Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Wow, you are pre-disappointed. How surprising.

Every one of the “Roberts Six” lied to get on the court.

Dear media: perhaps we ought to let Donald Trump speak for himself!

Hell hath no fury like a farmer bankrupted.

“Loving your country does not mean lying about its history.”

I did not have this on my fuck 2025 bingo card.

Republican speaker of the house Mike Johnson is the bland and smiling face of evil.

Giving in to doom is how we fail to fight for ourselves & one another.

Republicans seem to think life begins at the candlelight dinner the night before.

You don’t get to peddle hatred on saturday and offer condolences on sunday.

The real work of an opposition party is to oppose.

… pundit janitors mopping up after the gop

If rights aren’t universal, they are privilege, not rights.

Authoritarian republicans are opposed to freedom for the rest of us.

Accountability, motherfuckers.

They love authoritarianism, but only when they get to be the authoritarians.

It’s easy to sit in safety and prescribe what other people should be doing.

There is no compromise when it comes to body autonomy. You either have it or you do not.

“I was told there would be no fact checking.”

A norm that restrains only one side really is not a norm – it is a trap.

If you still can’t see these things even now, maybe politics isn’t your forte and you should stop writing about it.

The most dangerous place for a black man in America is in a white man’s imagination.

Not rolling over. fuck you, make me.

Never entrust democracy to any process that requires republicans to act in good faith.

You are here: Home / Cut the Bullshit- Pence Knew

Cut the Bullshit- Pence Knew

by | 103 Comments

This post is in: 

Time for the wingnut wurlitzer to fire up one of their favorites, a time-tested classic, the “Hoocoodanode Overture:

Vice President Mike Pence has been kept in the dark about former National Security Adviser Mike Flynn’s alleged wrongdoing, according to a source close to the administration, who cited a potential “pattern” of not informing the vice president and calling it “malpractice or intentional, and either are unacceptable.”

Horseshit. It was an open fucking secret. Hell, even worse, he knew who and what Trump was all about when he accepted the nomination, figuring it was better than lingering and being booed out of the Governorship in which he was such a spectacular disaster to the degree the Republicans in Indiana moved to overturn half of what he did the first day he was out of office.

It’s the same line of crap from the Republicans, just the names and factions change. The money guys didn’t really know the racists and bigots were serious. They didn’t know the religious nuts were serious. They didn’t know the neocons were serious. They didn’t know the teabaggers were serious. They didn’t know the alt right was serious. Over and over and fucking over again.

They knew they were serious, they just thought they could control them and get their fucking tax cuts, gut social security and medicare, and siphon off money to their buddies in Wall Street, the fossil fuel industry, while throwing a little coin to the outrage machine grifters to keep greasing the skids. And the inmates got loose. Again.

Pence knew. He just thought he could control it. They always do. And we all now what comes after the Hoocoodanode overture, don’t we? Of course we do- a rousing rendition of the “Not a True Conservative” chorus.

Reader Interactions

103Comments

  1. 1.

    Villago Delenda Est

    Pence needs to hang from the same gallows as Donald. Hopelessly compromised.

  3. 3.

    seaboogie

    Righteous rant John, and spot on.

    When we get to President Hatch, we’ll know that we are on the right track. ZEGS needs to go down, also too….

  4. 4.

    efgoldman

    Not for nothing was Dense known as the dumbest man in congress – in a very crowded field that included Gohmert, Yoho, Bachmann….

  5. 5.

    Robin G.

    I think the only real question is whether Pence technically kept his hands clean — like a mob lawyer who covers his ears and hums when his clients talk about whacking someone — or whether he stumbled in that little dance and did something indict-able.

  6. 6.

    Adam L Silverman

    From the unfortunately late expert on Pence:

    http://doghouseriley.blogspot.com/2013/01/back-home-again.html

    FRIDAY, JANUARY 18

    Back Home Again
    INDIANA inaugurated Mike “Choirboy” Pence its fiftieth governor earlier this week–apparently we had to–and while I can pretty much swear I’ll have nothing nice to say about the man from here on out, I will grant that he gave every impression of a man who was wearing a tuxedo for the second time in his life.

