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You are here: Home / Open Threads / Shitty Cops Abuse Power on Behalf of Garbage President

Shitty Cops Abuse Power on Behalf of Garbage President

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Remember earlier this month when Stormy Daniels got busted on misdemeanor vice charges in Columbus, Ohio? (Yeah, it seems like a year ago to me too.) The charges against Daniels were soon dropped, and she donated her tips from the night to the two local strippers who were arrested along with her, which makes Stormy Daniels a classier act than every adult Trump and all their supporters, combined and multiplied by infinity.

Soon thereafter, the city attorney announced that the office had dismissed the charges against the other two dancers and would no longer waste the district’s time with stupid charges like those on which Daniels was arrested. As many of us noted here at the time, the incident reeked of a politically motivated hit.

The vice squad initially claimed Daniels had been arrested during a human trafficking and prostitution undercover operation — she wasn’t targeted, they said, but rather just happened to be in a club that was under investigation. Columbus Police Department emails from a whistle-blower that were published yesterday seem to expose that story as a big fat lie.

The emails seem to show that lead arresting officer, Detective Shana Keckley, planned the bust well in advance of Daniels’ arrival. Days before Daniels came to town, the cop sent photos of Daniels and Trump from her home email account to her work email as well as a map of the club where Daniels would be performing. After the bust, she crowed about the national attention and exchanged email high-fives with other cops, asking one to not mention her (Keckley’s) name on Facebook.

Via the Fayette Advocate, which has posted copies of the emails:

“I got the elements….we arrested Stormy this morning, she is in jail.” (“Elements” are the burden police officers must meet in order to make an arrest.)

In another email dated on July 12 at 3:50 a.m., Keckley writes to another police officer bragging about Daniel’s arrest — without mentioning her by name — saying, “You’re Welcome!!!!!….Thank me in person later.”

Keckley went on to send additional emails, including one to Shane Keckley — purportedly her husband — writing, “It is all over CNN. I wanted you to know before everyone contacts you.”

Most cops are Republicans, and in the age of Trump, most Republicans are willing to disbelieve their own eyes and ears in their cult-like devotion to Trump. It wouldn’t be surprising if such devotion is even stronger among cops since Trump has gone out of his way to valorize the police and reinforce their biases.

A central ritual of Trump’s ongoing campaign rallies is a chant to jail a retired public servant who has been thoroughly investigated and cleared of criminal wrongdoing. Trump routinely abuses his office to demand that the Department of Justice disregard due process and pursue political vendettas on his behalf. So it’s also not surprising that his staunchest followers would heed that call to abuse power when a Trump nemesis happens to enter their jurisdiction.

After the charges against Daniels were dropped, the CPD tweeted a statement from the chief:

These emails should serve as Exhibit A in the investigations into the officers’ motives, and if it’s the political hit job it appears to be, the officers involved should be fired.

This story isn’t getting much attention. The charges were dropped. Daniels is in the adult film business. Everyone already knows Trump is a degenerate, so even stories with a salacious element that are linked directly to Trump have a “dog bites man” quality. But this story is especially chilling because of the flagrant abuse of power in the service of partisan politics.

We’ve heard a lot about stochastic terrorism over the past few years — the incitement of random violence via public demonization. What the Columbus cops did seems to be a species of stochastic fascism. We’ll find out soon enough if that sort of freelance oppression is allowed to stand.

PS: The lead cop in this politically motivated arrest is named Shana Michelle Keckley. Her husband, also a CPD cop, is named Shane Michael Keckley. That’s kinda weird, isn’t it? Has anyone ever seen them in the same room at the same time?

Reader Interactions

116Comments

  1. 1.

    TenguPhule

    We’ll find out soon enough if that sort of freelance oppression is allowed to stand.

    Or if it spreads.

  3. 3.

    Jeffro

    Most folks would kill for a mugshot like that.

    In other news (and since this is an OT), Ms Rubin offers up a succinct version of why the entire GOP isn’t fit to govern: The Rosenstein Impeachment Resolution Shows Why the GOP Isn’ Fit To Govern

    (yes, she has offered other reasons in previous columns…please don’t think that this of all things was the straw that broke the #NeverTrumpers’ backs! ;)

    …Mind you, there has been no finding that Rosenstein is in contempt of Congress or that he has broken any regulation or law. The impeachment resolution is pure piffle. (“A Justice Department official said Wednesday that only one committee request has been formally denied — a demand to see the unredacted Justice Department memo detailing which Trump associates are under investigation by Mueller and for which potential crimes. Officials declined that request because, they said, providing it could compromise ongoing investigations.”) Not even House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Chairman Trey Gowdy (R-S.C.) thinks that the resolution has merit.

