Some folks are fretting about the House Democrats’ impeachment strategy, worrying that it’ll focus too narrowly on Trump’s Ukraine shake-down scandal. They want House Dems to fold in Mueller’s investigation of Russia’s interference in our election, which documents Team Trump’s avid enthusiasm for Putin’s assistance before the election and attempts to obstruct the investigation after.
It won’t matter because it’s really the same damned scandal, as Giuliani has been trying to tell anyone with a camera all week. Giuliani and Trump both believe Ukraine worked with the DNC and George Soros to frame Russia and Trump for election interference. Here’s Giuliani saying it again this morning, this time outside Fox News environs:
Rudy explains how it was really Ukraine who colluded to interfere in the 2016 election, with the DNC, Hillary, George Soros and a secret contact at the DNC. pic.twitter.com/OAz6vnMCiJ
— Josh Marshall (@joshtpm) September 29, 2019
It’s whackadoodle stuff, which is probably why it’ll take a while for mainstream journalists and the public to understand that the POTUS subverted US foreign policy to investigate a conspiracy theory that was probably cooked up by Russian trolls in a Breitbart comments thread and forwarded via email by thousands of crazy uncles to hundreds of thousands of eye-rolling relatives. But here we are.
Trump’s former Homeland Security Advisor understands how dangerous it is to traffic in batshit lunacy:
This morning Tom Bossert, President Trump’s first Homeland Security Advisor, went on the ABC Sunday morning show. He said a lot about the most important charges against President Trump still not being proven, in his view. He repeated “no evidence of collusion” in the Russia probe. But it couldn’t be too reassuring to the President. The gist of his comments is that Rudy Giuliani’s nonsense is going to get Trump impeached and if President Trump “continues to focus on that white whale, it’s going to bring him down.”
From your lips to the Flying Spaghetti Monster’s delicate al dente orecchiette, Mr. Bossert.
Trump’s actions don’t make sense in a normal framework. But the suggestion that he didn’t win the 2016 election all by himself caused a narcissistic injury to Trump. And that injury is just as world-and-sense obliterating in Trump’s pea brain as was the injury Moby-Dick inflicted on Captain Ahab, sparking an obsession that led to the doom of Ahab and crew.
Thar she blows.
A Ghost To Most
Rudy is reenacting the end of ‘Scarface’ at this point.
Say hello to my little friend! Coming up.
Cathie Fonz
As stupid as this is, they are embroiling the whole US government in this fantasy and destroying people’s lives in the process.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/state-dept-intensifies-email-probe-of-hillary-clintons-former-aides/2019/09/28/9f15497e-e1f2-11e9-8dc8-498eabc129a0_story.html Pompeo and Barr are desperately trying to mollify Trump by “proving” that Hillary was corrupt.
Its terrible and it will take years for the US government to recover, if it ever does.
Wakeshift
@A Ghost To Most:
I said recently that this is like LARPing Game of Thrones.
I’m starting to believe that in retrospect this will look more like Pearl Harbor or Fort Sumter.
mellowjohn
Rudy’s looking more and more like Kate McKinnon.
NotMax
If the word meltdown didn’t already exist it would have to be invented for Giuliani.
OT. In other news: Ooh, shiny.
trollhattan
Radio this a.m. was all fretting about how impeachment “this close to the election will tell voters they themselves do not get to decide Trump’s fate.” What the everblooming hell is that even supposed to mean? We should let the crime syndicate operate unfettered for MORE THAN A YEAR? It’s like Moscow Mitch doubling-down on Garland.
JoyceH
@Cathie Fonz: I was just coming to bring up the email thing and underscore how dangerous this administration has become. It’s not just Trump and his White House staff, the entire executive branch has been infected with malicious insanity.
What the State Department is doing is going back through Hillary’s emails and retroactively classifying messages that were unclassified at the time and telling State Department employees that they are potentially on the hook for mishandling classified material. The messages go back as long ago as ten years!
We’re in Putin’s Russia territory here.
trollhattan
@NotMax:
Die he steal that from Ming the Merciless?
The hell is with our current billionaire crop and their space fascination? Genuinely surprised Bill Gates doesn’t have his own orbiting hotel.
germy
Karen S.