    I’ve lived here most of my life–in my defense, I am congenitally indolent–and Mike Pence is the sort of man I’ve been expecting to have to survive the governorship of for most of the last forty years. He’s a religious huckster with no other discernible qualities. He was essentially ushered into the Governor’s mansion by his predecessor–who gave then Lt. Governor Becky “GED” Skillman the same chronic and asymptomatic disease Mark Souder’s wife came down with right after Souder was caught dipping into the office help and needed to spend more time with the family–so that Pence wouldn’t either a) come back to Indiana and challenge Dick Lugar in last year’s primary or b) come back to Indiana and wait out Lugar’s last term.

    Pence had been the #3 Republican in the House, in case that tells you anything you didn’t already know about Republicans in the House, but quit his post after the 2010 elections because the party wasn’t mixing enough Religious with its Mania anymore, and said that would be his final term. It’s possible, I suppose, that he was self-aware enough to realize that the Jesus game had been played out a couple years earlier. It’s possible that he had fixed his eye on the governor’s job all along. (Skillman would’a put up less fight than an Italian quartermaster brigade, but running roughshod over the sitting Lt. Governor, who happened to be a woman, might have given some people the wrong impression about the Republican party’s gender politics.) The talk at the time was that Pence was planning his own Presidential run, perhaps as a stalking horse for Herman Cain, at a time when Daniels was still milking his own non-candidacy. Then, suddenly, the whole thing arrived like Athena. Or the 2000 candidacy of George W. Bush. Pence suddenly wanted to be governor, Skillman suddenly wanted to be barely ambulatory, and Daniels wanted to tote up some more “campaign” contributions.

    Pence’s campaign for governor basically consisted of him assuring concerned Hoosiers that he was a practicing heterosexual. As a result he managed to win by 70,000 votes in a state Mitt “Remember Me?” Romney won by a quarter million.

    Pence was, of course, hamstrung by the requirement that he continue the pretense that Mitch Daniels had solved all of Indiana’s economic problems, with his magic formula (this often felt like something he was required to say because voters believed it, not because he did). So Pence was left to promise to fix the future. Especially with a 10% tax cut.

    Which is already chafing the incoming veto-proof Republican General Assembly, which now finds itself walking the line between the Double Super Plus Robust financial shape Daniels left the state in, and what might be called the reality of being a broke shithole that’s done no maintenance on anything but Mitch Daniels’ image the past eight years.

    We can’t cut taxes any further without white suburbanites noticing something is up with education. We don’t have anything left to sell, though I probably shouldn’t say that out loud. Pence’s first budget includes the 10% cut, increases education spending, and winds up with a couple billion to add to our “surplus”. Which apparently means he found Mitch’s old blueprints in a drawer somewhere.

    Ain’t gonna happen. And Evangelical Mike has between now and next year to okay putting the state’s We’re Not Recognizing Anybody Else’s Homo Marriage Constitutional amendment on the ballot. And this year ain’t his first choice.

    Like I said: this is the governor I’ve been preparing myself for since the Nixon administration. But in the interim the country elected Reagan, Hoosiers elected Evan Bayh, and Mitch Daniels became a respected Republican intellectual. Hell, I can do eight years of Pence standing on my head.

  7. 7.

    Sanjeevs

    Kudos to Elijah Cummings with that letter to Pence about Flynn .
    Check fucking mate.

  9. 9.

    efgoldman

    @Robin G.:

    the only real question is whether Pence technically kept his hands clean

    Unlike the actual crime family, I doubt he was involved with moey laundering, financial fraud, or any of those kinds of things. I imagine they’ll have to get him on something to do with Flynn. Suborning perjury? Obstruction? Something like that

  10. 10.