    Indeed, former Justice Department officials and legal scholars have fretted that Rosenstein has been too accommodating to congressional requests. “The ironic thing about this push is that Rosenstein has done far more to satisfy what are really inappropriate requests from House Republicans than DOJ has ever done before,” former Justice Department spokesman Matt Miller says. “It’s been clear from the beginning that Meadows and company weren’t interested in anything other than shutting down the Mueller investigation, and this ridiculous move makes it even more obvious.”

    The damage here is being done not by Rosenstein, but by irresponsible, hyper-partisan congressmen. Former White House ethics counsel Norman Eisen and Fred Wertheimer, founder of Democracy 21, recently wrote about the impeachment gambit:

    Key House Republicans are abusing their offices and the public trust to blindly provide protection for [President] Trump. They are doing so instead of working to get to the bottom of the worst foreign attack on American elections in our history.

    They need to be called on their scandalous efforts to undermine the Mueller investigation and ignore Russia’s cyber invasion of our democracy. A bipartisan outcry greeted Trump’s Helsinki betrayals. We should be hearing protests at least as loud and bipartisan in response to this parallel — and equally unmerited — attack on American law enforcement right here at home.

    It is not Rosenstein who should be removed from office, but rather, the House Republican members who are obstructing an ongoing investigation of the Republican president and his cronies. While their actions are protected (most likely) under the” speech or debate” clause (preventing criminal prosecution or civil suit for actions that would otherwise be actionable), their pattern of conduct (cooking up a misleading memo about the FISA warrant application for Carter Page’s surveillance, exposing a confidential intelligence source, smearing the FBI) amounts to multiple blatant attempts to thwart an entirely legitimate investigation. If anyone in the White House is conspiring with them to interfere with the investigation, such individuals could be investigated for obstruction of justice.

    “This is a cynical, corrupt effort to kneecap the legitimate investigation of Jordan’s and Meadows’s ally, the president,” Eisen tells me.

    The thought occurs to me that Dems, united, ought to loudly and publicly put people like Jordan and Meadows (and Nunes, and Rand Paul, and others attempting to obstruct justice) on notice: “you’d better be pretty damn certain of the bullshit you’re throwing around here – certain that this president* is innocent and it’s all a witch hunt. Because if you’re wrong, if you’re covering for corrupt and illegal activity…we’re going to use every process available to make sure you are implicated in this cover-up”.

  4. 4.

    rikyrah

    BWA HA HA HA HA H AH HA HA HA HA HA

    Betsy DeVos’s $40 million yacht set adrift by vandals.

    Police are combing over this video for leads. pic.twitter.com/MaOhCFiBfd

    — Red T Raccoon (@RedTRaccoon) July 26, 2018

  5. 5.

    David Anderson

    Shana Michelle Keckley. Her husband, also a CPD cop, is named Shane Michael Keckley.

    Maybe they like to talk about themselves in the third person during sex

  6. 6.

    ruemara

    Considering the under-reported stories of the deaths of noted activists in the Ferguson protests, the black site abuse scandals of the Chicago police, I’m gonna put this into the “no real consequences for our beloved Stasi” column. They’re sick bastards with a grip on the throat of white America (I said it, deal) through propaganda and weaponized biases. We’re probably going to have to deal with much, much worse happening from these evil people with badges.

  7. 7.

    Major Major Major Major

    @Jeffro: “Most folks would kill for a mugshot like that.”

    This was also my reaction: damn, is that a mugshot?

    Sadly.

  10. 10.

    Jager

    My retired Boston PD Sgt, pal, Eddie and I were sharing a few cold ones back in the early 90’s, the subject of asshole cops came up, Eddie said, ‘Lad, it all started when we started wearin’ the flag on on our fooking shirts.”

  11. 11.

    TenguPhule

    The special counsel, Robert S. Mueller III, is scrutinizing tweets and negative statements from Trump about Attorney General Jeff Sessions and the former F.B.I. director James B. Comey, according to three people briefed on the matter.

    Several of the remarks came as Mr. Trump was also privately pressuring the men — both key witnesses in the inquiry — about the investigation, and Mr. Mueller is examining whether the actions add up to attempts to obstruct the investigation by both intimidating witnesses and pressuring senior law enforcement officials to tamp down the inquiry.

