Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Only Democrats have agency, apparently.

A snarling mass of vitriolic jackals

Bark louder, little dog.

’Where will you hide, Roberts, the laws all being flat?’

There are some who say that there are too many strawmen arguments on this blog.

He wakes up lying, and he lies all day.

There are more Russians standing up to Putin than Republicans.

The “burn-it-down” people are good with that until they become part of the kindling.

Today’s gop: why go just far enough when too far is right there?

He seems like a smart guy, but JFC, what a dick!

Stamping your little feets and demanding that they see how important you are? Not working anymore.

To the privileged, equality seems like oppression.

Damn right I heard that as a threat.

Republicans are radicals, not conservatives.

When they say they are pro-life, they do not mean yours.

I like political parties that aren’t owned by foreign adversaries.

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

Compromise? There is no middle ground between a firefighter and an arsonist.

They are lying in pursuit of an agenda.

“The difference between stupidity and genius is that genius has its limits.”

Sadly, there is no cure for stupid.

Wake up. Grow up. Get in the fight.

Celebrate the fucking wins.

People identifying as christian while ignoring christ and his teachings is a strange thing indeed.

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142Comments

  3. 3.

    ??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??

    TBF to Comey, I think he’s onto something about Trump corrupting those around him that have weak moral fortitude, but I do wonder how much it really is just despicable people taking advantage of Trump’s chaos to advance their own agendas/careers?

    As for Barr, he was always a corrupt asshole from what I’ve read. Did Comey sleep through Barr’s handling of Iran-Contra?

  5. 5.

    ruemara

    Fuck James Comey. He could’ve said Trump’s team was under investigation. He could’ve said that this was a serious investigation of foreign interference in the election and abuse of social media to swing votes. Instead he talked about Hillary’s emails, chastised her, then said it was a nothingburger. He swung the election for Trump, this ball-less wonder who didn’t have the fortitude to punish conservative FBI agents for moving against him and trafficking in conspiracy. FUCK. HIM.

  6. 6.

    Cheryl Rofer

    I think Comey has it mostly right here. I know it’s easy to Comey-hate, and Barr may not have had a lot of integrity, but I’ve been in situations where I had concerns about integrity, and the process I experienced was similar. The resemblance was like that of a mild hayfever compared to the measles, but I can see the parallels.

    It’s very difficult to make the decision as to when you make a move. Can you be more effective on the inside or the outside? You’ve got one chance; do you have enough pull to get the media coverage or other attention that is needed?

    And all the time, your judgment is being warped toward the very thing you’re concerned about.

    I would argue with Comey’s diagnosis of “lacking inner strength.” It can just be bad judgment about making a move. But I take the phrase to encompass, within the limits of an op-ed, all the reasons that someone would become infected by the Trumpian worldview.

    I think there’s also a will to power that keeps these people in place, which speeds up the process that Comey describes. If you really truly want to be, say, Secretary of State, you will brainwash yourself the way Mike Pompeo has. The person who probably has that “inner strength” is John Bolton. But he also has that will to power. He is dangerous.

  8. 8.

    NonyNony

    But more often, proximity to an amoral leader reveals something depressing. I think that’s at least part of what we’ve seen with Bill Barr and Rod Rosenstein.

    Bill Barr helped to cover up Iran-Contra. Bill Barr has been a toadying ass-kisser in the GOP for literally decades.

    What has happened is that Jim Comey has gotten his face eaten by the face-eating leopard party – a thing he did not think would happen. That’s what proximity to Trump has “revealed”.

  9. 9.

    TenguPhule

    @??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??:

    I think he’s onto something about Trump corrupting those around him that have weak moral fortitude,

    There is always a time and a place.

    His time was back in October 2016.

    He has no credibility in this place.

  11. 11.

    TenguPhule

    @Cheryl Rofer:

    but I’ve been in situations where I had concerns about integrity, and the process I experienced was similar. The resemblance was like that of a mild hayfever compared to the measles, but I can see the parallels.

    As Kay always says, all the stupid shit Comey had to do was follow the damn rules of his own fucking department.

    He didn’t. Which is why everyone here says fuck him.

  12. 12.

    BubbaDave

    I think Comey is not wrong (Josh Marshall over at Talking Points Memo referred to “dignity wraithing”) but he also coincidentally(?) elevates independence and following your personal morality — which is the exact justification he gave for his savaging of Clinton and throwing the 2016 election to Trump. Yes, an individual needs to have lines that they will not cross– but it’s also important to be willing to work within a system and sometimes defer to others’ judgements. Trump is a proto-fascist who needs to be resisted– but anarchy is not the answer either.

  13. 13.

    MisterForkbeard

    @Cheryl Rofer: Agreed. Comey is a gigantic asshole and he really needs to admit what he did. But he’s also absolutely right about how Trump is co-opting people that might otherwise have been fine in a ‘real’ administration. It doesn’t mean Trump is a masterful manipulator or anything – it’s just that in order to survive with him you HAVE to bend your morals and be complicit. So if you stick around… you’ve given in.

    That’s it. And it should be a lesson for basically everyone.

  14. 14.

    Wapiti

    I think Comey is looking at the tip of the iceberg. Trump didn’t create Barr and the pardoning of the Iran-Contra co-conspirators. Trump didn’t create Starr and that mismanagement of justice. Comey looks at the tip of the iceberg because he doesn’t want to see the rest of the thing. Because Comey was there during the Starr investigation; and he was silent and willing then.

  15. 15.

    TenguPhule

    @Cheryl Rofer:

    It’s very difficult to make the decision as to when you make a move. Can you be more effective on the inside or the outside? You’ve got one chance;

    All evidence to date shows that everyone with an ‘R’ label (Mueller possibly excepted) decided to wear the One ring.