    John Revolta

    Well if they ARE keeping him out of the loop, then why? Obviously they want to keep him clean because they’re setting Trump up for the dumpster.
    OTOH, if it’s bullshit and he DOES know the score, then he and Drump are both fucked. Either way I’m enjoying the ride.

  12. 12.

    seaboogie

    But to which I’ll add, what is up with Perez? The listening tour with the bros was a bunch of hooey, and it’s just crickets now from the dems. Wish I could believe this is strategic, but I have my doubts…

  13. 13.

    Mnemosyne

    @Robin G.:

    think the only real question is whether Pence technically kept his hands clean — like a mob lawyer who covers his ears and hums when his clients talk about whacking someone — or whether he stumbled in that little dance and did something indict-able.

    Given that Pence is notoriously dumb, I’m guessing he kept his hands clean while wading waist-deep in the shit and thought that was all that was needed.

  14. 14.

    Robin G.

    @efgoldman: It depends on whether they can *prove* he knew Flynn was under investigation during the transition. He’ll claim he was duped and kept in the dark. It’s bullshit, but again, mob lawyer with hands over his ears.

    I’m tempted to say he’s too dumb to pull off something that delicate, but if ever there was a time in his life to get something right, that was it.

  15. 15.

    Yarrow

    Of course he knew. Seen on one of the twitter accounts that seems to get accurate leaks: Pence was late to the Russia game but got on board quickly. And done forget Cummings’ Nov. 2016 letter to Pence. He knew.

    Speculation that Pence had also been turned–what is in those highly redacted emails from when he was Gov. of Indiana?–and was directing Flynn.

  16. 16.

    hovercraft

    Great rant.
    It’s funny how the party of personal responsibility is never responsible for anything, they always know what’s best, but as soon as their solutions go wrong, it’s who knew.

  18. 18.

    piratedan

    @seaboogie: I think the strategy is that the blood is in the water, let the sharks (the media) feed. They can always go to Ms. Waters, Pelosi or Mr. Cummings if they need a coherent take.

  19. 19.

    mai naem mobile

    I hope that the Dems are preparing to damage Pence beyond repair so that the GOP can’t use him. His name has to be mentioned along with Dolt every single time.

  20. 20.

    Robin G.

    @Mnemosyne: That’s my guess, too. But I guess we’ll see. There’s also the question of whether Pence will maintain just enough plausible deniability for the DoJ to let him go, rather than face the governmental crisis of removing both POTUS and VP.

    Frankly, we might want to hope he *does* escape. President Ryan might be worse.

  21. 21.

    efgoldman

    @Yarrow:

    Speculation that Pence had also been turned–what is in those highly redacted emails from when he was Gov. of Indiana?–and was directing Flynn

    He is literally too dumb to have pulled something like that off.

  22. 22.

    Mike in NC

    Trump/Pence will absolutely be the new Nixon/Agnew, because the same fucking morons voted for them over 40 years ago.

  23. 23.

    LurkerNoLonger

    Fuck Mike Pence, like all those buff and tanned party boys do whenever he closes his eyes and forgets to think about Jesus.

  24. 24.

    efgoldman

    @Robin G.:

    rather than face the governmental crisis of removing both POTUS and VP.

    Agnew and Tricksie Dicksie both went, although not at the same time

  25. 25.

    MisterForkbeard

    @marcion: I love that they’re doing it because they think they’re victims – they were “unfairly singled out for protecting for their users” by banning anyone who had the slightest criticism of the Sub or The_Donald, and permitting frankly amazing amounts of racism, sexism, and bigotry – as well as coordinating harassment of people the sub doesn’t like.

    It’s sad. Really, really sad.

  28. 28.

    jl

    @Robin G.: Lot of reports that Flynn told the Trump transition team lawyer early on. Pence was in charge of the transition, so he will have to plead gross stupidity, incompetence, and/or malfeasance.

    Edit: thanks to commenters above for reminding us about the Cummings warning letter. I read that Pence claims to have been ‘in a fog’. Yeesh. This is gonna get bad. Just too much BS spewing out of the shit show to keep up with or remember. And it’s just over 100 days in.

