Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Americans barely caring about Afghanistan is so last month.

Today’s GOP: why go just far enough when too far is right there?

Their freedom requires your slavery.

I’ve spoken to my cat about this, but it doesn’t seem to do any good.

We still have time to mess this up!

Putting aside our relentless self-interest because the moral imperative is crystal clear.

If senate republicans had any shame, they’d die of it.

Black Jesus loves a paper trail.

Conservatism: there are some people the law protects but does not bind and others who the law binds but does not protect.

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

“Everybody’s entitled to be an idiot.”

JFC, are there no editors left at that goddamn rag?

Let’s delete this post and never speak of this again.

Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

You can’t attract Republican voters. You can only out organize them.

Too often we confuse noise with substance. too often we confuse setbacks with defeat.

The cruelty is the point; the law be damned.

Let there be snark.

Russian mouthpiece, go fuck yourself.

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

It’s always darkest before the other shoe drops.

if you can’t see it, then you are useless in the fight to stop it.

Being the leader of the world means to be the leader of peace.

“More of this”, i said to the dog.

You are here: Home / Open Threads / Open Thread: Balloon Juice Zoom at 7pm ET on Presidents Day

Open Thread: Balloon Juice Zoom at 7pm ET on Presidents Day

by | 232 Comments

This post is in: 

Ix-nay on the Valentine’s Day zoom.  It will be on Presidents Day instead.

Change of subject, we can argue about whether there should be apostrophes and where they should be if they should be there.  That would be more pleasant than arguing whether this is the end of the world.  Jamie Raskin looks pretty pleased with himself, so in spite of my original disappointment I’ll go with his judgment on this.

Zoom will  be from 7-9 pm blog time (Eastern) on Monday, Feb 15.  Doors open at 6:30.  Send me an email message if you want to attend – I will reply with the zoom link and other info.

Other than that, talk about the impeachment trial or anything you want.

Open thread.

Reader Interactions

232Comments

  2. 2.

    Just Some Fuckhead

    I want you all to have an in-person “democrats failed/democrats can never fail” fight. If you can promise me that, I will attend your zoom meeting with my kitten filter.

  8. 8.

    WaterGirl

    There’s a stupid article on the Washington Post about the 3 women who “stole our attention” during the impeachment trial.

    They pictured Stacey Plaskett so I knew she was one, but how could she not be?

    Guess who the other two women were?

  13. 13.

    Almost Retired

    So how does these jackal Zooms work?  Are they moderated?  Are there little break out rooms?  I assume people pop in and out?  Can you tell me where the “touch up my appearance” button is on the Zoom interface?

  14. 14.

    WaterGirl

    So why did Castor show up at the trial this morning after the “quorum call”?  In the legal field, would bringing Castor in instead of Van Der Vile be considered a slap in the face?  Asking because I would personally like to punch Van Der Vile in the face in the nuts and I have never punched or hit anyone, so I’m hoping for an answer in the affirmative.

    I may just have to settle for the loud laughter at Mr. Vile from the entire senate.

  15. 15.

    Steeplejack

    @WaterGirl:

    I presume the times are EST? You probably need to specify for the sake of clarity.

  20. 20.

    WaterGirl

    If you had to use just one word (or phrase, i suppose) to describe Van Der Vile, what would it be?  One of the Lawfare guys called him odious.

  24. 24.

    Just Some Fuckhead

    @WaterGirl: If you had to use just one word (or phrase, i suppose) to describe Van Der Vile, what would it be?  One of the Lawfare guys called him odious.

    Wife-beater

  32. 32.

    WaterGirl

    @Almost Retired:

    Questions and Answers

    So how does these jackal Zooms work?  Are they moderated?

    YES

    Are there little break out rooms?

    NO

    I assume people pop in and out?

    YES

    Can you tell me where the “touch up my appearance” button is on the Zoom interface?

    I don’t zoom enough to know that.

  34. 34.

    JoyceH

    @Just Some Fuckhead: I think it’s interesting that Senate Republicans don’t understand how this is going to go down. Trump is quiet now – because he’s on trial! Once he’s acquitted, he’s going to be ‘liberated’. Might not be able to tweet anymore, but he’ll find some way to get his point across – and make it abundantly clear just what kind of man they threw away their reputations for. They’re going to regret a vote to acquit more and more every day for the rest of their lives.

  37. 37.

    The Thin Black Duke

    I’m sorry I missed the earlier thread, but maybe it’s a good thing I did because I’m not going to trash the Democrats. Life’s too short, y’know?

  43. 43.

