Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

I didn’t have alien invasion on my 2023 BINGO card.

Fuck these fucking interesting times.

Let me eat cake. The rest of you could stand to lose some weight, frankly.

… pundit janitors mopping up after the GOP

Let’s not be the monsters we hate.

Infrastructure week. at last.

A sufficient plurality of insane, greedy people can tank any democratic system ever devised, apparently.

Is it irresponsible to speculate? It is irresponsible not to.

fuckem (in honor of the late great efgoldman)

Optimism opens the door to great things.

Perhaps you mistook them for somebody who gives a damn.

I’d like to think you all would remain faithful to me if i ever tried to have some of you killed.

I see no possible difficulties whatsoever with this fool-proof plan.

After roe, women are no longer free.

Happy indictment week to all who celebrate!

Republicans don’t want a speaker to lead them; they want a hostage.

No offense, but this thread hasn’t been about you for quite a while.

You can’t attract Republican voters. You can only out organize them.

Imperialist aggressors must be defeated, or the whole world loses.

Take your GOP plan out of the witness protection program.

This really is a full service blog.

I like you, you’re my kind of trouble.

Technically true, but collectively nonsense

Republicans are radicals, not conservatives.

You are here: Home / Economics / Grifters Gonna Grift / Open Thread: Always Be Grifting, Donnie!

Open Thread: Always Be Grifting, Donnie!

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The spin — “Surprisingly, Trump inauguration shapes up to be a relatively low-key affair“:

President Obama’s first inaugural festivities stretched over five days. Donald Trump is spending barely three on his.

Bill Clinton hit 14 official balls on the day he was sworn in. Trump plans appearances at three.

And while other presidents have staged parades that lasted more than four hours, Trump’s trip down Pennsylvania Avenue is expected to clock in at 90 minutes — making it among the shortest on record.

In a word, the 45th president’s inaugural activities will be “workmanlike,” said Boris Epshteyn, communications director for the Presidential Inaugural Committee, a pop-up staff of about 350 people scrambling to put together the proceedings from the second floor of a nondescript government building just south of the Mall.

The notion of a relatively low-key inaugural bereft of many ­A-list entertainers may come as a surprise, given the president-elect’s flair for showmanship and his credentials as a reality TV star. Epshteyn said that Trump settled on a less flashy approach, however, including keeping the ticket prices for the inaugural balls at $50 apiece so that ­working-class Americans who helped fuel Trump’s victory can take part…

The old man wants to get home in time for his Matlock Apprentice reruns. Also, there’s that whole “can’t get any entertainers, or sell many tickets” problem.

But it’s not that he doesn’t have the funds! McClatcheyDC, “Big money names behind Trump inaugural start to come out despite his secrecy plan“:

Donald Trump is trying to keep the names of the people and companies donating millions of dollars to his inauguration festivities this week a secret — a break from his Republican and Democratic predecessors in the White House.

At least the last three presidents, Bill Clinton, George W. Bush and Barack Obama, all disclosed names of donors before they were sworn into office .

A federal law passed when Bush was in office required presidents to reveal names of contributors, but only 90 days following the inauguration.

Some names have been leaked out or been released by the donors themselves. Chevron gave $500,000 and will sponsor additional events and Boeing pledged $1 million, according to the companies. AT&T and JPMorgan Chase also donated, according to the companies. Other corporate donors include those who donated to Obama’s inauguration or had declined to contribute to the Republican National Convention last summer, including UPS, Bank of America and Deloitte, according to the New York Times.

“It is all about access and influence,” said Craig Holman, a lobbyist for the nonpartisan public advocacy group Public Citizen. “Donations come in very large amounts and from those who almost always want something from the new administration.”…

John Wonderlich, executive director for the Sunlight Foundation, which advocates for more openness in government, called Trump one of the most secretive candidates in modern history. “This trend is continuing through the pre-presidency and likely the presidency,” he said.

