations - what's that all about?"
He's flying to Indiana to survey the site.
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It’s not for a particular event, but a body of work. I have no problem with Tiger getting it. Many athletes have, and it’s hard to argue that Tiger is not if one the most famous and notable athletes of the 21st century.
I'm sure that part of it is about the golf, but I'll bet part of it is also about the blondes.
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He's flying to Indiana to survey the site.
Bravo
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I'm sure that part of it is about the golf, but I'll bet part of it is also about the blondes.
...and the porn stars.
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He's flying to Indiana to survey the site.
He referred to Notre Dame as a “museum”. Seriously. He thinks it’s the Louvre.
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He referred to Notre Dame as a “museum”. Seriously. He thinks it’s the Louvre.
Ok, need a citation on that one.
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Ok, need a citation on that one.
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not exactly a museum, but he really didn't seem to know what he was talking about. This interview prompted my response earlier. (https://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2019/04/15/trump_on_notre_dame_one_of_the_greatest_treasures_in_the_world_is_burning_to_the_ground.html)
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not exactly a museum, but he really didn't seem to know what he was talking about. This interview prompted my response earlier. (https://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2019/04/15/trump_on_notre_dame_one_of_the_greatest_treasures_in_the_world_is_burning_to_the_ground.html)
This terrible [checks notes] fire at the... [checks notes] Notre Dame cathedral...
He didn't call it a museum, but he likened it to a museum, which is weird. He's from New York, liken it to St. Patrick's!
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"Renovations - what's that all about?"
I thought this was a joke until the last link posted in the thread.
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Meanwhile, Bernie went on Fox News last night and ended up getting applauded off stage by the in-studio audience, following a relatively rousing - for a theoretically partisan crowd - call-and-response (https://twitter.com/i/status/1117948862319276035) series of questions during his summation. Just another reminder that the Republican strategy of labeling everything since (at least) the advent of Medicare as "socialism" has become background noise. It didn't work against Obama, it didn't work in 2018 and here is a self-proclaimed democratic socialist getting a Fox News crowd to agree vociferously with his platform pillars.
At the same time, according to a poll published in The Hill, only 1 in 5 Americans saw lower taxes in 2018 than 2017. About a third (including me) saw their taxes go up, about a third saw no change and about 14% didn't notice one way or the other. That should see "you can keep your doctor" levels of backlash coming. The working poor - who put Trump over the top - are the ones being hurt the most by Trump's fake-populism. The trick for the Democrats will be to make sure that the country focuses on the true culprits, and is not divided against each other as we were in 2016.
More Bernie highlights (https://youtu.be/hFkQMEAXY0Y).
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A few months ago, the Senate removed sanctions on a Russian oligarch in a somewhat eyebrow-raising move. Yesterday, that oligarch's company announced it's building a $200 million aluminum mill in McConnell's home state of Kentucky.
USA! USA! USA!
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I thought this was a joke until the last link posted in the thread.
When you have to fake empathy, you can come off sounding like a boob.
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Meanwhile, Bernie went on Fox News last night and ended up getting applauded off stage by the in-studio audience, following a relatively rousing - for a theoretically partisan crowd - call-and-response (https://twitter.com/i/status/1117948862319276035) series of questions during his summation. Just another reminder that the Republican strategy of labeling everything since (at least) the advent of Medicare as "socialism" has become background noise. It didn't work against Obama, it didn't work in 2018 and here is a self-proclaimed democratic socialist getting a Fox News crowd to agree vociferously with his platform pillars.
I've just seen snippets, but was this really a "Fox News crowd" or was it just a Bernie crowd in a town hall covered by Fox?
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I've just seen snippets, but was this really a "Fox News crowd" or was it just a Bernie crowd in a town hall covered by Fox?
It was a town hall organized and hosted by Fox News. There may have been Bernie plants, but Fox set it up.
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I've just seen snippets, but was this really a "Fox News crowd" or was it just a Bernie crowd in a town hall covered by Fox?
As HH said, it was a Fox event. No idea who controlled the crowd, but I doubt Fox would have allowed Bernie's folks to stack the audience. It's just a fundamental truth that people love social programs, especially if it helps get your kid out of the basement and stops your mother-in-law taking their place.
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I guess, but I view it the same way I would a debate run by Fox News: who's covering it and asking the questions is completely independent of who can get a ticket to attend. In other words, I am not as sold that the Fox News crowd loves Bernie and his ideas.
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The town hall was in Bethlehem Pa. Take the event to Kentucky and you'll get a different take I bet.
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The town hall was in Bethlehem Pa. Take the event to Kentucky and you'll get a different take I bet.
Even less collective teeth in the audience?
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Even less collective teeth in the audience?
They're all related. Even Ned who is his own grandpa.
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The town hall was in Bethlehem Pa. Take the event to Kentucky and you'll get a different take I bet.
Nevertheless, it's not very on-message for Fox News. They wouldn't have run with it if they didn't think the crowd would be sympathetic to their values.
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Nevertheless, it's not very on-message for Fox News. They wouldn't have run with it if they didn't think the crowd would be sympathetic to their values.
I saw a great clip where the hosts tried to nail Bernie for benefiting from the tax cut. “I voted against it,” he said. When they said that, yeah, but, you still benefited, he just repeated the same response but slower.
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I saw a great clip where the hosts tried to nail Bernie for benefiting from the tax cut. “I voted against it,” he said. When they said that, yeah, but, you still benefited, he just repeated the same response but slower.
Laugh all you want but one of those guys will end up being the Secretary of Treasury if he's not tall enough to be the Fed Chair.
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So, the piece of crap Barr (and Rosenstein) plans to hold a press conference tomorrow morning, presumably before the redacted "report" is issued or certainly before people could digest it. This guy has no pretension about being America's lawyer; it's transparent that he only cares about Trump. All his actions amount to getting up close to America and laughing in her face.
The press, being stupid and compliant, will attend this nonsensical press conference, digest his narrative-setting spin and run with it. So instead of letting the public/press read the redacted "report" and proceed accordingly, the press will spend all day reacting to some bullshit spin laid out by Barr.
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So, the piece of crap Barr (and Rosenstein) plans to hold a press conference tomorrow morning, presumably before the redacted "report" is issued or certainly before people could digest it. This guy has no pretension about being America's lawyer; it's transparent that he only cares about Trump. All his actions amount to getting up close to America and laughing in her face.
The press, being stupid and compliant, will attend this nonsensical press conference, digest his narrative-setting spin and run with it. So instead of letting the public/press read the redacted "report" and proceed accordingly, the press will spend all day reacting to some bullshit spin laid out by Barr.
He knows his audience.
What’s really going to chap your ass is when they give air time to Kellyanne.
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Well Barr's presser was a giant nothingburger. Speaking of "giant nothingburgers", who's willing to bet that the "peripheral characters" - who had damaging information about them redacted from the Mueller report - don't include Jr and Jared?
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I refused to watch this propaganda piece, but from reporting, it seems that the theory is similar to what I suspected: Roger Stone/Trump Campaign can't be charged with conspiracy because they and Wikileaks were not part of the GRU hacking. I suppose this interpretation might deter a prosecutor for a criminal case, but the facts scream out what we knew all along: Trump's campaign colluded with the Russians. They knew the Russians were behind the hack and coordinated with the Russians through Wikileaks in using the illegal goods to their advantage.
Whether someone is happy or unhappy with the terms collusion, coordination, conspiracy or whatever, everyone knows that Trump was in bed with the Russians in an effort to affect/steal the election. There's no need to be distracted by the legal niceties.
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I refused to watch this propaganda piece, but from reporting, it seems that the theory is similar to what I suspected: Roger Stone/Trump Campaign can't be charged with conspiracy because they and Wikileaks were not part of the GRU hacking. I suppose this interpretation might deter a prosecutor for a criminal case, but the facts scream out what we knew all along: Trump's campaign colluded with the Russians. They knew the Russians were behind the hack and coordinated with the Russians through Wikileaks in using the illegal goods to their advantage.
Whether someone is happy or unhappy with the terms collusion, coordination, conspiracy or whatever, everyone knows that Trump was in bed with the Russians in an effort to affect/steal the election. There's no need to be distracted by the legal niceties.
It's the cyber element of the crime that seems to be obscuring everything. This is exactly the same crime as Watergate, but instead of a bunch of heavy-shoed doofii breaking into the Democrats' office, a bunch of quick-fingered Russian hackers broke into Democrats' servers. Anyone thereafter utilizing the product of that theft, knowing it to be stolen property, is committing a crime. And if you want more Watergate analogies, Trump fired his was through DOJ and FBI executives until he got his people in the places he needed them to be.
The difference here is the frog-boiling effect of Trump doing everything out in the open - mostly on Twitter - so when we hear about his crimes, they don't sound so criminal. If we'd heard him ask Russia to hack Clinton's emails on a scratchy tape - instead of it being run a couple of times an hour on the TV accompanied by the knowing eye-rolls of the grinning heads - then I think the public reaction would not have been so "meh".
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House Democrats were so taken by Barr's "pity the
foo president" narrative*, that they have asked for Mueller to testify on or before May 23rd.
* Yeah, Barr stated that Trump wasn't obstructing justice, he was just frustrated because he thought the investigation was hindering his presidency. Voyager 2 is beyond the heliosphere and can still smell that bullshit.
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Their entire claim to "innocence" rests on not exceeding this bar as laid out in Mueller's report:
We understood coordination to require an agreement-tacit or express-between the Trump Campaign and Russian government on election interference. That requires more than the two parties taking actions that were informed by or responsive to the other's actions or interests. We applied the term coordination in that sense when stating in the report that the investigation did not establish that the Trump Campaign coordinated with the Russian government in its election interference activities.
A pretty high bar, and it's clearly implied that the two parties taking actions that were informed by or responsive to the other's actions or interests. The bolded part is a common understanding of collusion.
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The full context of Barr's "[T]he investigation did not establish that members of the Trump Campaign conspired or coordinated with the Russian government in its election interference activities."
Is:
"Although the investigation established that the Russian government perceived it would benefit from a Trump presidency and worked to secure that outcome, and that the Campaign expected it would benefit electorally from information stolen and released through Russian efforts, the investigation did not establish that members of the Trump Campaign conspired or coordinated with the Russian government in its election interference activities."
So to Reverse Barr it:
"[T]he investigation established that the Russian government perceived it would benefit from a Trump presidency and worked to secure that outcome, and that the Campaign expected it would benefit electorally from information stolen and released through Russian efforts."
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The full context of Barr's "[T]he investigation did not establish that members of the Trump Campaign conspired or coordinated with the Russian government in its election interference activities."
Is:
"Although the investigation established that the Russian government perceived it would benefit from a Trump presidency and worked to secure that outcome, and that the Campaign expected it would benefit electorally from information stolen and released through Russian efforts, the investigation did not establish that members of the Trump Campaign conspired or coordinated with the Russian government in its election interference activities."
So to Reverse Barr it:
"[T]he investigation established that the Russian government perceived it would benefit from a Trump presidency and worked to secure that outcome, and that the Campaign expected it would benefit electorally from information stolen and released through Russian efforts."
NO COLLUSION! NO OBSTRUCTION!
Just corrupt as fuck, that's all.
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NO COLLUSION! NO OBSTRUCTION!
Just corrupt as fuck, that's all.
Sounds about right to me.
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Trump does have the mob boss mentality, so it does seem that he deliberately kept Junior and Jared at arms length so that he could plausibly say he didn't know. He's an idiot in so. many. ways, but one doesn't get to where he is in life without knowing how not to get arrested.
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Trump does have the mob boss mentality, so it does seem that he deliberately kept Junior and Jared at arms length so that he could plausibly say he didn't know. He's an idiot in so. many. ways, but one doesn't get to where he is in life without knowing how not to get arrested.
In some sense I agree, but I think they said that there are 14 offshoot investigations from Mueller, only 2 of which we know about (Cohen and Craig). So, it's not implausible that should he not be president soon, 1 of those 12 investigations might lead to his arrest. Hell, I suppose the Cohen campaign finance case could lead to his arrest.
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I haven’t read the report. Some things I’ve seen reported jump out at me:
The “I’m fucked” quote is fun, but the whole utterance is in the report to show that Trump knew he had done wrong and, by saying it's “the end of my presidency”, was establishing his motive to obstruct. That charge requires prosecutors to establish the intent behind the obstruction, and Mueller included that episode to do exactly that.
In footnote 1991 on p390, Mueller posits that Trump could be prosecuted criminally even after impeachment. The latter being the process to remove him from office and thus not barring (Ha!) criminal charges thereafter. Mueller was prevented from bringing charges against Trump himself, but he seems, here, to be calling for law enforcement to take off and nuke Trump from orbit.
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Trump is claiming that the report - that two weeks ago he was happy for everyone to see because it exonerated him totally - is now "bullshit" made up by "19 angry democrats".
The press is picking at the wrong scab, spending time on the fact that it's now proven that Sarah Sanders lied to them. How could she?!!
Meanwhile, Nadler has subpoenaed the full, unredacted report with all the underlying documentation. I can see both sides of the impeach/don't impeach argument as it is likely to die in the Senate (or worse...acquittal) so why spend the political capital on the effort? At the end of the day though, witness testimony in open session - as we have seen here with the likes of Cohen, but going back to John Dean during Watergate - can be a very powerful way to get the truth pushed into people's brains. The argument that impeachment would die in the Senate didn't stop Democrats from passing any number of bills already this session, all of which died in the Senate. Also, it's the right thing to do for now - do we want an ever-more lawless president in the job for another 2 years - and it's the right thing to do for historical precedent.
The only real difference I see is that McConnell will only take up House bills that he knows will fail in the Senate, and he doesn't always bother even to do that. Should the House vote to send Trump to the Senate for a trial, McConnell is under no time constraints as to when that would take place. He likely wouldn't get it until early 2020 at which time election campaigns for president - and for a number of his Republican colleagues - will be in full swing. If he thinks he can get an easy acquittal, he'll try and jam in through. But after all the public testimony from the House proceedings, he may have more than a few Republican senators - up for re-election - who don't want to have to explain their vote to acquit to the voters in their state.
I think the press are going to peel away more and more of the black bars (what happened to the color-coding?) as time goes on, and I doubt any of them will have good news for Trump underneath. Whatever the high point (or least low point) of Trump's presidency was, it is not going to be topped from here on out. It will be an inexorable slide down into deeper disgrace. His base may hold, but 54% of the country already say they will not vote for Trump in 2020 and that number too is only going to get worse for Trump.
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The House should impeach the motherfucker, simply to convey for history that these actions aren’t acceptable in our democracy. They won’t though, they’re too worried about the tribal idiots, and the honest but exhausted decent citizens. The second group should buck up.
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It's the cyber element of the crime that seems to be obscuring everything. This is exactly the same crime as Watergate, but instead of a bunch of heavy-shoed doofii breaking into the Democrats' office, a bunch of quick-fingered Russian hackers broke into Democrats' servers. Anyone thereafter utilizing the product of that theft, knowing it to be stolen property, is committing a crime. And if you want more Watergate analogies, Trump fired his was through DOJ and FBI executives until he got his people in the places he needed them to be.
The difference here is the frog-boiling effect of Trump doing everything out in the open - mostly on Twitter - so when we hear about his crimes, they don't sound so criminal. If we'd heard him ask Russia to hack Clinton's emails on a scratchy tape - instead of it being run a couple of times an hour on the TV accompanied by the knowing eye-rolls of the grinning heads - then I think the public reaction would not have been so "meh".
When John Oliver called this whole sorry affair "Stupid Watergate" I don't think he knew how right he was.
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The House should impeach the motherfucker, simply to convey for history that these actions aren’t acceptable in our democracy.
People who should know keep telling me how smart and how tactical Pelosi is but I keep watching her refuse to embrace an obvious responsibility and when she isn't doing that she's busy being dismissive of a bold, strong, new generation of women leaders.
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People who should know keep telling me how smart and how tactical Pelosi is but I keep watching her refuse to embrace an obvious responsibility and when she isn't doing that she's busy being dismissive of a bold, strong, new generation of women leaders.
Our Congress has been broken for quite some time, I guess since the Gingrich "revolution".
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People who should know keep telling me how smart and how tactical Pelosi is but I keep watching her refuse to embrace an obvious responsibility and when she isn't doing that she's busy being dismissive of a bold, strong, new generation of women leaders.
They are so bold.
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People who should know keep telling me how smart and how tactical Pelosi is but I keep watching her refuse to embrace an obvious responsibility and when she isn't doing that she's busy being dismissive of a bold, strong, new generation of women leaders.
Harry Reid grasped the Obamacare nettle when he knew it would be the end of his political career. He steered it through the Senate fully aware that the good citizens of Nevada would through him out of office as a result. He did it all regardless of the personal cost. Then he went and won re-election.
Pelosi is gaming this out on old political algorithms that don’t apply now.
IMPEACH!
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They are so bold.
Next time I want the opinion of a 4chan level misogynist fuckwit I'll be sure to ask yours.
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Next time I want the opinion of a 4chan level misogynist fuckwit I'll be sure to ask yours.
What?!?!? They are bold. They are strong and bold human people. AOC and Omar are the future. So go fuck your delusional self you paranoid humorless dumbshit..
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What?!?!? They are bold. They are strong and bold human people. AOC and Omar are the future. So go fuck your delusional self you paranoid humorless dumbshit..
Ok, ok. I thought you were doing your usual routine. My apologies.
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Ok, ok. I thought you were doing your usual routine. My apologies.
No worries, You can never tell for sure. So with that in mind your response was almost warranted.
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Ok, ok. I thought you were doing your usual routine. My apologies.
Huh, and yet you were doing yours regardless.
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I try not to break character.
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I try not to break character.
I've always admired how you simulate such a virtually cool poker face.
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I try not to break character.
How can you improve on perfection?
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How can you improve on perfection?
Be more perfecter, duh.
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How can you improve on perfection?
Ask Harvey Haddix.
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Ask Harvey Haddix.
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Didn't make it that far, Harvey Korman told me to go fuck myself.
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There is no need to wait for an unredacted report... The House only needs to have 1 hearing. Ask Mueller, Don McGahn, K. T. McFarland, Corey Lewandowski to swear under oath the information in Mueller Report is true & accurate. If answer is yes go to a vote.
This makes so much sense. There's no need for it to be a drawn out affair as the evidence is all in the supporting documents to the report. They just need to prove a handful of high crimes and misdemeanors in order to remove him from office, they don't need to run the table of alleged crimes.
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Trump’s approval drops 3 points to 37% (https://thehill.com/homenews/administration/439832-trump-approval-drops-to-2019-low-after-mueller-reports-release-poll?amp&__twitter_impression=true) after the release of the Mueller report. Watch for him to go full racist foghorn to get it back up to 40.
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Rex Tillerson says Trump ‘asked him to do illegal things’ as secretary of state
Sorry, I don't know how to hyperlink on here:
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/rex-tillerson-trump-illegal-things-violate-law-secretary-state-mike-pompeo-a8673111.html
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As expected, Pelosi punts. Probably some bullshit about gathering evidence or proof. Fucking cowards.
The problem, is at their core, they are just like Republicans in that they believe both that the majority of Americans are lazy and depraved and that the purpose of a political party is not to promote values but to instead accumulate power.
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As expected, Pelosi punts. Probably some bullshit about gathering evidence or proof. Fucking cowards.
The problem, is at their core, they are just like Republicans in that they believe both that the majority of Americans are lazy and depraved and that the purpose of a political party is not to promote values but to instead accumulate power.
They have subpoenaed McGahn now. That's the ticket! Let's get some TV-news friendly sound bites of Trump asking his minions to commit crimes, and I believe we'll see public opinion shift.
Also, once they see the full, unreacted report, they may change their minds. I am assuming that what's under the black ink is worse than what we can see currently, and they'll have that plus all the supporting evidence.
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As expected, Pelosi punts. Probably some bullshit about gathering evidence or proof. Fucking cowards.
The problem, is at their core, they are just like Republicans in that they believe both that the majority of Americans are lazy and depraved and that the purpose of a political party is not to promote values but to instead accumulate power.
Wait, when hasn't a political party sought to accumulate political power as the vehicle for promoting(/pushing/enforcing) their values? Not in my lifetime, I don't think.
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Wait, when hasn't a political party sought to accumulate political power as the vehicle for promoting(/pushing/enforcing) their values? Not in my lifetime, I don't think.
I get that. But a theme of the last two years is that Republicans are craven because they care more about the saving their asses than they do about checking the abuses of Trump. If Pelosi's calculus is that impeachment proceedings hurt her party, and are therefore not worth the price of checking Trump's abuses, then the Democrats are basically doing the same thing as Republicans. Sure, it's not as repugnant, but still similar.
ETA: And the values that this calculation promotes are antithetical to the values professed by their criticisms of Republicans. That's the important part.
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I get that. But a theme of the last two years is that Republicans are craven because they care more about the saving their asses than they do about checking the abuses of Trump. If Pelosi's calculus is that impeachment proceedings hurt her party, and are therefore not worth the price of checking Trump's abuses, then the Democrats are basically doing the same thing as Republicans. Sure, it's not as repugnant, but still similar.
ETA: And the values that this calculation promotes are antithetical to the values professed by their criticisms of Republicans. That's the important part.
As Waldo said, all parties are about accumulating power. The difference between Democrats and Republicans is that the former wants to do it by letting everyone vote and winning the majority of that vote, while the latter is trying to enshrine power through court-packing, gerrymandering (in which I include the Electoral College) and voter suppression.
Pelosi's calculus is political for sure, as is Warren's. Impeachment is a political process. That is not even in the same universe as the Republican interference-running to stop the wheels of justice turning in the face of a wealth of evidence of widespread criminality by the president.
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That's BS; it's easily in the same universe. It might be Mercury to Pluto, but it's even the same solar system. All those Democratic criticisms of Republicans (many of whom know what a piece of shit Trump is) for putting party over country ring hollow. And I'm not persuadable by the cynical "truth" that all parties are the same. If they choose to be, they are; if they choose not to be, they aren't.
The Democratic punting is also going to lend some credence to a claim Trump will likely make: "You don't think what I did was that bad. If you did, you'd impeach me. You just want to keep investigating me, biting at my ankles, in an effort to seize power. You're politicians, just like me."
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All those Democratic criticisms of Republicans (many of whom know what a piece of shit Trump is) for putting party over country ring hollow.
I disagree. If you are the Democratic Party and you think Trump is bad for the country, then what's good for you is ostensibly what's good for the country. Impeachment proceedings could easily backfire on them in today's ass-backward political climate. They're better off keeping their eye on the ball for 2020, IMO.
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Hegar made if official today: she will run against Cornyn. I assume the Castro brother will as well, but I expect her to win the primary.
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/23/us/politics/mj-hegar-cornyn-senate.html (https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/23/us/politics/mj-hegar-cornyn-senate.html)
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The Mueller Report is available as an audio book. I got mine for free on Audible (you get one free book as a new user).
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The Mueller Report is available as an audio book. I got mine for free on Audible (you get one free book as a new user).
Who's the narrator?
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All those Democratic criticisms of Republicans (many of whom know what a piece of shit Trump is) for putting party over country ring hollow.
The Democrats - fighting against a spittle-filled headwind - pushed through the ACA because it was good for the people of the country. They got run out of Congress on a rail as a result. Now the ACA is more popular than it's ever been such that the Republicans - even with control of both chambers of Congress and the White House - couldn't undo it because it would have been politically untenable. That's the Democrats putting the country over politics...and of Republicans putting political survival ahead of fulfilling a near-decade long campaign promise.
If you can think of an example where Republicans leapt onto their own political swords for the greater good, then I'm all ears.
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I'm not arguing which party I prefer, and your example had nothing to do with the statement you quoted. It's pretty simple, if Dems don't want to impeach and remove Trump (right thing to do) because it is bad for their party, they are making the exact same calculation that a Republican who hates Trump, but refuses to investigate or criticize Trump (right thing to do), because it is bad for their party.
Besides, your example merely asserts what you (and I by the way) value. Some right leaning Republican can make the same argument: we lost the House in 2018 because we wanted to repeal the ACA because it costs too much or is socialism or whatever. We fell on our sword to save America. Every side can frame an argument like that.
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I'm not arguing which party I prefer, and your example had nothing to do with the statement you quoted. It's pretty simple, if Dems don't want to impeach and remove Trump (right thing to do) because it is bad for their party, they are making the exact same calculation that a Republican who hates Trump, but refuses to investigate or criticize Trump (right thing to do), because it is bad for their party.
I agree completely.
Besides, your example merely asserts what you (and I by the way) value. Some right leaning Republican can make the same argument: we lost the House in 2018 because we wanted to repeal the ACA because it costs too much or is socialism or whatever. We fell on our sword to save America. Every side can frame an argument like that.
They fell on their swords - most likely - to pass the "biggest tax cut in history"* too. But while the ACA's approval rating steadily improved as people started to enjoy it's benefits, everyone and their neighbor just got a good, hard and costly look at what the tax cut did for them. The merit of the sword-diving can only be judged over time as the results of the effort become known.
* It wasn't.
But don't just think about the ACA. Modern Republicans have vigorously opposed so many major pieces of legislation that have definitely improved the lives of Americans, including:
- FDR's new deal
- Medicare
- Medicaid
- Civil Rights Act
- Voting Rights Act
It's not like opposing the ACA is out of character.
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The Democrats - fighting against a spittle-filled headwind - pushed through the ACA because it was good for the people of the country. They got run out of Congress on a rail as a result.
Count me as one that was not in favor of and is still not in favor of the ACA. The health care system before the ACA had issues...all the ACA did was replace an old bucket of crap with a freshened bucket of crap.
Now the ACA is more popular than it's ever been...
The ACA's popularity is still not that favorable...50% of all adults
https://www.kff.org/interactive/kff-health-tracking-poll-the-publics-views-on-the-aca/#?response=Favorable--Unfavorable&rMax=1549440993103.4482&rMin=1486368993103.448
...such that the Republicans - even with control of both chambers of Congress and the White House - couldn't undo it because it would have been politically untenable. That's the Democrats putting the country over politics...and of Republicans putting political survival ahead of fulfilling a near-decade long campaign promise.
The Republicans reluctance not to touch the ACA had little to do with survival. Republicans from Republican districts constituents wanted the ACA absolved. Although once it was passed it's now part of a system. Pulling out unwanted parts destroys the system.
I also agree with JBM in that not proceeding with impeachment for the sake of the country because it's not the best political strategy is doing a disservice to those who elected them. That goes for all elected officials regardless of party affiliation.
I hate this political climate that points fingers and says, "oh yea, well they did/didn't do it too".
"That old law about 'an eye for an eye' leaves everybody blind. The time is always right to do the right thing."
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Who's the narrator?
Marc Vietor, Mark Boyett, and Victor Bevine (https://www.audible.com/pd/The-Mueller-Report-Audiobook/B07PXN468K). 19 hours 3 minutes
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Marc Vietor, Mark Boyett, and Victor Bevine (https://www.audible.com/pd/The-Mueller-Report-Audiobook/B07PXN468K). 19 hours 3 minutes
I was SO hoping it was Gilbert Gottfried.
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I was SO hoping it was Gilbert Gottfried.
With additional commentary by Bobcat Goldthwait!
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Count me as one that was not in favor of and is still not in favor of the ACA. The health care system before the ACA had issues...all the ACA did was replace an old bucket of crap with a freshened bucket of crap.
If you've ever been unemployed and in need of private health insurance, as I have, then you would not call the ACA a bunch of crap. Also, I presume from your comments that are not 26 or under and still insured on your parents' policy; a parent insuring your under-27-year-old on your policy; ever been sick enough to hit an annual or lifetime limit; have a pre-existing condition; and/or couldn't afford coverage but were ineligible for Medicaid so used the Emergency Room as your GP. That's part of the bunch of crap that is the ACA.
It didn't replace the old system - that is a catastrophe - it layered over it regulations to protect patients while creating a funding mechanism to allow those people outside of employer-based insurance programs the ability to buy affordable coverage. That's why it's called the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act.
The ACA's popularity is still not that favorable...50% of all adults
https://www.kff.org/interactive/kff-health-tracking-poll-the-publics-views-on-the-aca/#?response=Favorable--Unfavorable&rMax=1549440993103.4482&rMin=1486368993103.448
Yes, but look at from whence it came - change the time period on your tracking poll to "All". It's now supported by a (bare) majority of the country, from being horribly underwater. Also if you poll the tenets of the ACA, rather than "Obamacare", you get far greater support for its component parts than for the entirety, that was rendered toxic by a a scorched eartcampaign against it.
The Republicans reluctance not to touch the ACA had little to do with survival. Republicans from Republican districts constituents wanted the ACA absolved. Although once it was passed it's now part of a system. Pulling out unwanted parts destroys the system.
The House, when under Republican control, voted to repeal the ACA over 60 times.
I also agree with JBM in that not proceeding with impeachment for the sake of the country because it's not the best political strategy is doing a disservice to those who elected them. That goes for all elected officials regardless of party affiliation.
I hate this political climate that points fingers and says, "oh yea, well they did/didn't do it too".
"That old law about 'an eye for an eye' leaves everybody blind. The time is always right to do the right thing."
I am not sure what you're getting at here. Mueller is legally prevented from making an impeachment referral - unlike Ken Starr who was able - because of the regulations put into place after Ken Starr. He is also prevented from indicting a sitting president. He wrote that it would be inappropriate to accuse someone of a crime for which you could not indict them and thus allow them a speedy trial in which they were able to present a defense. All of this is because the responsibility for policing the president resides with Congress.
They have enough to make the accusation now, IMHO, but I can see the political strategy of holding more hearings to get live testimony from Mueller's witnesses. The tide is already turning towards impeachment, and it's been less than a week since we were able to read the redacted version of the report. The evidence is not all yet...umm...evident. As it comes out, the pressure will build.
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Also, for anyone not sure about impeachment, thinking that we can run out the clock on Trump, you need to keep an eye on his Twitter feed. Today, for example, amongst a blizzard of tweets about him doing nothing wrong - including one in which he wrote "I DID NOTHING WRONG" - he accused the UK of spying on his campaign (the day after announcing a state visit to the UK) and threatened a shooting war with Mexico.
Assuming he loses the 2020 election - which is not a given as he now has the levers of power and is using them, in part, to hold open the yawning gaps in our security to allow the Russians in again - he has another 21 months in office. Or, to put it another way: TWENTY-ONE MONTHS!
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Marc Vietor, Mark Boyett, and Victor Bevine (https://www.audible.com/pd/The-Mueller-Report-Audiobook/B07PXN468K). 19 hours 3 minutes
It's broken down into chapters. I'm going to listen to the Executive Summaries of both volumes, and see if I want to plow on from there. So far, the summary for Vol 1 is quite engaging. It highlights how we are all the boiling frog, because so much of this has been made public by reporters over the last two years, so it doesn't come across as revlationary (is that a word?), even though everything so far would be a nucular bomb if we were learning it here for the first time.
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It's broken down into chapters. I'm going to listen to the Executive Summaries of both volumes, and see if I want to plow on from there. So far, the summary for Vol 1 is quite engaging. It highlights how we are all the boiling frog, because so much of this has been made public by reporters over the last two years, so it doesn't come across as revlationary (is that a word?), even though everything so far would be a nucular bomb if we were learning it here for the first time.
This highlights another one of Barr's acts of obstruction: there was no reason not to release Mueller's summaries, other than to obstruct. If the public had a chance to read summaries, more would have done so and learned that "yes, indeed there was collusion, lots of it." This would have totally changed the conversation prior to the release of the redacted report. The conversation may yet get there, but it will take a lot of time and effort.
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revlationary (is that a word?)
No
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This highlights another one of Barr's acts of obstruction: there was no reason not to release Mueller's summaries, other than to obstruct. If the public had a chance to read summaries, more would have done so and learned that "yes, indeed there was collusion, lots of it." This would have totally changed the conversation prior to the release of the redacted report. The conversation may yet get there, but it will take a lot of time and effort.
Exactly. And Barr was still spreading his lies on the day of the report's release.
For example, I had a little fun above asking what was the missing lead to the "exonerating" sentence fragment Barr quoted in his letter. Here's the full sentence with teh redacted part boldened:
Although the investigation established that the Russian government perceived it would benefit from a Trump presidency and worked to secure that outcome, and that the Campaign expected it would benefit electorally from information stolen and released through Russian efforts, the investigation did not establish that members of the Trump Campaign conspired or coordinated with the Russian government in its election interference activities.
That's incredibly damning, and would have been the blaring headline if not for Barr's interference.
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If you've ever been unemployed and in need of private health insurance, as I have, then you would not call the ACA a bunch of crap. Also, I presume from your comments that are not 26 or under and still insured on your parents' policy; a parent insuring your under-27-year-old on your policy; ever been sick enough to hit an annual or lifetime limit; have a pre-existing condition; and/or couldn't afford coverage but were ineligible for Medicaid so used the Emergency Room as your GP. That's part of the bunch of crap that is the ACA...
Limey,
I had typed a longer reply but lost it...
My basic gripe with the ACA is out of control rates/patient billing. This was a problem before and has accelerated after the passing of the ACA with my own coverage. The ACA in my experience made the apparent issues worse in this case. The people I know that have been unemployed or are self employed gripe about the plan/rates they have also. Who's right you or them? I don't know...
As far as it's popularity, changing the time period to all, still comes out with a 50% favorable vs 39% unfavorable. The low popularity began because of a horrible roll-out and Pelosi's gaffe of needing to pass the thing before we find out what was in it. She pitched the ACA opponents a meatball down the middle on that one.
I have no idea why you brought Mueller not being able to legally make an impeachment referral. My point is that if Democrats feel there is enough evidence to impeach then that should be done. I jumped into the conversation because it was being stated that it's not in the Democrats best interests.
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That's incredibly damning, and would have been the blaring headline if not for Barr's interference.
How is that statement damning?
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How is that statement damning?
...
and that the Campaign expected it would benefit electorally from information stolen and released through Russian efforts
Were it anyone other than Trump, this would be scream-it-from-the-rooftops news.
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so it doesn't come across as revlationary (is that a word?)
I think "revelatory" is what you're looking for. Unless Republicans are censoring the dictionary now, which wouldn't surprise me at all.
