Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Some judge needs to shut this circus down soon.

Republicans do not pay their debts.

Schmidt just says fuck it, opens a tea shop.

“Squeaker” McCarthy

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

Conservatism: there are some people the law protects but does not bind and others who the law binds but does not protect.

🎶 Those boots were made for mockin’ 🎵

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

But frankly mr. cole, I’ll be happier when you get back to telling us to go fuck ourselves.

Let us savor the impending downfall of lawless scoundrels who richly deserve the trouble barreling their way.

Not all heroes wear capes.

Happy indictment week to all who celebrate!

T R E 4 5 O N

Nancy smash is sick of your bullshit.

When your entire life is steeped in white supremacy, equality feels like discrimination.

Only Democrats have agency, apparently.

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

No one could have predicted…

Infrastructure week. at last.

It’s time for the GOP to dust off that post-2012 autopsy, completely ignore it, and light the party on fire again.

I didn’t have alien invasion on my 2023 BINGO card.

JFC, are there no editors left at that goddamn rag?

I really should read my own blog.

Bark louder, little dog.

You are here: Home / Politics / Trumpery / Hail to the Hairpiece / Add another plea deal

Add another plea deal

by | 205 Comments

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Let’s see what else shakes loose today and tomorrow.

Update 1 Here is the information that Cohen is pleading guilty to (hosted by Lawfare)

Reader Interactions

205Comments

  6. 6.

    NotMax

    Wonder if the archivists of each chamber possess the authority to go back and put asterisks and appropriate notations in the records in such cases.

  8. 8.

    Yarrow

    LOLOLOL. Wonder if Trump got a heads up about this happening and that’s why he left the Christmas tree lighting ceremony early, looking like he’d crapped his pants?

    @Gin & Tonic: The meltdown of all of these traitors is delicious to watch.

  10. 10.

    Dev Null

    Anyone else having problems with stackpathcdn?

    I’ve been seeing wait times of multiple seconds for at least the past 12 hours (ie, since I first noticed), and possibly longer.

  11. 11.

    Jerzy Russian

    Nothing to see here, fellow citizens. Who among us hasn’t had their long-time personal attorney involved a variety of shady and/or questionable deals? Besides, he was trapped into perjury by being asked questions under oath. This is all normal.

    I am trying to learn to speak Stupid. I often ask for translations from Stupid here, so I figured I should just go ahead and learn it myself. How am I doing so far?

  13. 13.

    Dev Null

    @Jerzy Russian:

    How am I doing so far?

    Personally, I think you should throw in references to Crooked Hillary and “17 Angry Dems” and a brief note that Javanka’s private email server is nothing at all like Crooked Hillary’s classified emails …

    … but that’s a matter of personal taste, I s’pose.

  15. 15.

    Elizabelle

    And Deutsche Bank in Frankfurt raided today. Allegedly for the Panama Papers. And what else?

    Love that it happens the morning all the “elites” are heading to Argentina for the G-20.

  17. 17.

    Jerzy Russian

    @Gin & Tonic:

    To add to the lulz, a douchebag named Randy Credico, a minor planet in the orbit of Roger Stone, got drunk and went on the Twitter machine last night. Since

    You mean an ASSteroid, based on the orbital properties and location.

  21. 21.

    Elizabelle

    I think we’ve hit the beginning of the end. I speak of the Deutsche Bank raid. It’s got huge possibilities, even if the stated purpose is the Panama Papers.

  22. 22.

    Elizabelle

    @Gin & Tonic: (1) I guess they need the business. (2) Has been used before as retirement locale for last century’s Nazis. Check out the weather and culture, boys.

  23. 23.

    Jerzy Russian

    @Dev Null:

    17 Angry Dems? I had not heard that one before, although lately my memory is such that I can hide my own Easter eggs. Maybe I should try another language Navajo? That probably be easier to learn.

  24. 24.

    Yarrow

    I remember awhile ago The Hoarse Whisperer on Twitter, who seems to understand how narcissists work and how it affects those around them, had a thread talking about Cohen. He said that once the spell breaks, those who were under the spell of the narcissist often can’t believe what the narcissist got them to do. And they’re angry.

    He felt Cohen was a perfect example of that because you could sort of watch the meltdown happen. First all the denials from Cohen, then the begging and pleading to Trump to help him, then the threats, and yet Trump never stepped in to help Cohen. So at some point the spell broke and Cohen was ready to turn on Trump. The HW felt at that point Cohen was incredibly dangerous to Trump because he’d want to make Trump pay.

  29. 29.

    rikyrah

    Once again,

    I will ask that a FrontPager take on the topic of the sadistic sexual predator in Florida, his sweetheart deal, and the current Secretary of Labor.

    It’s a repulsive story..will make your skin crawl…
    Check the Miami Herald Twitter feed.

  30. 30.

    Jerzy Russian

    @OzarkHillbilly: I do need my brain for my current work, such as it is.

