Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Fuck these fucking interesting times.

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

It’s the corruption, stupid.

Jesus, Mary, & Joseph how is that election even close?

Pessimism assures that nothing of any importance will change.

Insiders who complain to politico: please report to the white house office of shut the fuck up.

Make the republican party small enough to drown in a bathtub.

I did not have this on my fuck 2022 bingo card.

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

Republicans seem to think life begins at the candlelight dinner the night before.

They’re not red states to be hated; they are voter suppression states to be fixed.

Hot air and ill-informed banter

They traffic in fear. it is their only currency. if we are fearful, they are winning.

A Senator Walker would be an insult to the state and the nation.

Bark louder, little dog.

No offense, but this thread hasn’t been about you for quite a while.

Eh, that’s media spin. biden’s health is fine and he’s doing a good job.

If you’re pissed about Biden’s speech, he was talking about you.

Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

You can’t love your country only when you win.

The words do not have to be perfect.

A democracy can’t function when people can’t distinguish facts from lies.

The cruelty is the point; the law be damned.

“More of this”, i said to the dog.

You are here: Home / Foreign Affairs / Repub Stupidity Open Thread: Mike Pompeo, the Biter Bit

Repub Stupidity Open Thread: Mike Pompeo, the Biter Bit

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Secretary Pompeo had a cunning plan, aimed at an audience of one: He would summon this little reporter girl, berate her on air, expose her as a whining liberal snowflake, and shore up his crumbling credentials with The Big Guy in the Oval Office!

Tragically, NPR reporter Mary Louise Kelly refused to play her assigned role in Pompeo’s dumbshow. And not only did she pants him in the media, but the more he tries to insist that he was in no way pantsed, the more other media co-conspirators snark, Nice boxers, Secretary Pompous!


Reader Interactions

141Comments

  2. 2.

    MattF

    FWIW, Pompeo’s an Evangelical— so he’s part of the Christian Scrum surrounding Trump these days.

  3. 3.

    Patricia Kayden

    “For 8 years Barack Obama walked on ice and never fell.”Thinking of this Ta-Nehisi Coates quote.Republicans would’ve impeached Obama for literally anything including the tan suit and Dijon mustard if they could’ve.Yet Trump has committed multiple felonies & they don’t care.— Kaivan Shroff (@KaivanShroff) January 27, 2020

  4. 4.

    Another Scott

    It would be so delicious for the NPR Totebaggers to bring him and the rest of Donnie’s henchmen down…

    In other news, GovExec (viewpoint):

    The federal government should suspend the Trump Organization from doing business with agencies. The Trump family businesses should in fact be debarred, but the standard for suspension is lower, the case is more clear, and the permissible period for suspension—up to one year—is sufficient for the government to avoid the worst risks associated with doing additional business with the Trump family.

    It’s difficult to imagine a contractor not already on the federal government’s excluded party list (or “blacklist”) that presents a stronger case for exclusion. The most likely reason Trump Org hasn’t been suspended is a fear of retaliation, which only underscores why the government must stop doing business with the Trumps.

    Not a Close Call

    Agencies most frequently suspend firms based upon adequate evidence of an offense indicating a lack of business integrity or business honesty that seriously and directly affects the contractor’s present responsibility. In 2020, only the willfully ignorant believe that Trump businesses embrace integrity and honesty.

    […]

    OhpleaseOhpleaseOhplease…

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  6. 6.

    Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)

    @debbie:

    These guys shouldn’t be allowed to delete tweets. I’m assuming it was Secretary Pompous’ (thanks Anne!) private twitter account? I suppose tweets by private accounts owned by officals aren’t covered under records laws

  9. 9.

    kindness

    I would really prefer to have a higher regard for West Point grads.  Pompeo is digging that grave way deeper than the usual 6′ one normally buries bodies.

  10. 10.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @JPL: yup, our country’s chief diplomat is not just a liar and a bully, but a buffoonish liar and bully, and everyone he deals with knows it. And if that weren’t enough, his boss can be bought by a week’s booking of a junior suite

  11. 11.

