Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

It may be funny to you motherfucker, but it’s not funny to me.

We’ve had enough carrots to last a lifetime. break out the sticks.

Hot air and ill-informed banter

Let’s not be the monsters we hate.

My years-long effort to drive family and friends away has really paid off this year.

Their freedom requires your slavery.

A democracy can’t function when people can’t distinguish facts from lies.

Americans barely caring about Afghanistan is so last month.

A Senator Walker would also be an insult to reason, rationality, and decency.

Some judge needs to shut this circus down soon.

Nothing worth doing is easy.

Red lights blinking on democracy’s dashboard

A thin legal pretext to veneer over their personal religious and political desires

Shallow, uninformed, and lacking identity

Let’s delete this post and never speak of this again.

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

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

“But what about the lurkers?”

Consistently wrong since 2002

If senate republicans had any shame, they’d die of it.

Make the republican party small enough to drown in a bathtub.

They traffic in fear. it is their only currency. if we are fearful, they are winning.

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

“Jesus paying for the sins of everyone is an insult to those who paid for their own sins.”

You are here: Home / Foreign Affairs / Pre-Dawn Open Thread: “The Broken Tail Light of the Trump Investigation”

Pre-Dawn Open Thread: “The Broken Tail Light of the Trump Investigation”

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Fortunately for Trump (and his Republican cronies / enablers), all the individuals involved were tested professionals who… uhhhh…


Maybe they’re just being nice to a cooperative… ooops:


.

And then, up pops the guy even Paul Ryan and Mick Mulvaney “joked” was a paid Russian agent…

Per TPM:

Rep. Dana Rohrabacher (R-CA) on Tuesday claimed that a meeting between himself and President Donald Trump was being set up so that the congressman could brief the President on a recent meeting he had with Wikileaks founder Julian Assange…

Rohrabacher, who has been described as “Putin’s favorite congressman,” met with Assange earlier in August and returned to relay Assange’s claim that Russia did not orchestrate the leak of emails damaging to Hillary Clinton. At the time, Rohrabacher pledged to give Assange’s message to Trump, and he now claims that the wheels are in motion to set up that meeting…

The congressman also recently promoted a report claiming that the hack into the Democratic National Committee’s server was an inside job.

He echoed this in his interview with Hannity on Tuesday, claiming that the DNC hack was not carried out by the Russians and that the narrative of Russian interference was crafted by the liberal “establishment” to distract from Hillary Clinton’s scandals…

Maybe they’re gonna argue that all these gomers are too inept / incompetent to be capable of treason?

Reader Interactions

145Comments

  1. 1.

    patrick II

    I know Gomert is the dumbest guy in congress, but Rohrabacher is pretty impressive in his own “Russia is our friend” way.

  2. 2.

    piratedan

    my fear is that there’s enough of the GOP that are so incredibly compromised, that even if it was all exposed for the world to see, that they would still brazen it out and act as if treason was simply “playing politics”

    I think Putin compromised not only Trump and Rohrbacher, I think essential players in the GOP party apparatus also took “dark money” (ty Citizens United! mind if we check the bank accounts of the Conservative members of the bench?) from foreign interests (hell, probably washed thru Trumps’s major donors, i.e. Russian interests controlled by people friendly to Putin). I wouldn’t be surprised to see Preibus, Rayn, McConnell, Scalise, Cornyn, Pence on the books. Obviously those on the campaign are dirty as hell, Conway, Manafort, Stone, The Trump Family singers, Lewandoski, Page and others…

    I wouldn’t be shocked if some dosh was also tossed to certain key elements at the NYT (writers are cheap, but editors might be expensive) and even the FBI and Camp Guiliani.

    Hell, I expect them all to be dirty, each with their hands out for their own personal agenda being seen to… all for the sake of some cash, with a healthy helping of racism and bigotry thrown in as appetizers…

    The question for me, is once its shown to be true, will anyone do anything about it.

  7. 7.

    aarrgghh

    i have a fantasy of a bitter trump, in exile in the ukraine, contenting himself with the thought of all the taxpayer dollars pocketed during his short tenure … that is, until he gets a frantic call from the kids about how all the family assets have been disappeared by hackers. trump calls putin and wants to know where all his money went. putin replies: “your money? that was always ours…”

  10. 10.

    bystander

    @p.a.: Hermes orange is a whole other matter, darling. With the right alligator trims and covered buttons? Too chic. Can’t wait to see them modeling them in the yard.

  13. 13.

    bemused

    I saw more of the Pittsburgh voter focus group interview last evening. No matter how “disillusioned” the trump voters claimed they were, they also were not ready to say they wouldn’t vote for him again. Guess I shouldn’t be surprised. My feeling is if trump would just tone it down, stop tweeting, stop showing them trump has no empathy, etc, etc, they wouldn’t have to worry their empty little heads about who he really is and keep their blinders on. However, when the group was simply asked what they thought about Mueller, the non-trump voters said things like “go faster” while none of the trump voters, iirc, seem to have any idea who Mueller was. Many of them had a “huh?” expression on their faces. Hard to believe they haven’t at least heard the name Mueller from their wingnut media or FB sources. You’d think they’d have daily migraines from constantly working that hard to ignore pesky facts.

