Trump’s personal lawyer, who is under investigation, arrived at the White House while the Judiciary Committee was passing articles of impeachment:
President Donald Trump's personal lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, was spotted at the White House this morning ahead of a vote in the House Judiciary Committee on Articles of Impeachment. pic.twitter.com/4BX0XM3rv5
— Maegan Vazquez (@maeganvaz) December 13, 2019
This is some brazen shit. Not unexpected since there’s a crime boss in the White House, but damn. Speaking of brazen, McConnell went on the Sean Hannity Show last night and admitted on TV that he’ll be coordinating impeachment defense with the White House and that the outcome is a foregone conclusion:
McConnell: Everything I do during this, I’m coordinating with White House Counsel and the president's lawyers. There will be no difference between the President’s position and ours.
"There's no chance the president will be removed from office."pic.twitter.com/oaZfKiP0g9
— Polly Sigh (@dcpoll) December 13, 2019
When the trial opens in the Senate, I hope the House managers make the case not only to impeach and remove Trump from office but also to impeach (in the sense of discredit) the credibility of the Republican Party. Armando on Twitter says the Democrats should demand that the chief justice be put in charge of all procedural questions, in response to McConnell’s vow to rig the outcome. Seems worth a shot to me.
Whatever happens, the case moving forward has to focus on Congressional Republicans as much as Trump. We all know Congressional Republicans will insulate Trump from the consequences of his actions, which 95% of them refuse to even mildly rebuke. The political value of this entire process is tying Trump around their necks, and I hope the House managers’ case is focused on that just as much as it’s about Trump’s rampant criminality.
Open thread!
Baud
Heighten those contradictions!
Nicole
In really depressing news, it looks like my cancer has recurred. I was diagnosed barely a week before the 2016 election (and at the time thought, well, at least I lived to see a woman President NOPE YOU CAN’T EVEN HAVE THAT), and now it returns right before impeachment, which, obviously, is going to go exactly as well and as honestly as the 2016 elections did.
How’s that for making a national crisis all about me? Sigh. This timeline sucks.
Baud
@Nicole: I’m sorry to hear that. Strength to you.
mad citizen
Perhaps Roberts can make it a 3 or 4 (House and Senate) cage match. It could get interesting. The one party is so blatantly corrupt.
Boris, Rasputin's Evil Twin
So, Moscow Mitch is telling us ahead of time he’s going to rig the trial. This should look great in his opponent’s campaign ads.
What a corrupt shitpile he is.
Kay
America’s Mayor! They’re all just gross. So sleazy.
Professor Bigfoot
THIS THIS THIS THIS THIS
We know the Senatortoise from Kentucky will game the system however he has to in order to protect Trump; so tie the bastard’s criminality around the neck of every single Republican running for everything, everywhere, from the White House to the dog house, OUT! NOW!
OzarkHillbilly
Discrediting the GOP is whole purpose of this impeachment, it was never to remove trump. The GOP would never go for that. McConnell wants to insure that no GOPs vote for removal, he doesn’t care about anything else except for giving the Collins’ of the Senate cover in their reelection bids.
As far as I know, the Chief Justice has the final say on all procedural questions as per the constitution.
JPL
@Nicole: I’m so sorry.
OzarkHillbilly
@Nicole: Sorry you have to go thru it all again.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
I’m pretty patient with DC Dems, but they, especially Senate Dems, really do need to start making some noise. Great opening for Harris to show people what they lost. Sherrod Brown’s not media shy (which occurs to me in part because twitter knife-fighter Brian Schatz is). Chris Coons owes partisans some fight. That goof from Arizona, the R who ran away then called on his caucus to step up and whose name always escapes me– speak up, son.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Nicole: so sorry to hear that.
schrodingers_cat
@Kay: That’s what Snooze Hour’s Whory Woodruff called him and did a fawning profile on him in the middle of the impeachment hearings.
Professor Bigfoot
@Nicole: that massively sucks. Pullin’ for ya.
JPL
It would not surprise me if Mitch called the Senate to order and passed a party line vote not to dismiss the charges. If possible, he’d do it before Christmas.
fyi, I just emailed Rep. McBath and thanked her for her vote.
Dorothy A. Winsor
@Nicole:
I’m so sorry. That sucks. Peace and strength to you.
zhena gogolia
@Nicole:
Oh, I am so sorry. I will be thinking of you and I hope you get the best possible care.
chopper
@Nicole:
oh fuck, that blows. be strong.
laura
@Nicole: I am so sorry. I wish you strength and courage. Fight when you must, rest when you can.
{{{{{HUG}}}}}
Kay
This election is being covered exactly like the 2016 election, so we can forget about a woman as President. The US is archaic and in the dark ages on equality. It’s just a fact. We’re supposedly this free wheeling innovative country but we’ve turned narrow and stingy and rigidly conventional. What we tell ourselves about ourselves is a lie. Trump isn’t anything new. He’s circa 1980. We’re lurching backward.
We hire low quality, egotistical old gargoyles who had their Glory Days in the 1980’s and hope to go back there.
Betty Cracker
@Nicole: Damn it! Hang in there, and remember that we are all rooting for you.
Elizabelle
@Nicole: Yikes. Hoping that you beat it back again, successfully. (Eradicate that mofo.)
And I hope you will let us know if you need any help meeting any of the co-pays, etc.
The Very Reverend Crimson Fire of Compassion
@Nicole: Rooting for you!
Betty Cracker
@Kay: I wish I could disagree, but I cannot. “Egotistical old gargoyles” is exactly right.
O. Felix Culpa
@Nicole: I’m so sorry. Peace and strength and healing to you.
MattF
I’ve been watching ‘The Irishman’ on Netflix. Scorsese plays a ‘retired’ mob hitman telling his story— I’m up to tales about Hoffa and RFK. But it’s the back-and-forth conversations among the career criminals that really gets my attention. I’m certain that this is what White House conversations sound like.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
at one of his 60 Minute Hates, trump was rambling along his stream of consciousness and (from memory) yelled something random about “THEY are trying to change our country” then he paused and focused and growled, “well, we’re changing it back”. That’s the essence of trumps.
