Pence’s Chief of Staff Nick Ayers.
Probably in collaboration with some of Pence’s speechwriters.
Why?
The op-ed is written by someone known to the Times, which means it is someone not first tier but still within the organization. Uses the same rhetoric as Pence, which makes sense when you realize that Pence doesn’t write his own shit and I’m not entirely sure the dimwit can actually construct full sentences that don’t start with “Hail Mary full of Grace.”
Young and dumb enough to think this counts as a principled stand. True believer from Georgia. Spent time in two thoroughly rotten organizations- College Republicans and Republican Governor’s Association, where the ends have always justified the means. Knows the importance of assuring the donors that this piece in the NY Times does- “Hey, he’s crazy, but we got tax cuts, deregulation, and Supreme Court,” which is the same deal with the devil that Pence made.
Also young enough that he feels pressured to do this because he wants to work again.
HeleninEire
Twitter Nixon says so, too.
Tom Levenson
Ein Backpfeifengesicht
Betty Cracker
Sounds plausible. If the op-ed writer is revealed to be Ayers, I wonder if that will prompt Twitler to go on a rampage through Pence’s staff. “Alexa, order ALL the popcorn!”
J.A.F. Rusty Shackleford
This would be awesome because it would splinter the administration further. I want them clawing at each other’s throats.
oldster
Tom, you took the compound word right out of my mouth.
That kid is so repulsive that I hope Cole’s post gets him fired, even if he didn’t do it.
zmulls
Pence’s staff making a move towards creating a vacancy in the Oval Office?
Comrade Nimrod Humperdink
I suspect that you’re either correct, or it’s somebody else that’s trying to make it look like it was Ayers, or at least throw off who actually DID write it.
Ken
If so, can Trump fire a member of the VP’s staff? Probably not, so another reason for the great “courage” of the op-ed. Also another ten points on Trump’s systolic pressure.
I do wonder however how much “blocking” of Presidential actions the VP’s staff can do. In a normal adminstration I’d think not much; in this one, who knows?
Adam L Silverman
@Betty Cracker: That’s actually already happened a couple of times. He’s prevented Pence from bringing on the national security advisor to the VP that Pence wanted. And there’s a lot of angst over Pence’s PAC and who is staffing it.
rikyrah
I honestly don’t care. But, the delusion that Race Bannon is any better ????
hueyplong
Can you imagine that smarmy, ambulatory bleached fecal pile as the chief of staff to an actual president, especially following on the heels of this insane clown era?
But then again, Trump having him killed, or doing it himself with his own hands — while the Secret Service stood there going “what the fuck?” — would be the kind of tawdry denouement this administration deserves.
So I’m rooting for this mysterious Cole guy (who acts like he runs the place) to be correct. If Dan Coats (another overnight candidate) turns out to be the guy, the old boys club will in fact label him a hero. So so the weasel pictured above.
Oh, and FTFNYT.
Ohio Mom
Of all the days for my newspaper delivery man to play hookey — I wanted a print copy of this historic missive.
Also, I like doing the puzzles with breakfast.
Baud
Lodestar!
TS (the original)
@Tom Levenson: I had to look it up – what a perfect description.
Mathguy
@Tom Levenson: That was the first description I thought of, as well. Then again, that’s true of practically everyone in this administration.
Leto
This has probably been stated already (I think we’ve had upwards of 1k comments about the op-ed), but we’re watching the Wizard of Oz right now: PAY NO ATTENTION TO THE MAN BEHIND THE CURTAIN!
@Betty Cracker@Adam L Silverman: : Laurence O’Donnell thought it was Dan Coates based upon LO’s time spent as a senate CoS working across the aisle with Coates. Specifically the language used (effective deregulation, historic tax reform, a more robust military and more), LO said that fit with everything Coates pushed for as a Senator. Just another interesting theory.
I don’t see how Friday’s news dump will compete with this, as the bar is set pretty high, but I’m sure they can top it.
Cheryl from Maryland
@J.A.F. Rusty Shackleford: This. Also, while the smug young asshole doesn’t realize this, even speculation that it is him will cause his probably horrible career to crash and burn.
Betty Cracker
Do y’all think the NYT was wrong to print the op-ed? I don’t, but it’s controversial even among not-Republicans. I think they had to print it — if the country is being run by a cabal of unelected wingnut shitheads who fancy themselves heroes, that’s important info that the public has a right to know.
catclub
@Cheryl from Maryland: UNless he can finger the real writer.
Bruce K
Sounds well-reasoned, especially because he seems to be one of those True Believers who is absolutely convinced of his rightness in all things – at the same end of the Dunning-Kruger curve as Trump himself, I’d wager.
We’re looking for someone who can convince himself that stripping children away from their parents and putting them in concentration camps is the Right Thing To Do. I don’t know if this guy is our General Keitel, but he’s probably worth putting on the short list.
rikyrah
Thread
Hillary Clinton (@HillaryClinton) Tweeted:
Today’s reason to call your senators and urge them to #StopKavanaugh: Kavanaugh would help kill the Voting Rights Act and uphold voter suppression laws that make it harder for voters of color to cast ballots. https://twitter.com/HillaryClinton/status/1037675043403309056?s=17
catclub
@Betty Cracker: Except they could report it as news and reveal the writer’s name.
This (insert editorial text here) was submitted to the NYT by John Bolton ( or other) for anonymous publication and we think that is news!
Adam L Silverman
@Ken: They all, except for the VP who was elected, work at the pleasure of the President. They are all technically senior assistants, deputy assistants, and/or assistants to the President.
SRW1
In case Amir’s too busy to provide the appropriate German saying, it’s the ironic ‘Nobel geht die Welt zugrunde‘*.
*Translation: ‘There’s nothing like going out in style.
zhena gogolia
@Baud:
Our new mantra.
JPL
@Leto: Every day is Friday in Trumpland.
I sure as hell hope they don’t send Ayers back to GA.
NotMax
Worst reboot of Mystery Date ever.
zhena gogolia
People who complain that this is a “distraction” from the Kavanaugh hearings — WTF are we supposed to do about the Kavanaugh hearings anyway? Seeing Kamala Harris questioning him on TV isn’t going to make a damn bit of difference. He’s in. We have to deal with the disaster. The time to do something about it was Nov. 2016.
Elizabelle
He looks like a young Quayle.
Got to love that today is probably a shitty day for Trump. Make them all so.
Betty Cracker
@catclub: I feel confident the writer wouldn’t have submitted it without a guarantee of anonymity. So, the paper had a choice: publish it anonymously or not at all. I mean, they could have said they’d publish it anonymously and then burned the source, but that would have consequences down the road too — no whistleblower would ever trust them again, even the virtuous ones. I think the NYT made the right call.
NotMax
@Adam L. Silverman
Shall mention again that Ivanka’s official job title is FIRST DAUGHTER AND ADVISOR TO THE PRESIDENT. (source – .pdf file)
ChrisS
@Betty Cracker:
I think it was wrong to print. It’s nothing more than a piece of propaganda to satisfy the capitalist wing of the GOP that don’t worry, we’ve got this, the Koch Industries 10-point plan is still being implemented regardless of the crazy man in the Oval.
khead
So, it’s Hoover from Animal House?
karensky
That face is calling out for a thrown cream pie!
hueyplong
@Betty Cracker: What if we learn that WaPo said they’d run it, but not anonymously?
But they didn’t burn him after FTFNYT ran it?
Cheryl Rofer
Pence and Pompeo have denied that they wrote the thing. But can we believe them?
TBH, I’m not spending much time on figuring out who it is. John’s guess is not a bad one. But there are so many spiritual authors of it in the administration. Axios reports that another two anonymous bravehearts have gotten in touch to tell them they wish they had anonymously written it.
Just remove them all.