  15. 15.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @bemused:

    Hard to believe they haven’t at least heard the name Mueller from their wingnut media or FB sources.

    Ummmm…. No, it isn’t.

  16. 16.

    debbie

    @bystander:

    Good grief. A photo of Trump and wife just popped up on my FB feed. I cannot believe she worse stilettos to a flood zone.

    ETA: I guess I’m the last to have seen that.

  19. 19.

    bemused

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    Maybe not but right wing media and their FB “friends” have surely trashed Mueller. Hard to believe they deliberately avoid all “news” but what do I know. Even more pathetic then for people who know absolutely nothing to go on tv and express their views. Makes my own head hurt.

  23. 23.

    Gin & Tonic

    @aarrgghh:

    i have a fantasy of a bitter trump, in exile in the ukraine

    0700 EDT, and already we have a winner for dumbest comment of the day.

    Ukraine’s government made little secret of its preference for HRC, and there’s not a chance in hell they’d grant Trump any sort of asylum, as he is viewed by nearly everyone there as an asset of Moscow’s.

    And it’s “Ukraine”, not “the Ukraine.”

  24. 24.

    bemused

    @rikyrah:

    Yes, so stupid I don’t know how they get themselves dressed in the morning.

    I was thinking of the non-trump voters on that focus panel. If I had been on that panel I would have had a hard time not bursting out in laughter or jeering at the dolts.

  29. 29.

    Kay

    @bemused:

    No, they really are that uninformed. There’s a disconnect between GOP voters and the GOP hard Right base. They were baffled by why Trump spent so much time on Arpaio – they don’t know who he is.

    They put all these big Trump media stories in the same basket- the “not working on what he said he would work on” basket. Remember that a lot of them were NOT regular voters- they were sporadically plugged in to begin with. They don’t follow this stuff, which is part of the reason they believed all of his bullshit.

    Everyone was laughing because the Trumpsters though Obama was President during Katrina. That’s genuine lack of engagement prior to Trump, not denial.

  31. 31.

    satby

    @debbie: and the garbage NYT (I think) had a story up within hours saying she wasn’t wearing the heels when she got off in Texas. But the fact that the entire trip was a photo op / fantasy op for her hubby was pretty obvious by their initial attire.

  32. 32.

    Baud

    @Kay: I have long believed that those of us who follow politics closely vastly underestimate how slowly information flows to regular people, if it even reaches them at all.

    ETA: And I include in that many dedicated Democratic voters who still don’t follow news regularly.

  34. 34.

    Thoughtful David

    @MJS:
    One of Faux News’s best propaganda tools is omission.
    In the gym I go to, one screen is always on Faux. The Monday morning after murder in Charlottesville of Ms. Heyer by white supremacists, I noticed that there was almost no word at all about anything that has happened in Charlottesville. Their show was almost 100% “look at these cute kittens” and “watch this cute toddler with a beach ball” kind of stories. On the other screens CNN, MSNBC, NBC, ABC, etc. were all covering the story in depth. Nothing on Faux.
    I imagine later in the day they got their talking points organized, but the lack of coverage in the morning was really noticeable.

  36. 36.

    bemused

    @rikyrah:

    I have a book on my shelf, “Mistakes Were Made But Not By Me by Carol Tavris and Eliot Aronson explaining how people get so invested in what they believe, they can’t let go of it no matter irrefutable evidence otherwise. I get that but at some point especially when it comes to trump and gop, they make a devil’s bargain when they realize or kind of know they’ve been conned and fleeced but still won’t admit it, that’s a cult, imo.

  38. 38.

    satby

    @Baud: that’s absolutely true. I can try to talk to someone about a story that’s even been in the news, like Mueller or the Russian meme bots, and people react like I’m a conspiracy nut. It’s the main reason I stay on FB and push back so hard on RW BS, because otherwise people less plugged in never hear the facts. With copious cites.

  39. 39.

    Kay

    @Baud:

    I saw a FOX poll yesterday that support for the wall has dropped dramatically- they theorize that people are tying Trump policy to Trump and they don’t like Trump (the person) so are less likely to support the policy.

    I feel like an initial impression that deep is hard to turn around. Once you think poorly of a person everything he or she does tends to validate your poor opinion, so it just compounds. There really is a window, and it can close.

  40. 40.

    Baud

    @satby:

    It’s also why false memes like “both sides” or ” liberal media” are such a powerful tool against us. Once they get internalized, they are hard to dislodge.

  41. 41.

    rikyrah

    @Baud:
    I simply don’t believe that. One of my favorite tweets after Comey was fired, came from a ‘Brotha on the streets’
    The way that he broke it down-what Dolt45 had done, into the simplest of street terms…
    Because THIS was someone that ‘shouldn’t know about this’
    Made me smile.