(a side note, it’s an interesting debate in which era trump’s brain is stuck, there’s this from that 80s, that from the 50s, that other thing from the 20s…)
Nicole
@Baud: Thanks, Baud. Depending on how bad it is, I may have to withdraw from my lobbying to be your VP. I’m sure you understand.
And thanks, everyone; it’s much appreciated. I’ll know more about what to do next week. Round two with the merciless assassin, as King Crimson member John Wetton called it.
As sorry as I am feeling for myself right now, I’m also grieving the stabbing that happened in Morningside Park on Wednesday (I live very close and am in that park all the time). The police have charged a 13-year-old and it just breaks my heart. Two young lives destroyed. Effing life, man. You just never know.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@MattF: one of the few things that surprises me about them at this point is that he maintains the discipline to keep anything written just vague enough to give Hannity and Goehmert thin reeds of deniability to cling to. And along those lines, that Fredo and Gummo have learned that lesson. Maybe the only thing they’ve learned.
Nicole
@Elizabelle: Thanks, that’s really kind. Our insurance is pretty decent, so I think the co-pays will be manageable, but I’ll give a shout out if we get in a bind. Best bunch of jackals anywhere.
schrodingers_cat
@Nicole: That’s rough. Wishing the best of luck and strength in your battle.
zhena gogolia
@Kay:
I’m trying to be more hopeful than you are. I almost think a Warren-Harris or Warren-Abrams ticket could win. They’re all so damn smart.
Yarrow
@Nicole: So very sorry to hear that. Sending good thoughts.
Jay
mad citizen
The Dems should be tagging the Rs with the word “corruption” and the phrase “fundamentally corrupt” 1000 times a day. The Rs have no answer to this truth.
schrodingers_cat
Two teenagers shot dead by the police in an anti CAB (Citizenship Amendment Bill) protest in Assam.
Jay
@Nicole
I am so sorry,
Fu€k cancer.
Yarrow
In case anyone is still wondering about the British election, Corbyn was the problem. New poll out today:
The leadership of the party is important. Having a candidate people trust is important.
Baud
@Yarrow: I think I read that he was going to resign, but didn’t say when.
Fleeting Expletive
Does Chief Justice Roberts’ role in presiding over the Senate impeachment trial include the power to disapprove or change McConnell’s sham-trial rules? This can’t be happening thisaway.
MattF
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: The open criminality of the WH crew is just amazing. And the way the criminality is normalized by the Trumpites is a lesson— they all know exactly how to do it. Where did they learn this?
Gin & Tonic
From Twitter (natch) – Trump has sent 367 Tweets so far this week. Obama sent 352 during his Presidency.
PPCLI
@zhena gogolia: I also should be grading papers, but I needed to break to a) Agree that they are incredibly smart. b) Recall the words of Adlai Stevenson on that:
A supporter shouted: “Governor Stevenson, all thinking people are for you!” And Adlai Stevenson answered, “That’s not enough. I need a majority.”
Jager
@MattF:
the WH conversations are not as “professional” or as well thought out
Professor Bigfoot
@Kay:
More like 1890, me thinks, after the end of Reconstruction and when Redemption was in full bloom…
Felanius Kootea
@Nicole: Hope you have all you need to fight the cancer. Sorry to hear that it came back.
I learned about the Barnard student’s death yesterday and I’m still in shock. Didn’t know it was a 13 year old.
Yarrow
@Baud: He has hedged it. Traditionally a candidate who loses, let alone loses this badly, would resign right away. He has said he’ll resign “before the next election” and “after a period of reflection.” It’s a cult and his followers don’t want him to go.
There’s a clip from Good Morning Britain, a morning TV show with the horrid Piers Morgan where the two sides of Labour are just yelling at each other across the desk. It’s the state of the Labour party in short clip.
schrodingers_cat
@Kay:
Ds are winning despite that look at the 2018 and the recent elections in KY and VA.
Baud
@Yarrow: A cautionary tale.
painedumonde
So there are only two Branches ® of our Government?
Felanius Kootea
@Yarrow: They trust Boris Johnson? The whole of the UK voting population must be smoking crack.
I know empires fall but it’s amazing to watch people dismantle things from the inside (with a small assist from Russia).
Yarrow
@Baud: Pretty much.
O. Felix Culpa
@schrodingers_cat: Thank you for that encouraging reminder. It’s possible that we’ll lose in 2020 despite our best efforts; it’s guaranteed we’ll lose if we so dishearten ourselves that we give up.
p.a.
@Nicole: sending all the (+)s I can muster.
Shakti
@Nicole: I’m so sorry, Nicole. :(
Yarrow
@Felanius Kootea: No. They dislike Boris a lot. They’re afraid of Corbyn.
From the results, it wasn’t that Boris and the Conservatives won; it was that Labour voters didn’t show up. The Tories increased their voting number by 1% and Labour went down by 7% (I think, or maybe it was 9%). Labour lost the election more than the Conservatives won it. That’s down to Corbyn, as can be seen by the above poll.
Jay
Canada fired up a “major” Government program to monitor and counter disinfo ops during the 2019 Election,
Sadly, “our” Institutions are still ignorant about the use and impact of disinfo on Social media and rely too much on the assertations of Social Media Corporations about how their platforms are internally regulated and benign,
except of course, for the “internal actors” who know how and are willing to to use it to their advantage.
Yarrow
@O. Felix Culpa: Absolutely. The disheartening so we give up is right out of the authoritarian playbook. If you find yourself going down that route, take a break, do something positive for yourself and regroup. When we get disheartened they have a better chance of winning. Don’t let it happen.
Kay
@schrodingers_cat:
Because they’re lousy judges of character. Which has nothing whatever to do with being “smart” or educational credentials.
Then, because they are lousy judges of character and have promoted frauds like Rudy for decades, they cannot admit an error, so it then becomes about them defending their own poor judgment.
This has nothing to do with the public. It’s a closed circle. It’s celebrities defending fellow celebrities.
Rudy has to be good because they said he was good. They vouched for him. Now it’s about them.