    Cheryl Rofer

    @JPL: There is so much that is not making the news these days thanks to the Narcissist-in-Chief.

    One of the things I’ve felt most like saying that about is a trial going on at Guantanamo that involves the two psychologists who devised the torture regime. War crimes and more war crimes. Just horrible. I’m seeing a few tweets, and the Guardian is covering it. But pretty much buried.

  15. 15.

    low-tech cyclist

    Off topic, but if Bolton so desperately wants to testify, why can’t the House invite him to do so? It’s not like they become inoperative while the Senate trial is going on.

    Sure, it wouldn’t be part of the official record of the Senate trial, but it would be damned hard to ignore.

  20. 20.

    Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)

    @Cheryl Rofer:

    One of the things I’ve felt most like saying that about is a trial going on at Guantanamo that involves the two psychologists who devised the torture regime. War crimes and more war crimes. Just horrible.

    Psychology is supposed to be a science that helps us understand the inner workings of the human mind to help us communicate with each, not torture people.

    I despise TV shows and movies that portray torture as effective and saves the day (looking at you 24). It feeds into popular perceptions

  21. 21.

    Brachiator

    @Cheryl Rofer:

    5 employees of TruNews, a website aimed at conservative Christians that described President Trump’s impeachment as “a Jew coup” planned by “a Jewish cabal,” received credentials from the White House to cover his recent trip to Davos, Switzerland

    Good thing this revelation didn’t come out close to International Holocaust Remembrance Day.  Oh wait…

  23. 23.

    Immanentize

    @debbie: Think!  By CIA, you should perhaps mean Gina Haspel who gave the critical order to destroy the torture tapes.  For those two grifters to testify, the Administration had to give the green light. Why would anyone be aiming at Haspel right now?  Hmmmmmm.

  30. 30.

    debbie

    @Immanentize:

    Honestly, I thought it was just passing the buck, but your point is valid. Or at least it seems valid, though I’ve still got Ken Starr rattling around in my head.

  32. 32.

    Mary G

    I can still see the Pompeo scriptual tweet. It’s got a lot of good replies.

    “He who mules for a treacherous liar is himself an ass.” – Hoarse 1:26— The Hoarse Whisperer (@HoarseWisperer) January 26, 2020

  35. 35.

    jimmiraybob

    Did anyone else notice that Robert Ray, early in his speech, called the articles of impeachment against Nixon and Clinton “crimes” and is now on about “we may as well write “crime” out of “high crimes and misdemeanors?”  Seems contradictory.

  38. 38.

    TS (the original)

    @Cheryl Rofer:

    The State Department has removed @NPR correspondent @michelekelemen from Secretary Pompeo’s plane for his upcoming trip to Europe and Central Asia following Pompeo’s criticism of his NPR interview.

    This is how anyone connected with trump relates to criticism. This is why most media use the softball questions and never followup on the answers. Unbelievable – except it is happening – what trump & co are doing to democracy.

  39. 39.

    mrmoshpotato

    @debbie:

    though I’ve still got Ken Starr rattling around in my head. 

    That means next year we can party like it’s 1999!

  42. 42.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    meanwhile, the Bernie wing continues to fight the real enemy: Democrats

    Iowa CCI Action, a progressive group which has endorsed Bernie Sanders, is staging a demonstration in Joe Biden’s HQ in Des Moines.

    You know who else has an office in Des Moines? Chuck Grassley, the guy who (with the help of Max Baucus) managed to slow down and shrink the ACA for over a year. And Joni Ernst, who’s vowing to cut Medicare and Medicaid. Also the Republican governor of Iowa, who is already campaigning for trump. Steve King is right down the road, but let’s protest Joe Biden, because he doesn’t support the plan that Bernie will shout into law. Assholes.

  45. 45.

    Kay

    Just like to note-it’s getting worse. The Trump hires are even lower quality, they lie more, and they attempt to intimidate more.

    It can be difficult see decline when you’re in something, but it’s going lower, still. Sinking.