  42. 42.

    bemused

    @Boudica:

    Oh gawd. Texas is going to be one huge toxic disaster zone.
    We met a couple at a wedding who retired to northern MN. She grew up in Texas and they had lived all over as her husband was in the military and then commercial pilot. She knew absolutely nothing about MN before moving here to live on a lake. She was just amazed at how clean the lakes and water were and loves the forests, animals, etc.

  45. 45.

    Kay

    @Boudica:

    Oh dear God. Those poor people. They just keep getting hit. You wish they could at least get a breather- 12 hours to regroup and assess. They have to be reaching exhaustion.

  46. 46.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Baud:

    And I include in that many dedicated Democratic voters who still don’t follow news regularly.

    That would be my wife. Every election I have to explain to her the various ballot issues and amendments to the state constitution. (she votes D always) I don’t mind but I do wonder about those without a politically plugged in spouse.

  47. 47.

    satby

    @Baud: part of a decades long process to intentionally disengage voters and the public from the government that supposedly represents them. Best, most effective voter suppression of all!

  48. 48.

    debbie

    @satby:

    Even if true, the fact that Trump used it as an opportunity to basically strut the power of his dick around is appalling. Not to mention that Melania let him.

  50. 50.

    bemused

    @Kay:

    Yet, they don’t get the least bit curious? I don’t get that at all. I would hate the feeling that I didn’t know important stuff that would affect my and my family’s lives. And if I didn’t try to find out, I would feel like a dope. Is it that they just want someone else to just handle everything for them so they don’t have to be bothered. Pure laziness?

  51. 51.

    Baud

    @satby: Absolutely. I think Booman had a post making that point, and actually somewhat lamenting his own contribution to the cynicism.

  52. 52.

    Kay

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    My daughter got her husband to vote for the first time in ’16. He genuinely supported Clinton, which made me feel bad. I hate when nice people lose and right out of the gate like that.

  53. 53.

    Baud

    @bemused: I think it’s like people who put off cleaning their garage because they know deep done it’s going to be messier than they imagine.

    Not me, of course.

  55. 55.

    TS

    Morning Ho is now attacking Pres Obama in regards to Trump removing all of the Obama initiatives. No wonder he is called Morning Joke. CLICK.
    Last two days he is doing a reversal on trump – wonder what is hiding there.

  56. 56.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @bemused: Working 2 or 3 jobs to keep a roof over one’s head and food on the table and shoe on your children’s feet and being involved in their schooling, while trying to keep a home somewhat clean and getting to the job on time every day when one’s vehicle needs a new engine and the tires are bald and personal property taxes are coming due and…. ad nauseum.

    I understand why they can’t invest the emotional energy into it. They don’t have any left.

  57. 57.

    Kay

    @bemused:

    They follow other things- sports, celebrities/movies/tv, their own romances …:)

    I don’t know anything about movies. Nothing. I know the names of no actors. When they die I think “oh, that’s who that is, that person I have seen”

  61. 61.

    Boudica

    @Kay: My son was eligible to vote the first time in 2016. It took a lot of cajoling but he voted for Clinton in Ohio. He went to see her when she spoke on campus and it helped change his mind. Sorry to see his choice not win. Then again my first vote was for Mondale and I’m still showing up for elections. Even school board ones.

  62. 62.

    Kay

    I know I say it too much but add to the annals of “The New York Times is horrible”- the Trump people told them Trump was “obsessed” with the Texas flood and they dutifully reported it as fact.

    Who knew it was so easy, right? Next they’ll tell them Trump is “obsessed” with jobs, or tax reform for the middle class, or affordable health care. “We cannot keep him away from the briefing books! ”

    This is the “access” they all fight for? For the Trump is obsessed with the flood scoop?

  63. 63.

    bemused

    @Kay:

    Priorities, I guess. Yeah, I do know folks like that. They don’t like to talk about anything heavy or serious, ever. I’m ok with being around them socially for short periods but then I get very bored.

  64. 64.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Baud: And I don’t mean to suggest they are. Badly phrased. In my wife’s case she just doesn’t want to go there because “it’s all so depressing”.

  65. 65.

    Betty Cracker

    @OzarkHillbilly: My husband is like that with local / state-level politics. He votes the straight Dem ticket in the general elections but usually doesn’t know anything about primary candidates until we discuss it. He has no clue about the non-partisan races until I tell him what I’ve learned before he votes. It just doesn’t interest him. I don’t think he gave a hoot about national politics either before we met, though he’s always been a liberal. He’s supportive of my activities as a precinct captain, etc., but would never get involved himself.

    To a certain extent, my husband’s political apathy is driven by his belief that it’s all rigged for rich people and corporations, a belief that long pre-dated the Bernie Sanders campaign. That message really resonated with him, which is why he voted for Sanders in the primary (but Clinton in the general because he’s not STUPID!). Cynicism is a real problem and not 100% without justification either.