Alien Radio
@Yarrow: Ask anyone why they don’t trust corbyn and you wind up with a catlogue of tory press talking points. He got Swiftboated.
and when they are saying they don’t trust him that means largely that they don’t trust him to deliver brexit (given where we saw thoose swings). I.E. they wanted a labour Brexiteer, not consensus seeker, so all the people Arguing for an Early Strong Remain platform for labour are basically wrong. Labour played the best game they could with what they had at their disposal but the British Media environment is toxic.
MattF
@Felanius Kootea: The North, plus Scotland, wants to be free of London and the South. That makes a majority. The EU is a stand-in for more nearby hatred.
PPCLI
Side observation: Kudos to Nadler for abruptly adjourning last night, to resume in the morning. To judge from Collins’ spittle-flecked meltdown, I assume that the Republicans planned — or perhaps had already spent millions cutting — ads demagoging about the “middle of the night vote”.
Side observation 2: I’m reassured about Pelosi’s political instincts after reading about the cranky Senate Republican reaction to the presentation of NAFTA 2.0 as agreed by House and Trump. a) Pelosi recognized that a1) Trump is a terrible negotiator except when his opponent is desperate. a2) In fact it is Trump who is desperate for a deal, any deal, that he can try to spin as a victory. a3) So Pelosi used this leverage to get concessions from the Administration on labor, etc that no Republican can be happy with. b) So labor is content with how things have worked out, and the Senate Republicans are stuck with the choice: agree with NAFTA 2.0 and make big business upset or stall NAFTA 2.0 and b1) make Trump upset and b2) highlight the fact that the House is getting tons of stuff done and the Senate is stalling, contrary to Republican messaging.
clay
@Yarrow: From the outside looking it, it always seemed to me that Corbyn, whatever his merits, was an anchor around Labour’s neck. I could not understand how he got in his position, nor how he maintained it after years of bumbling.
Steeplejack
@Nicole:
Sorry to hear that. Sending healing thoughts. ?
gene108
@Nicole:
I am sorry. Hoping for the best outcome for you.
PPCLI
@Nicole: So sorry. All my best wishes.
Steeplejack
I agree wholeheartedly with this and yield the remainder of my time.
Amir Khalid
@Yarrow:
True, but a win by a walkover is still a win.
Kay
@schrodingers_cat:
They want this to be about something “happening” to Guiliani that turned him from America’s Mayor into sleazy, corrupt, self-dealing operative. But is that really how people are? They turn into completely different people at 75 years old? Not likely.
Isn’t it much more likely he was always unethical and sleazy and self-dealing and they just didn’t see it because they were blinded by his celebrity and wanted to be close to power? This is what he is. He was always this. What changed is how people see him.
zhena gogolia
@Steeplejack:
I highly recommend reading that twitter thread that germy posted. Very amusing. Especially for Warren William fans.
gene108
@Boris, Rasputin’s Evil Twin:
I am not sure how much stacking the deck in favor of Trump will be viewed negatively in Kentucky. Outside of a narrow win at governor, Democrats lost the other statewide races.
Felanius Kootea
@O. Felix Culpa: I think people underestimate the negative impact of the Senate letting Trump off the hook on the election prospects of Republicans. They will go down with him in 2020 because he is going to be so much more blatant and so openly gross after they “acquit” him that independents and both-siders will have had enough. Republican voters will love him more but they are not the majority of the voting population.
Dems plus independents plus other non-Dems who are not Republicans are who the Democrats need to target about the lawlessness of this administration (in addition to their economic plans for the country).
Amir Khalid
@Nicole:
I am so so sorry to hear that. I don’t have any original words of comfort to offer, so just (((hugs)))
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@Nicole:
I’m so sorry this is happening to you again
Dorothy A. Winsor
@Kay: I think as people age, they become more themselves. They lose the ability to control their less acceptable instincts and just let it rip.
MattF
@Kay: Giuliani always had that aroma of locker-room politics. Some people find that attractive. But deodorant, no matter how heavily it’s applied, doesn’t fix the actual stink.
Jay
@Baud:
since Thatcher, the British Labour Party isn’t a “Party”, it’s been a coelition of Old Socialists, new socialists, Labour, ( Old Unions), New Labour,(Tory Lite), Labour Right, ( Austerians) and other “single issue” factions.
In the aftermath of the Election loss, Corbyn and his allies are going to try to “manage” the transition to new Leadership, with out losing their “highly popular” platform.
Much of the “anti-Corbyn” Labour Party, want a return to a position to the right of Blair, which would kill off Labour for a generation.
Traditionally, Labour, ( in the absense of scandal, etc) combines the election of a new Leader, with the selection of the Party Platform. The Left Coalition that has backed Corbyn, (roughly 60% of Labour) fear that the momentum of an anti-Corbyn backlash, could turn the Labour Party platform into a Thatcherist platform.
Yarrow
@Alien Radio: You get the media environment you get. All candidates have to learn to navigate it. Corbyn was dismal at doing that.
@MattF:
That may be true for Scotland, who went almost exclusively SNP, but the big story was the “red wall” fell as the North moved from Labour to Conservative. If they want to be free of London they didn’t do themselves any favors.
Yarrow
@Amir Khalid: Oh, absolutely. No disputing the results. Just post-game analysis is interesting as to what actually happened. The story that will get told and the actual facts are not necessarily the same.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Kay: a small man in search of a balcony. Jimmy Breslin had his number thirty-odd years ago. Those of us of a certain age remember when he moved his then-mistress Judi Nathan (now the future third ex-Mrs Giuliani) under the same tax-payer funded roof as his wife and children. He swept all that away by telling people which streets were closed on 9/11– when the emergency response center didn’t exist because he had ignored expert recommendations to put it in Brooklyn. Then he spent a couple of decades making money off 9/11. Those are the other tax returns I’d love to see.
Jay
@PPCLI:
and Nancy also swung changes to NAFTA 2.1 that Canada and Mexico saw as not only a no brainer, but also as improvements from their point of view, worth rapidly supporting.
Baud
@Jay:
A reasonable fear. But things obviously can’t keep going the way they’ve been going. Corbyn’s had his shot.