    Via the FTFNYT, so take with a grain of salt.

  13. 13.

    Mike J

    @rikyrah: Also, more appropriate to say her boat drifted off. No evidence yet that it wasn’t incompetence. I’ve seen hundreds of badly tied cleat hitches. “Set adrift” is pure speculation.

  15. 15.

    Roger Moore

    What the Columbus cops did seems to be a species of stochastic fascism.

    Unfortunately, I’m sure this is far from the last time we’ll have a need for this term.

  16. 16.

    LAO

    If you could see me, you’d see that I’m wearing my “shocked face”. It looks kind of like the emoji with it’s mouth wide open and eyebrows way up.

  17. 17.

    TenguPhule

    In what appeared to be a mass evacuation of immigrant children originally separated from their parents at the Southwest border, more than a dozen white vans lined up outside Cayuga Centers in East Harlem on Wednesday night, as the federal government raced to meet the deadline to reunite families.

    A video by Telemundo showed the vans as a reporter described children being led outside in pairs, carrying manila envelopes. Those were likely the government’s clinical and educational records that other children, previously discharged, had been given.

    By Thursday afternoon, about 200 of those children had left the New York-area welfare agencies, according to Mayor Bill de Blasio, speaking at a news conference in Staten Island. That left about 100 children, who for a number of government-determined reasons, were unable to be reunited with parents, still in New York.

    As if to underline the general chaos and uncertainty that has marked the federal government’s implementation and reversal of its “zero tolerance” policy at the border, Mr. de Blasio said he was still unsure about what happened to the children once they left New York.

    Via the FTFNYT. Hoping for the best here, but cynical enough to believe HHS could just be shuffling them off to where they hope they’ll be forgotten.

  19. 19.

    rikyrah

    WATCH: Children separated from their parents during the Holocaust recall lasting trauma they experienced from forced separation. TODAY is the deadline to reunite families. We’re calling on @POTUS to end zero tolerance & reunite children that remain separated from their parents. pic.twitter.com/KV0u9eCOQT

    — ADL (@ADL_National) July 26, 2018

  21. 21.

    The Moar You Know

    Correction: Most modern day American cops are not so much Republicans as Sturmabteilung waiting for legislation that will make them immune from any consequences from their actions. They see this president is finally going to give them that if he can. I’d support Trump too if I were the kind of shitty human being that becomes a cop.

  22. 22.

    Brachiator

    But this story is especially chilling because of the flagrant abuse of power in the service of partisan politics.

    Columbus has a problem if rogue cops see themselves as able to “freelance” in order to better serve their president. Trump lies about the “deep state,” but encourages the unraveling of society so that he can be served.

    There will be much work to do to clean this mess up in a post Trump world.

  23. 23.

    TenguPhule

    The federal government was rushing on Thursday to reunite the last 1,634 migrant families separated at the Southwest border who have been deemed “eligible” for reunification, in the final hours of a court-ordered scramble to reverse a contentious immigration policy that drew international condemnation.

    While the government appeared to be on track to meet Thursday’s deadline, its work to address the effects of family separation is far from over. The parents who were deemed eligible for reunification represent only about a third of all those who were separated from their children after crossing the border, a practice that began last summer and escalated in May.

    At least 917 other parents were not cleared to recover their children this week because they failed criminal background or parental verification checks. About 460 others appeared to have been deported without their children, and the government has yet to find them.

    Their futures, along with those of about 37 children whose parents have not yet been identified, remain uncertain.

    And of course this was completely predictable when they decided reunification wasn’t the initial plan.

    The reunifications have unfolded in chaotic scenes across the country. Many have been concentrated in Arizona, New Mexico and Texas, where families have been funneled into federal offices that were designated as “staging facilities,” overwhelming local resources to the extent that some parents have had to wait days after arriving to rejoin their children.

    At one such facility in South Texas, the Port Isabel Detention Center, the government has been labeling some parents as “released” while they are still in custody, according to Bethany Carson, who works for Grassroots Leadership, a nonprofit advocacy group in Austin.

    Ms. Carson said that hundreds of parents were sent to Port Isabel in recent weeks. After receiving word in the middle of the night from Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials that their children had arrived, the parents quickly changed into street clothes and were broken into groups of about 70 to wait to be reconnected.

    Some waited up to a week, Ms. Carson said, and were not allowed access to showers, phones or religious services, while efforts stalled to return their children.