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I think "revelatory" is what you're looking for. Unless Republicans are censoring the dictionary now, which wouldn't surprise me at all.
Today, the Dick Van Dyke show would have some fetching their fainting couches.
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
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My basic gripe with the ACA is out of control rates/patient billing. This was a problem before and has accelerated after the passing of the ACA with my own coverage. The ACA in my experience made the apparent issues worse in this case. The people I know that have been unemployed or are self employed gripe about the plan/rates they have also. Who's right you or them? I don't know...
Me. Because without the ACA they would not have been able to get plans that covered shit. As for rating etc., this is the problem with trying to cover everyone in a system designed to select against the sick or likely to get sick. There's a reason why the rest of the first world (and many others) don't do it the way we do.
As far as it's popularity, changing the time period to all, still comes out with a 50% favorable vs 39% unfavorable. The low popularity began because of a horrible roll-out and Pelosi's gaffe of needing to pass the thing before we find out what was in it. She pitched the ACA opponents a meatball down the middle on that one.
The website roll out was effed up for sure. Conservatives made a big song and dance about it while throwing recollections of the clusterfuck that was Bush's Medicare Part D rollout down the memory hole.
Pelosi's gaffe wasn't a gaffe at all (https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/pelosi-healthcare-pass-the-bill-to-see-what-is-in-it/); she made a long, legitimate statement, from which a fragment was culled and paraded as if it was tattooed on her forehead. Also, the audience mattered; it was couched as having been spoken to Congress, when it was actually at a public-speaking engagement.
You’ve heard about the controversies within the bill, the process about the bill, one or the other. But I don’t know if you have heard that it is legislation for the future, not just about health care for America, but about a healthier America, where preventive care is not something that you have to pay a deductible for or out of pocket. Prevention, prevention, prevention–it’s about diet, not diabetes. It’s going to be very, very exciting.
But we have to pass the bill so that you can find out what is in it, away from the fog of the controversy.
I have no idea why you brought Mueller not being able to legally make an impeachment referral. My point is that if Democrats feel there is enough evidence to impeach then that should be done. I jumped into the conversation because it was being stated that it's not in the Democrats best interests.
Agreed. The point about Mueller is that much was made of him not coming to a decision, when that is far from the truth.
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How is that statement damning?
So, if I'm standing outside a Best Buy, and guys in wearing masks and carrying sacks marked "Swag" are climbing out of a broken window with all sorts of electronic goodies, and they give a lot of them to me, that's ok?
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I think "revelatory" is what you're looking for. Unless Republicans are censoring the dictionary now, which wouldn't surprise me at all.
It was. WTF was I think?
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Me. Because without the ACA they would not have been able to get plans that covered shit. As for rating etc., this is the problem with trying to cover everyone in a system designed to select against the sick or likely to get sick. There's a reason why the rest of the first world (and many others) don't do it the way we do.
My sister and bro n law are both self employed. They had expensive crap coverage before and expensive crap coverage now. Only positive I see coming out of the ACA is preexisting illness coverage.
The website roll out was effed up for sure. Conservatives made a big song and dance about it while throwing recollections of the clusterfuck that was Bush's Medicare Part D rollout down the memory hole.
Pelosi's gaffe wasn't a gaffe at all (https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/pelosi-healthcare-pass-the-bill-to-see-what-is-in-it/); she made a long, legitimate statement, from which a fragment was culled and paraded as if it was tattooed on her forehead. Also, the audience mattered; it was couched as having been spoken to Congress, when it was actually at a public-speaking engagement.
Thanks for the greater context. First I've seen it.
Agreed. The point about Mueller is that much was made of him not coming to a decision, when that is far from the truth.
Yes, agreed
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My sister and bro n law are both self employed. They had expensive crap coverage before and expensive crap coverage now. Only positive I see coming out of the ACA is preexisting illness coverage.
But people's crap coverage had already been getting more expensive since the 70s and especially the late 90s. See third graph at https://www.kff.org/health-costs/issue-brief/snapshots-health-care-spending-in-the-united-states-selected-oecd-countries/
So costs were already spiraling out of control (especially relative to other countries), under administrations and Congresses from both parties. I know that the ACA itself has problems (I think it was myopic in a lot of ways, and didn't adequately plan for things like providers leaving certain markets entirely and dropping their insured) and doesn't have the teeth to directly address many of the biggest problems in the health care and health insurance industries. And I was personally negatively affected by the ACA, when my wife's private PPO plan first got downgraded to an HMO and then canceled entirely when United left Texas, and then paying the penalty at tax time when we didn't carry insurance on her for a while afterward. But I can respect that it's done some good, including slowing the rise of health care expenses since it's been enacted.
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My sister and bro n law are both self employed. They had expensive crap coverage before and expensive crap coverage now. Only positive I see coming out of the ACA is preexisting illness coverage.
Which is pretty fucking nice, considering the crap coverage they had before didn't cover things they might actually need it for - you know, the illnesses they already had - while the "crap" coverage they have now, does. Also, the ACA stops the insurance company from dumping you as soon as you become expensively sick, so there's that too.
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But people's crap coverage had already been getting more expensive since the 70s and especially the late 90s. See third graph at https://www.kff.org/health-costs/issue-brief/snapshots-health-care-spending-in-the-united-states-selected-oecd-countries/
So costs were already spiraling out of control (especially relative to other countries), under administrations and Congresses from both parties. I know that the ACA itself has problems (I think it was myopic in a lot of ways, and didn't adequately plan for things like providers leaving certain markets entirely and dropping their insured) and doesn't have the teeth to directly address many of the biggest problems in the health care and health insurance industries. And I was personally negatively affected by the ACA, when my wife's private PPO plan first got downgraded to an HMO and then canceled entirely when United left Texas, and then paying the penalty at tax time when we didn't carry insurance on her for a while afterward. But I can respect that it's done some good, including slowing the rise of health care expenses since it's been enacted.
Remember, in 2016, when Trump told everyone that he would provide "big, beautiful" healthcare that would be better and cheaper and cover more for everyone? Remember how he's been on a rant for going on two years now about John McCain's vote to foil his effort to repeal the ACA and take health insurance away from tens of millions of people? Remember that? Recently Trump said that he has a healthcare plan that will be better and cheaper for everyone, and he will roll it out to the nation right after he's re-elected in 2020.
To capture the full lunacy/irony of this situation, it's worth remembering that this was also John McCain's election strategy around the fact that, contemporaneous to the 2008 campaign, Osama bin Laden was still walking this earth (and, as we now know, jerking off to grainy VHS porn in a creepy little room in a compound in Pakistan). The concept that someone knows how to fix something that's bothering the entire country, but will hold it hostage for personal gain, is the antithesis of service.
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Speaking of healthcare, North Korea, before it would release Otto Warmbier - as U.S. citizen who had been treated so horrendously in Kim's regime that he died shortly after returning to the US - demanded that someone pay his $2 million healthcare bill. Seriously. Trump authorized it paid (and has denied that since, or course).
Congratulations everyone! Our tax dollars at work; funding a pudgy, crazy, nuclear-armed dictator with a stupid haircut...
...and Kim Jong-Un.
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Speaking of healthcare, North Korea, before it would release Otto Warmbier - as U.S. citizen who had been treated so horrendously in Kim's regime that he died shortly after returning to the US - demanded that someone pay his $2 million healthcare bill. Seriously. Trump authorized it paid (and has denied that since, or course).
Congratulations everyone! Our tax dollars at work; funding a pudgy, crazy, nuclear-armed dictator with a stupid haircut...
...and Kim Jong-Un.
And then Trump covered up for Kim Jong-Un absolving him of any responsibility for the treatment of death of Warmbier.
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But people's crap coverage had already been getting more expensive since the 70s and especially the late 90s. See third graph at https://www.kff.org/health-costs/issue-brief/snapshots-health-care-spending-in-the-united-states-selected-oecd-countries/
Exactly! That was my main point in my previous post. My biggest gripe with the ACA was not addressing the out of control spending.
So costs were already spiraling out of control (especially relative to other countries), under administrations and Congresses from both parties. I know that the ACA itself has problems (I think it was myopic in a lot of ways, and didn't adequately plan for things like providers leaving certain markets entirely and dropping their insured) and doesn't have the teeth to directly address many of the biggest problems in the health care and health insurance industries. And I was personally negatively affected by the ACA, when my wife's private PPO plan first got downgraded to an HMO and then canceled entirely when United left Texas, and then paying the penalty at tax time when we didn't carry insurance on her for a while afterward. But I can respect that it's done some good, including slowing the rise of health care expenses since it's been enacted.
Has it slowed the rise of expenses? I haven't seen that personally.
I've seen studies showing that expenses for hospital services are 60% higher in the US. Other areas are more expensive than other countries also, but 60% more for hospital services is obscene!
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My view of the ACA is this:
A pitcher went in with shoulder pain. He was informed that he had a tear in his rotator cuff, and would need major surgery to correct it, plus he needed mechanical changes to prevent it from recurring. The pitcher said no way could he do that, so instead he got a cortisone shot for the inflammation.
Now, did the cortisone help? Sure. But did it do anything to address the underlying issues? No.
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Exactly! That was my main point in my previous post. My biggest gripe with the ACA was not addressing the out of control spending.
Has it slowed the rise of expenses? I haven't seen that personally.
I've seen studies showing that expenses for hospital services are 60% higher in the US. Other areas are more expensive than other countries also, but 60% more for hospital services is obscene!
The problem with healthcare in the US is that there is no alternative to the private, for-profit, providers we all have to use. The entire system is laced with overhead and profit margin that compounds as it goes from supplier to wholesaler to provider to insurer. There are private providers in the UK too, for example, but they are competing against the National Health Service, that takes the National Insurance to provide cost-free healthcare. Yes the lines are long for non-emergency procedures, but have you seen Walmart on Black Friday? And that's just for a discount, not free.
Anyway, so as costs increase for, say, surgical gloves, that increase gets exaggerated through the system as each for-profit entity that handles the gloves adds its 20%-or-so overhead and profit margin on them until they get used on you and you pay all that compounded profit. Then your insurance rates go spiraling upward because they pay for it*.
* Maybe, depending on your deductible, but the rates go up anyway.
The 20% overhead cost is realistic, by the way. For comparison, Medicare runs at a 3% overhead. Amazing what happens when you remove CEO bonuses and marketing** from the cost structure.
** The pharmaceutical industry spends more money on marketing than on R&D. That's fucked up. Moreso, when you realise that much of their R&D is spent on creating competing products to existing medicines, instead of new products.
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Which is pretty fucking nice, considering the crap coverage they had before didn't cover things they might actually need it for - you know, the illnesses they already had - while the "crap" coverage they have now, does. Also, the ACA stops the insurance company from dumping you as soon as you become expensively sick, so there's that too.
Yes, very much agreed on the pre-existing illness coverage! Although, at least with the crap coverage they had before they really liked their doctor...new insurance. He gone. Doh!
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My view of the ACA is this:
A pitcher went in with shoulder pain. He was informed that he had a tear in his rotator cuff, and would need major surgery to correct it, plus he needed mechanical changes to prevent it from recurring. The pitcher said no way could he do that, so instead he got a cortisone shot for the inflammation.
Now, did the cortisone help? Sure. But did it do anything to address the underlying issues? No.
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
Very fitting analogy!
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My sister and bro n law are both self employed. They had expensive crap coverage before and expensive crap coverage now. Only positive I see coming out of the ACA is preexisting illness coverage.
Thanks for the greater context. First I've seen it.
Yes, agreed
Mrs banedoodle and I are self-employed in NC and are super happy with the ACA right now. It is immeasurably better than the private market right now for people in our bracket.
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My biggest gripe with the ACA was not addressing the out of control spending.
It never had the teeth to do that, and I don't think anyone - from either party - has both the guts to try to champion another law that can do it and the political capital to make it happen.
Has it slowed the rise of expenses? I haven't seen that personally.
I've seen studies showing that expenses for hospital services are 60% higher in the US. Other areas are more expensive than other countries also, but 60% more for hospital services is obscene!
The rise of health care expenses has slowed since 2010, and in 2016 we were about $300 billion (about 8%) under the 2010-baseline projections for 2016. Obviously not due solely to ACA, but at least in part.
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Katie, Barr the door!
AG Barr’s clear nervousness at the prospect of testifying in front of the House just went to 11. Last time around, he told both chambers - while under oath - that Mueller had not objected to his now-debunked fake summary. It turns out that Mueller had a big, fat fucking problem with it, and told Barr this in a letter sent weeks before Barr’s congressional testimony. Oops!
As an historical aside, Nixon’s AG went to jail for obstruction of justice. Another: Trump’s favorite “fixer” lawyer - Roy Cohn - died broke, disgraced, disbarred and abandoned by Trump.
Everything Trump touches, dies. In this case, though, Barr is experiencing something more like assisted suicide.
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Lindsey Graham's decent from mediocrity to full-on Trump sack licker was complete this morning when his opening remarks ahead of Barr's testimony to Graham's Senate Judiciary Committee included the assertion that Mueller found no collusion - which is not true* - and then went on about Hilary's emails. Seriously.
* Mueller was at pains in his report to explain that "collusion" isn't a crime and that he was looking for behavior that rose to the level of criminal conspiracy which, despite all their best, incompetent efforts, the Trump campaign did not quite reach. But they did try really, really hard.
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Oh, and Mueller's letter to Barr has been released and it's damning. The day after Barr's letter came out, Mueller made his concerns about the letter clear to the DOJ, and gave them pre-redacted versions of the report's introduction, and the report's summaries of the two volumes. He pointed out that they had been discussing for weeks how the summaries accurately summarize the SCO's work and conclusions. He decried that Barr had now sewn confusion over critical aspects of the investigation and damn-near begged Barr to release the redacted summaries.
Barr ignored all of this, took weeks more to release the redacted report - holding back the ready-to-eat summaries in the meantime - and testifying to Congress that he had no idea why the press was reporting a dissatisfaction with Barr's letter from Mueller's team. It will be interesting today to see if any Dems can land a punch on Barr. It will be even more interesting if he refuses to go under the greater scrutiny of a House hearing.
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If every president took a citizenships test, there is zero chance the Drumpf doesn’t come in last. He’s the fucking stupidest person we have ever elected President, by a wide margin. And the foxnews crowd loves him for that. We love idiots! The dumber the better! -deplorables
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If every president took a citizenships test, there is zero chance the Drumpf doesn’t come in last. He’s the fucking stupidest person we have ever elected President, by a wide margin. And the foxnews crowd loves him for that. We love idiots! The dumber the better! -deplorables
He's a way less cool President Camacho (https://static1.squarespace.com/static/51259dfce4b01b12552dad3e/t/58d09f6fbebafb6cdd91b52b/1490067325508/).
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House Judiciary Committee will meet on Wednesday to discuss holding Barr in contempt of Congress.
Mueller hearing scheduled for May 15.
Trump tweets about escalating his trade war with China and deploys a carrier group to Iran.
This is asymmetric warfare, and the opposition to Trump needs to realize it and step up its game.
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A recent opinion poll has a majority of Americans in favor of getting rid of the Electoral College. That is, of course, a heavy lift as it requires a constitutional amendment. Some states are going with the pledge that all their electors will go to the candidate winning the popular vote, but until those states amount to 270+ electors, it's moot. It does seem that, for now, it's going to stay and it's going to continue to enshrine minority power as long as the young and the restless liberals move to cities for work and opportunity (the Big Sort (http://www.thebigsort.com/home.php), as it's become known). The Electoral College only seems to have sway when it's close, but what if it stops only thumbing the scale in close elections?
I believe I understand the historical rationale for the EC, but we are far beyond those times. Yes, smaller states need representation, but they get two senators each meaning that small state voters have significantly higher influence on national policy than us here in Texas, for example. Montana merits only one House Rep. but gets two Senators. We have already seen the concentration of conservatism in these rural states as the emptying out of young, liberal voters continues and, more frighteningly, accelerates.
The Washington Post published an essay (https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/politics/wp/2018/07/12/in-about-20-years-half-the-population-will-live-in-eight-states/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.5a2ef0f29e4d) explaining how census projections expect that, by 2040, 70% of the population will live in 16 states. That means that 30% of the electorate - those in the 34 states that will, by then, have a median population over 65 - will get to send 68 Senators to Washington. SIXTY-EIGHT! And it gets worse: Eight states are projected have just under half of the total population of the country, 49.5 percent. That means that half the population will control 84% of the Senate.
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The constitutional amendment will never pass, IMO, as the numbers will never work. However, I believe the other route might work, eventually. Last I heard, they were near 200.
The whole democratic representation and power scenario in this country is depressing. The system is rigged in realistic terms, or just structured to over represent rural areas in politically correct terms. I am also growing increasingly weary about the future: the complacency of decent people and the decent press is allowing the pressure to rise. At some point in the future, there will be a release and it likely won't be pleasant.
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The electoral college is not functioning as designed, but not because of population shifts. Its function is specifically to prevent some unqualified, arm waving populist yahoo from stirring up enough rubes to get elected by popular vote. The founding fathers didn't fear small or big states, they feared an uneducated electorate. We've pretty much decided that the FFs didn't know what in the hell they were doing. We get the government we deserve.
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The constitutional amendment will never pass, IMO, as the numbers will never work. However, I believe the other route might work, eventually. Last I heard, they were near 200.
If Texas turns blue, then the Republicans can never again win the Presidency. With the House being constantly re-jigged based on population, it too should - gerrymandering (and Montana) aside - be representative of the people. The Senate, though, can be run using Mitch McConnell's playbook to completely stifle anything and everything it chooses to fuck with. If 68 seats go to the aging, rural states, they won't even need a filibuster to shit on everything.
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Hundreds of former federal prosecutors signed a statement (https://medium.com/@dojalumni/statement-by-former-federal-prosecutors-8ab7691c2aa1) agreeing "that the conduct of President Trump described in Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s report would, in the case of any other person not covered by the Office of Legal Counsel policy against indicting a sitting President, result in multiple felony charges for obstruction of justice."
...
We emphasize that these are not matters of close professional judgment.
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Hundreds of former federal prosecutors signed a statement (https://medium.com/@dojalumni/statement-by-former-federal-prosecutors-8ab7691c2aa1) agreeing "that the conduct of President Trump described in Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s report would, in the case of any other person not covered by the Office of Legal Counsel policy against indicting a sitting President, result in multiple felony charges for obstruction of justice."
...
We emphasize that these are not matters of close professional judgment.
Short version: "Du-uh!"
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NO OBSTRUCTION!
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McConnell and Schumer are trading jabs on the Senate floor. It's about as exciting and relevant as it sounds.
Meanwhile, the DOJ tried to head off the House contempt vote tomorrow morning, by offering a kumbaya session tomorrow afternoon. Nadler said "nuts", and so now DOJ staffers are meeting with House Judiciary Committee staffers this afternoon, with the sword of the contempt vote hanging over their heads.
Those staffers are the soft underbelly of the DOJ, as they will have student loans, rent, car notes etc., and a career ahead of them. Barr may walk away in the end (maybe to prison, like Nixon's AG), but they still have a life to lead. They are who needs to be leveraged here. The sight of Cohen skulking off to prison yesterday* must have been quite jarring; it shows just how little loyalty Trump has to even his longtime servants, so how is Barr going to fare, let alone a nameless DOJ staffer?
* While the President hung the Medal of Freedom around Tiger Woods' neck (maybe while swapping stories with him about fucking porn stars while their wives were at home with the young kids).
And Mnuchin said "nuts" to releasing Trump's tax returns based on a DOJ opinion that has not yet been written. The reportage on this has been infuriating; headline after headline says that Mnuchin "declines Congress' request..." Fuck that! The IRS "shall" provide any tax return that Congress requires, and Mnuchin has inserted himself in a process in which he doesn't belong, using an argument that is fake (Congress does not need a purpose - legislative or otherwise), and relying on the DOJ who have nothing the fuck whatsoever to do with any of this. Mnuchin was always going to do this; the press should have been ready with the correct nuance, not its usual lazy crap.
Chairman Neal is considering his options; he can subpoena the returns or sue in Federal court under the 1924 statute. Either way it's going to be a long road, but they should start by subpoenaing the players - Mnuchin and whoever the fuck Trump minion is in charge at the IRS (he was visibly shaking last time he was questioned on this) and put them under oath and have them lie about it and then impeach the fuckers. Barr too. Go after the deputies and underlings, because some (maybe most) of them will crack.
This is a fucking crime syndicate, and it needs to be treated as such. You go after the low-level players, flip them, and move on up the chain. This government is not functional at this point, so there is little to lose and all to gain by cleaning out the Trump garbage, one floor at a time.
EOR
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McConnell and Schumer are trading jabs on the Senate floor. It's about as exciting and relevant as it sounds.
Meanwhile, the DOJ tried to head off the House contempt vote tomorrow morning, by offering a kumbaya session tomorrow afternoon. Nadler said "nuts", and so now DOJ staffers are meeting with House Judiciary Committee staffers this afternoon, with the sword of the contempt vote hanging over their heads.
The problem is that "sword" is simply a wet noodle. There is little Congress can do and even less they're willing to do. They sold their Constitutional equality a long time ago. They're not getting it back. They are the President's bitch.
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The problem is that "sword" is simply a wet noodle. There is little Congress can do and even less they're willing to do. They sold their Constitutional equality a long time ago. They're not getting it back. They are the President's bitch.
It's becoming quite evident. I'm waiting for one of the House Dems to strenuously object.
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It's becoming quite evident. I'm waiting for one of the House Dems to strenuously object.
Or at least move to reconsider.
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It's becoming quite evident. I'm waiting for one of the House Dems to strenuously object.
Is that how it works? You “strenuously” object?
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Trump is the biggest loser, literally. The NY Times has found that, in the decade between the mid 80s and mid 90s, Trump lost over (pinkies up) $1 billion - more than any other American tax payer.
If you wanted to know why he’s fighting the release of his tax returns, it’s shit like this. There’s lots of inexplicable individual numbers in there, but it completely torpedoes his business schtick.
Oh, and NY state is voting on tomorrow, and expected to pass, a bill that will allow them to convey Trump’s state tax returns to Congress. They aren’t mirrors of his federal returns, but they’ll be pretty fucking informative.
The truth will out.
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Trump is the biggest loser, literally. The NY Times has found that, in the decade between the mid 80s and mid 90s, Trump lost over (pinkies up) $1 billion - more than any other American tax payer.
If you wanted to know why he’s fighting the release of his tax returns, it’s shit like this. There’s lots of inexplicable individual numbers in there, but it completely torpedoes his business schtick.
Oh, and NY state is voting on tomorrow, and expected to pass, a bill that will allow them to convey Trump’s state tax returns to Congress. They aren’t mirrors of his federal returns, but they’ll be pretty fucking informative.
The truth will out.
I have no doubt the reason he doesn't want them released is because it would show he has no real assets.
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Is that how it works? You “strenuously” object?
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He also risks being put on "double super secret probation" and possibly even on the "Enemies of Carlotta" list.
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I have no doubt the reason he doesn't want them released is because it would show he has no real assets.
That, and all the income will look dirty. It's so clear: man inherits fortune, is an epically shitty businessman, goes broke, no legit banks will lend him money, yet stays afloat. It just seems logical that we will one day learn for certain that his "wealth" is basically through the criminal enterprise of laundering.
Also, I'd assume his bullshit stock market schemes in the 80s, outlined in the NYT article, would be illegal, but I guess not. Either that, or there are just different rules for him.
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That, and all the income will look dirty. It's so clear: man inherits fortune, is an epically shitty businessman, goes broke, no legit banks will lend him money, yet stays afloat. It just seems logical that we will one day learn for certain that his "wealth" is basically through the criminal enterprise of laundering.
Also, I'd assume his bullshit stock market schemes in the 80s, outlined in the NYT article, would be illegal, but I guess not. Either that, or there are just different rules for him.
Trump is arguing today that showing losses on taxes is smart business. $1 billion in losses? Meanwhile, Fred Trump only posted a loss once, when he had to eat a $15 million investment in a failed business owned by one ... checks the article ... Donald J. Trump.
The article talks about how his returns are rife with "found money", that would prohibit you or I getting a mortgage. He was getting chunks of money injected into his finances as interest - $50 million in a single year - without there being the asset or investment base to support even a fraction of that interest. When Fred died, Donald's deep pocket went away and so he had to look elsewhere for un-discerning cash and, hey presto! Deutsche Bank!
It's not a stretch. Trump is in real estate - the preferred laundromat for crooked money; Deutsche Bank has paid huge fines for laundering money; both are heavily involved with Russians who have money to launder; and Deutsche Bank kept lending Trump money despite him defaulting on hundreds of millions of dollars in loans to them. That all stinks like Donald's adult diaper.
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It would be comical - if it wasn't so serious - that AG Barr is threatening*, on behalf of the White House, that they will invoke executive privilege over information given to the SCO by other people.
* Twitter says this has now happened. But the DOJ isn't coordinating with the White House over this or anything, right?
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Hundreds of former federal prosecutors signed a statement (https://medium.com/@dojalumni/statement-by-former-federal-prosecutors-8ab7691c2aa1) agreeing "that the conduct of President Trump described in Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s report would, in the case of any other person not covered by the Office of Legal Counsel policy against indicting a sitting President, result in multiple felony charges for obstruction of justice."
...
We emphasize that these are not matters of close professional judgment.
The count now is over 700. How many of these guys are there?
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It would be comical - if it wasn't so serious - that AG Barr is threatening*, on behalf of the White House, that they will invoke executive privilege over information given to the SCO by other people.
* Twitter says this has now happened. But the DOJ isn't coordinating with the White House over this or anything, right?
Their arrogance in this matter continues to grow. The letter from the Assistant AG was basically "We tried to negotiate in good faith, but since you are voting for contempt charges, we have to demonstrate our bad faith by now claiming privilege over the entire report."
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I just don't understand why they won't release it. No collusion. Why not share it??
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I just don't understand why they won't release it. No collusion. Why not share it??
Because they are the football player who spikes the ball in the end zone when there were flags thrown 50 yards upfield.
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Because they are the football player who spikes the ball in the end zone when there were flags thrown 50 yards upfield.
nice, i like that. if i remember it, i'm using it.
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Their arrogance in this matter continues to grow. The letter from the Assistant AG was basically "We tried to negotiate in good faith, but since you are voting for contempt charges, we have to demonstrate our bad faith by now claiming privilege over the entire report."
Every negotiation involves a hostage.
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I just don't understand why they won't release it. No collusion. Why not share it??
Trump's a billionaire, but we can't see his taxes.
He's a genius, but we can't see his grades.
He didn't collude, but we can't see the report.
Or, coming at it from the other angle, can you remember a single thing that he has said that has proven to be true when placed under scrutiny? Seriously, I can't.
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This a quote from Fox and Friends discussing the NYT article (via Politico). Can't make this stuff up:
“If anything, you read this and you're like: ‘Wow, it's pretty impressive all the things that he's done in his life,’” “Fox & Friends” host Ainsley Earhardt said Wednesday. “It's beyond what most of us could ever achieve.”
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This a quote from Fox and Friends discussing the NYT article (via Politico). Can't make this stuff up:
Yesterday, Pompei bragged that the melting polar ice was opening new, faster shipping lanes between the US and Asia.
You know, even though global warming isn’t real.
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Yesterday, Pompei bragged that the melting polar ice was opening new, faster shipping lanes between the US and Asia.
You know, even though global warming isn’t real.
To be fair, Trump sold him some ocean-front real estate in Colorado.
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Mark your calendars: May 22 - Waters vs. Mnuchin II. Only on
PPV C-SPAN.
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Let me pop in here to say, if Trump wants to pull all this shit with Iran he needs appoint a real SecDef and DHS Sec (in case of big terrorist attack) who can deal with things if they go bad. I don't know what he is trying to do (except letting the Saudis and Israelis run US foreign policy), but he needs to cut it out.
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Let me pop in here to say, if Trump wants to pull all this shit with Iran he needs appoint a real SecDef and DHS Sec (in case of big terrorist attack) who can deal with things if they go bad. I don't know what he is trying to do (except letting the Saudis and Israelis run US foreign policy), but he needs to cut it out.
Jared's busy solving immigration. He'll get to those other things when he's good and ready.
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Let me pop in here to say, if Trump wants to pull all this shit with Iran he needs appoint a real SecDef and DHS Sec (in case of big terrorist attack) who can deal with things if they go bad. I don't know what he is trying to do (except letting the Saudis and Israelis run US foreign policy), but he needs to cut it out.
Seriously, though, the Acting SecDef wasn't even at the cabinet meeting today.
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Seriously, though, the Acting SecDef wasn't even at the cabinet meeting today.
Exactly. Asking for all sorts of bad things to happen.
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Exactly. Asking for all sorts of bad things to happen.
Bolton is running foreign policy.
Miller is running immigration policy.
Trump is running trade policy.
What could go wrong?
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Bolton is running foreign policy.
Miller is running immigration policy.
Trump is running trade policy.
What could go wrong?
You would be remiss not to mention that Trump is aided by cokehead banker* turned CNBC talking sideshow act, Larry Kudlow, who is now head of the NEC.
* a coke problem so severe it is actually notable relative to all average Wall Street coke habits during the 80s.
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Just recapping the day:
1. House judiciary votes to cite Barr for contempt.
2. New York moves forward with closing the loophole for pardons for state crimes and making Trump's state tax returns available to congress
3. The GOP-led Senate judiciary intelligence committee subpoenas Don Jr. regarding his prior testimony
4. Jerry Falwell Jr has some nebulous cabana boy scandal involving Cohen
Typical Wednesday.
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Just recapping the day:
1. House judiciary votes to cite Barr for contempt.
2. New York moves forward with closing the loophole for pardons for state crimes and making Trump's state tax returns available to congress
3. The GOP-led Senate judiciary intelligence committee subpoenas Don Jr. regarding his prior testimony
4. Jerry Falwell Jr has some nebulous cabana boy scandal involving Cohen
Typical Wednesday.
Agreed on all fronts. However, while it's notable that Jr. got subpoenaed, it's also notable that others who have been caught lying to Congress were referred for prosecution. Jr. gets to come back to "correct the record". It's a sideshow; there's a long list of people we need to hear from before we get to Jr, and that list starts with Mueller and McGahn.
Of course, no one in the world not called Don Jr - not even Don Sr - thinks he can go in front of Congress and not lie his ass off again. Kamala Harris, for one, has good reason to leave a few marks on this moron. Warner, Feinstein, King, and Wyden are no fools either.
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Just recapping the day:
1. House judiciary votes to cite Barr for contempt.
2. New York moves forward with closing the loophole for pardons for state crimes and making Trump's state tax returns available to congress
3. The GOP-led Senate judiciary intelligence committee subpoenas Don Jr. regarding his prior testimony
4. Jerry Falwell Jr has some nebulous cabana boy scandal involving Cohen
Typical Wednesday.
Oh, and late-breaking...Trump laughs about shooting refugees at the border.
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Trump crashing the stock market again, with the upping of tariffs on China.
Given that the NY Times reported that Trump used to try to make money by ginning up takeover talks about a company then dumping its stock when the price climbed, maybe this is something for Congress to look at. Is he shorting stocks before he tweets (https://youtu.be/0kiVjtH7w8w)?
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Lots of elements of intrigue ongoing at the moment, but one that is playing out as I type is the Trump
crime Family's efforts to prevent long-time accounting firm Mazars from complying with a Congressional subpoena to hand over - essentially - the kitchen sink of Trump world's finances. The Trump's sued in federal court to block his accountants from releasing anything, widely seen as a clock-running measure. The federal judge wsn't so impressed with being used in that way, so he told all the parties that they will get one go at arguing this - today - and then he will rule on the suit immediately thereafter.
Well, the Trumps weren't having that, so they filed a request for a delay because they weren't ready. They weren't ready to argue their own lawsuit. They were, they told the judge, caught up in lots of legal shit and they just did not have the time to get ready to do things like defend their own previously staked-out position. The judge told the "Nuts!" and they're in court this morning (https://www.cnn.com/2019/05/14/politics/trump-financial-records-subpoena-hearing/index.html).
I'm not sure what the legal precedent is for telling a third party not to comply with a lawful subpoena because you don't like the idea of that information being released, but I'll let the eleventy-one lawyers on here hash that one out (at a mere $500/hour). Unless the Trumps can land some punches today, the judge is expected to rule before the end of the day.
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I'm not sure what the legal precedent is for telling a third party not to comply with a lawful subpoena because you don't like the idea of that information being released, but I'll let the eleventy-one lawyers on here hash that one out (at a mere $500/hour). Unless the Trumps can land some punches today, the judge is expected to rule before the end of the day.
If I were Iran, I'd be very nervous. Hell, I'm not Iran, and I'm still nervous.
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Not surprisingly, the two Saudi ships supposedly sabotaged by the Iranians appear to be just fine.
No proof, but given their lack of regard for truth coupled with their ineptitude, I wonder if they botched one of their false pretexts for war.
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Not surprisingly, the two Saudi ships supposedly sabotaged by the Iranians appear to be just fine.
No proof, but given their lack of regard for truth coupled with their ineptitude, I wonder if they botched one of their false pretexts for war.
Less competent than the Bush administration is a low bar under which they have easily sailed.
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The judge in the Mazars hearing has left it open until the 18th for both sides to submit additional evidence. Says he was never going to rule today.
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The judge in the Mazars hearing has left it open until the 18th for both sides to submit additional evidence. Says he was never going to rule today.
It's worth noting that the main argument put forward by Team Trump is that any presidential wrongdoing is a law enforcement matter, and not one for Congress. It's also worth noting that the judge asked them whether they believe that Watergate and Whitewater were outside of the scope of Congressional oversight, and they said yes.
So, just to be clear, law enforcement cannot indict a president because of DOJ policy (and they fact that it's now run by a Trump stooge), and Congress cannot investigate the president because that law enforcement's job, even though law enforcement cannot indict because of DOJ policy. Got it, your Majesty.
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Trump is on an unhinged Twitter tirade this morning, which usually means he's just been given some really, really bad news. Right now, the thing I suspect is animating the president is Flynn. Some of the sealed court documents in Flynn's case were unsealed, and it shows that Flynn claims to have been approached by members of the administration and Congress in order to get him to not talk to investigators. He even got a phone call from a White House lawyer, the transcript of which reads like a knockoff Mario Puzzo script.