This is insane. I just don’t understand how anyone can believe such nuttiness. Why is it so important to them to prove that Hillary is evil incarnate? They’ve allowed Hillary to live rent free in their heads for decades. They’ll sacrifice this country to appease Trump just to get one step closer to locking her up. What a sh*t sandwich of idiocy and malevolence.
JCNZ
“Probably cooked up by Russian trolls in a Breitbart comments thread and forwarded via email by thousands of crazy uncles to hundreds of thousands of eye-rolling relatives.”
Oh, stop!
joel hanes
The GOP and Fox are currently lashing themselves to the whale.
Our harpooners will need a strong arm, steady feet, and a keen sense of the moment.
Interesting times.
foreshadowing Cleek’s law
germy
trollhattan
@Karen S.:
To me what’s insane is how willing everybody not Fox is to put Rudy on camera. Do not feed the Ministry of Propaganda with free airtime, especially at a time they’re revving up the Palinesque kindergarten attacks (NB Devin Nunes’ prepared remarks at last week’s testimony).
Yarrow
@Karen S.: Think of it like an aging rock band playing their big hit from 30 years ago. Going after Hillary gets the wingnut crowd going.
germy
Ken
This is going to end up with someone being skinned on live TV to prove that they’re a lizard person.
And think of the ratings!
germy
satby
O.T. just popped in to say hi and and bye. Still without power at home. I’m waiting for my daughter in law and my Bahraini daughter to meet me in this restaurant, but I at least have coffee. Can’t wait to catch up on all the threads I’ve missed over the last 36 hours.
Matt McIrvin
@trollhattan: He’s a GenXer geek. I understand it. Boomers grew up immersed in Space Race imagery but GenXers got it a little differently: we grew up hearing about the Space Shuttle, and the whole propaganda message around the Shuttle was that it was supposed to open up space to the masses through commercial exploitation, spurred by cheap public access to orbit. At the same time, people were talking about O’Neill cylinder colonies, gigantic solar power satellites saving the world, that sort of thing. It was all supposed to be driven by capitalism. The world didn’t turn out that way automatically, but these rich guys believe they can make it happen.
NotMax
@satby
Power out bad. Coffee good.
Fair warning that there may have been a comment or two waxing negative about Dolt 45.
;)
Uncle Cosmo
@joel hanes: Call me Fishmeal. Hell, call me a cab. Or call me late for dinner. Just call me!
More specifically, call me if America’s Goombah steps into an elevator shaft sans elevator, or strokes out eating a stromboli, or is awarded a full-body massage under a loaded bus, etc etc etc – if there’s an open-casket viewing I’d hop the next flight from the Kuiper Belt to spit on the corpse.
scav
But so long as it’s a white whale, it’s a great all-’merkan whale, the biggest whale ever and it calls him Sir! They’ll all worship the whale and flor more than amere eight years!
NotMax
OT FYI.
If you start up Firefox and it looks … different, there seems to be somethin’ going on with the latest version remembering display preferences, although may well not affect every user.. Subsequently closing Firefox completely and then starting it again resolves this, at least for me.
debbie
I’m picturing Rudi — and his very sizable mouth — as Trump’s white whale. Or maybe Trump’s gut is the white whale.
TaMara (HFG)
@satby: Oh, my. I hope it’s back up and running soon. Thank goodness for coffee.
eclare
@satby: What happened?
John Cole
I had to google orecchiette
Kathleen
@trollhattan: Shorter Chuckles the Todd on Giest this morning: “Trump could make this Ukraine thing go away if it weren’t for Rudy”.
He and Geist also focused on horse racey aspects, such as “how will this hurt Biden” and laid the groundwork for a fake “but her emails” scandal by reporting that Hillary’s emails are again being investigated.
Jinchi
@A Ghost To Most: That ought to distract us from the accusation that Trump is abusing his office to prosecute his personal political enemies.
