Mark Esper didn’t know what would happen at the church after peaceful protesters were tear-gassed to make way for him to go to the church with Trump, for what that’s worth:
Defense Secretary Mark T. Esper said Wednesday that he does not support the use of active-duty military forces in quelling countrywide unrest — a statement that puts him at odds with President Trump, who has threatened to send troops into U.S. cities.
Trump’s warning, in response to waves of protest over the police killing of George Floyd, would require the invocation of the Insurrection Act to give members of the military the power to arrest. Esper said the measure should be used only as a “last resort and only in the most urgent and dire of situations.”
“We are not in one of those situations now,” he said. “I do not support invoking the Insurrection Act.”
So now the history books will dutifully record that Esper “broke with Trump” on the invocation of the Insurrection Act, which Trump was never going to do, and they will also record that he had some post-protester-abuse squeamishness. Duly noted. I’m going to pause and marvel at the notion that Esper or anyone else in the Trump Administration really thinks that they will escape from this with anything resembling a good reputation. Oh, wait, here’s why they think that:
NBC News White House Correspondent Peter Alexander is an effective stenographer — it wasn’t “tear gas,” it was a gas that causes eyes to tear up. I’m sure Esper’s exclusive to him or Maggie Haberman or some other credulous hack will detail the dark struggle of the soul that accompanied every moment of Esper’s tenure at the DoD.
While I’m on the theme of the feelings and insights of enablers, I refrained from posting about this piece by the ghostwriter of “The Art of the Deal” when it came out, but it’s been sticking in my craw. The article solemnly informs us that Trump is a psychopath, and cautions against what Trump will do in future, making it sound like Trump has some kind of superpowers that reside in him alone. That’s a ridiculous piece of self-serving reasoning. Trump’s success comes from the coterie of enablers that follow him around: Bill Barr, Lindsey Graham, Mark Esper, the guy who ghostwrote “The Art of the Deal” and hundreds of others. All of them thought they could get something from their association with Trump, and after it’s clear that Trump got them to do his dirty work and they’ve stained their reputations, they are looking for a cleanup. Fuck ’em, individually and collectively.
Update: I forgot to mention that Esper told the DoD chiefs to shush up about the Floyd killing until Esper could get his response out over a week later.
Baud
Esper seems like exactly the type of person who should be running the largest military in the world.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
They won’t. Not if we collectively work to make sure they don’t
SiubhanDuinne
SiubhanDuinne hating the use of gerunds in that Today Show report.
download my app in the app store mistermix
@SiubhanDuinne: The headlong rush away from a simple declarative sentence is often difficult to watch.
MattF
How many different versions of events has Esper offered so far? I’ve lost count.
dr. bloor
In fairness, the capacity to get other sociopaths to do your bidding when they’re smart and sociopathic enough to know better is a superpower unto itself.
mad citizen
@Baud: The type of person who goes on a walk with the president and doesn’t think or if he did think of it–surely he did–doesn’t have the balls to ask where the hell they are going?
SiubhanDuinne
@download my app in the app store mistermix:
It’s been going on for decades. I think CNN started it. I’ve always loathed it, but for some reason it’s really sticking in my craw these days.
Wapiti
Mark Esper – is he a moron or a wannabe fascist?
Little Mexican girl: “Why not both?”
Baud
@MattF: He’s learned from the master.
Geoboy
@Wapiti:
Litlebritdifrnt
I follow a lot of Legal Scholars from back in my anti-birther days and I am being continually told that The Insurrection Act was essentially repealed by the Posse Comitatus Act so unless all the Governor’s of the various States request military assistance Twitler can’t send shit to anyone that doesn’t ask. Any order coming from Twitler to any member of the Armed Forces to deploy to any State that hadn’t asked would be perfectly entitled to ignore it, it being an illegal order. I am sure the Lawyers on here can confirm that.
mad citizen
If trump really admires Nixon so much–and this seems like a new recent revelation–someone should tell him about the time Nixon went to the Lincoln Memorial in the middle of the night and what a success that was.
Related to him out and about from the WH, no one should worry about him leaving the place in January. Biden could simply use the same trick Homer Simpson did to get rid of his carny/squatters–you know, bet the house on whether Biden can throw a hula hoop on top of the WH chimney: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L3_CNAIwJvQ
WaterGirl
The Washington Post has this caption on the photograph:
Do we now know they were D.C. National Guard? Last I heard, they weren’t identifying themselves and anything that indicated who they were had been removed from uniforms and equipment.
WaterGirl
@MattF:
I don’t believe that he has yet reached one Tara Reade unit.