  47. 47.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    Brian Beutler
    Echoes of @GOPLeader bragging about how the House Benghazi committee hurt Hillary Clinton’s poll numbers. Trump bungled his corrupt plot to sabotage Biden, but rather than remove him for it, Republicans want to help him achieve the same ends by other means.

    @SenJohnBarrasso  @SenJoniErnst  on the Iowa Caucus taking place next Monday “Will they be supporting VP Biden at this point? Not sure about that“

    Joni Ernst is all but giggling about the effect of the Toomey strategy on Biden’s chances. Be careful what you wish for…

  48. 48.

    Commenting at Balloon Juice since 1937

    Hitler’s Circle of Evil on Netflix shows that administration as a bunch of incompetent idiots. Same as we have here. Low IQ syncophants. I’m surprised it took so long to defeat them but they had the German industrial capability and infrastructure to leverage for their insane purposes.

  49. 49.

    mrmoshpotato

    @Kay: “We’re at the bottom, sir.”

    “No we’re not!  Why do you think I brought all these shovels?!”

  51. 51.

    Mnemosyne

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist:

    This whole thing appears to be a coordinated strategy. I have no idea why Bernie’s team seems to think that bashing the other candidates to bring in unaffiliated white men will work to win the nomination, but they sure are committed to it.

  52. 52.

    moops

    @TS (the original): 

    Kicking the NPR reporter off the trip is just a form of access denial. It is the stick the administration uses to trade easy treatment in the press for access. In the Trump administration the calculation is pretty easy. They don’t hold press conferences any more. The administration pretty much only exposes themselves to Fox, and even more right-wing outlets.

  54. 54.

    Bill Arnold

    @Goku (aka Amerikan Baka):
    Did you see this about “The Preacher”?
    Thread. Read it, it gets worse (bold mine):

    The CIA had THREE authorised waterboarders. The contract psychologists Mitchell and Jessen, and a third, who is yet to be identified 17 years on. At the 9/11 hearing this week at #Guantanamo he was referred to as NZ7. But also as “the Preacher“. 1/3https://t.co/52PoZJ1zCp— Julian Borger (@julianborger) January 25, 2020

    Full article: Chilling role of ‘the Preacher’ confirmed at CIA waterboarding hearing in Guantánamo

  56. 56.

    Roger Moore

    @Kay:

    Just like to note-it’s getting worse. The Trump hires are even lower quality, they lie more, and they attempt to intimidate more.

    The declining quality of Trump’s hires was predicted.  Most presidents have a similar problem: they find the best people they can at the beginning of their term, so the replacements tend to be at least a little worse than the original.  That can be avoided if the process of replacement is slow, so the replacements are people who had a chance to get up to speed working as underlings.  But with Trump the number of candidates was always small, and the turnover has been so high that there’s no realistic chance of finding anyone better.  It’s hard to see how Trump could find someone worse than Betsy DeVos, Steve Mnuchin, or Steven Miller, but I’m sure he’ll somehow find a way.

  57. 57.

    oatler.

    @Lapassionara:

    I was hate-reading James Lileks’ site (bills himself as “center-right” but it’s okay, he just hates hippies) and his alt-right commentariat have dropped such gems today as posting National Socialist with “socialist” in bold type.

  58. 58.

    Rand Careaga

    @Commenting at Balloon Juice since 1937:

    Hitler’s Circle of Evil on Netflix shows that administration as a bunch of incompetent idiots. Same as we have here. Low IQ syncophants. I’m surprised it took so long to defeat them

    Let’s remember that curing Germany required a rigorous course of treatment administered by Doctors Stalin, Churchill and Roosevelt. Let’s hope we don’t require chemotherapy—or radiation.

  60. 60.

    Boris Rasputin (the evil twin)

    A “normal” GOP administration? What’s that? The last one I could possibly call “normal” was Ike’s. And that one overthrew a democratic government in Iran.