    On a serious note, I have always had a hard time moving from the “knows a few words” stage to being the actually functional stage. This I am envious of all of the multi-lingual people out there.

  31. 31.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Gin & Tonic: Their courts will take jurisdiction over matters outside of their borders.

    ETA: never mind, thought you were asking about something else.

  32. 32.

    Yarrow

    @rikyrah: It is truly disgusting. It’s a big enough story the Today Show did a segment on it today.

    Two horrible sexual predator stories in the news today: that one and another Les Moonves story. Rich, powerful men are not to be trusted.

  33. 33.

    SFAW

    @JPL:

    I hope you are right, because the republicans in the Senate will only impeach if trumps polls fall tremendously.

    That’s a Necessary condition, but not a Sufficient one.

    However, I have a feeling that the 27-percent rule does not apply to Shitgibbon — I figure there are 35-plus percent of hardcore racists and/or morons in this country. The 27-percent rule only relates to the insane, irrespective of their racism, fascism, moronitude, or assholishness.

    I’ll be giving a lecture on this topic at More (a/k/a Morse) Science High School, it’s scheduled for 2/29/19.

  37. 37.

    different-church-lady

    @Yarrow: Yes: for me the very moment I figured out I was under a spell felt like a key had just turned in a lock, and in that instant I was free of it forever.

  38. 38.

    Ceci n est pas mon nym

    So, although “Tick tock, motherfuckers” will never get old, I speculated a couple of days that maybe the sense of anticipation was getting beyond ticking and tocking, and moving into “Tell-Tale Heart” territory. So I give you the first quote:

    TICK TOCK: True! –nervous –very, very dreadfully nervous I had been and am; but why will you say that I am mad?

    It’s not a long story, I need to space this out.

  42. 42.

    Yarrow

    @SFAW: Let’s ask Cole how rich he is.

    @different-church-lady: That’s how The Hoarse Whisperer described it. It’s a process but at some point a switch flips and the person sees everything differently. And often they can’t believe what they were doing and putting up with.

  44. 44.

    Betty Cracker

    Huh, this additional info from CNBC is interesting:

    Cohen’s plea in federal court in Manhattan, his second there in the past four months, came as part of a new deal with special counsel Robert Mueller in the probe of Russian interference in the 2016 U.S. presidential election.

    Cohen told a judge Thursday that he lied in 2017 to the Senate Intelligence Committee in order to be consistent with Trump’s political messages, and out of loyalty to the president…

    Here’s what Cohen said at that appearance:

    “I assume we will discuss the rejected proposal to build a Trump property in Moscow that was terminated in January of 2016; which occurred before the Iowa caucus and months before the very first primary,” Cohen said in that statement. “This was solely a real estate deal and nothing more. I was doing my job. I would ask that the two-page statement about the Moscow proposal that I sent to the Committee in August be incorporated into and attached to this transcript.”

    Apparently the attempts to develop a Moscow property were ongoing until the summer of 2016:

    Well, that opens up all kinds of interesting possibilities, doesn’t it?

  45. 45.

    Yarrow

    @Tony J: LOL. Been saying that when things start happening they’ll happen quickly. Some speculation that Mueller’s team had been waiting for the Senate election in MS to be over so there was no possible question of the investigation interfering with the election. That happened Tuesday and BAM!

  47. 47.

    Ceci n est pas mon nym

    @Yarrow: It has been said many times that Republicanism is a cult. I’ve unfortunately had first hand experience with friends and family lost to a religious cult, and read a lot online from former members of that cult and their thought processes during and after.

    The waking-up moment is exactly as you are describing, and filled with a lot of anger. But to get to that point you have to get through anger at yourself for believing in these people and giving so much of your life and money to them. You have to be willing to admit bad things about yourself, and accept them. It’s a really big hurdle for people to get to that point, which is a major reason why people stay in the cults so long and ignore evidence as long as they can.

  48. 48.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Jerzy Russian: I once was on the level of “knows enough words and grammer of Spanish that can navigate south of the border while traveling alone.” Since then I met and married my wife who is fluent in Spanish, Catalan and English with a solid grounding in French. It is kind of embarrassing to be fumbling thru it while her face registers 7 levels of frustration.

  49. 49.

    Jeffro

    @Elizabelle:

    I think we’ve hit the beginning of the end. I speak of the Deutsche Bank raid. It’s got huge possibilities, even if the stated purpose is the Panama Papers.

    From your lips to the FSM’s ears.

    I love the smell of RICO in the morning!

  53. 53.

    Yarrow

    @Wild Cat: Horseshoe theory. If we think Russia and others aren’t playing both sides we’re being woefully naive.

    Hey, speaking of which, how ’bout that Tad Devine!

  59. 59.

    Gin & Tonic

    @Ceci n est pas mon nym: They used to have a section of the magazine that previewed events around town in the coming week or two (movies, concerts, theater, opera) in a typeface and size typically used for baseball box scores (agate?). There’d be a one- or two-sentence review or preview of the event. So there was a very long-running off-Broadway show called The Fantasticks. After some years of having the same capsule review, which every reader knew by heart, they started excerpting(?), serializing(?) Ulysses in that tiny space, about two sentences at a time. Place that in the category of very inside joke, I guess.