  67. 67.

    Kay

    @Boudica:

    It’s probably patronizing to voters but I never feel bad that the candidate lost- I feel bad that her voters lost. I’m worried they won’t recover :)

  68. 68.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Kay: “We cannot keep him away from the briefing books! He really likes the 8×10 color photo’s with the paragraph on the back of each one explaining what it is (but he never reads that).”

  69. 69.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Betty Cracker:

    my husband’s political apathy is driven by his belief that it’s all rigged for rich people and corporations,

    It’s the golden rule: The man with the gold makes the rules. I have a similar cynicism.

  71. 71.

    Kay

    I hired a contract accountant yesterday who was 1 year behind my daughter in high school.

    I’m as old as the hills. He has my Quickbooks log in so if he’s a crook she’ll be hearing from me. Clearly her fault.

  72. 72.

    Betty Cracker

    @Kay: Tom Levenson had an interesting take on Twitter yesterday vis-a-vis the Glenn Thrush puff piece that got savaged here and elsewhere. I hope he does a post on it.

  73. 73.

    bemused

    The other week we listened to a Tell Me Anything John Fugelsang (XMRadio) episode with a panel of comedians including Lewis Black. We had to laugh when one talked about trump and said every day spouse comes home and first thing other spouse says, “You can’t believe what the asshole said today!” We both said almost at the same time, it’s so true, this has to be happening in millions of homes across the country.

  74. 74.

    Jeffro

    @MJS:

    If you only watch Fox News, you probably have rarely heard the name “Mueller”.

    Unless it’s in the context of:
    1) “James Comey, known leaker and friend of Bob Mueller…”
    2) “Bob Mueller added a new investigator to his team, a big donor to the Clintons and other Democrats…”
    3) Cavuto: “Bob Mueller: cannibal? child abuser?”

  76. 76.

    ? ?? Goku (aka The Hope of the Universe) ? ?

    @Gin & Tonic:
    Where would Trump end up exile anyway? Not Russia for sure. He’d end up dead inside of a week

  78. 78.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes

    @Betty Cracker:

    My own cynicism isn’t rooted in any belief of rigging – I just think that American society is drowning in stupidity, particularly in the white demographic, and that our votes and pols reflect it.

  79. 79.

    Another Scott

    Maybe Donnie’s reality distortion field isn’t working too well? TheHill:

    The commanding officer who led the federal response to Hurricane Katrina blasted current relief efforts in Louisiana and Texas following Hurricane Harvey, warning on Wednesday that officials were unprepared for the scope of the disaster.

    “In Katrina, we had 40,000 National Guard [troops], 240 helicopters on the fourth day,” retired Lt. Gen. Russel Honoré told CNN. “They just got 100 helicopters in Texas. Something is significantly wrong in our command and control.”

    “They need to stop patting each other on the back while these poor people are out here waiting to be rescued,” he added.

    Honoré told CNN that the disaster caused by Harvey was “a lot bigger” than the devastation caused by Hurricane Katrina, which in 2004 left more than 1,200 dead and caused $108 billion in damages.

    “This is a lot bigger. I went out on a boat this morning in this very same community right here. This is huge,” Honoré told CNN. “After Katrina, the air elements and air component of northern command created a significant grid system for search and rescue.”

    “I don’t know where that is,” he said. “It didn’t look like anybody in Texas had ever read the plan.”

    […]

    This is my shocked, shocked face.

    :-/

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  80. 80.

    Jeffro

    Anyway, per that Kyle Griffin tweet (about the ex-Watergate prosecutor saying Trumpov’s acting like he knows time is running out) – on some level, I have no doubt that sheer animal instinct is telling Trumpov that the walls are closing in. But that’s probably competing with his monumental ego and need for adulation. I don’t think he really realizes how much trouble he’s in, on multiple levels. And that’s why I think in the end, just to keep his “fortune” from being brand-destroyed or RICO-confiscated, he himself might actually flip on all the folks who conspired with Russia (except Don Jr. and Jared, of course) as well as flipping on his Russian money laundering connections.

    Who knows, right? But he certainly cares about nothing but himself (and to a lesser extent, his family).

  81. 81.

    OzarkHillbilly

    Here in the state of Misery, we have another state rep running for asshole of the month:

    Rep. Warren Love, R-Osceola, posted a link to an article describing vandalism discovered Wednesday to a Confederate monument in Springfield National Cemetery. “This is totally against the law,” Love wrote. “I hope they are found & hung from a tall tree with a long rope.”

    Criticism on social media came swiftly. Rep. Shamed Dogan of Ballwin, the only black Republican in the Legislature, posted a screenshot of the Facebook post and condemned it. “Vandalizing property is wrong, but hoping for people to be hung/lynched over it?? Way over the line!!” Dogan tweeted. “What is wrong with us #moleg?”

    Lots of Dems piled on but I’ll skip all that to get to this precious bit of political limbo:

    Love has run into controversy in the past.

