Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Russia bombs Ukraine’s maternity hospitals; Republicans in the House can’t sort out supporting Ukraine.

Anyone who bans teaching American history has no right to shape America’s future.

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

Wow, I can’t imagine what it was like to comment in morse code.

It’s a good piece. click on over. but then come back!!

We are aware of all internet traditions.

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

This country desperately needs a functioning Fourth Estate.

They were going to turn on one another at some point. It was inevitable.

Ron DeSantis, the grand wizard, oops, governor of FL.

Russian mouthpiece, go fuck yourself.

We still have time to mess this up!

Proof that we need a blogger ethics panel.

The low info voters probably won’t even notice or remember by their next lap around the goldfish bowl.

Authoritarian republicans are opposed to freedom for the rest of us.

White supremacy is terrorism.

Fuck that bum, let’s go Joe!

Take hopelessness and turn it into resilience.

Technically true, but collectively nonsense

Republicans are radicals, not conservatives.

If you tweet it in all caps, that makes it true!

“woke” is the new caravan.

Israel is using food as a weapon of war. Unforgivable.

Just because you believe it, that doesn’t make it true.

You are here: Home / Open Threads / Trump Takes the Fifth

Trump Takes the Fifth

by | 278 Comments

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Trump was due to give a deposition this morning in New York Attorney General Tish James’ civil investigation of his lies about the valuation of Trumpco assets. He took the fifth.

In a post on Trump’s social media service, Truth Social, early Wednesday, Trump continued his attacks on James’s investigation, calling the Black law enforcement official “racist” and saying he was seeing her “for a continuation of the greatest Witch Hunt in U.S. History!”

Trump has famously said that only the mob takes the fifth, so if the shoe fits, etc.

Reader Interactions

278Comments

  3. 3.

    dmsilev

    Not all surprising. Not the taking of the 5th nor the self-aggrieved whining statement that he put out about it.

  8. 8.

    Scout211

    Because nothing really matters to him unless it affects Donald J. Trump.

    ETA: fixed link

    While campaigning in 2016, Trump suggested not answering questions was a sign of guilt. At a campaign stop in Iowa in 2016, Trump said, “If you’re innocent, why are you taking the Fifth Amendment?”

    In his statement Wednesday, Trump said, “Now I know the answer to that question” and decried James’ investigation. The former President and the Trump Organization have previously denied any wrongdoing.

    “When your family, your company, and all the people in your orbit have become the targets of an unfounded, politically motivated Witch Hunt supported by lawyers, prosecutors, and the Fake News Media, you have no choice,” the former President stated.

  9. 9.

    bbleh

    Just a note for the record that this is a CIVIL case and hence a jury CAN draw negative inferences from him taking the Fifth.

    And seriously, we’re talking about property valuations.  If they’re done in good faith, in accordance with generally accepted principles and/or based on the advice of professionals, what possible reason would there be to take the Fifth?

    I’m with a commenter somewhere else (who remembers where) that this was orchestrated by his lawyers, who know perfectly well he lies as reflexively as he breathes (probably by appealing to his sense of victimization, since they certainly couldn’t tell him it’s because he can’t be trusted to keep his story straight).

  10. 10.

    Frankensteinbeck

    @dmsilev:

    Not all surprising. Not the taking of the 5th

    On the contrary.  I’m told he loves to shoot his mouth off in depositions, because he thinks he’s smarter than any lawyer ever.  I think this is a sign of panic.  Over what, it’s hard to say.

  11. 11.

    NotMax

    @Scout211

    Fulminating about refusing to provide testimony on an outlet named Truth would be in strong contention for the height of irony.

    //

  13. 13.

    Deputinize Eurasia from the Kuriles to St Petersburg

    @bbleh:

    “…based on the advice of professionals, what possible reason would there be to take the Fifth?”

    Fraududent representations of value in obtaining loans. That’s a crime under both state and federal law.

  15. 15.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @NotMax:

    O/T, but I wanted to thank you belatedly for the information and links you posted yesterday on poultry farming. Turns out there’s some slight tangential connection to the project that’s occupying most of my time these days, only I didn’t grasp that until early this morning. Have now added it all to my project files.

  21. 21.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @NotMax:

    Fulminating about refusing to provide testimony on an outlet named Truth would be in strong contention for the height of irony.

    Irresistibly reminded of this little passage from Dorothy L. Sayers’ Clouds of Witness:

    “I fear we may have to wait a few moments for Sir Impey,” said Mr. Murbles, consulting his watch. “He is engaged in Quangle & Hamper v. Truth, but they expect to be through this morning—in fact, Sir Impey fancied that midday would see the end of it. Brilliant man, Sir Impey. He is defending Truth.”

    “Astonishin’ position for a lawyer, what?” said Peter.

  25. 25.

    mrmoshpotato

    @dmsilev:

    If he weighs as much as a duck, well that’s a duck I have no interest in meeting. 

    That’s one fat schmuck of a duck.

  26. 26.