11 dimensional chess in action.
waysel
I think they’ve been working on this for a long time as defense against the Mueller report. They always go for a mirror image/reversal of what they are guilty of. The MSM and NYT don’t care how ridiculous the GOP claims may be, if it hurts Dems, they’ll run with it. Also I read that Rogers Stones defense in his current trial depends on this looney ‘Hillary did it’ concept. Roger no doubt knows where many bodies are buried, so they don’t want him singing. Also Putin and the oligarchs are getting impatient about sanction lifting. Looks like they wanted more time to fabricate ‘evidence’, but the WB forced their hand. They are now forced to make do in the US, hence the SD reclassifications which was probably part of the original plan, but they were hoping to build a big fake case with nobody watching. Now they have to build it under scrutiny, but that won’t stop them. I like Betty Crakers insight about Trumps ego being averse to the notion that people will know he needed help to win because his personal magnificence was not enough in a fair fight. Sounds right. If they’re not stopped, I believe they will actually try to put Hillary in jail, because the base would love it, and they are all evil pieces of shit.
Kathleen
@scav: Or Great White Wail.
ewrunning
@trollhattan:That bit of “wisdom” came from the mouth of the ineffable Mara Liasson. It’s the sort of drivel from NPR that regularly makes me want to heave my radio out the window (and has prompted me to switch some of the money I was donating to Public Radio over to a subscription to TPM).
jc
Trump thinks: well I’m the POTUS, so whatever I claim to be true is automatically true. And more than half the time the media buys it, because they’re stuck — something serious happens in the world and they go to Trump to seek his authoritative opinion, even though he’s talking out his ass more often than not. And almost half the voters in the country don’t want to think, analyze or make informed decisions, they want to be told what’s true. And Trump is only too happy to fill their heads with gas-light.
Amir Khalid
I’ve said that the Trump administration is a version of The Godfather where all the Corleones are Fredo. I am now convinced that the consiglieri played by Rudy Giuliani is Fredo too.
StringOnAStick
This retroactive classification scheme needs to be shouted about by every D; this is authoritarian bullshit and needs to be exposed NOW.
OT, I did my first long hike (8 miles) after my second knee replacement 12 weeks ago. I ended up quite tired and needed to ice it, but it’s a start on the path back to getting my full life back but without painful arthritic knees. I figure it will take a full year .
Kathleen
Great outline of how the process of coordinating calls with foreign officials works from WaPo this morning, to help us evaluate other people’s claims about what is or is not appropriate or feasible:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/2019/09/25/cia-i-listened-dozens-obamas-calls-trump-knows-thats-normal/
MattF
Even the Russians are wondering wtf is going on with Trump and Rudy– they’ve been offering little ‘reminders’ that they’re not in favor of Trump releasing notes on his conversations with them. And why, exactly, would that be? One wonders.
Kathleen
@StringOnAStick: Congratulations!
Aleta
His perfect mind, the smartest and most loved winner in the history of the U.S., will not be whole until it claws out the dissonance of “illegitimate president.” Even as he destroys the servile environment that feeds him.
trollhattan
@StringOnAStick:
Nice! Self-propelled travel is the best travel.
Kathleen
@trollhattan: Too late to yesterday’s thread but wanted to congratulate your daughter (and you!) for her XC results yesterday!
StringOnAStick
@waysel: Now we know why Rudy went so insane, saying he’s the real whistleblower hero: he was going to be the guy who got to roll out the BS State department reclassification scheme to great fanfare on FOX. The whistleblower blew Rudy’s timing. I think the appropriate gif for this current state of the US S Trumptanic would be Putin slapping a riding crop on his palm in a very threatening manner, “drop the sanctions NOW”.
Another Scott
@satby: Ouch! :-( I hope it doesn’t last too much longer.
Enjoy your brunch/lunch/dinner!
Cheers,
Scott.
Amir Khalid
I hope TomatoQueen isn’t watching the Leicester-Newcastle Premer League match on the TV. Her Toon are a man down and getting thrashed 3-0.
Yarrow
Well, look who’s channeling efg:
Amir Khalid
@Amir Khalid:
Make that 4-0.
StringOnAStick
@Kathleen: @trollhattan: Thanks! My 26 week old knee replacement felt pretty darned good yesterday and prior to replacing it I was I constant pain and waking up at night f from it. I know the newest knee will reach “pretty darned good” status soon too. I will be back country skiing this year but getting my strength back for all that uphill climbing at high altitude will be a bit of a thing. Fortunately doing that will be the best way to get it back and you can’t beat the views.
trollhattan
@Kathleen:
Thank you, much appreciated!