    “They’re completely cut off from the outside world,” she said. “And officials are saying they’re free.”

    Last-minute logistical planning to meet the deadline has led to some mistakes. Some children have been sent to the wrong facilities, according to a government official who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the reunification efforts.

    On Tuesday, two siblings, 9 and 14, were abruptly flown from New York to be reunited with their mother in the Southwest — but the mother may have already been deported, according to the children’s lawyer, Priya Konings. On Wednesday, a case worker was in “panic mode” trying to resolve the situation.

    And of course this has pretty much dropped off the media’s radar because so many other fucking Trump fuckups arose in the last three weeks.

  24. 24.

    TenguPhule

    @The Moar You Know:

    Sturmabteilung waiting for legislation that will make them immune from any consequences from their actions.

    De Facto in effect already provided the victim is poor or a POC.

    Remember, we couldn’t get a fucking murder conviction when the fucker was caught on video shooting a fleeing man in the back repeatedly.

    No civil rights violations would be found under this regime.

  29. 29.

    smintheus

    Quick search turned up an online record stating that Shana Michelle Keckley is registered as a Republican. And until last year she was a community liaison officer doing the tough work or rescuing pets.

  30. 30.

    Brachiator

    @The Moar You Know:

    Correction: Most modern day American cops are not so much Republicans as Sturmabteilung waiting for legislation that will make them immune from any consequences from their actions.

    Cops are pretty much immune already.

  31. 31.

    hells littlest angel

    If you walk past the Keckley house late at night, you’ll sometimes hear Shane shouting, “Oh god, Shana, what have you done? Blood! Blood!”

  32. 32.

    Roger Moore

    @TenguPhule:

    Hoping for the best here, but cynical enough to believe HHS could just be shuffling them off to where they hope they’ll be forgotten.

    I can imagine all kinds of nefarious reasons why they’d want to move those kids, especially ones who already have legal cases started in New York.

  33. 33.

    TenguPhule

    With a White House that frequently changes course, and on the spur of a moment, economic analysts hesitated to cast any definitive judgement on the Trump-Juncker detent.

    “Is it actual, or is it just perfunctory?” said Maria Demertzis, the deputy director of Breugel, a Brussels-based think tank focusing on economic issues.

    And then there are questions about the particulars.

    As far as soybean imports, prices from Argentina and Brazil tend to be a good deal lower than prices from the United States, according to an EU official.

    U.S. prices have fallen somewhat in recent weeks, since China enacted its own set of soybean tariffs. But soybeans intended for Chinese markets can’t necessarily be redirected to the E.U., which has stringent regulations on genetically modified foods.

    According to a senior E.U. official, there have been no discussions about lifting those standards to purchase U.S. soybeans. The same official said that agricultural products were outside the talks between Juncker and Trump, directly contradicting comments from Treasury Secretary Wilbur Ross, who said Tuesday that “all agricultural products are something that will be discussed.”

    “Ross can say what he wishes, but it does not correspond to the joint statement,” the diplomat said.

    A similar situation exists regarding liquefied natural gas, said a European diplomat working on trade issues. That provision was likely meant as a German concession to the White House, the diplomat said, given Trump’s recent anger about the Nord Stream 2 pipeline deal, which will bring gas to Germany from Russia.

    Nord Stream 2 hasn’t been abandoned, though. And U.S. gas remains far more expensive, because of shipping costs.

    “The idea of significantly more LNG shipments to EU absurd,” tweeted Anthony Gardner, a former U.S. ambassador to the E.U. “It is not price competitive with piped gas.”

    So Juncker essentially pulled a Kim Jong Un on Trump. Gave him a wonderful headline and a meaningless agreement.

  34. 34.

    The Moar You Know

    De Facto in effect already provided the victim is poor or a POC.

    Remember, we couldn’t get a fucking murder conviction when the fucker was caught on video shooting a fleeing man in the back repeatedly.

    No civil rights violations would be found under this regime.

    @TenguPhule: Understood about the de facto nature of things, but they want it codified. At least half today’s cops were teens during the good old days (1985) before Tennessee v. Garner, and want a return to that standard. They’ll get it from this court.

  35. 35.

    Betty Cracker

    @smintheus: According to a tweet from Avenatti that was in Adam’s post (linked at the end of the 2nd paragraph in the original post above), the cops involved in the bust had social media pages that indicated they were big Trumpsters. The pages were mysteriously taken down after the arrest.

  36. 36.