    He has a picture of himself and another person on his Facebook page with a Missouri Battle Flag — sometimes called Price’s Flag — in the background. Unlike the more widely-known Confederate flag, the Missouri battle flag features a white cross, blue background and red outline. In a February Facebook post, the Pitch, a Kansas City news site, reported he shared a blog post calling President Abraham Lincoln the “greatest tyrant and despot in American history.” In a House committee hearing in January, during debate on a prevailing wage bill, Love referred to “the black Negro.”

    Love told the Post-Dispatch on Wednesday he is not a racist. “Listen, I’ve got good friends in the Capitol,” Love said. “Me and Tommie Pierson (a black St. Louis County Democrat) was co-captains of a softball team. And you can ask anybody in that Capitol. I probably have a better relationship with the minorities than anybody up there at the Legislature.

    “I play softball with them, I’m good friends with them. I, you know, I sit on the same side of the aisle with them and they’re on my softball team,” Love said.

    “I am definitely not that word,” Love said of the word “racist.” “I don’t even like to use that word.”

    Definitely not a racist piece of shit, definitely.

  82. 82.

    dr. bloor

    @Betty Cracker: Good thread, although I’d argue that “Good at his job but baffled by the bullshit” in the face of so much evidence re: Trump’s motives and character basically equates to “Bad at his job.”

  83. 83.

    Baud

    For the record, I’m highly cynical myself. But I try to fight it because I know it’s poison for both me and others.

  84. 84.

    bemused

    @Betty Cracker:

    Yes! Youngest kid and spouse laughed at the story. Definitely happens at their home.

    Really striking the contrast from the know nothing knuckleheads. Not happening in their homes.

  85. 85.

    Kay

    @Betty Cracker:

    I’m just sick of this game. Trump has apparently been playing it for 30 years. He claims to “attack” them and they go into their First Amendment swoon but it works- he gets favorable coverage out of it because they can’t be perceived as biased.

    I mean, come on. Presidents all do damage control and expectations management in a crisis. Preemptively announcing Trump is handling it well is bullshit.

    Compare the NYTimes coverage of Obama on the oil spill to Trump and the flood. This is a lower standard.

  86. 86.

    Quinerly

    Screaming headline at Breitbart that Cernovich believes Trump is “under house arrest at the WH.” Kelly has taken his phone. It seems since John Bolton hasn’t been able to connect with Trump, the only answer is the possibility of a take over by the globalists. Won’t link, but article is easy to find. I read it so you don’t have to…and I needed a morning laugh.

  88. 88.

    Baud

    @Kay:

    Preemptively announcing Trump is handling it well is bullshit.

    I’m shocked that the newspaper that preemptively announced that the FBI was not looking into any connections between Trump and Russia just before the election would do this.

  90. 90.

    ? ?? Goku (aka The Hope of the Universe) ? ?

    @Another Scott:
    Worse than Katrina? Can we even call this Trump’s Katrina? Wonder if Trump will blast him in a tweet? That should go over well.

  91. 91.

    ? ?? Goku (aka The Hope of the Universe) ? ?

    @Cheryl Rofer:

    Fox (FOX!!!) has 56% saying that Trump is tearing the country apart.” And other goodies

    Wow. Even Fox goons see he’s an incompetent, traitorous, nazi symp.

  93. 93.

    rikyrah

    @Kay:

    I know I say it too much but add to the annals of “The New York Times is horrible”- the Trump people told them Trump was “obsessed” with the Texas flood and they dutifully reported it as fact.

    They keep on publishing those bullshyt Jared and Ivanka stories. So tired of that bullshyt.

    Which is why I loved that Vanity Fair article from this week on that horrid duo.

  95. 95.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @raven: Heh, There’s some really tough competition out there. It’s hard for a racist POS to stand out these days.

  96. 96.

    Chyron HR

    Boy, it sure is weird how the past 3 presidents have all had hurricanes hit major cities during their administrations, and yet only two of those cities were completely annihilated, leaving nightmarish death tolls and ecological hazards. It’s almost like one party objectively runs the country better.

  98. 98.

    O. Felix Culpa

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    I do wonder about those without a politically plugged in spouse.

    My impression is that most people are not politically plugged in, hence vulnerable to whatever media, fb, and tribal “info” they get. Ms. O didn’t used to be politically plugged in, but that has changed. She’s not quite as obsessive as I am which is probably all for the good.

  99. 99.

    Kay

    @Baud:

    It’s just that they ALL do this-it’s like the Tradition of Crisis- all Presidents go out and say recovery efforts are going well.

    Trump does it and because he met that rock-bottom minimum standard they accept the official line? Why? Because he’s so credible? He fucking lies constantly. I don’t know – COUNT something- money, helicopters, people to the affected area. They have a metric to measure and compare. They’re allowing him to create a reality.

  102. 102.

    rikyrah

    @Jeffro:

    Anyway, per that Kyle Griffin tweet (about the ex-Watergate prosecutor saying Trumpov’s acting like he knows time is running out) – on some level, I have no doubt that sheer animal instinct is telling Trumpov that the walls are closing in.