“Running weather” suddenly arrived, our persistent 90-100 degrees plunged to 60s and 70s in about a day and a half. The kids are discovering a lot more gas in the tank during their long runs. Yesterday was my first XC meet and it’s an interesting thing to spectate at. The various courses (four distances in all) followed different bits of side-by-side loops laid out on a golf course, and I never quite knew where the runners would pop out of the trees. Following the crowd was the only strategy I could come up with but wasn’t completely reliable. Per my watch I put in eight miles yesterday, most of it watching kids put in miles.
Hitlesswonder
@Cathie Fonz: It’s particularly galling given that the Obama administration choose to “not look back” and investigate the malfeasance of the previous administration. Where is all the establishment media that so stridently said Obama should not investigate the origins of the Iraq war? The contracting? Surely they must be apalled at this investigation.
Oh the irony that Trump claims to be the victim of a witch-hunt even as he pursues his own real one against Hillary Clinton. Every lie the Republicans tell about the opposition is somehow the truth about them. They said Obama was a narcisisst who betrayed the nation and was simultaneously a bully and a wimp. And here we are.
japa21
Yes, this whole email crap is just that, crap. I bet there are plenty of emails to or from Pompeo on the normal (not classified) SD email system which have stuff in them that have been classified since they were sent or received. Let’s check those out as well.
Chetan Murthy
@Karen S.:
Need another “side” for the “both sides” narrative, don’t they? And Don Bedsore has to have a swamp to drain, after all ….. Hillary was just conveniently already a bete noire, is all.
patrick II
That they believe this is verified by the fact Donald asked Zelensky to get Hillary’s server back. Meanwhile, yesterday, it was reported Trump all but thanked the Russians for their interference during his 2017 with Russian ambassadors, telling them he didn’t mind their interference at all.
And they can believe both things at the same time. Insane is the correct word.
patrick II
@japa21: J
Just a note: McConnell uses a personal emal server who’s physical presence is in Moscow. Much more secure and less suspicious than Hillary’s basement.
Kathleen
@StringOnAStick: While I haven’t had a major injury or facing your level of obstacles, I’m “coming back” from 5 years of minimal running due to panic attacks (long story) and trying to be “competitive” in my new age group (70-74 as of next week). I’ve been running for over 30 years (including 15 full marathons) but tell myself every day, “You are starting from scratch. Let go of expectations and memories of past accomplishments. One day and one step at a time”. It’s hard for this Type A old gal (or so I’ve been told – the Type A part that is) but I am determined to regain my strength and my good form so I can enjoy the freedom and joy I experience from running. So good for you as you overcome a much bigger hurdle than !!
Kathleen
@trollhattan: How cool! I love watching cross country meets (both my brothers competed in the 80’s) and trying to follow them on the course can be challenging. But you walked further than they ran so you should feel good!
Frankensteinbeck
EDIT – Always remember, Trump has already confessed in his ‘transcript’ to asking another country to interfere in our elections. Everything else is gravy.
@Karen S.:
It staggers me, but at least I can understand the thought process. Trump is the hero and Hillary is the villain. Therefor she is the one who committed the crime. Therefor there is evidence to prove it, and they only have to find it. They’ve heard from somebody that the evidence is in the 30,000 ‘deleted’ emails. It’s irrelevant that they know Trump did the conspiring, and Trump and Rudy have the facts of the matter rubbed in their faces at all times. They KNOW Trump didn’t do anything wrong, so it’s a frame, so they’re going to prove it.
@Hitlesswonder:
Alas, very, very different from Trump’s actions. The previous administration’s crimes were political acts, stuff like war crimes, not personal crimes. The odds of getting those successfully prosecuted was remote. The odds of the Supreme Court declaring torture and probably a bunch of other Republican horrors forever legal were high.
@Hitlesswonder:
It’s the only way they understand the world works. Us vs Them and rules/morals only apply to Them.