Gin & Tonic
@Amir Khalid: Completely OT, but when you were studying Spanish, what study materials/technologies did you take advantage of?
West of the Rockies
Stay strong of heart and spirit, Nicole. This cyber community is here for you.
That picture of Rudy above… He looks like he could just collapse from the weight of his corruption, his lies, his vodka consumption, his age and infirmity. Seriously, he looks like a cardboard box left in the rain.
Baud
@PPCLI:
A positive rundown of what we got in the NAFTA 2.0 deal.
sdhays
@Nicole: I’m so sorry to hear that.
Does it bother anyone else when they refer to Rudy Guiliani as the President’s “personal lawyer”? I know that that’s what he’s called by the President, but does anyone believe that Rudy is actually giving Dump legal advice or would represent Dump in court? They call him that to try to use attorney-client privilege to cover up their crimes.
I don’t know what he should be called (other than “yet-to-be-indicted felon and traitor”), but calling him Dump’s personal lawyer seems to confer a status on him that he doesn’t deserve. Just a peeve of mine.
Yarrow
@Kay: Giuliani has been all up with the mob for at least a couple of decades. He’s a sleazy operator.
Gin & Tonic
@Yarrow: The people he met with in Kyiv are scumbags too. A natural fit.
Just Chuck
I never imagined fascism in this country would look so jowly, dumpy, and stupid.
Jay
@clay:
Corbyn was the Last True Labourite.
Basically the Biden of Labour, but not harkening back to the Clinton or Obama years, but the heyday of post WWII Labour and pre-Thatcher.
Unlike other Labour cantidates, he never compromised on what were traditional Labour values, which as the Labour Party swung right, then right again, made him the “moral standard” of the Party, post Blair.
Kay
On the subject of “archaic”, this is a good thing from Politico. They’re covering the members of labor unions who don’t get covered- service industry and female.
Despite what you read, coal miners and auto workers are not the growth categories in labor unions. It’s just more of the weepy nostalgia that covers this country like a wet, whiny, suffocating blanket.
This is what IS. It isn’t, in fact, 1980. We are allowed to move ON. We don’t actually have to live in the 1980’s glory days of Rudy and Trump. Fuck that. No one with any sense wants to go back there.
Yarrow
@Gin & Tonic: Scum recognizes scum.
Chyron HR
@Jay:
I am 100% on board with the RNC cancelling their 2024 primary now and declaring that nobody is allowed to challenge Trump for the nomination.
Mandalay
@Kay:
I fear you are right. There is an excellent article by Rebecca Traister titled “Can You Spot the Fake? Hint: Look at the pundits.” about how the pundits treat male Democratic candidates as opposed to their treatment of Warren. The article focuses on the opining of the odious Steve Schmidt, but it could easily have picked from a dozen other pundits who have the same lopsided agenda against female candidates.
And there was a nice shiv for the equally vile John Heilemann who was caught saying this about Warren:
catclub
A more skilled politician would realize this and act appropriately. Facts after all, are facts.
Obama knew there were times when inserting himself into a debate would not help his couse.
Mike R
@Nicole: Sorry to hear, wish you good luck and a victorious outcome. Cancer sucks.
catclub
and in answer to an earlier poster: Jeff Flake.
Betty Cracker
@sdhays: Counterpoint: calling Giuliani “Trump’s personal lawyer” makes it clear he (Giuliani) is acting outside the government in Trump’s interests, not the country’s, which underscores the illegality and corruption of what Giuliani was doing in Ukraine.
West of the Rockies
@Felanius Kootea:
You’re right: Republicans are not the majority. But we need everyone to vote. We can’t lose 3 million voters here because Saint Bernard isn’t the nominee, 5 million voters there because Joe is too old and out of touch, 4 million over there because EW is just too mommish or Pete is too whatever. GOTV.
JPL
@Nicole: You are going to beat this, but if you don’t feel like waving signs or knocking on doors next year I’ll understand and knock on doors for you. We are going to win and send this mofo to FL.
Jay
@Baud:
which is why Corbyn is resigning, but not immediately, so that the transition can be “managed” and not be a knee jerk reaction and an abandonment of policy in favor of the right.
Sadly, a lot of “politicals” react in the immediate aftermath, trying to respond to the “hot takes” of “analysis”.
Remember how Hillary lost because of “economic anxiety” and not campaigning in the Rust Belt?
sdhays
@Betty Cracker: Yeah, what frustrates me is that it just seems inadequate. Tying him to Dump is definitely a plus. Maybe “Trump crony” or “Trump co-conspirator”? “Trump stooge”? “Trump minion”? “Trump henchman”?
Jay
@Chyron HR:
They basically have cancelled the ReThug Primary.
Betty
@Nicole: So very sorry to hear this. Try to keep the discouragement at bay. Resist.
Amir Khalid
@Gin & Tonic:
A self-learning kit published by Oxford Unviersity Press, Take Off in Spanish, for beginner to intermediate learners. It came with lesson and exercise CDs. I had already used the German and French kits, so I knew what to expect. But this kind of thing needs to be supplemented with additional materials — a college-level grammar text is invaluable, I’ve found. Dictionaries not so much anymore, because there are excellent ones online.
Betty
@Kay: A lot of truth in what you say.
Mandalay
@Jay:
That is absolute nonsense. Corbyn is so much further to the left than all American politicians that likening him to any of them is meaningless, but to specifically pick Biden is just absurd.
Gin & Tonic
@Amir Khalid: Thanks.
sdhays
@Jay: I think Atrios’ US commentary is often off the mark nowadays, but I think he had a good take on the UK election. Basically, Brexit split Labour and didn’t split the Conservatives. Corbyn had his baggage, but a different Labour leader would have faced the same fundamental difficulties. The rise of the SNP, which basically has gutted Labour in its base of support is another problem that Corbyn didn’t cause and a different leader would been similarly unlikely fix.
What’s always fascinating is how much everything in the British media tends to be Corbyn’s fault, despite his not having any power, even as Labour leader. It’s just like here where the Republicans have no agency of their own.