Baud
@WaterGirl:
Tara. You don’t Tamara to sic the ducks on you.
oatler.
https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/jasonleopold/george-floyd-police-brutality-protests-government
The Moar You Know
Saw Esper spreading his “I saw nuffing, Colonel Klink” bullshit all over the ever so credulous media this fine morning. What an utter piece of shit. Can’t even stay bought.
Trump will fire his ass for this, so at least that’s something.
Matt McIrvin
@Litlebritdifrnt: I am not a lawyer, but it appears to me from the text that the Insurrection Act can be invoked without state consent if the problem is that the state is rebelling against the US to deny enforcement of federal law, or if it’s denying its citizens’ civil rights (this was Eisenhower’s justification for federalizing the National Guard at Little Rock). Obviously neither of these cases applies, but they could perhaps be construed to apply in Trump’s fevered imagination.
JCJ
@Baud:
Those ducks would tie you up with their little scarves!
LuciaMia
So it was tear gas-lite. Gotcha.
Ruckus
@The Moar You Know:
Always remember that the current WH hiring rule is that shitforbrains can only hire less qualified people to replace those he fires or who quit. And if he can’t find anyone unqualified enough the spot stays empty and shitforbrains ignores it.
Steeplejack (phone)
To be fair, Tony Schwartz (Art of the Deal ghost writer) has been vocally critical of Trump and his psychopathology for a long time, not just lately. I wouldn’t lump him in with the others.
A Ghost to Most
Hard to take seriously someone who was quick to transmit the propaganda about Antifa. Did you ever apologize?
PenAndKey
This was my non-lawyer understanding as well, with the caveat that he could still deploy if it was an insurrection against the federal government itself or in the defense of constitutional rights. If it ends up that he never follows through I’d bet good money it’s because someone, possibly even one of the governors or one of the GOP leaders in Congress, explicitly told him off for the obvious reason that none of those three scenarios are at play here.
LuciaMia
But Trump always goes out for a stroll in the afternoons. Relaxing, you know?
Evil_Paul
Just to be clear, every smoke grenade I’ve ever seen/used generates a lot of smoke, and does it pretty quickly. You set one of those off in the middle of the road, in a matter of seconds you won’t be able to see one sidewalk from the other.
Also, a lot of smoke grenades used in the army (Canadian Army, at least) is coloured smoke used for signalling aircraft. Those grenades leave a coloured stain on the pavement after they burn out
Now, how long the smoke screen lasts depends on the wind. I could totally see the smoke cloud trailing off down the street if the wind was up, but that just means the people down wind get the effects instead of the people near the device.
Tear gas generates a bit of smoke as they function. The “gas” is actually just the particulate smoke produced by the burning of special solid fuel pellets in the canister. Typically you’ll see an off-white cloud around the canister itself, with a kind of faint haze filling the air around it. Unless the gas is really thick, tear gas is mostly invisible (which means if the wind’s up you can have a gas cloud flying down the street without any kind of visual warning).
So if you’re seeing off-white smoke clouds just a couple of feet across/high, limited mostly to where the grenade landed, that’s tear gas. Anybody saying different is lying.
kindness
Point of wonder here….When Uncle Joe wins the election on 11/3/20 (not even Putin will be able to hack the numbers enough to make Trump victorious), would it be acceptable for him to demand resignations effective 1/19/21 from everyone serving in the Trump Administration on 11/4/20 or would that just be rude?
Jinchi
In his defense, when Schwartz ghostwrote his book in 1987, Trump was just a self-absorbed businessman. He warned us emphatically against electing Trump president in 2016 and he wasn’t subtle about why.
Callisto
I didn’t know it was gonna be a photo op! I swear I though trump and I were going to the church to hold hands and pray!
Matt McIrvin
NYPD plays the “cement milkshake” card:
https://twitter.com/thecitywanderer/status/1268211931447468032
I called it:
https://balloon-juice.com/2020/06/03/repubs-in-disarray-open-thread-weensy-little-cowards-every-one/#comment-7727136
PenAndKey
@Evil_Paul: I’m actually floored that they’re trying to gaslight the fact that they gassed the crowd despite full video evidence showing they’re full of it. And saying it’s “not tear gas”? Pull the other one. They sent canisters into the crowd that billowed white/light grey smoke, in an series of events where tear gas has been widely deployed already. Anyone that tries to claim that’s not tear gas is either an idiot or a liar.
Calouste
@Evil_Paul: Also, what’s the point in using smoke grenades at protesters? It only makes it harder for the police to see where they are. Usually it’s rioters who burn stuff and generate smoke to shield themselves from the police.
download my app in the app store mistermix
@Steeplejack (phone):
Yeah, he has, but I don’t know the value of it — we can all see what Trump is, and if Schwartz saw it and didn’t say it to collect a check, well, I’m not going to treat him like a hero. That said, he’s no Mark Esper.
