Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

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

Motto for the House: Flip 5 and lose none.

Accountability, motherfuckers.

In my day, never was longer.

He really is that stupid.

I know this must be bad for Joe Biden, I just don’t know how.

“Squeaker” McCarthy

Republican obstruction dressed up as bipartisanship. Again.

Meanwhile over at truth Social, the former president is busy confessing to crimes.

Within six months Twitter will be fully self-driving.

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

“Can i answer the question? No you can not!”

I’d try pessimism, but it probably wouldn’t work.

Historically it was a little unusual for the president to be an incoherent babbling moron.

Sitting here in limbo waiting for the dice to roll

Optimism opens the door to great things.

Republicans do not pay their debts.

If you are still in the GOP, you are an extremist.

Happy indictment week to all who celebrate!

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

Tick tock motherfuckers!

Prediction: the GOP will rethink its strategy of boycotting future committees.

“What are Republicans afraid of?” Everything.

This has so much WTF written all over it that it is hard to comprehend.

You are here: Home / Politics / Activist Judges! / Russiagate Open Thread: WHO FARTED LEAKED?!?

Russiagate Open Thread: WHO FARTED LEAKED?!?

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If the goal was to drive “President” Two-Scoops completely ’round the bend… well, it was a short trip:

In a tense meeting in early March with special counsel Robert S. Mueller III, President Trump’s lawyers insisted he had no obligation to talk with federal investigators probing Russia’s interference in the 2016 presidential campaign.

But Mueller responded that he had another option if Trump declined: He could issue a subpoena for the president to appear before a grand jury, according to four people familiar with the encounter.

Mueller’s warning — the first time he is known to have mentioned a possible subpoena to Trump’s legal team — spurred a sharp retort from John Dowd, then the president’s lead lawyer.

“This isn’t some game,” Dowd said, according to two people with knowledge of his comments. “You are screwing with the work of the president of the United States.”

The flare-up set in motion weeks of turmoil among Trump’s attorneys as they debated how to deal with the special counsel’s request for an interview, a dispute that ultimately led to Dowd’s resignation.

In the wake of the testy March 5 meeting, Mueller’s team agreed to provide the president’s lawyers with more specific information about the subjects that prosecutors wished to discuss with the president. With those details in hand, Trump lawyer Jay Sekulow compiled a list of 49 questions that the team believed the president would be asked, according to three of the four people, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to talk publicly. The New York Times first reported the existence of the list…

Now Trump’s newly reconfigured legal team is pondering how to address the special counsel’s queries, all while assessing the potential evidence of obstruction that Mueller might present and contending with a client who has grown increasingly opposed to sitting down with the special counsel. Without a resolution on the interview, the standoff could turn into a historic confrontation before the Supreme Court over a presidential subpoena…

The president has repeatedly decried the investigation as a “witch hunt.”…


Reader Interactions

118Comments

  4. 4.

    Jerzy Russian

    Jesus, Maria, & Jose. Catching up on all of the news today has been especially exhausting. Also, too, it was rainy and comparatively cold today. Our flowering plum is flowering now, and that normally happens in January. Even the trees here are disoriented by all that is going on.

  6. 6.

    MomSense

    @Adam L Silverman:

    That was clear from the start. My personal wild speculation is that Ghouliani joined trump’s legal team so he could find out what the special counsel has on him.

  8. 8.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Jerzy Russian: Call either Dr. Feelgood NY or Dr. RADM Feelgood DC and they’ll write you a script for something to pick you right up!

  9. 9.

    efgoldman

    @burnspbesq:

    Manafort has incompetent lawyers

    Question for you and other members of the bar: Is there one, single, at least competent defense attorney representing any single defendant or possible defendant in Mueller’s investigation? Looks like a bunch of bozos to these no-lawyer eyes.

  11. 11.

    Adam L Silverman

    @MomSense:

    Ghouliani joined trump’s legal team so he could find out what the special counsel has on him.

    Eventually handcuffs.

  12. 12.

    Barbara

    @efgoldman: Abbe Lowell represents Jared Kushner. But the better lawyers are the ones who are managing to stay out of the news. You can only do so much as the lawyer on the case.