Mike in NC
Any day now we’ll be hearing about how Fat Bastard has dispatched teams of investigators to Uruguay, Armenia, and Antarctica in search of Obama’s hidden birth certificate. Our tax dollars are being well spent.
tokyokie
@StringOnAStick: As someone who has been informed by multiple orthopedic specialists that I need a knee-replacement surgery, I sympathize with you and am glad to hear that things are going well. One of these days, I’ll have a job in which I can work with a full leg cast and crutches, but until then, I can’t afford to take several months off from working the floor as a nurse in a long-term care facility.
Amir Khalid
@Amir Khalid:
It’s 5-0 at the final whistle. Newcastle were crazy to let Rafa Benitez leave, and this dreadful season under managerial mediocrity Steve Bruce is the consequence.
oldster
@MattF:
I read that differently:
not as Putin saying “please don’t release transcripts,”
but rather as Putin saying, “we have transcripts too, and recordings, and they will hurt you much more than they hurt us. So do exactly what we tell you, or we will release them to hurt you.”
sukabi
@NotMax: the metal work on the head of that squid looks like it was hammered out in Billy Ray Bob’s barn after a quart of moonshine and 3 cases of Milwaukee’s Best.
sukabi
@oldster: unless Putin breaks in to a chorus of “It’s Raining Men” I think drumpf will miss that implication.
Steeplejack
@germy:
Pompeo not due in Italy until Tuesday.
Dorothy A. Winsor
@StringOnAStick: Rudy had dived head first down the rabbit hole, complete with references to George Soros. Can I just say I’m a good liberal, and I’m not sure who George Soros is. If I cared, I’d google him. But I don’t.
PS. I’m storing your comments on the knee replacement in my memory bank against the day when I need my knee(s) done. Very encouraging.
sukabi
@patrick II: I don’t think they believe that AT. ALL. I think they believe that it will keep their own crimes from being fully exposed. They are chumming the water with Hillary’s emails to bring in sharks to kill the investigations into THEIR behavior.
patrick II
@Karen S.:
Because it worked once, Trump never learns anything new (for example, he’s using the same failed business model as president that led to four bankrupticies) so he is smearing Hillary again. Plus, after years of right-wing attacks, Hillary’s name alone enrages them. He has nothing else to offer — racism, an economy still chugging along before he screws up too bad, and attacking his opponents personally and dishonestly. It worked before. It’s all he’s got.
Aleta
Is this your print or drawing?
patrick II
@sukabi:
Like everyone, I have struggled with the “are they so dumb that they actually believe what they are saying” vs “those outrageous, scheming criminal liars”. Trump asking Zelensky for Hillary’s server tipped the scales for me. He believes it. He’s nuttier than a fruitcake sprinkled with Giuliani dust.
germy
@Steeplejack:
So you're telling me HAG-O-COPTER (@ROTFLMFVO) is wrong?prostratedragon
Missouri man charged ‘set 13 wildfires on way to high school reunion’
When caught by leo he made some excuse about his late wife who died last year. But at the reunion before he was caught he said, ‘I didn’t expect to have this much fun.”’ [Link goes to a descriptive ditty]
joel hanes
@John Cole:
The FSM’s ears
Hoodie
I doubt Rudi is this nutty, he’s just this desperate and has zero scruples about how this nonsense can spiral into something dangerous. Rudi is out there doing his QAnon/Soros act because Trump wants to put maximum pressure on GOP senators not to break on impeachment. I wouldn’t be surprised that they are getting word through the grapevine that there is grumbling in the ranks. Trump knows that most of those guys hate him and would be all too happy if they could cut his throat without any political consequences. Rudi is rallying the nutjobs so they’ll flood those senators’ offices with threats of primarying, firebombing or worse. He doesn’t really care how crazy it looks to other people or what violence may flow from mainstreaming this crap.
germy
@Hoodie: I would sort of like to see Rudy indicted.
Frankensteinbeck
@patrick II:
Yes. It was a private conversation. It wasn’t framed as if he were asking for faked evidence, even if he thinks it could be faked. None of the rules for why a narcissist lies apply. He believes the most dumb-ass conspiracy theory that contradicts his direct experience, and believes that if he can get that server he can prove he’s the hero and his enemies are liars persecuting him. He is stupid and delusional to a terrifying extent.
Kirk Spencer
@Dorothy A. Winsor: I received insight when an acquaintance of mine, a both-sider Republican, said, “Soros is the Democrat’s Koch.”