  18. 18.

    chopper

    “my god, look at this horrible president who i had nothing at all to do with getting elected!”

  19. 19.

    TenguPhule

    @MisterForkbeard:

    But he’s also absolutely right about how Trump is co-opting people that might otherwise have been fine in a ‘real’ administration.

    NO. No he is not.

    All of the people Trump hires and attracts were already bad and incompetent people. His putting them in positions of power naturally leads to all of these horrible things happening because they are no longer constrained by any of the rules, customs or norms that any decent person would be.

  20. 20.

    Dorothy A. Winsor

    @BubbaDave: You have to be suspicious of yourself when your principles just happen to show that you should do exactly what you want to do anyway. If it’s satisfying to do that thing, you maybe shouldn’t

  21. 21.

    Eric U.

    This OP-Ed is what Comey’s book should have been like. But as a Republican that worked for Starr, he obviously has some self-serving blind spots. It would be interesting if everything becomes clear to him somehow, like Cole’s come to Jesus moment.

    Some of the people that I follow on twitter seem to be catastrophizing to a degree that worries me. I remember being incredibly depressed because of the state of the country under Lesser Bush. It was a very unhealthy time for me and I had trouble functioning sometimes. I am trying to avoid that much emotional involvement now. I’ll be needed if all the catastrophizing people are right about how bad things are going to get.

  22. 22.

    TenguPhule

    @Baud:

    Ain’t enough Hail Hillarys in the world to grant this guy absolution.

    Does the Catholic Church still sell Indulgences?

  23. 23.

    Cheryl Rofer

    Huh. I guess there is something to what Comey says, since TenguPhule feels it so necessary to disagree.

    It’s worth trying to understand the psychological dynamics of Trump’s actions. We are going to have to unspool the damage he’s done, and it won’t be done by shouting at people or putting them in reeducation camps. The dynamics Comey describes are real. They pull his followers in too.

  24. 24.

    trollhattan

    @??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??:
    Comey’s basically echoing Michael Cohen and while it’s too little too late from Jim Fucking Comey it will have more of an impact because he’s not headed to prison. (So far as I know.) Still a sanctimonious prick.

  26. 26.

    Eric U.

    Never-Trumper Rick Wilson has a hashtag: #ETTD — everything Trump touches dies. He’s been using it since before Trump took office, IIRC. So Comey is a little late to the party.

    eta: forgot that was the name of Wilson’s book

  28. 28.

    Betty Cracker

    Well, good for him. Too little, too late, of course, and he’ll never absolve himself of the sin of helping to saddle us with the psychopath in the White House. But the fact is, Comey’s voice resonates far beyond the fulminations on an almost top-10K blog or even House members who most people have never heard of, so to the extent he is able to shame anyone still capable of feeling shame and/or drive the media narrative among Beltway gasbags who bought his “last honest man” shtick, more power to him, and I wish him success in that endeavor.

  29. 29.

    TenguPhule

    Republican lawmaker and ally urged crowd to prepare for civil unrest

    Washington state Republican representative Matt Shea and several associates regaled an audience with conspiracy theories, separatist visions and exhortations for listeners to arm themselves ahead of a looming civil war, at a gathering at a remote religious compound in the north-east of the state last year.

    In recordings obtained by the Guardian, Shea and Jack Robertson, also known as radio personality John Jacob Schmidt, invoked their visions and fears of a violent leftist revolt in speeches at the 2018 God and Country event in Marble.

    The Guardian last week published leaked chat records in which Shea and Robertson were revealed to have discussed the use of surveillance, “psyops” and violence against liberal and leftist activists.

    Robertson – who aired fantasies of extreme violence against liberal activists in the leaked chats – told the audience at the 2018 event that they should be prepared for civil war.

    In his speech at God and Country last June, which immediately followed Shea’s speech, Robertson said: “Of course, you all know that you should have an AR-15 and a thousand rounds of ammo, right? Because Antifa is kicking up and getting ready to defend, right?”

    Shea’s speech flirted with themes of civil war, but mostly focused on the idea of separating eastern Washington out into a separate political entity, with the view of having “an entire geographic area repent”.

    He began by proposing “a simple idea that may make you cringe a little at first. And that idea is that liberty must be kept by force.”

  30. 30.

    Brachiator

    @??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??:

    BF to Comey, I think he’s onto something about Trump corrupting those around him that have weak moral fortitude, but I do wonder how much it really is just despicable people taking advantage of Trump’s chaos to advance their own agendas/careers?

    Shit attracts flies.

  31. 31.

    mrmoshpotato

    Oh look! Twitter telling Comey to shut the fuck up must’ve started dying down.

    Time for an op-ed in the New York Times!

  32. 32.

    Matt

    I’ll consider Comey’s apologies sincere when he puts them in his suicide note. Until then, he’s just trying to wriggle out of taking responsibility for the disaster he decided to cause.

  33. 33.

    TenguPhule

    William Barr says he can’t recall whether he provided information about ongoing federal investigations by US attorneys in New York and Virginia.

    “I just don’t recall providing any substantive information about a case,” he said.

    He declined to recuse himself from those investigations.

    So every federal case against anyone in Trump’s orbit is probably compromised now.

  35. 35.

    catclub

    @TenguPhule:

    Jack Robertson, also known as radio personality John Jacob Schmidt,

    John Jacob Jingleheimer Schmidt, that’s my name, too. Whenever I go out, the people always shout, there goes John Jacob Jingleheimer Schmidt, da da da da da da da.