Jinchi
He can ask for all their resignations effective 1/20/21. If he asks the day before, he still has to deal with whoever Trump replaces them with.
Ruckus
@Evil_Paul:
Now it’s been 5 decades ago but I’ve been in a closed room where a CS gas canister was set off and there was absolutely no smoke. The gas will make you wish you had never been born, but it was smokeless, colorless and all but odorless.
Callisto
@PenAndKey:
Apparently it’s supposed to be that Krusty Brand “Imitation” Tear Gas. Nine out of ten protesters can’t tell the difference. So I would gather.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@A Ghost to Most:
Not that I’m aware of.
Just Chuck
Eh, I’ll give him that one — in sane times, the DoD stays the hell out of such matters.
Jinchi
No one says he is. But he’s not an enabler of Trump’s presidency. He spelled out exactly who Trump was at a critical point in the 2016 campaign.
Ruckus
@kindness:
Not sure it would be rude if he asked them to resign immediately on 11/4/20 and Nancy take over till 1/20/21
PenAndKey
Art of the Deal was a morally gray fluff piece for a narcissistic business guy. That kind of junk gets published any time one of them wants to pay for someone to stroke their ego, sadly. Schwartz would have been better to not take the job, but he wasn’t exactly quiet about basically saying, “you’re going to elect WHO?” when Trump was running. I remember him telling anyone who would listen that Trump was a malignant danger with no business in government from the beginning. So hero? No, but not a villain in this tale either.
MattF
Dahlia Lithwick sees through the current mess and recognizes that it’s not about Donald Trump— it’s about the foundational crime of American society.
Lapassionara
@kindness: I think most appointed people are expected to tender their resignations effective upon the inauguration of a new president. No demanding necessary.
WaterGirl
@LuciaMia: More like tear gas with a different name. Like Puffs and Kleenex.
Leto
This happened this morning:Former Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein testifies on Crossfire Hurricane Investigation. Listening to it now. Lindsey Graham is grandstanding his intro and I think he’s gained 20lbs in his neck since the last time I saw him.
WaterGirl
@Baud: Rut roh! Fixed. With apologies to TaMara, Penelope, Pearl and all the ducks.
Wapiti
@Calouste: This. Unless you’re screening movement, why would you use smoke?
Evil_Paul
@Calouste: pretty much, yeah. Last thing you’d want in a “riot” would be to give cover to the “rioters.l
PenAndKey
@Lapassionara: That’s the norm, but let’s be honest here. Most of Trump’s appointees are idiots who probably still need to read their business card to even know what their job title is today. I can fully see some of them thinking that the job is theirs until they quit. Especially if Trump tries to make noise about how he’ll fight against the results if they don’t go his way.
Baud
Expect more tweeting on this issue.
The Moar You Know
When Uncle Joe wins the election on 11/3/20 (not even Putin will be able to hack the numbers enough to make Trump victorious), would it be acceptable for him to demand resignations effective 1/19/21 from everyone serving in the Trump Administration on 11/4/20 or would that just be rude?
@kindness: Pretty sure that’s common practice. Certainly not rude.
Leto
@Lapassionara: I’d make it a point of firing them. “Your resignation is not accepted. You’re fired.” Make it a point.
Just Chuck
@Leto: Political capital. They need to spend it on prosecuting them, not cashiering them.
Matt McIrvin
@kindness: Yesterday I had a moment of worry that even if Biden wins in a landslide, Mitch McConnell (if he is still in office) might have the Senate refuse to certify the election results, maybe on bogus fraud concerns, with the aim of kicking it to the House, where the one-vote-per-state rule would give it to Trump.
But then I looked up the actual rules for this and it wouldn’t work–to decertify an electoral vote, both houses of Congress need to vote to do so, independently (and not in the wacky way they resolve a deadlock either). The default is to accept the votes.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Matt McIrvin: Imm suggested in a comment last night that they could use the justification the business owners civil rights were being infringed upon by the looting.
IANAL, but had been thinking along those lines as well.
mad citizen
@LuciaMia: Yes, he’s a regular Harry Truman (who used to take morning walks outside the grounds).
On the tear gas story–what was it trump once said at a rally–don’t believe what you see on the news. So incredible.
rikyrah
They really want to run away from the tear gas. Why are they so determined to run from it?
All the rottenness, and it’s TEAR GAS that they want us to ‘understand ‘???
trollhattan
@mad citizen:
I assume Trump hates Nixon because 1. “He got caught.” and 2. “He’s a quitter!”