  13. 13.

    efgoldman

    @Adam L Silverman:

    Ghouliani joined trump’s legal team so he could find out what the special counsel has

    Ironically, an episode of L&O which ran today, Rudi Nounverb911 appeared as himself. Very strange, given recent news.

  15. 15.

    Kay

    ‏

    @digby56
    4m4 minutes ago
    More
    Lulz. Fox News’ Ed Henry just said some people in Trump’s orbit told him the president leaked the questions because he wanted them out so all the witnesses will be on the same page.
    And that is fine, apparently.

    I knew it. It doesn’t seem possible, but they’re getting sleazier. Many of YOU thought it couldn’t happen, but I knew they had new depths to plumb :)

    I knew one of the dopes wrote those questions, and I knew some of the other dopes would blab about it because they are absolutely incapable of shutting up.

    It’s the craziest thing I’ve ever seen. It’s like “hey-over here! We work for the President and we’re obstructing justice!”

    I think what’s scary about it is you wonder why they’re so sure they’re untouchable- in your bad moments you think “maybe they ARE untouchable! Maybe the rot runs that deep” Then you remember they’re also big mouth idiots who really haven’t done an honest’s day’s work in decades and you feel better.

  16. 16.

    geg6

    Fuck the fucking NYT. Nothing but a fucking megaphone for Trump and Giuliani. Dean Baquet and company should be sued for journalistic malpractice.

  17. 17.

    B.B.A.

    @Omnes Omnibus: If Trump were to take an IQ test, he’d respond to every question with an unrelated diatribe about condo towers, the unfairness of the Russia allegations, that guy who wrote something mean about him in Spy Magazine 30 years ago, Hillary’s emails, and/or what a swell guy the last third-world despot he spoke to is.

    I don’t know how to score that.

  19. 19.

    mai naem mobile

    I still cannot believe people voted for this fuckface dumbass shitbag for POTUS. He is an obvious fucking M.O.R.O.N. I understand some assholes feeling scared about becoming a minority in a country where they’ve been the majority but jeezus vote for somebody with half a working brain not some fucking orange ding dong with a rotting brain.

  21. 21.

    efgoldman

    @Adam L Silverman:

    His ex wife was a recurring character as a judge

    Dunno’. I never kept up with his social life.

    @B.B.A.:

    If Trump were to take an IQ test, he’d respond to every question with an unrelated diatribe

    How would you even administer a test to a narcissistic four year old?

  22. 22.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Kay:
    http://www.newsweek.com/trump-leaker-media-book-coverage-871448

    President Donald Trump leaks directly to top mainstream media outlets in order to attain more positive coverage, despite the commander-in-chief’s very public attacks on the media, according to a new book released Tuesday.

    The president routinely calls up reporters and is attributed as a “senior White House official,” author and veteran reporter Ronald Kessler claims in the book “The Trump White House: Changing the Rules of the Game.”

    White House counselor Kellyanne Conway was also accused in the book of being a major leaker to the media.

    “Trump phones Maggie Haberman of the New York Times directly, as well as Philip Rucker of the Washington Post, and Jonathan Swan of Axios, feeding them stories attributed to ‘a senior White House official,’ creating the impression the White House leaks even more than it already does,” Kessler wrote, according to People. “In other cases, the media has picked up reports on what Trump himself has said to his friends.”

    Trump has specifically tried to win over The Times’s Haberman, who’s come up with some of the biggest and most damning stories about the Trump administration over the last year.

    “He wants eventually to win her over,” Kessler quoted an unnamed Trump aide as saying. “The president subscribes to the general theory that a little love can go a long way. Even if a story will be bad, give it a shot and maybe it will come out a little better.”

  24. 24.

    SFAW

    @Omnes Omnibus:

    Is Trump’s IQ over 100?

    It depends: If that’s in Octal, or base 7, probably. Base 9 or 10? Well, as Deep Thought might say, “Tricky.”

  27. 27.

    eric

    @burnspbesq: It is not the questions the other witnesses need, it is Trump’s answers. Yet, those are ever changing. Any lawyer representing these fools, should know the questions. Did you do X? With whom did you do X? Why did you do X? Whom did you tell about doing X? Voila!

  31. 31.

    efgoldman

    @Davebo:

    Maggie Haberman following in Judith Miller’s footsteps

    Her picture is in the encyclopedia next to “villager” And she (pretends?) not to understand why.