  36. 36.

    MisterForkbeard

    @TenguPhule: Disagree.

    Trump brings in a LOT of really terrible people. He also had some people that would probably have been fine in an ordinary administration – Rosenstein might be one of these. Even John Kelly to some extent – he’s a racist sexist monster but in a normal administration it wouldn’t have been allowed to surface or been slapped back – or he’d be let go.

    Trump takes these people who could be perfectly adequate public servants and… “subverts” isn’t the right word. But he provides them the opportunity to do terrible things without judgment – indeed, it’s frequently the only way to get promoted or ‘succeed’. And so they do bad things.

    Again, this is entirely apart from people like Barr, Mnuchin, Mulvaney, Zinke, etc who have always been unfit and don’t have any kind of record of good service.

  37. 37.

    Roger Moore

    @??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??:

    TBF to Comey, I think he’s onto something about Trump corrupting those around him that have weak moral fortitude, but I do wonder how much it really is just despicable people taking advantage of Trump’s chaos to advance their own agendas/careers?

    I think there’s some from column A and some from column B. What I do think though, is that Trump has an eye for corruptible people, so even the people he chooses who aren’t already obviously corrupt should be seen as likely to become corrupt. And the whole aura of corruption around Trump gives license to the uncorrupt but corruptible to give into their worst impulses.

  39. 39.

    TenguPhule

    @Cheryl Rofer: Comey is arguing that Trump corrupted Barr and others like him.

    That’s like saying pissing straight into the long fermenting cesspool has now made it filthy.

  40. 40.

    Villago Delenda Est

    Comey’s not wrong, but his problem is he can never be forgiven for what he did to Hillary Clinton, and the country itself, in late October 2016.

  41. 41.

    Brachiator

    @TenguPhule:

    There is always a time and a place.

    His time was back in October 2016.

    He has no credibility in this place.

    I’m not concerned about Comey anymore. Trump is the clear and present danger.

  42. 42.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @Matt:

    I’ll consider Comey’s apologies sincere when he puts them in his suicide note.

    That is a horrible thing to say. Please do not be flippant about suicide.

  43. 43.

    Mandalay

    @??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??:

    I think he’s onto something about Trump corrupting those around him that have weak moral fortitude, but I do wonder how much it really is just despicable people taking advantage of Trump’s chaos to advance their own agendas/careers?

    There are certainly some corrupt mediocrities (e.g. Matthew Whitaker, Corey Lewandowski,
    Scott Pruitt, Melania Trump) who have shamelessly used their association with Trump for personal advancement.

    And there are a few true believers like Stephen Miller and Sarah Huckabee Sanders.

    But the great majority of those around him are simply weak, because if they cross Trump he will destroy them. While most Republicans in Congress probably despise Trump (even if they agree with most of his policies), they stay silent because they don’t want to incur his wrath. They all saw what happened to Jeff Flake and they don’t want to suffer the same fate.

  44. 44.

    TenguPhule

    @MisterForkbeard:

    Disagree.

    Trump brings in a LOT of really terrible people. He also had some people that would probably have been fine in an ordinary administration – Rosenstein might be one of these. Even John Kelly to some extent – he’s a racist sexist monster but in a normal administration it wouldn’t have been allowed to surface or been slapped back – or he’d be let go.

    Trump takes these people who could be perfectly adequate public servants and… “subverts” isn’t the right word. But he provides them the opportunity to do terrible things without judgment – indeed, it’s frequently the only way to get promoted or ‘succeed’. And so they do bad things.

    I would argue that them giving into temptation when Trump provides the opportunity shows that all of them, every single one of them, would not be fine in any reasonable administration. The screening process would have weeded most of them out and the ones who’d slip through would be the folks causing scandals once they were caught.

  45. 45.

    Mai Naem mobile

    Comey can’t fix what he broke. It’s just not possible. He needs to STFU and go knit afghans .

  46. 46.

    TenguPhule

    @Mandalay:

    While most Republicans in Congress probably despise Trump (even if they agree with most of his policies), they stay silent because they don’t want to incur his wrath.

    They also really like what he’s doing.

  48. 48.

    cmorenc

    Yeah, fuck James Comey for arrogantly providing the critical, timely extra push, eight days before the 2016 election, that allowed Russian interference with Trump collaboration to succeed in a narrow win rather than a loss.

    NEVERTHELESS – let’s not dismiss the usefulness of Comey’s broadside about how Trump corrupts and co-opts everyone around him. If it causes some voters to back away from any temptation they may have had to vote for Trump in 2020, it’s worth giving Comey a temporary pass to speak credibly in public about Trump’s culture of corruption. Once Trump’s voted out of office in 2020, Comey can go back to fucking himself for his unforgiveable meddling arrogance back in 2016..

  49. 49.

    gvg

    Umm I think he is also overlooking authority. Most of the people who work for Trump (or any President) have no authority or only what Trump grants. We elected Trump* and that gave him a whole bunch of authority and power. It doesn’t actually matter if anybody told Trump he didn’t have the largest crowd or whatever. Speaking up about most things will not actually change a thing. The things related to your own area of authority you may be able to change.
    Congress can successfully argue with Trump but only the democrats are. Why not? Trump isn’t the only problem.
    Judges can argue and win with Trump and that has been saving us so far.
    Comey bashing has already been done, don’t care anymore. I want to fire at Trump, Comey is peanuts. So just Specify that he isn’t forgiven and think about what he and others say. Everyone taking time to bash Comey AGAIN, is wasting time IMO. Attack Trump please.

  50. 50.

    J R in WV

    @TenguPhule:

    Does the Catholic Church still sell Indulgences?