Yutsano
@JPL:
Adjusted that for you. And if he moves to Florida the Third Lady drops divorce papers.
brantl
So Yertle is going to be colluding with the White House, eh? That should get some headlines. If these are actual, you know, felonies, won’t that make him an accessory after the fact, or am I selling him short? Was he likely an accessory before the fact?
Kay
@Mandalay:
Elizabeth Warren has been taking really aggressive criticism from the male candidates and political media for weeks. She pushes back and she’s “lashing out”. Women aren’t allowed to fight. We are not permitted to do that. I’m a Warren supporter but give me a fucking break. Why can’t she fight back? It’s the most sexist thing I’ve ever seen and it is everywhere. I’m sick of it. Why are these people so conventional? Our political media corps are more conventional than the Rotary Club. They’re stodgy.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@Jay:
There are still morons who cling to this. The same types who decry “identity politics”.
Also, too, fuck Ron Howard for signing on to direct the film adaptation of J.D. Vance’s Hillbilly Elegy
Baud
@Jay: I don’t care about the hot takes. The fact is Corbyn tried and failed.
Hillary, among all people, would be within her rights to say she was robbed and seek vindication. She has not made the attempt, which I think was the right call, as much as I’d like to see her make them eat crow.
Jay
@catclub:
Like many Politicians and Parties, Labour and Corbyn do not “grok” how the world has changed, in Politics, from Dark Money, through Social Media to corrupted Institutions.
In many ways, they relied, ( and many still are) on the ideas that “the Truth Will Out”, that the Institutions can stop, punish and correct illegality in realtime and that there is truth and justice in the world.
They are not alone in this. Many of the Institutions that we rely on to preserve our Democracies either don’t understand the threats, dangers and how to react and counter, or are compromised and corrupted.
In 2016, President Obama, Justice and the IC went to the ReThugs to stop Russia, only to discover that Russia had got there first, and a long, long time ago.
Kay
@Mandalay:
Women are crafty, scheming liars while men are plain spoken truth tellers.
They’re appalling.
Ella in New Mexico
@OzarkHillbilly:
Of course we all knew McConnell would do everything he can to keep BLOTUS from being held accountable, and would very likely not have any problem in terms of getting the votes to protect him, no matter how many Articles of Impeachment the House was able to come up with.
But as much as I loathe the man, he’s actually as good a tactician in his role in the Senate as Nancy Smash is in hers in the House. He can schmooze the members of “both sides” of his party (and we know from anonymous sources there are some who would be willing to vote to convict if there was a secret vote) every bit as craftily as she can, but no doubt he knows right now that the chances of being forced by a tiny handful of them to do at least a perfunctory trial are high.
He’s going on Hannity and making these public statements for two reasons: to placate Orange Menace and to try and put public pressure on those few into caving to him dodging the public airing in anyway he can. But he must have their votes to do it. I’m not sure he’s sure he does.
In the end, he knows he must follow established rules, and is extremely likely to do so but I see no role for CJ Roberts to interfere in anything he has the power and options to do, including a vote to “just shut this whole thing down” and acquit The Bastard. In the end, it’ll be the 3-5 R’s unwilling to go on the record as being complicit in this whitewash without any public trial who can change this, not Roberts.
Those Senators need to feel the heat to hold to their values, however wispy thin we all know they are. If I were one of the two billionaires running a vanity campaign for President in the Democratic Primary right now, I’d seriously consider how I could be putting my money to better use to push the Senate towards justice. There are enough of them worried about losing in 2020 that a little cash from a PAC could really make a gigantic difference in how they vote.
Kay
@Mandalay:
They’re supposed to be covering this race, not the imaginary race in their heads. They missed that both Biden and Mayor Pete and Trump have been attacking Warren for weeks, sometimes dishonestly?
She’s not allowed to hit back? It’s the equilvalent of “why don’t you SMILE MORE?”
I don’t mind that they attack her- that’s the game- but forbidding her to hit back?
Steeplejack
@zhena gogolia:
Will do. I’ve got it queued up.
trollhattan
@Nicole:
Very sorry to hear this, fight the fight!
And fuck cancer.
Leto
@Nicole: That totally fucking sucks. Fuck cancer. Indeed, worst timeline. I don’t know what I can do to help, but if you need anything let me know. Bad jokes? Stupid military stories? Pictures of *insert animal*?
Yutsano
@Leto: Red pandas. All the red pandas. I have yet to see anyone who didn’t like the amusing antics of red pandas.
Or penguins.
Steeplejack
@sdhays:
Is Giuliani even licensed to practice law in a relevant jurisdiction? (D.C.? New York?) I have read conflicting reports.
jc
The Republicans in Congress aren’t satisfied just being contemptuous of evidence, good faith, fairness, truth. Led by Moscow Mitch, the Senate Rs have the unmitigated gall to hold what can only be called a complete sham of a trial … right after the House Rs raged and raged about how the Dems holding Trump accountable was an unfair process.
Dmbeaster
@Kay: Giuliani as unethical all along is best demonstrated by his recommendation of that felon Bernie Kerik to the Bush administration back in 2003, after Giuliani had named him a police commissioner and then employed him in his security company.
Jay
@Mandalay:
I never said a word about policies.
For the most part, Biden is campaigning on his past and is garnering support based on a the Clinton and Obama years, in many cases, like his “appeals” to bipartizanship, nostalgia for a past that never existed,
Labour support for Corbyn is based on him being the last and only true 1960’s and early 1970’s Labour leader left standing. This has/had a lot of appeal for older Labour members, appaled at the right wing turn Labour took under Blair and the betrayal of old principals and old allies. For the young Labour, Corbyn also had a lot of appeal because a lot of the “radical progressive policies” we see being advanced today to fix basic issues like inequality, social safety nets, the environment, were bipartisan policies in the ‘60’s and early ‘70’s and were seen as just common sense.
One can’t compare Biden to Corbyn on policy, because even the British Tories on many issues, to the left of the Democratic Party.
The comparison was about emotional appeal, nostalgia and name recognition.
West of the Rockies
@Kay:
Also, too, men are insistent whereas women are shrill. Men are focused whereas women nag.