  32. 32.

    FlyingToaster

    @B.B.A.:

    If Trump were to take an IQ test, …
    I don’t know how to score that.

    Aha, an area where I have expertise.

    You make sure you have a professional with their copy of the DSM IV standing by, along with your normal scoring chart. Everytime he answers the question with something completely else, you hand off scoring to them.

    So you’ll find an IQ of maybe 75 and a diagnosis of full-blown narcissistic personality disorder.

  33. 33.

    Davebo

    @efgoldman: She’s not pretending.

    History proves there are no consequences and like Judith, she’s got a guaranteed income for life.

  34. 34.

    MisterForkbeard

    @Adam L Silverman: Haberman has some of the most damning trump stories? She should probably have published them, instead of the horrible pro-Trump gossip we get instead. It seems like the former is much more newsworthy than the latter.

  39. 39.

    mai naem mobile

    @efgoldman: is it the lawyers or in Manafort’s case he’s done so much crappy stuff he is not getting off. Kind of like being a lawyer for Madoff or Bin Laden.

  40. 40.

    NotMax

    Okay, something for the food people. Came across this recipe. So off the wall that it seems almost like a cookbook parody. Suspect it must actually work or it wouldn’t be offered up.

  42. 42.

    Aleta

    Margaret Hartman @MargHartmann, NY Magazine explains three theories about why the leak.(Excerpts)

    To Convince Trump Not to Do the Interview

    Schmidt writes:
    When Mr. Mueller’s team relayed the questions, their tone and detailed nature cemented Mr. Dowd’s view that the president should not sit for an interview. … Mr. Trump remained firm in his insistence that he meet with Mr. Mueller. About a week and a half after receiving the questions, Mr. Dowd resigned, concluding that his client was ignoring his advice.

    So perhaps Dowd, who would have access to the questions and seems to fit the description of “person outside Mr. Trump’s legal team” leaked the document to the Times. Trump puts a lot of stock in things he hears on TV.

    This almost certainly comes from team Trump–current or past members. Why would they leak? Pure speculation but I think they need help in persuading Trump NOT to talk to Mueller, and are counting on the outcry. They may be afraid to oppose on own since Trump wants 2talk.
    — Norm Eisen (@NormEisen) May 1, 2018

    Would any defense lawyer advise @realDonaldTrump to meet with SC Mueller? In the absence of any evidence of collusion, why? There is a constitutional objection to the very idea of obstruction in the dismissal of Mr. Comey. No collusion = end of inquiry.
    Hugh Hewitt (@hughhewitt) May 1, 2018

    To Convince the Public That Mueller Is Biased

    Leaks about the Mueller team’s interactions with the Trump legal team seem to have picked up since Rudy joined the crew
    — Sam Stein (@samstein) May 1, 2018
    —-
    And this latest disclosure comes days after Giuliani met with the special counsel, then subtly cast doubt on his credibility, telling The Wall Street Journal that he needed to suss out Mueller’s intentions (though they’ve known each other for decades).
    —
    Establishing “corrupt intent” is often key to charges of obstruction of justice, but Trump’s legal team may be trying to convince the public that Mueller is trying to trap Trump.

    To Convince Congress to Stop Mueller

    That other topic Hannity was bemoaning in a fact-free fashion brings us to a third theory: perhaps Mueller’s questions were leaked in order to put pressure on Republican lawmakers (and convince more of them) to shut down the special counsel’s probe, before it’s too late.

    Of course, it’s possible Mueller’s questions were leaked to accomplish multiple goals. Maybe the plan was to make Hannity even angrier than usual, and let him convince Trump, his House allies, and other Fox News viewers that Mueller can’t be allowed to ask the president to explain himself.

  43. 43.

    Mnemosyne

    Neal Gorsuch is on the Supreme Court to prevent Trump from being subpoenaed. That was the unspoken quid pro quo of his appointment.

  45. 45.

    Adam L Silverman

    @NotMax: I’ve seen recipes with avocado in place of other fats in baked goods. I’ve not seen using non dairy creamer in place of heavy cream for ganache. My recommendation would be, just because everything in the box cake mix is bleh, that you google for a good chocolate cake recipe that uses avocado in place of the other fats and use that if you want to try this.

  46. 46.