Baud
@rikyrah:
Among other things, my guess is liability.
PenAndKey
@rikyrah: My guess? Because the optics of “we tear gassed a priest for a photo op at their church” is polling extremely badly.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Lapassionara: I was going to say that, but these are Trump people, so expected behavior may not be a guide here.
Matt McIrvin
@The Moar You Know: All the political appointees go, not the civil servants. There are sometimes problems with administration hacks “burrowing” into civil-service positions so they can stay on.
Of course, the Trump team made noises early on about repealing civil-service laws so that this distinction no longer existed, and the President could have a government of loyal hacks down to the lowest-level positions; they justified it with talk of being sabotaged by burrowing Obama loyalists; this would be a disaster. IIRC Chris Christie and Newt Gingrich were keen on it.
VeniceRiley
Betwween 11/3/20 and 1/20/21: How do we prevent the destruction of documents after Trump loses?
Barbara
@Steeplejack (phone): He also wrote the Art of the Deal a long time ago, before anyone had any inkling that Trump would enter politics. I think it was so long ago that Trump was still married to his first wife.
Baud
@VeniceRiley:
We can’t really, especially if they don’t reveal that they are doing it. Biden can prosecute anyone who destroys federal records, assuming Trump doesn’t pardon them.
eric
I dont know is this has been shared, but i would like to report a murder.
The Moar You Know
@Baud: Ain’t gonna get their funding back.
The EU has basically banned the stuff for use in COVID cases. No American study is allowing its use anymore. It doubles the death rate.
The WHO needs to drop this sad-assed attempt to kiss Trump’s ass and hit up their other members to cover the American shortfall. We are not a trustworthy nor reliable partner and will not be for some time.
Hydroxychloroquine kills COVID patients. It does not help them. Period.
PenAndKey
@VeniceRiley: I fully expect that they’re already being destroyed or were never on government servers in the first place. Can any of us name a single person in Trump’s inner circle who hasn’t been caught “using personal email for government communications”?
“Lock her up!” wasn’t just projection, it was muddying the waters with “both sides!” bs when the accusation/charge is accurately thrown back in their faces.
MattF
@rikyrah: The narrative of ‘Trump is a manly man who repels Satanic hippies and leftists by waving a Bible at them’ didn’t work.
Jinchi
@Baud: Can you be pardoned before you’re charged with a crime?
Baud
@Jinchi:
Yes. Although I don’t know if it’s ever been litigated.
Kelly
@Jinchi: Nixon by Ford
Baud
I’m looking forward to the next McNaughton painting.
Marcopolo
So Trump’s gambit to use active duty military for civilian law enforcement has come to an end–at least for now.
I’m spitballing here, but I imagine that the rank & file military hierarchy both in the Pentagon and at various bases around the country (outside of Trump’s “influence”) let it be known that the road Trump wanted to go down would be blocked by them.
Baud
@Marcopolo:
I wonder if they’ll get medals
Jeffro
I broke my own little rule not to start political fights with my TCNJ dad and bro anymore…I couldn’t resist…
It was fun trying to get digs in with a big smirk on my face…might have to make this a regular Wednesday thing! =)
PS The subject line was “Infrastructure Week #156”. Bro will get it, Dad won’t.
rikyrah
The Moar You Know
@rikyrah: In this case, specicifity matters. Here’s a list of some common ones:
OC gas
PAVA spray
CS gas
CR gas
CN gas
bromoacetone
xylyl bromide
syn-propanethial-S-oxide
Mace
Use of OC gas is pretty common worldwide. Nobody blinks an eye, save for those who get it in the face.
-but-
Use of CS gas is a war crime.
So that’s a lot of people are getting really shitty and evasive about this, because it sure looks like some CS has been getting used.
Duane
@Evil_Paul: They really think we’re fools. Everything that comes from this administration is a lie.
Kent
It’s pretty routine to automatically ask all political appointees to resign unless there are a few that you actually want to stay on during the transition which was usually the case in normal times.
Marcopolo
@Baud: Coins, they’ll get those stupid–I think they are called challenge coins or something–things and they will be made with lead & depleted uranium and dipped in shit before being distributed.
Frankensteinbeck
@Matt McIrvin:
His strategy has instead been to empty as many of those positions as possible and appoint no one. That’s a big part of our current federal dysfunction. More than half the jobs aren’t being done at all.
Mallard Filmore
@VeniceRiley:
“You know that pardon Trump issued right before he left? We lost it.”
Baud
@Mallard Filmore:
That’s basically how Marbury v. Madison got decided, except it was a commission rather than a pardon.