  30. 30.

    Morzer

    Just remember that Honest Mike Pence set several land speed records for mendacious excretion during the VP debate.

  31. 31.

    Robin G.

    @jl: I think he’d plead that he, too, was a victim of the cover-up conspiracy. Total bullshit, of course, but that’d be his best play.

  32. 32.

    Yarrow

    @Robin G.: Don’t forget the good chance that Trump will throw Pence (and everyone else) under the bus in an attempt to save himself. It’s what he does. Trump could be the reason Pence is out.

  33. 33.

    Calouste

    @Sanjeevs: Methinks Flynn is desperately going through his papers trying to find something on Pence that will get him down to 10-20 from multiple life terms.

  34. 34.

    opiejeanne

    Pardon me for dragging the conversation off topic, but I missed the latest on Green not green. Is there any news from her family?

  35. 35.

    Robin G.

    @Yarrow: Huh. Fair point. God, what a shitshow. And if Pence goes under, we better fucking hope Ryan does too, because God help us if this nightmare leads to his ascension.

  36. 36.

    jl

    @Robin G.: Pence is cooked. I forgot about the letter warning about Flynn from Cummings. Pence now claims he doesn’t remember anything about any letter, babbling about being ‘in a fog’.

  37. 37.

    Morzer

    @Calouste:

    Mike Pence pauses, blinks, considers the question: “Why no, sir, I do not recall to have met a General Michael Flynn. Or, indeed, a Mr Donald Trump.”

  40. 40.

    David ?Canadian Anchor Baby? Koch

    Ooooof.

    I made the mistake of turning on CNN and Maggie Haberman is on defending Trump.

    Just disgusting.

  41. 41.

    Calouste

    @Yarrow: If Pence goes, the shitgibbon can’t save himself, even though he won’t realized it. Unless it something completely different, like transporting escorts across state lines.

  42. 42.

    MisterForkbeard

    @opiejeanne: Sadly, gnG’s family let us know that she passed away on… I think Wednesday night. There was a thread from yesterday about it where we all talked about what she meant to us.

    ETA: The thread was entitled “Bon Voyage”, I think.

  44. 44.

    Morzer

    @jl:

    The sort of fog that can only be achieved by a man putting his head in a plastic bag and standing over a boiling kettle.

  47. 47.

    efgoldman

    @Robin G.:

    True, but they took Agnew first.

    The indictments came thru first. His lawyers took one look and told him to take any deal he could get, right quick. He could have dragged it out, but he wasn’t that stupid.

  49. 49.

    M. Bouffant

    siphon off money to their buddies in Wall Street & the fossil fuel industry

    Not just those two; don’t forget the windfall that’s about to happen for the Military-Industrial-Congressional complex.

  50. 50.

    Raoul

    @Morzer: After Pence’s debate, the “Trump never said that” side-by-sides with Trump saying exactly those things were comedy gold.

  51. 51.

    Peale

    Pence oversaw a transition that staffed the administration with reprobates and fools. We should Ask him which ones of those he’ll keep. The more we get him talking about his plans pst Trump, thee more spears will get pointed at him.

  52. 52.

    Lord Dingleton

    Yesterday, upon the stair,
    I met a man who wasn’t there
    He wasn’t there again today
    I wish, I wish he’d go away…
    When I came home last night at three
    The man was waiting there for me
    But when I looked around the hall
    I couldn’t see him there at all!
    Go away, go away, don’t you come back any more!
    Go away, go away, and please don’t slam the door… (slam!)
    Last night I saw upon the stair
    A little man who wasn’t there
    He wasn’t there again today
    Oh, how I wish he’d go away…

  53. 53.

    efgoldman

    @Robin G.:

    God help us if this nightmare leads to his ascension.

    Only happens if both offices are vacant at the same time (i.e. they leave on the same day). Otherwise, whichever one is left is president and appoints a VP, to be confirmed by majorities in both houses, per section two of the 25th amendment. That’s how Ford became VP, and how Rockefeller became VP when Ford became president.
    Could be Granny Starver, by appointment, but certainly doesn’t have to be

  54. 54.