    I honestly believe he’s never come across anyone like Bobby Three Sticks in his entire life, and it’s confusing him. There were two important pieces of information that dropped yesterday.
    1. The more publicized piece is him working with Schneiderman
    2. The less publicized info that dropped is some Russian that he had testify under oath – WEEKS AGO.

  103. 103.

    Kay

    Trump wasn’t too obsessed with the storm to go out and sell his stupid tax plan, along with the entire Cabinet.

    They put their angst over the victims aside long enough to assure donors they’d be getting their giant tax cut.

    They’ll probably use the storm to slide the giant tax cuts past the public.

  104. 104.

    rikyrah

    @Quinerly:

    Screaming headline at Breitbart that Cernovich believes Trump is “under house arrest at the WH.” Kelly has taken his phone

    Well…he hasn’t been tweeting, has he?

  107. 107.

    rikyrah

    Ivanka Trump Backs White House Decision to Stop Obama’s Equal Pay Rulehttps://t.co/vOSAsXvHHg#WomenWhoWork pic.twitter.com/ueKKOFvJlA
    — Jesse Lehrich (@JesseLehrich) August 30, 2017

  108. 108.

    tobie

    What I found depressing about that Pittsburgh focus group is that all the Trump voters still think Hillary is the most corrupt politician EVAH and that meant they had no choice but to vote for Trump. Propaganda is really effective with stupid people and these people are dumb. Or venal. Or both. Our national government is being used as a personal cash register for the Trump Organization and this evidently does not strike so-called reluctant Trump voters as obscenely corrupt!

  109. 109.

    Kay

    More storm “obsession” from Team Trump. They can’t manage to get helicopters to Texas but they can meet with the lawyers over deporting kids:

    News: WH looking at whether state AG’s threatening DACA lawsuit willing to extend Sept. 5 deadline, sources familiar w/ discussion tell @CNN

    Trump isn’t just treated differently than Obama- he’s treated differently than every President in my lifetime. They gave him a trophy yesterday for saying “tax reform”. Is it worth it? What are we protecting here? If those people aren’t actually rescued they will know! They will be aware of that! It’s like “protecting their belief” in government is more important than pulling them out of water. No more protection. If it’s going down it’s going down and all the whistling in the dark isn’t gonna change that.

  110. 110.

    ? ?? Goku (aka The Hope of the Universe) ? ?

    @rikyrah:
    I mean, I was half joking about “Acting President Kelly”, but geeze that’s nuts.

  112. 112.

    ? ?? Goku (aka The Hope of the Universe) ? ?

    @tobie:
    They’re low info idiots who haven’t heard about the corruption more than likely

  113. 113.

    Kay

    @tobie:

    They said the same thing about Kerry though. All wobbly Bush voters switched to “you left us no choice!”

    It’s another excuse, a stop along the way in their process of admitting a mistake.

  114. 114.

    rikyrah

    The Fate of the DREAMers is on the Line
    by Nancy LeTourneau
    August 30, 2017

    I watched Trump’s speech in Missouri, not because I was interested in what he had to say about tax cuts (another of his agenda items that is likely DOA), but because I wanted to see if he had anything to say about the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program. That is the name given to President Obama’s executive order that protects young undocumented immigrants brought to the US as children, otherwise known as DREAMers. He didn’t address the issue.

    There is a reason why many people have been suggesting that an announcement about that program is imminent. A federal court in Texas halted a similar program for parents of childhood arrivals to the U.S. (DAPA), but the case is ongoing. Litigants have said that if Trump doesn’t halt the DACA program before September 5th, they would add it to the court challenge on DAPA. At that point, the administration would have to decide whether or not to defend DACA in court—a responsibility that would be up to AG Sessions.

  115. 115.

    rikyrah

    @Kay:

    Trump isn’t just treated differently than Obama- he’s treated differently than every President in my lifetime.

    The curve for unqualified White Men is REAL.

  116. 116.

    rikyrah

    @tobie:

    Propaganda is really effective with stupid people and these people are dumb. Or venal. Or both. Our national government is being used as a personal cash register for the Trump Organization and this evidently does not strike so-called reluctant Trump voters as obscenely corrupt!

    I still call bullshyt.

    He’s a vile, disgusting human being…and THEIR lack of character got them to vote for him.
    And, no, they should never be allowed to forget it.
    Which is why he MUST leave the office in handcuffs.
    Want to take their final excuse of ‘ Hillary was so corrupt’ away from these lying azz muthaphuckas.

  117. 117.

    rikyrah

    @Kay:

    Trump wasn’t too obsessed with the storm to go out and sell his stupid tax plan, along with the entire Cabinet.

    They put their angst over the victims aside long enough to assure donors they’d be getting their giant tax cut.

    They’ll probably use the storm to slide the giant tax cuts past the public.