    Mike in NC

    @Elizabelle:  Kathleen Parker just has to keep bringing up Nikki Haley because she is her fantasy GOP presidential candidate for 2024. As if the Republicans are going to nominate a non-white female anytime this century.

  45. 45.

    The Thin Black Duke

    @WaterGirl: I think that’s a good idea. I’m feeling somewhat positive about the direction the Democrats are going and I want to build on that.

  47. 47.

    WaterGirl

    @The Thin Black Duke: Yeah, I was initially shocked and disappointed about the decision, because I thought we had them right where we wanted them.  But that was only the fantasy that was in my head, because the Rs would have turned it into such a shit show that by the time the we got to the final vote, everyone would have forgotten the goodness of the past 3 days.

  49. 49.

    Ken

    @WaterGirl: Plus, it wouldn’t have changed the final result.  Well, maybe a one in a million chance, if a bunch of the Republican Senators used the extra time to catch COVID.

  51. 51.

    The Thin Black Duke

    @WaterGirl: The Democrats made the right choice. Maybe in an alternative universe the GOP would be moved by the testimony of the witnesses, but in our present reality, Donald Trump is going to be aquited in the end because the Republican Party is a sewer. But this is still a political victory for the Democrats, so it’s OK.

  52. 52.

    mrmoshpotato

    @Elizabelle: Don’t worry. We’ll be fine whether it’s the traitorous orange Soviet shitpile rightfully impeached twice, or Hillary impeached twice on January 21, 2017 because the Rethuglicans didn’t like how she breathed. ?

  53. 53.

    WaterGirl

    @The Thin Black Duke: I hope there can be real witnesses in a court of law or in the senate hearings that hopefully will come.  And the looking up of phone records, and all sorts of other things with a traditional investigation.  T**** is a menace.

  55. 55.

    JoyceH

    @The Thin Black Duke:  I agree. Witnesses would have turned the trial into a multi-week grand guignol circus, almost certainly without changing the final outcome, and dang, people, we need that COVID relief package passed and Merrick Garland confirmed!

    As for Trump – the full story IS going to come out. It always comes out. And it’s going to be uuuuuuugly.

  56. 56.

    JoyceH

    Hey, in open thready news, earlier I’d worried that the impeachment might big-foot my BookBub promo, but I worried needlessly. Promo was AWESOME. I gave away 27,500 copies of Book 1 of Regency Mage and now all four books in the series are in the Historic Fantasy Top 100, right in there with all the Outlander books, and I’m selling some books here!

  59. 59.

    Sure Lurkalot

    @JoyceH:

    They’re going to regret a vote to acquit more and more every day for the rest of their lives.

    I hope (and expect) Trump turns on them all.  I also hope he slips on the way to the can in the middle of the night, cracks his skull, screams, awakens Melanie and her lover who go back to loud sex while he slowly bleeds out.

  61. 61.

    mrmoshpotato

    @JoyceH: Via KurtEichenwald

    For everyone disappointed by the lack of witnesses, the truth is going to come out. Our justice system will get to the bottom of this and those who helped incite the insurrection will be investigated, prosecuted and convicted. And juries will pass judgement, not old R Senators.— Joe Lockhart (@joelockhart) February 13, 2021

  62. 62.

    PPCLI

    For those who contributed to the last thread, my sincere thanks. You’ve made it clear to me I was wildly overreacting.

    Now I’m going to play some hockey and forget about anything political for the rest of the day, for mental health reasons.

  66. 66.

    Elizabelle

    Bringing this forward, because Mary G found an interesting Wall Street Journal article that went up this afternoon, but it was behind a paywall.

    New York Prosecutors Investigating Trump’s Manhattan Properties
    Officials are investigating loans the former president took on four buildings, including his flagship Trump Tower

    @Mary G: Excerpting and summarizing the Wall Street Journal article today. TLDR: both NYC and NYS are taking a good hard look at his real estate valuation and the applications he submitted when he refinanced his Manhattan properties, as well as an estate in Westchester County. He could be too busy in court to run again in 2024.

    No one has any tax returns yet — Manhattan DA Cyrus Vance’s subpoena is in limbo while Trump appeals to the US Supreme Court — again! — on different grounds. No indication yet on whether the USSC will hear the second Trump appeal.

    The Manhattan properties under review are:

    his flagship Fifth Avenue building, Trump Tower; 40 Wall St., an art deco skyscraper in New York City’s Financial District; Trump International Hotel and Tower, a hotel and condominium building at Columbus Circle; and Trump Plaza, an apartment building on Manhattan’s East Side.