Trump is expected to raise more than $90 million — a record amount — from people and corporations to pay for days of activities, including receptions, balls and the parade surrounding the 58th inauguration celebration. Taxpayers will spend millions more on the official swearing-in ceremony, security, construction and cleanup…

Am I the only one who suspects some large portion of these ‘donations’ will go straight into Trump’s pockets, while the usual party preps get skimped?

Reader Interactions

143Comments

  2. 2.

    Petorado

    Trump seems to want people to know he is controlling a lot of weapons on inauguration day. He’ll have 20 jets/ planes/ helicopters flyover the parade route.

    During the preparation for Friday’s transfer-of-power, a member of Trump’s transition team floated the idea of including tanks and missile launchers in the inaugural parade, a source involved in inaugural planning told The Huffington Post. “They were legit thinking Red Square/North Korea-style parade,” the source said

    Nothing like having a new president saber-rattle to his own citizens. F*cker.

  6. 6.

    Jeffro

    @Patricia Kayden: Hey I think I see my bald spot in that 2009 crowd! ;)

    Clicked on MSNBC…watched some no-name drummer/singer, followed by Toby Keith thanking Obama for his service and wishing Trump well. Hey, you got it half right, Tobes. Trump couldn’t have looked more bored if he tried.

  7. 7.

    artem1s

    Hope those seat fillers are getting paid up front. Equivalent of one day’s pay of the CEO of Morgan Stanley would be my the minimum I would accept to go anywhere near that trainwreck. Also, any real con man CEO would instantly recognize the enormous opportunities here. These rubes should be charging Twitler to get access to them, not the other way around. He has proven time and again he is willing drop big bucks to keep up appearances. Those first in line with their hands out will get all the dough. everyone else gets the shaft. Carrier got it right. These CEO assholes are beyond stoopid.

  8. 8.

    Mnemosyne

    Is there a full list? I am now seriously considering paying my Chase car loan off early and depriving them of additonal interest payments, because fuck those guys.

    (I can afford to do it, but was trying to build up my credit score. But fuck those guys.)

  9. 9.

    Steeplejack

    @Patricia Kayden:

    Woodstock vs. Branson, Missouri.

    P.S. You have got to put a carriage return or something at the end of your comment when your last thing is a hyperlink. You have engulfed the Reply button yet again!

  14. 14.

    MisterForkbeard

    Gotta love spinning “Most expensive and least attended inauguration ever” as “low-key and workmanlike”.

    Seriously, what will they do will all the money they can’t have spent? Taking in record amounts of money for a much smaller production means the extra cash went somewhere.

  15. 15.

    Jack the Second

    Re: The Old Man, this is your periodic reminder that not only is Trump the oldest first-term President, he is also older than the *last three Presidents* *currently are*.

  20. 20.

    Dog Dawg Damn

    DoD told Trump “No” to missile launchers and tanks parading down D.C. streets.

    He’ll get 4 fly-overs instead.

  34. 34.

    West of the Rockies (been a while)

    Boeing contributed a million? Didn’t he publicly insult them recently?

  35. 35.

    MomSense

    @debbie:

    Saw him give a bit of a thank you at the end of the concert. Very low energy.
    I wouldn’t be surprised if we see some flop sweat tomorrow. Il Douche is in way over his head.

  37. 37.

    tofubo

    In about 4 hours, the 780 mile trip to DC will be done. Tomorrow for the parade. Itz gunna be yoooooge. Then Saturday some womenz are gonna get together…

  40. 40.

    Kryptik

    @Baud:

    And unfortunately, that’s what it really takes to win people over these days: it’s not about having the best ideas or inspiring hope, but harnessing and directing the all-powerful forces of spite and hate toward the right people. Hope really has no answer for the sheer overwhelming power of hate.

  41. 41.

    Steeplejack

    @Patricia Kayden:

    Okay, I just did a test. It appears that you are hitting the Link button with no text highlighted, then inserting the hyperlink in the pop-up box. That gives you the “opening” hyperlink command but not the closing one. If you do that you’ll see that the Link button has changed to “/Link,” which means it’s waiting for you to go the point where you want the link to end and click the Link button again to put in the closing hyperlink command. When you don’t do that, the hyperlink goes all the way to the end of the comment and also engulfs the Reply button.

