Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

The lights are all blinking red.

So it was an October Surprise A Day, like an Advent calendar but for crime.

Of course you can have champagne before noon. That’s why orange juice was invented.

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

You cannot shame the shameless.

When someone says they “love freedom”, rest assured they don’t mean yours.

‘Museums aren’t America’s attic for its racist shit.’

It’s a good piece. click on over. but then come back!!

Republicans got rid of McCarthy. Democrats chose not to save him.

Too often we hand the biggest microphones to the cynics and the critics who delight in declaring failure.

New McCarthy, same old McCarthyism.

Republican also-rans: four mules fighting over a turnip.

An unpunished coup is a training exercise.

Their freedom requires your slavery.

Trump makes a mockery of the legal system and cowardly judges just sit back and let him.

Roe isn’t about choice, it’s about freedom.

Not so fun when the rabbit gets the gun, is it?

Putting aside our relentless self-interest because the moral imperative is crystal clear.

Putin must be throwing ketchup at the walls.

It’s not hopeless, and we’re not helpless.

The willow is too close to the house.

Following reporting rules is only for the little people, apparently.

This blog will pay for itself.

The fundamental promise of conservatism all over the world is a return to an idealized past that never existed.

You are here: Home / Elections / Election 2016 / Russiagate Open Thread: Saturday Night Cold Dish

Russiagate Open Thread: Saturday Night Cold Dish

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“But wait,” cries the Mad Bitcher, “Some of us love chum!”…

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121Comments

  1. 1.

    dmsilev

    That Tweet & headline of Cilizza’s, oh my. That’s like Halperin (who we now know to be a dick on both a literal and figurative level) and his infamous “this is excellent news for John McCain” moment.

  2. 2.

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

    and they say the left can’t meme

    It’s different when the left does it. When the right does it, it’s just a joke. When we do it, we are violent Antifa anarchists who want throw our opponents in gulags.

    Yes, really.

  5. 5.

    PsiFighter37

    Cilizza was awful at WaPo, but he’s been even worse since moving to CNN. Not sure how that’s possible given how big of a tool he already was…

  6. 6.

    JGabriel

    Nate Silver via Anne Laurie @ Top:

    Today is the 1-year anniversary of the Comey letter, which was probably decisive in the election.

    The are at least three things that were decisive in the election, the absence of any one of which would have resulted in a win for Clinton:

    1. Vote Suppression
    2. Russian Interference
    3. The Comey Letter

  8. 8.

    Anne Laurie

    @PsiFighter37: Mark of a true professional — they can always dig a little deeper. And the Mad Bitcher’s always been rewarded for digging right through the bottom of his barrel!

  12. 12.

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

    @germy:
    Stroke out Donald! Be the first president in history who’s committed treason to stroke out!

  15. 15.

    JGabriel

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

    When we do it, we are violent Antifa anarchists who want to throw our opponents in gulags.

    I can’t think of a more fitting punishment for Trump and his band of enablers than to toss them all in a Russian gulag. Or maybe a gulag in north Alaska, since Putin would either let them out of a Russian gulag, or build it into a resort for their pleasure.

  16. 16.

    toine

    Trump was a beautifully executed plot perpetrated by Bush loyalists to prove that W was not the worst President ever…

  17. 17.

    eemom

    Yeah, the Comey (may he rot in hell) anniversary is depressing as shit…..as is the reminder that I totally didn’t think it would matter at the time.

  19. 19.

    germy

    Was just told by attorney who used to work at FBI that Jared Kushner is most likely the one being arrested Monday. My bet’s still Manafort.— Scott Dworkin (@funder) October 28, 2017

  20. 20.

    barb 2

    LOVE that video. Must watch it, must watch it!!!!!

    Amazing skill and time to put that together — s/he is a star!

  21. 21.

    eemom

    @JGabriel:

    That’s right. Those were each, as we say in my profession, a “but for cause.”

    Unlike the horseshit about those pooooooor “heartland” white men whose dicks Hillz failed to suck.

  24. 24.

    Patricia Kayden

    @Cheryl Rofer: It’s hilarious that Ivanka is smiling as her husband is being led away. I assume that’s how Melania will behave when Trump is handcuffed and dragged from the White House as well.