    And the WSJ buried one tidbit but good, paragraphs down. Maybe it’s important, maybe it’s not. Trump refinanced his Manhattan properties through Ladder Capital Corporation, a real estate investment trust which makes loans and repackages them to investors. Lo and behold,

    Jack Weisselberg, the son of Trump Organization chief financial officer Allen Weisselberg, works at Ladder. Jack Weisselberg didn’t respond to a request for comment. He hasn’t been accused of wrongdoing.

    Shades of Justice Kennedy’s son who worked for Deutsche Bank, or maybe not. Back to the WSJ:

    [The prosecutors ….] could be looking for discrepancies between loan documents and financial information submitted elsewhere by Mr. Trump, such as that on tax returns or submitted to an insurance company, legal experts said. Writing false information on a loan application with the intention of getting financial benefits one isn’t entitled to can be a crime under New York law, according to legal experts.

    … In addition to the Manhattan properties, prosecutors are examining Seven Springs, a 213-acre Westchester, N.Y., estate owned by the Trump Organization. At that property, prosecutors have subpoenaed information that relates to its valuation, which has varied widely.

    The office of New York Attorney General Letitia James has said it is conducting a separate civil-fraud investigation into properties including 40 Wall St. and the Seven Springs estate.

    Anyway, NYC and NYS are turning up the heat on Trump’s real estate financing, which may involve fraud, and that’s all good. And, the Trump Tower loan — $100 million — comes due next year. 2022. Drumbeat.

  70. 70.

    Cameron

    Is this VaVaVoom guy supposed to be well known? I’ve lived in Florida for the last four years, but I lived in Philly for nearly half a century before that, and I had never heard of him until this hearing.

  71. 71.

    The Thin Black Duke

    @JoyceH: Bullseye.

    The last thing the Republicans want is for the Democrats to actually help people. If you don’t put the brakes on that nonsense right away, people will start expecting the government to be responsive to their needs, and that would be disastrous.

    What the Democrats have finally learned is that the GOP aren’t colleagues you can negotiate with in good faith. They’re the enemy and the only tactic that’s appropriate at this point is to either ignore them or bludgeon them into submission.

  72. 72.

    Elizabelle

    While we wait, any guesses on additional surprise GOP votes to convict?

    I think this is going to be a pyrrhic victory for the Republicans, and the issues raised will come up again.

    Make them wish Hillary Clinton had been elected (by the fucking Electoral College too, by a fraudproof margin) in 2016.  Rue the day Trump got up there and showed the world their asses, in addition to his own capacious one.

  73. 73.

    JoyceH

    @Just Some Fuckhead:

    @JoyceH: I’m interested to see how Trump will continue to be relevant politically without Twitter.

    I saw somewhere, forget where, that he’s planning to make paid speeches overseas, and rallies here. Of course, that depends on people being willing to pay him for speeches when he has no government power they’re bribing him for, and also that he has or can get the funds to put on those rallies, and his cult still willing to show up for the freak show.

  98. 98.

    Just Some Fuckhead

    I predicted 58 for conviction. It was 57. I think the only chance we ever had with this thing is if McConnell had weighed in for conviction. I never expected it, of course. I don’t want to ever hear another fucking word about McConnell being an institutionalist. He’s a radical no different from the riff-raff that Trump tried to kill him with. McConnell just endorsed attacks on his revered Senate. Remember that McConnell said on the Senate floor the night of the attack that Trump had instigated the attack. So he can’t pretend he didn’t know. He knows Trump did it and he endorsed it.

  99. 99.

    guachi

    No conviction but still the highest number of Senators from a President’s own party to ever convict.

  101. 101.

    Elizabelle

    57 to 43.

    Fuck the fucking Republican senators.

    With some exceptions, and all respect to those GOP who voted to convict DJ Fucking Trump.

    What a bunch of losers.  Hang this around their necks.

  102. 102.

    Bill Arnold

    @Sure Lurkalot: ​

    I also hope he slips on the way to the can in the middle of the night, cracks his skull, screams,

    M. McConnell came quite close in August 2019, at home.

  103. 103.

    Ken

    @Elizabelle: Writing false information on a loan application with the intention of getting financial benefits one isn’t entitled to can be a crime under New York law, according to legal experts.

    Hoocouldaknowed?  Besides, which of us hasn’t obtained millions of dollars of loans by fraudulently keeping three sets of books?

  107. 107.

    Ken

    @guachi: No conviction but still the highest number of Senators from a President’s own party to ever convict.

    Doesn’t Trump also hold the record for second-highest number (1) from the first impeachment?  IIRC Romney’s vote was the first time any Senator had voted that way.

  109. 109.

    Elizabelle

    @CaseyL:   Well then.  Nothing stopping us from impeaching him for something else again.  Later.  The votes are trending in our direction.