    Nope.

    But I do, just send me a check and I’ll reply with all the indulgences you need.

    Make the amount of $$ commensurate with the level of indulgence you need for the sins you wish to be absolved of in the future.

    Sorry, no past sins can be cleaned up with this method. Confession must be explicit and complete!

  51. 51.

    TenguPhule

    @J R in WV:

    Make the amount of $$ commensurate with the level of indulgence you need for the sins you wish to be absolved of in the future.

    I may have to prematurely declare bankruptcy to afford that.

  53. 53.

    Immanentize

    @TenguPhule:

    John Jacob Schmidt

    John Jacob Jingleheimer Schmidt.
    His name is my name too.
    Whenever we go out,
    The people always shout,
    There goes John Jacob Jingleheimer Schmidt!

  54. 54.

    Ladyraxterinok

    @TenguPhule:
    JimBakker has been warning of an imminent Civil War. Refers to Rick Joyner warnings.

    Bakker seems to think the left will start it by arresting pastors, people ‘speaking God’s condemnation of LGBT people.’

    Allegedly T is attacking the evil forces that are working against him (Satan, demons, Democrats, deep state) and they are fighting back even harder.

    Window into totally different truth-universe.

  56. 56.

    Mandalay

    @Anonymous At Work:

    Well-replicated study…

    Hardly. It’s been widely debunked. See, for example:
    – The Stanford Prison Experiment was massively influential. We just learned it was a fraud.
    – New analysis suggests most Milgram participants realised the “obedience experiments” were not really dangerous
    – And from your own link:

    In 2012 Australian psychologist Gina Perry investigated Milgram’s data and writings and concluded that Milgram had manipulated the results, and that there was “troubling mismatch between (published) descriptions of the experiment and evidence of what actually transpired.” She wrote that “only half of the people who undertook the experiment fully believed it was real and of those, 66% disobeyed the experimenter”.She described her findings as “an unexpected outcome” that “leaves social psychology in a difficult situation.”

  57. 57.

    Archon

    Jim Comey, Bernie Sanders, the New York Times, and others misguided and frankly reprehensible behavior before the election I think was based on the idea that Donald Trump would not win the election.

    There are no excuses for anybody in 2020. Everyone knows the stakes and everyone knows Trump can win.

  60. 60.

    Jay C

    @Brachiator: @Roger Moore:

    I think you’re right about the mix of motivations: by-and-large, I don’t think there’s much evidence that – before he was elected, hell, probably before he started running – Donald Trump knew many/any of the corrupt creatures who would populate his Administration (Jeff Sessions is the only one that comes to mind offhand). And I’m sure that most of the “Establishment” Republicans were sure that Trump would be a malleable figurehead, content to make blustering speeches, handily sign off on anything a GOP Congress passed, and eventually “grow into” the role and become “Presidential”. Or at least Presidential enough to let them keep control of Congress.
    See how THAT worked out:

  61. 61.

    rk

    He’s correct of course. I think the truth of the matter is that a whole lot of people have no ethics or morals to speak of in the first place. You only have to look at evangelicals and Trump supporters. All the so called “values voters” and everyone who expressed outrage at Obama at every little thing, called him unpatriotic, then turned around and supported a completely immoral man who’s an actual Russian asset. These types of people are responsible things like the holocaust, wars and all human misery. Their values exist only in their own heads. They’re monsters waiting for an opportunity. I’ve seen them in action a few times. There was a riot in my neighborhood once, it went on for three days, people’s houses were looted and stripped bare. One of my neighbors, though not involved in the actual looting offered to sell my father a VCR at a dirt cheap price. My father refused, but even as a kid I was shocked that my neighbor would actually sell something stolen from someone’s house. I figured out at an early age that evil can be very ordinary. In Nazi Germany Barr, Graham and most of the GOP would have willingly carried out Hitler’s agenda.

  66. 66.

    dnfree

    @Cheryl Rofer: that’s what I was thinking. The people I know who are Trump followers are being pulled into the quicksand too gradually to notice. The evangelicals followed him because of abortion and the Supreme Court. Others followed him because of the economy, getting rid of regulations, capitalism. They started by overlooking some stuff and they seem to feel obliged to continue. In for a penny, in for a pound.

  68. 68.

    MattF

    @dnfree: I wouldn’t leave Trump himself off the hook– and I think that’s what is original about Comey’s essay. Comey describes, quite specifically, how Trump pulls people into evil.

  69. 69.

    Mandalay

    @TenguPhule:

    They also really like what he’s doing.

    They don’t, apart from lowering taxes on the rich. Most Republicans in Congress surely view Trump’s approaches to Putin, foreign policy, trade deals, healthcare and immigration the same way as the rest of us: as fucking disasters.

  70. 70.

    Roger Moore

    @MisterForkbeard:

    Trump takes these people who could be perfectly adequate public servants and… “subverts” isn’t the right word. But he provides them the opportunity to do terrible things without judgment – indeed, it’s frequently the only way to get promoted or ‘succeed’. And so they do bad things.

    I suspect there’s some kind of proximity effect, too. Some of the cabinet members who were not horribly corrupt before and who work in departments Trump has paid less attention to (e.g. Chao, Perry, Perdue) seem to have avoided degenerating under Trump’s watch.

  72. 72.

    Martin

    @Mandalay: I can claim that murders are a disaster but if I continue to fire weapons into homes at random because it makes me happy, then it’s a pretty spurious claim.

    Republicans care more about retaining office than any of the things you suggest they view as disasters. I suspect they too see them as disasters, and yet then enable those disasters. What does that really tell us about them?

  73. 73.