    The easiest way to do a link:

    1. Copy the hyperlink address you want to use from some other website.

    2. Write your text comment at Balloon Juice.

    3. Highlight the part of the text that you want to be the “face” of the hyperlink.

    4. Click the Link button.

    5. Insert your hyperlink, making sure to erase/overwrite the “http://” prefix that FYWP provides.

    6. Click “Okay” to get back to the comment box.

    Highlighting the text first, before you put in the hyperlink, will take care of both the opening and closing link commands.

  42. 42.

    chris

    @Steeplejack: Funny. When I (sort of) learned to type ‘carriage return’ was a key on them fancy electrical typewriters, we had to make do with a lever and a really cool bell. Steampunk before it was cool.
    Ding! Now after 30 years of screens and keyboards I have to take a moment to remember what it is.

  48. 48.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @Patricia Kayden:

    Me too. I worked as a secretary for several years in the ’60s before going back to college and embarking on a strange, checkered, and very different career path. I remember carbon paper, and what a giant PITA it was to make corrections on the original and each of four copies. I remember when making a photocopy was a matter of putting one document in a plastic folder and feeding the whole thing into a hot, smelly machine. After several minutes the original came back, along with one greasy, blurry, hard-to-read copy. Mimeographs and Dittos? Oh yeah.

  50. 50.

    Steeplejack

    @chris:

    I should have said Enter, but “carriage return” is still a bona fide thing, ASCII character 13. I was straining to get at the idea of putting something between the hyperlink and the end of the comment.

  51. 51.

    Uncle Ebeneezer

    @Patricia Kayden: just wait til all the celebrity pics from various Protest marches start hitting Twitter on Sat! I bet Kim Jong Orange will angrily tweet his tiny fingers off!

  55. 55.

    Calouste

    So the Investiture of the new King of the Netherlands in 2013, an event that happens once every three decades or so, came to $ 8 million. The Diamond Jubilee of Queen Elizabeth II of the UK, which was 10 years after her Golden Jubilee, cost $ 25-30 million. Investitures of the new kings of Belgium and Spain in recent years happened with minimal ceremony.

    Why does a republic feel the need to spend tens of millions on ceremony every 4 years?

  56. 56.

    Feathers

    @SiubhanDuinne: I had a receptionist job where I helped out the woman from the copier company who came out to do training on the new machines. She finally admitted that one of the worst things about the job was that she had to wear either white or a very pale pastel lady suit (remember those?) in order to show all the women that she wasn’t afraid of getting toner all over herself. Even then, I knew that was the pits.

    Also – I have a comment in moderation – possibly the link to a cached photo?

  57. 57.

    Aleta

    Probably mentioned already (I don’t have much focus lately).

    (from NYT today) Steven T. Mnuchin, President-elect Donald J. Trump’s pick to be Treasury secretary, failed to disclose nearly $100 million of his assets on Senate Finance Committee disclosure documents and forgot to mention his role as a director of an investment fund located in a tax haven, an omission that Democrats said made him unfit to serve in one of the government’s most important positions.

    The revelation came hours before Mr. Mnuchin, a former Goldman Sachs banker, began testifying on Thursday before the Senate Finance Committee, which has historically been bipartisan in its demands for transparency from nominees. Mr. Mnuchin was ready to outline his vision for the economy and defend himself against claims that he headed a bank that ran a “foreclosure machine” during the financial crisis.

    That’s awfully forgetful.

  58. 58.

    Roger Moore

    @efgoldman:

    Because why would all those racists economically anxious in the flyover states need to know about tornadoes, blizzards, droughts….

    They don’t. Having a NWS that lets people avoid the bad effects of weather is flouting God’s will. If He wants us to be killed by hurricanes, tornadoes, or what have you, who are we to prevent it?

  59. 59.

    Steeplejack

    @chris:

    Yeah, I think it was him. He wanted some company to “privatize” it all, basically by taking the raw government data feed and selling it on. The plan was ridiculous on its face.