    LOL.

  111. 111.

    janesays

    @CaseyL: I didn’t expect Cassidy. Or Burr. Toomey wasn’t completely surprising, given that he was one of the five Republicans who originally voted down Rand Paul’s attempt to dismiss the trial outright.

  112. 112.

    zhena gogolia

    @Ken:

    Trump also holds the record for only president to call upon a violent mob to break into the Capitol and try to lynch his own vice president. So there are a lot of firsts.

  113. 113.

    Redshift

    I’ve been playing with Kumospace a bit, and I think it might be better than zoom for party-type gatherings. It puts attendees in a simple 2-D virtual space where you can move around and only hear the people “near” you. The main drawbacks are that the limit for the free version is 25 people, I think, and you have to create an account (which is very easy.)

  114. 114.

    Just Some Fuckhead

    @CaseyL: I didn’t have a particular person in the eighth slot. I’d just done the math with a couple of maybes producing one yea.

  115. 115.

    zhena gogolia

    Oh, yes, Zoom. Watergirl, thanks for organizing. Please send me the link. This is Monday, right?

  117. 117.

    janesays

    @Ken: Correct. Every single Democrat voted to acquit in the impeachment trials of Andrew Johnson (shamefully so) and Bill Clinton (correctly so).

  119. 119.

    Elizabelle

    “Signing their names in the [rolls] of history along with his name.”

    Good on Schumer.  This goes into the Congressional Record.  Future historians will love his speech.

  122. 122.

    The Thin Black Duke

    Get ready for a tsunami of bullshit propaganda blaming this travesty of justice on the Democrats. Do yourself a favor and ignore it. Don’t click, don’t listen, don’t talk about it. Doing otherwise just amplifies the nonsense and you’ll be left with a migraine.

  124. 124.

    Elizabelle

    Schumer:  the vote should be  “A weight on their conscience.”

    An albatross on their backs.

    An anvil attached to their spindly white legs (all but two of said legs).

    Concrete boots.

    More fuel for their pyres.  Which they need not have leapt on, but they did.

  125. 125.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @The Thin Black Duke: good advice

    Josh Barr @jbarro ·2h
    I realize we’re in the moment and whatever happened just now looms large but the idea that “Dems folded and didn’t call witnesses” is going to be the thing people remember about this episode even days from now is totally nuts, sorry.

    The usual suspects here will keep on keening about betraaaayal, but I suspect more people will be talking about Tim Tebow or whatever reality show is having a new season.

  129. 129.

    Just Some Fuckhead

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: The usual suspects here will keep on keening about betraaaayal, but I suspect more people will be talking about Tim Tebow or whatever reality show is having a new season.

    I shutter to think of the coming horror of people expressing an opinion I think it stupid. All we can do is hug each other tightly and hope it doesn’t kill us.

  130. 130.

    Ken

    @debbie: Are any of the Republicans who voted to convict from states with a Democratic governor, and no laws about who the governor must appoint to replace a Senator?  Asking for a friend who’s trying to target an angry mob.

  132. 132.

    CaseyL

    WTF is McConnell doing? He voted Not Guilty and now he’s basically laying the insurrection at T*’s feet.

  133. 133.

    Just Some Fuckhead

    McConnell is trying to have it both ways. I can’t wait for the pivot where he says, “but I couldn’t vote for conviction because Democrats have bad breath and yucky positions.”

  135. 135.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @Just Some Fuckhead: Well, you caught me. I do think stupidity is a bad thing. And given that in 2022 we’ll risk losing the republic, I think now is a fine time to be calling out stupidity in politics.

    I can do it here, or yell out my living room window to equal effect, but my neighbors already think I’m weird. Which belief I encourage because otherwise somebody might start getting notions about potlucks or, god forbid, “block parties”.

    The battlefield now is in Wisconsin, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Georgia, Arizona,  Ohio and Florida.

    Onwards

  136. 136.

    Ken

    @CaseyL: Stewardess, I speak GQP sleazeball….

    “I’m too much of a coward to vote to impeach, but I think the Justice Department should file charges, especially since I can then demagogue about Biden’s politically-motivated prosecutions.”

  137. 137.

    Ceci n est pas mon nym

    Jamie Raskin looks pretty pleased with himself, so in spite of my original disappointment I’ll go with his judgment on this.

    I’m with you on this, WG. I’m not in the mood for doom and gloom. I admit I’d like to know more about how they think this (inevitable) outcome is a good one. I suspect it has to do with the 2022 elections and possibly with helping sway popular opinion on the rest of the legislative agenda.