    Kraux Pas

    @??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??:

    I think he’s onto something about Trump corrupting those around him that have weak moral fortitude,

    The whole Republican MO corrupts those that have weak moral fortitude. People like James Comey.

  74. 74.

    James E Powell

    @Baud:

    Ain’t enough Hail Hillarys in the world to grant this guy absolution.

    Agree completely. He put Trump in the White House and was just fine working for him. If Trump hadn’t fired him, he’d still be there defending the RW regime.

  75. 75.

    Whitney Barnes

    @Anonymous At Work:
    Has anyone ever been able to do a study on when staying in horrible systems like that really is helpful, as opposed to harmful? Oscar Shindler seems to have done a whole lot of good while collaborating with Nazis, are there any general characteristics about his position that we could use as a guide on when staying in a corrupt and horrible system really does help, and when staying is just quietly helping evil? (Like “you have to have a lot of autonomy” or “the people overseeing you can’t be fanatical believers” or “it won’t work for long, so be ready to call it quits eventually if the whole thing doesn’t fold first”)

    Is there going to be anyone who can be pointed at as staying in Trump’s administration where we’ll say “Things would have been much worse if they’d left” as opposed to “their staying legitimized all the horrible policies, and they couldn’t stop a one of them”?

  76. 76.

    James E Powell

    @BubbaDave:

    but he also coincidentally(?) elevates independence and following your personal morality — which is the exact justification he gave for his savaging of Clinton and throwing the 2016 election to Trump.

    That independence and personal morality and protecting the institution were all just bullshit justifications. He hates Hillary and he wanted to help the Republicans. I am willing to believe that he didn’t realize he would throw the election to Trump, but he definitely did what he did to harm Hillary Clinton and the Democratic senate campaigns.

  77. 77.

    Roger Moore

    @Mandalay:

    But the great majority of those around him are simply weak, because if they cross Trump he will destroy them.

    Sure. And Trump chooses to surround himself with weak people because he likes it that way.

  79. 79.

    eemom

    Shut the fuck up and die. That is the only intelligent response to anything James Comey has to say for the rest of his life.

  80. 80.

    psycholinguist

    @Cheryl Rofer: He’s describing something psychologists who study persuasion call the foot-in-the-door technique. Salesmen know it well, and Trump is just a large scale sleazy ass salesman. Get somebody to agree to a small thing, and they start seeing themselves as “someone who agrees to do things for this person”, and cognitive dissonance works against them saying no. Then gradually up the ante, leaving no clear place to get off the escalator. Before you know it, you’re driving off the lot with a new car.

  81. 81.

    Anonymous At Work

    @Whitney Barnes: One take I read on Schindler was that he wasn’t a humanitarian as much as he made a game out of seeing what he could get away with. Whether and to what extent that’s true is not something I want to discuss.
    But, even assuming that Schindler was a massive humanitarian in his intent, “unhappy is a land that needs a hero.” Shouldn’t need people like him acting heroically. Requires the need for a hero.

    Finally, that’s kinda what Milgram’s experiment was meant to show: how hard/rare resistance to authority could be. That for every person staying in the system to guide it, many more succumbed.

  82. 82.

    Roger Moore

    @Whitney Barnes:

    Is there going to be anyone who can be pointed at as staying in Trump’s administration where we’ll say “Things would have been much worse if they’d left” as opposed to “their staying legitimized all the horrible policies, and they couldn’t stop a one of them”?

    This is an inherently difficult question to answer, because we can’t know how their replacements would have behaved. To the extent we’ll ever be able to get an answer, it will only come when future historians have access to the Trump Administration’s internal documents so they can see what his appointees were really doing behind the scenes.

  84. 84.

    James E Powell

    @dnfree:

    The evangelicals followed him because of abortion and the Supreme Court.

    I disagree with this somewhat. The vast majority of people who refer to themselves as evangelicals are bigots who use religion as cover. They have few if any political positions that are in concert with Christian doctrine. They promote ignorance and invariably support bigotry and oppression.

  85. 85.

    sukabi

    @Cheryl Rofer: exacerbating the problem in DC are the self-serving, inc3stuous relationships that are developed over years. The not so kosher deals that are made that are eventually used as leverage for other deals.

    The decay grows and the ability to be a bulwark against absolute corruption becomes extinct. That’s the position the GOP is in now, absolutely corrupt.

  86. 86.

    Cheryl Rofer

    @psycholinguist: Thanks. I think in Trump’s case, as Comey describes it, there’s also a large role for guilt.

    “OMG, I just sat there when he said that racist thing.”

    Silence is assent. But what are Cabinet secretaries to do when Trump insists on a televised Cabinet praise session? As Comey points out, Mattis managed to avoid slurping up to The Master, but I’ll bet even he felt some guilt for being in the room with those performances.

  87. 87.

    Mandalay

    @Martin:

    What does that really tell us about them?

    That Republicans in Congress generally have “weak moral fortitude” as opposed to being “despicable people taking advantage of Trump’s chaos to advance their own agendas/careers”.

    Of course there are a few true believers like Meadows, Gohmert, Gaetz and Jordan. But most Republicans in Congress are just scared little bunny wabbits, desperate not to rock the boat so that they don’t get primaried. They go along with Trump due to fear rather than any hopes of personal advancement.

    [The comment was made with reference to goku’s post (#3).]

  89. 89.

    joel hanes

    @Roger Moore:

    Trump chooses to surround himself with weak people because he likes it that way.

    He has publicly stated that he likes his agencies to be run by “acting” head because acting heads are weaker than those who have the security of a confirmed appointment.

  90. 90.