    TenguPhule

    Facebook video spreads climate denial misinformation to 5 million users

    Marc Morano is the real-world fossil fuel industry version of Nick Naylor. His career began working for Rush Limbaugh, followed by a job at Cybercast News Service where he launched the ‘Swift Boat’ attacks on 2004 Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry. In 2006, Morano became the director of communications for Senator Jim Inhofe (R-OK), who is perhaps best known for throwing a snowball on the Senate floor and calling human-caused global warming “the greatest hoax ever perpetrated on the American people.”

    Thus it’s unsurprising that in 2009, Morano began directing fossil fuel-funded think tanks designed to cast doubt on the reality of and dangers associated with human-caused global warming. As he admitted in Merchants of Doubt, Morano frequently embodies the strategy of climate denial known as ‘fake experts’:

    Most recently, Morano created a short video that centers on three common climate myths and has garnered over 5m views on Facebook.

    Fuck Zuckerburg and fuck civility.

  37. 37.

    Roger Moore

    @schrodingers_cat:

    I don’t see anything random about this fascism, the police targeted a well known adversary of the current president.

    It’s similar to stochastic terrorism in that while the kind of perpetrator and victim are predictable, there are so many potential perpetrators and victims out there that you can’t reliably predict exactly who will do what to whom when. So we can know that cops will try to punish Trump’s enemies, we didn’t know it would happen to Stormy Davis in Columbus rather than, say, David Hogg in Phoenix.

  40. 40.

    Chip Daniels

    I’m in the Maxine Waters camp.
    That is, Officer Keckley should be publicly named, shamed and ostracized.

    We can’t allow this to be permissible behavior in a civil society.

  41. 41.

    prufrock

    @Betty Cracker: Off topic, but I wanted your opinion as a fellow Floridian. The latest DeSantis commercial invokes Trump’s blessing in the most 72 point font way possible. My question is, do you think he’s doing this because he thinks that will get a majority of Floridians to vote for him, or is this just an effort to maximize the base? Because every time I see the commercial, my TV risks catastrophic appliance failure by way of brick.

  42. 42.

    Mnemosyne

    Those cops handed Michael Avenatti a big, fat birthday present. I hope they appreciate it when he has them up on the stand and is reading their emails back to them. ?

    Actually, I’m guessing that the city attorney is already screaming that they need to settle the Daniels lawsuit NOW rather than let a judge or jury see any discovery.

    (Note: IANAL, so I’m using terms as seen on “Law & Order.”)

  43. 43.

    smintheus

    @Betty Cracker: Thanks, I hadn’t seen that info before. Columbus has always been weird, but until recently the local cult was Ohio State football.

  44. 44.

    Mnemosyne

    @schrodingers_cat:

    As Roger said, the “stochastic” part is that the cops didn’t get a call from Trump asking/telling them to do this — they decided to do it on their own.

  45. 45.

    The Dangerman

    Columbus be writing a nice check soon. Not as big as LA and Trader Joe’s check, but nice enough (I empathise with the LA cops, but if you are in that situation, you best never ever ever hit an innocent).

  47. 47.

    Mnemosyne

    @The Dangerman:

    I think there will be firings, too. If nothing else, the chief of police has sounded pissed from the very first press release that these cops publicly embarrassed the department like this. Publicly embarrassing your boss is one of the best ways to get your ass shit-canned.

  50. 50.

    Immanentize

    @Mike J:

    I’ve seen hundreds of badly tied cleat hitches. “Set adrift” is pure speculation.

    Totally my first thought. Because it was “untied” rather than cut loose, I suspect bad crew work. But these snowflakes always have to be the fookin’ victim (as Eddie might say)

  51. 51.

    Jeffro

    Come on folks, let’s be fair: if it was your 40 million Dollar yacht that have been set adrift wouldn’t you be upset? Oh wait, that’s right you all aren’t mindless greedhead assholes; therefore you never would’ve had anyone get so upset with you that they set your 40 million Dollar yacht adrift

    Carry on

  53. 53.

    Immanentize

    @Roger Moore: I may have said this before, but the Trump efforts are not really so much deportation efforts as they are incarceration efforts. Remember, just after the election, one of the first financial reports was a huge jump in for-profit prison companies.

  55. 55.

    Betty Cracker

    @prufrock: I hope DeSantis keeps humping Trump’s leg right through the general election and loses. But if he’s smart, he’s just consolidating the Trump base to beat Putnam and will then downplay the Trump connection. He doesn’t seem particularly smart but it might be an act for the rubes. Hard to say.