    Adam L Silverman

    @opiejeanne: Here you go:
    https://balloon-juice.com/2017/05/18/rest-in-peace-greennotgreen/

    Rest in Peace, greennotGreen

    by Betty Crackerat5:54 pm on May 18, 2017. It has 223 Comments.

    Steeplejack flagged an earlier comment from beloved commenter greennotGreen’s valiant sister:

    greennotGreen
    May 18, 2017 at 1:37 p.m.

    I like the title of this open thread [“Open Thread: Bon Voyage!”] for my message. My wonderful, generous, loving sister, greennotGreen, has moved on to the next stage in her journey. I watched and held her hand as she drew her last breath. I had talked to her all morning (about politics, of course). I will sure miss our “daily briefings.”

    A few years ago, when I shared the news here that I had lost my mom, greennotGreen left this comment for me:

    I’m sorry she departed so young, but what a wonderful legacy she left you! The stories you’ll tell with tears and laughter and eventually only laughter. So she does live on, and I hope you’ll let her live on here on these virtual pages with us, your virtual neighbors. Our thoughts are with you and your family…

    greennotGreen also left us too soon, but during the time she was our virtual neighbor, we were fortunate to witness her kindness, compassion, fierceness and humor. Her personality shone brightly, a light behind the pixels, and we’ll miss her.

    Our thoughts are with greennotGreen’s sister and niece, who took care of our friend with such love and compassion and were kind enough to keep us informed along the way, and also with greennotGreen’s mom. May greennotGreen’s wonderful legacy comfort her family now.

    UPDATE: greennotGreen’s favorite charities were the American Cancer Society, the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation and the Avielle Foundation, if you’d like to make a donation in her honor.

  55. 55.

    David ?Canadian Anchor Baby? Koch

    @Morzer: says public doesn’t care about russia; the opinion of independents and democrats don’t matter, only republicans; and trump’s statements that he fired comey because of the legal pressure he was putting on him isn’t evidence of obstruction.

    I turned it off after 90 seconds.

    it was a complete baghdad bob performance.

  56. 56.

    NotMax

    @Raoul

    Pence could stand as proof that nature does not abhor a vacuum, elseways his head would have imploded long ago.

  58. 58.

    Raoul

    @jl: “in a fog” might work in some PR offensives. I would hope that at trial, he’d be held to a standard of what a reasonably prudent person would do. And, as head of Trump’s transition, a reasonably prudent person should read a letter from the Ranking Member of a House Oversight Committee. Even if the reasonably prudent person is busy as a beaver.
    He’s stupid, but he was a House member for 12 years.

  62. 62.

    hovercraft

    @David ?Canadian Anchor Baby? Koch:
    I saw that earlier, it made me wonder where was that empathy towards Hillary and Obama, back then all she cared about was how things looked from the outside, now it;s all about how he feels how he’s trying to get people to like him.

  63. 63.

    mouse tolliver

    @Robin G.: Yeah, the more I hear about how out-of-the-loop Pence is, the more I start thinking about The Godfather Part II.

    SENATOR PAT GEARY: Mr. Cici, was there always a buffer involved?

    WILLI CICI: A what?

    SENATOR PAT GEARY: A buffer. Someone in between you and your possible superiors who passed on to you the actual order to kill someone.

    WILLI CICI: Oh yeah, a buffer. The family had a lot of buffers!

    Paul Ryan seems to have a lot of buffers too, because he never seems to know about Trump’s latest tweet or anything else that everyone inside the Beltway is talking about.

    I hope that Kevin McCarthy audio leaks so we can hear them all agree not to talk about what they plainly see. The ads could write themselves.

  65. 65.

    Mnemosyne

    @Peale:

    Pence oversaw a transition that staffed the administration with reprobates and fools.