    Mandalay

    @Roger Moore:

    And Trump chooses to surround himself with weak people because he likes it that way.

    But Trump didn’t get to “choose” the Republicans in Congress, and most were already there before he became president. Yet they still comply most of the time.

  91. 91.

    tobie

    @Mike in DC: Harris did a fantastic job. Barr tried to claim that there was no danger of him having a conflict of interest because he didn’t make his decision alone but with DAG Rosenstein. That’s where he fell into Harris’ trap. She then got Barr tripped up by highlighting that Rosenstein had a clear conflict of interest in being a witness to obstruction as well as a participant in the charging decision. She hammered Barr on whether he bothered to check with the DOJ ethics office to make sure Rosenstein was cleared of conflict of interest and could take part in the charging decision. Well played, Senator Harris, well played.

    I’ll be curious if Blumenthal ends up having lured Barr into a perjury trap. Barr said he couldn’t recall having discussion the 12 referrals from Mueller to other AGs with the White House. Then said he didn’t discuss anything substantive about those referrals. Sounds fishy.

  93. 93.

    Anonymous At Work

    @Mandalay:
    1. Stanford Prison Experiment is the example I still use of an experiment beyond the investigator’s control or ability to handle, even if he did egg on the extreme behavior.
    2. The link doesn’t work
    3. Those citations are pay-walled and would need to see if the refutations were supported or revisionist/contrarianism. I.e. “I think Milgram was bunk, now let me figure out how to prove it.”

    Overall, the study has been tested repeatedly, with a pretty wide band of results but the 5/8th overall holds up. Now, if the above articles are entirely true, that means that a majority of participants in all these examples knew what was *really* happening, kept quiet and played pranks on researchers, except for the ones that went through with it and developed PTSD.

  94. 94.

    Litlebritdifrnt

    Apparently the fabulous women senators are crawling up one side of Barr and down the other. I shall look forward to the clips later.

  95. 95.

    Kay

    Comey still doesn’t get it. It isn’t about them. All any of them had to do was simply do their jobs. They didn’t have to take a stand or agonize at all. They had to figure out what their jobs were and JUST do those jobs, and none of them succeeded because they all have huge egos.

    Process is supposed to protect us from fallible people, because it’s objective and rule-bound, and people are subjective and biased. The cure isn’t find or yearn for infallible people. The cure is just adhere to the process: don’t hold a press conference and opine on Hillary Clinton. Release the Mueller summaries rather than creating your own. This is a situation where it isn’t INACTION that is tripping these people up- it’s actions that shouldn’t be taken anyway. They’re inventing jobs they don’t hold and then doing those jobs poorly.

  96. 96.

    Mart

    @Archon:

    everyone knows Trump can win

    Lately the Trump backers I know are less likely to shout at me about how Trump has accomplished more than any other President ever. They now know deep down that he is a shit heel. But as long as Trump keeps punching down on the poors, the browns, the Muslims – and keeps shouting Democrats are evil, he will get their vote. Comey is just another sore loser just like the others who bitch about Trump after they are fired. Who cares what he thinks. Keep America Great 2020!

  97. 97.

    Immanentize

    @Whitney Barnes:
    Re: working inside a corrupt system.
    I can only offer my own example. Representing people on death row in Texas was certainly deciding to work within a corrupt — and corrupting — system. There are alternatives to direct representation — policy work, legislative advocacy, candle light vigils at the prison….

    But I chose to represent people directly even though it was almost always a hopeless legal act with the law and judges bending way over to assure an execution takes place. This does not include the testilying by police, prosecutors hiding or destroying evidence, etc.

    I think that my efforts and those of my colleagues kept further rule breaking from happening. Also, there is a valid “witnessing” component in which the whole system for s better if someone is watching — if someone says, “no.”

    I know, small batch artisnal data; use it as you like.

  98. 98.

    Jay C

    @Mandalay:

    “Yet they still comply most of the time”

    Of course they will: Party Over Country every time. And their party has become the Trump Party. As evidenced by the RNC’s obsession with stamping out any possible primary challenges for 2020.

  99. 99.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    @??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??:

    TBF to Comey, I think he’s onto something about Trump corrupting those around him that have weak moral fortitude, but I do wonder how much it really is just despicable people taking advantage of Trump’s chaos to advance their own agendas/careers?

    Like any good con man Trump tells his marks what they want to hear and the greedy ones fall for it.

  100. 100.

    janesays

    It seems like some people have trouble holding these two positions simultaneously…

    1) James Comey is a preening asshole who still refuses to accept responsibility for the role his own actions had in getting the orange POS in the White House.
    2) James Comey is 100% correct in his assessment of the cult of Trumpism in this Op-Ed.

  101. 101.

    Gex

    @Ladyraxterinok: More like the rhetoric being deliberately deployed to pave the way for them to initiate hostilities against the left. Keep fabricating outrages from the left in order to make it easier to justify “self defense” from the right.

  102. 102.

    trollhattan

    Sweet rompin’ Ronny Reagan on a Roomba, enough with you people.

    HELENA — Montana Gov. Steve Bullock will announce his bid for the presidency in two weeks, MTN News has learned — adding to the 20 Democrats already running for the 2020 nomination to challenge President Trump.

    Bullock, a two-term governor who can’t run for re-election in 2020 because of term limits, isn’t talking publicly yet about his specific plans.

    But sources told MTN News the Democratic governor plans to officially unveil his candidacy soon, likely the week of May 13.

    Bullock’s announcement won’t be a big surprise. He formed a political action committee, Big Sky Values PAC, in mid-2017, to fund political travels and activity around the country, and he’s hired political veterans as staffers for the PAC, including an organizing director in Iowa.