    I don’t think they finished, but I’m not sure.

  60. 60.

    Jay C

    @Yarrow:

    @SFAW: Let’s ask Cole how rich he is.

    Not sure it would stack up in pure dollar terms, but I’d guess that John’s RE holdings are probably on a firmer financial footing than Donald Trump’s.

  63. 63.

    Jerzy Russian

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    My wife is fluent in three languages, with English being her third. I am at the toddler level in her second language, where I know the words for common food items and certain barnyard and zoo animals. I can also say simple phrases like “I feel sick” or “I need to poo”.

  67. 67.

    Dev Null

    @Jerzy Russian:

    17 Angry Dems? I had not heard that one before

    Surely you know about “Conflicted Bob Mueller and his 17 Angry Dems”?

    … although lately my memory is such that I can hide my own Easter eggs.

    Yah, me too… one of the few wins in getting old.

    Maybe I should try another language Navajo? That probably be easier to learn.

    So I hear. /snark

  69. 69.

    Ceci n est pas mon nym

    @oldgold: Nah, and neither will Amir’s German quote at #61 about Mueller grinding slowly but exceedingly fine. With bilingual pun yet!

  70. 70.

    germy

    Trump had nice things to say about Epstein in an old interview.

    “I’ve known Jeff for 15 years. Terrific guy. He’s a lot of fun to be with. It is even said that he likes beautiful women as much as I do, and many of them are on the younger side. No doubt about it, Jeffrey enjoys his social life.” https://t.co/rYL2B3wlSf— Zelda J Pinwheel ☂️ (@ZeldaJPinwheel) November 28, 2018

    If you ask him now, he’d probably say “Never heard of the guy. I think he was a pal of Bill Clinton’s.”

  73. 73.

    germy

    Thread:

    Organized crime.

    It's the reason your paychecks don't go as far as they once did, why incomes are unequal.

    It's the reason we have an Opioid epidemic and our Legislative branch feels broken.

    It's the reason executive compensation looks more like legalized embezzlement.

    1/— Chris Nethery (@ToestringRd) November 28, 2018

  77. 77.

    Gin & Tonic

    @Betty Cracker:

    the summer of 2016

    The summer, eh? Wasn’t the R convention in July? The one where the only change to the platform made by the T team was in favor of Russia?

  78. 78.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Jerzy Russian: My wife grew up in Franco’s Spain, speaking both Majorcan (a dialect of Catalan) and Spanish, but it was forbidden to teach any language but Spanish (in grammar school I assume, she learned French in HS). So she while she can speak Majorcan fluently, and she is able to work it out while reading it is almost impossible for her to write.

  83. 83.

    Yarrow

    @Betty Cracker: I remember when that happened. Jaw-dropping. But also hilarious watching Manafort stumble so badly. As usual our complicit media just shrugged.

    A full scale investigation into our media organizations is also necessary to get us out of this mess. They’re as compromised as anyone.

  87. 87.

    Elizabelle

    @Yarrow: Thank you for the money laundering thread.

    And I agree with you about our complicit media. For one thing, consolidated media ownership in the US has to go. Break up big, lying media. It’s got a bigger mission than infotainment.

    (I kind of think all the focus on AOC is like poltico-ing up the Kardashians. Are WE clamoring for all AOC all the time? Maybe not.)

  88. 88.

    LAO

    I think this thread by PopeHat gets it right:

    Okay. Let's talk about a few reasons today's Cohen plea is significant.First: it expressly contemplates Cohen's cooperation, which Cohen's previous agreement did not. Suggests that Mueller is satisfied that Cohen's cooperating enough to give him an agreement. /1— OkayMaybeItsRICOHat (@Popehat) November 29, 2018

  89. 89.

    schrodingers_cat

    @Yarrow: It is sad to see some leftie Indian journalists whose credentials are otherwise impeccable fall for Assange and Wikileaks as the great savior of democracy. Ideological blinders are not just RWNJ weakness.

  90. 90.

    oldgold

    @Yarrow:

    “Let’s go.” “We can’t.” “Why not?” “We’re waiting for Godot.”
    “ESTRAGON: “I can’t go on like this.”
    VLADIMIR:”That’s what you think.”

    ― Samuel Beckett, Waiting for Godot

  91. 91.

    Elizabelle

    @Yarrow: Do you think you could find that Hoarse Whisperer thread on narcissism? I can look too. I think it appeared here a few times. (Mnemosyne is also interested in narcissists.)

  94. 94.

    Elizabelle

    @LAO: PopeHat’s changed his/her twitter handle to OKMaybeItsRICOHat.

    Napalm in the morning. RICO for Christmas season.

  95. 95.