    Do you have any preference on the Dem side? I’m still undecided. Saw Levine speak at a county-level meeting some months back and was underwhelmed, but his staff does great outreach. I like Gillum but am worried about his ability to win statewide. Graham seems good, though I really don’t like dynastic politics.

  57. 57.

    Millard Filmore

    @The Dangerman:

    (I empathise with the LA cops, but if you are in that situation, you best never ever ever hit an innocent).

    A “good guy with a gun” means you need more body bags. A few days ago the local TV news had a clip from Texas showing a policeman driving after a crook, firing his gun through the windshield, and also firing as his patrol car rolled alongside the perp. Good God! Where are those bullets going? They don’t magically vaporize after passing the target.

  58. 58.

    Gin & Tonic

    @Mnemosyne: But s_c knows the meaning of “stochastic” (I suspect Roger does too) – it means statistically random. This arrest was not statistically random, to the extent you can describe a single data point as random or not.

    /pedant

  60. 60.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @rikyrah: has the Beast tweet-sploded yet? this is the guy who goes back to Papa trump

    There was some speculation that trump and Cohen, on that tape, sound like they know they’re being recorded. I was skeptical, but Cohen of course knew, and the way he hits Weisselberg’s name sounds like he’s making sure he said it, almost as if he knew he might be sharing that info with somebody some day….

  64. 64.

    Roger Moore

    @Immanentize:
    I sincerely doubt the family separation thing was done primarily to help the private prison industry. If it had been, the private prisons would have been given advance notice to set up child prisons to handle the new business. Instead, they had no plan at all to deal with the number of children they had to deal with, so they wound up with all kinds of incompetent improvisations.

    I will go back to what I’ve said all along. The plan (such as it was) was that taking children away from their parents would be so terrible that people would stop coming here and they wouldn’t have a large number of separated families to deal with. They never seriously planned what would happen if family separation wasn’t enough of a deterrent, and everything that’s happened since has been a result of them flailing around trying to deal with their lack of planning. Of course the flailing around has only compounded the problem, so they’ve flailed even more trying to deal with the new problems the earlier flailing around has created, etc.

  66. 66.

    trollhattan

    @Mike J:
    What’s been “set adrift” are those defrauded for-profit college students DeVoss screwed high and hard yesterday. Screw her back, sideways.

    p.s. Boat, insurance, bigger boat. It’s the circle of life so look for fraud on her part.

  67. 67.

    LAO

    @Immanentize: Hello — I saw this tweet and thought of you… I would hope that it’s actually “all of Trump’s lawyers” and not just some of them.

    Privately, some Trump lawyers have expressed concern that Mueller will stitch together several episodes, encounters and pieces of evidence, like tweets, to build a case that Trump embarked on a broad effort to interfere with the investigation, NYT reports. https://t.co/kxeWA4bLyS— Kyle Griffin (@kylegriffin1) July 26, 2018

  69. 69.

    Roger Moore

    @Gin & Tonic:
    It depends on what population you’re sampling from. If you think you’re sampling from the general population, yes, the police and their victim was not random. But if the population you think you’re sampling from is Trump supporting police and people Trump is mad at, then it is pretty random. That’s the point I was trying to make above. Yes, you can predict within a general class who are going to be the fascists and who are going to be their targets, but you can’t predict the specific fascist or the specific target with anything like specificity.

  70. 70.

    randy khan

    I would guess that most of the people here figured that Daniels was targeted from the moment we heard about the arrest.

  73. 73.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @LAO: IANAL but I figured his tweeting at/about Comey was witness intimidation as soon as I saw the one about “better hope there aren’t tapes”. When the POTUS starts making veiled threats at a private citizen, especially a witness, especially someone he just fired, that’s abuse of power. INM not H if unlearned O.

  74. 74.

    Kay

    Shana Michelle Keckley. Her husband, also a CPD cop, is named Shane Michael Keckley. That’s kinda weird

    Guffaw.

    I don’t know why Trump supporters are so nasty to Stormy. Dear Leader went out with her and was willing to pay her a bunch of money. Does he show poor judgment?

  75. 75.

    Rand Careaga

    @The Moar You Know:

    I’d support Trump too if I were the kind of shitty human being that becomes a cop.

    I’m aware that the line of work is irresistibly attractive to former school bullies and sundry other sociopaths—I was beaten up by three of these forty-seven years ago, and have never been unduly sentimental about law enforcement—but I’ve encountered and, in the course of my alleged career, even occasionally worked with decent human beings who wore the uniform at local, state and federal levels.