    He also has a communications person in Iowa, which will hold the nation’s first presidential nominating contest in 2020: the Iowa caucuses, on Feb. 3.

    I would support no Bullock other than Seth.

  103. 103.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    @Cheryl Rofer:

    I think Comey has it mostly right here. I know it’s easy to Comey-hate, and Barr may not have had a lot of integrity, but I’ve been in situations where I had concerns about integrity, and the process I experienced was similar. The resemblance was like that of a mild hayfever compared to the measles, but I can see the parallels.

    To echo what cheryl said I was in a silent assent situation, it first took me while to figure out how bad it was and then afterwards it was a hell of fight breaking the cycle when you aren’t allowed to speak up. It took me standing up and silently walking out of meeting with the gaslighter to get the rest of the group to wake up and start fighting back.

  104. 104.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Anonymous At Work: I’ve used Zimbardo in my work. My dad actually knew Milgram as professional colleagues (Milgram senior, my dad junior). What I find interesting is that while the Vox article, citing The Guardian, goes after Sharif’s experiment, there’s no mention of Tajfel et al’s small group experiments, which were essentially extensions and replications of Tajfel et al’s original study. And similar, in intent, to Sharif’s.

    I also find it interesting that no one ever seems to mention that Zimbardo’s study was one of many psychological and sociological studies at the time being sponsored by the military to study issues of how people respond under stress, specifically what the stressors to do their understanding of their relationships to others in a group. Zimbardo’s funding was from the Department of the Navy. The Army had been funding the studies that gave us relative deprivation theory as they were concerned about what happened to the group identity and dynamic when someone within a unit, in this case a squad or platoon, was promoted.

  105. 105.

    Alternative Fax, a hip hop artist from Idaho

    @SiubhanDuinne:

    @Matt:

    I’ll consider Comey’s apologies sincere when he puts them in his suicide note.

    That is a horrible thing to say. Please do not be flippant about suicide.

    1000x this. I am going to bitch every time I see a flippant comment or joke about suicide on this blog, and I don’t care who makes it -even if it’s the blogmaster himself.

    Why do we tolerate flippant breeziness about death from a brain disorder when we never would about death from malignancies? Hear any brain tumor jokes lately? Plenty of suicide jokes around. Stop it.
    This was written by the daughter of good friends of raven. Suicide is the 2nd leading cause of death in the US among ages 10-34 and the 4th leading cause of death in ages 35-54 (source).

    You can also donate to NAMI SW Ohio here. Among the things that NAMI affiliates do is provide support groups for people who have loved ones who attempt suicide – many who attempt suicide succeed.

    You want to be flip about it? Go fuck yourself, ideally with heavily oxidized farm tools.

  106. 106.

    mary s

    Sure, sure, Trump has tarnished many people’s reputations because his kind of corruption is so blatant and crass — which, I’m sure, is very irritating to elites like Comey. And yes, I wish Comey would just stop offering his sage and principled (sic) opinions. But what annoys me most about what Comey is doing here is providing cover for the elites (both Dems and Repubs) who are constantly trying to protect the reputations of people like them — e.g., people like Bart O’Kavanaugh or William Barr, who went to the right schools and go to the right receptions and all that.

  107. 107.

    Baud

    @trollhattan:

    How many Democratic candidates do we need to have before the odds of two of them having the same birthday are greater than fifty percent?

  111. 111.

    Alternative Fax, a hip hop artist from Idaho

    @Immanentize:

    small batch artisanal data

    How would you like that credited, Professor? I plan to use it frequently, but was trained to provide citations unless it’s original work. (Rather a quaint concept recently, it seems).

  112. 112.

    Hitlesswonder

    Not to laud Comey – but I am shocked that he names names in the op-ed. That’s an interesting line to cross, as it seems like it’s forbidden among the political elite to say someone failed or is corrupt. The media have a hard time saying Barr is corrupt, for example. Certainly it seems a low bar to say what is obviously true, but I find this novel and I hope helps crack the media wall (though it seems unlikely).

  113. 113.

    schrodingers_cat

    The self satisfied and smug asshole can just shut the fuck up. I read his column in the garbage times and true enough it is a steaming pile of shit.
    1. First of all the presumption that all these R hacks had integrity to lose before they started working for the Orange dyed man.
    2. Enough if with the Mattis hagiography. He ordered troops to the border for an election side-show, among other things.
    I have a suggestion for Comey, take sanyas and spare us your gyan (wisdom). You have already done enough damage.

  114. 114.

    Roger Moore

    @Baud:

    How many Democratic candidates do we need to have before the odds of two of them having the same birthday are greater than fifty percent?

    Same as for any other group: 23.

  118. 118.

    Mart

    @Baud: When everyone was overjoyed by an amazing coincidence; my dad the physicist would do the maths and say actually there is a one in (reasonable #) chance of that happening. A true spoilsport.

  120. 120.

    Ocotillo

    It is interesting to me that hardly anyone who has left this administration has come out and laid it all out there about what was going on in the administration while they were part of it. Rexxon, Mattis, McMaster, Cohn to name a few continue to remain silent. Omarosa actually threw it out there but she was never considered a VSP.

    Also, it appears both on the money side and thought side, most “establishment” GOPers are drinking the Kool Aid now.

  122. 122.

    trollhattan

    @Ocotillo:

    Also, it appears both on the money side and thought side, most “establishment” GOPers are drinking the Kool Aid now.

    They know their current Griftopia has a looming sell-by date and everything they do going forward is targeted at 1. Continuing the harvest and 2. Delaying the end date as long as possible.