Not true once you dig, but it’s the perception/mental defense they use.
laura
@prostratedragon: that article makes me think really bad thoughts about what would a fitting penalty. Many of our life long friends lost everything in the 2017 fires in Napa and Sonoma county. My dad lived less than a mile from the northern edge of the evacuation zone and I am sure it hastened his death early in 2018.
Thinking really bad thoughts about a pyromaniac who went on to have the most delightful time at his class reunion.
RedDirtGirl
@StringOnAStick: Congrats! That’s wonderful.
James E Powell
@jc:
100% of Republicans and a fair majority of the press/media agree.
patrick II
@Hoodie:
I think everything you are saying is right — except this — at some point, Giuliani believes what he wants to believe – the best version of himself and the real-world context for his best self. That is why he is so emotional — “I’m the hero! I’m the hero!” He has talked himself into this shit.
Gelfling 545
@Cathie Fonz: If Hillary had been corrupt as Satan, as corrupt as some would like to imagine, it wouldn’t make what Trump’s doing any better. We punish the bad guys we catch. We don’t let them go because we didn’t catch everybody.
Another Scott
@Frankensteinbeck: I think we need to keep in mind that The Memo isn’t a transcript.
(Emphasis added.)
The way I read that, Donnie was telling Zelenskyy that Rudy and Bill were going to fill him in on what they expect Ukraine to find and how to spin it. Or else. Not that Donnie believes the rumors/CTs.
Donnie’s playing mob boss and expecting fealty. Reality or belief doesn’t enter into it. And Zelenskyy knows that (“BTW! I stayed at Trump Tower! I paid you! I know how this game works!!”)
YMMV.
Cheers,
Scott.
JoyceH
@tokyokie:
If I might make a suggestion? I too have been told by orthopedic surgeons that I need knee replacement surgery, both knees. And it’s true, I’ve seen the x-rays, barely a scrap of cartilage left.
HOWEVER.
Before you schedule knee replacement, if you haven’t tried it yet, I suggest you find a good physical therapist. I’ve had two, the first was good and the second was great. I have minimal knee pain and am trying to rebuild my muscles and stamina.
My first physical therapist told me, “Not every knee pain is a joint pain”, and I’ve adopted that as a watch word. I limped for five years, because my right knee popped painfully when it was bent and straightened. But you know what? That had nothing whatsoever to do with the arthritis! The second physical therapist diagnosed the problem – a tight IT band had pulled my kneecap slightly off track. She worked on that for several months, and now I don’t limp at all. Sometimes I catch myself in a mirror at the gym or somewhere, and am all ‘look at YOU, walking like a normal person!’.
A lot of the knee pain that is attributed to arthritis can be alleviated entirely with attention to various tendons and muscles, and I’ve got so I know when this area starts to ache, to massage out this muscle.
With a referral from ortho, physical therapy is covered by insurance. Some knees do need to be replaced, but I always strongly advise people to try physical therapy first.
Steeplejack
@germy:
At least you’ve moved up from unsourced Internet bullshit to (sourced) rando nutjob bullshit. Keep on keepin’ on!
jonas
@trollhattan:
I guess having the president’s batshit insane lawyer scream incoherently about bizarre conspiracy theories he thinks will vindicate his client is good for ratings. Remember how CNN used to have Gregory Craig on during the Clinton impeachment shouting about how it was all merely an attempt by the Freemasons to cover up the disappearance of the Fort Knox gold to deflect attention from Henry Hyde’s son’s role in the Kennedy assassination? Oh, wait.
cain
@Matt McIrvin:
I must have been asleep when all that happened. Maybe I was too focused on the law breaking that Reagan was doing.
Steeplejack
@Aleta:
I believe it’s Rockwell Kent, for an illustrated edition of the novel.
prostratedragon
@laura: Amazing how destructive one little goofball can be, isn’t it? I oppose the death penalty on principle, but I sure can see how society can get pushed there.
sukabi
@germy: no “sort of want” for me, Guiliani needs to be indicted for his role.
Ryan
Do not go gentle under that good bus,
Senility should burn and rage at the close of Fox;
Rage, rage against going under the bus.