    Despite all of our wailing and gnashing of teeth, the Dem leadership has proved to be pretty canny so far this year, so I’m still cautiously optimistic.

  141. 141.

    CaseyL

    @Just Some Fuckhead: If he’s saying the reason the trial shouldn’t have happened because T* was no longer in office, when he’s the one who refused to call a Special Session while T* was in office…

    …well, shit; he’s doing exactly that.

  143. 143.

    Just Some Fuckhead

    @CaseyL: Exactly. This is McConnell trying to have it both ways. If we had a real national press in this country, they’d be asking McConnell why he pushed the impeachment trial out past Trump’s term and now says Trump can’t be convicted because he’s no longer in office. McConnell’s logic also indicates every president gets a free attempt at a putsch their last weeks in office because they can’t be accountable after they are out of office.

  144. 144.

    The Thin Black Duke

    @Just Some Fuckhead: Mcconnell understands that Trump’s attempted coup put the GOP in a lose-lose situation. No matter how much lipstick Fox News puts on this pig, this acquittal ain’t pretty.

  146. 146.

    Ceci n est pas mon nym

    @WaterGirl: Can you tell me where the “touch up my appearance” button is on the Zoom interface?

    Curious about filters after the now-famous kitten/lawyer incident, I went into Zoom today and found them.

    I don’t see one that does the whole-face kitten thing we saw in that incident, but there are many options for facial modification, such as animal muzzles, or a pirate hat and eye patch, or a halo over your head, or facial hair, modified eyebrows, lips in any color, etc.

    I’m actually kind of impressed. As I remarked to my wife while playing with it, this is pretty slick AI at work. It’s able to find your facial features, and figure out which way your head is pointed and modify the filter in real time to match at the video frame rate.

    This may not have been quite where the original developers of AI thought it was going though…

  147. 147.

    zhena gogolia

    @Elizabelle:

    Neguse’s closing was really brilliant. I was going to watch Raskin, but I’ve had enough for today too. I’ll watch it tomorrow. I feel I owe it to them to pay attention, as I did with Schiff last time.

  150. 150.

    CaseyL

    Well.  McConnell is now saying T***** should be arraigned on criminal charges for “everything he did while he was in office.”  Oh, and civil charges, too.

    Oh, and now he’s blaming the Democrats for the delay.  What a slime.

  151. 151.

    Elizabelle

    @zhena gogolia:   Yeah.  I actually missed quite a bit of the trial.  I will go back and watch the Democrats again later; glad that C-Span makes that always possible.  No need to see any more of van der Vile.

    I never saw any of the first impeachment; avoided it out of despair at that foregone conclusion.  Might have to watch that one of these days, too.  At least parts of it.

  152. 152.

    Just Some Fuckhead

    McConnell is saying the criminal justice system needs to go after Trump now. That’s a pretty convenient argument that lets Republicans off the hook for Trump’s demise and puts someone else on the hook.

    Also, FWIW, prosecution attempts will likely result in a SCOTUS decision giving the president immunity because he was in office at the time of the events in question.

  153. 153.

    Ken

    @CaseyL: McConnell is now saying T***** should be arraigned on criminal charges

    Wait, my snark at #136 got it right?  Well.  Stopped clocks, I guess. Or… The start of a magnificent career as a political pundit?

  154. 154.

    Just Some Fuckhead

    @Ken: Kudos to you. Like Claire McCaskill said, I would never have imagined Mitch McConnel doing a “lock him up” speech.

  155. 155.

    CaseyL

    How many Senators will now rise to opine on the case?
    Kind of interesting to see Bennett reiterating the whole history of the incitement, and the numerous times T**** violated his oath of office.
    ETA: Wonder if Liz Cheney is cringing every time a House Manager and a Democratic Senator approvingly quotes her?​ Pretty sure she didn’t mean her words to be a Democratic rallying cry.

  158. 158.

    Just Some Fuckhead

    @The Thin Black Duke: I think Republicans are in untenable position of having to get past Trump while holding onto the millions of new voters he brought into the Republican party through force of personality.

  159. 159.

    zhena gogolia

    @Elizabelle: 
    Oh, definitely. There are so many brilliant moments. You could watch the whole thing as a kind of miniseries (skipping the Repubs, of course). The testimony by Yovanovich, Vindman, et al. is gripping, as are many, many speeches by the Dems.

  160. 160.

    Ken

    Question. Even though they didn’t convict, can they still vote that Trump may not hold public office again?  I mean, if there’s a lot of GQP Senators saying that he’s guilty guilty guilty of insurrection, you’d think they’d all get behind applying the 14th amendment ban-hammer.