    Amir Khalid

    The references to “Individual 1” in that document remind me of the references to “Malaysian Official 1” in the 1MDB case. And we all know what happened to that guy.

  96. 96.

    Platonailedit

    Multimillionaire Jeffrey Epstein was accused of sexually assaulting dozens of teen girls. Their stories were dismissed by prosecutors, who cut Epstein a lenient deal. His victims have never had a voice, until now.

    Part 1 of #PerversionofJustice: https://t.co/Rdg8AkvaDO— Miami Herald (@MiamiHerald) November 28, 2018

    "I don't think anyone has been told the truth about what Jeffrey Epstein did," said Michelle Licata, now 30. "He ruined my life and a lot of girls' lives. People need to know what he did and why he wasn't prosecuted so it never happens again." pic.twitter.com/RCWvKdqYGX— Miami Herald (@MiamiHerald) November 28, 2018

    Finally, some journalism about these scummy pedophile thugs, who of whom went on become the totus.

  97. 97.

    David Evans

    @MP: Yes. Also Einstein

    Raffiniert ist der Herr Gott, aber boshaft ist Er nicht.

    ant the text of Brahms’s German Requiem – though there I may be influenced by the music.

  99. 99.

    Yarrow

    @Elizabelle: Here’s a short two tweet thread on Cohen:

    Ya know, re: the whole Cohen thing, I’m not surprised he’s gonna full-snitch.There’s a thing with narcissists. Once a flying monkey gets ostracized, they sometimes awaken as if from a spell and are like “Holy crap, all of that stuff was me? We did all that?!”1/— The Hoarse Whisperer (@HoarseWisperer) October 18, 2018

    If you go to the top of the HW’s Twitter feed he has a pinned tweet that is the first in a long thread about narcissists.

    I know Mnem has read his twitter feed, as she’s mentioned it.

  103. 103.

    smintheus

    I have a theory about why Manafort is maintaining his seemingly crazy cooperation/coordination agreement with Trump. He knows that a pardon wouldn’t keep him out of jail because he’s subject to prosecution in state courts, and things he has done during the Mueller investigation have added further crimes that Trump can’t protect him from.

    I suspect that Manafort is looking to play Trump in order to get leniency from Mueller. He may have little enough to offer Mueller that Mueller doesn’t already know; his bargaining position clearly is weak. But if Trump commits further crimes while coordinating with Manafort – obstruction of justice, witness tampering, what have you – and Manafort can prove it, Manafort’s bargaining position gets a lot stronger. The cover up with Manafort could be the thing that cooks Trump’s goose, as the evidence of a crime most easily proven and most easily made public (even without necessarily the willingness of the Attorney General to make it public). The AG can’t easily block Mueller from making public his evidence about Manafort’s crimes.

  104. 104.

    Yarrow

    @schrodingers_cat: Yep. The far left and far right are much closer together than people generally think.

    @oldgold: You do you.

    @LAO: I get a kick out of Popehat’s name changes. New ones all the time. Looooove the smell of RICO in the morning. Hey, hey Reince Priebus, man in charge of the RNC during all of these happenings. Will be so good to see you again. Heading into court.

  105. 105.

    LAO

    tremendous timing for Trump to tweet "where's a crime? Show me a crime" and then two hours later his ex-lawyer tosses another crime onto the crime pile— Simon Maloy (@SimonMaloy) November 29, 2018

  107. 107.

    Kay

    ooh. Good. Developments.

    Cohen doesn’t seem as horrible as the rest of the Trumpsters to me. I like his hangdog expressive face. He seems more like a real person.

    Maybe I could testify at his sentencing and OPINE on how I think he’s rehab-able :)

    There’s hope for him. He MAY have a redeeming quality or two. He could potentially become law-abiding and productive, I think.

  109. 109.

    Amir Khalid

    @Yarrow:
    I suspect his lawyers didn’t dare tell him, because they were afraid he would brag about it somewhere public and wind up, well, not helping things.

  110. 110.

    The Dangerman

    A little help. I’ve lost track of who is guilty of shit in Trump’s orbit; I think it will be easier to keep track of who’s innocent. I mean, the Adults (I’m guessing Baron’s clean, but will need an army of therapists for the rest of his life).

  111. 111.

    bemused

    @Yarrow:

    I remember that as well and thought at the time that Manafort was a very poor liar. Yet, he thought he could get away with lying to the Mueller team. The lying liars are all hubris.

  114. 114.

    SFAW

    @The Dangerman:

    A little help. I’ve lost track of who is guilty of shit in Trump’s orbit;

    All of them.

    keep track of who’s innocent.

    None of them.

    Glad I could help.

  119. 119.

    SFAW

    @Yarrow:

    My only “complaint” (so to speak) re: “Tick tock” is that the bell ain’t tolling fast enough for all those motherfuckers. Not your fault or problem, obviously. And I will keep using it whenever appropriate.

  120. 120.

    germy

    @Kay:

    Cohen doesn’t seem as horrible as the rest of the Trumpsters to me. I like his hangdog expressive face. He seems more like a real person.