    Ken

    @Deputinize Eurasia from the Kuriles to St Petersburg: Fraududent representations of value in obtaining loans.

    I was under the impression that the AG had already established that — it would seem pretty easy to do, given access to both sets of books the valuations on the tax returns and those on the bank loan applications. Perhaps they don’t have those records yet?

    Assuming they do, I would have thought most of the questions would be to establish whether Trump knew about, or ordered, the fraud. Which, thanks to the Fifth, the jurors can now infer.

  27. 27.

    SFAW

    I would be amazed, if when TFG is questioned about it later, he doesn’t burble something like “the corrupt racist NY AG would only distort my honest, truthful answers, and ask ridiculous ‘gotcha’ questions, in a corrupt attempt to entrap me.”

  30. 30.

    jonas

    @bbleh:Just a note for the record that this is a CIVIL case and hence a jury CAN draw negative inferences from him taking the Fifth.

    You are correct, but color me surprised. How is defrauding lenders and other people with interest in the valuation of Trump’s properties not a criminal matter? Isn’t fraud, you know, fraud? Or is there really no clear criminal statute that says you can’t bullshit appraisals?  IANAL, so I really don’t know.

  32. 32.

    different-church-lady

    @WereBear: You know, we all end up dead in the end. Why not coked up and face down in a fountain below a tacky neon sculpture?

  33. 33.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @Baud:

    LOL, I’m thinking of kidnapping Emanuel and holding him for ransom!

    No, it’s nothing secret, and I’ve mentioned it before. It’s the course I’m creating on how English social changes in the 20th century influenced (and were reflected in) the mystery fiction of Agatha Christie and Dorothy L. Sayers. There are at least two examples (both in Sayers) of women engaged in chicken farming, and if in fact this was a relatively new phenomenon in England as well as in the US, it might be worth a brief mention.

  35. 35.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @schrodingers_cat: He muttered some stuff, but he, and everyone else in the Dem Caucus, voted the right way.  I, for one, am inclined focus on the vote and celebrate the result.  YMMV.

  40. 40.

    mrmoshpotato

    @schrodingers_cat:

    With all his blubber he will float. 

    I would argue that that’s mean, but…

    Stuff your fat, fascist ass into a golf cart while all of the other G7 leaders are walking because they have the stamina, Dipshit Donny!

  43. 43.

    NYCMT

    @SiubhanDuinne: remember that the Sherlock Holmes story The Blue Carbuncle featured a goose raised in the flock of a suburban housewife. Revolution at the table by Harvey Levenstein mentions the cost of chicken at the end of the nineteenth century was due to the short supply because poultry was generally raised in suburban areas in small flocks by women, as an alternate source of household income.

  45. 45.

    Another Scott

    @Ken: I hope the folks writing these white-collar laws take a step back and realize that it doesn’t matter if magic words were or were not spoken directing some to do something illegal.  Or the person’s “frame of mind” at the time.

    What maters is, cui bono?  Who benefits?  If TTO benefits in an illegal scheme, then everyone part of that, especially those who worked on the papers and signed off on the work, and especially those who pocketed the financial benefits, are responsible.  It doesn’t matter if TFG didn’t explicitly tell his banksters and accountants and lawyers – “Do ALL the CRIMES and SHOW ME THE MONEY!!1”

    This isn’t hard.

    You get the benefit of an illegal scheme, you’re responsible.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  49. 49.

    mrmoshpotato

    @Baud:

    One of Dr. Suess’s unpublished works. 

    It was a children’s book for adults, because inside there’s a whole lotta “fuck.”

  52. 52.

    jonas

    @Omnes Omnibus: “They” being…who? My understanding is that this was an investigation being conducted by NY AG Laetitia James’s office. I wasn’t aware that AGs are parties in civil suits, but I guess they are!

  55. 55.

    jonas

    Throughout all of this, we are reminded over and over what a fucking whiner Trump is. FFS, it’s a million times worse than listening to a five year-old on an 8-hour road trip where the radio and AC aren’t working.

  57. 57.

    Ken

    @Tony G: hamberders   with ketchup    on the wall

    This has potential as a haiku.

    Hamberders tantrum
    Leaves greasy spots with ketchup
    Splattered on the wall

  63. 63.

    Scout211

    @jonas: Throughout all of this, we are reminded over and over what a fucking whiner Trump is.

     

    True. And while I assume he would rather be seen as a winner than a whiner, that schtick has worked for him with his fans and with the media since he announced for the presidency through today. Sigh.

    I hope it ends sometime soon but I am not holding my breath.

  66. 66.

    different-church-lady

    So this whole “If they can do this to Trump, they can do this to you!” line…

    I’m perfectly aware they can do this to me. THAT’S WHY I DON’T DO CRIMES ON A DAILY BASIS.

  68. 68.

    NotMax

    “Here’s another bill from your lawyers, sir.”

    “I’ve told you over and over again, Mexico will pay for that.”