  162. 162.

    zhena gogolia

    @Elizabelle:

    Anne Laurie kindly invited me to do a guest post on the first impeachment, and this is part of what I wrote:

    We are all too prone to easy cynicism: “The Republican majority in the Senate will never convict and remove Trump, so why should I pay any attention to the impeachment hearings or trial?” Well, I did pay attention, and what I saw was deeply inspiring and hopeful. Rep. Adam Schiff, Rep. Jerrold Nadler, and their Democratic colleagues, as well as the counsel for the Democrats on the House Intelligence and Judiciary Committees, Daniel Goldman and Barry Berke, did not get cynical, they did not give up or phone it in. They went to BATTLE for this country, day after day, and used everything in their arsenal: intelligence, hard work, and most of all, that unfashionable thing, patriotism. Despite the obstruction of the president and his allies, the Democrats proved Trump’s guilt so decisively that even the Republicans had to admit it. They were left with no fig leaf other than, “Yeah, he did it, but he’s giving us tax cuts so it’s okay.” They were left with no defense.

  165. 165.

    CaseyL

    From Betty Cracker’s twitter:

    McCaskill says McConnell’s post-acquittal anti-Trump speech was to placate big GOP donors who don’t want to be associated with the Trump crazies. Sounds plausible.

    So the whole impassioned speech was just to get the moneybags to open up again?

    The oligarchs the GQP depends on love the T**** crazies: they’re the ones who keep government from being able to function. I guess the whole McConnell song and dance gives them, as well as him, some plausible deniability.

  167. 167.

    Another Scott

    @Ken: Someone was speculating a few days ago, maybe on nycsouthpaw’s twitter thing, that that was the way to go.  Given the SCOTUS I don’t see how it would work.

    Cheers,

    Scott.

  168. 168.

    Elizabelle

    @Ken:   WRT the WaPost article on Graham, not a lot of new info, although Graham would not comment on their story.  Which struck me as interesting.  He is a lawyer, and does not want to go on the record.

    WaPost:  Graham’s post-election call with Raffensperger will be scrutinized in Georgia probe, person familiar with inquiry says

    … the inquiry by Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis will include an examination of the call Graham, a staunch Trump ally, made to Raffensperger 10 days after the Nov. 3 election.

    FWIW, Raffensperger’s office is NOT investigating Graham, because there was no audio made of the call.  They are solely investigating Trump.

    Raff …, however, expressed surprise and was aghast that Graham basically asked him to cast out mail-in ballots from counties suspected of having signature discrepancies, since they could not separate out the bad ballots.

    Some of the article was a law prof railing about Graham ending up as target of this investigation, and as a juror on the Trump impeachment trial, where he is also advising Trump.

    A lot of laying out Graham’s interactions with/counseling of Trump.  And Graham’s spokesman denying all allegations outta Georgia.  Of course.

    I guess the article is pretty much about “Pilot Fish” Graham being all over the marina in all matters Trump.

    The revelation that the probe will examine the Nov. 13 call adds to the number of roles Graham has played in connection to Trump’s attacks on the election.

    The senator is currently serving as a juror in the former president’s ongoing impeachment trial in the U.S. Senate. Graham has also functioned as an unofficial adviser to Trump’s defense team, speaking with his lawyers and Trump regularly.

    Now, Graham’s own actions are being examined in a criminal investigation.

    There are no rules barring Graham from serving in various capacities, as an impeachment trial is a political process that is not required to follow judicial procedures. But experts nonetheless questioned what they described as the former Senate Judiciary Committee chairman’s clear conflict of interest, which they said makes it impossible for him to serve as an impartial juror — something the Constitution requires of senators in impeachment procedures.

    “So Graham is sitting in judgment on Trump on a charge that cites Trump’s call to Raffensperger, while Graham may be a person of interest in a criminal investigation of his own call to Raffensperger,” said Stephen Gillers, a law professor at New York University who studies legal ethics. “Outside the Senate’s Wonderland court, a potential juror who is under investigation for conduct that is also the subject of the trial would be excused for cause.”
    …

    …   Raffensperger said Graham asked on the [November 13] call whether political bias could have prompted poll workers to accept ballots with nonmatching signatures. The senator pressed the secretary of state to audit ballot-envelope signatures — and wondered if all ballots should be tossed in counties that yielded high discrepancy rates, since it would be impossible to toss only the affected ballots, which are separated from their envelopes before counting to protect voter privacy, according to Raffensperger.

    Raffensperger said at the time he was stunned that Graham appeared to suggest that he find a way to toss legally cast ballots.

  169. 169.