The judge who unsealed these documents is the same judge who:
1) has seen all the documents, unredacted, and so knows the excrutiting detail of Flynn's crimes;
b) thereafter in court accused Flynn of treason; and
iii) pretty much threatened Flynn with immurement, such was his reaction to Flynn's crimes.
That judge has now ordered the public release - in unredacted form - of all of the elements of the Mueller Report that relate to Flynn.
As an aside, the judge told Flynn last December that he needed to do a lot more atoning in order to get any consideration in sentencing. Apropos nothing, the White House cannot stop Flynn - a private citizen - from appearing in Congress under subpoena. Juss sayin....
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The appeals court judge who will hear Trump”s suit to keep his taxes from congress - and many other fights between Trump and Congress is....
Merrick Garland.
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Kushner was sending money to Russian individuals in 2016 and in doing so triggered Deutsche Bank's suspicious activity algorithms. The staff took a look, thought "Yep, these stink," and referred the transactions up the chain, where they should have been referred to the DOJ and/or Treasury Dept. but in fact were quashed. In 2017, i.e. while he was President, Trump sent millions of dollars to Russian individuals and in doing so triggered Deutsche Bank's suspicious activity algorithms blah, blah, rinse, repeat.
Seriously, how dumb (or kompromised) is Deutsche Bank? Those suspicious activity reports would've been shredded at the DOJ or Treasury, so why sit on them and put themselves in harm's way? They've already paid huge fines for money laundering, and they're going to take on this burden too?
Anyway, can we start impeachment yet? Trump is telling non-government employees to one-finger salute subpoenas and skip non-optional hearings. Initiating impeachment would add more weight - legally - to Congress' demands, and it might focus witnesses as to the seriousness of the situation. Of course it goes nowhere in the Senate, but the televised hearings will move the needle against Trump so fast - just like with Nixon - that Republicans will be forced to nuke him from orbit just to survive - just like with Nixon*.
* That didn't work, by the way, they got shellacked next election.
Meanwhile, released closed-door testimony from Cohen puts Ivanka right in the middle of Trump Tower Moscow. Lock them up!
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I can't figure out what the Democrats' plan actually is. Do they care about oversight, I mean, really care about it, or do they just mouth the words hoping to avoid real oversight under the belief that things will just fall their way like in 2018. Seems like the leaders, and all major candidates but Warren, favor the second approach: "oversight without heart."
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Oh, and speaking of Deutsche Bank, the hearing of Trump's lawsuit to stop them being forced to turn over his financial records - presumably including all those suspicious transfers to individual Russians - is tomorrow. The hearing of his lawsuit to stop Mazars from being forced to turn over his financial records was yesterday, and the judge spiked it and then Icky-shuffled for a bit, such was the strength of the decision in favor of Congress.
TeamTrump asked for a stay pending appeal and the judge declined; Mazars now has 7 seconds days to comply.
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I can't figure out what the Democrats' plan actually is. Do they care about oversight, I mean, really care about it, or do they just mouth the words hoping to avoid real oversight under the belief that things will just fall their way like in 2018. Seems like the leaders, and all major candidates but Warren, favor the second approach: "oversight without heart."
The leaders fear a blowback like the Republicans got after Clinton's impeachment*; which really didn't happen and, in any case, this is entirely different. This is Nixon, not Clinton, where the Republicans got dragged across the line marked "The Right Thing" after a ton of damning televised testimony and once the missing tapes were released, and they still got told to get their coats after the subsequent election.
Apparently it's now basically Pelosi and Hoyer trying to hold back the tide of Democrats wanting to start impeachment hearings. TrumpWorld's stance that Congress cannot oversee his administration is a dare to impeach; and the only remedy for now and for the future is to start the process. He wants the fight and that's what scares some Democrats; but the fight will only solidify his base - who are with him anyway - while the process will lay bare all the things in the Mueller report and elsewhere that no one has the time or inclination to read (only about 3% of Americans have read the Mueller report).
He is already about 20 points underwater on the question "Will you vote for Trump next election?" I can only think that some Democratic leaders think they may lose that lead by impeaching and will, in my opinion, lose that lead by not impeaching, because you give Trump the get out of jail free card of saying "Even the Democrats don't think I did anything wrong, otherwise they would have impeached me!"
* When someone spouts off that Trump couldn't have obstructed justice because there is no underlying crime, ask them what was Clinton's underlying crime. If they say "lying", you can smugly point out that the lying was the obstruction, not the underlying crime, and ask them to try again. And then pull up a chair and a six-pack while they twist themselves into a pretzel.
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Be sure to do it smugly, that’s the best part. Nothing more satisfying than being smug.
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Be sure to do it smugly, that’s the best part. Nothing more satisfying than being smug.
It's not as good as the pantsing of those who claimed that Ted Cruz could be president but Barack Obama couldn't...but it's still entertaining.
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The appeals court judge who will hear Trump”s suit to keep his taxes from congress - and many other fights between Trump and Congress is....
Merrick Garland.
That’s not really true. It’s going up to the DC Circuit, but it’ll be a random panel of three judges. Garland may or may not end up being one of those three, and he has no control over who gets selected.
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It's not as good as the pantsing of those who claimed that Ted Cruz Hillary Clinton could be president but Barack Obama Donald Trump couldn't...but it's still entertaining.
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Donald Trump is proving that Donald Trump can’t be president.
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I can't figure out what the Democrats' plan actually is. Do they care about oversight, I mean, really care about it, or do they just mouth the words hoping to avoid real oversight under the belief that things will just fall their way like in 2018. Seems like the leaders, and all major candidates but Warren, favor the second approach: "oversight without heart."
What are they going to do? Strenuously object? Congress abdicated oversight of the President in 1991, and they're not getting it back, especially with a President who will tell them to go fuck themselves, and his party will fall in line behind him. They are all spineless, and Trump knows this. He's like a drug dealer who sells oregano instead of weed to junior high school kids...what are they going to do, complain to their parents?
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What are they going to do? Strenuously object? Congress abdicated oversight of the President in 1991, and they're not getting it back, especially with a President who will tell them to go fuck themselves, and his party will fall in line behind him. They are all spineless, and Trump knows this. He's like a drug dealer who sells oregano instead of weed to junior high school kids...what are they going to do, complain to their parents?
Trump just kicked out Pelosi and Schumer from their scheduled infrastructure meeting and then went into the Rose Garden to say that he won't work with Democrats while they are investigating him. Someone needs to spank this screaming baby.
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Trump just kicked out Pelosi and Schumer from their scheduled infrastructure meeting and then went into the Rose Garden to say that he won't work with Democrats while they are investigating him. Someone needs to spank this screaming baby.
Someone needs to, but they won't. He's a less accountable version of King Joffrey.
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Someone needs to, but they won't. He's a less accountable version of King Joffrey.
He's making himself impossible to ignore. It's also got to be unsustainable to be to the right of Freedom Caucus-member Justin Amash on this.
Start the inquiry now and get it over by the end of the year.
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What are they going to do? Strenuously object? Congress abdicated oversight of the President in 1991, and they're not getting it back, especially with a President who will tell them to go fuck themselves, and his party will fall in line behind him. They are all spineless, and Trump knows this. He's like a drug dealer who sells oregano instead of weed to junior high school kids...what are they going to do, complain to their parents?
Strenuously object is all they have been doing. They have had numerous chances to be tougher. They could have gone all in prior to Mueller, but they said "no, we are waiting for Mueller."
After the report was released, they could have jumped to conclusions like Trump and announced it to the world, basically setting their narrative rather than allowing Trump to. Those conclusions would have at least contained "The report shows he's guilty of obstruction" or "If he hadn't obstructed, Mueller would surely have found underlying crimes." These claims would have been no less justified than Trumps "No collusion, no obstruction, complete exoneration," but Trump sure wasn't scared to proceed that way.
After all of the D bank, tax record, financial record stuff, just come out and assert: "there's lot's of smoke that he is guilty of money laundering and that he is financially beholden to Russia and other countries. We're going to assume he is until he proves otherwise. He needs to come clean."
I get that these are all marginal tactics played by those with an inherently weak hand, but the "let's wait, object, then strenuously object, or threaten this that and the other" play is lame. Basically, the Dems play by different rules, and it always hurts them. The public doesn't give you any credit for playing fair and it's stupid for the Dems to continually act as if the public does.
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He's making himself impossible to ignore. It's also got to be unsustainable to be to the right of Freedom Caucus-member Justin Amash on this.
Start the inquiry now and get it over by the end of the year.
It's unsustainable in the long run, but they're enjoying the short run. Trump owns the Republicans. They are debt to him because he's made it socially acceptable to be racist bigots again and they can't thank him enough. They are going to go down with the ship, but not until they elevate Trump to God status. In other words, after 2025.
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Strenuously object is all they have been doing. They have had numerous chances to be tougher. They could have gone all in prior to Mueller, but they said "no, we are waiting for Mueller."
After the report was released, they could have jumped to conclusions like Trump and announced it to the world, basically setting their narrative rather than allowing Trump to. Those conclusions would have at least contained "The report shows he's guilty of obstruction" or "If he hadn't obstructed, Mueller would surely have found underlying crimes." These claims would have been no less justified than Trumps "No collusion, no obstruction, complete exoneration," but Trump sure wasn't scared to proceed that way.
After all of the D bank, tax record, financial record stuff, just come out and assert: "there's lot's of smoke that he is guilty of money laundering and that he is financially beholden to Russia and other countries. We're going to assume he is until he proves otherwise. He needs to come clean."
I get that these are all marginal tactics played by those with an inherently weak hand, but the "let's wait, object, then strenuously object, or threaten this that and the other" play is lame. Basically, the Dems play by different rules, and it always hurts them. The public doesn't give you any credit for playing fair and it's stupid for the Dems to continually act as if the public does.
This is my point. The Dems do not have the guts to act, and Trump knows this. He is literally above the law now.
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The DOJ caved and is handing over the counter-intelligence elements of the Mueller report, as they should have from the beginning.
And the federal judge hearing the sister case to Monday’s ball-stomping - this one involving Trump’s financial records at Deutschdramat - riverdanced all over TeamTrump’s arguments.
Probably explains why he was ranting in the Rose Garden, slurring and sniffing as he does when under particularly high pressure.
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You know...? For an Astros forum this place has a pretty large amount of smart people. I’ve enjoyed this thread from the beginning. Thanks all.
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You know...? For an Astros forum this place has a pretty large amount of smart people. I’ve enjoyed this thread from the beginning. Thanks all.
Smart indeed. Why I bet if you averaged the IQs around here it’d be about 100. As opposed to a Cub forum where if you summed them you’d get about 65.
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Smart indeed. Why I bet if you averaged the IQs around here it’d be about 100. As opposed to a Cub forum where if you summed them you’d get about 65.
What do you suppose the respective BACs might be?
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Inexplicably, Don Jr. has a book deal. Naturally, therefore, the tag #DonJrBookTitles is trending on Twitter.
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Inexplicably, Don Jr. has a book deal. Naturally, therefore, the tag #DonJrBookTitles is trending on Twitter.
"Fun With Dickhead and Dickhead, Jr"?
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"Fun With Dickhead and Dickhead, Jr"?
I offered “The Handjob’s Tale”.
Others include:
The Great Twatsby
Pride and White Prejudice
No Expectations
The Tax Man Cometh
Coward’s End
Triumph of the Shill
A Fail in Two Cities
Little Lord Flauntleroy
Twelve Years a Slave to Russian Banks
Malice in Blunderland
Collusion Runs Through It
and many, many more.
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Inexplicably, Don Jr. has a book deal. Naturally, therefore, the tag #DonJrBookTitles is trending on Twitter.
I assume this is a coloring book.
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and many, many more.
Crime and Punishment
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The Brothers KaraJackOff
Gone with the Chin
A Man for all Treasons
The Boy Schmuck Club
Children of a Lesser Man
I Know Why the Caged Bird was Trophy Hunted
The Alt-Right Stuff
Mopey Dick
Hairy Trumper and the Morally Hollows
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The Alt-Right Stuff
This one, this one's a keeper. You might be quite pleased with such an achomlishment.
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The Alt-Right Stuff is up there with The Brat in the Hat.
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Crime and Punishment
Crime and Pardonment
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Crime and Pardonment
Of course. What is wrong with me?
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As he walked to the podium in the Rose Garden for his on-the-fly, completely out-of-the-blue press conference yesterday - that was complete with printed handouts and a banner - Trump held his handwritten notes in such a way that photographers were able to get a snap or two of them. The notes were just the usual list of perceived grievances and whataboutism, but the thing that stood out for me was that they included one note to remind him to say that the Dems had no accomplishments. Hmmm.
Despite the fact that the House has passed over 100 bills that McConnell has left to rot in his office trash can, Trump spelled "accomplishments" - handwritten, don't forget - as "achomlishments". Maybe, it was one of his staffers who can't even spell phonetically but, tellingly, it was written in thick black Sharpie...
Today , Trump described Rex Tillerson - who he picked to be his first Secretary of State - as "dumb as a rock". Tillerson, of course, has been reported to have called Trump a "fucking moron". The best people, amirite?
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Today , Trump described Rex Tillerson - who he picked to be his first Secretary of State - as "dumb as a rock".
He said Tillerson was ill-equipped and ill-prepared to be Secretary of State. I wonder if he remembers that he appointed him or if he thinks he was an Obama holdover or what.
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Theresa May is out. Limey, I understand very little about Brexit. What is your prediction on the final outcome, or will it just be strung along endlessly?
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Theresa May is out. Limey, I understand very little about Brexit. What is your prediction on the final outcome, or will it just be strung along endlessly?
In the words of Mr. T, “Prediction? Pain.”
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Theresa May is out. Limey, I understand very little about Brexit. What is your prediction on the final outcome, or will it just be strung along endlessly?
I honestly have no idea how this will go. Gun to my head, I’d say hard Brexit, i.e. falling out of the EU with no agreement in place. The Brexit campaign was breathtakingly corrupt and based entirely on the fake premise that Britain could keep all the stuff it liked from the EU, while still getting out. Europe was consistent in saying that this was nonsense and would never happen.
When the Brexit vote squeaked to a narrow victory, every leader in the Brexit movement quit. They knew it was impossible. The PM Cameron quit, because this was his fucking mess in the first place and was replaced by May, who was anti-Brexit. She prostituted the government to a fringe group in order to maintain a majority, and has been getting told to fuck off ever since by everyone from Aberdeen to Azerbaijan. Every Brexit proposal put to a vote in Parliament has gone down.
So now it’s very possible that Boris Johnson - the Clown Prince of Brexit - will be the new PM. If that happens, think of the worst thing possible, double it, and you’ll still fall short of how bad things will get.
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I honestly have no idea how this will go. Gun to my head, I’d say hard Brexit, i.e. falling out of the EU with no agreement in place. The Brexit campaign was breathtakingly corrupt and based entirely on the fake premise that Britain could keep all the stuff it liked from the EU, while still getting out. Europe was consistent in saying that this was nonsense and would never happen.
When the Brexit vote squeaked to a narrow victory, every leader in the Brexit movement quit. They knew it was impossible. The PM Cameron quit, because this was his fucking mess in the first place and was replaced by May, who was anti-Brexit. She prostituted the government to a fringe group in order to maintain a majority, and has been getting told to fuck off ever since by everyone from Aberdeen to Azerbaijan. Every Brexit proposal put to a vote in Parliament has gone down.
So now it’s very possible that Boris Johnson - the Clown Prince of Brexit - will be the new PM. If that happens, think of the worst thing possible, double it, and you’ll still fall short of how bad things will get.
I think it's very likely a determined PM could force a hard Brexit in the fall, which of course would be a disaster.
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I think it's very likely a determined PM could force a hard Brexit in the fall, which of course would be a disaster.
At which point Scotland will secede.
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At which point Scotland will secede.
And the Welsh contingent of secessionists counted in the 1’s will start to gain followers.
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And the inevitable Irish reunification.
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And the inevitable Irish reunification.
Sure to come off without a hitch.
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That one-way Mars mission is starting to look more attractive.
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Today Trump wish his hosts a “Happy Memorial Day”. His hosts are the Japanese.
At least he will be in Britain on the 4th of June.
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Mueller to give a statement today at 10am CDT. No questions allowed afterwards. I'll get excited if and when Mueller says something meaningful that's not edited for public consumption by Barr.
Oh, and Michael Wolff has a new book out that we can all ignore but the press is wanking over like they're a 13-year old with his first copy of National Geographic.
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Mueller to give a statement today at 10am CDT.
/approaches podium
//taps mic
“Game of Thrones seasons 7&8 were some real bullshit.”
/leaves without questions
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So, if you haven''t read Justin Amash's Twitter threads about why he thinks Trump should be run out of the White House on a rail, then you should. It's the kind of sober, point-by-point, principled without grandstanding, demolition of the arguments against impeaching while painstakingly making the arguments for impeachment that Democrats could do worse than copy and paste onto their campaign websites. He also has another thread where he does the same to Bill Barr, stripping him to the bone marrow.
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Mueller to give a statement today at 10am CDT.
Are Barr's strings going to be attached to him?
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Are Barr's strings going to be attached to him?
Not any more.
Says his work is over and he's leaving the DOJ. As a private citizen, he can choose to do things like testify in front of Congress without requiring permission from his former bosses.
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So, if you haven''t read Justin Amash's Twitter threads about why he thinks Trump should be run out of the White House on a rail, then you should. It's the kind of sober, point-by-point, principled without grandstanding, demolition of the arguments against impeaching while painstakingly making the arguments for impeachment that Democrats could do worse than copy and paste onto their campaign websites. He also has another thread where he does the same to Bill Barr, stripping him to the bone marrow.
He's clearly one of the only people on capitol hill who has actually read the Mueller report. There's no way to fairly read it and reach any other conclusion than the president first placed his (and Russia's) interest over the nation's, denied and worked to cover up the extent of Russian interference on his behalf, and then committed multiple felonies to interfere with the investigation into that interference.
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In what little I saw, it looked like Mueller is refusing to do any more than what he's done. To some extent I get it, but it's still disappointing.
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In what little I saw, it looked like Mueller is refusing to do any more than what he's done. To some extent I get it, but it's still disappointing.
He doesn't want to be part of the shitshow on Capitol Hill. I get that, but it is unavoidable at this point. He wants to testify in private - it's all business and no grandstanding behind closed doors - but we need him on the evening news recounting his findings for the record.
He said today that, if called, he would not speak to anything beyond what is in the report. Fine. When can you be there?
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If we had confidence that the president clearly did not commit a crime, we would have said so.
He couldn't exonerate Trump and he couldn't charge him, so he sent his report up the chain because that's all he could do. The House needs to up its game.
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He couldn't exonerate Trump and he couldn't charge him, so he sent his report up the chain because that's all he could do. The House needs to up its game.
DOJ policy says we could not charge him with any crimes.
If he had not committed any crimes, we would've said so.
It's a pretty straight forward message.
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DOJ policy says we could not charge him with any crimes.
If he had not committed any crimes, we would've said so.
It's a pretty straight forward message.
I've seen it described as a professorial lecture admonishing students for not doing the required reading. Seemed pretty apt.
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Sad!
NEW: The White House wanted the USS John McCain “out of sight” for Trump’s visit to Japan. A tarp was hung over the ship’s name ahead of the trip, and sailors—who wear caps bearing the ship’s name—were given the day off for Trump’s visit.
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If you had a space unchecked on your Trump Federal Investigation bingo card, fear not, you can now x-out Mar-a-Lago (https://www.miamiherald.com/news/politics-government/article230946518.html). The Feds are looking at whether the Rub’n’Tug lady was funneling money from China into Trump’s campaign through his club. Subpoenas have been served.
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Sad!
NEW: The White House wanted the USS John McCain “out of sight” for Trump’s visit to Japan. A tarp was hung over the ship’s name ahead of the trip, and sailors—who wear caps bearing the ship’s name—were given the day off for Trump’s visit.
I have seen this and still can't believe it. Especially as it appears to have been initiated not by Trump, but by those around him in order not to raise his snowflakey temperature by even a fraction of a degree. If so, why the fuck didn't the DOD just tell them to fuck off?
There are reports that the crew of the John McCain weren't invited to hear the president's address (lucky them) and those that tried to go anyway were turned away at the door. Seriously, what the fucking fuck? It took less than three years but we're North Korea now.
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Acting SecDef Shanahan says he doesn't know who gave the orders re: USS John McCain. OK, so find out who and start firing people. Also, you don't have control of the DOD, so you should be fired too.
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I had nothing to do with Russia helping me to get elected.
At least you can now admit it.
These last two days have seen Mueller confirm that they could not find that Trump hadn't committed any crimes, and Trump admitting that Russia helped him get elected. Hmmmm (https://images.app.goo.gl/L1Gus6LwcJgAH5LS7).
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Quote from: @realDonaldTrump
I had nothing to do with Russia helping me to get elected.
That's a dangerous starting point as this statement will crumble under scrutiny.
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That's a dangerous starting point as this statement will crumble under scrutiny.
Yep. But he is admitting - as the Mueller Report lays out in 200-pages of detail - that Russia meddled in the election and helped him win in the process. Since then, though, he has done nothing about preventing it from happening again and has actively prevented those trying to do so, from doing so.
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And the hits keep coming today. The non-partisan Congressional Research Service has published a report on the effects of the GOP tax cuts. Among their findings:
- Increase in GDP was negligible;
- GDP growth was sufficient to offset only 5% of the lost tax revenue (the remaining 95% going on the US' credit cards);
- Corporations used the tax windfall (either lowered tax bills or repatriated revenue) to repurchase shares; and
- Despite the ballyhoo, very little money was used to pay increases or bonuses to workers.
Basically the opposite of what those who were selling this joke then...and now...are claiming.
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But none of those facts will prevent them from saying the exact same things the next time they want to cut taxes. I've been hearing it since Reagan.
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10 years from now everyone is gonna laugh their asses off at the Fucking morons who supported this conman. Hopefully this site doesn’t change domains so we can dig up old threads and mock the shit out of the couple of Dotard supporters
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I mean, if you have ever even thumbed through a history book. And read about dipshits, and thought.....I can’t believe people were so fucking stupid to fall for that dudes BS. That is how history will remember trumpers. Sad!
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I mean, if you have ever even thumbed through a history book. And read about dipshits, and thought.....I can’t believe people were so fucking stupid to fall for that dudes BS. That is how history will remember trumpers. Sad!
This assumes that red states will allow history books without glowing recollections of the Trump administration to ever make it to classrooms. Republicans don't have a great track record with textbooks.
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This assumes that red states will allow history books without glowing recollections of the Trump administration to ever make it to classrooms. Republicans don't have a great track record with textbooks.
Just because you never rode a dinosaur doesn't mean it didn't happen.
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Just because you never rode a dinosaur doesn't mean it didn't happen.
Don’t tell C4
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While Trump and his
kids senior White House advisers are making a spectacle of themselves in London, poor little Jared was left at home which turns out to have been a bad idea. He spent his time making a bigger fool of himself in an interview with Jeremy Swan, in which he failed to answer "yes" or "no" to whether it was racist of his father-in-law boss to engage in birtherism. I haven't seen the whole thing, but apparently Jared had to stop multiple times to have his diaper changed.
Also back in Washington, Mitch McConnell's wife Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao is in hot water because she used her government position to get her family members included in high-level meetings with the Chinese government, and had her staff arrange travel for at least one of them. Of course, these days, not using your position of power to financially benefit yourself and your family will make those around you nervous and suspicious (https://comettv.s3.amazonaws.com/uploads/2017/07/don-suth.jpg).
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its one thing to be hoodwinked into thinking Donald Trump would drain the swamp, but what level of idiocy and delusion does one have to have, to think that’s still the case. I man, surely even folks like Mr Happy have come to realize Trump and his cronies are the swamp.
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Those wascally Brits are having fun with Trump's visit. In addition to flying the Baby Trump blimp, they projected his approval numbers vs. Obama's onto the side of the Tower of London, and the projected a USS John McCain baseball cap onto Madame Tussauds.
The biggest troll of them all, though, maybe Her Majesty herself. Buckingham Palace has over 77 state rooms and guest bedrooms, but the Trumps could not stay there - as did the Clintons, Bushes and Obamas before them - due to renovations.
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Those wascally Brits are having fun with Trump's visit. In addition to flying the Baby Trump blimp, they projected his approval numbers vs. Obama's onto the side of the Tower of London, and the projected a USS John McCain baseball cap onto Madame Tussauds.
That might be enough for him to cut his trip short. His base and Fox News would eat it up.
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The biggest troll of them all, though, maybe Her Majesty herself. Buckingham Palace has over 77 state rooms and guest bedrooms, but the Trumps could not stay there - as did the Clintons, Bushes and Obamas before them - due to renovations.
She's probably worried he would pee the bed.
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She's probably worried he would pee the bed.
[Golf clap]
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Cracks in the wall? More Republicans are coming out against Trump's tax on Mexican imports and the Senate - on a bi-partisan basis including even Lindsey Trump-Gorveler Graham - is planning 22 separate resolutions to try to stop Trump from selling arms to Saudi Arabia.
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Cracks in the wall? More Republicans are coming out against Trump's tax on Mexican imports and the Senate - on a bi-partisan basis including even Lindsey Trump-Gorveler Graham - is planning 22 separate resolutions to try to stop Trump from selling arms to Saudi Arabia.
Don't worry, Trump will smack them back in line. They'll dip their heads, say they're sorry, and get a cookie.
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Don't worry, Trump will smack them back in line. They'll dip their heads, say they're sorry, and get a cookie.
Yes, but what kind of cookie? Chocolate chip or oatmeal raisin? It makes a huge difference for most folks.
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Yes, but what kind of cookie? Chocolate chip or oatmeal raisin? It makes a huge difference for most folks.
oh shit, you left out peanut butter.
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oh shit, you left out peanut butter.
Chocolate chip is the only option for a deal. I walk away at oatmeal raisin, PB...etc. Walk away carrying my head high too. Sometimes you just have to take a stand for what is right.
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Chocolate chip is the only option for a deal. I walk away at oatmeal raisin, PB...etc. Walk away carrying my head high too. Sometimes you just have to take a stand.
you're a total loser, who's probably failing in the ratings too. Peanut butter cookies (I've had both BudGirl's and Astrojo's, btw) are TREMENDOUS!
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you're a total loser, who's probably failing in the ratings too. Peanut butter cookies (I've had both BudGirl's and Astrojo's, btw) are TREMENDOUS!
There is no fence to sit on between chocolate chip and PB. Wrong is wrong no matter the opinion of the majority.
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Yes, but what kind of cookie?
THE BEST
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The acting SecDef is withdrawing from consideration of the position of actual SecDef - and stepping down entirely - because it turns out he’s something of a major douche. Still going to war with Iran, though, son everything is fine.
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The acting SecDef is withdrawing from consideration of the position of actual SecDef - and stepping down entirely - because it turns out he’s something of a major douche. Still going to war with Iran, though, son everything is fine.
He gets to replace the acting SecDef lickspittle with another acting SecDef lickspittle, this one who was a lobbyist for Raytheon. Exciting military bona fides.
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Biden full pike with two and a half twists and into a nuclear face plant. Harris steps over him on the way to kicking everyone else’s ass.
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Biden full pike with two and a half twists and into a nuclear face plant. Harris steps over him on the way to kicking everyone else’s ass.
What did you think about the previous debate?
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Harris is good. She's a tough gal. She is smart and accomplished. I don't know if she has a chance in hell.
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I watched both debates and all I took from it is that the Democrats are probably going to lose. Lose to the crappiest opponent imaginable. Like the Reds sweeping the Astros last week.
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I watched both debates and all I took from it is that the Democrats are probably going to lose. Lose to the crappiest opponent imaginable. Like the Reds sweeping the Astros last week.
They might also have all their candidates as beat to shit as the Astros were by the time they all show up for the proverbial big game.
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They might also have all their candidates as beat to shit as the Astros were by the time they all show up for the proverbial big game.
I really think they need to figure out who their candidate is early so that they can spend the campaign piling on Trump rather than tearing one another apart. But at least right now that doesn't seem likely.
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What did you think about the previous debate?
Didn’t see the first one.
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This foreign trip has been the worst yet. He praised journalist serial killer Putin for not having a free press to worry about, jokes with him about election-rigging, took a closed door meeting with him and invited in only Jarvanka, the latter of whom was allowed to put out the official “read out” of the meeting as a video “book report” that was as pathetic as you’d imagine, praised Kashoggi’s murderer and war criminal MBS, embarrassed us (because he has no shame) about his complete lack of understanding of basic politics such as what is a “western liberal democracy” and sent Kim a “You up?” tweet and got an affirmative response to his booty call which ended up with his new Press Secretary being injured in an “all out brawl” between the press and North Korean
security military.
And as horrendous as all of this was, nothing quite plumbed the depths of cringe-worthiness as Ivanka trying to interject herself into a conversation between world leaders and getting blanked and side-eyed. He really is trying to set her up as his heir to the throne (sorry Jr.). The French delegation gave so few shits about offending Trump that they put out the video clip
And this guy is still the favorite to win in 2020. The way the damage he’s doing is accelerating, the second 4 years will be exponentially worse than the first 4. The third 4 will be The Road. And then Ivanka takes over...
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Details from what FBI found inside Epstein’s $77 Million Manhattan mansion:
- Extraordinary volume of photographs of nude underage girls
- Hundreds perhaps thousands of sexually suggestive photographs of fully or partially nude females.
- Safe containing compact disks with labels
This guy needs to be in Federal pound me in the ass jail without lube for the rest of his life. Same goes for anyone on any of those CDs, be they royalty, former (or current) Presidents, entertainers, anyone. Acosta can join them too as an accessory after the fact, as can any other enablers out there.
Round them all up and throw all the fucking books at them.
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Epstein pleaded not guilty. Prosecutors want him held without bail.
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Details from what FBI found inside Epstein’s $77 Million Manhattan mansion:
- Extraordinary volume of photographs of nude underage girls
- Hundreds perhaps thousands of sexually suggestive photographs of fully or partially nude females.
- Safe containing compact disks with labels
This guy needs to be in Federal pound me in the ass jail without lube for the rest of his life. Same goes for anyone on any of those CDs, be they royalty, former (or current) Presidents, entertainers, anyone. Acosta can join them too as an accessory after the fact, as can any other enablers out there.
Round them all up and throw all the fucking books at them.
Given that all of the right wing's bad faith attacks turn out to be projections of their own behavior, this and the Trump Kentucky campaign chair seem to put the whole pizzagate lunacy into a new perspective.
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Given that all of the right wing's bad faith attacks turn out to be projections of their own behavior, this and the Trump Kentucky campaign chair seem to put the whole pizzagate lunacy into a new perspective.
Every accusation a confession.
Here's the part I don't get about this whole Epstein thing - if you were already a sex offender and you knew that investigators were still interested in you for a variety of reasons, wouldn't you maybe just go ahead and get rid of your child porn?
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Every accusation a confession.
That’s a great line and fits perfectly.
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Here's the part I don't get about this whole Epstein thing - if you were already a sex offender and you knew that investigators were still interested in you for a variety of reasons, wouldn't you maybe just go ahead and get rid of your child porn?
I assume that they gradually become convinced of their invulnerability, especially when one of their own becomes grifter-in-chief.
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I assume that they gradually become convinced of their invulnerability, especially when one of their own becomes grifter-in-chief.
...and you’d already all-but walked on far worse offenses* than child porn, with a non-prosecution agreement in your back pocket.
* If you don’t know what Epstein actually did, watch this (https://youtu.be/1jDPzW9COsU) from the Miami Herald. You may want to step away from anything breakable first, though.
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Embattled Labor Secretary Alex Acosta - who is currently trying to strip 80% of the budget for the prevention of sex trafficking... just think about that for a moment - rake-stepped his way through a Trump-ordered press conference yesterday. He claimed that the environment we are in now - presumably meaning as it relates to child rape - is different than it was all the way back in 2008. He also claimed that he did not have the evidence available now.
Former colleagues have come out and cried "bullshit", saying there was a 53-page Federal indictment ready to go, but it was dropped. Congress is demanding Acosta come and testify as to what the fuck he was thinking; hopefully they will subpoena that draft indictment.
In the meantime, though, Acosta struggled the most with the question that really should be burning up everyone: why were none of Epstein's co-conspirators charged?
There are a lot of people associated with Epstein who frequented his parties. He brought these girls to his parties. 1 + 1 = rot in jail motherfucker. These Epstein-adjacent people include Prince Andrew (one of the girls in the Herald piece mentions servicing "royalty"), Bill Clinton, Alan Dershowitz and one Donald J. Trump, who has described Epstein as a "terrific guy", was a regular at his parties, has hosted at least one of Epstein's parties at Mar-a-Lago and is probably more adjacent to Epstein than he is to Melania. He also has admitted to grabbing pussies without permission and of invading the dressing rooms of his Miss Teen USA pageant contestants, because he could. Miss Teen USA is open to girls between 14 and 19.
Trump has been proved correct that he could shoot someone on 5th Ave and get away with it. He is credibly accused of full-on raping a woman in a New York city department store, yet the media focused on Biden's inappropriate handsiness instead. But can he rape a child - maybe children, plural - and get away with that?
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Every accusation a confession.
Every cop is a criminal and all the sinners saints.
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Trump has been proved correct that he could shoot someone on 5th Ave and get away with it. He is credibly accused of full-on raping a woman in a New York city department store, yet the media focused on Biden's inappropriate handsiness instead. But can he rape a child - maybe children, plural - and get away with that?
Of course he can. Hillary used a private email server. 'Nuff said.
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Embattled Labor Secretary Alex Acosta - who is currently trying to strip 80% of the budget for the prevention of sex trafficking... just think about that for a moment - rake-stepped his way through a Trump-ordered press conference yesterday. He claimed that the environment we are in now - presumably meaning as it relates to child rape - is different than it was all the way back in 2008. He also claimed that he did not have the evidence available now.