  60. 60.

    Feathers

    @Calouste: Remember that the money isn’t going to the public festivities, it’s almost entirely spent on sad, lavish parties being thrown for the winners of the election.

  61. 61.

    PVDMichael

    Lost in today’s news: Trump asks Obama’s special envoy on ISIS to holdover. Guess that’s what his “secret plan” was…

  63. 63.

    SiubhanDuinne

    Just saw a photo of Donnie and Malaria walking hand in hand down the steps of the Lincoln Memorial.

    How can he not know how sloppy and ridiculous and unkempt he always looks with his ties always four or five inches too long? I mean, I get the (possibly unconscious) Freudian symbolism of the overlong pointy ties arrowing straight to his penis, but is he honestly so clueless that he doesn’t realize what he’s signalling to the country and the world? And couldn’t Melanoma or a trusted advisor clue him in?

    Guess not.

  66. 66.

    lamh36

    Not even gonna wait for tomorrow. I’m unfollowing @POTUS and @FLOTUS now. It has been a pleasure being able to keep up with them both

  67. 67.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @Aleta:

    That’s awfully forgetful.

    Oh please. Who hasn’t failed to mention $100 million here, $100 million there? Do these people think we’re all fucking bookkeepers or something?

    ETA: Waves at Gin & Tonic @#65!

  68. 68.

    Major Major Major Major

    Miguel Ferrer has died. I knew him as Albert Rosenfield on Twin Peaks.

    Albert Rosenfield: [to Sheriff Truman] Now you listen to me. While I will admit to a certain cynicism, the fact is that I am a naysayer and hatchetman in the fight against violence. I pride myself in taking a punch and I’ll gladly take another because I choose to live my life in the company of Gandhi and King. My concerns are global. I reject absolutely revenge, aggression, and retaliation. The foundation of such a method… is love. I love you Sheriff Truman.
    [he leaves the room]
    Dale Cooper: [to Sheriff Truman] Albert’s path is a strange and difficult one.

  70. 70.

    Steeplejack

    @Calouste:

    Why does a republic feel the need to spend tens of millions on ceremony every 4 years?

    Because we’re the richest nation on earth and we’ve got money to burn! Just not on bad stuff like health care, infrastructure, the social safety net, etc., etc.

    (In fairness, aren’t most of the inaugural event expenses paid by the private sector?)

  71. 71.

    p.a.

    Generalities (race issues almost always the unfortunate exception):
    Most Americans from, say FDR through LBJ: hey, those folks have something worthwhile that I don’t. How can I get it too?

    Some very loud Americans from, say Tricky Dick to now: hey, those folks have something worthwhile I don’t. Who can we elect to take it away from them?

  74. 74.

    Steeplejack

    @Gin & Tonic:

    Belize, Barbados, Bahamas . . . all those funny names run together. How am I supposed to remember all the places I have money socked away? I have people for that!

  76. 76.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @Feathers:

    she had to wear either white or a very pale pastel lady suit (remember those?)

    I do remember them, but don’t think I ever wore one after the age of about 14, when I had a lovely pale pink linen suit, wore it to church one Sunday, and started my period with a hey-nonny-nonny sometime between the processional and the Nunc dimittis. Never again.

  77. 77.

    Yarrow

    Jake Sherman
    ‏@JakeSherman

    DASHA ZHUKOVA, wife of Russian industrialist billionaire ROMAN ABRAMOVICH, is here for inauguration. Guest of IVANKA, per source.

    They’re not trying to hide the Russia entanglements at all.

  78. 78.

    Jim Parish

    @chris: It was Santorum, in April 2005. His objection was to the NWS providing weather information publicly, except in extreme and hazardous cases, on the grounds that this was unfair competition to companies like AccuWeather.

  79. 79.

    Major Major Major Major

    @p.a.: Apes get very touchy about perceived unfairness and sometimes prefer burning it all down as a result. I wonder what happened in the 1960’s that might have changed some people’s perceptions of what they deserved…

  80. 80.