    Jerzy Russian

    @Adam L Silverman: I was thinking of Dr. Nick from The Simpsons.

    I think at one point there was a radio D.J. around here with the stage name Dr. Phil Goode. Also, too, there was someone called “Marty with the Party”. Maybe they have moved on to Washington, D.C.

  48. 48.

    Waratah

    @NotMax: Sigh, they keep trying to come up with something new. I don’t mind change but I think I will eat my avocado in dip and eat regular chocolate cake made the old fashion way.

  49. 49.

    David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch

    Word on the street is John Miller and John Bannon are the leakers.

  50. 50.

    burnspbesq

    @MisterForkbeard:

    They moved to dismiss the count in the indictment that alleges willful failure to file an FBAR for 2011 on statute of limitation grounds. The problem is that the general Title 18 five-year statute doesn’t apply. The relevant statute is in 31 U.S.C. section 5321(b), and it’s six years, and it is generally understood to run from the due date, which in those days was June 30.

  52. 52.

    GregB

    Eff the NY Times.

    In another sign of the Apocalypse…WWE wrestler Kane is now the GOP nominee for mayor in some Tennessee city. Favored to win the general.

    We’re all props in Vince McMahon’s road show.

  53. 53.

    El Caganer

    Bobby Three-Sticks vs. Donny Two-Scoops. Three falls, fifteen-minute time limit, in the steel cage.

  54. 54.

    LongHairedWeirdo

    This is just a bizarre claim. Does he think people won’t realize numerous questions are about collusion unless they use the specific word “collusion”? Does HE not realize it?

    That’s a really stupid question. He will say it – it will be believed by some, accepted as possible by others, and it will be dutifully reported.

    Remember: the Republicans barefaced their way out of “the UK saw evidence of a potential sale of uranium from Niger” which was an obvious lie by omission (“…but we investigated and know it’s bullshit.”).

    TRUTH DOES NOT MATTER to these people – only whether they can sustain the spin. Whoever doesn’t realize that is either dull witted, or just not trying.

  55. 55.

    Geeno

    @Adam L Silverman: Donna Hanover as Judge Deborah Bourke. It was her kids campaigning against their father in 2000 that forced Rudy to duck out of the Senate race against Hillary “for medical reasons”. That left a relatively unknown (at the time) product of the Long Island D’Amato machine – Rick Lazio – to be the sacrificial lamb as the last thing upstate republicans wanted to vote for was another Long Islander.

  56. 56.

    Ruckus

    @B.B.A.:
    May I suggest zero. As in nada, nothing, the IQ of a houseplant. And that is pretty disparaging about houseplants. I mean they have no brain but still.

  57. 57.

    Mary G

    One of the very fine people from Charlottesville seems to have some problems. I bet $5 that he thinks Twitler can and will pardon him.

    BREAKING. Jacob Goodwin, the white bigot that my team and I painstakingly identified and located as one of the men who brutally assaulted Deandre Harris in Charlottesville has been found guilty of malicious felony assault. He will do 5-20 years in prison. https://t.co/zEYberi3ns— Shaun King (@ShaunKing) May 2, 2018

  58. 58.

    Yarrow

    @NotMax: It’s fairly common to use things like applesauce in place of oil in recipes so it doesn’t surprise me to see an avocado substitution. It’s probably pretty good. The creamer in the ganache, though? Yuck. Creamers usually use oil and often oils like soybean so it’s not exactly super healthy.

  61. 61.

    jl

    ” #1 rule of covering the Trump administration: Never imagine there’s an innocent explanation. ”

    I dunno about that. It’s hard to figure out when so much stuff has no rational explanation at all.

  62. 62.

    Aleta

    @David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch: I hope you’re wrong. They’ve flown under the radar for so long that I’ve had hopes they’ll be the only ones whose reputations remain untouched at the end. I like to picture the pair of them with their heads down, working hard. Coming in early every morning to make sure the coffee maker is on, the document shredder plugged in, the hand sanitizers unclogged. The unsung heroes of the administration who are actually getting something done.

  64. 64.

    Ruckus

    @opiejeanne:
    Someone probably told him once that he had a terrible IQ. He thought that 75 would be OK if the top number is 100. He also figured that seeing as how he knows everything it’s just the questions that are wrong. So he added 35 to his score of 75 and came up with 98.