    There are no ethical Republicans. Those are extinct.

  127. 127.

    Aleta

    Watched most of the hearing.

    Darren K @heydtrain
    I know it’s not their beat, but I miss @Hegemommy and @AngryBlackLady on judicial committee hearing days.

    Imani Gandy @AngryBlackLady
    you should follow @emptywheel! It’s her wheelhouse

    So I checked the end of her feed. Wheeler’s focus is good for reading about the hearing.

    emptywheel @emptywheel

    Criminal Division (Benczkowski), also a Kirkland and Ellis lawyer, asked Barr to get the waiver so he could oversee investigation into Kirkland and Ellis client.

    *
    Bingo:
    Barr started making the decision on obstruction prior to seeing the report.
    *
    Barr got the report on the 22nd. Made final decision on 24th.
    Admits he had started discussing it before he got the report.

    “OLC had already done a lot of thinking about some of these issues.”


    southpaw @nycsouthpaw
    Barr previously testified that the Russia investigation was without basis. In questioning from Sen. Durbin just now, he indicated he doesn’t know what the referral from the Australian government that launched the investigation said.

    emptywheel @emptywheel
    Why hasn’t any Dem laid out that there are underlying crimes?

    (Earlier)

    emptywheel
 @emptywheel

    Again, there is ZERO question there was an underlying crime.
    Mueller says there was.
    *
    Barr: The President does not have to sit there and allow investigation to run its course, bc he was being falsely accused. Most of obstruction do involve exercise of constitutional authority.
    *
    Barr keeps claiming that Trump was being falsely accused.
    That’s … not what the Mueller report shows. 


  129. 129.

    cwmoss

    @SiubhanDuinne: It is a horrible thing, but I agree with it. We are in a horrible time, and Comey is a person whose absence would improve the world.

  131. 131.

    Chris Johnson

    @lamh36: ‘k, now I would be pretty much happy with Kamala Harris as President (though I would prefer Warren… and say Harris as Attorney General? or veep?)

    Because you can see her being Kamala Harris on a second by second basis. She’s going after this guy, controlling her tone, making her points, yet there are these tiny moments of instant glee as the bozo steps in it. He’ll say a thing, and her face just flickers for a moment, just an instant of prosecutorial satisfaction and then she’s back on the attack.

    She’s QUICK. I like Warren because she has done the research and understands where we are, and has coherent plans, and can call for these plans in a stirring way (so stirring that the MSM is already panicking and claiming she is ‘unlikeable’). Warren has done her homework and is representing a constellation of appropriate directions for us to take. In a better world, that would be all we need.

    But there are a shitload of criminals about, and it’s a fight. And by God is Kamala Harris quick and smart. I am loving that. I don’t think she automatically has good directions, so we’ll have to care about who has her ear: that sort of smarts is prone to being able to justify very unliberal attitudes, a sort of ‘gotcha’ mindset. The underlying principles have to be set by the Democratic Party and the American people. We’re doing that, and so we could probably effectively use Harris’s ferocity.

    You have to be willing to cope with the gish-galloping of the old white Republican man, ride it out without getting into a yelling match, and remember exactly what weaknesses and gotchas were presented. They will not cooperate and yelling at them just makes you look like the unreasonable one (to prejudiced onlookers). But someone like Harris is already expert at dealing with this. I want her fighting for my interests. Kamala Harris vs. the assholes who’ve been wrecking my world from under my feet, all my life.

  134. 134.

    Barbara

    @cwmoss: No, the world would not be a better place. What has happened has happened and won’t not have happened just because the agent of past doom goes away. I have been nonstop angry for more than two years but I hope I never have this kind of vindictive spirit.

  137. 137.

    Anonymous At Work

    @Adam L Silverman: I do Institutional Review Board work, so my perspective is skewed towards “Someone fucked up, here’s how and here’s the lesson for not repeating it/why we ask you 3 extra questions.” With a [you whiny babies] being subtexted at times for certain audiences.

    That Zimbardo had DoN funding only deepens the lessons from his study on my end and doesn’t change them. That he pushed in- and out-groups harder than he originally indicated fits with the purpose of his funding, even if he didn’t announce it to the participants. I don’t deal directly on ethical deception (although we do review and approve such) but I use Humphrey’s Tearoom Trade and NHS’s Tuskegee to show unethical deception.

    Looking at Tajfel’s stuff for the first time, I will have to explore further but only because I read a lot in that area, from the pop-science Nudge to the more serious Kahneman, Tushnet, Akerlof, etc.

    PS: The singular critique to many of my presentations is that I overdo the history of all these experiments. “…hill upon which I would die…”

  138. 138.

    Ruckus

    @trollhattan:
    Those two things, ethical and republican are opposites. They repel each other, like the same poles of magnets. Powerful magnets.

  139. 139.

    Sab

    @Immanentize: Your clients knew they had someone fighting for them. Possibly for the first time in their lives. Not much in your life. Possibly something in theirs.

  140. 140.

    Mary Ellen Sandahl

    @Litlebritdifrnt: Is that a British figure of speech? At least in reference to Barr and women Senators, it produces a disturbing mental image. I might go so far as to say icky.
    Can’t we say that they repeatedly chastised Barr with stinging nettles?

  141. 141.

    Momus

    For Trump, its all about the transaction. Ethics and morals are not involved. If you attempt to transact with Trump, he owns you.

  142. 142.

    Procopius

    I’m pretty sure the “principle” Mattis resigned over was that the President* was not following his advice and was a pretty unpleasant person to deal with, too. I didn’t see him arguing that the Pentagon needed to develop an actual strategy and declare its goals in the forever wars.

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