Betty Cracker
@zhena gogolia: We’re living on Planet Distraction now, and if we can’t walk and chew gum, we’re doomed. I was glad to see that Harris’s skewering of Kavanaugh did get a decent amount of coverage, even if it did happen on the same day some self-important wingnut jackass informed us that unelected officials are running our government after a soft coup.
I think when today’s hearings start, a Democrat should enter a motion to suspend further hearings and a vote until we figure out who the fuck is running the country. It won’t stop the hearings, of course, but it’s a fair question — why is a man whose own staff says he’s deranged and not actually running the country (not to mention under investigation for collusion with a hostile foreign power to subvert democracy) be allowed to make a lifetime appointment?
Enhanced Voting Techniques
Also, got to see how worthless his life philosophy is in practice so in the midst of an esoteric crises and latched on the generals and their refusal to carry out illegal orders from Trump as role model. Trump’s administration has failed, not Conservatism which can not fail, so a good Conservative doesn’t listen to Trumlp kind of stuff.
dr. bloor
@Tom Levenson: The language gets a bit unwieldy at times, but Backpfeifengesicht is as tight and lovely as anything every turned out by Daimler or BMW.
Adam L Silverman
@Leto: It wasn’t Coates.
Baud
If Dems weren’t so feckless, they would have taken inside jobs in the administration so they could undermine it anonymously from within.
montanareddog
@zhena gogolia:
True. But we have to assume Sen. Harris knows something we don’t. She could not get him to perjure himself but she sure made him look shifty. At some stage, what she knows will drop. If nothing else, that could force a recusal in any Special Counsel-related cases.
Adam L Silverman
@Betty Cracker: They had to print it. What was wrong was the author publishing it this way. This is a combination of too cute by half and trying to have one’s cake and eat it too.
Viva BrisVegas
@Betty Cracker:
The NYT could have passed him on to The Intercept.
Another Scott
@Betty Cracker: They were fine to print it, if today, or tomorrow they tell us who the writer is.
“Here’s some important news about how our Constitution is being subverted by someone who admits to subverting it!!! But it’s more important to us to protect his name, and let him put his odious spin on his actions to further his own career by using us as his mouthpiece, than to tell you who wrote it so that the subverting of the Constitution will end!!11”
I’m not seeing how the FTFNTY comes out as a good-faith actor here if they don’t give up his name soon.
YMMV.
Cheers,
Scott.
Kay
I know everyone is gun shy and we don’t want to JINX it but if the objective was to reassure donors don’t they also have to worry about freaking out VOTERS?
Come on. This is bad for them. They’re telling the country that Trump is unfit. Outside the Trump loyalists (who will be pissed because they’re attacking Dear Leader) won’t normal people think “this is chaos- they need a check on their power”
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@ChrisS:
I think it’s really more of a manifesto of the True Believers in a time of system wide failure for the Republicans.
Baud
@Viva BrisVegas: Win!(ner)
NonyNony
The fact that Bargain Basement Rush Limbaugh was on a winning presidential ticket irritates me. The fact that he wasn’t the dumbest half of that ticket depresses me whenever I think about it.
As for the guess to the id of the op-ed writer – it’s as good as any. I think it’s definitely at the right level – someone who is an assistant to a big name, not actually one of the big names.
If someone from Pence’s orbit really did produce the op-ed though, that makes it substantially worse on the Times for printing it anonymously IMO. Because then there’s the power angle between Pence and Trump to consider, and whether this is a deniable plant from Pence to encourage people to start pushing for Trump to be removed so he can “reluctantly” step up to pull the plug and take over.
(Is Pence smart enough to pull that off? No. Is Pence dumb enough that he thinks he’s smart enough to pull that off? I suspect the answer to that is a resounding yes.)
schrodingers_cat
Is it me or does he look like a younger, better looking version of Pence. Did Pence know Ayers mother? It would be irresponsible not to speculate.
Dorothy A. Winsor
@montanareddog: It sounded as if she thought he’d talked to Trump’s personal attorneys before getting the nomination, with the implication that his thoughts on presidential immunity were part of a deal.
Betty Cracker
@ChrisS: It is exactly what you say it is, but it also contains the explosive (and credible) allegation that unelected people are running the country. IMO, that’s important enough to warrant printing it and letting people draw their own conclusions. Thankfully, the “trust us, we’re the adults in the room” propaganda angle doesn’t seem to be going over well with anyone.
Baud
@Kay: Agree.
Kay
The part that kills me is how total the ethical collapse is. NOT ONE of the GOP members of Congress stood up in any meaningful way and DID anything.
That defies ordinary odds, I think. That many craven cowards. 100% cowards. To a man or woman.
schrodingers_cat
OT good news. The write-in candidate I canvased for the Tuesday primaries for the state senate, Jo Comerford, won. Also too, Natalie Blais for state rep. Natalie is a good egg.
Adam L Silverman
@NotMax: Those are the by position names. Technically every one of those is an assistant to the President. Senior, Deputy, just assistant. My official title on the org charts at USAWC was Cultural Advisor and Professor. My actual position title on my civilian mobilization orders (SF69) was subject matter expert. My actual duties, as defined and delineated in my orders were even broader than the two titles on the org chart.
hueyplong
1. “Anonymous Braveheart” should become a term of art here.
2. I also thought of Hoover from Animal House
Baud
@schrodingers_cat: Congrats!
Patricia Kayden
@zmulls: A vacancy that Pence may not fill. He’s implicated in the Flynn fiasco since he obviously failed to properly vet him. Plus, we don’t know what Mueller may have on him. Pence should wait before measuring the White House drapes.
OzarkHillbilly
@Betty Cracker:
hmmmmm… That sounds like a good reason for removal from office via impeachment. Of Kavanough.
Kay
@Baud:
I feel like the “reassure donors” is the sort of ultra-sophisticated guessing we get among the people who think Republicans are all strategic geniuses. Nothing can be plain bad for the GOP. It’s all part of the plan.
What if it is what it looks like and they’re all flailing around covering their asses and scrambling to limit damage?
Patricia Kayden
@schrodingers_cat: Yay!!
schrodingers_cat
@Kay: Indian PM Modi is pretty horrible but some high profile leaders of his party, elected reps no less have been calling him out for a while now. And T’s roots in the R party are far more superficial than Modi’s in BJP and the Sangh parivar (family).
Another Scott
In other news, https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-09-05/obama-takes-on-trump-hitting-campaign-trail-for-2018-democrats
Good, good.
Cheers,
Scott.
Keith P.
I looked up “lodestar honor” yesterday, and got Mike Pence (or speechwriter), but also Mike Bloomberg and Henry Kissinger, who both used it last week at McCain’s funeral.
But Ayers is a good pick anyway. He’s known enough to get “senior” anonymity
OzarkHillbilly
@Adam L Silverman: Yeah, I think that sums up my feelings pretty well too.
Baud
@Kay: I agree. It’s annoying how well puff them up. Especially Trump.
Baud
@Baud:
Well = we.
uila
FWIW, Pence is a born-again evangelical. If he’s still saying Hail Marys, Mother will not be pleased.
montanareddog
@Dorothy A. Winsor: Good point. I got the impression she knew who Kavaaugh spoke with and what was said but it may have been just an attempt to provoke an admission just on the basis of a rumour.
However, he repeatedly said he did not know who worked at Kasowitz etc. If it was a meeting arranged by Kasowitz etc. rather than a chat with a lawyer acquaintance who changes firms frequently, and that came out, then that is a clear lie under oath.
Kay
@schrodingers_cat:
It’s also a lie that they’re protecting conservative principles. Trump wouldn’t know a conservative principle if it bit him on the ass.
They wanted tax cuts and deregulation and to enrich their gross cronies, and he delivered.
Trump is hugely cynical. At base that’s his ideology. He believes the absolute worst of people and boy oh boy was he right about these people! They are as craven and greedy and dishonest as he believed, was BANKING on. He pegged them as being as lousy as he is- he was betting they wouldn’t stop him if he bought them off- and he was right.