  61. 61.

    natem

    I mean Rupert Murdoch and the other gazillionaires who built empires on peddling fascist propaganda the last 30-odd years. Congratulations! Not only have we got fascism, we’ve got the stupidest fucking people alive running the show and a mainstream media too feckless to grasp the full magnitude of it.

  62. 62.

    Brachiator

    @Roger Moore:

    The declining quality of Trump’s hires was predicted. Most presidents have a similar problem: they find the best people they can at the beginning of their term, so the replacements tend to be at least a little worse than the original.

    Trump has always looked for bootlickers and people hostile to good government.  He will always look for these types.  If anything, he tried to fake out the GOP by selecting a few people with some competence, but as he has become more comfortable in his role, he is throwing off advice and restraint.

    And of course, he falls back on Kushner and Ivanka as advisors to help fill the gaps.

  63. 63.

    RaflW

    Refusing a seat on his taxpayer funded jaunt to Europe to a different NPR reporter (shockingly, also a woman, like the other three reporters Pompeo has publicly attacked). It’s hideous, it’s blatant authoritarianism, and the State Dept Correspondents Association should not credential anyone to go on Mike’s trip.

    Sure, in the short term he’d feel like he won something by getting the press ‘off his back’, but even this shitshow has a media strategy. His team will have to explain to him that, yes, angry fat loser, even you need press coverage to be any sort of S.O.S. at all.

  64. 64.

    terraformer

    @Immanentize: Maybe. I’m so cynical I think the whole Bolton thing is designed to backfire. (Warning: conspiracy) – he “leaks” the manuscript with all this damaging information, gets subpoenaed, then goes straight Trump party-line testifying. He can say that the manuscript was just that, it wasn’t his. And even if it was, it was a early draft that he thought he’d destroyed. Or something similar.

    Then, the horrible Rs can say “well, the testimony the Ds wanted so bad supported the President’s case”, and then they go on their merry way and we go on our horrible way to an autocracy.

    Certainly, such a scenario requires some government-fu that these dopes clearly haven’t demonstrated they have, but I just can’t trust Bolton to be our savior. Something smells with the timing of it. Hope I’m wrong! Hope Bolton is really just going to punch it in and turn the knife.

  66. 66.

    jl

    @terraformer:  I think Bolton would think that gambit is far too risky for Bolton’s power player and financial neocon demigod future.

    Edit: and I think public information gives very strong evidence that Bolton is extremely ticked off at Trumpsters who will never be displaced, and to whom Bolton lost in the Trumpster WH power plays.

  67. 67.

    mrmoshpotato

    @natem:

    a mainstream media too feckless to grasp the full magnitude of it. 

    More like a mainstream media that participated in and revelled in this shitshow.

    Joe and Mika: Oh Donald!  It’s great to talk to you!  What’s up champ?

    Fuck ’em.

  68. 68.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Bill Arnold: The Preacher was Charlie Wise, the CIA’s Chief of Interrogations, who died in 2003.

    https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/jan/25/some-folks-were-tearful-cia-waterboarding-on-trial-in-guantanamo

    In the courtroom this week, the interrogations chief has been referred to by the code NX2. Mitchell calls him the “new sheriff”, but it has been reported his real name was Charlie Wise, who had honed his craft carrying out interrogations for the Contra rebels in Nicaragua in the 1980s. He apparently died of a heart attack in 2003, just weeks after being dismissed.

    According to declassified cables and courtroom testimony, Wise set up his own training programme, and took his students to a black site in Afghanistan, codenamed Cobalt, to practise their techniques on Ammar al-Baluchi and other prisoners. During that training, Baluchi was repeatedly slammed against a wall, suffering brain trauma as a result.

    “Looks like they used your client as a training prop,” Mitchell told Connell. A newly declassified paragraph in a secret CIA inspector general report quotes one of the students as saying the site was used for “on-the-job training”. Trainees had to use each of their techniques on Baluchi and other inmates in order to earn certification.

    An unsanctioned, improvised waterboard was also set up at the Cobalt site, according to defence lawyers. It does not seem to have been part of the training, but it was used on at least one detainee.