    I heard some tapes of him leaving threatening messages on people’s phones. He may be a real person, but not a nice one.

    If he hadn’t gotten caught, he’d still be leaving threatening messages.

  122. 122.

    Yarrow

    @different-church-lady: People will say no, but I’m optimistic. When the truth comes out, and it is starting to and will continue to, people will see. We need to do a lot of cleaning house to make our country work again, though.

    @Amir Khalid: Agreed. Trump can’t keep his mouth shut. @LAO: Hysterical. The walls are closing in and he can’t hide. I need more popcorn!

  123. 123.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Kay:

    Cohen doesn’t seem as horrible as the rest of the Trumpsters to me.

    Cohen was a sucker. Now he’s woke. I think most can be sympathetic with such a person because there is always a touch of “There but for the grace of God go I.”

  124. 124.

    bemused

    @germy:

    I’d guess that a large part of Cohen’s “regret” is huge anger that he is the one charged with felonies while trump is still walking around free.

  125. 125.

    Yarrow

    @SFAW: When it happens it’s going to happen fast. It’s starting now and things are going to get crazier. It won’t be long now, although just given the timing of things I think Nancy Smash will be Speaker before everything falls apart for Trump. Just as extra security because Ryan is a traitor.

  127. 127.

    laura

    @rikyrah: What Rikyrah said!
    Unaccountable Power and Entitlement and pssy fever.
    Epstein, Trump, Clinton, Dershowitz, Prince Andrew, and…………….?
    Kick over every rotted log.
    Demand that the Labor Secretarty Acosta resign today.
    I want to puke after reading the Miami Herald.

  128. 128.

    lollipopguild

    @Jay C: John’s “richness” is the fact that he is a warm loving cranky honest falible human being. As a human being John is light years ahead of trump.

  129. 129.

    germy

    @bemused:

    I’d guess that a large part of Cohen’s “regret” is huge anger that he is the one charged with felonies while trump is still walking around free.

    Yes. He’s outraged, not woke.

  133. 133.

    JMG

    Cohen was a low rent slimeball who lived on the fringes of New York’s high rent slimeball community. Folks like him have been around the city since Peter Stuyvesant was and have been taking falls for centuries. At least he had the good sense not to count on Trump to rescue him.

  134. 134.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @Kay: IIRC Cohen grew up in a family with fringe connections to OC, saw a lot of easy money being made with no heavy lifting. Stumbling into trump’s orbit must have seemed like coming home, and whatever weird charisma trump seems to have for broken people made Cohen believe he was one of the family, almost a son, almost a Jared! And now he finds out he’s not even a Lewandowski or a Keith Schiller

    @schrodingers_cat: I’ve been busy the last few weeks and haven’t read too many threads. Is he still saying Nancy Pelosi will cost us the mid-terms?

  136. 136.

    danjos

    Witches are made of wood and lighter than ducks?

    Dumbest administration ever, they keep pleading guilty to witch hunts.

  137. 137.

    jonas

    Back during the campaign and early in Trump’s term as the extent of his corruption and election rigging was becoming clear, Josh Marshall at TPM made a remarkably prescient prediction: that Michael Cohen would be the lynchpin to everything. The money laundering, the email hacks/collusion, the pornstar payoffs/campaign finance violations. Cohen was at the center of Trumpworld and knows where the bodies are buried and has been laying out a detailed roadmap for Mueller to follow for the past six months. The cherry on top of all of this would be if Cohen admitted that he had met with Russians in Prague, as alleged in the Steele dossier. He’s always strenuously denied this, but there has been reporting that Mueller has other evidence of the meeting. So we’ll see.

  139. 139.

    germy

    trump reserves the word “weak” for people he hates and fears the most.

    TRUMP, speaking to reporters outside the White House, says Michael Cohen is "a weak person. And by being weak, unlike other people that you watch, he's a weak person, and what he's trying to do is get a reduced sentence. So he is lying about a project everybody knew about." pic.twitter.com/QVSGJcoRa6— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) November 29, 2018

  140. 140.

    bemused

    @germy:

    Yup, he is only woke to the fact that he was too dumb to imagine he/they getting caught and that trump would make him the fall guy in a nanosecond.

  143. 143.

    SFAW

    @Elizabelle:

    Please don’t even joke about that. Not funny. At all.

    Noted, but no promises.

    But, really, has anyone asked Moulton what, to me, is a key question: “If your insurrection looks like it will result in Speaker McCarthy, will you revise your stance?” If he says “No,” that’s a problem, and I don’t quite trust him enough to believe he’ll 100-percent-no-bullshit say “Yes.” Maybe I’m not giving him enough credit, but I’ve seen too many “friends” kill the goose because they weren’t getting enough golden eggs.

    I truly hope I am concerned over nothing.

  145. 145.