I look at the saintly Susan Collins and I just want to puke. What a fraud. Ben Sasse with his wide-eyed boy scout bullshit. They ALL failed when they were tested.
Waldo
Code name: Derp Throat
OzarkHillbilly
@schrodingers_cat: Congrats.
Raoul
He looks like a more plump and pious Dan Quayle. And Quayle was basically a useful idiot (hey, like Mike Dense!).
Spanky
There’s no way I can wade through all the comments in all the posts from the last 16 hours, but has anyone raised the possibility that this was submitted to FTNYT because someone’s handler at the Kremlin demanded that it be done? This is just the sort of thing that’s of enormous value to Putin. It creates a huge distraction in the US Govt. It further diminishes our standing in the world. It sows distrust with our allies.
I’m so old that I can remember a time when such a suggestion would be dismissed out of hand as paranoid ramblings.
NotMax
@Adam L. Silverman
Technically, schmecnically. It’s the title that goes on the record (and on the business card). Of course she serves at the (ahem) pleasure of the president.
NonyNony
@Kay:
I wish I believed that was true. Sadly I’m not sure that most voters actually care about the competence of the people in charge, but only care if their “team” wins.
I know that’s not entirely true, but I am starting to suspect that everyone who actually cares about the fitness of our leaders for office migrated over to the Democratic party during the W years, so there aren’t really any left in the GOP. And among the GOP voters who care about things other than raw tribal identification, what they care about is getting power and enacting a Republican agenda – and democracy and functioning government aren’t on that agenda.
I think there are a handful of voters who voted for Trump in the last election who have buyer’s remorse and wouldn’t do it again. I don’t know if this op-ed moves any more Trump voters into that camp, but my suspicion is that it doesn’t.
Chyron HR
@zhena gogolia:
Sneering that Trump’s latest perversion of government is just a distraction from the preceding perversions of government isn’t about doing something, it’s about demonstrating one’s intellectual superiority.
Leto
@Adam L Silverman: But it wasn’t not Coates… it’s the schrodinger’s cat of leakers right now :P
@Kay:
You’ve mentioned before how “normal people” are too worried about their everyday life: kids going to school, working two jobs, living paycheck to paycheck, just the new normal that’s been occurring for the past twenty years. They’re too busy with the minutia of their dailies lives to be too worried about what’s going on in Washington. From your everyday observances of the normies you interact with, is this breaking through to them? Is this clusterfuck of a human being finally motivating them to either 1) swap the multi-generational voting pattern and vote Dem or 2) pay enough attention to wtf is going on outside of their 5 yard range to see that the shit is collapsing around them and they need to get off their asses and actually vote?
They’ve had almost 3 years now to see how categorically unfit he is to hold office (not to mention almost 40 years of seeing how Republicans can’t govern). If they weren’t hit by the clue-by-four before, this won’t do it either.
Kay
@Baud:
I love Democrats but this always happens. It isn’t unique to Trump. In 2006 Karl Rove said he “had the math” and the entire Democratic base freaked out and were convinced he was rigging voting machines. They get inside our heads too easy.
Gin & Tonic
@Viva BrisVegas: Oh, snap.
O. Felix Culpa
@uila: I was about to say the same thing. Hail Mary is an expression of Catholic “idolatry” in evangelical/fundy world. Not a thing Pence would ever say. His idolatry lies in other directions.
zhena gogolia
@Kay:
Right. Anyone who would be “reassured” by this is freaking out of their minds.
JPL
@Adam L Silverman: The president is promising to declassify documents, which would give up source names. Using the declassification process to punish people is not only dangerous now, but how do we recover from this?
OzarkHillbilly
Pence’s Chief of Staff Nick Ayers sings “Tomorrow Belongs to Me”
I knew I’d seen his face before.
hueyplong
Every single thing that comes out now is a “distraction” from some other simultaneously occurring crime.
These aren’t distractions. They are an avalanche.
We haven’t even bumped up on Mueller’s Friday Activity yet.
Interesting times are kind of overrated.
Kay
@Leto:
I think it is but I’m not sure. What’s happened is they have just stopped talking about it. I get really vehement complaints from farmers – farmers hate uncertainty – their whole thing is limiting risk, but it almost seems like people are avoiding the whole subject. This county went 70% for Trump so maybe they are sheepish? I don’t know. I don’t have a good sense.
Keep in mind that despite the hype and propping up by media Trump is genuinely unpopular. He’s not a popular president. So we would be talking about slippage down from 40%, and 40% is basically the GOP share of voters. It probbaly won’t look like an earthquake. Most people already don’t like him.
Adam L Silverman
@zhena gogolia: @Betty Cracker: @montanareddog: @Dorothy A. Winsor: My understanding from the reporting on this is that Senator Harris and her staff ferreted out – it is unclear if this started as a tip someone pushed to them – that Judge Kavanaugh had a detailed discussion with someone at Kasowitz’s law firm about the Special Counsel’s investigation and that the substance of that conversation were inappropriate and improper. The reporting seems to indicate that Senator Harris and her staff don’t have this completely locked down yet. They clearly have reason to believe and enough supporting information for her to start on this yesterday, but they’ve told reporters they are continuing to work this lead. This is similar to Senator Leahy’s accusation that Judge Kavanaugh was party to cyber crimes, specifically a hacking of the Democratic members of the Senate Judiciary Committee emails, internal correspondence, and work product stored on the Senate’s computer system. While I don’t know if Leahy can bring himself to actually just release all the evidence on this that he teased, it appears that Harris either thinks her staff has, or will have/fully confirm, a smoking gun that when she drops it either on Kavanaugh directly at the hearings or just puts it out to the press, it will be something that forces him to withdraw.
I like Senator Leahy, but he’s fealty to a Senate that was destroyed in 2009 is a problem. I also like Senator Harris and I have seen no indication that she has any such blind spots or concerns. If she has the goods on Kavanaugh she will weaponize them at the most strategically opportune moment.
Elizabelle
@Kay: Did the apprentice you mentioned in the morning thread survive the OD? I hope he was able to get clean, but probably another sad story …
Jinchi
I definitely agree this is some pro-Pence lackey.
It reads like the RoguePotusStaff twitter feed that was all the rage early on, and for all their bile against Trump, they were always quick to come to Pence’s defense. Written by a group of conservatives who were quite willing to grovel before the king, and filled with self-congratulation at their heroic, anonymous stand against him, just like the NYT Op-Ed.
We know they support a large part of Trump’s agenda, but we’re not quite sure which parts are beyond the pale. Is it the Muslim ban? Is it kidnapping refugee children and deporting their parents? Is it his wholesale embrace of Putin or proto-Nazis? His attacks on the Justice Department? The rampant corruption of Trump and his cabinet officials?
If so, they seem to have failed at stopping all of that, so what have they actually done?
They watched as he fired Sally Yates, Preet Bharara, James Comey, Andrew McCabe, and Peter Strzok and threatens career employees like Bruce Ohr.
Maybe their great success is protecting Jeff Sessions.
bemused
@Kay:
Some Republican folks may be staying a lot quieter these days but I’d like to be a fly on the wall when they are talking politics with their own tribe and hear how they really feel.
Kay
@Elizabelle:
No. He died. It made the local paper. The apprentices are close. There are only about 25 in a “class” in my son’s union – they take 25 or so a year- and they get to know one another very well over 5 years, akin to how one would get to know classmates in a VERY small school. They were really torn up about it.
Gelfling 545
@Kay: God alone knows. What passes for “ normal people” in this mess?
