Jay Sekulow up. He seems to be the ringmaster for all the President’s lawyers. I’m not going to spend a lot of time on this.
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Come for the politics, stay for the snark.
Russian mouthpiece, go fuck yourself.
The poor and middle-class pay taxes, the rich pay accountants, the wealthy pay politicians.
I like you, you’re my kind of trouble.
My years-long effort to drive family and friends away has really paid off this year.
A snarling mass of vitriolic jackals
They’re not red states to be hated; they are voter suppression states to be fixed.
Come on, man.
Take hopelessness and turn it into resilience.
Their freedom requires your slavery.
“woke” is the new caravan.
Conservatism: there are some people the law protects but does not bind and others who the law binds but does not protect.
Whoever he was, that guy was nuts.
Come on, media. you have one job. start doing it.
Our job is not to persuade republicans but to defeat them.
A thin legal pretext to veneer over their personal religious and political desires
Accused of treason; bitches about the ratings. I am in awe.
Do not shrug your shoulders and accept the normalization of untruths.
Sitting here in limbo waiting for the dice to roll
Historically it was a little unusual for the president to be an incoherent babbling moron.
If you’re pissed about Biden’s speech, he was talking about you.
The next time the wall street journal editorial board speaks the truth will be the first.
Nancy smash is sick of your bullshit.
Since when do we limit our critiques to things we could do better ourselves?
Teach a man to fish, and he’ll sit in a boat all day drinking beer.
guachi
Reading captions, his short intro was not defending anything Trump did but attacking the Democrats’ motives for impeachment.
Leto
Listening to Ken Starr speak, in public about anything, reaffirms there’s no God.
Edit: also listening to Ken Starr speak to the Senate about being “impartial” is just… satire is dead.
HRH mistermix, Lord Bombay Sapphire, Duke of Schweppes
When the facts are against you, argue the law. When the law is against you, argue the facts. When both are against you, get that lying piece of shit Sekulow to run his mouth.
Yutsano
At work.
Can’t watch.
Probably the better for it.
Also: automatic double carriage returns suck.
takebakawashi
Starr is droning on about the history of impeachment (including in the UK?); the gall of this motherfucker talking about impeachment having become “a weapon to be wielded against one’s political opponents”
Please, someone in the gallery get thrown out for shouting, “Call Bolton!”
Please please please.
HalfAssedHomesteader
Starr is blathering on with his irrelevant history lesson. Determined to make the Republicans’ “boring trial” claim a reality.
zhena gogolia
@takebakawashi:
trollhattan
@Yutsano:
That’s paragraph spacing at work.
Use shift+enter for single-line spacing.
Aleta
@takebakawashi: Starr has been “led to reflect” — He’s just a thoughtful, trustworthy guy calmly advising the Senate that it can gently weave a restorative tapestry out of this mysterious language in the Constitution.
takebakawashi
@Aleta: me to Starr: Andrew Johnson article 11? You bullshit-spewing sack of camel exudate, you want the common law of impeachment, look at articles 8 and 10 and get back to me.
Amir Khalid
This is a test.
Single-line spacing:
Successful.
Regular spacing:
Also successful.
ETA: Alas, it does not work when the comment is posted.
Immanentize
@Amir Khalid: Try text mode?
JPL
Sen Loeffler’s Cumberland office answered the phone. I identified myself and gave my address and then asked if she was aware that John Bolton was a lifelong republican who worked for Reagan, both Bushes and Donald Trump. I found it offensive that she would accuse him of slander without hearing his testimony. The person was speechless on the other end. If you live in GA call 770 661 0999.
Another Scott
@Yutsano:
Wonkette LiveBlog Day Whatever.
Cheers,
Scott.
wvng
@JPL:
I love this response and shared on Facebook. I sadly have been limited to calling my two WV senators. Manchin I call and say please keep doing the right thing (today he called for Roberts to decide on the applicability of witnesses to the case). Capito I call to scream at her for a bit.
As for watching the hearings, I think of that classic bit with a detective standing in front of a fireworks factory on fire saying “nothing to see here.” In the current case, there is actually nothing worth seeing to see here.
Sloane Ranger
So, I wondered how the President’s men would deal with the Bolton reveal and Sekelow (sp?) seemed to be urging Senators’ to ignore it as it’s not a formal statement or document.
Seems to beg the question that maybe the manuscript and/or its author should be subpoenaed to become so.
Maybe they’re playing for time waiting for Schiff or Nadler or someone to once again offend Susan Collins delicate sensibilities.
S
marklar
Starr-land vocal band:
My motto’s always been ‘when it’s right, it’s right’
Why wait until the middle of a cold dark night?
When everything’s a little clearer in the light of day
And we know the Senate’s gonna let him off any way
Yutsano
@Another Scott: Thank you for making my brain even dumber. :P
patroclus
I’ve been watching for an hour and a half and so far, it’s a whole load of nothing. Sekulow keeps saying they’re going to address the “facts” but they haven’t so far. Starr was just focused on nonsensical irrelevant historical non-analogies but he did foreshadow a big “reveal” in that Dershowitz is going to talk about Tribe supporting the impeachment of Reagan. (??!!) And Sekulow’s big point was showing the sharing of pens when the Pelosi and the House managers signed the Impeachment resolution. (??!!)