Though hatchetmen at their end know they ultimately must,
Because their words provoke no reaction from the Spox they
Do not go gentle under that good bus.
Aleta
@Steeplejack: thanks!
Wonderfullest things are ever the unmentionable
Ken
@Kirk Spencer:
He says that as if there’s something wrong with what the Kochs are doing.
Perhaps relatedly, I’ve never heard anyone say “Koch is the Republican’s Soros.”
Karen S.
@patrick II: This makes sense. It’s true. It’s all Trump has got, and it has been enough to gain the undying loyalty of some truly unhinged people.
Kathleen
@patrick II: I just read on Twitter (can’t remember whose TL) that NYT has “anonymous source” who claims that Trump didn’t say that. I wonder if they’ll vet “the source” like they’re trying to vet “The Whistleblower” for, you know, reasons.
Jay
Kathleen
@sukabi: They also know it’s catnip for the media pundi-ratti, many of whom will gleefully sniff it.
Kathleen
@JoyceH: Excellent advice.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Kathleen:
Of course not, anonymous sources are more credible in the NYT’s world than folk who put their name and risk their reputation with their claims.
James E Powell
@?BillinGlendaleCA:
It should be noted that this only applies to Republican anonymous sources.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@James E Powell: Of course.
opiejeanne
@laura: As a native Californian this arsonist makes me ill with rage. Until recently we owned a cabin that was in the path of the Old Fire in the San Bernardino mountains. That fire was in 2003, set by an arsonist, and the scars are still there. More than a thousand homes burned down, thousands displaced, and several deaths attributed to the impact of the fire.
And this idiot thought he was having fun. I know the area pretty well and I’m surprised there wasn’t a major conflagration. What a horrible human being.
Tehanu
@StringOnAStick: How great for you! I had some arthritic knee trouble early this year that went away, more or less on its own, but I couldn’t hike 8 miles if Nazis were chasing me — a quarter mile per day is about my limit. You’re inspiring me to get off my duff and try a little harder.
Btw — the whale etching at the top is fabulous. I’ve always loved Rockwell Kent.
Tenar Arha
@Dorothy A. Winsor: George Soros is a very rich man who has donated millions to good government organizations in the former Soviet block countries, including Hungary, and thus became a target for Russian propaganda. So now when you hear “George Soros” from a RWNJ these days, think “the Rothschilds,” & assume that somewhere there’s an underlying antisemitic/Russian/another authoritarian regime conspiracy theory involved. He’s their shibboleth.
J R in WV
@Kathleen:
I believe that Secretary Clinton’s emails will be investigated until Chelsea is dead and gone, as the guilt clearly is inherited down the gene-line.
Not that this makes any sense, it doesn’t, but since when has that bothered today’s Republicans!?!
Zinsky
Go over and check the comment threads on FoxNews’ website (I know, it is very painful). The hardcore right-wingers are still regurgitating the Seth Rich/George Soros/Clinton Foundation fairy tales that have been debunked a thousand times. I really don’t think anything will convince these people otherwise. We are dealing with a cult of personality here. Reason goes out the window. We need to be talking about de-programming techniques and electroshock therapy here folks, to get through to these gaping assholes.
J R in WV
@tokyokie:
I am not a doctor of any sort, but many friends and relatives (and me, I too!) have had joint replacements. No one needed a full leg cast. Knee replacement patients don’t get crutches, they use a walker to keep from falling while starting their PT. You will need PT, you will need time off, but not several months, should be covered by Worker’s Comp if you’re still working. [You don’t get sick leave??? Boo!]
Wife didn’t even have stitches, just glue and transparent surgical tape over the glued incision, was able to take a shower as soon as she could stand up in the shower. I helped with the showers.
TomatoQueen
@Amir Khalid: Oi, you at the top of the table don’t need to be rubbing the salt in the wound. You let Rafa go too, within living memory. You’ve also had shitty owners, only they were Americans & easy to get rid of. We’ve got a well-entrenched Cockney billionaire and the latest delusional purchaser, Peter Fucking Kenyon, for our pains. We’re just getting started. Howay also to today’s away supporters singing so loudly they could be heard across the Pond.
JAFD
@StringOnAStick: Allll Riiight ! (high five) Know how you feel. Good luck !