Baud
@Steeplejack:
You know, I went here and no one with Guliani’s name came up. Hmmm.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@Kay:
It’s selective enforcement applied to the political arena, just another example of conflicting expectations on behavior applied to women and men.
Mandalay
@Kay:
Rubin is going after Warren for not releasing her tax returns prior to 2008 (!), and makes this bad faith argument:
Of course you can always get the outcome you are after if you compare apples with oranges.
And if Buttigieg wants to see Warren’s tax returns from before 2008 he can start by showing us his first.
ola azul
@Kay:
This is, imo, both incisive and precisely correct. As to how it came to pass that a big-city mayor — beloved by lawn-order proto-fascists and reviled by, you know, actual citizens — came to be ‘MURICA’S MAYOR!, well, I gotta theory about that.
fwiw, imo:
When 9-11 happent, it is my considered opinion that the media needed a hero. Not America, please note, the media *decided* that America could not “survive” the ordeal (cuz we’re infantilized children to them) w/o exalting Rudy.
Why? Cuz GeeDub acted the coward on 9-11. Like a dithering callow outta-his-depth coward. Can’t have that, no sirree. So the media created “America’s Mayor”, whose sole fucking accomplishment was to *not* shit his pants in public like, you know, GeeDub did.
Also, too: Cuz the media cannot face an uncomfortable (to say nothing of inconvenient) truth squarely at all, ever, even if all our lives depended upon it (viz. the normalization of a transparently unfit imbecile as “President Trump” whose “policies” are worthy of chin-stroking consideration). So rather than confront the harsh reality that our Shrub-like preznit froze, then panicked on 9-11, the media shifted the spotlight to a glory-hog who was more’n happy to bask innit.
Rudy, like Trump, is the same shithead he’s always been. Not that the media would ever deign to notice.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@Mandalay:
Is there a reason why she hasn’t?
JustRuss
I despise Giulliani as much as the next guy, but what’s brazen about him meeting with Trump? Attorneys aren’t supposed to meet with their clients? I don’t get it.
I heard Moscow Mitch on NPR last night vowing to collude with Trump to defend him, and yeah, that’s brazen. Couldn’t believe he just put it out there like that. Points for honesty, I guess.
Baud
@JustRuss: I think it’s just the fact that Guliani was just in Ukraine seeking to manufacture dirt on Biden.
Steeplejack
@Gin & Tonic:
Are you starting from scratch or somewhere in the intermediate zone?
Mandalay
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka):
Is there any reason why she should? Nobody else has released tax returns prior to 2008 AFAIK. And Buttigieg wants to see her returns, but he won’t release his? Fuck him.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@Mandalay:
In that case, I guess not, if nobody else has released theirs
The Lodger
@Nicole: Sorry. Cancer sucks.
ola azul
@Baud:
I appreciate that you (and others) deliberately use the word “manufacture”.
Even Dems will oft say “dig up,” which is a subtle (and ill-considered) ceding of rhetorical ground by adopting the opposition’s dishonest wording, cuz it subliminally suggests there be dirt to be dug.
Betty Cracker
@JustRuss: I think it’s pretty fucking brazen because Giuliani just got back from Ukraine, where he was carrying out Trump’s corrupt scheme to rig the 2020 election and was arriving to brief Trump on those corrupt activities. Also, that he’s still Trump’s lawyer while under investigation for tons of crimes is a scandal in itself.
Mandalay
@West of the Rockies:
Men are assertive but women are emotional, yet men are emotional and women are moody.
Men are combative but women are testy.
This thread could have legs.
Steeplejack
@Baud:
I could see Giuliani fancying himself such a freewheeling macher that he has neglected to maintain the proprieties, so to speak.
ola azul
@Nicole:
Well, fuck. I know you only thru your thoughtful, well-reasoned, impassioned, humane postings, and while there is never a good time for awful news, the timing of this does seem especially cruel. I wish you strength on your road to wellness.
Jay
@Baud:
Labour is not going to reorganize and realign based on the “hot takes”, no matter how much the anti-Corbyn groups and the Punditocracy want them too, and push and pressure them to.
Unlike American Presidential Party Candidates, in the Parliamentary Systems, Party Leaders, while also being cantidates for the Prime Ministers Office in an election, also have a day job, which is running and managing the Political Party at the National level, along with being a sitting MP.
one of the two is a job that American Presidential Cantidates never have, and the second, is often a job, that Presidential Cantidates no longer have, ( Billionaires, ex-Governors, ex-Congresspeople, previously failed Cantidates, etc.)
In a Parliamentary system, Party Leaders have to be:
-a) an elected and sitting MP for their riding, ( or running for a seat in the House),
-b) a leader and manager of the Members in the House on day to day issues and long term,
-c) a leader and manager of the National Party.
In the American system, many people, in the House, Senate and a variety of National Party Organizations fill that role.
You don’t quit your day job as CEO because you didn’t win the election to head the Company’s Social Commitee or run the Fantasy Football League.
in Canada, Scheer announced his immediate resignation of the Conservative Party, because of scandal and corruption, not because he lost an election or was a drag on the Party in the election, (which he was).
He still has his day job as an MP.
With out the scandal, Scheer would have stayed on as Party leader, no matter the internal and external opposition, until the next Leadership Convention. If a sufficient internal movement formed inside the Party to dump him, then, and only then, would he consider resigning and not running for Party leadership again.
jonas
Obama’s brain wasn’t broken…
Baud
@Jay: It’s up to Labour’s voters to figure out what they want to do in response to yesterday. Obviously, nothing legally compels them to jettison Corbyn from his role running the party.
Yarrow
@Baud: Traditionally Corbyn would jettison himself after a loss this big. Doesn’t look like that’s going to happen so there will likely be a major Labour civil war about the direction of the party.
I think this idea has merit:
Baud
@Yarrow: That’s my understanding of the unwritten rules of parliamentary democracies — that leaders step aside when they suffer a big loss. But maybe that’s changing.
Mandalay
@Jay:
You didn’t, so my bad, though since they have both been campaigning for months, assuming a comparison of their political positions was not unreasonable.