    SFAW

    @Yarrow:

    Yes, I know she’s smarter. I’m concerned that Moulton and his fellow travelers think it’s a holy cause, etc., rather than a negotiating tactic.

  146. 146.

    Yarrow

    @SFAW: Nancy is plenty smart enough to maneuver around him. He thinks he’s way smarter than he is. I think it’s a media-manufactured “controversy” to generate “Dems in disarray” headlines.

  147. 147.

    Yarrow

    @SFAW: Almost no one in Congress thinks something is a holy cause. Maybe one of those guys would but the rest will easily be persuaded by the carrots of committee positions or other goodies or the sticks of being banished to a low level committee. They all want to be in power and if they vote for McCarthy the opposite party will have more power. They may be making noise now but they’re not stupid. No one is challenging Nancy so it’s her or McCarthy. McCarthy won’t give them or any Dems choice committee positions.The rest of the Dems will slaughter them if they vote to make him Speaker.

  149. 149.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    I don’t know who Rantt Media, is, but…

    Rantt Media @ RanttMedia
    51m51 minutes ago
    So this morning, Deutsche Bank was raided in a money laundering investigation.

    Trump’s company owes Deutsche Bank $364 million.

    Kushner’s company owes Deutsche Bank $285 million.

    We don’t know if it’s related, but watch this space.

    per the NYT, the investigation is related to the Panama Papers, which had a lot of details about Russian oligarchs

    BERLIN — One hundred seventy officers searched the headquarters of Deutsche Bank in Frankfurt and five other sites in the area early Thursday as part of a money-laundering investigation involving hundreds of millions of euros, prosecutors in Frankfurt said.

  151. 151.

    randy khan

    @Gin & Tonic:

    I never knew that – what a great little joke. And The Fantasticks is still running, so if they’d kept it up, they might have gotten to the end of the book by now.

  153. 153.

    SFAW

    @Yarrow:

    Intellectually, I know you’re right, and I’m not losing any sleep over this.

    But I’m kind of annoyed that Moulton and some of his collaborators still seem to be pushing this.

  154. 154.

    Kelly

    @Jerzy Russian: I can make sense of signs and other simple text in most languages that share our alphabet. Then I visited Jerusalem and found Hebrew and Arabic completely incomprehensible. Fortunately English is commonplace.

  155. 155.

    Jeffro

    @germy:

    trump reserves the word “weak” for people he hates and fears the most.

    and “boring” for people who nail him: Obama’s pre-midterms speech, NYT article on his family’s long-running illegal tax avoidance, etc

  156. 156.

    Mike in DC

    The Russian conspiracy hypothesis in a nutshell:
    1. Trump’s campaign and the Russians entered into an implicit/explicit quid pro quo agreement: Russian help and financial inducements in exchange for some foreign policy favors once in office. Both parties took affirmative actions in furtherance of the conspiracy.
    2. Trump was aware of the deal
    3. Because he was aware of the deal, Trump took extraordinary steps to try to stop, impede and obstruct the criminal investigation of the conspiracy.

    We are ever closer to confirmation of 1. If 1 is confirmed, 2 is virtually guaranteed to be confirmed as well, and 3 will be obvious.

  157. 157.

    Mary G

    Love the title of this article by the WaPo factchecker: A tour through the tumbleweeds of Trump’s thoughts on the Fed

    The White House declined to answer our questions intended to clarify the president’s words, so we consulted with experts in an effort to deconstruct his rhetoric.

    We cannot claim complete success, and it’s fairly amazing the White House would not try to offer an explanation. But perhaps aides do not know what he meant, either. Anyway, here’s a tour through his spin, bluster and puzzling claims.

    Almost their entire front web page is bad news for Twitler. One article talks about average life expectancy in America dropping for the first time since WWI, which is a result of drug overdoses and suicides, but the president isn’t innocent of exacerbating them.

  161. 161.

    rikyrah

    @RepJeffries: “How dare you lecture us about treason. This is not a dictatorship. It’s a democracy and we do not have to stand for a reality show host masquerading as President of the United States.”pic.twitter.com/SfwpUl48v3 ??

    — NotMyPresident (@ironstowe) November 29, 2018

  162. 162.

    Gin & Tonic

    Seeing reports that Trump has called off his planned meeting with Putin at the G20 because of the ongoing situation with the Ukrainian ships and sailors. Honestly thought he’d fold.

    Also seeing that Ukraine’s security services have released audio of Russian aircraft, ships and controllers communicating at the time of the incident, that makes it clear this was aggression on Russia’s part. No links because everything so far is in a combination of Ukrainian and Russian.

  163. 163.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    @Gin & Tonic: Hmm, this guy is implying Donny Dumbass is a pedophile. So is this what Pizzagate was really about?

    Credible evidence that Trump is a child molester might be beyond the pale for even the Republicans.

  164. 164.

    Robert Sneddon

    @MP:

    Some people say German isn’t a pretty language.

    German love poetry sounds like a declaration of war with no quarter.