Fester Addams
So like the “little green men” in Ukraine?
PenAndKey
@The Moar You Know: Tear gas use on the battlefield is a war crime, sure, but it’s perfectly legal for police to use domestically. It was a major sticking point when the Chemical Weapons Convention was being negotiated in the 90s.
So let that sink in for a minute. chemical weapons that are illegal in war are legal for nations to use on their own citizens unless they have local laws banning their use. Just… yeah…
Charluckles
Feeling fired up. I was just at the grocery store and some boob was harassing a group of the kids who work there about how no one has actually died of the coronavirus and so he shouldn’t have to wear a mask. I chewed on him. But in truth he is just brainwashed and confused. In my mind the Trump administration turning masks and social distancing into a political hot potato will be one of the defining moments of the Trump presidency. He had the blood of tens of thousands of innocent Americans on his hands.
H.E.Wolf
Yep! At 120 steps to the minute, same as when he was an artillery Captain in the US Army in WWI.
Also worth mentioning that Harry Truman was a committed anti-segregationist, in deeply segregationist Missouri, in the early 1930s. He refused NOT to campaign on the issue.
P.S.: omg, there’s British Pathé news service camera footage, from 1946, on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bGWMSbCDC3I
Matt McIrvin
@Kent: If I recall correctly, when Trump was preparing to take office, he and his people actually did not know that the White House staff wouldn’t be staying on after the changeover.
Uncle Cosmo
OK, WTF does “TCNJ” mean? Seen it about a dozen times here, never defined, doesn’t appear in the Lexicon. Googled it, got “The College of New Jersey,” which obvs ain’t the intention.
So, what?
HumboldtBlue
@eric:
We riffed on that tweet last night as McCain cos-played Scarlett O’Hara.
Evil_Paul
@Duane: I’ve had a few cases where it was legitimate ignorance. Where I had to explain to somebody who honestly didn’t know the difference and what to look for (on the TV).
Then there’s the people being deliberately ignorant. People who assume that, because I’m arguing against police brutality, I must be some kind of “clueless hippy liberal” who doesn’t know the difference between a magazine and a clip and therefore they can bullshit me to my face…
Kay
Another lie from the attorney general. The standard on this has to go back up once the Trump people are gone. The lying is the central issue. It can’t be seen as acceptable. They ROUTINELY lie to the public.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Matt McIrvin: AND were surprised how many people worked in the West Wing.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Uncle Cosmo: Trump Cult Nut Job.
Calouste
@Uncle Cosmo: T#%*p Cult Nut Job
Kay
Mark Esper blatantly lied yesterday when he was asked about the church. The only reason he admitted it is because 15(!) people heard him say he was going to the church with Trump. Something should happen to him as a result of that behavior. If he were working in a well-run private sector organization it would be a problem. He lied and the one and only reason he owned up is he got caught.
Are we really willing to accept such incredibly low ethical standards going forward? Is there a way to raise them in a formal way once the Trump people are gone? It’s unacceptable.
eric
@HumboldtBlue: thanks…..sorry, i missed it.
smintheus
Mike Esper thought it was a costume ball.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V4aUgnGAXF8
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Kay: Low quality hires have low ethical standards.
HumboldtBlue
@eric:
It was fun and we can always do it again. Mocking McCain is a fun activity for the whole family!
J.
So, fun fact, I wrote a piece on ghostwriters for a national magazine in the late 1980s, and one of the ghostwriters and books featured in the article was Tony Schwartz and The Art of the Deal. As I recall, Mr. Schwartz had nothing but lovely things to say about Trump. (I have my transcript somewhere.) I also spoke with Trump a handful of times (over the phone) in my job as fact checker for said magazine. Back in those days, Trump looooved journalists and anyone willing to write about him. And he could be rather charming. However, when I would mention Trump to my father, who was a senior director at a prominent investment bank and a next-to-scratch golfer, he would tell me that Trump was scum, a liar and a cheater (my father hated people who cheated at golf), and that no investment bank would touch him. He died long before Trump rose to power and no doubt would have been appalled.
Kay
@?BillinGlendaleCA:
Right but now that the standard is so low can we leave it up to the discretion of the President? We’re not protected enough from these people. I want some guardrails in place. They’re not policing themselves so they need a strict regulatory regime, to make up for their lack of personal ethics and self control. The market isn’t weeding these people out. It’s making more of them.
Brachiator
What’s next,? They’ll claim that a test of a Pandemic vaccine got out of control.