    Not just that — people with strong ties to Russia. Tillerson. Sessions. Flynn. And more. I doubt it’s a coincidence, or that Pence was able to keep his mouth shut about it.

  66. 66.

    hovercraft

    @Major Major Major Major:
    But, but Rick Santorum says it’s unpatriotic to be gleeful about all this, and Dershowitz says that the ACLU is falling down on their responsibilities because this leak violates client lawyer privilege. Maggie Haberman finally said something worth while, she pointed out that Twitler loved wikileaks when they were hacking into Podesta’s private e-mails, and he too great delight in reading those e-mails aloud at his rallies, he used to love leaks so now him complaining about leaks is rich. Frothy mixture says, but, the American people elected him.

  69. 69.

    Aleta

    Pence has spent his life praying for the chance to sell his soul to the devil. He fell for Trump’s old bluff, if you ‘buy my book’ ‘pay my university’ ‘join my campaign’ then all this gold filigree can be yours.

  70. 70.

    efgoldman

    @hovercraft:

    Dershowitz says that the ACLU is falling down on their responsibilities because this leak violates client lawyer privilege.

    Any resemblance between that know-it-all publicity hound and an actual attorney ended decades ago, first when he defended Von Bulow and second when he defended torture. I can’t believe anybody at Harvard law takes a course with him if they don’t absolutely have to.

  71. 71.

    hovercraft

    @efgoldman:
    Agreed, I was waiting for someone to point out that reports are that the leaks are coming from his staff who have decided that he’s dangerous, and so they’re trying to scare him straight. I mean does he really think that his lawyers would risk getting disbarred to leak this, and we’re talking about McGahn and that sleaze ball Steve Cohen. So what the hell is he talking about, a staffer telling the press that the boss told lawyers to look into how impeachment works is indiscrete, not a violation of client lawyer privilege,

    Goodnight.

  73. 73.

    efgoldman

    @hovercraft:

    we’re talking about McGahn and that sleaze ball Steve Cohen.

    They will try every single defense and obstruction tactic they can think of. Pretty soon I expect hoary old executive privilege to rise from Tricksie Dicksie Nixie’s grave. But of course, once Citron Shithead himself makes something public, he’s lost at least part of the privilege.
    One thing about Tricksie, the paranoid old bastard: He knew how to keep his big yap shut, and not to do the prosecutor’s work for him. If I were Shitweasel’s lawyers, I’d keep a roll of duct tape in my briefcase at all times.

  74. 74.

    laura

    @seaboogie: Perez is here in Sacramento for the big Dem hootenanny.
    The party best get cracking on pulling together a midterm wave.

  76. 76.

    Aleta

    the racists and bigots the religious nuts the neocons the teabaggers the alt right
    They knew they were serious, they just thought they could control them

    In their mind, those groups are just the means of production, not human variables. Industrial power plants lying out there to be seized. Turn them on, off, max them out, shut them down, leave them leaking when they break.

  78. 78.

    amk

    for all his much derided denseness, mikey’s career path, from a lowly cong critter to fucked up govenorship to corrupt veep to possible prez, is one which few career pols have achieved. sheer luck? electoral cunning? stupid base voters?

  80. 80.

    jl

    @amk: I read that Pence got his start as a right wing radio jock. So, he probably has some shrewd intuition for what kind of fake schtick will appeal to enough gullible voters to get him to the House and Indiana gubernator chair.

    Whether getting on the Trump Crazy Train was luck or not is debatable. Would he have taken the job if his political future looked good in Indiana? It didn’t. He was very unpopular in Indiana. His luck was running out. Getting in on the Drumpster fire might not look luck at all in retrospect, but rather desperation.

    Anyway, Pence, like Dub, probably has some shrewd political PR instincts. Except, like Trump, far worse person in many ways, and dumber, than Dub.

  81. 81.

    Chet Murthy

    @piratedan: Apropos of good hair, who’d have thought that Gov. Goodhair and Dr. Sleepy would end up being the least fucked-up Putinfluffer appointees? I sure wouldn’t have.