  165. 165.

    dmsilev

    @Gin & Tonic: Awww, too bad. I’m sure Donnie was looking forward to chatting with his bestest buddy Vlad. Well, I guess that just makes more time to chat with the Saudi Murder Prince.

  166. 166.

    Served

    The feds are currently raiding the office of a long-time Chicago alderman who represented Trump in his dealings with the city.

    https://twitter.com/lynnsweet/status/1068183197412982784

    Lynn Sweet
    ‏
    Verified account

    @lynnsweet
    14m14 minutes ago
    More Lynn Sweet Retweeted Chicago Sun-Times
    City Hall power Burke, who sits on millions of campaign dollars, represented @realDonaldTrump in Chicago real estate dealings. Up for re-election in February and for first time in ages, has a potential fight. And now this…..

  169. 169.

    MattF

    @Gin & Tonic: Showing love for murderers is part of Trump’s behavioral repertoire, but I’m guessing that the NatSec team made a collective frowny face about a Trump/Putin meeting.

  171. 171.

    Jeffro

    The dam really is breaking…raids all over…people flipping right and left…and this:

    Donald Trump appeals to men secretly insecure about their masculinity:

    LOLOLOLOLOLOL

    …research suggests that Trump is not necessarily attracting male supporters who are as confidently masculine as the president presents himself to be. Instead, Trump appears to appeal more to men who are secretly insecure about their manhood. We call this the “fragile masculinity hypothesis.” Here is some of our evidence.

    What is ‘fragile masculinity’?

    Research shows that many men feel pressure to look and behave in stereotypically masculine ways — or risk losing their status as “real men.” Masculine expectations are socialized from early childhood and can motivate men to embrace traditional male behaviors while avoiding even the hint of femininity. This unforgiving standard of maleness makes some men worry that they’re falling short. These men are said to experience “fragile masculinity.”

    The political process provides a way that fragile men can reaffirm their masculinity. By supporting tough politicians and policies, men can reassure others (and themselves) of their own manliness…

    In a major American newspaper, no less. Run while you still can, Donnie…grab your ‘go bag’ and just GO!

  173. 173.

    Martin

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    Cohen was a sucker.

    We’re all suckers. Most of us are reasonably well attuned to spotting a person who is lying to us because we see the tells from someone struggling with their inner guilt. Narcissists lie with such conviction and confidence that we get caught out believing them. If you are a person who is swayed by confidence, then you miss the tell entirely. I’ve known pathological liars and it’s pretty easy to buy into their lies. When you realize you were duped, you’re pissed. A bit at them, but as much at yourself for not having the independence of thought and skepticism to avoid getting taken in. We all like to believe we are good at judging the character of others and here’s a situation where you blow it entirely, and it stings. It rattles your own self-confidence, and you’re mad because you put your trust in this person who gave zero trust back to you.

    That’s the thing about Michael Avenatti that sounds an alarm for me – his unwavering confidence. It’s probably just his personality, but I now take that as a tell that someone is bullshitting me. I have a hard time trusting extremely confident people.

  176. 176.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes

    My understanding is that there are two pools of information and charges being developed – one pool is purely federal, and the other consists of violations of New York law that isn’t entangled with the federal stuff.

    The process has included extensive cooperation with the New York AG, which may already have a stack of sealed indictments naming Trump and his children.

    This is Mueller’s insurance policy against premature pardons; time done at Attica is a lot less fun than time done in a pleasant federal lockup.

  178. 178.

    Martin

    @Tazj:

    The California election system “just defies logic to me,” Ryan said during a Washington Post event.

    “We were only down 26 seats the night of the election and three weeks later, we lost basically every California race. This election system they have — I can’t begin to understand what ‘ballot harvesting’ is.”

    The California election system is pretty simple if Ryan would take 10 minutes to understand it. We now allow unrestricted mail-in voting. Ballots can be postmarked as late as election day, and can be dropped off at any polling place. Unlike the usual electronic machines most counties use, the mail-in ballots need to be scanned and processed and that takes time. Additionally, we’ve added same-day voter registration which allows a provisional ballot to be filed. Finally, a few months ago we passed a law that says that for a ballot which is contested, the voter needs to be consulted to obtain the true intent of the vote, which also takes time. As a result our deadline for certifying the election is a month after the election.

    On election night there were 3.5 million mail-in ballots that were received that day. There was an additional 1 million provisional ballots. I know that in my district, the Republican observer contested just about every signature of Democratic mail-in ballots. So GOP ballots were getting counted but Dem ballots needed to contact the voter and ask if that was their ballot. That’s why so many ballots are still being counted.

    The GOP understand the CA system extremely well. They are exploiting it to their advantage. That’s fine, that’s why the checks are there. But to then claim you don’t understand it – that’s bullshit.

    And our process will likely get faster. Some of these laws were passed just months ago and Registrar of Voters didn’t really have time to implement efficient systems.

  180. 180.

    Gravenstone

    @LAO: Michael, about that bus we threw you under earlier? Here’s a whole fleet of them for you to be ground beneath.