Adam L Silverman
@JPL: A future Congress is going to have to consider how they can write legislation that clarifies the President’s roles, responsibilities, and powers in regard to classification. Right now these matters are solely executive branch issues because Congress has largely decided they don’t need to be involved in it. Essentially a bunch of things that everyone excepted as the way the President and the executive branch should operate turned out to be easily broken norms and traditions. These things will have to be legislated as actual constraints and that legislation will need to include specific enforcement language and have some enforcement mechanisms (punishments) written in for failure to comply.
Adam L Silverman
@OzarkHillbilly: He also looks like the actor who played Eichman’s son in Operation Finale.
ET
Yesterday was my 50th birthday. I had a quiet day until I turned on the TV and the oped was ALL THE TALK!
Meet the Press had Ruth Marcus on and she thinks based on her knowledge of the NYTimes folks that the leaker is high level (the paper wouldn’t have bothered/risked it otherwise) and this was in the works before the Woodward excerpts were out (paper had to run it through internal channels). That seems logical.
rikyrah
They continue to reveal shyt that we already knew.
…………………….
The Guardian
Revealed: Trump inauguration crowd photos were edited after he intervened
Jon Swaine in New York
A government photographer edited official pictures of Donald Trump’s inauguration to make the crowd appear bigger following a personal intervention from the president, according to newly released documents.
The photographer cropped out empty space “where the crowd ended” for a new set of pictures requested by Trump on the first morning of his presidency, after he was angered by images showing his audience was smaller than Barack Obama’s in 2009.
The detail was revealed in investigative reports released to the Guardian under the Freedom of Information Act by the inspector general of the US interior department. They shed new light on the first self-inflicted crisis of Trump’s presidency, when his White House falsely claimed he had attracted the biggest ever inauguration audience.
The records detail a scramble within the National Park Service (NPS) on 21 January 2017 after an early-morning phone call between Trump and the acting NPS director, Michael Reynolds. They also state that Sean Spicer, then White House press secretary, called NPS officials repeatedly that day in pursuit of the more flattering photographs.
VOR
@NonyNony: I think there were a small number, certainly not the majority, of Trump voters who voted for him as a lark. Perhaps they wanted a check on an out of control Hillary Clinton. Perhaps they thought it would be a good laugh to vote for an obviously unfit clown. Perhaps it was a vote against “politics as usual” or to “shake things up”. Remember that he won by a mere 80,000 votes spread across 3 states so this doesn’t need to be a big group.
I remember after Brexit there were numerous interviews where people admitted voting for it as a joke, because they never dreamed it would win.
The Trump Administration is serving as a reminder that it really does matter who our leaders are, that it does make a difference. So yes, I am hoping this moves a small number of voters to the polls to provide a check on Trump.
rikyrah
@ET:
HAPPY BIRTHDAY :)
Gelfling 545
@Betty Cracker: I would suggest that anyone who would vote for Trump doesn’t CARE who’s running the country. They want entertainment with big production numbers.
PJ
@Betty Cracker: I think we already knew that Trump was being undermined by his hires, and, if there were any doubts, Woodward’s book quelled them. So the op-ed is not newsworthy, but it is valuable to the writer to send signals to the money people backing the Party reassuring them, and to boost his own status with the money people. (I think it is also no coincidence that the op-ed came out two days after the first reviews of the Woodward book, but whether is part of some greater strategy or plan, I have no idea.) So the NY Times is only broadcasting mainstream Republican talking points, and making these staffers and mainstream Republican values appear as patriotic and heroic, rather than the reverse. I’m sure it was a no-brainer for Dean Baquet to run it, because he is the king of dubious editorial decisions, but it isn’t really news.
Cheryl Rofer
@Adam L Silverman: Thanks, Adam. This is helpful.
PJ
@zhena gogolia: As long as someone is not carping along with them about their issue du jour, these people will be complaining about “distractions”. Everything Trump and his people do is a distraction from the “real issue”, whatever they think that is, but that shifts every week (or day) because Trump, his minions, Congressional Republicans, and the Supreme Court are up to new shady shit every day of the week.
Yarrow
That guy looks like a cross between Eric Trump and an ugly version of “Pretty in Pink”-era James Spader
Leto
@Kay: I had a long reply to this but FYWP ate it. While most people don’t like him, in their eyes he’s keeping the promises of tax cuts, deregulation, and keeping the blahs in their place. If the “true republicans” can keep on delivering those three, while making sure he doesn’t blow up the world, they’ll be happy. “Oh, he’s not that bad. There’s people in place to keep him in check, plus they’re doing great things…”
Also I don’t want these assholes silent. They need to admit they made a mistake and help fix it. It’s what adults do. Staying silent is the equivalent of a 3 y/o pouting they can’t get ice cream. They’re supposed to be adults. Fucking act like it.
Anonymous At Work
@Adam L Silverman: And if it is him, he gets canned by the President, got underground until he gets hired on Pence’s staff for his Presidential bid, only with the “credibility” of writing this op-ed as well.
The kicker would be if Trump was convinced Pence and Pence’s whole staff were out to get him. Thaaaaat’s when this gets bloody and amusing.
danielx
For those of us us who have the good fortune to be among his former constituents, this is not news. Pence is entirely out of his depth when it comes to complex tasks like composing coherent sentences.
schrodingers_cat
@Betty Cracker: I am among those people. I think NYT should just change its name to the Republican Russian Times. They act like they are a propaganda broadsheet for the Republicans. If they had published the same fucking op-ed with the name of the “brave” R supposedly saving us from the worst excesses, it would be a different story.
Betty Cracker
@PJ: Well, if the author thought people would buy the “patriotic and heroic” angle, he miscalculated badly. The consensus from Fox News to MSNBC is that this isn’t how a democracy is supposed to work. One notable exception: Senator Bob Corker seems reassured and said this is how he’s understood the government under Trump has been run since day one. In saying so, he’s implicated himself since it’s his fucking job to uphold the constitution.
catclub
If the writer is being honest here, it is not Mnuchin. He would have no problem with the lack of moral principles.
Adam L Silverman
@Cheryl Rofer: You’re welcome.
I’d like to see Senator Leahy just disregard Senator Grassley’s attempts to keep this bottled up by declaring it “committee confidential”. There’s nothing Grassley or any other Republican senator can do to Leahy if Leahy just releases it. If Leahy really wanted to cover his tuchas, he could just read it into the Senate record during open speech time today or tomorrow. At that point his staff can just release that entry to the press and let them go to work. Unfortunately I don’t think Leahy can bring himself to do this. Senator Feinstein, however, would just go YOLO and hand copies out.
As for Senator Harris, she’s not going to let this go. She’s recently a former prosecutor and chief law enforcement officer. And she’s never served in the Senate that Leahy still thinks exists. She has no illusions. And my impression is that she’s got both excellent political instincts – even on things I don’t agree with her 100% on – and she’s not afraid to fight. If/when she’s convinced she’s got the details locked down, she’s going to use them to maximum effect.
Rommie
Remember that someone(s) has/have staked their professional career on the NYT keeping a secret. They are too dumb to realize, or brilliant to realize, what’s going to happen, with no middle ground there.
Meanwhile, Trump has gone the full Hartmann and is currently looking for the Fairy Godmother in the White House. And that can’t help but bring a smile to my face.
rikyrah
I’m going to say this again…
Those who think that Race Bannon is just gonna ease up on in there ARE PHUCKING DELUSIONAL.
There is nothing..
And, I mean NOTHING…
That indicates that Dolt45 is going down..
WITHOUT TAKING EVERYONE ELSE DOWN WITH HIM.
PaulWartenberg
this is a solid guess, it makes a ton of sense, and part of me would love to see trump go ballistic on Pence and/or Pence’s staff because I’ve been told trump can’t fire Pence (Vice President is a Constitutional office and apparently only impeachment would do it, meaning trump would have to get Congress to commit).
hueyplong
I am really rooting for this Pence dweeb to be the guy, because Trump-on-Pence violence as Mueller closes in is the best scenario in a landscape filled with potentially bad ones.