Duane
@Evil_Paul: Until you explained it I wouldn’t have known the difference by looking. Thanks for the info.
hilts
Referring to Peter Alexander as a stenographer is a cheap shot. He fact checked Trump in real time over his bullshit claim about the size of his electoral win and asked dumbass Ivanka about sexual harassment allegations against her daddy. He’s not a suck-up reporter.
Warblewarble
Esper thought tRUMP was going to church to confess his sins………….Esperexit 1..2..3
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Kay:
Yeah, that’s pretty much where we are. The only check on the President’s hiring(for cabinet positions) is the Senate and well it’s run by the Turtle.
David ? ☘The Establishment☘? Koch
Next Dump will say he didn’t sleep with Stormy Daniels, but rather with a smoke canister and pepper balls designed to simulate sex.
Kathleen
@SiubhanDuinne: Gerunds have feelings too. ?? And they have always spoken well of you.
dww44
@Kay: Absolutely agree that it is imperative in 2021 that Congress legislate integrity and rules back into our government. There has to be a way. We can no longer depend on elected and/or appointed government officials to police themselves. In all seriousness, Kay, I nominate you to point the way.
Kent
It’s harder than you think to destroy government documents. Any decision document of any import will have been passed around digitally and signed off by various people and be stored on multiple servers and in multiple email accounts that are all auto-archived.
What an incoming Dem administration does need to do is bring in a big team of forensic IT experts to capture and preserve everything digital. But the issue goes WAY beyond just the white house. Every agency from the EPA to Justice will likely have digital evidence of wrongdoing by Trump folks. They need to preserve all of that. On the plus side, most of the IT folks in every agency are going to be civil service folks, not political appointees and they are unlikely to go along with any sort of digital burning of all the evidence. Just because a hated boss like say…Pompeo or DeVoss orders documents destroyed, doesn’t mean it is actually going to happen.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@The Moar You Know:
Oh cut this “not a reliable partner” bullshit out. The US isn’t the only nation in the world that has lost it’s collective mind. The right wing “populist” authoritarians have taken over in other places, namely the UK, Brazil, Australia, Austria, Poland, etc. France nearly elected Marie Le Pen, a Putin-connected right-winger a few years ago. She could win this next presidential election
Galahad Threepwood
Now the obligatory “tensions with the White House” stories are running about Esper, saying that Trump doesn’t respect him and that he defers to Mike Pompeo all the time. I mean it was obvious that Trump and his loyalists would have the knives out for Esper after this, and he probably knew it.
Obviously Esper is a useless, pusillanimous coward who is trying to protect his future prospects in a post-Trump Washington, but my worry is that he will now be forced out and replaced by someone who will do Trump’s bidding in this situation. After all, Sessions showed a tiny bit of spine and integrity, and as a result he was relentlessly undermined by Trump until he resigned, and after that we got Barr, who was a million times worse. This is gonna get a lot worse before it gets better, y’all. Hold on tight.
uila
@download my app in the app store mistermix: If you’re going to heap scorn on Trump’s media enablers, let’s start with Mark Burnett. You can’t tell me there aren’t hours and hours of Apprentice outtakes of Trump being Trump that would have been disqualifying back when it mattered, and yet somehow the blooper reel from hell still has not leaked. Schwartz’ sins pale in comparison.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@uila:
Mark Burnett and his wife are evangelical nutjobs I think. They produced some Bibical special a few years ago
Jeffro
@Uncle Cosmo: My bad…I switched from “RWNJ” (right-wing nut job) to “TCNJ” (trumpov cult nut job) a few months ago. It’s usually in reference to my dad and bro (who earned it and then some by sticking with trumpov during the impeachment hearings and trial) but applies to anyone who still supports the Ill Douche.
Just Chuck
@PenAndKey:
I suspect one big reason for banning it in war specifically is that once they start using chemical agents on the battlefield, escalation to mustard and nerve gas is more likely. Especially if chaotic combat reports mistake it for the stuff in the first place.
LuciaMia
Ha, forgot about him. His website is titled ‘McNaughton Fine Art’. Others might beg to differ.
In his painting ‘The Impeachment Mob’, Pelosi actually looks really good!
Sister Rail Gun of Warm Humanitarianism
@Kent:
Absolutely right. Many years ago, I worked in a state government office that had regular visits from goons from the Chief Engineer’s office who went through our files and removed anything they didn’t want to have preserved. (This was in the days when there was a total of one PC in the office, an XT with 640K and a 10MB HD, so no digital copies unless they were on the Word Processing Dept.’s mainframe.)
We kept duplicate files hidden away around the offices. Every time they came through, we pulled out the dupes and made new file copies.