    Roger Moore

    @Steeplejack:

    I should have said Enter, but “carriage return” is still a bona fide thing, ASCII character 13.

    Yes, but you should really use a new line (\n, 0x0A) any time you use a carriage return (\r, 0x0D), unless you want to overwrite your text. A lot of software will assume a \r any time you specify a \n, but won’t necessarily do the opposite.

  81. 81.

    Mike in NC

    Only one of my wife’s friends here is driving to DC for the march on Saturday. The rest are throwing a local Anti-Trump party the same day. Any excuse to uncork a few bottles of wine.

    Local TV news had a glimpse of the festivities in Washington, including an interview with a couple of biker types happy to “take our country back”. Still whining after all these years.

  82. 82.

    Chris

    @West of the Rockies (been a while):

    Trump very meaningfully targeted them, and they’re trying to get back in his good graces so he doesn’t tank their stock again.

    This is going to be a mafia presidency like we’ve never seen, with sums extorted from all over to the tune of “nice base you’ve got here, Colonel. Be a shame if anything happened to it.” The 1% aren’t used to being on the receiving end of these, and they’re going to learn what it’s like fast.

  84. 84.

    Yarrow

    @ljdramone: That would be a great idea. Then let everyone in the path of a tornado or hurricane pay to find out if they should evacuate or hide in a storm cellar. What could go wrong? Oh, and I’m sure Accuweather would love to pony up for those weather satellites.

  86. 86.

    Roger Moore

    @p.a.:

    Some very loud Americans from, say Tricky Dick to now: hey, those folks have something worthwhile I don’t. Who can we elect to take it away from them?

    It’s not even that Those People have something worthwhile we don’t have. It’s that they have something worthwhile we don’t want them to have, and we’re willing to lose it ourselves to make sure they can’t have it.

  88. 88.

    Chris

    @SiubhanDuinne:

    I just got home from my usual hour long commute on the DC metro, this time with more teabaggers. Was thinking “good lord, whoever thought fascism would be so badly dressed?”

  91. 91.

    Chris

    @p.a.:

    It’s truly amazing how completely conservatives have turned into a bad caricature of socialists. Now complete with obedience to Moscow.

  92. 92.

    Steeplejack

    @Roger Moore:

    Jesus, I was simplifying for rhetorical effect and sparing the laypeople the gory details.

    ETA: But thank you for reminding me of my Altos CP/M box and my beloved NEC Spinwriter.

  94. 94.

    JPL

    @ljdramone: If there’s money to be made, someone has to make it. I live in Atlanta and a rumor has been floating around that they want to buy the weather TV channel. TV not the company that’s now owned by IBM.

  96. 96.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    small things….

    Amy Fried ‏ @ ASFried 10m10 minutes ago
    More
    Friend who went to @ SenatorCollins’ Bangor office today says phones were ringing and ringing, staff could not keep up with them.

  97. 97.

    MomSense

    The tiny handed tin pot looks terrible in a tuxedo. He’s still talking about the campaign. I think he is a bit hung up on legitimacy. SAD!

  100. 100.

    Chet Murthy

    @Lizzy L: like this

    Here’s what I did:

    (1) click “link” button
    (2) paste my URL into the popup dialog
    (3) click “ok” (or whatever it was, in that dialog)
    (4) typed “like this” in the edit buffer
    (5) click “/link” button

    And that was it.

  105. 105.

    Iron City

    @Jim Parish:
    And if I recall correctly AccuWeather was started/is owned by some meteorologists/atmospheric physicists/football coaches from Penn State (grades 13-16 in Happy Valley). AccuWeather global Headquarters 385 Science Park Rd. State College PA 16803. And lots of National Weather Service brass had PhDs from the same august institution of higher education that was also the recipient of lots of federal dollars for weather research. Is this a great country or what.

  106. 106.

    Larkspur

    Agent Orange isn’t making a lot of sense. What a surprise, I know. But less sense than usual. He seems drugged.
    ETA: Christ what an asshole.

  109. 109.