[the definition of “bad” has been under constant revision the last couple of years]
Shakti
@Betty Cracker:
I don’t think The New York Times was wrong per se, but I feel like anyone paying attention wasn’t surprised by one sentence of that op-ed. Look at all the “leaks” and the turnover.
It’s not a warning, it’s shades of O.J’s If I Did It as written by Deep Throat, but Dumber.
Adam L Silverman
@Anonymous At Work: There’s a lot of paranoia in the President’s orbit about the VP, his staff, the PAC he set up, who is staffing that PAC, and what the VP’s ultimate goals are. I’m also convinced that when you see anonymous leaks that wrong foot Secretary Mattis with the President – such as planted stories that Mattis has started his own PAC to prepare either a primary challenge to the President or for a run as an Independent – that they originate with the VP and his senior aides in the attempt to kneecap the one person they think might present a threat to Pence’s ambitions.
catclub
@Leto:
Which is more than true. He has a far, far lower brown person body count than GWBush, and has (not yet) wrecked the economy in the same manner.
Looked at another way, we let GWBush get away with far worse because he was born to the GOP aristocracy.
Adam L Silverman
Senator Grassley has gone into full cornpone whiner mode to start today’s hearings.
WereBear
Brilliant!
I also thought “palace coup” but have been soothing myself with what must be true: that Pence is also up to his eyeballs in this scandal. Aren’t they ALL?
xjmuellerlurks
John Barron wrote it, with help from that new guy from Fox. It’s a con man’s play. It’s misdirection/redirection, building on the Woodward book. Look here at this bright shiny bullshit and ignore the Kavanaugh thing, the Mueller thing, midterms, and the general looting and pillaging the administration is doing. It gets out in front of the Woodward book with an allegation that real patriots are running the country, not Trump, regardless of the lunacy in the WH. They had someone the NYT trusts deliver it. The NYT, being what it is, published. It’s all hooey meant to distract us from what’s really important. The Times should be ashamed for publishing this drivel, but isn’t and won’t be.
catclub
@Rommie:
Trump as James Jesus Angleton (also Captain Queeg) just makes me smile, for some reason.
WereBear
Proof of evolution, you ask me. They have been determined to kick out anyone with a brain; anyone who protested their cheating tactics; anyone who wasn’t a Nixon acolyte; just anyone who would stop them.
This is what you get from four decades of looking for the most craven and easily bought people in the US and letting them run everything.
PJ
@catclub: Bush got away with more also because Americans are, by and large, chickenshit, and many believed that the crimes and acts of gross negligence the Bush administration committed were A-OK since they were mostly committed against Arabs and brown people. Also, for all his fuck-ups, Bush’s behavior was pretty consistent, which reassures the media that he is “serious.”
evodevo
@uila: Yes. I don’t know where his religious loyalty now lies (he was once a CATHOLIC DEMOCRAT!!), but evangelicals consider Catholics to be the spawn of satan, or at least Hell-bound idolaters, and would NEVER be caught saying a Hail Mary …
Leto
@WereBear:
I’m sure the Kochs are happy with their return on investment.
schrodingers_cat
@Baud: @OzarkHillbilly: @Patricia Kayden: Thanks! This was my first vote in a primary. I see this as a good beginning.
Jack the Second
So I don’t think the FTFNYT should have published the anonymous op-ed, and I don’t think they should have doxxed the author.
Instead they should have treated the op-ed as an anonymous source and written a goddamn article explaining the situation. You know, like a newspaper with reporters.
Include quotes of what the person is doing, interview constitutional scholars on how illegal this is, maybe an interview with someone like Adam about how whistleblowing and resigning in protest actually works, point out the self-servicing rationalizing the source does to justify their illegal lawbreaking.
Publish it A1 above the fold.
PaulWartenberg
Things I realized as I slept last night:
1) The Op-ed essentially validates Woodward’s book: as much as trump was trying to get out there claiming the whole book is false, the Op-Ed works as independent confirmation that staffers in the West Wing are trying to manage trump like he’s a madman unfit for the office.
2) Since this verifies Woodward’s work, this means we ARE coping with an administration that is operating on principles that makes “Game of Thrones” look like Sesame Street. The level of backstabbing Woodword describes involves constant shifts in alliances AND violent verbal confrontations on nearly a daily basis. Trust seems to be non-existent between the high-level staff, and everyone seems to operate under so much stress they CAN lose their minds at any moment.
I honestly cannot recall in my adult lifetime any other administration that operated this way. There may have been factions under each administration – Obama likely had them, I’m pretty sure Dubya did, Clinton and Bush the Elder likely did, I’m pretty sure Reagan had one or two internal cabals at work – but there was at least a sense of teamwork, that they could walk into another person’s office for a lively chat and not a shouting match. With trump, everyone’s walking around with a shiv hidden under their shirts for personal protection.
3) trump may not want to believe Woodward’s book and may genuinely deny it, but even now he’s GOT to be thinking back on all the times his handlers told him NO and realizing he should fire each and every one of them just to root the traitors out.
This is a man who operates entirely on the principle of Personal Loyalty… and Loyalty that ONLY goes upward to himself. Everyone else is cannon fodder to him (even his own family members). The second he thinks you’re disloyal, and that he can afford to have someone else on his payroll fire you, he will order that firing (SEE Omarosa).
We are facing the dread of a Saturday Night Massacre type purge of the West Wing…
Gelfling 545
@PJ: But imagine, if you will, the uproar if they declined to publish it and were later discovered to have had it and concealed it. Regardless of conservative messaging it confirms Woodward’s reporting. I think they had to publish it.
hueyplong
@Adam L Silverman: I thought the only two modes Grassley had were “full cornpone whiner” mode and “no comment” mode. Is there a third, more triumphalist mode, and if so, isn’t that really a variant of “full cornpone whiner,” seeing as how even triumphant Grassley is just a guy whose victim status has merely been temporarily relieved by Godly Republican measures?
Just typing this makes me think he’d be a leading light in any Pence Era.
Adam L Silverman
Booker has just gone nuclear on Grassley! He’s going to release documents, specifically emails pertaining to Kavanaugh’s views on race, before Grassley has cleared them. He just told Cornyn he doesn’t care that Cornyn thinks he should be expelled for this, accepts he’s knowingly doing this, and has challenged Cornyn to try to expel him.
Melusine
Reposting cause I zombied last night’s thread:
If it really was a cry for help, the message would have been, “We can’t go to Republicans because they’ve proven they’re compromised, some of us are cooperating with Mueller but that process takes time, we need the American people to speak up NOW, we need help from the IC, we need everyone to vote for Democrats because this shit can’t go on dear god we’re kidnapping children – whatever our sins we didn’t sign on for THAT.”
Instead, it’s don’t worry, you didn’t elect us and don’t know our names but WE’RE in control, we’ll stop any policy WE don’t approve of (but don’t worry, we’re totally down with fucking over the lower classes and bringing asbestos back). The grownups are in charge, no need to vote the GOP out…
It is entirely possible that Putin is setting his puppets against each other. This weakens shitgibbon, who is quickly outliving his usefulness, it might provide a veneer of heroism for a more suitable stooge, and it guarantees more chaos and distrust in our system, our leaders, and America itself. I’m sure this is not playing as an act of bravery overseas – it’s playing as another arrogant, treasonous toad trying to stage a coup or rehabilitate themselves. One more reason not to trust the U. S.
rp
I don’t think the NYT would publish an op-ed like that from Ayers; he’s not high enough on the food chain. But it’s very possible that it was written by Ayers and submitted by Pence.
hueyplong
@Gelfling 545: See, once upon a time there was this issue about emails in a presidential election.
Gelfling 545
@Anonymous At Work: Do you think Pence would actually have the temerity to run?
low-tech cyclist
I don’t care if SAO-Anon is Ayers or not, but Lordy, what a vacuous look that guy has on his face.