    I am today a dignified old pensioner, and not the shaggy youth whose appearance proclaimed “wannabe enemy of the state” (ah, and how thrilling those sentiments were back then, coming from the left, and how chilling today from our nascent fascist movement), a red flag to police who were already disposed to crack heads, and have relied on the constabulary these latter years when I have issues with Oakland’s criminal lumpenproletariat, a demographic with which the city is, alas, more abundantly provided than one might wish. That said, I readily acknowledge that some cops are assholes, and that the blue wall of silence is despicable.

  76. 76.

    Kay

    Why don’t the Columbus cops just do their jobs instead of hatching elaborate 7th grade plots to humiliate the President’s former girlfriend while they’re on the clock?

    Back to work, you slackers.

  78. 78.

    LAO

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: I think, in the end and should he be allowed to finish the investigation, Mueller is going to lay out a substantial obstruction of justice case against Trump. But I don’t see him obtaining a grand jury indictment on that basis. I could be wrong, I hope I’m wrong but I think he’d hesitate before indicting a sitting president.

  80. 80.

    Immanentize

    @LAO: They are in such a bind on tweets. Sometimes they say it is just Trump being Trump. Other times they say it is the official statements of the President and the government. His tweets have been used against him in every policy lawsuit so far.

    “The suspense is terrible. I hope it will last.”

  81. 81.

    Brachiator

    @Mike J:

    It only did $10k damage so if it’s an insurance scam it’s as badly executed as the rest of her policies.

    Poor Betsy will have to use one of her back-up yachts.

    The Seaquest can reportedly accommodate 12 guests and 12 crew members—enough space for the entire Trump cabinet if Nikki Haley, Ryan Zinke, and Mike Pompeo are willing to make it a working vacay!!!!—and is one of 10 boats owned by the DeVos family.

  82. 82.

    rikyrah

    @schrodingers_cat:

    @Roger Moore: Stealing babies has been on the agenda since Kelly was the DHS head. He publicly advocated for it during his tenure. I don’t know if it was his idea in the first place.

    Sure was.
    Because, this was the thing that made me realize, beyond a shadow of a doubt..
    that Kelly Ain’t Shyt.

  83. 83.

    rikyrah

    @Roger Moore:

    They did a PILOT PROGRAM

    a PILOT PROGRAM

    that did NOT have as part of it – a Family Reunification Plan.

    I completely disagree with you. They were ALWAYS gonna fill up the new Private Prison contracts with Brown people.

    Saw that coming a mile away.

  84. 84.

    prufock

    @Betty Cracker: I would say something about the difficulty of memory holing a commercial that airs four times an hour during the Wheel of Fortune/Jeopardy! block, but experience has taught me that many of my fellow citizens are…challenged.

    I don’t think that ant of the three Democratic candidates are significantly different ideologically, so I’m gonna go with who I think it’s most electable, which happens to be Graham, dynasty politics be damned.

  85. 85.

    HeleninEire

    @Major Major Major Major: LOL. Most normals would just like one regular picture like that.

    Totally OT but relevant to my answer.

    Back in Queens I used to get my nails done in a place right next to a “gentlemen’s club.” The women that worked in the gentlemen’s club would come in there too. I am straight as straight can be but they were so beautiful that even I could not stop staring at them. On a Saturday morning after they had worked all night.

    I stopped getting my nails done there.

  86. 86.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @LAO: yeah, I meant to add: the effect and impact of those tweets– and all the lies and bullying– are unique to the presidency, so you wouldn’t find indictable (if that’s a word) but I can’t imagine how anyone could look at this honestly and say it’s not impeachable.

    I was trying to imagine a parallel case, someone immensely rich and powerful– Bloomberg or Gates– tweeting about a key witness in a case against them and/or their company. 1) would that be intimidation or instruction? 2) hard to imagine they’d be dumb enough to do it

  87. 87.

    Calouste

    @TenguPhule: Yep. I saw it described as Juncker giving the shitgibbon the current situation in gift wrap with a bow on top, and the shitgibbon was of course very impressed with the wrap and bow. And had no clue about what was in the actual package.

    The rest of the world is just stalling because they know deals with the shitgibbon are worth shit.

  88. 88.

    The Other Chuck

    @schrodingers_cat: “Optics” and “momentum” are at least common terms with multiple connotations. “Stochastic” is a 50-cent word appropriated to sound intelligent.