Former colleagues have come out and cried "bullshit", saying there was a 53-page Federal indictment ready to go, but it was dropped. Congress is demanding Acosta come and testify as to what the fuck he was thinking; hopefully they will subpoena that draft indictment.
In the meantime, though, Acosta struggled the most with the question that really should be burning up everyone: why were none of Epstein's co-conspirators charged?
There are a lot of people associated with Epstein who frequented his parties. He brought these girls to his parties. 1 + 1 = rot in jail motherfucker. These Epstein-adjacent people include Prince Andrew (one of the girls in the Herald piece mentions servicing "royalty"), Bill Clinton, Alan Dershowitz and one Donald J. Trump, who has described Epstein as a "terrific guy", was a regular at his parties, has hosted at least one of Epstein's parties at Mar-a-Lago and is probably more adjacent to Epstein than he is to Melania. He also has admitted to grabbing pussies without permission and of invading the dressing rooms of his Miss Teen USA pageant contestants, because he could. Miss Teen USA is open to girls between 14 and 19.
Trump has been proved correct that he could shoot someone on 5th Ave and get away with it. He is credibly accused of full-on raping a woman in a New York city department store, yet the media focused on Biden's inappropriate handsiness instead. But can he rape a child - maybe children, plural - and get away with that?
Trump was sued by a woman who claimed he raped her at an Epstein party when she was a child, but she dropped the lawsuit rather than lose anonymity.
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Acosta resigns in scandal.
It's worth remembering that there has been no new information about Acosta between his nomination/confirmation to the position of Labor Secretary and now.
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In other news, Carla Provost, the head of Border Patrol was shocked...SHOCKED...to find that there was
gambling in this establishment a Facebook group of around 9,000 border patrol agents (that's got to be about all of 'em, right?) that was rife with racist and sexist commentary.
Guess who we now know was a member (https://theintercept.com/2019/07/12/border-patrol-chief-carla-provost-was-a-member-of-secret-facebook-group/) of that Facebook group...
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Checks the tape:
No Labor Secretary
Acting DHS Secretary (and no Deputy)
Acting Defense Secretary (and no Deputy)
Acting White House Chief of Staff
Acting CBP Commissioner
Acting ICE Director
Acting USCIS Director
Acting UN Ambassador
Acting FDA Commissioner
Acting OMB Director
Acting Secretary of the Army
Acting Secretary of the Air Force
Acting DHS Under Secretary for Management
No DHS Under Secretary for Science & Technology
No DHS Under Secretary for Strategy
Acting FEMA Director (it’s hurricane season!)
and Ivanka acting as if she's Secretary of State.
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In other news, Carla Provost, the head of Border Patrol was shocked...SHOCKED...to find that there was gambling in this establishment a Facebook group of around 9,000 border patrol agents (that's got to be about all of 'em, right?) that was rife with racist and sexist commentary.
Guess who we now know was a member (https://theintercept.com/2019/07/12/border-patrol-chief-carla-provost-was-a-member-of-secret-facebook-group/) of that Facebook group...
For the most part, people can’t help how they look. Personally, I carry too much weight because I gain too easily, but I also lose it almost as easily so the weight I carry is mostly a lifestyle choice I make. I was losing my hair - nothing I can do about that - so I now shave my head. So there are things we can control about our looks and things we can’t.
I say this as I am torn about what I’m about to say. This (https://pbs.twimg.com/media/D_TllzjXkAA5gXy?format=jpg&name=medium) is Border Patrol Chief Carla Provost. Holy shit!
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Uncle Ranty was in high dudgeon this morning, when he went off on a multi-tweet brazenly racist tirade (https://www.cnn.com/2019/07/14/politics/donald-trump-tweets-democratic-congresswomen-race-nationalities/index.html) aimed at four freshmen Democratic congresswomen of color. He told them to "go back" and "fix the totally broken and crime infested places from which they came," calling the government of their country of birth "corrupt" and "inept".
Three of the four were born in the US so...fact check....DING!
This is only going to get worse. The 2020 strategy is going to be the 2016 strategy if the 2016 strategy snorted Adderall on a daily basis. All racism, all the time. The photo op late last week with Pence, Cornyn et al at a border detention facility was on purpose; they don't care that most of America looked at this with horror, they only care that they reassure their base that they are being as racist as they can as often as they can.
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This is only going to get worse. The 2020 strategy is going to be the 2016 strategy if the 2016 strategy snorted Adderall on a daily basis.
Unfortunately, I think this is going to be true of both parties, which means four more years.
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Unfortunately, I think this is going to be true of both parties, which means four more years.
Possibly, although Trump seemingly is doing everything in his power to unite everyone except his base against him. This morning, he renewed his racist attacks on AOC et al, and announced a change to the rules on how assylum-seekers will be handled at the border. Spoiler alert: it's not to make things better for them.
Don't get fooled by the press, who feel their role is to balance one side against the other. Case in point: "Beto's ancestors owned slaves" is news currently. This is how far the press will stretch to find a story to try to balance their coverage of Trump's racist tweets (that they refuse to call "racist"). The O'Rourke story is a non-story; but here it is high up the front page while Trump is treating human beings...right now and in our name...how Beto's ancestors once treated slaves.
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“Comments some are calling racist” is like “some are calling Hank Aaron a good hitter”
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Possibly, although Trump seemingly is doing everything in his power to unite everyone except his base against him.
Prepare to be underwhelmed. In the eyes of many people I know who hate him but voted for him, he still hasn't done enough to cause them to vote D next year. And the D candidates have plenty of time left to make the slightest of missteps and render themselves unelectable by R voters.
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Prepare to be underwhelmed. In the eyes of many people I know who hate him but voted for him, he still hasn't done enough to cause them to vote D next year. And the D candidates have plenty of time left to make the slightest of missteps and render themselves unelectable by R voters.
Oh, no doubt. At the same time, Trump has a habit of opening his trap when he should leave well alone.
Case in point, there was a potentially damaging in-fight ongoing: Pelosi vs. AOC, Tlaib, Omar and Pressley. Shots had been fired and it had the potential to get out of control and foment a war between the pro-impeachment and con-impeachment camps in the Democratic Party. Then came Uncle Ranty's Sunday morning poop-tweets with a bunch of racist shit aimed at AOC et al, and the potentially damaging Democratic in-fight has been in cease fire ever since.
Trump's ability to self-destruct is going to have a say in the election as much as Democrats ability to alienate moderates. We don't know who is going to step on their genitalia the hardest of the closest to the election, but we do know that we can't yet imagine how bad it's going to get. For a huge ass, Trump has no bottom.
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I do my best to ignore Kellyanne Conway (the same way she ignores laws and Congressional subpoenas) but, today, at a press spray in the driveway of the fucking White House, she responded to a reporter’s question by saying “What’s your ethnicity?”
She is paid by us. That needs to stop.
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PS: The reporter being challenged about his ethnicity by a government official...is Jewish.
Nope! Don't see any majorly disturbing historical parallels there.
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Two huge gut-punches for Trump today. Expectation of which, combined with the imminent testimony from Mueller, may be one of the drivers behind his attention-grabbing tweets (that, and he's an unabashed, incorrigible racist).
1. Background documents from the Cohen trial released today show that Trump was way deeper into the Stormy Daniels hush money payments than he was her vajayjay; and
B. Jeffrey Epstein was denied bail, meaning that he will likely never spend another day in his life not in jail, unless he rolls over and squeals like the baby he is expected to be.
With regard to 1., it implicates all those around him you would expect, including Hope Hicks, but significantly it continued beyond the election and into his time as President.
With regard to B., there are many, many, rich, powerful and famous men who are shitting themselves over this. The collective flushing of toilets in Manhattan executive suites alone may have caused a sewer back up. We are going to be not stunned by the identity of many of these men as they are revealed (Trump, Dershowitz etc.), but there are going to be some that will be shocking and saddening.
The UK went through this a few years back when the English equivalent of Dick Clark - Jimmy Savile - shortly after his death was found out to have been a prolific and disgusting sexual predator of children, with a penchant for somnophilia and necrophilia. Also, he was literally adjacent to many of the killings of the Yorkshire Ripper, whom he visited repeatedly in prison after his capture; believed to be an act of altruism at the time, the unlikely friendship took on a frightening new meaning.
As the investigation delved into Savile's horrendous, life-long sex crime spree, it turned out that he, a long time BBC Radio DJ, was the king pin in a ring of paedophiles working in entertainment, particularly in BBC radio and television. It seemed that each week a new favorite from my past as a child was outed as one of these evil men. It got so bad that when I saw a headline that had the name of famed TV astronomer Sir Patrick Moore in it, I was relieved to find that he had died, rather than been added to the list.
However, justice is justice. Evil men are evil men, whether or not they were entertaining or somehow important in between committing sex crimes. It will be bad, but it's all for the greater good.
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I’m assuming you’re referring to his gut as huge, not the punches.
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One of my favorite bands in a past life was a bunch of misfits from Dayton, OH, called Guided by Voices. They have a song called Closer You Are. The chorus goes, The closer you are, the quicker it hits you.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eTEcNruLS3Y
Played live, when the singer was drunk as hell, which was pretty much always, he would sometimes sing these lines instead:
The fatter you are, the smaller your dick looks.
Not sure why that suddenly occurred to me.
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One of my favorite bands in a past life was a bunch of misfits from Dayton, OH, called Guided by Voices. They have a song called Closer You Are. The chorus goes, The closer you are, the quicker it hits you.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eTEcNruLS3Y
Played live, when the singer was drunk as hell, which was pretty much always, he would sometimes sing these lines instead:
The fatter you are, the smaller your dick looks.
Not sure why that suddenly occurred to me.
Is that Bob Pollard’s band? My buddy really liked them and him and I recall numerous stories about how much he valued beer.
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Is that Bob Pollard’s band? My buddy really liked them and him and I recall numerous stories about how much he valued beer.
'Value' is one way to put it.
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They're still out there (https://www.guidedbyvoices.com/tour) cranking away.
A 'must-see live' band, if only for the unpredictability.
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Trump is the most unfit divisive President ever. It’s amazing to think just a couple years ago Trumpkins were gnashing their teeth over Obama. Now their cowardly fatasses sit on their hands. Sad!
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Congressman: “Could you charge the President with a crime after he left office?”
Mueller: “Yes.”
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Congressman: “Could you charge the President with a crime after he left office?”
Mueller: “Yes.”
NO COLLUSION! NO OBSTRUCTION!
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But the “optics” were terrible, because this is a fucking drama production, not the state of our republic.
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But the “optics” were terrible, because this is a fucking drama production, not the state of our republic.
It's so fucking crazy. The report is pretty clear and should have provoked impeachment hearings the day after it was issued.
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It's so fucking crazy. The report is pretty clear and should have provoked impeachment hearings the day after it was issued.
No doubt. Pelosi was really gone all in on a dangerous hand. Come election time, Trump will say he did nothing, otherwise the Democrats would have impeached him. There is some validity to that assertion, in an odd way.
I don’t have a good idea on the election, but it looks more favorable toTrump today than it did a year ago.
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I don’t have a good idea on the election, but it looks more favorable toTrump today than it did a year ago.
I'm afraid his strategy of normalizing his appalling behavior has worked. Boiling frog and all that. I fear that absent some galvanizing event (and I shudder to think what that might be), there's going to be enough apathy on the left that he'll be able to use his gerrymandered electoral votes to squeak into another term. It's an incredibly depressing thought.
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It's so fucking crazy. The report is pretty clear and should have provoked impeachment hearings the day after it was issued.
They should be pulling an all-nighter drafting impeachment documents right now.
This is crazy pills time. Mueller has said the President should be charged with the crimes for which he laid out substantial, comprehensive and damning evidence in his report and reiterated in his testimony today. It’s Congress’ job; do that fucking job.
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He’s 100% getting re-elected, and today was a debacle.
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Congressman: “Could you charge the President with a crime after he left office?”
Mueller: “Yes.”
I read about this exchange, but now I have seen it. Unlike almost every written work, this is waaay better on film. It was a question from a Republican congressman, who was incredulous at Mueller’s quick, forceful and unequivocal response. So he asked it again, and got the same response, just better than before. Better, stronger, faster.
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I'm afraid his strategy of normalizing his appalling behavior has worked. Boiling frog and all that. I fear that absent some galvanizing event (and I shudder to think what that might be), there's going to be enough apathy on the left that he'll be able to use his gerrymandered electoral votes to squeak into another term. It's an incredibly depressing thought.
“States” is not how gerrymandering works.
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“States” is not how gerrymandering works.
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Wrong term, right result.
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Wrong term, right result.
It's entirely conceivable that Trump could get buried in the popular vote in 2020 and still win the electoral college. Democratic enthusiasm to vote against the motherfucker could swell the vote counts in populous states like California, New York and even Texas, while making fuck-all difference to the actual result.
The Democrat needs to win the Clinton states plus Michigan, Pennsylvania and one of either Wisconsin or Arizona. Michigan and Pennsylvania are showing signs of leaning democrat, but Wisconsin and Arizona are toss-ups at best. It was no accident that Manafort was sharing internal Trump campaign polling data on these three rust belt states with his Russian cut-out. It will be no accident when it happens again.
Barring shock results in Florida or Texas, this election will come down to who wins Wisconsin and Arizona. Everyone knows it; including Uncle Vlad.
#democracy
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“States” is not how gerrymandering works.
Yeah, I understand. I was too lazy to go back and change it.
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I recorded the debate, to watch after the Astros game. CNN is fucking atrocious. Instead of a lead in where you educate the public, then ask a question designed to ferret out differences between the candidates, they ask a stupid gotcha question on a misunderstood topic. Then, the candidates are forced to try to reframe the question in a way that might stir useful discussion, but before they can they are interrupted by the dipshit CNN morons.
Seriously, this type of debate is a disservice to all.
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I recorded the debate, to watch after the Astros game. CNN is fucking atrocious. Instead of a lead in where you educate the public, then ask a question designed to ferret out differences between the candidates, they ask a stupid gotcha question on a misunderstood topic. Then, the candidates are forced to try to reframe the question in a way that might stir useful discussion, but before they can they are interrupted by the dipshit CNN morons.
Seriously, this type of debate is a disservice to all.
I didn’t watch, but CNN is the Trump of shitty political coverage.
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In the hours after the El Paso shooting, Mitch McConnell's campaign posted a photo of gravestones at a rally, one of which is for Amy McGrath, his current campaign opponent (https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/mcgrath-blasts-mcconnell-over-photo-depicting-her-name-on-a-gravestone/2019/08/05/577362e0-b7ae-11e9-b3b4-2bb69e8c4e39_story.html). You've gotta be fucking kidding me.
But hey, it's the liberals and their violent rhetoric.
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In the hours after the El Paso shooting, Mitch McConnell's campaign posted a photo of gravestones at a rally, one of which is for Amy McGrath, his current campaign opponent (https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/mcgrath-blasts-mcconnell-over-photo-depicting-her-name-on-a-gravestone/2019/08/05/577362e0-b7ae-11e9-b3b4-2bb69e8c4e39_story.html). You've gotta be fucking kidding me.
But hey, it's the liberals and their violent rhetoric.
Can anyone name one redeeming quality of Moscow Mitch??
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Can anyone name one redeeming quality of Moscow Mitch??
You gotta remember that these people presumably represent the views of their state, or at least those who vote in their state. There's trainloads of support for his actions and his views in Kentucky.
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Can anyone name one redeeming quality of Moscow Mitch??
He encourages young men to pose in his campaign t-shirts while choking a cardboard cutout of AOC.
Eh? Oh.
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Can anyone name one redeeming quality of Moscow Mitch??
I like turtles.
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I like turtles.
I love lamp
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I like turtles.
alkie, is that you?
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Waiting to see if Hannity et al will pursue the Epstein suicide with the same vigor as their Clinton/Foster fever dream.
Not.
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Waiting to see if Hannity et al will pursue the Epstein suicide with the same vigor as their Clinton/Foster fever dream.
Not.
Why would they not? This pretty much secures the White House for Trump in 2020.
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Waiting to see if Hannity et al will pursue the Epstein suicide with the same vigor as their Clinton/Foster fever dream.
Not.
Or like the vigor of the James McDougal death while incarcerated. Or a combination of the two.
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Or like the vigor of the James McDougal death while incarcerated. Or a combination of the two.
Damn, some people can’t get past their Clinton paranoias. An oddity of the human species.
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Waiting to see if Hannity et al will pursue the Epstein suicide with the same vigor as their Clinton/Foster fever dream.
Not.
In the sense that they are claiming Hillary arranged for Epstein's murder?
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In the sense that they are claiming Hillary arranged for Epstein's murder?
Well, that certainly wasn't the twist I was expecting. Once again, I have been outmaneuvered.
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Well, that certainly wasn't the twist I was expecting. Once again, I have been outmaneuvered.
Remember that whole "Blame the other side for all the shit we've done" game plan they've executed so well so far?
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Remember that whole "Blame the other side for all the shit we've done" game plan they've executed so well so far?
What was it Chuck said..."every accusation a confession"?
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What was it Chuck said..."every accusation a confession"?
Trump already floating conspiracy theories that Clinton had Epstein killed. You know Hannity, who worships the toilet in which Trump shits, is not going to let this go. Ever.
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While complacency is and would be a terrible thing, here's the latest state polling on Trump's job approval (https://civiqs.com/results/approve_president_trump?annotations=true&uncertainty=true&zoomIn=true&utm_campaign=ticker); the state-by-state numbers being important because that's how the game is played.
Trump is underwater in:
- Michigan (by 11)
- Pennsylvania (by 12)
- Wisconsin (by 10)
- North Carolina (by 9)
- Virginia (by 17)
- Utah (by 3)
- Texas (by 1)
- New Hampshire (by 26) (not a typo)
- Iowa (by 4)
- Arizona (by 9)
- Colorado (by 18)
- Florida (by 3)
- Georgia (by 5)
- Minnesota (by 15)
- Nevada (by 23)
- New Mexico (by 9)
- Ohio (by 2)
Also with:
- Independents (by 10)
- Women (by 25)
- Every age group except over 65s
- Every ethnic group except whites
While the Democrats' path to 270 is narrow, Trump's is narrower than his baby fingers wrapped around his micropenis. In 2016 he threaded the needle by < 80,000 votes across MI, PA & WI and, right now, his job performance is disapproved of by double-digits in each of those uber-critical states. He's also underwater in Ohio, Florida, Arizona, Texas, Georgia and U-fucking-tah. Job disapproval doesn't necessarily translate into votes - hence the eleventying-down on the racism - but he can't afford to lose a single state he won last time and right now he's in danger of losing a lot of them.
It's the economy, stupid. And while the Dow is good, that isn't trickling down to the miners and car workers and many, many others for whom he promised to make things great again. He's also chopped off farmers at the knees and is trying desperately not to fuck up holiday shopping.
"His" people are the ones taking it in the ass the most; they should be the ones to run him out of the White House on a rail - a heavily reinforced, steel rail - directly into the waiting cuffs of a NY state trooper.
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While complacency is and would be a terrible thing, here's the latest state polling on Trump's job approval (https://civiqs.com/results/approve_president_trump?annotations=true&uncertainty=true&zoomIn=true&utm_campaign=ticker); the state-by-state numbers being important because that's how the game is played.
Trump is underwater in:
- Michigan (by 11)
- Pennsylvania (by 12)
- Wisconsin (by 10)
- North Carolina (by 9)
- Virginia (by 17)
- Utah (by 3)
- Texas (by 1)
- New Hampshire (by 26) (not a typo)
- Iowa (by 4)
- Arizona (by 9)
- Colorado (by 18)
- Florida (by 3)
- Georgia (by 5)
- Minnesota (by 15)
- Nevada (by 23)
- New Mexico (by 9)
- Ohio (by 2)
Also with:
- Independents (by 10)
- Women (by 25)
- Every age group except over 65s
- Every ethnic group except whites
While the Democrats' path to 270 is narrow, Trump's is narrower than his baby fingers wrapped around his micropenis. In 2016 he threaded the needle by < 80,000 votes across MI, PA & WI and, right now, his job performance is disapproved of by double-digits in each of those uber-critical states. He's also underwater in Ohio, Florida, Arizona, Texas, Georgia and U-fucking-tah. Job disapproval doesn't necessarily translate into votes - hence the eleventying-down on the racism - but he can't afford to lose a single state he won last time and right now he's in danger of losing a lot of them.
It's the economy, stupid. And while the Dow is good, that isn't trickling down to the miners and car workers and many, many others for whom he promised to make things great again. He's also chopped off farmers at the knees and is trying desperately not to fuck up holiday shopping.
"His" people are the ones taking it in the ass the most; they should be the ones to run him out of the White House on a rail - a heavily reinforced, steel rail - directly into the waiting cuffs of a NY state trooper.
There isn't a policy implemented that does not try to harm someone weaker than themselves. I have no faith in the American people that vote to do the right thing to save this country. I am just going to do what I can to try and make it better.
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There isn't a policy implemented that does not try to harm someone weaker than themselves. I have no faith in the American people that vote to do the right thing to save this country. I am just going to do what I can to try and make it better.
I do not believe for a second that Trump will not win Texas, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin. He will win a second term easily. It simply doesn't matter what ridiculous or evil thing he does or how he hurts people. People will believe they deserved it and God wanted them to be punished by such a godly and honorable man. Plus, Hillary used a private server.
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I do not believe for a second that Trump will not win Texas, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin. He will win a second term easily. It simply doesn't matter what ridiculous or evil thing he does or how he hurts people. People will believe they deserved it and God wanted them to be punished by such a godly and honorable man. Plus, Hillary used a private server.
You are right. My sister said this weekend that Hillary was more evil than Trump. On what good green earth is that true? My brother uses bible verses out of context to say the right is just and the left is foolish. I have no doubt you are right. As a country we are going to reap what we sow.
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You are right. My sister said this weekend that Hillary was more evil than Trump. On what good green earth is that true? My brother uses bible verses out of context to say the right is just and the left is foolish. I have no doubt you are right. As a country we are going to reap what we sow.
And make no mistake...2020 will be Trump v Hillary again. No matter who the Dems run, it will be a referendum on Hillary.
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There isn't a policy implemented that does not try to harm someone weaker than themselves. I have no faith in the American people that vote to do the right thing to save this country. I am just going to do what I can to try and make it better.
"Nobody ever went broke by underestimating the intelligence of the American public."
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Trump already floating conspiracy theories that Clinton had Epstein killed. You know Hannity, who worships dines from the toilet in which Trump shits, is not going to let this go. Ever.
FIFY
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Trump's re-election strategy is to run 2016 again; it's a purely base-based play. He's going to go full bore on racial and social grievance. Of course, he's been president for 4 years and, for many of those who gave him a try in 2016, he's made life significantly worse or, at best, has not moved their situation one iota upwards. Coal jobs are not coming back, the manufacturing jobs he'd said he'd protect are still leaving and - notably - the GOP cannot get away from its Quixotic tilting against Obamacare*.
Trump is still wildly popular with self-identified Republicans. What that doesn't tell you is that Trump is boiling off the moderates, notably including suburban women, so that he's wildly popular with a shrinking pool of voters. The economy isn't working for his core voter - the white, non-college educated man - and it's quite possibly going to tank worse than 2008 before we get to the election**.
While I get that it's no slam dunk, he's going to need a longer series of miracles to pull off the shock he did in 2016. Of course, there is still the possibility that the Democrats will hand it to him on a plate or that Russian interference will evolve from Facebook brain washing to simple vote tally hacking, but he's heavily underwater in a lot of the states he cannot lose and he alone will not be able to reverse that trend.
If the Dems don't shit the bed and Trump stays the course, the only variable I see here is guns. It's going to be a big issue, and Democratic primary candidates are going to start running hard to the left on it. Republicans are nothing but consistent in their ability to be rallied around a single cause, and gun reform could be that issue the same way gay marriage and abortion rights have been in the past. But then, it could go the other way if the pitch is delivered correctly, because a lot of "real Americans" are scared to go to Walmart right now, and could be moved towards reform by the right proposal.
* Lindsey Graham's being the most recent, on the record, promise to repeal Obamacare. The lunacy of it being that they've already stripped away the unpopular stuff, so all this does is take away all the popular stuff.
** The Dow tanked 800 points today and many are predicting a recession (even 2008 didn't see us going backwards). Because Trump has already blown stimulating moves like tax cuts, and interest rates are already low, he has absolutely no economic tools left to bring to bear on a backsliding economy, even if he had the first clue how to use them.
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The Dems can still win in 2020. I'm looking forward to the Gabbard VS Harris cat fight. Two women that needed not to ride a president's coat tails to eminence. Seriously, Hilary Clinton?!?!?! Oh well, it almost worked, #ANARCHISTFORANYONEBUTTRUmP
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And in typically unremarkable news Trump today said that Jews that vote Democratic (read 80% of American Jews) are disloyal and he is cancelling a trip to Denmark because they won’t discuss selling Greenland.
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And in typically unremarkable news Trump today said that Jews that vote Democratic (read 80% of American Jews) are disloyal and he is cancelling a trip to Denmark because they won’t discuss selling Greenland.
Yes, very disloyal to the 2nd coming of God. Well he didn't actually say that himself. He was just tweeting a tweet when someone else said it.
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Yes, very disloyal to the 2nd coming of God. Well he didn't actually say that himself. He was just tweeting a tweet when someone else said it.
He just walked out on the WH lawn and said “I am the chosen one.”
I wish I were joking.
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The President of the United States is decompensating right in front of us, but THIS IS FINE.
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The President of the United States is decompensating right in front of us, but THIS IS FINE.
New day, new shit. I found this excerpt in a WaPo article on Trump further fucking up trade. It’s sadly funny:
”The instruction for U.S. firms to leave China was quite stunning. I’m completely surprised by it,” said Alison Acosta Winters, senior policy fellow at Americans for Prosperity, a conservative group. She said there was “tremendous concern” among lawmakers, including congressional Republicans, about the direction of the trade war, which has hogtied the world’s two most powerful economic engines for more than a year.
Rather than owning the libs, this is something new. Their fucking monster is tearing more shit up and there will be more damage to follow.
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New day, new shit. I found this excerpt in a WaPo article on Trump further fucking up trade. It’s sadly funny:
Rather than owning the libs, this is something new. Their fucking monster is tearing more shit up and there will be more damage to follow.
To paraphrase Alfred: rather than admit a mistake, he'll burn it all to the ground.
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To paraphrase Alfred: rather than admit a mistake, he'll burn it all to the ground.
Before he took office, people who’d reported on Trump over the years, predicted exactly this.
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Before he took office, people who’d reported on Trump over the years, predicted exactly this.
Heard on the radio this morning that he was seriously asking his "cabinet" why we couldn't drop a nuke on a hurricane in the Atlantic to keep it from hitting the US.
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Heard on the radio this morning that he was seriously asking his "cabinet" why we couldn't drop a nuke on a hurricane in the Atlantic to keep it from hitting the US.
Why not just build a wall? That'll keep them out. #@Making weather great again.
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Why not just build a wall? That'll keep them out. #@Making weather great again.
Who's gonna pay for that wall, though?
Just in case anyone thought I was joking: https://www.axios.com/trump-nuclear-bombs-hurricanes-97231f38-2394-4120-a3fa-8c9cf0e3f51c.html
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Who's gonna pay for that wall, though?
Just in case anyone thought I was joking: https://www.axios.com/trump-nuclear-bombs-hurricanes-97231f38-2394-4120-a3fa-8c9cf0e3f51c.html
Radiation and high winds go together like peanut butter and jelly
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Radiation and high winds go together like peanut butter and jelly
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Like well done steak and ketchup
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Sooooo much shit last week:
* He cancelled a visit to Denmark even though they tried really hard not to laugh at him for wanting to buy Greenland
* He called the Fed Chair - for whom he fired the completely competent Janet Yellen to install - an enemy of America
* He called President Xi an enemy of America
* He ordered US companies to start seeking alternative trading partners from China (while every scrap of MAGA-shit, Ivanka-shit and Lahren-shit is made in China)
* He claimed that the most frequent question he got from the other leaders at the G7 was "Why does your press hate America so much and want it to fail?"
* He skipped out on the climate session at the G7
* He claimed he missed the climate session because he was meeting with the leaders of Germany and India
* The leaders of Germany and India were at the climate session
* He proclaimed the next G7 will be at his struggling Doral resort
* He complained loudly in public and even louder in private that Putin wasn't allowed in the G-club anymore
* He claimed Obama lost a part of the Ukraine (but couldn't remember which part)
* He claimed Melania has come to know mass-murderer Kim Jong Un to be a nice guy
* Melania has never met Kim - that was his other wife, Ivanka
* He claimed he has had second thoughts about his trade war with China (which , at this point, is lost)
* He claimed he has had second thoughts about having second thoughts about his trade war with China
I left off the nuking hurricanes thing because it was mentioned above and it's story about prior statements. It's a concept that's debunked in about 20 seconds by any expert: hurricanes put out the equivalent energy of a 10-megaton warhead about every 20 minutes, a hurricane would not even blink if hit by a nuke. The really scary part of this story is that Trump has brought up this "option" multiple times during his presidency.
Multiple. Times.
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From the "you think you've got problems" file: across the pond, Posh Trump is petitioning the Queen to suspend parliament until literally a day or two before Brexit happens. This does two things:
1) Removes the democratically elected representatives from the decision-making process around perhaps the most consequential and far-reaching decision the country has ever faced; and
B) Puts the Queen in an historic, and historically untenable, position.
To wit, as the head of the government, the Queen has the ability to step in here and torpedo this anti-democratic, despotian move by Boris. What Johnson is doing to suspending parliament so that it can't hold a vote of no confidence which, if passed, forces him to dissolve his government and hold an election. Conceivably, an election could bring to power a government that is pro-remain and thus kill Brexit, so Johnson is suspending parliament to stop himself from being forced out of office just so he can crash through his own version of Brexit - which is just leaping of a cliff and expecting Trump to catch him. It's breathtakingly anti-democratic (insert clapping Putin gif here).
The Queen has the power to stop him; she can dissolve the government by decree, but it's a bullet she gets to fire once for the remainder of time. Such an exercise of monarchical power - even if for the greater good - will almost certainly mean the end of such a power. Pretty much the last monarch to do so had his head chopped off. The UK is in the ever-shrinking minority of countries operating without a written constitution, and calls for there to be one have been growing of late and will get even louder because of all the shit being pulled over Brexit. In such a constitution, it's inconceivable that the monarchy will retain anything like the authority it has now (if any at all), so every monarch over the last few hundred years has kept this one bullet in the magazine with the safety catch firmly on.
But, right now, the Queen is the only person who can stop Johnson railroading through his preferred "hard" Brexit. Will she pull the trigger? It's all happening right now...
ETA: She didn't. Parliament suspended for 5 weeks.
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The whole world is being run by cowards.
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Thanks, I had just assumed Parliament tested positive for PEDs from petrol station boner pills.
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Thanks, I had just assumed Parliament tested positive for PEDs from petrol station boner pills.
That's not what's making Brexit hard...
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Meanwhile, Deutschedramat has responded to a court order to state whether they have certain documents relating to Trump's finances, including his tax returns. A source told Lawrence O'Donnell that the bank confirmed they had some (or some parts) of Trump's tax returns, and also that some of his loans had Russian co-signers.
By way of confirmation, Trump's lawyers are threatening O'Donnell with legal action.
The possibility that he has Russian co-signers on loans should be a blaring, giant, off the charts scandal. It isn't.
BTW, on this very day in 2014, Obama wore a tan suit to the White House briefing room, and conservatives proclaimed the end of civilization as we know it.
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Meanwhile, Deutschedramat has responded to a court order to state whether they have certain documents relating to Trump's finances, including his tax returns. A source told Lawrence O'Donnell that the bank confirmed they had some (or some parts) of Trump's tax returns, and also that some of his loans had Russian co-signers.
By way of confirmation, Trump's lawyers are threatening O'Donnell with legal action.
The possibility that he has Russian co-signers on loans should be a blaring, giant, off the charts scandal. It isn't.
BTW, on this very day in 2014, Obama wore a tan suit to the White House briefing room, and conservatives proclaimed the end of civilization as we know it.
O’Donnell acknowledged this was single-sourced and should not have been reported.
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O’Donnell acknowledged this was single-sourced and should not have been reported.
I just saw that, and I agree.
But we're existing in a world of asymmetric realities where the president can say made-up shit all day long, but a journalist has to apologize for reporting something - that could well be 100% true - but for which he has only one source.
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I just saw that, and I agree.
But we're existing in a world of asymmetric realities where the president can say made-up shit all day long, but a journalist has to apologize for reporting something - that could well be 100% true - but for which he has only one source.
But what if that source has as casual a relationship with the truth as the President?
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But what if that source has as casual a relationship with the truth as the President?
True. And it undermines the news to put out something like that too quickly so as to give Trump the ability to declare it fake news, so that if and when it gets proved out, it has far less impact or reach. You come at the Trump...
But it's still a weird theme of these times that journalists often end up apologizing to Trump for their reportage.
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Given what Posh Trump is up to in Limeyland, how long before Daddy Trump tweets out that he's poro...purogo...prero...firing Congress?
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True. And it undermines the news to put out something like that too quickly so as to give Trump the ability to declare it fake news, so that if and when it gets proved out, it has far less impact or reach. You come at the Trump...
To me this is the most important thing out there. What might be the most brilliant decision the Founders made was guaranteeing a free press. Complete independence from government is beyond vital. When they do their job right they are THE most important check on government. We the people need them and rely on them to be accurate AND complete. When they are the service they provide is immeasurable. When they let other things, like allowing themselves to be in bed with one of the parties, get in the way of the fullness of their job they compromise themselves and end up fucking over their own impact.
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When they let other things, like allowing themselves to be in bed with one of the parties, get in the way of the fullness of their job they compromise themselves and end up fucking over their own impact.
It hasn’t hurt FOX’s impact.
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It hasn’t hurt FOX’s impact.
What's the most recent polling say about faith in mass media?
That's where they've hurt themselves.
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What's the most recent polling say about faith in mass media?
That's where they've hurt themselves.
It blows my mind that you are treating Fox News as if it were a journalistic enterprise of some sort.
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It blows my mind that you are treating Fox News as if it were a journalistic enterprise of some sort.