His other pics on Google Images aren’t an improvement in that respect. Looks like he’s got a 40-watt bulb where his brain should be.
That’s probably a requirement for being one of Pence’s staffers, though. Can’t be smart enough to show up your boss.
OzarkHillbilly
@schrodingers_cat: And many happy returns.
Jeffro
@Adam L Silverman:
All part of understanding/creating/operating within new norms, rather than going back to old ones, as you have noted before. Great point.
Chyron HR
@Adam L Silverman:
For the love of god somebody primary that shitlib neoliberal sellout shill!
Jeffro
@Adam L Silverman: That’s awesome – THIS IS HOW YOU DO IT, DEMS!
gVOR08
Pence is wholly owned by the Koch’s. The Kochs are supposedly splitting from Trump. The Kochs presumably would love to have Dense as prez. But even Dense isn’t dumb enough to strike at the king without being sure of killing the king. Presumably the Kochs also own Pence’s Chief of Staff and might have suggested the need for an incitement toward the 25th that’s deniable by Pence.
Adam L Silverman
@Chyron HR: I’m assuming this is sarcasm.
Jeffro
Btw for those who are interested, Greg Sergeant notes a key flaw in Anonymous’ argument: oh yeah Trumpov DOES have “first principles”
Trumpov’s paranoid rage is getting worse…but the WH ‘resistance’ is a sham.
You backed it, you bought it, GOP. We’re going to make you own this mess until the end of time.
Elizabelle
@Adam L Silverman:
That’s my hope WRT Kavanaugh. Why I am not going to get all depressed right now. Kavanaugh’s dirty. Even slowing the vote until after the midterms could doom him.
And I want the spotlight to hit Anthony Kennedy and his Deutsche Bank son next. If Kennedy’s done anything improper, his reputation should be shredded too. Horrible man.
Leto
@PaulWartenberg: #3 is a def possibility, a “purge” of all non-loyals. Perfect pretense for it, though I’m not sure who he would get to replace those people. Honestly, who’s going to come work for this WH? We were already scrapping the bottom of the barrel.
I’m not surprised at #2 because that’s how he’s operated his business for his entire life. Always playing factions off against each other, always demanding proof of loyalty/fealty. Lots of good points here.
Chyron HR
@Adam L Silverman:
If I was being sarcastic I would have called him a corporatist neoliberal shitlib sellout shill.
OzarkHillbilly
@Adam L Silverman: Good on Booker.
dww44
@zhena gogolia: That may be true. But we could also pick up the phone and call our Republican senators and argue that this nomination should be postponed for many reasons, as it breaks all norms and the nominee won’t address the primary issue of how he might rule on holding a sitting President accountable for his crimes.
We know that lots of information about the nominee is being hidden from the American public, including stuff both known and unknown. As was said on cable news this morning, it will only take ONE Republican senator to come over from the dark side. Besides,there’s the way that he treated Guttenberg day before yesterday. That was a real character tell. That alone should disqualify the seating of someone who’s likely to be on the Court for more than 30 years.
Gelfling 545
@hueyplong: There was also a tale about Russian interference which they didn’t publish and are still catching hell for from properly thinking people.
Ruckus
@Betty Cracker:
I think they should have printed it. For the same reasons you do.
It was intended to be printed, whomever wrote it wanted it out there. And if they didn’t they are even more stupid than previously envisioned.
Sister Rail Gun of Warm Humanitarianism
There are Ayers all through my yet-to-be-pieced together DNA puzzle.
Please, Crom, tell me he’s not a cousin.
Calouste
It is possible that the intention of the op-ed writer was to put out the message that everything is under control even with the madman in the Shite House.
The very predictable effect however is that it is going to drive that narcissist madman up the wall due to the lack of loyalty it displays and the bad light it puts him in. They might have gotten away with stealing documents off his desk so he wouldn’t sign them because he didn’t remember about them. He is never, ever going to forget this though.
Elizabelle
OT: NPR just reporting that British coroner concluded Dolores O’Riordan of The Cranberries drunk drowned in her hotel bathroom. She had consumed 4 times the legal limit of alcohol. Coroner calling it a “tragic accident.”
RIP Dolores. The Guardian’s article.
Ruckus
@ChrisS:
Knowledge is better than darkness.
Sure the shit would happen anyway.
Sure it would have been and will be bad.
Knowledge is still better than darkness.
rikyrah
@Kay:
It shows, beyond a shadow of a doubt, who they are. At their core. That they are, and have always been, COMPLETE AND UTTER FRAUDS.
catclub
@Melusine: well put
Kay
.
I love the remove– Ben Sasse is just a passive observer of the national scene. Powerless. Just your average American watching this and shaking his head. “Yet, in a way…”
Christ almighty REMOVE these people. Find someone who actually wants to do the job.
Congressional Republicans hear “three times a week” that the president is a dangerous nutjob and they smile and say “gosh- how crazy is the US government?”
Trump himself is removed. Yesterday he tweeted that someone should bring the op ed writer to “offocials”- like, I don’t know, HIM or his low quality hires?
OzarkHillbilly
@Ruckus: My problem is what is the motive of the writer? Do I want to be an unwitting tool in furthering their agenda? Looking at who they work for and what they praise, that answer is indubitably “No.” Whatever this person/s is up to it isn’t good.
Adam L Silverman
@Jeffro: @OzarkHillbilly:
Thursday
Sorry, this is off topic, but I just had to share. Was listening to the Senate hearing on Kavanaugh just now, and Sen. Lee said something absolutely perfect. While justifying the process they went through to hide the documents, he said, “we’re doing what the law allows us to do”. Which I don’t think that’s quite what he wanted to say! But what a wonderful admission.
ChrisS
@gVOR08:
Pence was Manfort’s selection, right? Koch Industries isn’t interested in sharing power with Russian billionaires, so why would they back a a guy pushed by them?
Koch industries is about survival and advancing the long-con. They’re not going to flip the card table over with some kind of dirty deal with Pence. I do think that this OpEd writer is specifically advancing the idea that Koch Industries retains control of the Executive branch regardless of what Trump spews out on twitter.
Adam L Silverman
@Chyron HR: Well that clears things up then.
Jinchi
@catclub:
That quote rules out everyone outside of the holy roller club. Another point in favor of the Pence faction being behind the OpEd.
Adam L Silverman
@Sister Rail Gun of Warm Humanitarianism: Narrator (sounding strangely like James Earl Jones with asthma): “Nick Ayers is your father.”
schrodingers_cat
@Kay: Not really surprising for a party that hates governance.
Haroldo
@Viva BrisVegas: This is perfect.
Spanky
@OzarkHillbilly: See me back at Comment #75.
Jinchi
@ChrisS:
Pence had been in the Koch brother’s pocket a lot longer than he’s been in Russia’s.
https://www.desmogblog.com/2017/10/20/5-facts-about-mike-pence-s-close-ties-koch-brothers-not-included-jane-mayer-s-new-yorker-article
Leto
@Kay: That’s essentially the stance of the entire Republican party: “What can we do? I know we’re a co-equal branch, meant to provide a check/balance to the executive, but you know, those tax cuts aren’t going to pass themselves…” They’re all feckless cowards. Like @rikyrah: said: COMPLETE AND UTTER FRAUDS.
@OzarkHillbilly: Not sure of the motive, but we know what this group (remember, this person said it was a group of them doing this) is up to because they admitted it: “effective deregulation, historic tax reform, a more robust military and more” Hide the silverware, hide the pearls, hide your coupons… they’re coming for it all.