  89. 89.

    workworkwork

    @The Dangerman: We might have fewer incidents like this if the damages were paid out of the police pension fund.

    Just saying.
    Why should taxpayers be on the hook for these people?

  91. 91.

    The Other Chuck

    @LAO: Shorter: “Trump’s lawyers worry that Mueller will actually do his job as a prosecutor.”

  92. 92.

    debit

    @HeleninEire:

    I am straight as straight can be but they were so beautiful that even I could not stop staring at them.

    Also straight, but if Stormy asked me if I was interested in a fling, my answer would be a confused, “Maybe?”

  93. 93.

    Mnemosyne

    @Gin & Tonic:

    With the disclaimer that I couldn’t get through remedial college-level math, it’s random in the sense that no one could have predicted that, of all of the places Stormy’s tour visited, it would be this specific city where she got arrested on trumped-up charges. That’s the stochastic part.

  95. 95.

    Mnemosyne

    @schrodingers_cat:

    I keep trying to get people to call it “hashtag terrorism,” but I don’t have enough letters behind my name to pull it off.

    In this case, it was #MAGA terrorism.

  98. 98.

    John Revolta

    @Immanentize: So, what…………….a $40 million yacht is tied to the dock by one goddamned line?
    Or were ALL the lines just, you know, tied sloppily? Sounds funny to me but I’m a poor ass landlubber. Still…………………

  101. 101.

    TenguPhule

    @LAO:

    to build a case that Trump embarked on a broad effort to interfere with the investigation

    Exhibit A, your honor. Defendant on video saying “I did it, I did it, what the hell do you think you can do about it? Prosecute me? Hah! i’d like to see you try!”

  103. 103.

    TenguPhule

    @Kay:

    Why don’t the Columbus cops just do their jobs instead of hatching elaborate 7th grade plots to humiliate the President’s former girlfriend while they’re on the clock?

    You expect them to work for the public? What are you, some kind of socialist?! //s

  104. 104.

    Betty Cracker

    @prufock: Makes sense. I’ll work my ass off for whoever wins the nomination, of course. I’m sure Graham will make a fine governor.

    @Mnemosyne: “Hashtag” is an adjective that conveys the concept well, after a bit of explanation. I’ll use that if the issue ever crops up again, if only to shut the goddamned pedants up.

  105. 105.

    Immanentize

    @John Revolta: 40 M yachts are very rarely “docked” because docks hurt boats. They are usually moored or anchored off shore a bit, yes, by one or two lines at the most. Some places moor big ass yachts “parked” to the dock with the rear facing the dock so you can step off — again, two lines at lost.

  107. 107.

    John Revolta

    Okay, I’ll buy that.
    All’s I know about yachts is my friend Larry used to work on Malcolm Forbes’ yacht like 30 years ago. It was tied up to the dock in the East River one time
    and I was able to look through a porthole and see Larry slingin’ hash down in the- what, galley? Good times.

  113. 113.

    debbie

    This story isn’t getting much attention.

    Tough to compete with an OSU diving coach accused of being a sexual predator and an OSU football coach accused of violating a restraining order taken out by his ex-wife.

    ETA: Gah! How could I forget Jim Jordan? The predator enabler who saw nothing?

  114. 114.

    jharp

    “Statement from Columbus Police Chief Kim Jacobs.”

    Damn. I forgot about Kim Jacobs.

    I went to High School with her.

  115. 115.

    J R in WV

    @Mnemosyne:

    I saw a total stranger use the phrase ‘victory gin’ online couple of days ago, and hoped Goku didn’t see it!

    I know adding this just contradicts my point, but I don’t care.

    I like it that the cleat hitch on Betsy’s little yacht came loose. I’ve set cleat hitches on an 800 foot long Navy vessel, back in the day.

    We saw some giant MF yachts when we were on the whale watching trip last March. If anyone really wants to see them, just say and I’ll send a set of pics to Alain when he gets that fixed up.

    Steve Jobs’s boat was one, and… um, I’ll ask the wife. One was white and one was a really really dark navy blue nearly black. Both were huge. Moored outside the yacht basin, too MF big to even get into the basin! But not anchored out, they were accessible from shore.

  116. 116.

    Ian R

    @workworkwork:
    Win a few of those cases, and watch the Blue Wall of Silence crumble.
    “Fuck you. Be a dirty cop on your own dime, not with my retirement.”

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