    The Thin Black Duke

    @Just Some Fuckhead: Thing is, while Trump did bring more voters to the GOP, Trump also brought even more voters to the Democrats. He single-handedly negated the “both parties are the same” nonsense and terrified those voters who before could afford to be indifferent. I think that’s the reason Mcconnell is throwing Trump under the bus now.

  170. 170.

    something fabulous

    Nice! I am in; will send you an email. Wouldn’t have been free tomorrow, so that is swell. ???

  173. 173.

    Elizabelle

    @zhena gogolia:   Please post the link to your guest post.

    Have to confess, I also purposely avoided the impeachment because I was on a cruise, with very little internet.  And that I chose that lengthy last-minute trip in hope of avoiding the impeachment, which was going to be painful.

    Who knew that a new villain, COVID-19, would rear its head and become more widely known during the voyage?

  176. 176.

    Another Scott

    @Just Some Fuckhead: President is different, as we know.  It’s one dude/dudette with the power to destroy the planet.

    I’m not sure about the state limits.  One term is too little.  Having someone be governor/mayor/sheriff for life is a bad idea, but something that the voters there can decide and it doesn’t have much effect on the rest of the country.

    If all else is equal, I’m a fan of the maxim (HT Billin, again) – “We already have term limits: they’re called elections.”  When systems become entrenched and corrupted and block necessary change, then sometimes, maybe, enforced term limits make some sense.  But it’s better to fix the corrupt system (as there is more bad about such systems than just someone being in office ‘too long’.)

    Any human system can be corrupted.  The answer is to get better humans into the system.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  179. 179.

    CaseyL

    Not sure if anyone’s still watching C-Span, Nancy Smash is on camera reminding everyone that the House Managers were timely in delivering the Article of Impeachment to the Senate, and that it was Mitch McConnell who refused to take receipt of it.

    She is going to town on McConnell’s ass.

  180. 180.

    Benw

    Today I took the kids into the city, went sledding in Prospect Park, and got pizza. It was a good day. Saw the news of the acquital on the drive home. Felt good not to think about Republican assholes before then

  183. 183.

    Just Some Fuckhead

    @Another Scott:   It’s one dude/dudette with the power to destroy the planet.

    BTW, we didn’t institute presidential term limits because of one dude/dudette with the power to destroy the planet. We did it because one guy kept getting elected over and over.

  186. 186.

    J R in WV

     

    @Ken: ​

    @Baud: My favorite is fo’c’s’le, because it shows that we’ve had grammer pendants for centuries.

    No, that follows simple rules — the original word is forecastle, because back in the old days it was taller than the main deck, like a little castle on the fore end of the ship.

    Each apostrophe is for an omitted vowel left out of that word as it’s pronounced by professional sailors, and in the Navy.

    Simple, easy. Even for sailors.

  187. 187.

    PST

    Sometimes timing is everything. Pausing for witnesses to be deposed and then maybe to testify would have wrecked the momentum that the managers had built with their meticulous but reasonably concise presentations and that opposing counsel had contributed to with their incompetence. Short of actually swaying ten more republicans, there was nothing to be gained by getting testimony next week over getting it a few months from now in the course of a comprehensive investigation of what went down in the events culminating in the January 6 insurrection. The threat of witnesses got the Herrera Beutler affidavit into the record establishing that Trump knew in a timely fashion what was happening in the Capitol. None of that changes the makeweight jurisdictional argument the republicans are using. Finishing with a 57-43 vote against Trump is about as good as anyone could have expected, and on the way to that result, we got a brilliant public presentation of the case against Trump. I expectations were high, but the reality was better. Now back to the Covid-19 emergency and the Biden agenda.

  189. 189.

    Just Some Fuckhead

    @PST: As Raskin is saying in a press conference now, he made the call on no witnesses/entering Herrera Beutler’s affidavit into the public record. He further said that there is no additional witness that would have overcome the jurisdiction argument that Republicans were making. He said Republicans (McConnell) admitted they made their case.

  190. 190.

    J R in WV

    @JoyceH: ​
     

    Woot!! Congratulations, the Regency books deserve it, very readable and well plotted. I like them a lot even tho I don’t much care for (as in can’t read at all) Jane Austin’s work. Keep us posted on how well it goes. And keep up the good work!!

  192. 192.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @Just Some Fuckhead: ​
     

    As Raskin is saying in a press conference now, he made the call on no witnesses/entering Herrera Beutler’s affidavit into the public record. He further said that there is no additional witness that would have overcome the jurisdiction argument that Republicans were making.

    But I thought that the Senate Dems had betrayed us….

  193. 193.

    Just Some Fuckhead

    Swalwell said they could have called as a witness God Herself and that wouldn’t have overcome the jurisdiction dodge. That was pretty awesome.