    The CIA was forced to close down its first main interrogation centre in Thailand in late 2002 when its existence was discovered by the New York Times. The “high value detainees” were transferred by rendition flights to a new site in Poland, codenamed Blue, which was run by Wise.

    Mitchell visited Blue shortly before Christmas in 2002, and testified he witnessed at least two extreme techniques that had not been approved by the CIA or the justice department. In one, a piece of wooden dowel was put behind the knees of a detainee who was made to kneel and then had his back forced back “until his shoulder blades were touching the floor”.

    In another, the prisoner’s elbows were strapped together with a strap behind his back and his hands were raised above his head. Fearing the torture would cause permanent injury, Mitchell said he tried to stop it but was told “it was none of my fucking business”.

    When the contractor declared he wanted to return to the US, Wise told him he was not allowed to leave, Mitchell claimed. Nor could Mitchell contact the outside world as all communications equipment at the site were locked up. For a week he was a prisoner of his rival, he said.

    Mitchell said he was finally permitted to go home because the tension inside the site began damaging morale. On his return he said he complained to the CIA leadership but to no avail. Wise stayed in his job and Mitchell found he was giving courses at headquarters including the banned techniques more than four months later. The chief of interrogation was only fired that summer.

    Wise was a piece of work, but Mitchell and Jensen, who are equally bad, have to make him out to be the real villain to save their own asses. And since he’s dead, that’s much easier than it would otherwise be because he can’t refute them.

  70. 70.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    Good for Chris Murphy

    Rachel Bade
    @ ChrisMurphyCT says Senate Dems won’t be “co-conspirators” to a WH effort to use the trial to hurt Trump’s potential 2020 rival . On a 1-for1, Biden-for-Bolton idea, he’s OUT THIS is why even if there are 51 votes for witnesses, there may not be 51 for a deal…

  71. 71.

    jl

    What I want to know is, who really knows were Ukraine and Bangladesh are on the map, Kelly or Pompeo?

    Assuming there is any truth at all in anything Pompeo says about this squalid and hilarious farce, even a single word.

  72. 72.

    John Revolta

    @Brachiator: Trump has commented, even before he was POTUS, how he prefers to hire people who (he feels) aren’t quite as smart as (he feels) he is. Wants to always feel like he’s the smartest guy in the room. This may help to explain his stunning pre-political business career.

  73. 73.

    Brachiator

    @jl:

    I think Bolton would think that gambit is far too risky for Bolton’s power player and financial neocon demigod future.

    Edit: and I think public information gives very strong evidence that Bolton is extremely ticked off at Trumpsters who will never be displaced, and to whom Bolton lost in the Trumpster WH power plays.

    Bolton is a neocon. But Trump is pure con. Trump will make sure that Bolton is exiled from right wing society if he crosses him. There is currently no one of importance to the right of Trump that might offer Bolton support.

  76. 76.

    Another Scott

    @terraformer: Meh.

    I am not part of whatever drug deal Sondland and Mulvaney are cooking up…

    Doesn’t sound like someone who’s going to throw himself on the Donnie Grenade.

    YMMV.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  77. 77.

    Ruckus

    @John Revolta:

    It would also help to explain who works for him now.

    Although the records of some of them suggest that their brains did actually work at one time or another. Maybe trump causes brain damage just by his presence.

  81. 81.

    brantl

    I am amazed at how big of an asshole Dershowitz is. It’s just unbelievable just how pompous a putz he is. What a wanker.

  83. 83.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    Acyn Torabi @ Acyn
    Senator John Kennedy says he doesn’t find Lev Parnas or John Bolton credible

    Jason Campbell @ JasonSCampbell
    White House Press Secretary Stephanie Grisham suggests John Bolton may have sold out “potential national security in [his] country”

    one more

    Tom Nichols @ RadioFreeTom

    And now Debbie Lesko is on Tucker Carlson’s show, talking about how Romney has a case of sour grapes and that’s why he’s out to get the president. Whoever compared these people to Jonestown and Scientologists owes and apology to cults.