I didn't bring up Fox news. I was originally thinking more about print media than tv even though it was tv that spurred the conversation I was referring to.
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To me this is the most important thing out there. What might be the most brilliant decision the Founders made was guaranteeing a free press. Complete independence from government is beyond vital. When they do their job right they are THE most important check on government. We the people need them and rely on them to be accurate AND complete. When they are the service they provide is immeasurable. When they let other things, like allowing themselves to be in bed with one of the parties, get in the way of the fullness of their job they compromise themselves and end up fucking over their own impact.
There is no "free press" anymore, and there may never have been. Journalism has always been--business first. The history of the press is filled with corruption and influence peddling on a multitude of levels. But other than that, I totally agree with you.
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I didn't bring up Fox news. I was originally thinking more about print media than tv even though it was tv that spurred the conversation I was referring to.
Once news departments shifted from being a public service to a for-profit venture (thank you CNN), they were destined to fall afoul of speed over accuracy. That was O'Donnell's crime here, he wanted the scoop so much (to please his audience and thus his advertisers) that he didn't wait for it to be confirmed.
Fox News just hammers the same made-up crap 24/7.
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So today Trump went full on crazy suggesting he be given back time as President that was "stolen" due to his many scandals. I guess that's sort of how "injury time" works in soccer?
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So today Trump went full on crazy suggesting he be given back time as President that was "stolen" due to his many scandals. I guess that's sort of how "injury time" works in soccer?
So, no need for an election, just extend his term??? Yeah, that's democracy at work.
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So, no need for an election, just extend his term??? Yeah, that's democracy at work.
I'm sure he was "just joking".
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/why-cant-we-use-nuclear-weapons-against-bedbugs/2019/08/28/c5cb6b20-c9c4-11e9-a4f3-c081a126de70_story.html
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Cavuto crushed Trump on foxnews today.
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I assume trump will have some sort of nickname for him by tomorrow.
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Cavuto crushed Trump on foxnews today.
Appeasing the advertisers. They’ll be back to mushroom gorveling soon enough.
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Just in case you bought into Trump's head fake - that he'd be spending the weekend at Camp David monitoring the plight of millions of
voters citizens - he took a helicopter from there to his Virginia golf resort where he will spend the rest of the weekend golfing, verbally harassing the undocumented male workers and sexually harassing the undocumented female workers.
I truly fear for the people in the path of this storm. Trump has, just this week, pulled nearly $300 million from FEMA - over $150 million of it from the disaster relief fund - to pay for ICE and his other border nonsense. Also, by now, the competent staff in every government agency has been whittled down to almost nothing, so the chances of this not being a Katrina-esque horror show is slim to none. It's mostly down to the hurricane, at this point.
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The other day, Trump issued a tweet suggesting that Alabama could be impacted by Dorian. The National Weather Service immediately corrected him, saying that there will no impacts to Alabama. Today Trump called that a "phony report by a lightweight reporter" and insisted that he was correct, not the NWS.
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Meanwhile Pence is in Ireland so he is of course staying at Trump's resort on the western side of the island and flying 180 miles to attend meetings in Dublin. He even has the gall to say that Trump "suggested" he stay there. The corruption is banal at this point.
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Meanwhile Pence is in Ireland so he is of course staying at Trump's resort on the western side of the island and flying 180 miles to attend meetings in Dublin. He even has the gall to say that Trump "suggested" he stay there. The corruption is banal at this point.
Pence said he checked with Trump's people and they approved it, so it's perfectly legit. I wish I made that up.
Plus, he's getting an employee discount.
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Limey, can you decode all of the latest Brexit developments from today?
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I'd love Limey's take too. I thought THIS (http://"https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2019/09/brexit-boris-johnson-parliament-democracy.html") article was informative, and it's worth a click for the photo alone. They predict a new general election.
Quote relevant to this thread:While, from the perspective of this non-British observer, Brexit seems like a very bad idea, the arguments of many Remainers and People’s Vote proponents also often seem to boil down to: The voters did something dumb, so it shouldn’t count. As an American in 2019, I certainly sympathize with the sentiment, but whatever that argument is, it’s not “democratic.”
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I honestly don’t know WTF is going on in great detail. What it does seem to be, to me at least, is a continuation of the same self-serving power games that opened this Pandora’s Box in the first place. David Cameron - who deserves to be put in the stocks for about a year - initiated the Brexit referendum to placate his far-right party faction in order to consolidate his position as Prime Minister (which was shaky at the time). Well the lazy fuck never thought it would be close so he didn’t bother to put a minimum threshold on it (like there was to get in)..
Fast-forward 3 years and Posh Trump is a PM who is in desperate need of consolidating his position as Prime Minister etc. etc. Yada yada yada.
Brexit has ripped apart the country and the political system. Johnson won’t get any Brexit plan passed just as May couldn’t before him. His call for an election is either a Hail Mary to get a better majority but it could just as easily be a plan to get voted into the minority so that he’s off the hook and can go back to obstruction because that’s so much easier than actually fucking doing something.
But don’t listen to me, because I really have no clue. Here’s Jonathan Pye with another mid-report rant (https://youtu.be/bjghJ6Dy6Do).
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I'd love Limey's take too. I thought THIS (http://"https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2019/09/brexit-boris-johnson-parliament-democracy.html") article was informative, and it's worth a click for the photo alone. They predict a new general election.
Quote relevant to this thread:
The initial referendum was flawed both procedurally (there should be more than a simple majority to effect such existential change) and substantively (nobody knew what specific plan they were voting for or against).
It makes sense to me that following the referendum, which was non-binding, the people would be able to vote on the various options negotiated as a result of the initial vote, with the understanding that it was a directive to explore possibilities to leave. Once they could choose amongst concrete plans, an informed vote could take place. Of course, this history could be a figment of my imagination but it’s what always made sense to me.
I don’t understand the argument that “if we knew then what we know now we would never have done that” is somehow a subversion of democracy. Let the people speak.
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Sweary comedian Stewart Lee discusses Brexit (https://youtu.be/uovt1sC3rtM). Later in the same set he discussed Trump (https://youtu.be/YKS6KNwAhPw).
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Here’s Jonathan Pye with another mid-report rant (https://youtu.be/bjghJ6Dy6Do).
Dicks!
Great.
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I don’t understand the argument that “if we knew then what we know now we would never have done that” is somehow a subversion of democracy. Let the people speak.
Yeah, me neither. In the US if, for example, a president is elected and four years later the majority of voters say, Man, this is fucking crazy, well, you get to try it again. There is no trying it again four years after you leave the EU.
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The other day, Trump issued a tweet suggesting that Alabama could be impacted by Dorian. The National Weather Service immediately corrected him, saying that there will no impacts to Alabama. Today Trump called that a "phony report by a lightweight reporter" and insisted that he was correct, not the NWS.
Now he is showing off a doctored hurricane map (https://twitter.com/JProskowGlobal/status/1169315111636520960) that retroactively includes Alabama in what appears to be crudely drawn sharpie and is insisting it is real.
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Now he is showing off a doctored hurricane map (https://twitter.com/JProskowGlobal/status/1169315111636520960) that retroactively includes Alabama in what appears to be crudely drawn sharpie and is insisting it is real.
This is how much contempt they have for their voters. They know they can do something as ridiculous as this, and it won’t hurt them. Their voters will just accept the sharpie-doctored map as real and continue on without a curious synapse ever firing.
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Voters will just accept the sharpie-doctored map as real and continue on without a curious synapse ever firing.
You misspelled 'elites.'
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This is how much contempt they have for their voters. They know they can do something as ridiculous as this, and it won’t hurt them. Their voters will just accept the sharpie-doctored map as real and continue on without a curious synapse ever firing.
His belief that such a poor job of faking will fool anyone explains how he believes he’s ever given a woman an orgasm.
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18 U.S. Code § 2074
Whoever knowingly issues or publishes any counterfeit weather forecast or warning of weather conditions falsely representing such forecast or warning to have been issued or published by the Weather Bureau, United States Signal Service, or other branch of the Government service, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than ninety days, or both.
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His belief that such a poor job of faking will fool anyone explains how he believes he’s ever given a woman an orgasm.
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Like he would really care about giving a woman an orgasm.
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Like he would really care about giving a woman an orgasm.
trump doesn't give orgasms. he takes them.
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He is mentally unfit to be President. He has absolutely lost his mind. Amazing that there are people so blinded, they can't recognize how batshit crazy this shitbag is.
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Trump's new Middle East coordinator is Jared's assistant Avi Berkowitz. He's 28. He graduated from law school in 2016.
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He is mentally unfit to be President. He has absolutely lost his mind. Amazing that there are people so blinded, they can't recognize how batshit crazy this shitbag is.
And now he's trotting out the Assistant Undersecretary of Whatever-the-fuck to keep digging the hole. Amazing.
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He is mentally unfit to be President. He has absolutely lost his mind. Amazing that there are people so blinded, they can't recognize how batshit crazy this shitbag is.
He continues to pretend that the threat to Alabama from Dorian was ever a thing, now getting government employees to lie on his behalf. Meanwhile, Dorian is fucking up parts of the U.S. not called Alabama, while tens of thousands of people are in desperate need of help in the Bahamas.
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Trump's new Middle East coordinator is Jared's assistant Avi Berkowitz. He's 28. He graduated from law school in 2016.
The person he is replacing was Trump’s real estate attorney. Seriously.
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Today his shitbag campaign manager is advertising for sale on the website "the official Trump marker, which is different than every other marker on the market, because this one has the special ability to drive @CNN and the rest of the fake news crazy!"
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Today his shitbag campaign manager is advertising for sale on the website "the official Trump marker, which is different than every other marker on the market, because this one has the special ability to drive @CNN and the rest of the fake news crazy!"
Man, if I were in charge of the Trump show I would be doing this kind of shit constantly. Trump markers, an oversized Trump driver that is 100% guaranteed to hit straight every time, a Trump tie that goes down to you knees, Trump cages for your unruly kids, grandkids, more probably, decorative mushroom penis candles, those lunatics will buy anything.
One of the biggest flaws in what appears to be a hastily conceived plan is that he ran for president after he quit peddling meat, vodka, water, wine, flights, online classes, who knows what else. Now pretty much all his minions have left is a night at one of the hotels, which would probably stretch the budget of the camouflage to church crowd. I guess they could try to satisfy themselves with one of those penis candles I was mentioning.
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Because the stupid wasn’t already stupid enough, now NOAA has released a statement defending Trump and calling out NWS Birmingham.
Trump’s erosion of respected institutions continues.
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A retirement community on the Rio Grande, full of Trump voters, is now stressed that Trump is going to run his ego wall right through their community (https://www.nytimes.com/2019/09/05/us/border-wall-brownsville-texas.html#click=https://t.co/Uxx1KzQHCA).
Also, if you thought Pence staying on the opposite side of an entire country because that was convenient for Trump’s personal revenue was a bit on the nose, Trump directed a military flight to make an unnecessary refueling stop at a commercial airport (where the fuel cost to the military is higher) so that the crew could stay at his Turnberry golf resort (https://www.politico.com/story/2019/09/06/air-force-trump-scottish-retreat-1484337). Google shows 120 cheaper hotels between the airport and the resort.
Congress has been demanding an explanation of this since April but has been completely stonewalled by both the White House and the Pentagon. Is this a one-time thing? We don’t know. We do know that Turnberry has been a disaster for Trump, lost $4.5 million in 2017, but somehow increased revenue by $3 million in 2018. It’s not like Trump properties get more popular as his presidency rolls on...
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Prestwick is a regional airport that is the closest to Trump’s Turnberry resort It’s 34 miles away (Glasgow International is 90 miles away). Prestwick nearly went out of business in 2013 - which would be terrible for trade at Turnberry - but the Scottish govt bought it for £1 and have been running it ever since.
US military flights en route to/from the Middle East never stopped at Prestwick (or anywhere in Scotland) before 2017. They stopped at military basis in Germany or elsewhere. But since 2017, the US military (i.e. you and me) has spent $11 million on fuel at Prestwick; fuel that would be cheaper to get at a US base.
This is how deep the corruption goes.
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There is a decades long history of US military aircraft refueling at Prestwick beginning in the 40s and continuing through at least the 70s. I don't know for sure, but I have no reason to believe that the US has ever discontinued its refueling operations there. During the 50s and 60s, Prestwick was a major refueling hub for trans-Atlantic US military flights. I have landed in Prestwick for the purpose of refueling in US military aircraft on flights both originating and terminating in Turkey. That was many, many years ago.
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There is a decades long history of US military aircraft refueling at Prestwick beginning in the 40s and continuing through at least the 70s. I don't know for sure, but I have no reason to believe that the US has ever discontinued its refueling operations there. During the 50s and 60s, Prestwick was a major refueling hub for trans-Atlantic US military flights. I have landed in Prestwick for the purpose of refueling in US military aircraft on flights both originating and terminating in Turkey. That was many, many years ago.
I have no doubt that corruption (witting and unwitting) in the Trump presidency is vast and deep, but the Prestwick thing seems like a stretch.
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There is a decades long history of US military aircraft refueling at Prestwick beginning in the 40s and continuing through at least the 70s. I don't know for sure, but I have no reason to believe that the US has ever discontinued its refueling operations there. During the 50s and 60s, Prestwick was a major refueling hub for trans-Atlantic US military flights. I have landed in Prestwick for the purpose of refueling in US military aircraft on flights both originating and terminating in Turkey. That was many, many years ago.
Did you then drive over 30 miles from Prestwick to stay at a luxury golf resort?
The fuel thing may be a red herring, but the staying at Trump properties thing - with the G7, Pence and now this - is becoming a theme.
This is all, of course, on top of Trump’s constant trips to his own properties, dragging the entire presidential entourage and apparatus with him where they pay full freight (and in one case run up a 5-figure bar tab). Trump has spent 1 day in 3 of his presidency at one of his own resorts.
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Trump has spent 290 days at Trump properties, 30% of his presidency. And all we get from the right is crickets
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Did you then drive over 30 miles from Prestwick to stay at a luxury golf resort?
The fuel thing may be a red herring, but the staying at Trump properties thing - with the G7, Pence and now this - is becoming a theme.
This is all, of course, on top of Trump’s constant trips to his own properties, dragging the entire presidential entourage and apparatus with him where they pay full freight (and in one case run up a 5-figure bar tab). Trump has spent 1 day in 3 of his presidency at one of his own resorts.
Never got to RON at Prestwick. Just stayed long enough to get refueled and maybe grab some chow at the flight line mess hall.
There was (and still is I think) a big refueling operation for US military aircraft in the Azores. Not sure what the hotel situation is there.
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Never got to RON at Prestwick. Just stayed long enough to get refueled and maybe grab some chow at the flight line mess hall.
There was (and still is I think) a big refueling operation for US military aircraft in the Azores. Not sure what the hotel situation is there.
The crew had done this run about 50 times and they had refueled in the Azores, Germany and Italy; never Scotland. Their per diem for meals did not even cover the food cost at Turnberry. They also felt completely out of place because they could not meet the dress code. This stinks of a Trump scheme because it’s so brazen and so completely half-assed.
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Other news sources are following the stink, and the numbers are going up. The number of Turnberry stays and the amount of money spent on fuel at Prestwick are climbing steeply as more sources offer more detail.
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Trump is currently claiming that he had secretly invited the Taliban to a meeting at Camp David, but has now canceled it (because it turns out that murderers will be murderers). The meeting was planned for next week, being the week of 9/9 to 9/14.
Let that sink in.
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The fuel thing may be a red herring, but the staying at Trump properties thing - with the G7, Pence and now this - is becoming a theme.
This is all, of course, on top of Trump’s constant trips to his own properties, dragging the entire presidential entourage and apparatus with him where they pay full freight (and in one case run up a 5-figure bar tab). Trump has spent 1 day in 3 of his presidency at one of his own resorts.
The really concerning thing here isn't each individual grift - in true Trump style each one is kind of a small deal in the grand scheme of things, befitting the man - it's the fact that his corruption has permeated many levels of many government departments.
1) Dorian-a-Lago: about which Trump tweeted a cat video at about midnight last night...seriously...is just ridiculous; but there are now documented reports that NWS meteorologists were admonished - by memo - not to correct Trump's incorrect tweet. NOOA later jumped in to the fray to defend Trump publicly (but without attribution), too.
2) Doonbeg-a-Lago: (someone please tell me this is Gaelic for "douchebag" and they renamed the town after Tump moved in) meant that Pence had to take Air Force 2 back and forth for the 180-mile commute, at significant expense to the tax payer, not just in fuel but in logistics and administration time. The State Dept and the VPs office had to sign off on all of this, and they have since defended the move.
3) Turnberry-a-Lago: the DOD has (finally) commented on this, and claimed that the air crew got a discount to stay at Trump's resort. It was $136/night. The crew stayed there both going to and returning from the Middle East. But think about this: the Air Force had sent this particular crew on this run over 50 times previously, each time having them refuel at US military bases in Germany or Spain - where the fuel is cheaper. Trump takes office in 2017, and they suddenly switch to a civilian airport in Scotland that happened to be in desperate need of the business and also which happens to be Turnberry's aorta. Then they agree to put the crew up at Trump's resort which, despite the discount, is still more expensive than military lodgings (the fact that there are cheaper hotels is irrelevant - they should've been on a military base). And the DOD was ok with all of this, stonewalled Congress about it since April and only put out a statement - defending the choice - after the press got ahold of it.
Trump has long since completed his takeover of the Republican Party; episodes like this show that he is well on his way to taking over the organs of government. I know I am prone to hyperbole, but I do not think I am being so when I say that, if he is not ousted in 2020, we may never see a full and free election ever again. The Right-Wing Noise Machine is already talking of a political dynasty of Trumps, meaning that they have been planning on this for a while and are now starting to socialize it.
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The Air Force was shocked...SHOCKED...to hear that more air crews have stayed at Turnberry when stopping over at Prestwick. They have promised a thorough investigation, acknowledging that tax payers footing the bill for military personnel to be put up at Trump's for-profit establishments is not a good look. Ya think (https://www.politico.com/story/2019/09/08/trump-resort-air-force-probe-1485447)?
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Meanwhile, as Trump has been feuding on Twitter with John Legend and Chrissy Teagan (which is bringing a tiny mushroom-headed dick to a porn shoot), hurricane-stricken Bahamians looking to escape the devastation at home were kicked off ferries to the US. In the past, visa requirements have been waived for those with valid IDs and no criminal record, but not so under this government. The cruelty is a feature, not a bug.
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The IG is now looking into Sharpie-a-Lago, after reports that Wilbur Ross - who is now facing calls for his resignation - threatened to fire NOAA officials of this nonsense.
Jesus wept.
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Oh, and in case you missed it, the CIA had a spy deep inside the Kremlin, to the point where he was close enough to Putin to be able to photograph papers on his desk. In 2017, they exfiltrated him in a panic that Trump would accidentally (on purpose) blurt out his identity to someone - probably a Russian - and get him killed.
The extent of the damage to the United States that Trump has done in less than 3 years will be felt for decades and some of it is irredeemable. Will international partners ever trust us again? Trump has reneged on so many treaties and agreements "just 'cos (Obama)" that even if future deals were being negotiated by President Hanks, they'd quite rightly be looking 4 years past him to wonder who's got next.
Meanwhile, the US lost a vastly and uniquely useful intelligence asset just because Trump is Trump. I mean, I bet Putin wishes he had an asset that close to the Oval office! Eh? Oh.
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Oh, and in case you missed it, the CIA had a spy deep inside the Kremlin, to the point where he was close enough to Putin to be able to photograph papers on his desk. In 2017, they exfiltrated him in a panic that Trump would accidentally (on purpose) blurt out his identity to someone - probably a Russian - and get him killed.
This, and the hurricane bullshit are so fucking problematic and likely historical stories. But he’s numbed me and most of the country so much that it’s just Monday’s story.
Screw all those who willingly brought this upon us.
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You'll be glad to know that the FEC isn't really doing much of anything right now because they can't raise a quorum because 3 of the 6 seats are vacant and haven't been filled by His Trumpiness. Who do suppose would stand to benefit from such a state of affairs?
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You'll be glad to know that the FEC isn't really doing much of anything right now because they can't raise a quorum because 3 of the 6 seats are vacant and haven't been filled by His Trumpiness. Who do suppose would stand to benefit from such a state of affairs?
This is all so much worse than even the most pessimistic of us could have imagined.
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This is all so much worse than even the most pessimistic of us could have imagined.
Limey - check your PM
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Limey - check your PM
Limey’s a naturalized American, Boris isn’t really “his” PM any more.
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Limey - check your PM
He's out of control, ain't he?
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Couple of quick hits:
Trump wants to lend Iran $15billion
His trade war with China has cost 300,000 jobs in U.S.
The Federal deficit just topped $1 billion (per year) for the first time in 7 years
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Couple of quick hits:
Trump wants to lend Iran $15billion
His trade war with China has cost 300,000 jobs in U.S.
The Federal deficit just topped $1 billion (per year) for the first time in 7 years
Trillion.
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Trump wants to lend Iran $15billion
Curious to see how Republicans are tying themselves in knots to defend this.
The Federal deficit just topped $1 trillion (per year) for the first time in 7 years
And this. Fiscal conservatism is long dead, but they sure do preach it.
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Curious to see how Republicans are tying themselves in knots to defend this.
The same way they defend every other anti-conservative thing that Republicans have wailed about for decades - shamelessly.
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NEWSFLASH: Justice Kavanaugh is a rapey drunk.
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NEWSFLASH: Justice Kavanaugh is a rapey drunk.
As has been said already about the media jumping to be the 1st to break a story. Now the Times has revised it's story to include that the accuser originally claiming the incident declined to be interviewed and her friends say she does't recall it.
What's that about?
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As has been said already about the media jumping to be the 1st to break a story. Now the Times has revised it's story to include that the accuser originally claiming the incident declined to be interviewed and her friends say she does't recall it.
What's that about?
I don't really get the problem with it, personally.
If a bunch of people saw it happen, but she doesn't recall it, seems like it still probably happened.
I bet ol' Drunk Dick McSupremeCourtJustice doesn't remember it either.
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I don't really get the problem with it, personally.
If a bunch of people saw it happen, but she doesn't recall it, seems like it still probably happened.
I bet ol' Drunk Dick McSupremeCourtJustice doesn't remember it either.
I guess the problem is it plays into the "Fake News" narrative. It's going to be called fake news by Trump supporters no matter what, but leaving out these details gave something of substance to be pointed to backing up the fake news claim.
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I guess the problem is it plays into the "Fake News" narrative. It's going to be called fake news by Trump supporters no matter what, but leaving out these details gave something of substance to be pointed to backing up the fake news claim.
They call anything and everything fake news if it does not fit their agenda.
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They call anything and everything fake news if it does not fit their agenda.
I agree.
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Doesn't matter if they report it early, report it late, or don't report it at all. It will be denounced and ignored by Teflon Don and his sycophants all the same.
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I guess the problem is it plays into the "Fake News" narrative. It's going to be called fake news by Trump supporters no matter what, but leaving out these details gave something of substance to be pointed to backing up the fake news claim.
I don't see how leaving that out has anything to do with it happening, but okay.
Trump's tried and true plan is to call everything a lie then quietly let the facts fall in to place that it did happen and never acknowledge it again.
This follows that pattern, just with a wrinkle in the story.
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Trump's tried and true plan is to call everything a lie then quietly let the facts fall in to place that it did happen and never acknowledge it again.
This follows that pattern, just with a wrinkle in the story.
Trump is no doubt guilty of just what you've said.
I don't see how leaving that out has anything to do with it happening, but okay
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In the below article the authors of the book that was used for the NYT article gave some statements that the Times editors left out some details that they believed to be in their words “significant”.
https://www.yahoo.com/news/nyt-kavanaugh-book-skullduggery-132959100.html
From the linked article…
At the same time, Kelly and Pogrebin acknowledged there were “errors in the process” of preparing an opinion article in the Sunday paper about their book that resulted in Times editors removing “significant” information favorable to Kavanaugh’s defense from an early draft.
The article stated that, in the course of researching their book, the authors had uncovered a “previously unreported” allegation that Kavanaugh, while a freshman at Yale University, was at a drunken dorm party where “friends pushed his penis” into the hand of a female student.
The allegation in the report triggered demands — led by a half-dozen Democratic presidential candidates, including Kamala Harris, Elizabeth Warren and Pete Buttigieg — for Kavanaugh to be impeached.
But the Times article left out a key detail that is included in the book: that the woman at the party in the new allegation never spoke to the authors and, according to several of her friends, didn’t recall the event ever happening.
Much of the article about their book in Sunday’s paper involved seven witnesses who, the authors claim, corroborated aspects of a separate account by another former Yale classmate, Deborah Ramirez, that Kavanaugh exposed himself to her at another dorm party. Such corroboration would be significant given that, according to initial accounts last year, Ramirez had been initially uncertain about Kavanaugh’s role in the alleged incident
But the authors acknowledge that none of those corroborating witnesses actually were present at the dorm party. Several of them — including Ramirez’s mother — had been told about the incident but with no reference to Kavanaugh being the offender, and two others only “vaguely” recalled it without being told it involved Kavanaugh. Ken Appold, one of those who did hear that it was Kavanaugh, wasn’t present at the event and, according to the Times reporters, couldn’t remember who told him about it. Yet another of the corroborators heard that it involved Kavanaugh — but only from Appold.
Against these details, the book also includes passages boosting Kavanaugh that also were left out of the Times article. The authors report that Leland Keyser, a onetime friend of Christine Blasey Ford, came to question Ford’s account that Kavanaugh sexually assaulted her at a high school house party. Keyser had been named by Ford as one of those present at the party when the assault occurred. But Keyser — after initially saying she didn’t remember being at the party but that she believed Ford — no longer does so and told the authors that she was pressured by Ford’s allies to change her story. “I was told behind the scenes that certain things could be spread about me if I didn’t comply,” she is quoted as saying.
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Trump is no doubt guilty of just what you've said.
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In the below article the authors of the book that was used for the NYT article gave some statements that the Times editors left out some details that they believed to be in their words “significant”.
https://www.yahoo.com/news/nyt-kavanaugh-book-skullduggery-132959100.html
From the linked article…
That all is certainly a bit questionable at best.
Much like everything about this story, Kavanaugh (and all the shit that has come out about him) is greasy enough that details just seems to slip and slide away enough to cast doubt.
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That all is certainly a bit questionable at best.
Much like everything about this story, Kavanaugh (and all the shit that has come out about him) is greasy enough that details just seems to slip and slide away enough to cast doubt.
After he denied being much of a drinker/partier I view everything he says with suspicion. His own best friend wrote a book about their college partying. His greasiness gives me heartburn
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So Trump's at it again. He promised something to
Putin a foreign leader that was so concerning to staff national security experts that one of them reported it under the whistleblower statute. That law requires that this report run up the chain all the way to the Congressional security committees; yet Trump's Director of National Security (whoever the fuck that is this week) instead parked it and requested that Trump's legal defense team the DOJ give him guidance.
This, right on the heels of Lewandowski's "fuck you" performance in his committee testimony this week, shows in yet more stark relief how lawless this administration is.
Oh, and the DOD has spent over $200,000 at Trump Turnberry since 2017, paying room rates double the local average.
Democrats in Washington are in the process of fucking up this whole thing. Nadler letting Lewandowski wave his package at them for about 5 hours on Monday before releasing his attack dog - who fucked over Lewandowski royally and should've had the whole fucking session - was pathetic. It confirms Pelosi's reluctance to support impeachment, because she doesn't trust these fools to do it right. She knows that if you come at the king...
To beat Trump in 2020 - which I truly believe is the last chance to save this democracy through electoral means - Democrats will have to show that they are worthy of people's trust. They were given the House in 2018 mostly to act as a check on Trump, and they have dick-stepped through the first 8 months since getting the gavels. They are running out of time to show they are up to it before everyone checks out and Trumps wins a 2nd term with 40% of the vote.
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Meanwhile, Warren seems to have pivoted to a campaign message that Trump is corruption incarnate, but that he's the end result, not the cause, of a system that has been corrupted over the years. That seems like a winning message to me, and the best one being put forward by any candidate.
As much as I support Beto's stance on gun control, that's not going to win you Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, Florida or Arizona.
As much as I support Bernie's stance on medicare for all (but not his timeline for it), that's not going to win you Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, Florida or Arizona.
As much as I support Biden's stance on...ummm...not being Trump? That's not going to win you Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, Florida or Arizona. (Biden's going to win PA).
As much as I support Harris' stance on criminal justice reform, that's not going to win you Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, Florida or Arizona.
What's win you Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, Florida or Arizona... maybe ... is stopping the gilded classes from fleecing us for our money, our health and our lives. Warren is flat out, by far, the best person to articulate and represent that goal.
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Elizabeth Warren (and Bernie) saying she would ban fracking on her first day in office is crazier than anything Trump has said, which is a high fucking bar.
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Elizabeth Warren (and Bernie) saying she would ban fracking on her first day in office is crazier than anything Trump has said, which is a high fucking bar.
It’s not something I liked hearing, and it’s a silly thing to say because she can’t do that, but Trump says dozens of crazier things every single day, so please take your false equivalence and file it with Trump’s tax returns..
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Compared to saying you are just going to shut down one of the biggest growth industries in the U.S., drawing on a map with a sharpie is just "eccentric".
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I'm hoping Warren starts gaining ground. I hate picking a favorite candidate this far out from an election, but I'm finding myself rooting for Warren against Bernie and Biden.
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Compared to saying you are just going to shut down one of the biggest growth industries in the U.S., drawing on a map with a sharpie is just "eccentric".
NEWS FLASH: POLITICAL CANDIDATE MAKES IMPOSSIBLE CAMPAIGN PROMISE
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NEWS FLASH: POLITICAL CANDIDATE MAKES IMPOSSIBLE CAMPAIGN PROMISE
Why not just call out all lunacy for what it is? No matter if it's your party of choice or in an upcoming election your candidate of choice. What she said was stupidly impossible. I'm not going to waste my time defending someone with the dumb.
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Compared to saying you are just going to shut down one of the biggest growth industries in the U.S., drawing on a map with a sharpie is just "eccentric".
Next time I find myself taking a selfie with her I'll be sure to let Warren know she can kiss North Dakota goodbye.
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Compared to saying you are just going to shut down one of the biggest growth industries in the U.S., drawing on a map with a sharpie is just "eccentric".
Right. Because the sharpie nonsense is easily the worst thing Trump has ever said or done.
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Speaking of crazy shit Trump says, the whistleblower scandal appears to be about multiple occasions when Trump tried to blackmail Ukraine into investigating Biden.
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Speaking of crazy shit Trump says, the whistleblower scandal appears to be about multiple occasions when Trump tried to blackmail Ukraine into investigating Biden.
I wouldn't worry too much about that; Rudy cleared it all right up tonight.
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I wouldn't worry too much about that; Rudy cleared it all right up tonight.
For your reading pleasure:
Senate panel postpones Darrell Issa confirmation hearing over FBI file questions (https://www.cnn.com/2019/09/19/politics/darrell-issa-hearing-postponed/index.html?no-st=1568978570)
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Gotta love the MSM. This morning they are chasing Trump defenders down the rabbit hole of whether Trump abusing his power to sway the election in his favor is not an intelligence concern, and thus not covered by the whistleblower law.
Look over there fellas, the story is waaaaay over there.
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Why not just call out all lunacy for what it is? No matter if it's your party of choice or in an upcoming election your candidate of choice. What she said was stupidly impossible. I'm not going to waste my time defending someone with the dumb.
The point is, we live in an age when every candidate - R or D, good or bad, smart or stupid - promises dumb shit. You have to run all of the dumb shit through a filter. (Unless you're Trump and you actually start doing all the dumb shit you said you would do.)
Limey's point about false equivalence is a good one.
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Speaking of crazy shit Trump says, the whistleblower scandal appears to be about multiple occasions when Trump tried to blackmail Ukraine into investigating Biden.
At least eight times, is the latest reporting. Each one, an impeachable offense on its own.
Anyone still think that he’s not again coordinating election interference with Putin?
At what point do Republicans decide to put country over party?
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When they have all the money and start wanting it from each other?
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At what point do Republicans decide to put country over party?
Never. A question without an easy answer is whether Pelosi/Dems will do a damn thing about it.
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Never. A question without an easy answer is whether Pelosi/Dems will do a damn thing about it.
I’d say we have nine months worth of evidence on the very easy answer to that.
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Pelosi says she wants the change the law to allow indictment of a sitting president. Ignoring the fact that no one of standing has ever ruled that it is illegal, that’s a gross abdication of duty on her part. The constitution put the power to hold accountable a sitting president in her hands, and she’s currently screwing that pooch into an early grave.
Her House majority is going to be running campaigns next year on needing to be re-elected as a check on Republican corruption, having done nothing about it during the two years since we elected it to do just that.
They’ve already missed the boat on impeachment. This Ukraine thing is a gift from the Gods of politics to allow them to say, “ok, now he’s already colluding with foreign powers to influence the next election and using the power of the U.S. government to do it, we have to impeach.” It’s right fucking there. Just take it and run with it.
And if you thought there was any chance of this working out ok, just look at the news today. In between stories about Trump sending troops to Saudi Arabia in which they blow over most of the important facts, including that it’s completely illegal, they’re discussing the merits of the case against Hunter Biden and how it impacts Joe’s campaign.
W..........T............F
This is already over. We’re Trumplandia now and there’s no one to stop it.
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This is already over. We’re Trumplandia now and there’s no one to stop it.
Welcome to the Turkey of the West.
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I mean, what was the DNC hiding there in its Watergate offices? Must have been something very important for Nixon to try and get it.
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Trump said today he was deserving of Nobel Prizes for various things. I assume peace is one, and he think his books on real estate are deserving of the prize in literature. I'm guessing his work around hurricanes deserves the nod in physics, and there's probably his work in chemistry worthy of consideration. I'd look for them to simply rename it the Trump Prize, or maybe make him the permanent winner of all categories in perpetuity.
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Trump’s repeated admission of the main facts of the Ukraine scandal has been an injection of adrenaline right to the heart of impeachment. More and more Democrats are moving to that side of the Venn, Pelosi is having a summit with senior Democrats tomorrow, junior Democrats put out a joint op-ed and the Acting DNI is due to testify to the House on Thursday.