This went on for a couple of years until someone in another office had something so egregious that he was able to get a reporter interested. When they went through our files, the files were complete and waiting for them. I don’t think the now-former Chief Engineer ever realized how all of it finally came out. He probably blamed the goons for being lazy.
Digital files are much, much easier to keep extra file copies of.
Death Panel Truck
That was Sgt. Schultz.
HumboldtBlue
New Biden ad
Jeffro
@Kay:
@?BillinGlendaleCA:
For the constant lying by cabinet officials: maybe the main thing we can do is to raise the standards for running for/holding the Office of the President. Better, harder-working people would in theory appoint better, harder-working people. I dunno.
Calouste
Some spun up a twitter bot that just retweets everything the shitgibbon tweets. It got banned for offensive content. https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2020/06/bot-banned-from-twitter-for-repeating-trumps-tweets-verbatim/
LuciaMia
Obama to address the nation at 5pm.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@Calouste:
What actually was the inflection point for Twitter to start doing a better job of policing their platform?
HumboldtBlue
@LuciaMia:
TaMara has a post prepared to go up 10 minutes before it starts.
Also, we have found Karen’s husband.
Geminid
@Galahad Threepwood: I like the “pusillanamous.” An under utilized word. Like “churlish,” very applicable these days.
zhena gogolia
@HumboldtBlue:
They tactfully edited out the “F–k Trump” graffiti.
LuciaMia
@HumboldtBlue: Definitely looking forward to it.
Bill Arnold
@Evil_Paul:
And if you’re there, and want to be sure, just breath in a lungful and see what happens. Then loudly inform everyone in the area about your findings. /snark
Smoke is (in this context) fake tear gas, intended to scare a crowd into dispersing.
HumboldtBlue
I still don’t trust Republicans against Trump to do the right thing when Joe and Kalama take over but if they can help get them there I’m all for it.
Republican Voters Against Trump
Baud
@Jeffro:
I thought you were a friend.
Kent
@Sister Rail Gun of Warm Humanitarianism: That’s exactly why folks like Jared Kushner and other political lackies like him prefer to use private communication channels like WatsApp and private email accounts. Because they know once anything they write gets into any official government electronic channels they lose control of it and can’t easily erase it.
The problem is that someone like Jarad or Ivanka or any other Trump cretin can SEND commands through private email, but if the recipient within the government RECEIVES the message on a government email account then it will be preserved anyway. I suspect it is REALLY DIFFICULT to actually govern without leaving an electronic paper trail of some sort.
Jinchi
Given that we now know Trump is a notorious liar, I’m trying to puzzle out how that would work.
Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes
@SiubhanDuinne:
Gerunds were those things that I paid no attention to in any English class, ever.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Jeffro: Can’t argue with that.
Bill Arnold
@The Moar You Know:
This is related to concerns about some high-profile papers that used “hospital records procured by a little-known data analytics company called Surgisphere”.
A mysterious company’s coronavirus papers in top medical journals may be unraveling Kelly Servick, Martin Enserink, Jun. 2, 2020)
Some careers will be damaged. Not stated, but one might wonder about the possibilities that stock market (and other markets) manipulations were involved.
Mike in NC
We were exposed to tear gas in a warehouse as part of Refresher Training at Gitmo in the 1980s. Walk in wearing gas mask, then when directed take it off and stand still until told to leave the building. Nasty stuff to be sure and it affects people very differently. One guy near me ran out of the building and collided with a tree.
Mike in NC
@HumboldtBlue: A great ad that references Fat Bastard’s idiotic “American Carnage” inaugural address, which was so deranged it could only have been written by Bannon and Miller.
raven
@Mike in NC: And if you panicked it was worse, the DI would make you keep trying to repeat name, rank and serial number until they were satisfied. I think that was worse than when I got it in demonstrations out in the open.
The Pale Scot
@Jeffro:
Hmm.. I thought it “Trump Crazy”, but either one works
Raoul
Oh boy. The Atlantic publishes Mike Mullen’s call to keep the military out of domestic issues. Not to be caught out, a day later The NYT publishes Tom Cotton’s call to have troops occupy our cities.
Meanwhile Esper is a spinning fool, about to be fired. Quite the public job application the Times is facilitating.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@raven:
What purpose does training like that serve other than to torture soldiers?
dopey-o
@VeniceRiley: “how do we prevent the destruction of documents once fat nixon loses? ”
I’ve been concerned about that. I’m buying stock in companies that manufacture shredders….
I suspect all white house / admin documents are composed on computers and stored on network drives. I doubt the low-quality hires are competent enough to log in without leaving a record, delete all the files, then track down all the backups and destroy those.