That said, I’d also agree with you on Biden, but disagree that Corbyn really harkens back to old Labour. He certainly wants to re-nationalize some industries which was at Labour’s core in the earlier part of the 20th century, but his positions on so many other issues distance him from the Labour Party itself:
I’m pretty much with him on all that, and those on the left of the Labour Party in the past would also be supportive, but those positions are a million miles away from past Labour policy.
So no, I don’t think Corbyn really harkens back to the old Labour very much. He just happened to be in the right place at the right time after Miliband stepped down. He’ll be looked back on as an accident of history, a compromise selection for the leadership of the Labour Party, rather like Michael Foot who was equally unsuccessful.
Elie
@Nicole:
Keep on keeping on. Strength to you and optimism. No one knows our path in this life in advance.
ola azul
@Baud:
[Sung to the tune of “The Age of Aquarius” …}
It’s the aaage of unaccountabiilityyy
the aage of unaccountabiilityyy
Unaccountabiiiiiilityyyyy
Unaccountaaabiilityyy …
StringOnAStick
@ola azul: I made this point to a patient yesterday who works for the local PBS station; Rudy was sent to Ukraine to manufacture evidence against Biden, not dig up dirt, and the media should use the word manufacture. Manufacture is much more accurate, dig up dirt implies there is something there needing to be dug up.
sdhays
@Yarrow: This doesn’t make any sense to me. Britain is leaving the EU at the end of January. Remain lost, and lost big time. And they lost because too many people who supported Remain accepted defeat in the first place. Remain is a bigger loser than the Labour Party here.
The next battle is going to be over preventing the breakup of the United Kingdom, and at this point, most of the major players don’t seem to want to keep it together. It’s certainly not in BoJo’s interest to keep Scotland in the fold.
Jay
@Baud:
it’s not up to Labour’s voters. It’s up to the Leadership of the Labour Party to decide what happens, and the Membership of the Labour Party to pick the option they want.
In Parliamentary systems, you actually have to join a Political Party and pay membership fees. It’s like a Gym.
When you register to vote, you don’t register Party Membership at all, or Party Preference.
Once you are a Member, you get to decide how much you want to participate, locally and federally, and some participation may require approval, election, fees and donations.
the Labour Party has a bit over 425,000 members,
and drew a bit over 12,250,000 votes.
patroclus
@Baud: Not necessarily. The last time Labour did this poorly, it was under a very new and interim Clement Atlee in 1935 and he stayed for the long run. The Tories didn’t dump Churchill after 1945 either. Both came back to win general elections. It’s more of a modern custom than a rule. Corbyn and his supporters are determined to continue to dominate the Labour party – I don’t see him going for awhile. Although he should because he’s a terrible leader (unlike both of the above).
ola azul
@StringOnAStick:
Good on you. Innit remarkable that we, the hoi-polloi, are obliged to line out members of the media, who’re either being lazy or dishonest? The enduring legacy of Newton Leroy “DivorcePapersintheCancerWard” Gingrich n Frank “TheFuckICareifIPoisontheWellI’mRichBitch!” Luntz.
How you been?
(Saw, very much later, that you had asked about the young fella’s film; will just say, there’s a whole lotta hurryupnwait in making even a brief appearance inna film.)
Baud
@Jay: That’s what I meant. I worded it incorrectly. I meant the members of the Labour Party. They’re the ones who elected Corbyn to lead the party in the first place IIRC.
Baud
@patroclus:
Thanks.
Yutsano
@Nicole: Can we ask for a rewrite on the timeline? Or fire the writing staff?
I sincerely hope you kick the ever loving tuchas out of your errant cells. We’ll be here if you need support/laughs/primal screaming targets. Just let us know.
And fark cancer.
JustRuss
@Betty Cracker: IOW, business as usual in Trumpland. I guess the gaslighting’s working, if he doesn’t hold a press conference with Trump announcing they’ve successfully strong-armed Ukraine into manufacturing false charges against Biden, not brazen enough to be worth mentioning.
Ruckus
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
You do understand that you are making the case for dementia don’t you?
The deeper one gets into it the more the memories are blurred and combined, until even the individual memories are made up rather than remembered and then nothing real is left.
Ronnie had Nancy to run the place, all trump has is racist haters and idiots. It isn’t going well.
Ruckus
@Nicole:
I’m really sorry.
I know first hand how that threat is always hanging over our heads.
All I’ve got is kick cancers ass. It deserves it.
joel hanes
@MattF:
They’ve been practicing since Nixon.
Jay
@Mandalay
There are parts of your mentioned list that are consistent with “old” Labour ideals, but reflect the changed world.
Ireland and Palistine for example. The weight of Social and Economic Justice and Democracy have swung from Israel and Northern Ireland to Palistine and Unification, because neither Northern Ireland or Israel measured up to their ideals and on many issues, they have become the very thing they were created to fight.
Anti-war and disarmament are very “old” Labour, ‘60’s and early ‘70’s, not ‘50’s or Post Thatcher.
Then, there are the “new issues”. The idea that part of the UK could “peacefully” leave, would have been an anthema to “old” Labour as Britain was still reeling from the loss of the Colonies, the responsibilities of the Commonwealth, and of course, Northern Ireland. As a result, the idea that any region of Britain could peacefully leave, was as unthinkable as a peaceful sucession by a State in the immediate aftermath of the US Civil War. It did not fit what was believed to be reality. More so when the only people pushing Scottish Nationalism at the time were a bunch of cosplaying IRA fanboi’s on the Reich, and Bader Mienhoff “tankies” on the far Left.
The sad reality for Labour, is that while Corbyn should have been the consience of the Party post Blairite, somebody with out the baggage and more attune to the new political environment should have been the leader.
Sadly, all center-left parties have been completely sandbagged and left unable to effectively respond to the new reality of politics, from dark money, through ratfucking, disinfo, foreign actors, corruption of Institutions to the Media landscape.