  182. 182.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @rikyrah: You just don’t know how powerful Burke is.

    One of the last old bulls from the Daley Machine, isn’t he? He must be older than dirt

  183. 183.

    Gravenstone

    @The Dangerman:

    A little help. I’ve lost track of who is guilty of shit in Trump’s orbit…

    Start with :”Everyone”, then work backwards. You’re right that it’s much shorter that way.

  184. 184.

    O. Felix Culpa

    @Robert Sneddon: Sorry, no. Have you ever read Rilke, zum Beispiel? German isn’t as mellifluous as French, but it still has beautiful lyric poetry to offer.

    #GermanLiteratureMajor

  186. 186.

    Elizabelle

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: Ed Burke. Democrat. Alderman for 49 years. His father held the seat previously. Looks a bit like Dick Cheney.

    Nevah heard of him before, but I am not from Chicago. Rikyrah can keep us informed.

  188. 188.

    O. Felix Culpa

    @Elizabelle: Burke is a long-time machine pol and powerful guy. A big fish on the Chicago scene, so this news is a very big deal. (Former Chicagoan)

  189. 189.

    J R in WV

    Given that the whole set of Republicans appear to be unable to not project their own flaws onto others, I also believe pedophilia and child abuse of the worst kind will appear at some point in this legal Shakespearean saga.

    Money laundering may be the tool used to open up the box of horrible secrets, but the box is full of horror.

    I think Barron and Tiffany are the two trumps who are not guilty of any crimes, Barron because he’s so young and Tiffany because her mom kept her thousands of miles from her dad. Plus she is relatively young also, and appears to be pretty smart scholastically. Hope she’s learning about how to be a better person from the headlines!

  190. 190.

    TenguPhule

    @J R in WV:

    I also believe pedophilia and child abuse of the worst kind will appear at some point in this legal Shakespearean saga.

    Too late.

    Look up Epstein.

  191. 191.

    Dev Null

    @SFAW:

    OK, that’s all I got.

    If I weren’t so lazy I’d check online for origin, but … condition contrary to fact. Here are a few more, probably from an entirely different source:

    “Glue the sheep to the dark blue background”
    “It’s easy to tell the depth of a well”
    “These days a chicken leg is a rare dish”
    “Joe brought a young girl”
    “The juice of lemons makes fine punch”

  192. 192.

    J R in WV

    @Enhanced Voting Techniques:

    Credible evidence that Trump is a child molester might be beyond the pale for even the Republicans.

    So that photo of The Donald, little Ivanka, and the rutting parrots didn’t do it for you? ‘Cause it did it for me, along with the pix in bed, in the convertible, etc, etc.

    Just do a google image search for Donald Ivanka Parrots, the photos will do it for you.

  194. 194.

    Ladyraxterinok

    @Elizabelle: State and local police raid chancery of Galveston-Houston archdioce searching for and seizing files on priests reported for sex abuse but whose cases were handled ‘in house.’

    Reported yesterday by Wm Lindsay at his blog bilgrimage.blogspot.com with link to video from Houston tv station reporting raid.

    Wm states this raid is especially important because the cardinal of this diocese is head of the US bishops council.

  196. 196.

    Ladyraxterinok

    @Jerzy Russian: Benjamin Lee Whorf claimed that Navaho is the only language in which one can discuss quantum machanics! Otherwise you have to use higher math.

    I freaked out when we read that in my jr yr course on the psych of language and thought. I’d had a hard soph yr of physics and wondered if learning Navaho would have helped.

    (It may have been Hopi, not Navaho. Course was in 59-60, v looong time ago!)

  199. 199.

    Dev Null

    @J R in WV: There have been so many stories about underage sex trafficking in connection with Trump Model Management, and so many connections to known pedophiles, that I find it hard to believe that they’re all fiction. e.g. this diary at dKos, which has links to other diaries.

    Then there’s Jane Doe, who was going to go public just before the 2016 election … but got cold feet and pulled the plug minutes before a news conference was to go live (hosted by Lisa Bloom). And I’ve heard references to a child (Maria, I think) who just “disappeared”.

    Knowing what we now know about Trump, underage sex trafficking doesn’t seem fantastical.

    All that said, I’m not aware of objective evidence …

  200. 200.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    @germy: I can’t help think that all the pearl clutching over Pelosi becoming speaker is because she is a far more interesting and sympathetic figure than Glassy Eyed Granny Starver could ever be.

  203. 203.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    @Dev Null:

    All that said, I’m not aware of objective evidence …

    I remember all the stuff about Trump models, that model is code for “14 years old” the story that Trump would host sex parties with models and his own daughter was model and was amazed the MSM simply didn’t care. Then again, if Roger Stone was behind the scenes working the media…

    But if Cohen or the like start talking about underage girls at sex parties in court, that does change things.

    This all reminds of me of when one of my cousins wanted to do modeling and the whole family was “WTF? NO!”

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