  25. 25.

    Libarbarian

    Not sure I can give a shit. Still super cynical any will pay a price. It will be a financial crime. Out on bail in hours. Probably plea bargain for a slap on the wrist. The banksters all got away with it. Congress even made the DEA kiss the asses of legal heroin merchants. I’m too jaded to get excited by anything less than a final conviction for something real.

  26. 26.

    Gin & Tonic

    @germy: While I’d love, love, love for it to be Jared, I’ve wanted to see Manafort go down for years. He has the blood of Ukrainians on his hands, and I want him to die in prison.

  27. 27.

    Major Major Major Major

    @Libarbarian:

    The banksters all got away with it. Congress even made the DEA kiss the asses of legal heroin merchants. I’m too jaded to get excited by anything less than a final conviction for something real.

    Well, in those cases, as you even note in one of them, no crimes were committed.

    In this case, crimes were most definitely committed.

  28. 28.

    James E. Powell

    If there were justice in this country, Comey would be cleaning the latrines in a FEMA re-education camp somewhere in the New Mexico desert.

  30. 30.

    oatler.

    If Trump melts down, he’ll take it out on his fellow citizens, maybe start napalming west coast forests.

  31. 31.

    Frankensteinbeck

    @Major Major Major Major:
    I was blown away that when the banks straight-up lied about the credit default packages they sold to investors, that didn’t count as fraud and was not criminally punishable. It opened them to possible lawsuits, but in criminal terms it was totally legal. Ditto the robosigning.

  33. 33.

    Raoul

    @oatler.: The west coast has been self-napalming already this fall. And I don’t mean to be flip. It’s been horrible to watch. I’ve never lived there, but visited many times. Ugh.

  35. 35.

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

    @oatler.:
    Shamelessly plugging my classic from yesterday:

    “Fuck it! This is all Vlad’s fault! Well he can get a nuclear missile rammed up his ass! Kelly, get me the football! If I can’t win nobody can!”

    And then the Generals heroically tackled him in the Oval Office and “accidentally” cracked his skull open on a corner of the desk. Pence then resigned due to “ill-health” and the People were so grateful we threw out the constitution. Kelly, Mattis, and McMaster formed a triumvirate to peacefully rule over America and protect “traditional values”. Co-Emporer Kelly in particular often talked about the “white man’s burden” and our need to self-lessly bring human rights to the dusky savages of Africa and the yellow hoards of mainland Asia. Europe needed to be “re-educated” about traditional white values. America took over the world, spread freedom to everyone, and eventually created a post-scarcity society.

    The end. Oh and then the Generals were overthrown somehow by space communists. The end for realsies.

  37. 37.

    PsiFighter37

    @germy: I would be shocked if Jared is the first one in handcuffs. Certainly seems like Manafort or Flynn would be the first to do the perp walk. That said, I would love if it was Jared. Striking Trump on family first would send a very loud message that he’s on notice.

  38. 38.

    Tony J

    The nice thing about indictments starting to drop is that the whole rickety framework of the Trump (mal)Administration, which has been quivering and shaking from the start due entirely to internal failures, will now come under concerted pressure from an external source that they all know can and will kick down every door they could previously declare closed to everyone else. Democrats can’t touch them, the media always covers for them, the electorate isn’t allowed to judge them – but the courts can, and since they know they’re guilty as sin…

    It’s at this point in the TV series that The Master triggers nuclear war because his human servants have outlived their usefulness and it’s time for the mortal world to tremble before his uncloaked malevolence. Unless that’s what’s going on here Humpty Trumpty is in the bowl spiralling towards flushdown. Eventually.

    Which is nice.

  40. 40.

    Frankensteinbeck

    @PsiFighter37:
    Jared would sing like a god damn canary. His father taught him that family is supposed to protect HIM, not the reverse. He would have to actually feel in danger first, which will be difficult because he’s got one gigantic conviction of entitlement going on.

    EDIT – @Major Major Major Major:
    VERY much ditto. I hate misinformation, period.