Meanwhile, all of this shit that Trump dumped on his own head is looking increasingly like it’s all for nought in more ways than one. Biden slipped to 2nd behind Warren in the latest Iowa poll, 22 to 20. More importantly, given Iowa’s caucus process, Warrens lead over Biden grows when you combine 1st and 2nd choices, 42 to 30.
Trump is going to have bankrupted is own presidency going after the wrong person. That’s about as Trump as it gets.
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It’s now being reported that Trump ordered Acting Chief of Everything Mulvaney, days before calling Zelensky, to put the military aid to Ukraine on hold. The guns in this circular firing squad are all smoking.
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It’s now being reported that Trump ordered Acting Chief of Everything Mulvaney, days before calling Zelensky, to put the military aid to Ukraine on hold. The guns in this circular firing squad are all smoking.
There's also speculation that John Bolton is the whistleblower. Strange bedfellows, etc.
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There's also speculation that John Bolton is the whistleblower. Strange bedfellows, etc.
Well, at least we can all agree that he is a raging Democrat.
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There's also speculation that John Bolton is the whistleblower. Strange bedfellows, etc.
That would be AWESOME!
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Pelosi has called a 5 pm press conference. Rumored to be forming a Select Committee on Impeachment.
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⬆️⬆️⬆️⬆️⬆️
Pelosi is expected to state she is full force behind impeachment.
Meanwhile, Trump says he’ll release the transcript of the call in question soon. Expect the full exoneration victory lap moments thereafter.
Schumer is introducing a Senate resolution calling for the release of the whistleblower complaint; McConnell supposedly is not going to object.
Schiff says that he is discussions with the whistleblower’s lawyer and that he may testify before the House as early as this week (I’m guessing in a closed setting).
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There's also speculation that John Bolton is the whistleblower. Strange bedfellows, etc.
If it’s Bolton, for whom I have had zero respect, he will get some from me going forward for doing what none of the other current and fired administration officials have done: come forward with the truth of what they know about this dangerously corrupt president.
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I should add the caveat that the Bolton speculation I saw was only on Twitter (so far), but some journalists there found it plausible.
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I stopped listening to Pelosi’s address as she totally lacks the rhetorical power of persuasion. She is terrible, IMO: this isn’t about whistleblowing; this is about what should be a clearly understandable abuse of Presidential power.
Don’t muddy the fucking waters.
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The Senate apparently unanimously passed a resolution demanding that they see the whistleblower complaint. McConnell mentioned the need for "bipartisan oversight of intelligence matters". Is he finally seeing which way the wind is blowing?
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They'd better make damn sure they've got a big enough gun to do the job. Nothing could be worse heading into the election than to hold impeachment proceedings and then have him skate.
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The Senate apparently unanimously passed a resolution demanding that they see the whistleblower complaint. McConnell mentioned the need for "bipartisan oversight of intelligence matters". Is he finally seeing which way the wind is blowing?
Yes. He’s seeing his gavel getting shoved up his arse next November. Which has a number of knock on effects including him and his wife going to jail.
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They'd better make damn sure they've got a big enough gun to do the job. Nothing could be worse heading into the election than to hold impeachment proceedings and then have him skate.
The Senate is still highly unlikely to convict. I fully expect them to deploy the Nixon model by which he resigns and Pence* pardons him. I think this will happen quickly.
* Karen “Mother” Pence has just joined Twitter and is now being “positioned” on social media. They expect her to be First Lady sometime soon.
The difference here is that I doubt the State of New York is going to back off and there’s nothing Pence or any of them can do about it.
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From Twitter:
Congrats to Trump on finally being fucked by a woman his own age.
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From Twitter:
I saw another one that was basically Impeachment is the first thing Trump has actually earned.
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I wonder if he'll be released from prison to receive his Nobel Prize.
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Recent history repeating itself.
Trump claims he will release the transcript of one call and the whistleblower complaint. The press jumps all over it, trying to figure out if this one “transcript” is a smoking gun. Of course, it is likely doctored by the White House, incomplete and most importantly, one piece of what will be a lot of evidence. The strategic release of this incomplete evidence will provide an opportunity for Trump and his minions to put out the smokescreens and build up tribal passions.
Next, they will delay the release of the complaint for bogus reasons and delay any other evidence from coming out, thereby stalling and stringing out the investigation and allowing them time to distract from the central abuse of power.
I know that the press in unable to keep their eye on any ball for long, but I sure hope Dems can.
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The “transcript” is five pages long for a half hour call.
Any reporter referring to this as a “transcript” is committing journalistic malpractice.
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The call notes are a lot more incriminating than I expected. Everything from in response to being thanked for the promised aid, Trump says "I would like you to do us a favor though" and investigate Biden ("Biden went around bragging that he stopped the prosecution so if you can look into it...") to the Ukrainian President saying "I stayed at Trump Tower!"
I imagine the actual conversation was much more blatant.
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And then there's the part where Trump seems to think that Hillary's server is in Ukraine and wants to Ukrainian president to find it. What the fuck.
Here's the document the white house released: https://www.whitehouse.gov/wp-content/uploads/2019/09/Unclassified09.2019.pdf
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And then there's the part where Trump seems to think that Hillary's server is in Ukraine and wants to Ukrainian president to find it. What the fuck.
Here's the document the white house released: https://www.whitehouse.gov/wp-content/uploads/2019/09/Unclassified09.2019.pdf
Surreal.
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“Nancy Pelosi is no longer Speaker of the House.”
Is mental incapacity an affirmative defense to impeachable offenses?
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“Nancy Pelosi is no longer Speaker of the House.”
Is mental incapacity an affirmative defense to impeachable offenses?
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Isn't the under the purview of the 25th? amendment?
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Schiff has now seen the whistleblower's complaint and called it "serious" and "disturbing". I think we'll get to see it soon and/or hear from its author in open testimony. The read-out from the call was pretty damining in and of itself, when you consider that we're not dealing with something that needs to rise to the level of criminal culpability; it's just about whether Trump used the power of his office for personal gain and that's pretty fucking glaringly obvious from what we know and what Trump has admitted to.
This has gained traction I think for a few reasons: it's simple, its self-contained and its immune to the customary waffling and gaslighting that has withered previous scandals. Even Trump's tactic of airing it out to make it seem innocuous hasn't worked, and his band of flying Trumpanzees have not been able to usurp the narrative. Hillary's server? Seriously? Even Steve Douchey said this morning that he hopes there's something else because what there is right now is really bad.
Meanwhile, the release of the readout itself has been a diplomatic disaster, because Zelenskiy wasn't expecting his side of the conversation to be released. This White House is just really bad at everything.
Lastly, Trump is obviously the big fish here, but it also has the potential to take down Pence, Pompisspot, Giuferatu, Barr and maybe others, who all participated in the crime and/or the cover up.
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My Congressman, Dan Crenshaw, just tweeted this:
This impeachment inquiry seems worse for Biden than it is for Trump.
Now the Hunter Biden-Ukraine issue is on everyone’s radar AND we know that Democrats overstepped with their ”quid pro quo” accusation.
Have to wonder whether they did this to help Warren/Sanders..? 🤔
I guess he ran out of characters before he could shoehorn "emails" in there. What a tool (PS, I told him so).
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If Trump is impeached, he may well win all 50 states in 2020. It will be a landslide of Reagan proportions.
Crenshaw is an embarrassment.
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If Trump is impeached, he may well win all 50 states in 2020. It will be a landslide of Reagan proportions.
Crenshaw is an embarrassment.
Grudgingly, I have to admit that impeaching Trump for any of his many, many previous impeachable offenses had a lot of risk attached, because they were all wonky and nebulous crimes, many of which were before he took office (which shouldn't matter but it does). This, on the other hand, is Trump threatening another country to go after his political opponent in the confines of a single phone call. Everyone has watched the Godfather or The Sopranos, and so everyone recognizes the implicit threat in Trump's words to Zelensiy. He's been caught red-handed and in real time. His base won't move, but they don't matter, I don't see people who were on the fence over Trump deciding to vote for him because he was impeached.
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Speaking of Biden, he has been hiding behind Pelosi's skirt this whole time and continues to do so. He's not up to the task and - with Trump likely gone or severely hobbled - it's no longer about beating Trump, it's about motivating voters to go out there and run the table. Biden is not that candidate, and neither is Bernie.
Meanwhile, Warren has been out in front of this from the get-go, has run an excellent campaign with a strong mix of policy, grievance and hope. She is also bursting to the front in Iowa polls and moving up nationally. It's starting to look like it's hers to lose.
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Speaking of Biden, he has been hiding behind Pelosi's skirt this whole time and continues to do so. He's not up to the task and - with Trump likely gone or severely hobbled - it's no longer about beating Trump, it's about motivating voters to go out there and run the table. Biden is not that candidate, and neither is Bernie.
You're a lot more optimistic about this process than I am. I think it's a huge risk, and there's the chance that it will galvanize his base and some of the fence-sitters, making sure that every single one of them votes. Combined with the usual Dem complacency, you could have a repeat of 2016, where the popular vote goes against him but he wins the EC. And then you'll *truly* see a maniac unleashed. Not to mention that RBG won't last six more years.
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I don’t get this fear at all. Being impeached for this isn’t going to help him. Seriously, anyone who is moved toward Trump by this was already a solid Trump voter already.
Democrats need to exercise some muscles and get in the ring once in a while.
Btw, I agree that Warren benefits from this the most, both cause she has balls and because it fits neatly into her anti-corruption themes.
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Democrats need to exercise some muscles and get in the ring once in a while.
If they do nothing, the6 have no platform on which to campaign in 2020. People aren’t going to be enthusiastic about two more years of tutting on TV.
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I don't see people who were on the fence over Trump deciding to vote for him because he was impeached.
Trump did not win in 2016 because of his base. He won because a huge portion of the "on the fencers" voted against Hillary Clinton. They will do the same if Trump is impeached.
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I don’t get this fear at all. Being impeached for this isn’t going to help him. Seriously, anyone who is moved toward Trump by this was already a solid Trump voter already.
Democrats need to exercise some muscles and get in the ring once in a while.
Btw, I agree that Warren benefits from this the most, both cause she has balls and because it fits neatly into her anti-corruption themes.
Me too.
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Trump did not win in 2016 because of his base. He won because a huge portion of the "on the fencers" voted against Hillary Clinton. They will do the same if Trump is impeached.
He deserves to be impeached. Grow a pair and do the right thing.
ETA: I am happy the dems seem to be growing a pair. I am not impugning the testicular presence of persons here. Not yet.
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Trump did not win in 2016 because of his base. He won because a huge portion of the "on the fencers" voted against Hillary Clinton. They will do the same if Trump is impeached.
He won because Hillary was a bad candidate who was politically calculating to a fault. That’s also why she lost to Obama.
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He won because Hillary was a bad candidate who was politically calculating to a fault. That’s also why she lost to Obama.
"Politically calculating to a fault" seems to nicely encapsulate a hearty chunk of democratic voters.
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He deserves to be impeached. Grow a pair and do the right thing.
ETA: I am happy the dems seem to be growing a pair. I am not impugning the testicular presence of persons here. Not yet.
Settle down, Beavis. I haven’t argued he doesn’t. I’m making the observation that doing so will ensure his re-election.
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The whistleblower’s complaint has been declassified. Keep an eye out for it being released publicly.
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He deserves to be impeached.
This is too true...
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Trump did not win in 2016 because of his base. He won because a huge portion of the "on the fencers" voted against Hillary Clinton. They will do the same if Trump is impeached.
I'm not a fence sitter when it comes to Trump, but Socialism is a sticking point for me and many other independent voters out there. Democrats, at least in the debates have shifted towards embracing many socialist platforms that independent voters won't support. Not saying I can support Trumps either though...arg...
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I'm not a fence sitter when it comes to Trump, but Socialism is a sticking point for me and many other independent voters out there. Democrats, at least in the debates have shifted towards embracing many socialist platforms that independent voters won't support. Not saying I can support Trumps either though...arg...
"Socialism" is just a dog whistle of the right to justify racism and maintain their class privilege. The vast majority of American already embrace these socialist" planks, including things like Social Security, Medicare, and socialized health insurance. The right uses the term to scare people by saying "vote for X, and you'll end up in Venezuela". Unfortunately, the ignorant masses of electorate buy into it. Fear is a powerful motivator.
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I just tuned in to this guy’s testimony. I realize he was in an extremely tough position, but Schiff is eating him alive, in a very sedate manner. The Dems should give all their time for questioning to him, as he’s one of their few professionals.
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Maguire’s FIRST action upon receiving the whistleblower complaint about the White House...was to take it to the White House!!!
Also, there is a word-for-word actual transcript of the call that White House attorneys decided to deep-six in super-secret storage because it’s so bad. There are more than just this one...
Dog One is open. I repeat, Dog One is open.
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Maguire’s FIRST action upon receiving the whistleblower complaint about the White House...was to take it to the White House!!!
Also, there is a word-for-word actual transcript of the call that White House attorneys decided to deep-six in super-secret storage because it’s so bad. There are more than just this one...
Dog One is open. I repeat, Dog One is open.
Now if Trump will just get a blowjob from a chubby intern, the Wingnuts will be ready to throw him in jail.
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Settle down, Beavis. I haven’t argued he doesn’t. I’m making the observation that doing so will ensure his re-election.
I just don't follow the logic. How would airing corrupt ineptitude make people vote for him who wouldn't already?
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I just don't follow the logic. How would airing corrupt ineptitude make people vote for him who wouldn't already?
There’s a lot of misinterpretation of the aftermaths of the Nixon and Clinton impeachments.
Clinton’s was obviously politically motivated and it cost the GOP the House that they’d just won back. Clinton was re-elected, but was left with enough stank on him that Gore pretended not to know him - despite Clinton still being a popular figure at the time - and promptly lost in that Florida shitshow that likely doesn’t happen if Gore had felt he was able to embrace Clinton.
Republicans turning on Nixon, late in an mid-term election year, was what forced him to resign. The GOP still got trounced that November and Carter won the White House thereafter.
A Trump impeachment is far more akin to Nixon than Clinton, but it’s not like Clinton’s impeachment didn’t leave a mark either.
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"Socialism" is just a dog whistle of the right to justify racism and maintain their class privilege. The vast majority of American already embrace these socialist" planks, including things like Social Security, Medicare, and socialized health insurance. The right uses the term to scare people by saying "vote for X, and you'll end up in Venezuela". Unfortunately, the ignorant masses of electorate buy into it. Fear is a powerful motivator.
You really think that Independent voters are for canceling student debt, free college, Medicare for all, UBI, reparations...etc?
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I just don't follow the logic. How would airing corrupt ineptitude make people vote for him who wouldn't already?
The problem is you're trying to use logic. Stop that.
Impeachment is bad. Very bad. It's an admission that your elected officials have betrayed you and it's a permanent black mark on democracy as a whole, so there better be a damn good reason for it. Getting a blowjob, or little bits of corruption, do not rise to the level that would make most people accept that tradeoff. It has to be far, far worse than simply encouraging meddling in the election. Unless there are Russian tanks rolling down Pennsylvania Avenue, it will simply piss people off. Their reaction is not logical.
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You really think that Independent voters are for canceling student debt, free college, Medicare for all, UBI, reparations...etc?
Most reasonable people are for fixing these problems. The right refuses to acknowledge there are problems, or if they do, they blame it on people of a different skin color, immigrants or Jews/Muslims, or what have you. They want to burn down the huts of the troublemaking poor.
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There’s a lot of misinterpretation of the aftermaths of the Nixon and Clinton impeachments.
Clinton’s was obviously politically motivated and it cost the GOP the House that they’d just won back. Clinton was re-elected, but was left with enough stank on him that Gore pretended not to know him - despite Clinton still being a popular figure at the time - and promptly lost in that Florida shitshow that likely doesn’t happen if Gore had felt he was able to embrace Clinton.
Republicans turning on Nixon, late in an mid-term election year, was what forced him to resign. The GOP still got trounced that November and Carter won the White House thereafter.
A Trump impeachment is far more akin to Nixon than Clinton, but it’s not like Clinton’s impeachment didn’t leave a mark either.
The Clinton impeachment was in his second term.
But I agree with you that this impeachment is much more akin to Nixon than Clinton.
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Most reasonable people are for fixing these problems. The right refuses to acknowledge there are problems, or if they do, they blame it on people of a different skin color, immigrants or Jews/Muslims, or what have you. They want to burn down the huts of the troublemaking poor.
Fixing and what has been put forth are 2 different animals IMO.
You keep mentioning the right so I'm thinking you missed my point of the need for independent voters to secure the electoral vote.
The left keeps shifting further left while the right shifts further right. That's has the potential to leave a larger majority in the middle.
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The problem is you're trying to use logic. Stop that.
Impeachment is bad. Very bad. It's an admission that your elected officials have betrayed you and it's a permanent black mark on democracy as a whole, so there better be a damn good reason for it. Getting a blowjob, or little bits of corruption, do not rise to the level that would make most people accept that tradeoff. It has to be far, far worse than simply encouraging meddling in the election. Unless there are Russian tanks rolling down Pennsylvania Avenue, it will simply piss people off. Their reaction is not logical.
I agree that logic doesn’t predominate. Thus, your conclusion may yet become true. But, I doubt most people will see “simply encouraging meddling in the election” as insignificant. It fits neatly into populist anger that the system is unfair, and used and abused by the powerful to their advantage.
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Fixing and what has been put forth are 2 different animals IMO.
This is what you're being told, correct.
You keep mentioning the right so I'm thinking you missed my point of the need for independent voters to secure the electoral vote.
The left keeps shifting further left while the right shifts further right. That's has the potential to leave a larger majority in the middle.
My point is that the right preys on the independent voter by invoking fear, and it's successful strategy for them. "Sure, healthcare is expensive, but if you try to make it available to everyone, you'll all be dying in the streets from dysentery and ingrown toenails. If you don't build a wall, the Mexicans will be stampeding your daughters and raping your cattle. If you try to educate everyone, some immigrant will take your job and you'll be reduced to eating dirt with no shoes on. If you accept Muslims, you'll all be stoned to death for wearing a tshirt with the American flag on it while your women are sold into sexual slavery..." Well who the hell wants any of that?
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I agree that logic doesn’t predominate. Thus, your conclusion may yet become true. But, I doubt most people will see “simply encouraging meddling in the election” as insignificant. It fits neatly into populist anger that the system is unfair, and used and abused by the powerful to their advantage.
You're assuming people will believe it in the first place. A bold assumption, IMO.
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This is what you're being told, correct.
Nope
My point is that the right preys on the independent voter by invoking fear, and it's successful strategy for them. "Sure, healthcare is expensive, but if you try to make it available to everyone, you'll all be dying in the streets from dysentery and ingrown toenails. If you don't build a wall, the Mexicans will be stampeding your daughters and raping your cattle. If you try to educate everyone, some immigrant will take your job and you'll be reduced to eating dirt with no shoes on. If you accept Muslims, you'll all be stoned to death for wearing a tshirt with the American flag on it while your women are sold into sexual slavery..." Well who the hell wants any of that?
[/quote]I haven't been told any of that. Maybe I don't know any real Republicans if that's how real Republicans think.
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I haven't been told any of that. Maybe I don't know any real Republicans if that's how real Republicans think.
We've all been told that. Not all of us believe I=]-[0pol but a substantial majority of "independents" play the devil-I-know game.
And so to pick a common topic...what is your objection to universal health care?
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I haven't been told any of that. Maybe I don't know any real Republicans if that's how real Republicans think.
You don't remember any of the "death panels" horseshit Republicans peddled during the 2008 campaign and Obama's first term?
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You don't remember any of the "death panels" horseshit Republicans peddled during the 2008 campaign and Obama's first term?
I do. It wasn't stated as funny as HH said it though.
I also remember being told “If you like your health-care plan, you’ll be able to keep your health-care plan, period. No one will take it away, no matter what.”.
The Repubs don't have the market cornered on horseshit.
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We've all been told that. Not all of us believe I=]-[0pol but a substantial majority of "independents" play the devil-I-know game.
And so to pick a common topic...what is your objection to universal health care?
Ok, but in this case 2 is better than 1…How about I pick 2 of my greater objections.
Cancelling student debt & free college. I agree that the price to go to college is a problem. I do not agree at all that cancelling student debt and free college is a good way to proceed.
1st is the cost. No one has a good plan on how to pay for this. Raising taxes for the top earners I do not believe will be enough to both cancel the existing debt and pay for free college.
2nd is that from some experience. I have 2 family members with a lot of student loan debt. Family member 1 owes +$100,000. Family member 2 owes +$20,000. Family member 1 went on to get his masters in a worthless degree that family member 1 has never worked at. Family member 2 got a 4 year degree. Neither family member has much motivation of paying off the debt…That’s bad enough but here’s where I get really torqued. Family member 1 borrowed and used student loans to pay for “living expenses”. Some of that living expense debt used from student loans was for the coolest shoes out that everyone was wearing, eating out with friends…other non-tuition stuffs. That’s so foolish of family member 1…but then family member 2 says hold my beer! Family member 2 went and used some of the loaned money to go to the Cracklin Festival in Lafayette that family member 2 REALLY wanted to go to but didn’t have the cash. Way to go family member 2. Inventive!
Some stats I pulled from the web:
A Student Loan Hero survey found that 20% of students use their student loan funds for travel and 26% use them for clothes. Only 10% use student loan funds just for tuition.
What the heck is the other 44% going to?
Would I like them to be debt free? Sure.
Do I want to raise anyone’s taxes (even evil Mr. Burns) to pay for this? Nope
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I'm not a fence sitter when it comes to Trump, but Socialism is a sticking point for me and many other independent voters out there. Democrats, at least in the debates have shifted towards embracing many socialist platforms that independent voters won't support. Not saying I can support Trumps either though...arg...
Here's what I don't get: if you're convinced you're going to lose either way, what's wrong with a principled vote for a third party or independent candidate? There's bound to be one.
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Would I like them to be debt free? Sure.
Do I want to raise anyone’s taxes (even evil Mr. Burns) to pay for this? Nope
So what is your stance on this? Do you think "they made their bed, now must lie in it", or do you think there should be some way to get them out of their mess, even though it was of their own making? Secondly, if it's the latter, what is your proposal?
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Some stats I pulled from the web:
What the heck is the other 44% going to?
I'm guessing a substantial portion of student loans go to pay room and board, books, misc fees, etc...the other general costs of college. But I don't have any stats to back that up.
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So what is your stance on this? Do you think "they made their bed, now must lie in it", or do you think there should be some way to get them out of their mess, even though it was of their own making? Secondly, if it's the latter, what is your proposal?
Hard work and living within your means won't kill them. Their mess and their responsibility to fix it. I'm not going to pull money out of the pocket of someone else to fix their stupid. They were adults when those decisions were made.
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Ok, but in this case 2 is better than 1…How about I pick 2 of my greater objections.
Cancelling student debt & free college. I agree that the price to go to college is a problem. I do not agree at all that cancelling student debt and free college is a good way to proceed.
1st is the cost. No one has a good plan on how to pay for this. Raising taxes for the top earners I do not believe will be enough to both cancel the existing debt and pay for free college.
2nd is that from some experience. I have 2 family members with a lot of student loan debt. Family member 1 owes +$100,000. Family member 2 owes +$20,000. Family member 1 went on to get his masters in a worthless degree that family member 1 has never worked at. Family member 2 got a 4 year degree. Neither family member has much motivation of paying off the debt…That’s bad enough but here’s where I get really torqued. Family member 1 borrowed and used student loans to pay for “living expenses”. Some of that living expense debt used from student loans was for the coolest shoes out that everyone was wearing, eating out with friends…other non-tuition stuffs. That’s so foolish of family member 1…but then family member 2 says hold my beer! Family member 2 went and used some of the loaned money to go to the Cracklin Festival in Lafayette that family member 2 REALLY wanted to go to but didn’t have the cash. Way to go family member 2. Inventive!
Some stats I pulled from the web:
What the heck is the other 44% going to?
Would I like them to be debt free? Sure.
Do I want to raise anyone’s taxes (even evil Mr. Burns) to pay for this? Nope
I don't know about this, but when I got college loans for a seemingly worthless grad degree (that eventually proved quite valuable) they were federal Stafford loans and what I could spend them on was very proscribed. I couldn't buy anything that wasn't directly academic. I couldn't use them for rent, even, and we were deeply underwater trying to make ends meet on Long Island.
They are all paid off now, because we were lucky enough to have a small inheritance that enabled us to buy a house for a good price at the right time in a good market. If not for my grandparents'-in-law's foresight and munificence they'd be looming over us for the next lots and lots of years.
And also, just food for thought: people racked up a lot less student debt when college tuitions were more heavily subsidized from higher taxes. It drives me nuts, all these guys who got 100k degrees for cents on the dollar and then got out and cut their own taxes.
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I'm guessing a substantial portion of student loans go to pay room and board, books, misc fees, etc...the other general costs of college. But I don't have any stats to back that up.
I have no idea, but found this as showing a great deal of the money is being used frivolously.
https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/EJ1140908.pdf
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I don't know about this, but when I got college loans for a seemingly worthless grad degree (that eventually proved quite valuable) they were federal Stafford loans and what I could spend them on was very proscribed. I couldn't buy anything that wasn't directly academic. I couldn't use them for rent, even, and we were deeply underwater trying to make ends meet on Long Island.
They are all paid off now, because we were lucky enough to have a small inheritance that enabled us to buy a house for a good price at the right time in a good market. If not for my grandparents'-in-law's foresight and munificence they'd be looming over us for the next lots and lots of years.
And also, just food for thought: people racked up a lot less student debt when college tuitions were more heavily subsidized from higher taxes. It drives me nuts, all these guys who got 100k degrees for cents on the dollar and then got out and cut their own taxes.
Glad you were able to get yours paid off!
As far as you not being able to use them for anything other than academics I have no idea.
This seems to back up that some loans aren't as regulated as what yours were.
https://studentloanhero.com/featured/what-can-i-spend-student-loans-on/
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Here's what I don't get: if you're convinced you're going to lose either way, what's wrong with a principled vote for a third party or independent candidate? There's bound to be one.
Have you read the platforms from some of the 3rd party candidates?
Guess what I'm trying to say, is that if the Democrats could run a candidate that's closer to the center, myself and many other independents would probably be in.
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The Clinton impeachment was in his second term.
Oops, yes. Thanks for the correction.
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I have no idea, but found this as showing a great deal of the money is being used frivolously.
https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/EJ1140908.pdf
To be fair, that study finds that only 23% of students surveyed used any student loan money for any non-educational stuff. It doesn't attempt to itemize which categories students spent their loan money on (about 1/3 of those categories are perfectly defensible), nor does it attempt to ascertain how much money students spent in each of those categories, from their loans or otherwise.
Besides, this doesn't have to be binary. It can be possible that 1) some students use loan money frivolously, and 2) tuition is too expensive.
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To be fair, that study finds that only 23% of students surveyed used any student loan money for any non-educational stuff. It doesn't attempt to itemize which categories students spent their loan money on (about 1/3 of those categories are perfectly defensible), nor does it attempt to ascertain how much money students spent in each of those categories, from their loans or otherwise.
I see. Thanks for pointing that out
Besides, this doesn't have to be binary. It can be possible that 1) some students use loan money frivolously, and 2) tuition is too expensive.
I can completely agree with this.
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Hard work and living within your means won't kill them. Their mess and their responsibility to fix it. I'm not going to pull money out of the pocket of someone else to fix their stupid. They were adults when those decisions were made.
So...and I don't want to put words in your mouth here...you think they should just have to now suffer whatever consequences that mistake brings?
Do you feel the same about these other "socialist" agenda items? Healthcare for instance...don't have money for insurance? it's your own fault, you'll have to just live or die with whatever health problems you have?
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So...and I don't want to put words in your mouth here...you think they should just have to now suffer whatever consequences that mistake brings?
Do you feel the same about these other "socialist" agenda items? Healthcare for instance...don't have money for insurance? it's your own fault, you'll have to just live or die with whatever health problems you have?
Thanks for asking and not assuming.
With health care...No, I do not think that if you don't have health insurance it's you own fault, you'll just have to live or die with whatever health problems you have.
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To be fair, that study finds that only 23% of students surveyed used any student loan money for any non-educational stuff. It doesn't attempt to itemize which categories students spent their loan money on (about 1/3 of those categories are perfectly defensible), nor does it attempt to ascertain how much money students spent in each of those categories, from their loans or otherwise.
Besides, this doesn't have to be binary. It can be possible that 1) some students use loan money frivolously, and 2) tuition is too expensive.
What an excellent job abstracting the abstract.
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Two new polls in the last two days have the majority supporting impeachment. It’s a slim majority, but it’s moved into the positive just this week. It will move more as the hearings reveal the depth and breadth of the crimes and coverups. 😁😁😁😁
Meanwhile Trump wants to be rid of his meddlesome whistleblower, and lamented that he couldn’t just drag him out and hang him. I am not exaggerating. 😳😳😳😳
Oh, and emails with the full transcripts of Trump’s calls were stored on a separate email server in a basement somewhere. 🤣🤣🤣🤣
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With health care...No, I do not think that if you don't have health insurance it's you own fault, you'll just have to live or die with whatever health problems you have.
Do you support trying to make healthcare available to everyone, irrespective of wealth?
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With health care...No, I do not think that if you don't have health insurance it's you own fault, you'll just have to live or die with whatever health problems you have.
I don’t think a person who believes this can be called a “centrist.”
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I don’t think a person who believes this can be called a “centrist.”
I think that at this point that's a fairly majority view, along with requiring coverage for pre-existing conditions.
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I don’t think a person who believes this can be called a “centrist.”
I think the double.negatives confused you.
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I think the double.negatives confused you.
Yeah I missed that the last clause was quoting HH.
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Do you support trying to make healthcare available to everyone, irrespective of wealth?
Sure, that would be great. Up front cost of paying for it, cost of actual care, level of care, already existing shortage of doctors causes things to get sticky. Then, thinking about the Fed running health care makes me squeamish. The Fed surely can't mess up another government program.
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I think the double.negatives confused you.
Thanks for the assist
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Sure, that would be great. Up front cost of paying for it, cost of actual care, level of care, already existing shortage of doctors causes things to get sticky. Then, thinking about the Fed running health care makes me squeamish. The Fed surely can't mess up another government program.
Forget bout paying for it or running it for the moment... you support the concept of universal healthcare...is that fair to say?
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Forget bout paying for it or running it for the moment... you support the concept of universal healthcare...is that fair to say?
I do this game with my kids when I'm leading them to a argument ending point I'm about to lay on them.
For the moment I'll forget the stickies. Yes, I can support the concept of universal care.
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I do this game with my kids when I'm leading them to a argument ending point I'm about to lay on them.
For the moment I'll forget the stickies. Yes, I can support the concept of universal care.
So you see it coming. My argument is that you're not opposed to the socialism, you're afraid of the unknowns of implementing it, so you default to the status quo. Bringing this back to my original point...this is what I see in the majority of the "independents" and "fence sitters", and why the Republicans' fear mongering works on them.
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So you see it coming. My argument is that you're not opposed to the socialism, you're afraid of the unknowns of implementing it, so you default to the status quo. Bringing this back to my original point...this is what I see in the majority of the "independents" and "fence sitters", and why the Republicans' fear mongering works on them.
Fear leads to the dark side. I don't have fear but legitimate questions. The left has not sufficiently answered those questions.
In this instance you picked medicare for all which happens to be one of the least on my list that I object to. That why I tried to give you 2 for 1 to start with.
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Trump: (https://www.latimes.com/politics/story/2019-09-26/trump-at-private-breakfast-who-gave-the-whistle-blower-the-information-because-thats-almost-a-spy) "“I want to know who’s the person, who’s the person who gave the whistleblower the information? Because that’s close to a spy. You know what we used to do in the old days when we were smart? Right? The spies and treason, we used to handle it a little differently than we do now."
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Fear leads to the dark side. I don't have fear but legitimate questions. The left has not sufficiently answered those questions.
In this instance you picked medicare for all which happens to be one of the least on my list that I object to. That why I tried to give you 2 for 1 to start with.
Has the right answered those questions??
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Trump: (https://www.latimes.com/politics/story/2019-09-26/trump-at-private-breakfast-who-gave-the-whistle-blower-the-information-because-thats-almost-a-spy) "“I want to know who’s the person, who’s the person who gave the whistleblower the information? Because that’s close to a spy. You know what we used to do in the old days when we were smart? Right? The spies and treason, we used to handle it a little differently than we do now."
Huh, sounds like the threat of retaliation.
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Fear leads to the dark side. I don't have fear but legitimate questions. The left has not sufficiently answered those questions.
In this instance you picked medicare for all which happens to be one of the least on my list that I object to. That why I tried to give you 2 for 1 to start with.
We all have questions. That doesn't mean we should blindly accept where we are and dismiss alternatives.
Your 2 for 1 was essentially just 1...the exorbitant costs to go to college and all that results. And that's not at the top of critical list...it's several rungs below health care, which is the single biggest burden people are likely to face in their lifetimes. And be that as it may, it's the single biggest issue over which the scared cry "SOCIALISM!!" I'm glad you don't.
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Huh, sounds like the threat of retaliation.
Here's some fun context for the comments: "The person briefed said that many of the diplomats in the room took particular offense because there were children in the audience and it was supposed to be a family-friendly event. Instead, the kids there saw Trump talking ominously about treason and spies and how we need to be rougher on people."
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Has the right answered those questions??
No, they haven't. But the ineptitude of the right doesn't make the platforms of the left legitimate or give a pass to not answer how the programs they put forth are going to work.
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We all have questions. That doesn't mean we should blindly accept where we are and dismiss alternatives.
On this we agree
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Fear leads to the dark side. I don't have fear but legitimate questions. The left has not sufficiently answered those questions.
Here are some proposed solutions (http://cepr.net/publications/op-eds-columns/the-problem-of-doctors-salaries) to doctor shortages along with an honest look at the political challenges of making those solutions happen.