Warblewarble
Fire when you see the “whites” or whatever of trumpthuglicans eyes.Gettysburg was won by standing firm shooting straight and using the artillery, time for the”terrible swift sword”
Gin & Tonic
@Steeplejack: More or less from scratch. I know a few words and can sometimes figure things out from other Romance languages, but I have more Slavic than Romance languages.
artem1s
@OzarkHillbilly:
this confuses me completely. Putin must have something really damning on Moscow Mitch. Cause supporting Dolt45 could put safe GOP Senate seats into play, IMO. What could Mitch possibly have to lose if he remained neutral – shut his mouth and wrangled the Senate majority to a no vote? Whatever you think about MM, you have to admit he’s never been bad at testing the political wind – but this is a colossal miscalculation. Whatever the dirt is, it must be bad.
Nicole
@Leto: Thank you (and to everyone else who chimed in since I left the computer- my best friend came over for a few hours, which was much welcomed). Bad jokes are always welcome; especially if they are terrible puns.
patroclus
@Jay: Not “all” center-left parties. The Liberals in Canada just won, Spain just went for the PSOE and Argentina just turned leftward. And the Democrats in the U.S. are poised to win after the 2018 mid-terms if we don’t Corbynize ourselves. Thankfully, even Wilmer isn’t that terrible and there is no comparable issue to Brexit here that will split us so badly.
artem1s
@MattF:
Darth Cheney, Karl Rove, et al
Nicole
@Yutsano: Definitely we should fire the show runner for this time line, at the very least. I don’t know what their overall plan for this series is, but it ain’t working for me.
And again, thanks. For now it’s a lot of reminding myself I’m probably not dying tomorrow or the next day or the day after that, so pick up and prepare for the next round of treatment, whatever that turns out to be.
artem1s
@gene108:
they probably won’t beat Moscow Mitch, but the GOP will have to spend money on a race would normally be a cinch.
James E Powell
@StringOnAStick:
It is well-established that the press/media will use the phrases that Republicans choose for them. Anything else would be biased.
Ksmiami
@Felanius Kootea: my philosophy- you can have progress or you can have nostalgia but not both…
catclub
@artem1s:
I would agree. Pence instead of Trump would make little difference to McConnell in terms of judges. Why does he care so much?
Jay
@patroclus:
the Liberals in Canada scraped out a win, and as I pointed out earlier, and several times over the past few days, despite a major Government effort across many Departments, got sandbagged by disinfo on Social Media.
when it takes Elections Canada and the RCMP 3 and 1/2 years to investigate illegal, organized ratfucking, by a domestic Actor, that results in a non-prosecution, a slapped wrist and a collective Media shrug,
it shows that our Institutions are not able to deal with the current landscape.
once again, the US and Western IC’s have been watching and monitoring in real time, Russian and others mutilayered programs to attack our democracies since before 2008. Not a peep out of them until 2016, and by that time, several of the Institutions in control of protecting US Democracy, were already in the bag for Russia. Yurtle.
Another example. Election hacking. Everytime the Institutions in charge release a report on 2012-2018 hacking “attempts”, it’s deeper and possibly more effective than previously reported.
People need to know before they go to the polls, that their vote may be compromised or erased, and be armed with ways to protect their vote or track that their vote gets recorded correctly and reported correctly. Telling them 8 years after the fact that their vote may have been changed, lost or stolen, doesn’t protect democracy. Or unhackable systems, ( paper ballots) need to be mandated.
In the British Election, we saw in real time how fake news went from Twitter, swarmed through Social Media, to the front pages of the papers and TV,
only to be exposed by Citizen Journalists, not the Institutions charged with protecting Democracy, and the only result, was a “meh” and a “lets move on” by the cornerstones of Democracy.
There will be no short term or long term consequences for that deliberate ratfucking and in a large portion of the web it will live on as a “truth” and viral incitement for years to come.
The US is going into the 2020 election with all the 2016 ratfucking in place, Domestic and Foreign, allied with a host of new Foreign and Domestic actors who have learned what works, have acquired the tools from Bot networks to Dark Money PAC’s and have started deploying, with zero “official” push back.
thalarctosMaritimus
@Nicole: I’m sorry to hear the news.
We’re all pulling for you. If there’s any way we can help, please just say the word. We jackals have to stick together.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@catclub: trump doesn’t give a shit about judges, and only cares about the Republican Party as a means to his own power and preservation, if they throw him to the wolves, and he could turn rogue against McConnell and the party, there’s no telling what damage he could do, encourage or inspire write-in Senate campaigns in ME, CO, AZ, IA, NC, turn against Pence or whoever the 2020 R nominee was so he could say “See?”. trump is an idiot– have you seen the report from Peter Bergen that he suggested Seoul should be moved away from the border with NORK?– but he has certain political talents, among them a bully’s instinct for his enemies’ weak points.
It’s all wild speculation, since McConnell is never going to take that chance
Warblewarble
Moscow say again Moscow Mitch working for Putins puppet.Moscow Mitch say it loud working for PUTINS puppet.Clear light and determination all that that holds any hope in this time of trial. My grandchildren need a better world how about yours.FIGHT.
CaseyL
@Nicole:
Oh, hell. I am so sorry to hear that. I hope your treatment is effective and beats the bastard back.
It really does seem like the universe is gutting us all just because it can.
(((CassandraLeo)))
@Nicole: Agreed. This is truly the Darkest Timeline.
I wish you luck in battling your illness.
Ceterum censeo factionem Republicanam esse delendam.
James E Powell
@Nicole:
Sorry to hear this. F cancer and F the national crisis. This is about you. I wish you strength & peace. Know that you are loved.
rikyrah
@Nicole:
Sending you prayers :(
Zelma
@Nicole:
Just keep your spirits up and know that we are all wishing you the best. I’ve gotten through two bouts and am doing fine. They’ve come so far with cancer treatment.
lurkypants
Yes, he’s licensed in New York. I checked.
janesays
@catclub: McConnell and all of these other GOP lackeys aren’t afraid of Trump, they’re afraid of the millions of devoted redhat lunatics who wait for hours in lines to see Cheetolini carry forth at his Nazi rallies in places like Bumblefuck, Alabama.
If he and they don’t demonstrate total fealty to their orange messiah, they will turn on them. Trump has absolute control of the party now, in a way no previous president has ever had total control of either major political party in any of our lifetimes.
Steeplejack
@lurkypants:
Thanks.