  82. 82.

    TenguPhule

    @Raoul:

    Orrin “Private memos to health insurance cos” Hatch? F*k him.

    Only need him in office long enough to get a Democrat in place to replace him. Then he can join the chopping block.

  83. 83.

    jl

    @Chet Murthy: Maybe Gov Goodhair is doing the best he can at Dept of Energy, once he found out it was not just some kind of energy PR marketing operation. But he will preside over gutting anything dealing with renewable or environmentally friendly energy programs. And the good Dr. just got his portfolio for gutting HUD programs for poor last day or so.

    So, give them both of them enough time to wreck stuff up before you get a judgmental, OK? Yeesh.

  85. 85.

    Mnemosyne

    @Major Major Major Major:

    Well, come on, what do establishment California Democrats know about how to win elections, anyway? Time for new blood and new ideas so we can have a supermajority in the legislature!
    /sarcasm, obvs

    There may end up being a regional split between South and North. The Sanderites down here have been getting their asses handed to them in local primaries.

  86. 86.

    cckids

    @Chet Murthy:

    who’d have thought that Gov. Goodhair and Dr. Sleepy would end up being the least fucked-up Putinfluffer appointees?

    Neither of them is likely doing anything at all. Probably sitting on a beach somewhere, laughing about how easy government work is. Not like anyone would notice they aren’t around. Too much shit going down.

  87. 87.

    opiejeanne

    @Adam L Silverman: Thank you and everyone else who responded, and God speed to greennotGreen.

    I thought she must have passed by now, but people will fool you.

    I lost another dear friend that I only knew online, but I knew her for over 15 years on a forum as much a community as this one sometimes is. She was far too young, just about 40, and cancer got her too. Just as I thought she was dying, breathing her last from what her mother had been telling us, my friend suddenly posted “I’m not dead!” It should have been “I aten’t dead!” but I think her painkillers had made her a bit addled. She lasted another week, after that rally.

    I lost two other Real Life friends that same week, and I was almost afraid to turn on the computer for several days.

  89. 89.

    opiejeanne

    @Mnemosyne: We have a state senate fight shaping up in Washington, in my district. The state senate seat is the only Republican of all the various levels of representation I have, and the fellow who was elected to the seat died last year of lung cancer.
    The Democratic candidate, Manka Dhingra has a lot of qualifications, is a prosecutor, is involved with mental health and domestic violence agencies. Her opponent, Jinyoung Lee Englund, is running as a Republican but when I looked her up last week she was an Independent. She endorsed Trump, is anti-everything we stand for, and sounds like someone who needs to just shut up.
    The signs for the two candidates have appeared on driveways in my neighborhood two doors apart which makes me wonder if they are neighbors.
    I think I will be volunteering for Manka Dhingra’s election because our state senate has too many Republicans and we can’t get anything done.

  92. 92.

    Chet Murthy

    @jl:

    Yeesh.

    Hey hey, don’t get me wrong. Absolutely they’re execrable by any decent standard of humanity. I was merely observing that by the standards of asshattery of their compadres, they’re bona fide -geniuses-. Yes, they’re awful human beings. But compared to Spicey, or KKKeebler Elf, or Miller, or Bannonazi, or …. well, you see what I mean, right? They’re bona fide geniuses — not stepping on their own dicks every 5min.

    Which doesn’t mean they’re safe for Planet Earth, or for America. Just that they’re smarter than your average Trumpster, as it turns out.

  93. 93.

    Shalimar

    “This group of inept, incompetent morons don’t trust Pence” is not a ringing endorsement of his ability. That and the fact that White House staff leakers have made it clear that Pence has been in every important meeting. They do trust him.

  96. 96.

    Applejinx

    @Robin G.:

    And if Pence goes under, we better fucking hope Ryan does too, because God help us if this nightmare leads to his ascension.

    This is why Ryan was looking so freaking happy for a while there, before he knew he was on tape admitting that Trump was paid by Russia.