There's a lot that goes into the cost problem: shitty insurers, MD protectionism, hospital monopolization, prescription patent abuse, etc., etc. I do get frustrated with the politicians who oversimplify things (e.g. focusing entirely on the insurance companies) because it makes M4A seem like a half-baked idea. But there is a lot of good work being done behind the scenes, and I think the best thing we can do as voters is commit to the goal of M4A but demand more details about how our representatives are going to do it right.
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Trump: (https://www.latimes.com/politics/story/2019-09-26/trump-at-private-breakfast-who-gave-the-whistle-blower-the-information-because-thats-almost-a-spy) "“I want to know who’s the person, who’s the person who gave the whistleblower the information? Because that’s close to a spy. You know what we used to do in the old days when we were smart? Right? The spies and treason, we used to handle it a little differently than we do now."
In the past, a lot of the populace viewed these types of statements as tough guy shit, they might of even admired it. I bet that threshold has been, or will shortly be crossed where these statements are increasingly viewed as the ramblings of a terrified man.
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Here's some fun context for the comments: "The person briefed said that many of the diplomats in the room took particular offense because there were children in the audience and it was supposed to be a family-friendly event. Instead, the kids there saw Trump talking ominously about treason and spies and how we need to be rougher on people."
Makes one sentimental for the days when he was just talking about fuck-yachts to Boy Scouts.
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Here are some proposed solutions (http://cepr.net/publications/op-eds-columns/the-problem-of-doctors-salaries) to doctor shortages along with an honest look at the political challenges of making those solutions happen.
There's a lot that goes into the cost problem: shitty insurers, MD protectionism, hospital monopolization, prescription patent abuse, etc., etc. I do get frustrated with the politicians who oversimplify things (e.g. focusing entirely on the insurance companies) because it makes M4A seem like a half-baked idea. But there is a lot of good work being done behind the scenes, and I think the best thing we can do as voters is commit to the goal of M4A but demand more details about how our representatives are going to do it right.
Medicare runs at about a 3% overhead. Show me a for-profit insurance company that comes within 15 points of that!
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Here are some proposed solutions (http://cepr.net/publications/op-eds-columns/the-problem-of-doctors-salaries) to doctor shortages along with an honest look at the political challenges of making those solutions happen.
There's a lot that goes into the cost problem: shitty insurers, MD protectionism, hospital monopolization, prescription patent abuse, etc., etc. I do get frustrated with the politicians who oversimplify things (e.g. focusing entirely on the insurance companies) because it makes M4A seem like a half-baked idea. But there is a lot of good work being done behind the scenes, and I think the best thing we can do as voters is commit to the goal of M4A but demand more details about how our representatives are going to do it right.
Thanks for the link! Some of what the article proposed is a good start.
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New poll (https://today.yougov.com/opi/surveys/results#/survey/72f3bf66-dee3-11e9-b4a9-9f0e9e31e4a3/question/9b91b2b7-dee3-11e9-ba0e-c7fcd6994022/politics) has only 49% of Republicans opposed to impeachment.
Meanwhile, the pro-impeachment percentage has increased by 13 since Sunday.
This is the fallacy of Pelosi chicken-and-egg argument against impeachment playing out in real time.
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One last thought on student loans...
I’m hoping that there starts to be less of a stigma associated with not going to a four-year university. People go even if they can’t afford it because they feel like they have to, so they go get a degree just to get a degree, can’t find a job with it, and have trouble paying their loans off. Or worse, they don’t finish their degree for whatever reason and are saddled with debt and nothing to show for it.
My son will be starting the college decision process in about six years, my daughter another three years after that. Who knows what tuition rates will be by then. I don’t want college to be the automatic choice for them if it’s not right (or not necessary) for the careers they want.
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Medicare runs at about a 3% overhead. Show me a for-profit insurance company that comes within 15 points of that!
That is shockingly efficient for the gubmint. If I correctly interpreted the numbers I just looked up, the UK’s NHS is about 2.5%.
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That is shockingly efficient for the gubmint. If I correctly interpreted the numbers I just looked up, the UK’s NHS is about 2.5%.
It’s actually very doable when you don’t have to spend anything on marketing, make a profit for shareholders or pay a CEO a gadgillion dollars.
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It’s actually very doable when you don’t have to spend anything on marketing, make a profit for shareholders or pay a CEO a gadgillion dollars.
The worst thing about competition is marketing. Think how cheap auto insurance would be if the insurers weren't allowed to fill airtime with Flo, the lizard, Aaron Rogers, Shaq and the General, J.K. Simmons and that other guy that was in Oz, Pedro Cerrano, or the myriad of other hucksters hawking their wares.
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The worst thing about competition is marketing. Think how cheap auto insurance would be if the insurers weren't allowed to fill airtime with Flo, the lizard, Aaron Rogers, Shaq and the General, J.K. Simmons and that other guy that was in Oz, Pedro Cerrano, or the myriad of other hucksters hawking their wares.
When Big Pharma bleats about having to charge so much for drugs because they need to fund R&D, just remember that they spend twice as much on marketing as they do on research (and much of the research budget is spent on making competitor-products to existing drugs).
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I'd say he's coming increasingly unhinged but it's par for the course.
Trump rants nonsensically about his own spelling mistake, while confusing hyphen for apostrophe (https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/trump-news-twitter-cnn-spelling-liddle-impeach-today-a9122916.html)
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The House Intel Committee is going to take the lead on the Ukraine investigation. Good. Schiff’s great at this stuff.
Also, they’re scheduling hearings for next week. Good. This is too important to take a recess.
They’re expected to call Barr and Giuliani. Good. I’ll be in my bunk.
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Some press are now trying to couch this as an issue of national security. They’re also hung up on the cover up. They’ve already lost their focus.
Sure, one can argue that there are national security issues here, and sure, all criminals try to hide their deeds, but the issues here are abuse of power and undermining democracy. Even the Trump camp knows this. That’s why they tried to cover it all up.
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They’re expected to call Barr and Giuliani. Good. I’ll be in my bunk.
yikes
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Kaiser Foundation study of US health insurance: https://slate.com/business/2019/09/health-insurance-us-kaiser-study.html
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Some press are now trying to couch this as an issue of national security. They’re also hung up on the cover up. They’ve already lost their focus.
Sure, one can argue that there are national security issues here, and sure, all criminals try to hide their deeds, but the issues here are abuse of power and undermining democracy. Even the Trump camp knows this. That’s why they tried to cover it all up.
The national security issue is serious. If Trump is involving foreign governments in his illegal schemes that he then covers up, they have leverage over him.
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Have you read the platforms from some of the 3rd party candidates?
Guess what I'm trying to say, is that if the Democrats could run a candidate that's closer to the center, myself and many other independents would probably be in.
It will be interesting to see how much the eventual nominee retreats from her (or his) most audacious proposals. Warren doesn't strike me as one to temper herself, but it's certainly a norm that candidates swerve left (or right) for the primaries and reverse course for the general. Perhaps the eventual nominee will put some distance between herself (or himself) and her (or his) more unapologetically socialist proposals.
A quirk of this batty season we find ourselves in is that lefty policies tend to be extremely popular when people are polled about them. I think more and more that polls are active agents of evil, and the first politico to actually run in spite of them will find they're creating their own weather. We are a great malleable shitheap of mostly undoctrinaire types, the plaything of cynical marketing from the right and failed expectations from the dems. And we're ungovernably large. And we're too well off to give enough of a shit about tyranny of the minority. In other words the time's could hardly he riper for something great or horrible to happen.
I forgot what my point was.
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Pompeo has been subpoenaed to provide documents relating to
Rudi’s incessant blabber mouth Ukraine.
Barr’s next, I’m sure. Maybe Pence too, after Trump outed him.
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Here are some proposed solutions (http://cepr.net/publications/op-eds-columns/the-problem-of-doctors-salaries) to doctor shortages along with an honest look at the political challenges of making those solutions happen.
I call bullshit on this talking point:
For example, many states now allow nurse practitioners to prescribe medicine without the supervision of a doctor, and there is no evidence that this has resulted in worse outcomes for patients.
Counterpoint: https://www.medpagetoday.com/nursing/nursing/82253
Doctor's salaries are a pretty small part of the problem compared to hospital/insurance company bureaucrat salaries, or pharmaceutical company marketing budgets.
We already have universal health care, it's called the emergency room. It encourages the worst possible health practices (wait until you are dying) and leads to the most expense for all of us.
The status quo is not acceptable; we need a single-payer system.
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Kurt Volker resigned from the State Department tonight, to spend more time getting Giuliani’s tire marks off his suit.
Also, reportedly, Trump met with Wayne LaPierre today to ask the NRA to fund his impeachment defense. The story goes that LaPierre asked for Trump’s help in quashing gun reform which Trump agreed to give. Which itself is an impeachable offense.
His a crime layer cake.
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The national security issue is serious. If Trump is involving foreign governments in his illegal schemes that he then covers up, they have leverage over him.
I don’t really disagree, but it’s not as clear as the core crime and is just going to distract from what people can clearly understand. We don’t need this to be about whether people can blackmail Trump.
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I don’t really disagree, but it’s not as clear as the core crime and is just going to distract from what people can clearly understand. We don’t need this to be about whether people can blackmail Trump.
Agreed. This is an old-fashioned scandal, which is why I think it’s taken off so quickly. Trump’s prior offenses were all committed out in the open, on Twitter, and often previewed before they were done. The press and the Democrats did not have a playbook for that.
This one is a crime committed in secret that was then exposed. That’s old school, and they all knew how how to work it. In just 3 days it has turned politics inside out and embroiled the president, the VP, the Sec. of State, the AG, America’s mayor and America’s son-in-law (oh yes, Kushner’s in this up to his pencil neck too).
Now we’re in a world that everyone knows how it goes...except Trump.
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The over-classification of Trump’s calls with Zelenskiy, Putin and MBS (you knew those other two would crop up, right?) is itself against the law.
I am giddy at the prospect that Trump is going to get proper fucked when the contents of his secret server are subpoenaed and brought forth.
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Roger Angell turned 99 on September 19. I truly hope he outlives this thread and I look forward to the next presidential election to see if it will be even more of an important vote.
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I’m starting to contemplate that the Senate may actually remove him. A week ago,I thought the chance was zero; it’s definitely above zero now. We hear quotes saying that 30 Republican Senators would vote for removal if it were a private vote. I also read a quote from a Republican house member from Nevada who isn’t on board with impeachment, but wants to gather facts and said:
it would be a “problem” if it was “proven” that Trump used government agencies to “put (his) finger on the scale of an election.”
Once Republicans publicly float language like this, you know things are changing behind the scenes.
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It’s snowballing now. Everyone is confessing what they know to the nearest newsy. To wit, reports tonight say that the readout of the infamous Oval Office meeting in 2017 - the day after Trump had fired Comey when he met with assorted Russian dignitaries and talked about the pressure being off - was also deep-sixed in the basement server. The report also says that he told them he didn’t give a shit about the Russians interfering in our elections.
The thing is, the readouts of these meetings and conversations aren’t as classified as the place they’re being stashed. They are subpoenable (is that a word?) and not subject to privilege or national security concerns. They need to subpoena all the readouts on that server - it’s a closet full of a billion skeletons.
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This onion is getting peeled by a ferret on espresso.
Former DNI Coates was fired just days after the Zelenskiy call. Trump wanted his man installed as the Acting DNI but found out that, by law, the Deputy DNI takes the Acting post. So Deputy DNI had to go too, and so Coates had to tell the excellent Sue Gordon that she had to resign. Trump put up a spectacularly bad nominee who flamed out and ended up with Maguire as his new DNI.
With what we know now, this looks infinitely more shady. Did he have to remove the intelligence professionals in order that The transcripts of him committing his high crimes be buried in his secret server? Coates and Gordon probably just made Schiff’s witness list.
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In his furious Sunday-long tweet storm, Trump called for Schiff to be tried for treason and warned against civil war if impeachment continues. In a normal world, that would be the last thing a politician would say before being forced to resign. In Trump World, it barely gets an above the fold headline.
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In his furious Sunday-long tweet storm, Trump called for Schiff to be tried for treason and warned against civil war if impeachment continues. In a normal world, that would be the last thing a politician would say before being forced to resign. In Trump World, it barely gets an above the fold headline.
Master Windu will need to bring better backup this time!
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Here'smore fodder for the obvious undermining of national security: "Attorney General William P. Barr has held private meetings overseas with foreign intelligence officials seeking their help in a Justice Department inquiry that President Trump hopes will discredit U.S. intelligence agencies’ examination of Russian interference in the 2016 election, according to people familiar with the matter."WaPo article. (https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/attorney-general-barr-personally-asked-foreign-officials-to-aid-inquiry-into-cia-fbi-activities-in-2016/2019/09/30/d50cd5c4-e3a5-11e9-b403-f738899982d2_story.html)
It's amazing to me that now--months after the Mueller report was released and (right or wrongly) met with a collective shrug despite detailing multiple crimes--Trump and his folks are still working to undermine both the report and the underlying foundation for the investigation that Russia launched a cyber campaign to help Trump's campaign. Hell, even Trump's conversation with the Ukrainian president was the marriage of three crazy conspiracies designed to blame someone other than Russia for the hack on the DNC (or more specifically that the DNC famed Russia).
Meanwhile, the Wall Street Journal reports (https://www.wsj.com/articles/mcconnell-envisions-senate-trial-if-house-passes-articles-of-impeachment-11569865002) that Pompeo was listening in on the call with the Ukrainian president. Last week Pompeo pretended not to know what was said in the conversation.
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It's amazing to me that now--months after the Mueller report was released and (right or wrongly) met with a collective shrug despite detailing multiple crimes--Trump and his folks are still working to undermine both the report and the underlying foundation for the investigation that Russia launched a cyber campaign to help Trump's campaign.
Are you kidding? We’re about due for yet another statement from yet another NOAA lackey that Alabama was absolutely at high risk of tropical storm damage.
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He is a psycho
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/01/us/politics/trump-border-wars.html?action=click&module=Top%20Stories&pgtype=Homepage (https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/01/us/politics/trump-border-wars.html?action=click&module=Top%20Stories&pgtype=Homepage)
Privately, the president had often talked about fortifying a border wall with a water-filled trench, stocked with snakes or alligators, prompting aides to seek a cost estimate. He wanted the wall electrified, with spikes on top that could pierce human flesh. After publicly suggesting that soldiers shoot migrants if they threw rocks, the president backed off when his staff told him that was illegal. But later in a meeting, aides recalled, he suggested that they shoot migrants in the legs to slow them down. That’s not allowed either, they told him.
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Obama mocks GOP, jokes they want border moat (https://www.cbsnews.com/news/obama-mocks-gop-jokes-they-want-border-moat/)
Maybe they'll need a moat. Maybe they'll want alligators in the moat.
Oh yeah, this was from 2011. #BeyondSatire
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Oh, and it’s bad enough that foreign governments pay Trump by staying at his properties, but now Politico reports that foreign governments are paying Trump for stays at his resorts and then not staying there (https://www.politico.com/news/2019/10/02/trump-hotel-empty-rooms-016763). There’s a spate of large block bookings being made and paid for, but no one shows up.
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Oh, and it’s bad enough that foreign governments pay Trump by staying at his properties, but now Politico reports that foreign governments are paying Trump for stays at his resorts and then not staying there (https://www.politico.com/news/2019/10/02/trump-hotel-empty-rooms-016763). There’s a spate of large block bookings being made and paid for, but no one shows up.
“The unifying theme of congressional investigations is examining the president’s abuse of his office and his power to advance his personal political agenda and his goal of financial self- enrichment,” said Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.), a member of the House Oversight Committee.
I'd say that's on the money and also why it is counter productive to focus impeachment only on Ukraine amongst the sea of crimes.
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Bernie had 2 stents put in a blocked artery after experiencing chest pains.
Get well soon, Bernie, but unfortunately your campaign should pretty much be over.
https://twitter.com/taragolshan/status/1179405504507981824
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I'd say that's on the money and also why it is counter productive to focus impeachment only on Ukraine amongst the sea of crimes.
It’s a balancing act between not leaving anything out (which means it would take forever to finish) and going narrow suggesting that everything else was ok (or at least not impeachable).
I think they need to pick maybe 3 things:
Abuse of power (Ukraine)
Influence peddling (foreign/lobbyist spending/investment at Trump/Kushner properties)
Self-enrichment (govt spending at Trump properties)
I am leaving out anything from the Mueller report because - as serious as it is - it would be cleaner to go with all new stuff. The RWNM would make it all about the Mueller report which was twisted into nothingness and with hindsight was so narrowly focused that it blew right by all the rest of this. Also, the new stuff is all entirely while Trump has been president, so it’s clearly valid for oversight by Congress.
ETA: Plus, of course, any shit that any of the pull from now on can be considered obstruction, which is an impeachable offense. As Trump’s knee jerk reaction to getting caught criming, is to do more crimes, this will likely lead to an ever-extending list of charges.
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Judging by his Twitter feed in the last few minutes, Trump was watching the Pelosi/Schiff briefing. He reacted with his customary calmness and sanity and did not at all go off on an expletive-laden tweet storm that was as as fact-free as it was unhinged.
PS. The Dow has dropped 500 points today, after dropping over 300 points yesterday, because Trump has killed manufacturing activity. It’s at the lowest point it’s been in 10 years, i.e. since the end of the 2008/9 recession.
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It’s a balancing act between not leaving anything out (which means it would take forever to finish) and going narrow suggesting that everything else was ok (or at least not impeachable).
I think they need to pick maybe 3 things:
Abuse of power (Ukraine)
Influence peddling (foreign/lobbyist spending/investment at Trump/Kushner properties)
Self-enrichment (govt spending at Trump properties)
I am leaving out anything from the Mueller report because - as serious as it is - it would be cleaner to go with all new stuff. The RWNM would make it all about the Mueller report which was twisted into nothingness and with hindsight was so narrowly focused that it blew right by all the rest of this. Also, the new stuff is all entirely while Trump has been president, so it’s clearly valid for oversight by Congress.
ETA: Plus, of course, any shit that any of the pull from now on can be considered obstruction, which is an impeachable offense. As Trump’s knee jerk reaction to getting caught criming, is to do more crimes, this will likely lead to an ever-extending list of charges.
The ten discrete examples of obstruction in volume 2 of the Mueller report all occurred while he was president. I can't imagine not including that in articles of impeachment.
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The ten discrete examples of obstruction in volume 2 of the Mueller report all occurred while he was president. I can't imagine not including that in articles of impeachment.
They are serious and eminently impeachable, but their inclusion will muddy the very clear waters of the more recent crimes. And with Mueller himself being almost a hostile witness, I’d hate to see all this other good stuff dragged off course when that stuff is already in the record.
#KISS
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Latest opinion polls show a plurality support impeachment and removal.
Trump’s (entirely predictable) strategy is that he will burn everything and everyone to the ground if anyone tries to remove him from office or even interfere with his ongoing crime spree.
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Rick Perry is the latest to be dragged into the Ukraine scandal. Oops.
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On the WH lawn this morning, Trump invited China to investigate the Bidens.
He's trying to normalize it.
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On the WH lawn this morning, Trump invited China to investigate the Bidens.
He's trying to normalize it.
Asked what he wanted President Zelensky to do about the Bidens, “If they were honest about it, they would start a major investigation into the Bidens.” His strategy appears to be to keep committing crimes so that the law can’t catch up to where he is.
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“Mr. President, you can’t secretly commit crimes.”
“Read you loud and clear.”
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
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Pence goes all in with Trump:
"The American people have a right to know if the vice president of the United States, or his family, profited from his position."
Either that, or he’s confessing.
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The text trail of the Ukraine thing are totally damning. You can see Ukraine desperately trying to convince us as to their dire situation, and all the get is “Say Biden” over and over.
Oh, and after Trump shocked us by calling on China to investigate Biden, it turns out that he asked Xi personally to do this during a June call.
There is absolutely zero chance for a clean election with this man involved.
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Xi update: Trump promised silence on Hong Kong protests in return for an investigation into Biden.
So now we have Trump willing to abandon Ukrainians to Russia and Hong Kongians (Konganese? Kongolians?) to China in order to get re-elected. He also called Boris Johnson asking for the same thing while Bill Barr has been haranguing Australia and Italy. How many others?
This is just one week of the impeachment inquiry.
I am not sure with whom I'm more angry: Trump and his flying Trumpanzees, the Republicans in Congress who have gone deaf, dumb and blind, or the Democrats who are being calm and methodical when this is running around, hair on fire stuff.
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I am not sure with whom I'm more angry: Trump and his flying Trumpanzees, the Republicans in Congress who have gone deaf, dumb and blind, or the Democrats who are being calm and methodical when this is running around, hair on fire stuff.
It's the Republicans in Congress. Trump is a corrupt daft narcissistic lunatic and we all knew that going in. The Democrats, in their ham-fisted way, are at least trying establish accountability. The congressional Republicans have utterly abdicated their responsibilities to the nation.
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It's the Republicans in Congress. Trump is a corrupt daft narcissistic lunatic and we all knew that going in. The Democrats, in their ham-fisted way, are at least trying establish accountability. The congressional Republicans have utterly abdicated their responsibilities to the nation.
Correct on all accounts.
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Having fired a test missile - successfully - from underwater, North Korea has now withdrawn from negotiations over denuclearization. #ArtOfTheDeal
Trump is now blaming Rick Perry for the call with President Zelenskiy. No really.
Trump spent the day rage-tweeting about Mitt Romney.
This is fine.
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Oh, and tomorrow’s Sunday show line up includes no one from the administration, no senate republicans and no house republicans.
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Having fired a test missile - successfully - from underwater, North Korea has now withdrawn from negotiations over denuclearization. #ArtOfTheDeal
Trump is now blaming Rick Perry for the call with President Zelenskiy. No really.
Trump spent the day rage-tweeting about Mitt Romney.
This is fine.
Only in a Trump administration could Rick Perry be the mastermind
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It’s amazingly sad people still support this cretin.
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The whistleblower's lawyer says he now has a second whistleblower who has first-hand knowledge of the calls and has filed the appropriate complaints so is protected under the law*.
Another attorney says that he has multiple administration staff consulting with his firm. I don't know why we are not seeing a joint press conference with Mattis, Knielsen, Coates, Kelly, Tillerson etc. etc. saying exactly what they know. Those who get out in front of this are going to be saved and the rest are going to go under in the tsunami.
Speaking of...Mike Pompeo seemed to let slip that he was on more/most of the calls of interest.
If Ron Johnson's defense (https://www.nbcnews.com/meet-the-press/video/-senator-johnson-please-gop-senator-refuses-to-answer-questions-over-ukraine-70725701857) of this is anything to go by, it's all about saying that Trump is right to try to get to the bottom of why Russia was framed for 2016. That's got to burn on the way out, right? It's completely ridiculous. Apart from anything else, all 14 intelligence services agreed that it was Russia, including the CIA which was at the time being run by...checks notes...Mike Pompeo.
* Whistleblower protections that were updated and strengthened and signed into law by...checks notes...Donald J. Trump.
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Couple of quick hits this morning:
- Trump has ordered the withdraw of US forces from Syria (https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/trump-administration-to-pull-troops-from-northern-syria-as-turkey-readies-offensive/2019/10/07/a965e466-e8b3-11e9-bafb-da248f8d5734_story.html) because hey, mission accomplished (https://cbsnews2.cbsistatic.com/hub/i/r/2008/05/01/d851091e-a642-11e2-a3f0-029118418759/thumbnail/1200x630/e8589f6f948ed6b929982a2871e452c6/image4061139x.jpg) against ISIS, apparently. Brett McGurk, Trump's former special envoy for defeating ISIS, is pissed (https://twitter.com/brett_mcgurk/status/1181085818493927425). Nikki Haley, Trump's former UN ambassador, is pissed (https://twitter.com/NikkiHaley/status/1181191973367160834). Even Lindsey Graham sounds pissed (https://twitter.com/LindseyGrahamSC/status/1181181561045172224), although he throws in enough qualifiers to leave open the option to walk it back later.
- Federal judge orders Trump to turn over eight years of tax returns (https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/07/nyregion/trump-taxes-lawsuit-vance.html).
Trump's Twitter account should be popcorn material today.
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Trump was ordered to cough up hid tax returns by a federal judge and then another federal judge immediately issued a stay on that order. It helps to have packed the federal courts with cronies and believers.
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The Turks have already started bombing the Syrian border. They have no idea where the US forces are, but they’re still bombing.
This is a bigger clusterfuck than the Ukraine shit last week, and that was unprecedentedly fucked.
There is no bottom; only grift, corruption, incompetence and perhaps, right now, the deaths of some of our finest.
He needs to be dragged from the Oval Office without delay.
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Amb. Snodland - this week’s dumbest member of the Trump crime family - has been blocked by the State dept from testifying in closed session to congress today. The State dept is also Hindi g back the full text exchanges on the subject which, for the record, we’re all made on WhatsApp using personal phones and not on secure government phones/servers.
I mean, they just look so innocent, right?
Trump is waving his tiny, mushroom-headed cock at congress. It’s time they took a long run up and kicked him right in the junk. Start putting people in jail.
In other news, impeachment is gaining popularity across all sides of the political divide, including being +21 with Republicans. This Syria thing has Trump in an incredibly weak and vulnerable situation. It’s time to go after him full bore. It’s not just politically expedient, it will save lives.
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I found this interesting, in that it is a sign of new cracks in the armor:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/religion/2019/10/08/trump-danger-losing-mandate-heaven-over-syria-decision-pat-robertson-warns/ (https://www.washingtonpost.com/religion/2019/10/08/trump-danger-losing-mandate-heaven-over-syria-decision-pat-robertson-warns/)
The president, who allowed Khashoggi to be cut into pieces without any repercussions whatsoever, is now allowing the Christians and the Kurds to be massacred by the Turks,” Robertson said. He additionally blasted Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan — with whom Trump has a friendly rapport — as a “thug” and a “dictator.
That’s Pat Robertson, using inflammatory language directed at Trump, rather than directing it at Trump’s opponents. I realize he is crazy and this is not Ukraine-related, but if there starts to be cracks in the the crazy support, what’s left?
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Sondland was advised by the White House, in a 12:30am voicemail, that he should not testify. That voicemail will be one of the subpoenaed items. They are so dumb they do all this stuff Lon recorded media (like texting “call me” instead of just calling).
Speaking of which, Trump tweeted out that it was his decision to hold back Sondland’s testimony. So that’s another article of impeachment for the ever-growing pile.
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Trump has fully embraced obstruction of justice. NYT: The White House declared war on the impeachment investigation, saying in a letter to House leaders that it would not cooperate with the inquiry.
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Trump has fully embraced obstruction of justice. NYT: The White House declared war on the impeachment investigation, saying in a letter to House leaders that it would not cooperate with the inquiry.
Subpoena them all and fill up the jail.
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Reports are that Turkey and Russia...yes, Russia...are mounting a coordinated offensive against the Kurds. Coming at them from two directions. This is a massacre of 2 million people happening in real time, and it’s down entirely to one man. I am completely lost for words.
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Some peanuts in this giant turd of politics right now:
- A new poll has more than 50% in favor of removing Trump
- Warren is now the nationwide front-runner* in the Democratic primary
* There's lots of love for Biden, which is why he was the out-and-out leader for so long. But this was mostly name recognition. As the campaign has progressed, it has become more and more clear that he’s not up to this. His stilted and slow responses to various moments has been concerning; his complete inability to push back on the attack on his family has been a disaster. I mean, Trump is going after your son’s foreign business dealings...it’s right fucking there! EOR
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Meanwhile the list of documented sexual assault/perviness victims of Trump continues to expand: (https://www.esquire.com/news-politics/a29391247/donald-trump-assault-allegations-karen-johnson-all-the-presidents-women-book/)
While the president has publicly faced allegations from two dozen women, this book reveals another 43 allegations of alleged inappropriate behavior, including 26 instances of unwanted sexual contact.
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The Turks are hitting the Kurds with air strikes, including civilians. They are begging for the enforcement of the No Fly Zone but US forces have been told to stand down.
ISIS has been attacking Raqqa, including suicide bombings, and most of the city is without power.
This is just 72 hours since Trump’s fateful phone call with Erdogan in which he was said to have been “rolled”.
And don’t forget that last time (that we know of) Trump talked to Erdogan, the same thing happened - he promised to pull out of Syria completely - but the uproar from Trump’s own party forced him to reverse the “decision”. This time, Erdogan was prepared and had his forces ready to roll immediately so that he would turn Trump’s stupidity into a fait accompli.
This is so fucked up. If we let this stand, millions will die and ISIS will be resurrected. If we push back, we will be in a shooting war with Turkey and Russia. But, her emails...right?
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Trump has released a statement confirming Turkey’s attacks on the Kurds. Here’s the link (https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/2q97YCXcLOlkoR2jKKEMQ-wkG9k=/0x0:900x500/1200x800/filters:focal(378x178:522x322)/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/49493993/this-is-fine.0.jpg).
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The Turks are hitting the Kurds with air strikes, including civilians. They are begging for the enforcement of the No Fly Zone but US forces have been told to stand down.
ISIS has been attacking Raqqa, including suicide bombings, and most of the city is without power.
This is just 72 hours since Trump’s fateful phone call with Erdogan in which he was said to have been “rolled”.
And don’t forget that last time (that we know of) Trump talked to Erdogan, the same thing happened - he promised to pull out of Syria completely - but the uproar from Trump’s own party forced him to reverse the “decision”. This time, Erdogan was prepared and had his forces ready to roll immediately so that he would turn Trump’s stupidity into a fait accompli.
This is so fucked up. If we let this stand, millions will die and ISIS will be resurrected. If we push back, we will be in a shooting war with Turkey and Russia. But, her emails...right?
It's an astonishing Game of Thrones level betrayal of our only allies fighting against ISIS in the area.
There are reports that residential areas are being bombed by the Turks. This is a completely unnecessary and avoidable humanitarian catastrophe.
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It's an astonishing Game of Thrones level betrayal of our only allies fighting against ISIS in the area.
There are reports that residential areas are being bombed by the Turks. This is a completely unnecessary and avoidable humanitarian catastrophe.
I’m not sure it even rises to GoT level. This is our foreign policy being sold for - in the grand scheme of things - paltry amounts of money into Trump’s pocket. He sold his soul for a Trump tower in Moscow, and he is destroying the US’ ability to influence the world for a generation.
Trump reneged on the TPP, the Paris Climate accords, the Iran nuclear deal and NAFTA - while threatening endlessly to kill NATO - and now has abandoned the Kurds to annihilation. Even if the next president is a hybrid love-child of Jesus, Mohamed and Krishna (i.e. Elizabeth Warren), no one will trust US policy because we will reanimate Ghengis Khan and elect him 8 years later.
Trump is stress-testing this grand experiment in democracy, and it’s failing on almost every front.
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8 Kurdish civilian deaths recorded this far. Of course, while civilian deaths are tragic, so will be all the deaths of Kurdish fighters who have been abandoned to be slaughtered by vastly superior forces.
The news should be nothing but this until it’s resolved. Even Jesus knew that we had to look out for the Christians in Syria (yes, for you Trumpist lurkers - the Kurds are Christians).
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The Kurds are Christians.
Some are, but most are Muslim (you may be confusing them with Armenians).
This is still abhorrent, and the reality that how much Republicans will care about these events depends in large part on the religion (and race) of the victims is sickening.
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Some are, but most are Muslim (you may be confusing them with Armenians).
This is still abhorrent, and the reality that how much Republicans will care about these events depends in large part on the religion (and race) of the victims is sickening.
Thanks for the correction.
As to the race thing, I think it’s even beyond that. Trumpists would abandon Europe to Putin if Trump told them to. They’ve already sold out Ukraine, which is Europe’s largest country not called Russia.
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The ground attack has started.
This isn’t GoT, this is LOTR. It’s Helm’s Deep without the intervention of the Riders of Rohan; it’s Osgiliath; it’s Minas Tireth without the intervention of Theoden and the dead; it’s the burning of the Westfold; it’s the scouting of the Shire.
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Some are, but most are Muslim (you may be confusing them with Armenians).
This is still abhorrent, and the reality that how much Republicans will care about these events depends in large part on the religion (and race) of the victims is sickening.
Let's not forget what Turkey did to the Armenians.
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How do you get out of Impeachment hearings? You create a diversion - or a war. Take your pick America.
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Trump on the Kurds: "They didn't help us in the Second World War, they didn't help us with Normandy." He says they're only interested in fighting for "their land." He adds, "With all of that being said, we like the Kurds."
President Trump: Captured ISIS fighters held by Kurds in northern Syria “are going to be escaping to Europe, that’s where they want to go, back to their homes.”
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Correct on all accounts.
Rep. Mark Green, with NPR's Here & Now, talking about Trump and Syria:
"Yeah, I disagree with what he’s doing now, I wish it wasn’t happening, but I still fully support it."
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8 Kurdish civilian deaths recorded this far. Of course, while civilian deaths are tragic, so will be all the deaths of Kurdish fighters who have been abandoned to be slaughtered by vastly superior forces.
The news should be nothing but this until it’s resolved. Even Jesus knew that we had to look out for the Christians in Syria (yes, for you Trumpist lurkers - the Kurds are Christians).
I don't think most people who pulled the lever for Two Corinthians give a shit about that one way or the other.
It's time for everybody in red states to start leaning on their senators and representatives. I'm contacting mine today.
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Fox News poll:
Do not impeach: 40%
Impeach but do not remove: 4%
Impeach and remove: 51%
Fox Fucking News!
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Fox News poll:
Do not impeach: 40%
Impeach but do not remove: 4%
Impeach and remove: 51%
Fox Fucking News!
FAKE NEWS!
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Rep. Mark Green, with NPR's Here & Now, talking about Trump and Syria:
"Yeah, I disagree with what he’s doing now, I wish it wasn’t happening, but I still fully support it."
Ladies and gentlemen, I give you the Republican Party.
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We have a long and sorry history of totally fucking the Kurds over. Why they ever believe us, I have no idea.
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We have a long and sorry history of totally fucking the Kurds over. Why they ever believe us, I have no idea.
Because Trump’s sacrifice of the Kurds came out of the blue, it appears that we had been giving Turkey up-to-the-minute tracking data on all forces in the region...including the Kurds.