It would require multiple IT staff, and they would have to trust ine another. If 2 or 3 spare thumb drives were to be left lying around in half-forgotten nooks and crannies of the white house, they would be very valuable after Jan 21, 2021.
‘dang it, i think i left my thumb drive at work! Must have slipped out the back of the drawer in my desk! Could Attorney General Harris take a look? And please make sure that the very important files aren’t corrupted. I think the password is os2472gdkfghsj97888. ‘
Jeffro
@Baud:
Effective 2028! 2032?
That’s what I meant ?
Jeffro
@Raoul: yeah, maybe they should ask themselves what sort of public service they are providing with the constant “both sides” thing, especially when the two parties are not at all the same.
it’s tire rims and anthrax all the way down, Katie!
kindness
I’m a little freaked out that apparently Eric Prince’s mercenaries are the ones ‘guarding’ Washington DC that have no ID on their uniforms:
https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2020/6/3/1950181/-Unmarked-unidentified-armed-militia-now-patrolling-Washington-D-C
J R in WV
@kindness:
Demand Resignations? Why? Just terminate them all for cause, much worse on one’s resume to be terminated for cause, isn’t it? And surely to dog, we have “for cause” nailed down for anyone voluntarily accepting a job from Trump after, well, pick a date of an illegality that was plain and public!
If you stayed on after the Ukraine scandal was testified to in congress, you were aiding and abetting a criminal conspiracy. Lucky to not be in prison awaiting trial. Take the opportunity to accept being fired, run away, and hope no one comes around to ask questions under penalty of law.
Omnes Omnibus
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka): You enter the chamber wearing your mask. You can see and breathe. You take the mask off and they make you breathe in. You can’t breathe and you can’t see. It makes you trust your mask. It really does keep bad stuff out.
And it’s a bonding experience.
Feathers
@Omnes Omnibus: One of the problems with these sorts of exercises (like making cops get tased) is that trainees who have been through them are more likely to gas or tase other people later on. I had to put up with it, so should you. You could do the exercise with just regular smoke.
I am wondering if we are going to see a moratorium on domestic use of tear gas and rubber bullets.
PenAndKey
@Omnes Omnibus: So it’s hazing with a dollop of useful training thrown in. In my career I’ve trained near a hundred people on how to properly wear a respirator to avoid pathogens and highly potent carcinogenic compound exposures. Every one of those soldiers could have gone through my training to “learn the value of their mask” using nothing more harmful than a denatonium bitterant. Using tear gas to prove the point is like making someone wear a ballistic vest and then shooting them in the plate to point out why getting shot is bad.
Omnes Omnibus
@Feathers: Goku asked what the purpose was other than torturing soldiers. I answered.
Omnes Omnibus
@PenAndKey: Are you familiar with military basic training?
Morzer
@Steeplejack (phone): I agree with this. It would have been easier for Tony Schwartz to go MAGA and cash in on his Trump connections, but he’s denounced Trump from the get-go.
Morzer
@Baud: Jeffro is trying to clear the field for the Baud Hegemony.
J R in WV
@Uncle Cosmo:
Pretty sure it means Theo-Cratic Nut Job, as in Jerry Falwell Jr, Franklin Graham, etc.
brantl
@Jinchi: Nixon was.
brantl
@Uncle Cosmo: Winging it, but Total Conservative Nut Job, maybe?
J R in WV
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka):
It gives you a real and concrete interest in learning how to use your gas mask, and a desire to keep it on until an all-clear is announced. It gives you experience with non-toxic chemical warfare, so that in case of the real thing you take it as seriously as you should take it.
I was in a concrete bunker sort of building and they dropped the canister down a little chute. The DI was wearing his mask at the beginning… we all were. Then we had to take ours off and hold it up in the air… DI didn’t open the door until he saw all the masks up in the air. IIRC, it was over 50 years ago, still kinda fresh.
trnc
I think you’re wedging a ton of hindsight into this. What DT is now is a far cry from what he appeared to be then, not only because he got pretty positive coverage at the time but because he also spoke coherently and publicly identified as much less conservative. You can fault the starstruck media for some of that image, but there’s no reason Schwartz should have known he was advancing the career of a psycho at the time he agreed to write the book. By the time he realized it, he had a contract and he most definitely would have been sued for breach of contract, and you can bet your ass he would have lost in court.
As someone else pointed out, Schwartz could easily have jumped on the gravy train when DT decided to run. I give him a lot of credit for not doing that AND for being as outspoken as he was.
WaterGirl
@PenAndKey: We should just start saying “tear gas or whatever they’re calling it these days”.
Just Chuck
@WaterGirl: Freedom Gas.