  41. 41.

    debbie

    Whoever created that video did a far more accomplished job than whoever patched together Trump’s official portrait.

  46. 46.

    ruemara

    @germy: I do not know why people like TMZ or Harvey Levin. They simply sidestep the fact that those guys were part of the Trump campaign.

  49. 49.

    dm

    @toine:

    Trump was a beautifully executed plot perpetrated by Bush loyalists to prove that W was not the worst President ever…

    I think about the fact that each Republican president astounds me by managing to make his Republican predecessor look better, makes me almost nostalgic, even, and I fear for what the Republican who comes after Trump will be like.

  52. 52.

    John Revolta

    @Omnes Omnibus: I don’t really buy into all the paranoid crap you hear around the place sometimes, but since it’s that SCARY time of the year, I could point out that the Air Force is said to be chock-fucking-full of religious fanatics who believe that there has to be an apocalypse so that Jeebus can come down and rule the Earth for a thousand years. Just sayin’!

  53. 53.

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

    @Major Major Major Major:
    Feedback? Well, I like the website so far. You are considering adding online publishing options support right? That would be prettu cool. Under the work section, could theoretically right out an entire story? Because it only says blurb next to the textbox.

    My one real real problem with it is logging onto my account on different devices. I’m not able to, which is a real problem. I made sure I used the same username and password info, so I don’t know what’s wrong.

  56. 56.

    jl

    I don’t think the media will ever admit it. The vast majority are patent corporate hacks selling ‘information product’. The rest are too infected by corporate hackdom to get much out of line. Famous old news people who are lionized now, and have awards named after them, like Muorrow and Cronkite, were willing to get into trouble, lose jobs or risk losing jobs. Tapper, Cooper and others may make some gestures, but will trim.

    I guess people need to keep reminding us about the truth. But OTOH, I have long since tired of spending any time on HRC/S*****s, and other topics related to the 2016 election, that do not help us directly with getting out of this mess in 2018 and 2020.

  57. 57.

    Major Major Major Major

    @? ?? Goku (aka The Hope of the Universe) ? ?: If you are who I think you are, you registered twice, one of them has a space at the end of the address. Which is a bug! So I fixed it to strip out the whitespace.

    Why don’t you send me your account info via the contact form, mention it’s you, and I can delete both accounts. Then you can re-register and your logins should be consistent and normal.

    (The actual text of a Work is in the Sections you add underneath it.)

  59. 59.

    Ruckus

    @debbie:
    He’s an artist, paid to portray the subject. One can only work with the subject one has. In this case a horrible sack of shit. So the portrait is at least realistic.

  60. 60.

    Adam L Silverman

    Not all heroes were capes:

  61. 61.

    Mike J

    ?Seasonal Scaryname ?‏Verified account @JoshMalina 48 minutes ago
    God grant me the serenity 2 accept the things I cannot change, and the courage 2 change the things I can. And make it Jared on Monday.

    Amen

  63. 63.

    debbie

    @Ruckus:

    No. It’s very amateurish. I used to do a lot of Photoshopping for layouts; I don’t consider myself any kind of expert, but even I could have done a better job. Compare the fuzziness of the lapel pin to the sharpness of Trump’s tie, which is less than a few inches away.

  64. 64.

    Cacti

    @JGabriel:

    The are at least three things that were decisive in the election, the absence of any one of which would have resulted in a win for Clinton:

    1. Vote Suppression
    2. Russian Interference
    3. The Comey Lette

    4. “Protest vote” dipshits.

    Gary Johnson and Jill Stein saw their share of the vote jump from 1,745,598 in 2012 to 5,946,437 in 2016.

  66. 66.

    kindness

    Awesome bottom video. This batch of charges….they are just the first. These people get this to turn on their bosses, etc, etc. If you worked for Trump, would you have any problems rolling over on him? The man has no idea what zero chance he has to survive this with out being jailed.

  73. 73.

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

    @gene108:
    I can’t believe she made DBZ references. That was crazy. I couldn’t imagine being thar window guy. Christ.

  74. 74.

    BC in Illinois

    For you people who want to be “Jared on Monday” . . .

    You need to think these things through. There are larger issues involved.