  86. 86.

    Sm*t Cl*de

    @jl:

    What I want to know is, who really knows were Ukraine and Bangladesh are on the map, Kelly or Pompeo?

    What kind of dickweed keeps a blank map of the world on hand just in case a journalist needs to prove her grasp of political geography?

  88. 88.

    MomSense

    I’ve watched a couple hours of this now and the president’s team has nothing.  It’s like a high school version of the federalist society.

  94. 94.

    jl

    @Sm*t Cl*de: That question was just me wondering whether Pompeo has said one thing that could conceivably be true in this affair.

    Only thing I could think of is that Pompeo has Ukraine and Bangladesh confused, and Pompeo honestly thinks he is right. Then Pompeo would be truthful, though ignorant.

  95. 95.

    JPL

    haha   I was just listening to a local council meeting so I could make comments.    Now I’m listening to Alan who is spewing out nonsense.  As boring as streaming local council meetings might be they don’t match listening to  Dershowitz .     OMG what a ………..

  97. 97.

    Duane

    @RaflW: It doesn’t matter if Kelly couldn’t tell Ukraine from Uruguay. From now on every reporter should ask Pompeo the same question. Answer the question Pompeo, you lowly piece of Kansas dirt.

  101. 101.

    MomSense

    @mrmoshpotato:

    Not all high school students!

    My word this presentation is boring.  It’s all irrelevant.  Let me define impeachable offenses so narrowly that I can then go back and selectively cull quotes by founders and justices to prove my bogus definition.

  105. 105.

    Booger

    Can we at least start referring to this shitweasel as “Pompy-Oh” instead of “Pomm-PAY-oh.” “Pomm-Pay-oh” is what you’d call someone with dignity.

  107. 107.

    dww44

    @Roger Moore:  As for me, I sincerely hope he doesn’t need to replace them before the election, and he better darn well not be in a position to do so after then.

  108. 108.

    MomSense

    @chris:

    I just took a sour cream coffee cake out of the oven.  If I’m going to suffer through this   BS I’ll need treats.

  109. 109.

    Another Scott

    @MomSense:

    A theme today has been that Congress’s subpoenas can simply be disregarded by people who don’t think they were procedurally authorized and have no force and effect unless ratified by the judicial branch.

    That ought to be a tough sell to members of Congress.— southpaw (@nycsouthpaw) January 28, 2020

    Will it? It shouldn’t be a close decision, but…

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  111. 111.

    Roger Moore

    @Brachiator:

    Trump will make sure that Bolton is exiled from right wing society if he crosses him.

    Too late for that kind of thinking.  Bolton fought Trump on Ukraine, and that’s already unforgivable in Trump’s book.

  112. 112.

    Roger Moore

    @Ruckus:

    Although the records of some of them suggest that their brains did actually work at one time or another. Maybe trump causes brain damage just by his presence.

    I think brain damage and extreme desperation are the only reasons someone would consent to come on board with Trump today.

  115. 115.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    MaxBoot
    As I thought. From NY Times: “Mr. Trump later complained to associates that the presentations from his defense team were boring.”

    Jim Jordan, your life is calling!

  116. 116.

    Bill Arnold

    @terraformer:

    Certainly, such a scenario requires some government-fu that these dopes clearly haven’t demonstrated they have, but I just can’t trust Bolton to be our savior. Something smells with the timing of it. Hope I’m wrong! Hope Bolton is really just going to punch it in and turn the knife.

    It is worrying with that guy. OTOH, the NYTimes piece says “Multiple people described Mr. Bolton’s account of the Ukraine affair., and it’s been corroborated in outline by others previously. (Under oath? I need to look.). And if Bolton’s book sells well, it’s a twofer – revenge (justified) on Trump, and retirement income without wingnut welfare.