    I understand what you say, Kay…but, more than once yesterday, I heard…

    Why is he doing this tax reform speech in the middle of this natural disaster..
    It was tone deaf.
    He doesn’t have a plan, Kay. An actual plan

  118. 118.

    Kay

    @rikyrah:

    Tax “reform”, DACA, he doesn’t seem “obsessed” to me. Maybe Jared is tasked with parting the waters down there.

  119. 119.

    Amaranthine RBG

    @Kay:
    I find those NYT stories credible. The Houston floods are/were the latest shiny thing. I can easily see Trump glued to the teevee watching coverage.

    Did your notice his comments about how this was the biggest/worst flooding ever?

    His narcissism translates that as he is President and “in charge” of the response to the biggest flood ever. Confirms his importance

    He, of course, couldn’t care less about the people affected, policies to minimize future damage etc

  120. 120.

    Kay

    @rikyrah:

    Obama did a fundraiser in the middle of the oil spill and the NYTimes went crazy with outrage. This is the frame they use.

    Except for Trump. Because they adopted lower standards for this President. This damages the whole concept of “merit” and “merit” is probably essential in a (supposed) meritocracy, don’t you think? People have to BUY that on some level.

  121. 121.

    rikyrah

    What Trump Doesn’t Want You to Know About Corporate Taxes
    by Nancy LeTourneau
    August 31, 2017

    As had been broadcast prior to his speech in Missouri yesterday, Donald Trump tried to make his tax cuts sound like a populist proposal to help American workers. Part of that meant trying to sell us on the idea that cutting the corporate tax rate would grow the economy and increase wages. To make that point, he said that the corporate tax rate in this county was the highest in the developing world—limiting our competitiveness. In a way that has no meaning, what he said is true.

    The reason I say that has no meaning is because that chart represents the “statutory corporate tax rate,” or the one that is on the books. It has nothing to do with what corporations actually pay in taxes. To answer that question we have to look at “effective corporate tax rates”—what they pay once all of the loopholes are factored in. Here is how the U.S. compares to the other G7 countries on that score.

    What we see is that the effective corporate tax rate in the U.S. is actually below average when compared to other G7 nations. That helps explain this chart that Kevin Drum shared yesterday to demonstrate why it is not corporate taxes that have been choking American growth.

  122. 122.

    rikyrah

    Judge’s order says Kobach index must be detailed and list every record created by commissioners in “all mediums” — includes personal email pic.twitter.com/fSG9sgFDCB
    — Daniel Jacobson (@Dan_F_Jacobson) August 30, 2017

  124. 124.

    cmorenc

    @Baud:

    It’s also why false memes like “both sides” or ” liberal media” are such a powerful tool against us. Once they get internalized, they are hard to dislodge.

    An especially pernicious false “both sides” variant is “all politicians lie” => all political liars are equivalent => (Schumer, Pelosi, Clinton) lie as much or MORE than Trump. And therefore, why should we believe any of this crap about Trump and Russia is anything more than a lying political witch-hunt / smear campaign against Trump? LaLaLaLa we can’t hear you (why they ignore fact-based news non-fox news media, cause they all lie, too).

  125. 125.

    WaterGirl

    @debbie: She has no class at all.

    Totally unrelated, I saw your comment about your eyes on one of the earlier threads. Do you have the floaters and flashing thing going on? That happened to me two years ago. Not fun!

  126. 126.

    geg6

    @Betty Cracker:

    I love Tom, but I hope he doesn’t. If the NYT didn’t know Trump would be this kind of disaster, then why did everyone else in NY journalism know it? And it’s not as if the NYT editors and reporters like Haberman and Thrush are such nice people that they just don’t notice the crazy and criminal. Hell, they’ve spent years and years ginning up crazy and criminal in the case of the Clintons, so their naive “niceness” just doesn’t cut it. Tom is giving them waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay to much slack here. They deserve none of it. In fact, I often notice dark clouds and shadows when the subject of the NYT and the lickspittles Haberman and Thrush come up.

  127. 127.

    WaterGirl

    @satby: Did I ever mention that my “never pays attention to the news but always votes” sister saw my “Puzzies Against Trump” magnet on my fridge and thought it was cute. She made a comment that told me she thought it was just a cute way of saying “Women Against Trump”.

    She hadn’t even heard any of the grab ’em by the puzzy” uproar. Guess who she voted for?

  132. 132.

    danielx

    Another fucking fantasy world column by my man David Brooks….

    It’s become more of a white party in recent years, of course, and adopted some wrongheaded positions on civil rights enforcement, but it was still possible to be a Republican without feeling like you were violating basic decency on matters of race. Most of the Republican establishment, from the Bushes to McCain and Romney, fought bigotry, and racism was not a common feature in the conservative moment.