    If he’s under indictment, how will he be able to bring peace to the Middle East?

  76. 76.

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

    @BC in Illinois: Forget the ME. We need top diplomat senior advisor Jared to convince the DPRK to unilaterally disarm itself and surrender all autonomy to us. Trump Tower Pyongyang won’t be built until Rocket Man is Saddamed.

  77. 77.

    Alternative Fax, a hip hop artist from Idaho

    @Gin & Tonic: Me too. And while in prison, in fear that he’ll be taken out and put on a plane to Ukraine any day.

  78. 78.

    dmsilev

    @BC in Illinois:

    If he’s under indictment, how will he be able to bring peace to the Middle East?

    Israelis and Palestinians, coming together to celebrate Kushner’s indictment?

  80. 80.

    rikyrah

    I swear. I just watched the last one at first, without audio. Then , I saw that it had audio.
    FROM RUSSIA WITH LOVE????
    HOLLERING????

  83. 83.

    JPL

    The Washington Post endorsed Northam, and I hope the Gillespie reads the endorsement and cries.

    Both men are able, widely respected and have had impressive careers, including in business and politics — Mr. Northam, the current lieutenant governor, as an Army veteran and pediatric neurologist; Mr. Gillespie as a Republican operative and lobbyist.
    Mr. Northam, whose knack for working across the aisle once prompted Republicans in the state Senate to ask him to switch parties, mounted a campaign largely true to his reputation for decency and good sense. Unfortunately, Mr. Gillespie chose a different path. Faced with a choice of highlighting his undeniable command of policy or pandering to vile and racially inflammatory tendencies in his party’s base, the Republican opted for the latter. In so doing, he shocked even some admirers.
    It is not that Mr. Northam is qualified and Mr. Gillespie unqualified. It is that Mr. Northam can convincingly promise to be governor for all Virginians, while Mr. Gillespie, even while asserting the same, has disqualified himself from any such credible claim. We support Mr. Northam.

  85. 85.

    Mr Stagger Lee

    Just got Devil’s Bargan by Joshua Green(great to live in a region where libraries are respected) This is going to be a good read I hope.

  86. 86.

    Jeffro

    Carter Page has to be curled up in the corner of a darkened room somewhere, praying it’s not his card that just got dealt…

  87. 87.

    (((CassandraLeo)))

    @Major Major Major Major: TBH, while I haven’t forgiven them and won’t ever do so, I’m really not convinced all of them did understand what they were doing. Americans’ overall understanding of statistics and mathematics is so horrible that I wouldn’t be remotely surprised if a lot of third-party voters completely failed to understand how the spoiler effect works in a first-past-the-post system. When I’ve tried to explain Duverger’s Law to third-party-curious voters, a lot of them have completely failed to understand it, even though it’s fairly elementary mathematics. It might be an act or simple denial, but I think in a lot of cases these people were genuinely too ignorant to grasp why third-party votes helped Trump.

    As I said, though, I still don’t forgive them. Fuckem.

  88. 88.

    Ruckus

    @debbie:
    You expect me to subject myself to looking at that piece of shit? When I walk into the VA on Monday his picture will probably be in the lobby, right by the front door. I will go in the back door just to avoid that.
    Funny fact, TV show Grey’s Anatomy was filmed at the VA clinic I go to. They did a pretty bang up job of making the shots unrecognizable, took me a year to notice how they did the shots. I had wondered what all the TV cabling running around was for. Then one day they took a shot which was obvious. Cabling is gone now, has been for at least a couple of years.

  90. 90.

    Major Major Major Major

    @(((CassandraLeo))):

    Americans’ overall understanding of statistics and mathematics is so horrible that I wouldn’t be remotely surprised if a lot of third-party voters completely failed to understand how the spoiler effect works in a first-past-the-post system.

    Every single one I’ve talked to has seemed to, and did it anyway.

  92. 92.

    West of the Rockies (been a while)

    Assist to Lurker Dean, who linked that video in the downstairs thread.

  94. 94.