    J R in WV

    @Patricia Kayden:

    When you press the Enter key (once) to go to a new line or (two of ’em) a paragraph. Technically that character is a Carriage-Return, from the term used to describe pushing the part of a type-writer holding the paper back for a new line to type on, historically. From pre-computer times back in 1979 or so. Used for the same purpose on computer terminals –> PCs –> laptops and tablets and such.

    After you paste a link in, just hit the enter key or type something to separate your link from the reply button, which is also a special nearly link that can get cross-threaded with your link.

  111. 111.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @Chris:

    Was thinking “good lord, whoever thought fascism would be so badly dressed?”

    It’s hard to look pulled-together when you’re wrapped in a flag carrying a cross.

  121. 121.

    Wapiti

    @Lizzy L:

    I suspect most of the jackals have seen this post of John Scalzi’s already

    I like his suggestion that people in the upper tax brackets who get a tax cut might earmark all or part of it to causes that are arrayed against the Trump/Republicans. Not sure I’m in that group, but if I am, the ALCU could benefit.

  123. 123.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @MomSense: avoiding that noise may finally cure me of my MSNBC addiction– I have been Tweety free for a few months now

  125. 125.

    jonas

    Well, if there are any words we’ve come to associate with Trump, they’re “casual” and “understated”. It’s why he campaigned in an Amish buggy.

  126. 126.

    MomSense

    @SiubhanDuinne: @debbie:

    He has a wicked inferiority complex. He cannot let go of the election and trying to prove he is a winner. I plan to insult and belittle him at every opportunity.

  128. 128.

    J R in WV

    @Aleta:

    It does seem awfully forgetful, and in his testimony he claimed that it was because those should-be-illegal Government Forms are so difficult to complete correctly.

    As if he doesn’t have a total complete accounting department to do that… which was totally unaware of $100,000,000 of their boss’s assets !!!!!!!??? WTF?

    Who does that? Someone trying to launder their own money away from their own government’s accountants – a tax cheat criminal, that is who does that. For Treasury Secretary, for Dog’s Sake!

  130. 130.

    Jeffro

    @PVDMichael: my fear is that he wants to drop a nuke…” just one you know a tiny one “…on ISIS, ” just to get their attention and give them one last chance to surrender so that we can take the oil ”

    You know it’s not inconceivable

  133. 133.

    J R in WV

    @Steeplejack:

    My first computer was CP/M too – a Kaypro luggable, and a daisy-wheel, with carbon ribbons you could print a really professional looking resume, which was it’s primary purpose, customized resu’s and cover letters. Got me that first job, which led to an actual career with good payroll, retirement savings plan AND a pension, so far.

    And they had better not try to bankrupt a family that has done all the right things, made all the proper decisions, depending upon promises made to be promises kept…

    That computer and printer cost $3,400 in 1984 or ’85… amazing, think what you could get for that today! Servers, NAS, BIG screens, the mind boggles.

  134. 134.

    Yoda Dog

    @Frank Wilhoit: Fuck off, frank, Im just trying to deal with this disaster as best I can. I was responding specifically to Jeffro, though your two cents has been duly noted.

  137. 137.

    AxelFoley

    @lamh36:

    Not even gonna wait for tomorrow. I’m unfollowing @POTUS and @FLOTUS now. It has been a pleasure being able to keep up with them both

    Y’know what? I’ma do the same thing now. Not gonna wait until tomorrow.

  139. 139.

    Montysano

    @SiubhanDuinne:

    How can he not know how sloppy and ridiculous and unkempt he always looks with his ties always four or five inches too long

    I know it’s small potatoes relatively speaking, but the tie thing makes me crazy.

  142. 142.

    JAFD

    @Montysano: He be tryin’ t show the plebs “I can affo’d the fanciest of threads, and I don’t care when they tell me how I suppos’d to wear them”

  143. 143.

    Mike G

    Trump’s trip down Pennsylvania Avenue is expected to clock in at 90 minutes

    If this were a just world, it would be a 90-second full-throttle dash through a gauntlet of rotten vegetables.

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