Bill Arnold
@Another Scott:
Evan Hurst is funny. I do wish people would start saying that no f-in “Transcript” has been released! The Ukrainians have a recording; they must be tempted, if they could be sure that Trump couldn’t arrange for Ukraine to be destroyed before Jan 20 2021.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@patroclus:
great, is he going to mention that time Larry ate all the good canapés at the Harvard Law Friday afternoon sherry hour, when he knew Dersh had had to skip lunch that day?
Raven Onthill
Moral philosophers will henceforth measure hypocrisy as fractions of a starr.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
JPL
@wvng: I’ll call Perdue tomorrow and ask if he thinks it’s okay to use tax payer funds to investigate Russian conspiracy theories and political opponents.
Duane
@patroclus: If this is a defense of Trumpov these guys are really clueless. Even I know better. Still with the no quid pro quo. They must be confident Bolton won’t testify, otherwise a competent defense would drop it.
bemused
Trumpie watching and screaming at his defense team, “Why aren’t they yelling, pounding the table and calling the Dems losers?”
Just One More Canuck
@Duane: “competent” – I see the problem here
JPL
@bemused: His call was perfect. Someone has trump’s phone and he is walking around heavily sedated at this point.
bemused
@JPL:
I can’t imagine no attention span trumpie could listen longer than first five minutes before getting bored.
Duane
@Bill Arnold: Ukraine can’t be sure Trumpov won’t try to destroy them after Jan. 20, 2021, either. Might be wise to take him out now, if they can.
satby
Adding Ken Starr on the team was a huge fuck you to the Democrats and to the American people who continued to support President Clinton after Starr’s $70 million snipe hunt failed to get a conviction.
They’re rubbing our collective noses in our utter powerlessness. They think they are anyway.
gene108
@JPL:
I take Trump at his word, on this issue.
In Trump’s mind, extorting someone you have leverage over via a telephone call is a “perfect call”.
Kay
Just the EGO on these people. The complete and utter lack of self awareness or shame.
They needed to be checked LONG ago – but instead they were awarded lifetime sinecures making millions of dollars. Year after year, decade after decade, the worst people got promoted. This is what you’re left with- an “elite” that are fucking low quality buffoons.
Clean house. They all need to go. No more books, no more university appointments, no more cable tv guest slots. Find better people.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@satby: stunt casting and owning-the-libs by the game show host in the Oval Office
ETA: Ari Melber on MSNBC is calling Starr’s appearance an “unmitigated disaster”. I think it would be true, if the jury weren’t already pretty much paid off
Fair Economist
@JPL: Go JPL!
MisterForkbeard
@patroclus: The thing about the pens is that the Democrats were smiling during part of that. Therefore they’re just having a lot of fun, this thing is partisan, and obviously we have to throw it out.
I keed, but I have seen this argument
Duane
The Republican’s concern about the upcoming election is so hypocritical it’s laughable. There can’t be a person left in the US that believes the election will be fair if Trumpov is their candidate.
Bill Arnold
Since Trump’s defense team is bringing it up, these are facts that every reporter should know:
There’s a huge loophole in the GOP’s claim that Trump’s sale of Javelin missiles to Ukraine shows his support for the country (John Haltiwanger, Jan 23, 2020)
Kay
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Ken Starr thinks we’re idiots. He thinks he can stand up there and spout this nonsense and none of us will remember his insane, grandstanding pursuit of the Clintons. It’s the reason we’re stuck with him- why we’ve been subjected to his fucking mediocre “work” for 30 years.
They don’t even go away when they cash in and go to the private sector. They won’t ever, ever go away.
It’s not enough that they make millions after their government turn on wingnut welfare. They’re back! Over and over, forever.
Bill Arnold
Evan Hurst at Wonkette calls Starr a “Blowjob Investigator”. I’d amend that to a “Respected Blowjob Investigator”.
FlipYrWhig
Wouldn’t it get all the Republican senators off the hook if John Roberts just ruled that there needed to be witnesses? It’d give them a procedural figleaf and, better yet, someone for the Trumpies to blame.
Kay
Why does the NYTimes continually broadcast the Trump Administration threats to obstruct witnesses with litigation?
Who needs to hear these threats? How does promoting them serve the public?
How stupid are they? They haven’t yet figured out this is a tactic intended to intimidate witnesses from appearing?
No wonder Trump played these people for 50 years. They’re not smart people.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
Good on Joe
Duane
The team of misfits is doing it again! Rudy Colludi is relevant to this trial? Well, thank you. He should be called as a witness.
Frankensteinbeck
@Bill Arnold:
Why? The thing that was released confesses to asking a foreign government to interfere in an American election. Everything else is details. That’s why it’s the only event to seriously move the polls. We don’t need the original.
wvng
@JPL: There really is no reason for anyone not to be calling their senators. Call your Democratic senators to thanks them for standing up for our country; I understand that Dems are not hearing from their constituents and we must change that. Call your republican senators and ask them why they hate America or, better, ask them the very clever questions JPL has developed.