  65. 65.

    jl

    @Aleta: So many weird Trumpster stories today, no way I have time to follow them all.
    Do they no for sure that these are actual questions that the Mueller team wrote down. Or did the Trumpsters guesstimate a pastiche of what they think his team will ask from communications between the counsels, or just made some up out of whole cloth.

    From the few I’ve seen they seem very generic and have the tone of something slap-dashed together quickly (which is real tell that something is a Trumpster original creation).

  69. 69.

    B.B.A.

    @GregB: So, at the 2020 debates, our candidate should smack Trump with a folding chair. That’s allowed under the rules of presidential debate, right?

  71. 71.

    mai naem mobile

    I haven’t thought this through completely but I think I would take a do over election with Gorsuch off the USSC and the recission of all federal court appointments in exchange for letting Dolt45 and direct family only get off scott free. There would be some more strings etc. Also, I don’t think this would ever happen.

  73. 73.

    hervevillechaizelounge

    @Kay:

    I think what’s scary about it is you wonder why they’re so sure they’re untouchable

    My mind runs the same way: what if the Trump regime hasn’t fired Mueller because they know his investigation doesn’t matter? We’ve already seen ample evidence of conspiracy and obstruction and the MSM doesn’t care. The republicans have their own noise machine—they’ll drown Mueller out regardless of the evidence uncovered.

    Slightly off topic: I watched a three-hour Frontline documentary about the early days of the AIDS crisis last night and had an epiphany—republicans have ALWAYS been evil. And they’ve never paid the price.

    Why would they expect this time to be different?

  74. 74.

    vhh

    @Aleta: I suspect the logic was an incoherent mishmash of all of the above reasons, overlaid with a thick layer of Sopranos style “fuck the law.” I trust that Mueller and his staff, who have experience dealing with racketeers, know how to deal with a shitstorm like this.

  77. 77.

    david

    In other election news, your new (probable) mayor of Knox County, Tennessee… Glenn Jacobs.
    Better known as Kane of WWE fame. Yes, the Big Red Machine will bring hellfire and brimstone to Knox County.

    Welcome to 2018.

  79. 79.

    Yarrow

    @david: Well, Minnesota elected Jesse Ventura as Governor in 1998, so it’s not exactly a new thing for a wrestler to go into politics.

  80. 80.

    hitchhiker

    @B.B.A.:

    In spite of everything, I just can’t get myself to believe that Trump will be participating in the 2020 election. I just can’t do it.

    Maybe it’s just a thing I tell myself to get through these days, but I feel certain that the Ds will take the House in 6 months, and then … there will be blood, metaphorically speaking.

  82. 82.

    efgoldman

    @hervevillechaizelounge:

    they’ll drown Mueller out regardless of the evidence uncovered.

    Only among the mouth breathing flying monkeys, who believe everything Weasel Face tells them.
    Are you paying attention to special election results? You should. They’re usually a harbinger.

  83. 83.

    Aleta

    @vhh: Yeah, a block they’ve thrown up. Because things like tacks on the road and smoke bombs — slowdowns and confusion–are perhaps the best things they can control at the moment.

    Still, trying for hearts and minds makes sense, because they can keep working with the theme of unfairness and injustice for the elections, no matter what happens with T. Ignite the emotion and then try to point it here and there.

  84. 84.

    Shalimar

    In non-news news, I am thinking of rewriting the lyrics to Lean On Me. All I have so far:

    Pee on me,
    When your bladder’s full,
    I’ll pay you cash,
    Trust me, my money’s good.

    I want to be somebody you can pee on.

  85. 85.

    efgoldman

    @Aleta:

    they can keep working with the theme of unfairness

    I repeat: Nobody believes them any more except the flying monkey mouth breathers, who have been lost to us for a generation and aren’t coming back.

  88. 88.

    Aleta

    @jl: NY Magazine, quoting the NYT, says the questions were “read by the special counsel investigators to the president’s lawyers, who compiled them into a list. That document was provided to The Times by a person outside Mr. Trump’s legal team.”

  89. 89.

    efgoldman

    @Manyakitty:

    but he’s still mostly popular with rank and file Republicans.

    Am I the only one who’s paying attention to the special election results this year?
    You Chicken Littles are attributing magickal powers to RWNJs that they don’t have. STOP COWERING!