Jeffro
@Adam L Silverman: “Eject me from the Senate for sharing information about a SCOTUS nominee, when you’ve withheld tens of thousands of documents about this man’s work, about his views, before giving him a lifetime appointment? When he has refused to answer even the most basic of questions put to him about those views? When my great state of New Jersey will gladly send another Democrat here to be its Senator, and to keep asking the questions and yes, releasing important information to the public? GO AHEAD, REPUBLICANS. I am releasing the information that you refuse to release. Do as you will.”
Calouste
@ChrisS: Koch Industries is rather concerned about the tariffs and the trade wars, because it really affects their business, so they won’t think they’re really in control from that perspective.
And I doubt the Kochs need an op-ed in the NYT to know what’s going on in the Shite House, they have more direct sources for that.
Elizabelle
@rikyrah: They represent their funders, not their constituents.
Burn them all to the ground. And Citizens United and the campaign finance shenanigans. We’d be better off with publicly funded campaigns, that are harder for ratfuckers to exploit.
Adam L Silverman
@Jeffro: He’s doing a good job this AM. I’m guessing he has the morning shift and Senator Harris has the afternoon watch.
Matt
@Betty Cracker: This isn’t a whistleblower reporting misconduct, this is a participant in a defacto administrative coup crowing about how much he’s “helping”.
I don’t like a country run by President Cheeto at all, but I like a country run by whichever unelected MAGA-chud was closest to the Resolute Desk in the last five minutes even less.
The Ancient Randonneur
@Adam L Silverman:
Bravo! It’s about time someone did this. Let this be the first of many.
Leto
@Adam L Silverman: The tag-team Harris/Booker duo. Meaner than the Road Warriors, but more eloquent than Hulk/Macho Man (oooooooooh yeaaaaaah!)
jamey
The kid has a face that says, “shank me, prison daddy.”
/sorry #notsorry
bemused
@Adam L Silverman:
Wow, what Cornyn said! Has he met our president? SMH
Pittsburgh Mike
I’m also thinking it’s Coats. First, Coats was a US Senator, and they think they’re opinions matter more than anyone else. Second, Coats is DNI, and the letter writer clearly cares about foreign policy and intelligence matters. The letter writer also knows the intelligence services well enough to believe that Trump won’t get help from them to find the author. Pompeo is too pro-Trump and I don’t see that Haspel has been around enough to have managed Trump in anything significant. People in Justice and the FBI are already on thin ice with this administration, and likely wouldn’t risk it. Also, they’re not going to risk looking biased when they are already effectively destroying the President by following up all of his criminal actions.
I doubt a former or current general could go against their training to respect civilian leadership enough to basically write “We are ignoring the President and running the country ourselves,” so that takes out Mattis and Kelly. And Kelly’s pretty much a pro-Trump scumbag anyway.
Jarvanka won’t risk the life long gravy train they’re on.
If Betsy DeVos, Rick Perry or Ben Carson wrote it, my head will explode :-)
Kathleen
@oldster: He does have the “I’m The Perfect Aryan Specimen” vibe doesn’t he?
Ceci n est pas mon nym
@Elizabelle: Oh crap. What a stupid way to go.
I didn’t know much about her, didn’t know the Cranberries by name but when I listened to some of their stuff I recognized her voice instantly.
After her death I ran across this YouTube. She’s completely adorable and tells possibly the most Irish story ever.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C0Hbq5wpsd0&feature=youtu.be&t=1m28s
“So I popped a spud in the microwave…”
Kay
@Leto:
I’m collecting these.
She thinks this will fly. “I won’t read it and then I don’t have to do anything”
It’s like hide and seek with little kids. They hide “behind” a skinny tree and put their hands over their eyes- all confused. They can’t see YOU so they must be hidden. Right? That’s how this works?
rikyrah
@schrodingers_cat:
a WRITE-IN candidate won?
FABULOUS!
Aleta
If Ayers, it sure is a 180 from the Ayers of yesteryear who sort of told Congress Repubs to get 100% behind T or get purged. Though if that was about getting the tax plan through, I suppose it would have been as much about Ayers working to pay off big the donors and keep them as his special friends.
(After searched for this, I see at that time (in politico, oct 2017) he was ranting about losing control of both houses in 2018. In that light you could see the motivation for the article. And also, as some said, a bold (stupid, desperate) play to keep his dark money sources in with Pence?)
ChrisS
@Calouste:
This wasn’t an OpEd to Koch Industries, it’s from them to the rest of the GOP saying that “Yes, Trump is a buffoon, but we’re still getting what we want through other means, please continue to support to our GOP candidates.”
Aleta
@Aleta: Ayers has fcked up once already with dark money sources, especially now if there’s an investigation re: Greitens.
St Louis Post Dispatch, in June
There’s more in the article about whether an investigation is even possible.)
Cheryl Rofer
@Adam L Silverman: I am seeing on Twitter multiple Democratic committee members saying they are going to release documents and recognizing that “committee confidential” means little to nothing.
debbie
@Tom Levenson:
It’s times like this when German is indispensable! Wish I’d ignored my advisor and took a class or two.
Gravenstone
@NonyNony: Mother made him do it.
Brachiator
I would love for it to be this guy. The bad blood between Pence and Trump would be at a permanent boil. I am loving the Star Trek “Mirror Universe” treachery on display here.
And if this is the guy, and he is found out and resigns, removing a key Pence aide would be delicious.
debbie
I doubt it’s anyone on Pence’s staff. I’d bet it’s someone who wants to discredit Pence so he can’t suceed Trump. My bet’s on Stephen Miller, aka Mr. Smarm.
Hawes
I’m going with Mick Mulvaney. Been there since the beginning, high ranking staffer with typical Randian ideas.
Brachiator
Also, too, this guy looks like he might be one of Trump’s illegitimate sons.
Anonymous At Work
@Adam L Silverman: Is it paranoia? A Bible-banger doesn’t cozy up to the Living Embodiment of ALL Seven Deadly Sins without a reason, and the only, obvious, and stated reason is that Pence will inherit the office from Trump. “I will be loyal to you until the day you die [which is when I will massively betray you and kill you]” is the pledge that Pence effectively made.
PS: Any indication about how Trump will deal with Pence? I’ve openly wondered if Pence’s position on the Transition Committee wasn’t about kompromating him from the get-go.
debbie
@Betty Cracker:
I’m off work today and am listening to Glenn Beck who, last time I listened, supported Trump pretty much across the board. Today, he declares he’s torn between enjoying this and slamming the anonymous official who wrote that op-ed piece. FUN TO LISTEN TO!
debbie
@Adam L Silverman:
Is this not the Way of the GOP?
Brachiator
@debbie:
Miller is all about white supremacy more than he cares about GOP economic “principles.” He is more likely to be a Trump loyalist.
Anonymous At Work
@Gelfling 545: God told him so.
debbie
@Adam L Silverman:
Elizabeth Warren didn’t get very far when she tried the same thing. “Nevertheless, she persisted.”
schrodingers_cat
@rikyrah: Yes she did! It was kind of an unusual situation. The D in question had to resign and there was no time to file for a nomination because the deadline had passed. Stan Rosenberg has been a mentor to many pols in the district and he had only one official challenger. So when he had to drop out, the race garnered 4 write-in candidates, in addition to the person who was on the ballot.
I was pretty impressed by Jo, when I met her at a neighbor’s house about two weeks ago, ended up canvasing for her. Though she can’t do much about immigration on the state level since its a federal issue she gave my concerns a full hearing and was knowledgeable and impassioned about the issue.
BTW my district is very white and rural but super liberal.
debbie
@Brachiator:
Yes, and this is all a ploy against his and Trump’s enemies.
Brachiator
@NotMax:
Interesting that there is no title or position of First Son in the Trump administration.
schrodingers_cat
I finally read that stupid op-ed. It is enraging.
Leto
@Kay: Rep Morris-McRodgers hosted Nunes at her fundraiser to explain to the base how they’re going to stick the final shiv in the Mueller investigation, as well as how they’ll continue the funneling of public money to the 1%.