Jinchi
FYI, for those of you who were wondering if the Dems should trade Biden testimony with the Republicans to get testimony from Bolton, there’s a reason not to play that game.
That game never ends.
Bill Arnold
@Frankensteinbeck:
Because it’s a lie. A blatant, repeated lie. The main document in question says:
What was released was a prettied-up version of the conversation. We don’t know how it was edited or what it excluded. A cursory examination shows extemporaneous speech complexities that Trump has not demonstrated in public. (IMO).
patroclus
Jane Raskin just spent 30 minutes “defending” Guiliani by talking about “America’s Mayor,” Carl Sandburg and the “fact” that the Mueller report didn’t find any obstruction of justice (??!!) and concluded that the score is now Guiliani 5 Schiff 0. (??!!)
Mo MacArbie
Should I call my senators? I’m in NC now, and I’m pretty much at, “Please proceed, senator.” Fuckem
James E Powell
@Kay:
I think he knows that we – meaning we fairly attentive Democrats – are not idiots, but he is counting on the press/media to avoid or obscure his history so that those who don’t follow things will have no context.
trollhattan
@Kay:
Yup, the umpty-year Whitewater Investigation, which proved Bill Clinton really likes women and women seem to like Bill Clinton. After that, leading Baylor Rapeversity to awesome heights, so awesome they were embarrassed into letting his ass go. In Texas.
That Ken Starr.
zeecube
@FlipYrWhig: It’s possible if no one objects to the ruling. But unlikely. My understanding is that any ruling by Roberts may be vetoed by a 51-49 senate majority vote. I am sure someone, like Graham, would object, requiring at least 4 republicans to go on the record in support to sustain Robert’s ruling.
Yutsano
@zeecube: Roberts has done absolutely nothing this whole trial. What makes you think he’s going to bother to intercede with the calling of witnesses?
FlipYrWhig
@Yutsano: That was my idea not zeecube’s.
Yutsano
@FlipYrWhig: Noted. My point still stands.
catclub
How do you know? The original is probably much worse for Trump.
FlipYrWhig
@Yutsano: My thinking was that if there really are some number of Republicans who would like to hear from witnesses but are afraid of having to cross Trump in public, they could accomplish the same goal in a different way by getting John Roberts to do their dirty work. But I didn’t realize/remember there was an additional procedural roadblock until zeecube pointed it out.
cain
@James E Powell:
I don’t see why the media should do anything of the sort. Do they need access to Ken Starr in the future that they need to be careful? Burn his ass, and then see what happens.
I think the entire media is afraid of the right wing noise machine for the most part – or they need the right wing noise machine to give them money.
cain
@FlipYrWhig:
I would like to see Roberts actually do his job and defend the constitution and stop all the lying and what not. History is going to definitely be harsh on everyone on the conservative side when we eventually get a foothold.
mrmoshpotato
@Bill Arnold: And that is one of the many reasons we love Wonkette.
J R in WV
@Bill Arnold:
Wow! Must have been a heck of a hummer to be respected!!
mrmoshpotato
@J R in WV: Wouldn’t expect less of the Blowjob Heard ‘Round The World.
HalfAssedHomesteader
Pam Bondi is way out of her league.
chris
@HalfAssedHomesteader: No kidding! I thought it was Ivanka at first glance. The hair will go right to daddy’s… heart.
PST
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Tribe had a good comment today on twitter, especially apropos for those who remember him from decades ago as an old debater and debate coach:
Leto
So I get out of PT, drive a few mins down the road to Giant (grocery store), do my thang, get back in the car, turn the radio on and immediately regrets my life’s decisions. Hear, “Hunter Biden, Hunter Biden, Hunter Biden” and just… like Adam warned us that Russian disinformation would be the central “facts” to their defense but JFC I just can’t with these people. Turned it to music and just drove home.
@chris: Turned the tv on, thought it was Ivanka arguing, then saw it was the paid off Florida AG. Absolute shit show.
James E Powell
@cain:
When do they ever do that to Republicans?
Or they are also components of the right wing noise machine.
psycholinguist
Jay Sukelo looks just like the lawyer from the Simpsons. And by that, I mean he doesn’t look like a real human being, but like a cartoon of a human. That can’t be a coincidence.
cain
@James E Powell:
Sure they probably are part of the right wing. They seem to have their own vision of America and it’s all about corruption and grift.
HalfAssedHomesteader
@chris: I thought that too. I’m sure he’s watching this part of the trial by himself (and yet not really alone).
chris
@Leto:@HalfAssedHomesteader: Audience of one.
Bill Arnold
Do Democratic Party Senators get to ask these liars questions at some point? Because there are a lot of lies.
HalfAssedHomesteader
@Bill Arnold: At least from the Republican side they’ll direct their questions to their own side: You said the president is innocent but can you tells just how innocent he really is?