  198. 198.

    Geminid

    Witnesses might have provided some gripping testimony. I wonder how many people would actually have watched them, though. The two videos presented by the prosecution will be seen by many times that number. I’m glad this trial ended when it did.

    And I am not surprised that North Carolina Senator Richard Burr voted to convict. It may have been ten years ago, but Burr was one of six Republican Senators to vote to allow gay men and woman to serve openly in the military. This was in the 2010 lame duck session, and it stood out to me at the time because the other Republicans were from New England and the Midwest.

  201. 201.

    SiubhanDuinne

    STACEY PLASKETT NEWS: Joy Reid is going to have her as a guest on MSNBC, 9:00 pm EST tonight. I know I’ll be watching!

  203. 203.

    Tazj

    @SiubhanDuinne: Thanks for the heads up, I’ll be watching. I’ll admit to being caught up in the anger for a while after the Democrats decided not to call witnesses. I’ve calmed down quite a bit after finding out what really happened.

  205. 205.

    Elizabelle

    @SiubhanDuinne:   I am utterly loving Akhnaten.  And recognizing  some of the musical fragments.  Glass reuses (started to type “recycles” but that is too trite).

  210. 210.

    Anya

    @Geminid:  Personally, I thought the Impeachment Managers have made their case. Yes, witnesses would have been compelling but I think Republicans would have turned it into a circus and prolonged the process more than it needed.

  212. 212.

    Tazj

    @WaterGirl: I suppose shouldn’t have put it that way. I personally don’t know what really happened but when the Democrats first decided not to call witnesses I was angry that they were “caving” to the Republicans and undercutting the House manager’s case.

    Then time passed, there were 57 votes in the Senate to convict and I read that some potential witnesses went cold and wouldn’t have testified without being subpoenaed. I also read that Jamie Raskin made the decision to proceed without witnesses. And maybe the Republican would have held up too much while not producing a different vote on impeachment.

    Put a different way, I’m not as outraged right now at Senate Democrats as I was earlier this afternoon while reading too much social media.

  216. 216.

    glory b

    @WaterGirl: Haven’t looked, but I heard Nicole Wallace say that her republican contacts told her all of the potential witnesses “went cold” including the congressperson from Washington. So, given that they looked to have a long series of (false) denials, they read her ststement into the record.

    And yeah, as someone who’s not a white male, I figure that maybe we don’t have the time or luxury to expend lots of energy trashing each other, especially when we don’t know the whole story.

  218. 218.

    Another Scott

    @Just Some Fuckhead: “We” didn’t do it, the GOP did.  They were continuing to throw a tantrum after FDR beat their asses so many times and passed the amendment in 1947 (2 years after he died).  Somehow it wasn’t a big deal when Grant and TR were running for a 3rd term…

    Lots of things have changed since 1947, including Congress ceding an awful lot of power to the executive, so we kinda lucked out in a way (at least in some cases)…

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  219. 219.

    WaterGirl

    @Tazj: Yeah, since I posed my question, I watched the press conference.  They didn’t cave.  They felt they had strongly proven their case, they didn’t want this hearing turned into a 3-ring circus,  and they pointed out that one of the witnesses who was called for the jan 2020 impeachment… that is still be litigate din court one year later.

    I think they made the right call.

  221. 221.

    J R in WV

    @Just Some Fuckhead:

    I shutter to think…

    Actually, you probably shudder to think, as shutters are outside windows to close over the windows to protect the glass.

    Shudders are an expression of emotion. /pedantry

  222. 222.

    Another Scott

    @Just Some Fuckhead:  See the last sentence in #218.

    HTH!!

    [eta:] I’m not sure what you’re arguing here, since you’re the one in favor of congressional term limits and age limits…

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  223. 223.

    Just Some Fuckhead

    @J R in WV: “Shutter” is a BJ tradition, you obnoxious piece of shit. Are you going to stalk me around the site now and say stupid shit? Because I’ll need to evaluate my options after your initial attack followed by stalking.

  224. 224.

    Just Some Fuckhead

    @Another Scott: I thought it was pretty clear what I was arguing. We both support term limits. You just want selective term limits and I want them straight across the board. It’s on you to justify how you can want term limits for some and not others.

  229. 229.

    Just Some Fuckhead

    @Another Scott: Your explanation was an in-hindsight justification of a term limit law put in place for the exact reason we need one now. We don’t have to agree but if you can’t offer a better explanation why one set of term limits is okay and the other isn’t, I’m going to declare victory and move on. I’d suggest until you can make the distinction, you should probably go to a “no term limits anywhere” position.

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