    He must surely know that Pence is also compromised, and the arrogant fuck clearly thought he was going to be President.

    I suppose it’s possible, but he really did not want word getting out that he knew. ‘The Family’ can’t afford him anymore, and he may already be past that shit-eating grin stage. That was when he thought his secrets would be kept… and before he knew he was on tape.

  97. 97.

    Gvg

    If both Trump and Pence are seen by the republican’s in the house as likely to go down, I have been thinking there would suddenly be challenges to Ryan’s speakership. It will only happen if the republican’s know that enough of them have had enough. Ryan only got and keeps the speakership because all the extreme factions within that party make the job impossible and unattractive. He was just barely an acceptable compromise. When he can sniff the presidency, that dynamic changes. Of course there will be a couple of egotistical idiots who can’t count votes trying to get it.at that point Ryan won’t look like the greatest leader.
    I suppose it’s even possible Pelosi could be in contention. Depends on what evidence turns up on Trump/Pence that changes Republican house perceptions. they have to fear their own re election prospects first.

  98. 98.

    Jeffro

    @Robin G.: you guys are forgetting that in the course of Trump being removed from office or leaving office, he will probably hopelessly fracture the GOP. Even if Pence is sworn in, he’ll nominate his own vice President, and if Pence is forced out, THAT person will become president

    So… we probably don’t have to worry about Ryan or hatch . It’ll be a “player to be named later”

  99. 99.

    Jinchi

    “That’s nonsense. That’s nonsense.” – Pence during the vice-Presidential debate, repeatedly denying that Trump said things that everyone in the country had heard him say.

    Pence lies constantly. I don’t know where he gets his reputation for honesty.

  100. 100.

    Groucho48

    I assume the transition team lawyer will eventually be testifying. Asking who on the transition team he informed of Flynn’s serious problems would seem to be an obvious question to ask him. And, “everybody, Katie”, would seem the appropriate answer for any lawyer who didn’t want to face dereliction of duty accusations.

  101. 101.

    Ella in New Mexico

    Pence is great at employing that pious little innocent putz face. But starting way back when he paid his own mortgage and personal expenses with campaign funds in Indiana, he’s always been as a shady as fuck https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/mike-pence-used-campaign-funds-to-pay-his-mortgage–and-it-cost-him-an-election/2016/07/15/90858964-49ed-11e6-bdb9-701687974517_story.html?utm_term=.ac75d5f828ce

    Also, don’t forget who’s dirty, Federally indicted hands were in control of how Pence got picked to be VP in the first place–http://www.dailykos.com/story/2017/3/22/1646138/-Manafort-made-Pence-the-VP-they-talked-regularly-during-the-transition

    Word on Teh Twitterz is that Pence is sneaky-leaking anti-Trump and pro-Pence crap all over DC to facilitate Trump’s early departure and his own assumption of the Presidency. Apparently, ever since Cheney got the authority to declassify information, the VP has had this power, and may be the “leaker” of some of the most recent stuff we’ve heard that’s damning to his boss (eg, stuff Trump said to the Russians re: Comey). Like THAT’s not gonna come out.

    As evil and sinister as they can be, It’s continously amazing just how fucking stupid this whole bunch is.

  102. 102.

    Groucho48

    Kos has a diary that says Rep. Cummings sent a letter to the transition team about Flynn in Nov. . The diary has a copy of the letter and a copy of the acknowledgement that the letter was received.

  103. 103.

    Theodore Wirth

    I have been posting this around for the last few day. Sorry if this is redundant but I need more memory.

    Anyway, here go appropos:

    Go ‘way from my window
    Leave at your own chosen speed
    I’m not the one you want, babe
    I’m not the one you need
    You say you’re lookin’ for someone
    Who’s never weak but always strong
    To protect you an’ defend you
    Whether you are right or wrong
    Someone to open each and every door
    But it ain’t me, babe
    No, no, no, it ain’t me babe
    It ain’t me you’re lookin’ for, babe

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