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Trump’s scandals and crimes are all just blowing up today.
Two of Giuliani’s henchmen in his Ukraine gambit were arrested last night trying to leave the country. They were due to testify to Congress today; they are facing charges for violating campaign contribution laws (naturally).
Control of military aid to Ukraine was taken away from career bureaucrats - who raised concerns that withholding it for political purposes is illegal - and given to a political operative - also illegal.
43 more women have accused Trump of sexual assault, including one who claims that he actually grabbed her by the pussy and pushed her into a room.
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I just don’t trust anything Barr does, or allows. So, either he’s setting up Rudy to take a fall for Trump (which won’t work) or he just allows these guys to be arrested because it’s better than having them testify.
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I just don’t trust anything Barr does, or allows. So, either he’s setting up Rudy to take a fall for Trump (which won’t work) or he just allows these guys to be arrested because it’s better than having them testify.
It was the SDNY that had them pinched, apparently before any charges had been filed. Barr may not have been aware of it, therefore. Looks like the SDNY got an alert they were leaving the country and just decided to go get them.
Barr is working for Trump 100%.
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Giuliani’s goons are being represented by the same lawyers who defended Paul Manafort. 👀
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The indictment of the above goons includes a very short alignment of dots whereby Foreign National-1 (a Russian) , funneled money to the goons who then donated it to various GOP campaigns. This is what happens when a smoking gun becomes a mushroom cloud.
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I just don’t trust anything Barr does, or allows. So, either he’s setting up Rudy to take a fall for Trump (which won’t work) or he just allows these guys to be arrested because it’s better than having them testify.
Who tipped off the goons that set them running?
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Who tipped off the goons that set them running?
Giuliani was spotted having lunch with them YESTERDAY. Who tipped off Giuliani?
It’s now being reported that the DOJ has been aware of the SDNY’s investigation into these two for months.
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Developments today, of which there are many and of import:
- The Turks have bombed US special forces, presumably in error
- The former Amb to Ukraine defied the State dept or complied with a congressional subpoena - depending on what channel you watch - and testified to Congress today. She confirmed that she’d been recalled because of pressure from the White House on the State dept, and that the State dept is a mess of pissed off people
- A Federal appellate panel voted 2-1 that Trump cannot block a subpoena for his financial records from Mazars. The dissent was from a Trump-appointed judge who’s opinion was so thin and poorly argued that it was ridiculed in the affirming decision.
- A Federal court slapped down Trump’s declaration of an emergency to fund wall construction.
- a Federal court slapped down Trump’s attempt to suspend the “public charge” rule that protects green card holders receiving government assistance.
- Rudy’s goons have a significant presence on social media, and it’s pretty hard to find a post, photo or video that doesn’t have Rudy or a Trump or three in it.
- The Dow bounced based on Trump claiming he got a trade deal agreed with China. Because that has been true every other time he’s said that?
- Lindsey Graham got pranked into thinking he was talking to Turkish diplomats on the phone (it was a couple of Russian comedians) and he reversed entirely his public, anti-Syria withdrawal stance and was all in with Trump. He’s got some splainin to do because he clearly wasn’t joking.
- Shep Smith has quit Fox News.
Quite a day. None of it good for Trump and his shrinking band of loyalists.
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The whole situation in Syria is unraveling fast:
- Turkish forces are committing war crimes
- The Kurds have been forced into an alliance with Bashad’s, Russian-backed Syrian government
- No one is now fighting ISIS, who are escaping from their Kurdish captors
- US forces are cut off and in need of evac, most likely by airlift
- We are trying to figure out what to do about the 50 nukes we have stationed in Turkey
What a shitshow. Aside from the death and destruction - which is horrifying - the big/only winners here are Putin, Bashad (i.e. Putin) and Erdogan.
This is completely indefensible, yet Republicans continue to offer bizarre third person criticisms as if it’s some kind of abstract issue and not the deaths (in one case reportedly by rape and stoning) of men, women and children who are our long time allies.
My disgust for Trump and his enablers - be they in Washington, on TV, the 40% who still support Trump or those complete cunts who made the “Kingsman” parody - is overwhelming right now.
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Fiona Hill is my favorite person this week. Her lawyers told the White House to take its privilege claim and shove it, citing the law, testified for 10 hours and, reportedly, told the committee:
- She blew the whistle on Giuliani to the NSC
- She did so at the urging of John Bolton
- She quoted Bolton as calling Giuliani a “hand grenade who’s going to blow everybody up” and that he’s “not part of whatever drug deal Rudy and Mulvaney are cooking up.”
So what this means is:
- Welcome to the party Mick Mulvaney
- Bolton is going to be a star witness who’ll be hard to smear as a deep state democrat
- This is accelerating - Neil Cavuto denounced Trump last night on Fox News
I remember a quote from an unnamed CIA office when Trump was elected, saying “he will die in jail.” He definitely deserves to, but now it is starting to seem that he just might. Republicans need to turn on him hard and fast to (try to) save their own political skins; Ukraine and the Kurds give them the excuse. Once Congressional Republicans stop running interference, Trump is fucked. And he’ll make sure to take everyone he can down with him.
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Lots of witnesses scheduled to testify this week, including Sondland who is expected to sing to save his own skin/business (his wife is quoted as being worried about a backlash against their hotel chain). It’s going to get crazier and crazier, methinks.
The Sondlans’s own the Provenance hotel chain, fyi.
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Hey das, saw this last night re: the NWS and NOAA and was wondering if you had any thoughts:
https://youtu.be/qMGn9T37eR8
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The whole situation in Syria is unraveling fast:
- Turkish forces are committing war crimes
- The Kurds have been forced into an alliance with Bashad’s, Russian-backed Syrian government
- No one is now fighting ISIS, who are escaping from their Kurdish captors
- US forces are cut off and in need of evac, most likely by airlift
- We are trying to figure out what to do about the 50 nukes we have stationed in Turkey
What a shitshow. Aside from the death and destruction - which is horrifying - the big/only winners here are Putin, Bashad (i.e. Putin) and Erdogan.
This is completely indefensible, yet Republicans continue to offer bizarre third person criticisms as if it’s some kind of abstract issue and not the deaths (in one case reportedly by rape and stoning) of men, women and children who are our long time allies.
My disgust for Trump and his enablers - be they in Washington, on TV, the 40% who still support Trump or those complete cunts who made the “Kingsman” parody - is overwhelming right now.
And as expected Russian forces have swooped in to fill the vacuum in northern Syria.
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And as expected Russian forces have swooped in to fill the vacuum in northern Syria.
The voters who wanted to “send a message” or “shake things up”, may have killed an entire people.
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The voters who wanted to “send a message” or “shake things up”, may have killed an entire people.
And most of them don’t care. (Some are nice people, I’m sure.)
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And most of them don’t care. (Some are nice people, I’m sure.)
Lara Trump defends her father in law's withdrawal because, according to her, most people would have to google to find out who the Kurds are.
The old 'I'm an ignorant fuckwit and you're likely an ignorant fuckwit so it's ok to leave our allies to certain slaughter' foreign policy argument.
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So, one of those two associates arrested earlier had a company which paid Rudy $500,000 last year. I wonder what Rudy did to earn that? Nothing, it’s just naked corruption.
The company’s name was Fraud Guarantee. Can’t make this up.
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So, one of those two associates arrested earlier had a company which paid Rudy $500,000 last year. I wonder what Rudy did to earn that? Nothing, it’s just naked corruption.
The company’s name was Fraud Guarantee. Can’t make this up.
There’s a thread on Twitter for people to post funny alternative names but, aside from Crime R Us, Twitter had nothing.
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The Trump Administration is now pursuing the curious political strategy of publicly admitting to crimes.
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Mildly concerned that Limey stroked out over some point in the last 2 days.
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The Trump Administration is now pursuing the curious political strategy of publicly admitting to crimes.
It's not a crime if nobody does anything about it.
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Mildly concerned that Limey stroked out over some point in the last 2 days.
It’s insane how we get an 8-year term’s worth of scandals in a day. Every day.
Today started with news that Turkey didn’t even bother pretending to adhere to the bullshit moratorium, and has been shelling the Kurds.
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Today started with news that Turkey didn’t even bother pretending to adhere to the bullshit moratorium, and has been shelling the Kurds.
Including, reportedly, with napalm and white phosphorus.
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I believe the number is 24. That’s how many Republican Senators will need to join Democrats in voting to convict Trump in his upcoming impeachment trial*. Mitt Romney gave a floor speech yesterday in which he went after Trump I’m very strong terms (for a Morman), and there are reports that he’s been working behind the scenes to gauge support for impeachment among his GOP colleagues.
So here we are. The fate of the Republic is falling on Romney’s incredibly narrow and rubbery shoulders. I don’t feel good about it but, if he pulls it off, he will be the hero we need but not the one we deserve right now.
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Speaking of the good of the Republic, reports claim this morning that concerns were raised about Hunter Biden’s Burisma gig in 2015...and then VP Joe Biden quashed them.
This cannot be a distraction and this cannot be a fig leaf over the gargantuan pile of corruption in the Trump administration. Biden needs to suspend.
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I have no love for Biden, and his son profiting off his dad’s position is bullshit, although is just one turd compared with Trump’s truckloads. However, I take exception to the characterization that he “quashed” it. The report I saw said he didn’t want to deal with it while his other son was dying.
Any rate, I assume Biden is done, especially if the opposing narrative is that our politicians are opportunistic scoundrels that need serious checks. I also hope is clarifies the Dem race as a race between Warren and someone more moderate, whoever that turns out to be.
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I have no love for Biden, and his son profiting off his dad’s position is bullshit, although is just one turd compared with Trump’s truckloads. However, I take exception to the characterization that he “quashed” it. The report I saw said he didn’t want to deal with it while his other son was dying.
Any rate, I assume Biden is done, especially if the opposing narrative is that our politicians are opportunistic scoundrels that need serious checks. I also hope is clarifies the Dem race as a race between Warren and someone more moderate, whoever that turns out to be.
I get what you’re saying, and I don’t want to run too deep into this diversionary rabbit hole, but Biden could’ve and should’ve stayed out of it. He didn’t.
If Trump is still there in 2020, the opponent cannot be someone with less corruption. Even if it’s a fraction of a fraction of Trump’s corruption, Trump (and the media) will make them equivalent and neutralize the issue.
This is why Biden is hobbled, and this is why Bernie is hobbled (where are his tax returns - he hasn’t released them from back on the 2016 campaign). The Dems could run Ronald Reagan and he’d get smeared as a socialist, so that’s baked in, but the candidate has to be clean on the issue where Trump is weakest, and that’s corruption.
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Surreal to read trump's boys attacking hunter biden over nepotism. Think trump and biden are both done. Wonder what's coming next.
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Lara Trump defends her father in law's withdrawal because, according to her, most people would have to google to find out who the Kurds are.
The old 'I'm an ignorant fuckwit and you're likely an ignorant fuckwit so it's ok to leave our allies to certain slaughter' foreign policy argument.
Trump isnt the first U.S. president to sell out the kurds. Doubt they were too offended or surprised. Already made nice with Assad. Suprised even lara trump makes such a stupid excuse. Kurds have been in the news consistantly since we invaded Iraq.
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Surreal to read trump's boys attacking hunter biden over nepotism. Think trump and biden are both done. Wonder what's coming next.
People who were all over this, criticizing the Bidens for nepotism:
Donald Trump Jr.
Rand Paul
Megan McCain
Ronna Romney McDaniel
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People who were all over this, criticizing the Bidens for nepotism:
Donald Trump Jr.
Rand Paul
Megan McCain
Ronna Romney McDaniel
That is a funny fucking list. I guess irony is not a concept taught at elite private schools for especially deserving scions and heirs.
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In other news, there's no truth to the story that Mick Mulvaney's press conference today consisted entirely of him stand at the podium, looking confused, with one hand full of toothpaste and the other holding an empty tube.
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In other news, there's no truth to the story that Mick Mulvaney's press conference today consisted entirely of him stand at the podium, looking confused, with one hand full of toothpaste and the other holding an empty tube.
LOL. Which would be less strange than what he actually did.
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Limey, I thought you'd appreciate this. (https://thehobbledehoy.com/2019/03/08/british-writer-pens-the-best-description-of-trump-ive-read/)
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Limey, I thought you'd appreciate this. (https://thehobbledehoy.com/2019/03/08/british-writer-pens-the-best-description-of-trump-ive-read/)
Magnificent.
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Limey, I thought you'd appreciate this. (https://thehobbledehoy.com/2019/03/08/british-writer-pens-the-best-description-of-trump-ive-read/)
"if Frankenstein decided to make a monster assembled entirely from human flaws – he would make a Trump." That's perfect.
And I love this: "If being a twat was a TV show, Trump would be the boxed set." It's a fantastic blend of crudeness and eloquence, which is something I appreciate and strive to achieve. Swearing can be eloquent when done right.
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ICYMI: Trump had a bad day yesterday. Bill Taylor testified yesterday that there was not only a quid pro quo with Ukraine, it was the driving, overriding and paramount demand of the Trump administration. Trump demanded that Zelenskyy get up in front of cameras and announce an investigation into Biden AND the DNC server, and that military aid was being withheld for this and Ukraine knew that.
This blows up pretty much every talking point, including one post-testimony taking point. Trump tried to argue today that there could be no shakedown if the other side didn’t know that the aid was being withheld. Ignoring the fact that this is yet another open confession to this crime, (a) does it really matter if Ukraine didn’t know? You were still trying to crime them, and (2) they absolutely did know and there are multiple accounts to corroborate this.
The WH Press Secretary, whoever the fuck that is these days because they’re never seen/heard, tried to paint Taylor as some kind of aggrieved, activist, deep state diplomat. That’s about as credible as Trump’s tan. Taylor is a West Poibt graduate and Vietnam vet who was appointed Ambassador to Ukraine by Poppy Bush, had a distinguished career, retired and was later recalled to act as Ambassador to Ukraine again by...checks notes...Donald J. Trump.
Taylor added more detail around Giuliani’s “irregular” diplomatic channel that involved Rudy, Perry, Volker and Ron Johnson. Fuck the lot of them.
Speaking of Rudy, his goons are proving to be a rich vein of evidence of illegal money flowing from Putin-connected oligarchs to Rudy himself, Trump’s “America First” PAC (because the irony is strong with them) and various other drooling Trump proctologists such as Kevin McCarthy and Ron deSantis.
The shitnado of corruption swirling around Giuliani just itself is impressive in is scope, audacity, sloppiness and stupidity.
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Meanwhile, republican members of the house have disrupted the testimony of DOD official Laura Cooper by storming the secure room in which it is taking place. (https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/trump-impeachment-inquiry/laura-cooper-pentagon-official-overseeing-ukraine-testifies-impeachment-inquiry-n1070586)
Only committee members are authorized to attend the deposition. Some of the unauthorized republicans brought their phones, which aren't allowed in the secure room so now a security sweep needs to be performed before the deposition can be resumed.
House republican classic two-step: (1) impeding investigations (2) endangering national security while doing so.
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House republican classic two-step: (1) impeding investigations (2) endangering national security while doing so.
(3) order pizza. I’m not kidding.
I’ve seen reports on Twitter that the Sergeant at Arms has been called. We’ve all seen protestors - even handicapped ones - being dragged from hearings. How the fuck that hasn’t happened here is a travesty. It’s a felony to use a cell phone in a SCIF and these dumb fucks are tweeting and ordering pizza.
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Lev Parnas - Rudy’s Goon #1 - appeared in court today. His lawyer argued executive privilege may apply.
I. Shit. You. Not.
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In other pseudo-legal news, Trump’s lawyers argued today that Trump could, actually, shoot someone on 5th avenue and there is nobody with jurisdiction over him to bring a charge while he’s in office. Trump’s lawyers also argued that, because Trump did not divest his businesses, this complete immunity applies to them as well. This case is deffo going to Trump’s hand-picked Supreme Court, when we will find out if there is 5 of them who will, with the stroke of their pens (while wearing a beer can hat) convert this republic into a monarchy.
To wit, at a rally in PA today, the crowd started chanting “4 more years” and Trump corrected them to chant “16 more years”... which they dutifully did.
Trump is not going to leave office voluntarily. He never was. Putin has been in office for decades, and he is calling the plays for Trump. They’re going to rig the election in 2020 so that Trump wins, and they’re going to start on removing term limits thereafter. I am convinced more than ever of two things: (1) removing Trump before 2020 is the only way to prevent the US from descending into an endless kleptocracy with a succession of Trumps as it’s Dear Leader, and (b) the previous statement is simultaneously hyperbolic, unthinkable and completely true.
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(3) order pizza. I’m not kidding.
I’ve seen reports on Twitter that the Sergeant at Arms has been called. We’ve all seen protestors - even handicapped ones - being dragged from hearings. How the fuck that hasn’t happened here is a travesty. It’s a felony to use a cell phone in a SCIF and these dumb fucks are tweeting and ordering pizza.
So, about that... a Fox News reporter is saying on Twitter that some of the Republicans were hoping to - even ASKING to - get arrested so that they could use it for propaganda.
https://twitter.com/chadpergram/status/1187173332682182656?s=21
Better move to wait them out.
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So, about that... a Fox News reporter is saying on Twitter that some of the Republicans were hoping to - even ASKING to - get arrested so that they could use it for propaganda.
https://twitter.com/chadpergram/status/1187173332682182656?s=21
Better move to wait them out.
This is literally the plot to the movie "Airheads".
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This is literally the plot to the movie "Airheads".
Holy shit!
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Getting arrested to own the libs!
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Getting arrested to own the libs!
And all that just one day after Trump called these sad sacks to the WH and told them to get tougher.
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Well Gaetz et al got their wish. Public hearings to start next month.
🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣
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The Daily Beast: Judge Napolitano Schools 'Fox & Friends' on Impeachment.
https://www.thedailybeast.com/judge-napolitano-schools-fox-and-friends-on-impeachment-adam-schiff-just-following-the-rules-written-by-gop?source=articles&via=rss
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It’s been a bad week. Everything from the absurd, like human frat paddle Matt Gaetz leading his mob to intimidate a witness, to the tragedy of the death of Elijah Cummins. In between, we found out that the DOJ is working on its own soviet-style purge, and we’re sending more forces to Syria to protect Assad’s oil. And then there’s the Astros...
So, it being Friday, here’s something to give you a smile:
Rudy Giuliani butt-dials NBC reporter, heard discussing need for cash and trashing Bidens (https://www.nbcnews.com/news/amp/ncna1071901?__twitter_impression=true)
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They didn’t take Baron to the World Series?
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They just showed Trump on the big board at the Nationals. He was booed widely and loudly, and then the spontaneous chant of “Lock him up!”
The cut away to some military types, and the crowd reverted to cheering.
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Was Gaetz on his knees during the shot?
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Was Gaetz on his knees during the shot?
You could see the top of his head.
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I noticed that the "Veterans for Impeachment" guys behind home plate got removed pretty quickly.
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I noticed that the "Veterans for Impeachment" guys behind home plate got removed pretty quickly.
The guy wearing the MAGA hat behind home plate was there the whole night.
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The guy wearing the MAGA hat behind home plate was there the whole night.
Kinda like how the media shrugs at the “Lock her up!” but were clutching their pearls at the “Lock him up!” chants last night.
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The guy wearing the MAGA hat behind home plate was there the whole night.
That guy and his dad are there for every game. Just unbelievably impassive frog-faced old dudes. That's the first time I'd ever seen him in the MAGA hat. I imagine it wasn't a coincidence.
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That guy and his dad are there for every game. Just unbelievably impassive frog-faced old dudes. That's the first time I'd ever seen him in the MAGA hat. I imagine it wasn't a coincidence.
I believe they are brothers. Henry and Murray Itkin. Charming pair.
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I believe they are brothers. Henry and Murray Itkin. Charming pair.
Sell, Mortimer, sell!
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Today, decorated 20-year combat veteran, Purple Heart recipient and - according to Fox News - deep state Soviet sleeper double-agent, Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman, will testify that he was on the July call between Trump and Zelenskiy and that the shakedown happened exactly as Taylor et al have testified. Poof goes the hearsay defense.
Coincidentally, Amb. Sondland has reversed his testimony and said of Taylor’s recounting... “yeah, what he said!”
Speaking of hearsay defenses, is there now anyone on the call not called “Trump” who disputes the testimony of Taylor, Yovanovitch, Hill, Sondland and now Vindman? When Democrats seat each if these people in front of Congress and the TV cameras - one after the other to corroborate each other’s testimony - it’s going to be a “missing tapes” moment.
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The Trumpist have taken cult worship to a new level. Creepy.
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The Trumpist have taken cult worship to a new level. Creepy.
Two days ago they were attacking critics of Tulsi Gabbard because it’s disrespectful to her military service. Yesterday they were attacking Nats fans for booing Trump because it’s disrespectful. Last night...Vindman’s a traitor.
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Two days ago they were attacking critics of Tulsi Gabbard because it’s disrespectful to her military service. Yesterday they were attacking Nats fans for booing Trump because it’s disrespectful. Last night...Vindman’s a traitor.
Well, they're half right: there was a traitor on that call.
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Tim Morrison resigned today ahead of testimony tomorrow. John Bolton’s deputy - Kupperman - has asked a court to weigh in on whether the administration can block him from testifying. Oh, and John Bolton himself is slated to testify next Wednesday.
The wall has broken and the undead are pouring through the hole like it’s World War Z.
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Devin Fucking Nunes has outed the whistleblower.
There has to be some repercussions, right?
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Devin Fucking Nunes has outed the whistleblower.
There has to be some repercussions, right?
Not until there's a change in the executive branch.
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Where’d you hear this?
And, of course there won’t be repercussions.
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The dude is apparently a Democrat which naturally means that extorting an ally and demanding that they make up baseless nonsense out of whole cloth as domestic political assistance is actually perfectly OK. In fact, it's perfect.
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Where’d you hear this?
And, of course there won’t be repercussions.
All over twitter.
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Impeachment procedure vote passes. 196 Republicans voted against the thing they have been screaming for all over the TV for the last few weeks.
So now:
- public hearings can commence
- deposition transcripts can be released
- subpoena refusal just got much, much harder to do
- Devin Nunes is in charge of Trump’s defense in the House
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Rudy Giuliani needed Apple genius help to unlock his iPhone after being named Trump cybersecurity adviser
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/rudy-giuliani-needed-apple-genius-help-unlock-his-iphone-after-n1074241
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Trump’s vagina was still full of sand from being booed by the Nationals crowd last week, so his nannies decided to get him back out there to show that he can get some love from a non-rally crowd. They tried to think of the most Trump-friendly crowd they could, and came up with UFC. Well guess what? Booed by that crowd too.
What’s left? NASCAR? A monster truck rally?
I don’t think he realizes that this is the rest of his life.
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Rudy Giuliani needed Apple genius help to unlock his iPhone after being named Trump cybersecurity adviser
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/rudy-giuliani-needed-apple-genius-help-unlock-his-iphone-after-n1074241
He defended himself on Twitter saying that the FBI needed Apple’s help to get phones open. Don’t worry, the rank stupidity of that comment was pointed out to him (the FBI was trying to open other people’s phones, not their own).
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Bad day for Trump today. A federal appeals court ruled that his bank has to turn over 8 years of tax returns and the House Dems started releasing the deposition transcripts from testimony by witnesses in their impeachment hearings.
I haven’t seen too many reports on the latter - looks like just more color to the story. Such as Sondland telling Yovanovitch that she should tweet out support for the president to keep here job - he actually told her to “go big or go home”.
Trump’s lawyers plan to take the tax returns all the way to SCOTUS, where all eyes will be on John Roberts. Will he allow his court to appoint a King?
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Trump did get some non-horrible polling news today: he has narrow leads over most Dem candidates in the 6 close states he won in 2016.
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Bad day for Trump today. A federal appeals court ruled that his bank has to turn over 8 years of tax returns and the House Dems started releasing the deposition transcripts from testimony by witnesses in their impeachment hearings.
I haven’t seen too many reports on the latter - looks like just more color to the story. Such as Sondland telling Yovanovitch that she should tweet out support for the president to keep here job - he actually told her to “go big or go home”.
Trump’s lawyers plan to take the tax returns all the way to SCOTUS, where all eyes will be on John Roberts. Will he allow his court to appoint a King?
Trump is not turning over his tax returns. Period. The SCOTUS can say anything they want, he will tell them to shove it up their collective arse, and that will be the end of that.
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Trump is not turning over his tax returns. Period. The SCOTUS can say anything they want, he will tell them to shove it up their collective arse, and that will be the end of that.
They’re not getting them from Trump directly, they’re getting them from his accountant. Unless that accountant has fewer clients than Michael Cohen, they’re not going to risk an existential punishment to protect Individual-1’s tax returns.
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Lev Parnas appears to have flipped on Rudy, or is trying the lever a pardon out of Trump. Or both. I’m leaning both.
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They’re not getting them from Trump directly, they’re getting them from his accountant. Unless that accountant has fewer clients than Michael Cohen, they’re not going to risk an existential punishment to protect Individual-1’s tax returns.
Punishment by whom? Federal law enforcement, which is commanded by...let me check...Donald J. Trump?
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To much going on, so... *** Floating dumpster fire gif ***
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So the impeachment testimony is very interesting, and telling. On the one side, you have a steady stream of Trump administration officials who all have the same narrative - that Trump used the withholding of military aid and a White House meeting to pressure the new President of Ukraine to announce an investigation into "the Bidens". On the other side, you have people who don't want Trump to get removed from office - including Trump - so they are trying to stop that from happening. The problem is, the latter group has absolutely nothing to argue.
Now I won't get into the detail of the testimony here; there are plenty of other places to look for that. What's interesting to me is the "defense" of Trump is non-existent. It's been a couple of stunts - one of which has backfired spectacularly - and waffle that there can't be anything here because we have had no first hand testimony. That latter argument is so pathetic that it's embarrassing, and this is for two reasons:
a) Many of the first-person witnesses have been asked or subpoenaed to testify, and have been blocked from doing so by the White House. This includes specifically Bolton, Pompeo, Giuliani and Mulvaney, the last of whom can also testify to the withholding (or not) or the military aid because he's the head of OMB who is in control of such things. And
ii) There will be first-person testimony next week in the form of Vindman and, more significantly, Sondland.
The "hearsay" defense will evaporate next week and they'll be left with stunts and procedural bitching. Sondland is about as Trumpy as you can get and, if he corroborates the mountain of evidence pointing in the same direction, then that should close this case from a fact perspective. What will be left is a test for the individual Republicans in the Senate; will they adhere to their oath to uphold the constitution or will they go down in history as endorsing a monarchical presidency?
What's really fascinating is that this test will fall on the narrow shoulders of Senate Republicans just as a whole heap of bad news about Trump's political value hitting like a shitnami. To wit:
1) Trump campaigned hard for Gov. Matt Bevin in Kentucky which Trump won by 30 points - Bevin lost;
2) Trump campaigned hard for Eddie Rispone in Louisiana, which Trump won by 20 points - Rispone lost
3) Republicans got moved into political irrelevancy in Virginia
4) Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-NY) - who tried to speak out of turn at the hearings to create a viral moment - was successful in a way. Her opponent went from 5,000 Twitter followers to 230,000 and has raised nearly $1 million since Stefanik's stunt.
Trump is becoming politically toxic. The steady stream of testimony against him; his ongoing losing streak in the courts that seems will lead eventually to all kinds of damning personal and political documentation coming out; no wall; no coal jobs; the carnage of his trade wars. Even Fox News cannot hold the line 24/7, and is letting truth seep into their coverage. All of it will factor into the decision of Senate Republicans when this case comes before them.
Trump's in bad shape now, and it's only going to get worse for him.
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I’m fully expecting an acquittal in the Senate with some Republicans joining the Dems, but the good thing about the public hearing is that almost everyone listening will know that what he did was dead wrong. They’ll also know that if Obama or Clinton had done that, they’d have lost their job for sure. So, it will be basically be distilled down to “We’ll never turn on our criminal.”
That’s fine and all, but that cynicism and criminal abatement comes with a cost. May be naive, but that’s my hope.
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I’m fully expecting an acquittal in the Senate with some Republicans joining the Dems, but the good thing about the public hearing is that almost everyone listening will know that what he did was dead wrong. They’ll also know that if Obama or Clinton had done that, they’d have lost their job for sure. So, it will be basically be distilled down to “We’ll never turn on our criminal.”
That’s fine and all, but that cynicism and criminal abatement comes with a cost. May be naive, but that’s my hope.
I think the Dems are relying on that. I think they believe that actually removing Trump would set off a reaction that would cost them (and us), and they're counting on the Senate not to impeach (if they even send charges up to the Senate). But by going through all of this, they're going to get loads of Trump's ugly shit out in the open in time for the election, and they'll be able bang on it again and again through the entire campaign. And Republicans will have to decide, late in the game, whether Trump is too toxic and has to be replaced by somebody else.
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Hilarious side note:
Dan Crenshaw tweeted in support of Elise Stefanik - saying that Democrats are scared of her - which resulted in his tweet blowing up with people reporting donations to his 2020 opponent, Elisa Cardnell. Elisa, being ever so polite, is thanking everyone on Dan’s thread. 🤣🤣🤣
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ABC/Ipsos poll:
70% of Americans believe Trump did something wrong
57% want him impeached
51% want him impeached *and* removed from office
21% made that decision this after last weeks hearings
Those are some terrible numbers for Trump after just one week of public hearings. Tomorrow, Vindland (in BB all his military finery) and Sondland Wednesday. This week is likely to be worse. Given the medical news, it might literally kill him.
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What’s the medical news?
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What’s the medical news?
Medically confirmed cheetosis.
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What’s the medical news?
He made an unscheduled trip (not on public or White House internal itineraries) to Walter Reed on Saturday for some sort of medical procedure. They're saying that he's "starting his annual physical" or some shit. So without further details, and given previous credibility issues, we're left to wonder if they're covering up something.
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Sondland just torched the entire administration.
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Sondland just torched the entire administration.
[Trump probably] Never heard of him. [/Trump probably]
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One of the many remarkable things about Sondland's testimony is that Trump wanted the Ukrainian president to announce the investigations, but didn't really care if the investigations actually commenced. The notion that Trump of all people gave a rat's ass about addressing corruption in Ukraine was always laughable, but this testimony establishes corrupt intent pretty clearly.
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[Trump probably] Never heard of him. [/Trump probably]
Trump actually just a few minutes ago: “I don’t know him very well. I have not spoken to him much. This is not a man I know well. He seems like a nice guy though.”
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Trump actually just a few minutes ago: “I don’t know him very well. I have not spoken to him much. This is not a man I know well. He seems like a nice guy though.”
I was only slightly being tongue in cheek.
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I was only slightly being tongue in cheek.
The man is a parody of a self-parody.
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https://twitter.com/aravosis/status/1197184057249062915?s=21&fbclid=IwAR13GPGl5fZiVgtjktySl4Ozs73Dlwcz2g8uCX82hR7wV1z24H7iFROvM8A
That is the funniest fucking thing I've ever seen.
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https://twitter.com/TheDailyShow/status/1197205929411928064
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https://twitter.com/aravosis/status/1197184057249062915?s=21&fbclid=IwAR13GPGl5fZiVgtjktySl4Ozs73Dlwcz2g8uCX82hR7wV1z24H7iFROvM8A
That is the funniest fucking thing I've ever seen.
I keep waiting for one with the curb your enthusiasm theme.
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I keep waiting for one with the curb your enthusiasm theme.
In the same thread: https://twitter.com/ellievhall/status/1197195784422338561
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In the same thread: https://twitter.com/ellievhall/status/1197195784422338561
Just as good as I hoped.
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One of the many remarkable things about Sondland's testimony is that Trump wanted the Ukrainian president to announce the investigations, but didn't really care if the investigations actually commenced. The notion that Trump of all people gave a rat's ass about addressing corruption in Ukraine was always laughable, but this testimony establishes corrupt intent pretty clearly.
Yeah, I didn’t see much of today’s stuff other than Schiff and Goldman. They should have jumped on this more, as it clearly illustrates Trump’s priority, as you’ve pointed out.
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Also, it has to sting the Republicans that Schiff gets to rip everyone a new one to conclude every day. Elections have consequences.
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Also, it has to sting the Republicans that Schiff gets to rip everyone a new one to conclude every day. Elections have consequences.
These hearings wouldn't even be happening if the Democrats didn't take the house.
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These hearings wouldn't even be happening if the Democrats didn't take the house.
They’d be investigating Hunter Biden.
Oh wait, they had control of both houses in 2016 and didn’t do jack shit about Hunter Biden, which is how you know this is a 100% smear campaign against Joe.
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Oh wait, they had control of both houses in 2016 and didn’t do jack shit about Hunter Biden, which is how you know this is a 100% smear campaign against Joe.
They were busy. You think the greatest healthcare bill in the world was going to write itself?
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Rocket To Russia (https://youtu.be/8lnycszxXVk)
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Rocket To Russia (https://youtu.be/8lnycszxXVk)
Covered by The Smiths (https://twitter.com/BenJamminAsh/status/1197396744876761088?s=20)
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These hearings wouldn't even be happening if the Democrats didn't take the house.
Correct. Yet, even in the current timeline, none of this would be happening unless the whistleblower had blown the whistle. Without that, even with Dems in control of the House, Zelenskiy would've made the announcement Trump demanded which would have meant that Biden's corruption and the FACT that it was Ukraine - not Russia - who hacked the 2016 election would be screeched on an endless loop, propelling Trump to his second term.
Also, Manafort, Stone, Cohen (maybe), Gates et al all get pardoned because it wasn't Russia so they can't be guilty. I mean, Trump may still get re-elected and/or all those crooks may get pardoned - but now we have a chance to go the other way. Without the whistleblower, we'd be living that Amazon Prime alternative history for the rest of our miserable, Russian-speaking lives.
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Also, it has to sting the Republicans that Schiff gets to rip everyone a new one to conclude every day. Elections have consequences.
How Schiff hasn't gone flying over the desk at Nunes and Jordan multiple times these last two weeks is beyond me. I'd need a new gavel every day because a team of surgeons are trying to retrieve yesterday's.