  117. 117.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    I think we may be overthinking Bolton. Maybe he just really, really hates trump

    WASHINGTON — John R. Bolton, the former national security adviser, privately told Attorney General William P. Barr last year that he had concerns that President Trump was effectively granting personal favors to the autocratic leaders of Turkey and China, according to an unpublished manuscript by Mr. Bolton.
    Mr. Barr responded by pointing to a pair of Justice Department investigations of companies in those countries and said he was worried that Mr. Trump had created the appearance that he had undue influence over what would typically be independent inquiries, according to the manuscript. Backing up his point, Mr. Barr mentioned conversations Mr. Trump had with the leaders, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey and President Xi Jinping of China.

  120. 120.

    Roger Moore

    @dww44:

    If there are any new openings in the cabinet between now and the election, Trump will just appoint Kushner as the acting secretary of whatever.  It’s the easiest route to guaranteeing the replacement is worse than whomever they’re replacing.

  122. 122.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @MomSense: I never even try to bake anything, because if I were even moderately successful, whatever came out of the oven would be eaten, most likely, before I went to bed that night.

    the words “sour cream coffee cake” make me want to drive to the grocery store and find something– no good bakery in my town.

  124. 124.

    mrmoshpotato

    @dww44: The government’s the problem.  Duh!

    “Ummm…Ronnie.  You know the presidency is part of the government, right?

  126. 126.

    Ruckus

    @Commenting at Balloon Juice since 1937:

    Even if one has the chops it’s difficult to shine in a shit show with this much shit being thrown around. It’s like they took the lid off an industrial sized blender and have a conveyor dumping in more so they get a study flow over everything and everyone.

  128. 128.

    MomSense

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist:

    I usually try to bake only when there are more mouths to feed, but I was craving something yummy.

    I missed the proceedings before 545 tonight.  Did any of the defense attorneys present any facts or evidence?

  132. 132.

    Brachiator

    @dww44:

    Hasn’t this been largely true of every Republican Administration from Reagan on?

    No. Trump is extra nasty about it. And he especially wants to obliterate Obama’s record.  The thing is, Trump is not really ideological.  He is not a conservative in any meaningful sense of the term.  He wants to re-brand the United States as a Trump product based on the weird hateful shit that goes on in his head.

  133. 133.

    Sm*t Cl*de

    @John Revolta:

    The tweet up above shows that Pompeo knew ahead of time that she was going to ask him about Ukraine. The map was obviously set up as a gotcha, and a very stupid one at that.

    Stupid indeed. Pompeo claimed that the meeting was an off-the-record one-on-one interview, but with the map story he ended up personally admitting boasting that this was a lie – it was an attempt to intimidate.

  134. 134.

    Steeplejack (phone)

    @jl:

    My “charitable” explanation is that when Pompeo was screaming/​dictating his memo he said “Belarus” and it was taken down wrong as “Bangladesh.” Sometimes hard to understand the spittle-flecked bellowing. And nobody, including Pompeo, caught it before it went out.

  135. 135.

    danielx

    Every time I think a Trump appointee can go no deeper – that he or she has at last reached full, pure, distilled essence of douche….another comes along to prove me wrong.

    Somehow the phrase “wingnut event horizon” just doesn’t do justice to the present situation.

  136. 136.

    Sm*t Cl*de

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist:

    White House Press Secretary Stephanie Grisham suggests John Bolton may have sold out “potential national security in [his] country”

    Fair enough. When Bolton sent a preview to the White House so they could check for national-security concerns, he was pretty much guaranteeing that some cockwomble there would leak it to the media.

  137. 137.

    O. Felix Culpa

    @MomSense:

    I missed the proceedings before 545 tonight.  Did any of the defense attorneys present any facts or evidence?

    HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!! Stop, please, you’re killing me.

  141. 141.

    pluky

    @danielx: Wingnut “Event Horizon” is perfect! Think about what it means in it’s source context; the zone around a black hole within which nothing can escape. Furthermore, the distance to fall is not fixed at the Schwarzchild radius. Remember, a black hole is a singularity; the distance from the horizon to the “center” is infinite!

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