  90. 90.

    Anne Laurie

    @NotMax: Tastiest chocolate cake recipe I know is made with sour cream as the ‘fat’; it’s incredibly rich but you can’t tell the ‘secret ingredient’ by taste.

    Not expert enough to know whether the new Mystery Solution would work *exactly* the same, but… it might be good enough for someone who thinks coffee creamer is the same as actual milk!

  91. 91.

    Aleta

    @efgoldman: I believe you. I don’t know how to predict the impact of fatigue and confusion (despite logic) that they are generating. Like in marketing, when sensory fatigue overwhelms decision making.

    eta I think I have that, because my comments don’t make sense.

  94. 94.

    Manyakitty

    @efgoldman: I’m neither chicken littling nor cowering, so stop making rash assumptions.

    He’s still relatively popular with his party. This is a fact. I suspect what’s happening in the special elections is that non-voters are showing up at the polls again. This is a better outcome because most of his fans are lost, or at least not worth the effort right now.

  95. 95.

    efgoldman

    @Aleta:

    I don’t know how to predict the impact of fatigue and confusion

    All the hundreds of thousands (millions?) of motivated and pissed off people who’ve been marching, organizing, registering and voting aren’t going anywhere between now and November.

  97. 97.

    (Temporarily) Temporarily Max McGee

    @Anne Laurie:

    Tastiest chocolate cake recipe I know is made with sour cream as the ‘fat’

    I can taste that now, like I’ve had that before, but I can’t remember if it was a friend who made it, or if I had it at a restaurant or if it was something I picked up at a store years and years ago.

    Whatever, you made me hungry.

    ETA: It’s cupcakes that Temporarily Ma McGee makes from time to time.

  100. 100.

    jl

    @Aleta: Thanks. I only saw a few questions, and maybe I saw the generic ones that most any informed person would ask. But, I think they must have been leaked by a Trumpster, so I have to wonder how faithful the released version is. When I have time I’ll read about this latest mess in more detail.

  102. 102.

    Aleta

    @efgoldman: I’m not pessimistic– I think what I’m trying to say is that the smoke being blown around Mueller, just like the attacks on the press and the JD, is aimed beyond the investigation. (Since the investigation, whatever the results, may not be at a stage that is influenceable.) I’m not predicting these tactics will influence the election, either. I feel good about the elections, great about the marches. My concerns are down the road–freedom of speech relating to dissent, court decisions., EO protections, discrimination laws.

  103. 103.

    sigyn

    @Yarrow: And, you know, he actually wasn’t completely horrible. I was kind of smitten myself when the owner(s) of the Vikings were pushing for a new stadium (to be paid for by a tax increase. Ventura said something along the lines of: “There is no way I’m going to tell a poor single mother that she has to pay more taxes so that some billionaire can have a fancy new playground.”

  104. 104.

    hervevillechaizelounge

    @efgoldman:

    Democrats are good people and we’ll show up at the polls but the republicans are getting really bold about subverting democracy. Everyone seems so complacent: “This is America; of course our elections will be fair.”

    Republicans would gladly steal every single election (dog catcher, school crossing guard and American Idol included) if they thought they could get away with it. They’re stupid and inept but Vlad isn’t and their propaganda (amplified by RWNJ media) is effective.

    I knew Trump would win as soon as he entered the race but all my friends pooh-poohed me; of course Hillary’s going to win—look at the polls!

    I look back at that period and wonder what else I could’ve done to explain how dire our situation was; I don’t want everyone to be sad but they need to be vigilant.

    tl;dr: I know we’re mobilized but my anhedonia won’t let me enjoy it;)

  105. 105.

    suezboo

    A question from an innocent bystander, if you don’t mind. Say SC Mueller finds solid evidence of collusion and obstruction etc. Who does his report go to ? What retribution can Trump expect ? We know he won’t be impeached by this Congress. So what happens after the investigation ?

  106. 106.

    Chet Murthy

    @hervevillechaizelounge:

    I know we’re mobilized but my anhedonia won’t let me enjoy it;)

    I’m hoping we’ll pull it out. But not at all counting on it. And frankly, wondering how it’ll work, when we go all Euromaidan after the GrOPers steal the 2018 elections. Everybody sez that these assholes are just incompetent, and that’s why they act like they’re invincible. Some sort of cosmic Dunning-Kruger effect. And sure, I hope that’s true. But Vladi’s got excellent secret police, and they’re focused on fucking us UP.