    I suppose it’s possible that Villager Extraordinaire Brooks has never heard of the Southern Strategy, nor yet that Ronald Reagan made a speech defending states’ right in Neshoba County, Mississippi (look it up), or…oh, why bother? If Brooks is just now discovering that the current day Republican Party is suffused with racism down to its lily white toes, he’s somehow missed a good portion of US political history of the past forty years. I realize that dropping embarrassing material down any convenient memory hole is pretty much required for Republicans, but even for Brooks this is rich.

  133. 133.

    MJS

    @danielx: Those positions on civil rights enforcement were simply “wrongheaded”, not an indication of the GOP’s basic racism. It’s always just a coincidence with these guys.

  135. 135.

    Tokyokie

    @satby: In the movie The Flim-Flam Man, George C. Scott plays a small-time grifter in the South who tells his protégé (Michael Sarrazin) that the only marks he can con are those who think they’re getting a deal that’s too good to be true. Anyway, I think there’s a lot of truth in that statement. The folks who have bought into Trump’s bullshit have bought into a con, thinking they’ll get a wall along the border or the return of anthracite coal mining or heavy manufacturing jobs at no cost whatsoever. But to oppose Trump means admitting that they’ve been duped, and rather than admit they’re wrong, they double down and choose to believe irrational crap, like Obama was president when Katrina hit New Orleans. It’s like after not growing hair after the first couple of $50 bottles of Miracle Hair Grow Tincture, they buy several cases of the stuff rather than admit they wasted their money.

  136. 136.

    Jeffro

    @danielx: “it’s become more of a white party in recent years, of course…” You can almost hear the SIGH there from Bobo. “Alas, SIGH, it’s become more overtly racist than usual, SIGH, of course…you wouldn’t believe, SIGH, the lengths I have to go to SIGH to try and keep us afloat and viable as a party SIGH”

  137. 137.

    Honus

    @Kay: sort of like the reverse of all those people that didn’t like the ACA until Obama was out of office. It not just the person though, people don’t like the policy either.

  138. 138.

    Honus

    @danielx: I can’t remember McCain or the Bushes actively fighting bigotry with any real action. McCain did defend obama in one instance in a debate, and GWB said it was wrong to blame all the Muslims after 9/11 (and then started a war that killed hundreds of thousand of muslims). George Romney did march for civil rights, over 50 years ago. Mitt, not so much. So yeah, Bobo, as usual, is full of shit.

  139. 139.

    J R in WV

    @piratedan:

    I have thought the NYTimes has been turned for many years now. They seem to manage to damage the nation with every mal-formed non-scoop they pound on, with giant lies on the top of Page One supporting the most damaging possible foreign policy AND domestic policies that our worst enemies could dream up.

    Impossible for it to be a coincidence this 5th time. Enemy action without any doubt. How this is being done to us we will probably never know, but it IS being DONE to us, repeatedly!!

  140. 140.

    WaterGirl

    @J R in WV:

    I have thought the NYTimes has been turned for many years now. They seem to manage to damage the nation with every mal-formed non-scoop they pound on, with giant lies on the top of Page One supporting the most damaging possible foreign policy AND domestic policies that our worst enemies could dream up.

    Impossible for it to be a coincidence this 5th time. Enemy action without any doubt.

    That’s perfect. I wish I had written it!

  141. 141.

    J R in WV

    Once upon a time, like 55 years ago, there were Republicans who sided with Martin Luther King jr and his non-violent campaign for equality. My dad was one.

    But there were damned few of them, and they had very little power in their own party, which by about 1968 had plunged into the Southern Strategy, swallowed up as much racism in that pool of depravity as they could hold, and have spent the past 50 years beating the drum of racist hatred for their own political benefit.

    Any news organization that doesn’t realize this plain and obvious fact is blinkered by their owners. And I mean that statement in every sense of the word owners. Bought and paid for, totally controlled, etc, etc. Grab them by their money!!! They will follow you anywhere!

    ETA: Brooks may be too stupid and immature to be a real racist, but he doesn’t see that he is surrounded by it, and can’t tell that it is a cancer at the center of humanity. That’s some real moral blindness there!! Also fix’d a typo.

  142. 142.

    J R in WV

    @WaterGirl:

    Thanks! They provide just enough real news about unimportant issues, and with just enough subtly turned bitterness to make cover for the real stories, which damage the nation and the people of the nation on every level. Sickening.

    I was brought up in a newspaper family, and it is hard for me to realize and admit that one of the iconic pillars of American journalism has become sellers of despicable anti-American lies, much like a paper Fox News. And not the only pillar of Americanism to be turned against the people, either. I gotta stop there.

  143. 143.

    Dulcie

    @bemused: Many people think of politics as a sport, as in “I’m really not into baseball”. They just can’t put it all together – that the reason we have roads, and streetlights, and daily mail service IS politics and good governance – in a way that’s meaningful to their day to day lives. I find it heartbreaking.

  144. 144.

    Citizen Alan

    @Honus:

    One of the saddest things about the Romney campaign was learning more about the life and beliefs of George Romney, who really would have been a good president in my opinion, and then realizing how humiliated he would be by the man his eldest son that grew up to be.

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