    Ruckus

    @(((CassandraLeo))):
    No, it’s low math skills/knowledge.
    Tutored stats in college, most of my clients were good at tests in HS math and couldn’t understand why they did so poorly at stats. My easy answer was they had never studied higher math and had no idea that it even existed beyond what they had learned for basic tests in HS. My teacher liked me because I could explain stats in a way that the totally uninitiated could see it. Then of course they got into it deeper and had that terrified look once again.

  95. 95.

    Chet Murthy

    @Major Major Major Major:

    Huh? What kind of meme are you describing? Very few of the lefty memes I see are about Nazi-punching or whatever.

    Oh, I get what Goku’s talkin’ about. That meme in the OP — wow, we’re reveling in a police state!

    Derp derp derp: “Wait until the boot’s on the other foot, O^ lefties, and you’ll be ruing the day you reveled in the unjust oppression of your political opponents! Har Har! Payback will be twice as tasty!”

    And all that, yeah?

  96. 96.

    Citizen Alan

    @Cacti:

    Here’s an epiphany I had about protest votes. In 2000, I voted for Nader. I was (and am) in Mississippi where Gore never had a shot, so I made a protest vote against the Democratic Party. In my defense, it was mainly a protest vote against Lieberman, but still. Anyway, I never regretted it until 2016, when I had the sudden realization that for every person who votes third party, there are probably at least two or three people who buy into the framing that there’s no difference between the Republicans and Democrats but who are too lazy to go to the trouble of actually voting third party for someone who has no chance of winning. IOW, the vote depression effect of third party candidacies is probably much bigger than just the people who vote third party.

  105. 105.

    zhena gogolia

    @Another Scott:

    I just went to YouTube to watch it again, and it’s in the description under the video. Even the identification of Matt Monro is there. These people are meticulous.

  110. 110.

    (((CassandraLeo)))

    @Villago Delenda Est: Amongst our media asshats, Cillizza might honestly be my choice for first into the woodchipper. There are so many choices though.

    @Major Major Major Major: @Citizen Alan: oh don’t get me wrong, there are plenty of fuckers along those lines too, and I might actually hate them more than Trump voters, though it’s a close call. The Trump voters at least have the courtesy to stab you in the front, to use Scaramucci’s favourite metaphor. The level of mathematics/statistics understanding in this country is horrible though. There were plenty of people who, when I explained step-by-step how Nader was a spoiler in 2000, showed every sign of being completely incapable of understanding basic arithmetic. I think @Ruckus explained it better than I did.

  116. 116.

    NotMax

    @Major Major Major Major

    Reminded of one comment from a noted source regarding the controversial kouros statue at the Getty Museum.

    (paraphrasing) “Maybe it’s just an example of a crappily sculpted kouros.”

  117. 117.

    TS

    @Matt McIrvin:

    Holy shit, they actually banned him for that? Can they really justify not banning Trump?

    They can’t justify not banning trump – but if they did ban him – the business would be worth $0

  118. 118.

    (((CassandraLeo)))

    @TS: I’m not entirely sure it’s worth much more than that now. AFAIK it’s never turned a profit. Then again I guess the huge user base might be a source of value entirely independent of that.

  119. 119.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Major Major Major Major: I think it was one of the LGM commenters who said (and I agree) that for the most part third-party voters understand the spoiler effect; they just believe that it doesn’t have any bearing on what they should do, because their reasoning is deontological, not consequentialist. They believe that they are morally obligated to vote for the candidate they like the most, regardless of consequences, and if that has perverse consequences, that’s the system’s fault, not theirs.

    And, to be fair, a lot of the things people are told to try to get them to vote tend to drive them in that direction. PSAs and activists say that the vote is the voice of the people, that they can’t give that voice up for free when so many died to secure and protect it, etc. This emphasizes the vote as an expressive act; you are making your preferences known. To people who have internalized this, being told that they have to vote for a candidate they don’t like the most of all, according to some minimax calculation of the consequences, feels like being ordered to cheat, or to lie. They see it as somebody bullying them into doing something dishonest for a self-interested reason, and they recoil.

  121. 121.

    West of the Rockies (been a while)

    I’ve watched the video probably ten times today… so gratifying. Now, make it so, dear FSM.

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