    So no, I sure ain’t enjoying it. And dreading the call for people to start trekking to Washington (b/c some sort of “protest in your own city” won’t do SHIT, not when my city is San Francisco — not unless we’re gonna fuckin’ secede, and even then, it’d have to be Sacramento).

  107. 107.

    Chet Murthy

    @suezboo: Most folks around here (I suspect, and I agree with ’em) would say … “nuthin, until the Dems take back the HoR, at which point serious investigations happen, Shitlord’s lieutenants all get indicted, and …. then more nuthin until 2020”. I think people are pretty resigned to the idea that we won’t take 2/3 of the Senate, hence no conviction on impeachment. And the GrOPers? They ain’t gonna flip — they’re too damn scared of Shitmidas’ base. So nothing until 2020. Except for as much investigation as possible, and as much prosecution as possible. Which is all enabled by the Dems holding a house of Congress.

    That is, assuming the GrOPers don’t steal the elections.

  108. 108.

    Chet Murthy

    @suezboo: Didn’t answer all your Qs. IIRC Mueller’s report goes to Rosenstein, who then send it to Congress. And that’s it. B/c it’s pretty well-establshed you can’t indict a sitting President. Ah, well.

    @hervevillechaizelounge‘s anhedonia is well-justified. WASF, even under the rosiest of scenarios.

  109. 109.

    opiejeanne

    @Ruckus: Heh.I realized after I posted that 98 is too high for what we’re seeing him usually demonstrate. Or maybe he’s just nuts.

  110. 110.

    akryan

    @MomSense: I don’t think he really got anything new. These questions were always pretty obvious lines of inquiry just from what’s been in the media. I could have gone back over shit that was in public and come up with those lines of inquiry. If I could, Trump’s lawyers could too.

  111. 111.

    akryan

    I don’t know where this group think that you can’t indict a president comes from. Somebody tell me if they know. It’s Mr. President, not King President. The entire design was that the President would be an ordinary citizen. The process would usually go through the political process by custom, but I don’t see why a President couldn’t be indicted. If he literally shot someone on 5th ave, wouldn’t he be indicted for murder? He would be arrested and indicted for it. It wouldn’t just go to congress to decide to impeach him or give him the opportunity to pardon himself. I don’t even think our SCOTUS would uphold that.

  112. 112.

    Chris Johnson

    @Kay: They’re making the OTHER scum look bad, so no, they’re not untouchable.

  116. 116.

    jc

    @El Caganer: “Kayfabe” – Term in pro wrestling. Kayfabe was the unsaid rule that the wrestlers should stay in character during the show and in public appearences in order to maintain a feeling of reality (albeit suspended) among the fans.

    Wrestling term derived from “carnival talk” for the word “keep”. Originally would have been pronounced more like “keel-feep”. When said quickly, it sounds like kay-fabe. Used as shorthand term for “keep quiet”, or “keep secret”.

    The word would not originally have been used as part of a sentence. It would have conveyed the meaning of a sentence in itself. The whole point of carnival talk was to speak quickly, and in manner that the “rubes” couldn’t understand.

    Wrestling term meaning “top secret.” It refers to the practice of maintaining the illusion that wrestling was 100% genuine.

    the use of terms (at one time unknown to fans) that would conceal the illusion of scripted wrestling. comes from the pig-latin pronunciation of the word, fake (akefay)

  117. 117.

    Jamey

    @Omnes Omnibus: Prolly 110-115 (SB test), which is at the top end of SD. He’s cunning and quick-witted (sociopathy and relatively high Gf [fluid intelligence] have been closely linked in some studies]), but his Gq (crystallized intelligence) is catastrophically bad.

    Overall, I’d say Trump’s “EQ” is what we should be looking at…

  118. 118.

    TenguPhule

    @efgoldman:

    All the hundreds of thousands (millions?) of motivated and pissed off people who’ve been marching, organizing, registering and voting aren’t going anywhere between now and November.

    Whether their ballots will actually be allowed and counted fairly is still an open question.

    2 years to prepare and still not ready with paper backups in enough districts to be cause for concern.

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