This line of explanation has been especially prevalent the past 10 years. “Oh, I didn’t see that; I didn’t read that; I have no idea what you’re talking about”, all while running from reporters. Essentially refusing to accept accountability for their actions, or their parties actions. I’d like to hope that at some point it has to catch up. Eventually the rug is full and nothing more can be swept. Also I think that your collection would be simultaneously informative and depressing for future historians to follow. A failure scrapbook, if you will.
The Midnight Lurker
So… this fine young man is the only adult in the room?
Barbara
@Jack the Second: I generally agree with your take. Their option was, without burning the source, to explain it in an article. HOWEVER, I do believe that simply publishing it as written has a much bigger impact in jump starting an actual conversation. Because it’s one thing to report that an anonymous source told me this — it’s another thing to actually and in unedited version show you exactly what they are thinking inside the WH. Also, my first reaction was Mnuchin, but my knowledge of potential candidates is actually pretty weak, and I agree that someone on Pence’s staff is a likely culprit, and furthermore, that it was probably done with Pence’s approval or someone close to Pence. For one thing, of all the officials working at WH, Pence is the only one who can’t be fired, and the people working for him know that their best and brightest future is one where he becomes president. That gives them an incredibly strong motive as well as a sense of invulnerability that others probably don’t have.
schrodingers_cat
The smug self satisfaction of the op-ed writer is puke worthy.
To paraphrase in one line.
And the first three NYT picked comments are praising Pravda on the Hudson for their “bravery”
Barbara
@Jeffro:
Kamala Harris is boss. She takes no prisoners. I am so glad California Dems seem to be taking notice of the deep talent pool in the state — Adam Schiff, Ted Lieu, as well as others.
schrodingers_cat
First Republican Times Pick
Brave Rs are brave. SMH
RobNYNY
@TS (the original):
An excellent German word that English has needed, like Schadenfreude. Another one I am hoping will enter the English language is “Zumutbarkeit” (tsu-MOOT-bar-kite). It means “a willingness to put up with unreasonable demands.”
Fair Economist
@Cheryl from Maryland:
I am really hoping the author is never ID’d because then the suspicion will ruin at least a dozen wingnut careers.
Fair Economist
@schrodingers_cat:
We’ve known for some time the NYT is in on the right-wing takeover. Publishing this is yet more, and then choosing to spotlight support for this monster is another.
Miss Bianca
@Tom Levenson: My German is a little rusty – does that translate to “assface”? ; )
Miss Bianca
@Betty Cracker: I personally think it makes the Times complicit in the crimes, but I guess I have to agree that they probably thought they had to publish it – and I’m sure they’ll come up with some bs excuse about their own culpability.
Ceci n est pas mon nym
@Fair Economist:
Didn’t the CIA at one point get Stalin to kill off a bunch of his top people one by one by planting suspicions that they were disloyal?
Bet it wouldn’t be hard to play that game with our own stable genius. In fact in all seriousness, that’s where I think we’re going this fall. (“Kill off” in the sense of career, of course. He doesn’t have an actual firing squad. Yet.)
Obdurodon
@OzarkHillbilly: I agree. If the president turns out to have attained office by foul means, as almost certainly seems to be the case, then *every one* of his appointments in invalid and should be rescinded by whatever means necessary.
J R in WV
@O. Felix Culpa:
Calouste
@Kay: The interviewer should have said ” We will just give you a couple of minutes to read it now, it’s not very long.”, and call for a production assistant to bring in a print out.
Radiumgirl
@Adam L Silverman: Does that mean Trump could take revenge by firing everybody who works for Pence?
zhena gogolia
@Jack the Second:
This is a good analysis.
zhena gogolia
@dww44:
Yeah, I’ve called Blumenthal twice. I feel pretty confident he didn’t need my call to do the right thing.
Burt Lancaster is advertising his coup in the New York Times. Damn straight I’m going to pay attention to that! As well as to Kavanaugh.
J R in WV
@schrodingers_cat:
Congratulations, again. You should be aware that write-in campaigns that succeed are SUPER rare, and you are not likely to see this again in your whole voting life, so savor it while it is still fresh.
What a good time you’ve had in your first primary, I’m jealous!! Remarkable!
rikyrah
@Melusine:
UH HUH
UH HUH
sdhays
@Miss Bianca: I think there’s a great deal of value in having someone, even anonymous, essentially write a confessional about how they and everyone around the “President” is subverting the chain of command. Nothing it said isn’t something we’ve heard before – these people have been telling reporters this from the beginning; no one paying attention should be at all surprised. But those reports have a “that can’t possibly be fully accurate” quality to them, and those that want to be skeptical can discount them as drummed up reports from an anti-Trump press.
But this is different. This is a plain confession from someone who does not have an ideological reason for undermining the “President”. And no one is suggesting the Times made it up, so that means it’s been confirmed by Spankee himself – he totally believes it’s real, so that avenue of misdirection is gone. I think that matters and justifies the Times printing it.
sgrAstar
@xjmuellerlurks: total bullshit. No one is ignoring anything. Why do trolls always try to sell the idea that we can’t pay attention to more than one thing at a time? The value of the op-ed is demonstrated by the boosted disarray in the WH. Without speculating on the strategic objectives of the writer, I think we can agree that the op-ed has focused discussion on the preznit’s malevolence and utter incompetence, and pushed that discussion a lot farther into the mainstream. Is that a good thing? I’d say, yes.
Brachiator
@schrodingers_cat:
Coming late to what may be a dead thread. Still, it is great that your write-in candidate won! Very unusual.
Princess
If Ayers wrote it — and I think that is plausible — it is as good as if Pence wrote it. He certainly wrote it for pence and with pence and pence sent it to the NYT under his name, not that of his CoS
dejc
@Ken: Even those hiding behind anonymity, even those hiding behind those hiding behind anonymity, no one has made a single allegation that Trump has done anything wrong. Okay, let’s talk about Trump’s style, his temperament, his approach to the rule of law, our vaunted institutions, and the First Amendment…
Has Trump bent subordinates over the Resolute Desk to use them as his own personal humidor and then committed perjury? No, that was Bill Clinton’s style.
Has Trump weaponized the IRS against the American people, left four Americans to die in Benghazi, run guns to Mexican drug lords, and spied on the national media? No, that was Barack Obama’s style.
Has Trump politicized a funeral to fuel his petty grudges? No, that’s the McCain style.
Has Trump launched a war of choice with no endgame? No, that was George W. Bush’s style.
Has Trump been caught off guard by no less than the fall of the Soviet Union and 9/11; did he sucker us into an endless war because his intelligence was junk? No, that’s the Deep State’s style.
Has Trump laundered money through a law firm to hire a foreigner to approach the Russians so they can fill a dossier with lies as a means to rig an election? No, that’s Hillary’s style.
Has Trump lied to obtain warrants so he can abuse his power to surveill and spy on a presidential campaign? No, that’s the FBI’s style.
Has Trump called for violence? No, that’s CNN’s style.
Does Trump oversee an institution riddled with rapists? No, that’s Hollywood’s style.
Is Trump in charge of an institution that covers up for and enables sexual predators? No, that’s the establishment media’s style.
Does Trump stand silent as his audience boos rape victims? No, that’s Jake Tapper’s style.
Those guilty of the above want to overturn an election because Trump refuses to take their crap, enjoys cheeseburgers, fires off tweets that haven’t been focus-grouped, wants to kill the monstrous Bashar al-Assad, protects our border, and might have yodeled in a porn star’s gully 13-years-ago.
All I know is this…
For the first time since those passenger planes hit the World Trade Center 17 long years ago, Trump has at long last returned America to peace and prosperity… Something so rare, no one under the age of 30 even remembers what it’s like.
VincentN
@dejc:
You almost had me but this statement is so absurd that it has to be satire. Bravo.