    //

  69. 69.

    oatler

    @Ken:

    Pretty good, but leave out the adjective.  Not “greasy”- the reader should be able to smell  the spot.

  71. 71.

    Edmund Dantes

    I will say this. More innocent people should take the 5th. Especially when talking to cops and investigators (and prosecutors).

    If they want to charge you, there is no way to talk your way out of it. You can talk yourself into it though.

  72. 72.

    Spanky

    Has anyone done a welfare check on Kay? I figured she be dancing across the comments for the last three days, but I don’t recall seeing her

    Never mind. 9:04 this AM

  74. 74.

    NotMax

    @lowtechcyclist

    Tangentially reminded of an old favorite.

    Shake and shake
    The catsup bottle.
    None’ll come —
    And then a lot’ll.
    – Going to Extremes, Richard Armour
    :)

  76. 76.

    Deputinize Eurasia from the Kuriles to St Petersburg

    Jesus – I am not OK. I represent a woman suing the parents of a young man that killed her 17 year old daughter (his girlfriend) in a wreck roughly six months after breaking her back in a wreck when he was running from the police after they shoplifted a bunch of stuff. My theory is negligent entrustment, as he was under indictment for the felony wreck that broke the kid’s back and had just come out of rehab when mommy lent him her late model Lincoln at midnight (they have resources). Young man was 21.

    Anyway, I was obtaining some records on that wreck as the case just heated back up after the young man’s death by OD last week. Unfortunately, these aren’t dry records – the crime scene photos from the vehicular homicide (which he pled to – he was high as a kite) are in the stack. They’re really gruesome, and I hate them and hate the idea of having my client see them.

    I gotta take a minute.

  78. 78.

    Geminid

    @Spanky: I’m a little worried about debbie. She was commenting regularly until three weeks ago. I sure hope things are Ok in Columbus.

  79. 79.

    jonas

    @Scout211: I think he reflects back at them their own deep sense of grievance and resentment towards a society and culture where white, heterosexual, Christian males are no longer the center of the universe.

  81. 81.

    Suzanne

    @different-church-lady:

    So this whole “If they can do this to Trump, they can do this to you!” line… 

    I have that thought every fucking time some GOP or libertarian fuckhead makes some bullshit comment about this. “They can do it to you!” or “The state has the monopoly on violence!”. Like, you utter dumbfucks, I am fully aware that the long arm of the law can fuck with me any time it wants, and I am also aware that private citizens can fuck with me, with the law declining to prosecute the issue.

  87. 87.

    WereBear

    @SiubhanDuinne: In a Jungian serendipitous way, I was just reading that Delaware was the first chicken farming operation for meat. Anywhere. And led to great impact on this in the 20s?

    It was a woman!

  89. 89.

    Anyway

    @Omnes Omnibus:

    Bernie’s protegee won the primary for the Vt House seat that opens up when the current rep runs for Leahy’s senate seat.  Sanders’ candidate (whom he campaigned for) beat the “Democrat” backed by Leahy.

    Bernie Jr in the house soon – gonna be some epic rants from s-c :-)

  93. 93.

    JMG

    @WereBear:Ah, this reminds me of a childhood summer. I grew up in Wilmington, Delaware. One day my mom went downstate to an auction of assets of a bankrupt chicken farming/processing operation. She returned with 100 pounds of wings she got for six cents a pound. 100 pounds is one hell of a lot of chicken wings. Fortunately, we had one of those ’50s top-opening enormous stand alone freezers. but we had wings at every dinner and most lunches that summer, and my parents gave enormous cocktail parties where wings were the food served. The Summer of Wings! I think I was nine, and the memory is still vivid.

  94. 94.

    Baud

    @Suzanne:

    If people who are above the law aren’t above the law, what does that mean for all the people who aren’t above the law?

  96. 96.

    Betty Cracker

    @Deputinize Eurasia from the Kuriles to St Petersburg: Yikes, that’s terrible. Self-care definitely in order after viewing such material.

    We all know terrible, tragic things happen every day, but we don’t usually see it if we don’t work in the ER, EMS, PD, etc. Many of my relatives are in the medical field, and I think people become hardened to gruesome sights and horrible tragedies out of necessity. But most of us don’t, so it’s shocking when you do encounter something like that.

  97. 97.

    misterpuff

     

    @NotMax:

    Tangentially reminded of an old favorite.

    Shake and shake
    The catsup bottle.
    None’ll come —
    And then a lot’ll.
    – Going to Extremes, Richard Armour
    :)

     

    Tangentially reminded of an old favorite.

    Some folks will never eat a skunk,
    but then again some folk’ll
    Like Cletus the Slack-jawed Yokel.

  98. 98.

    Deputinize Eurasia from the Kuriles to St Petersburg

    @Omnes Omnibus:

    It’s …. jarring.

    And now, as defense counsel (defending under a reservation, natch) just reminded us, “my clients buried their only son three days ago, and I’m not calling them about opening an estate so you guys can sue it”.

    I want to be sympathetic, but they trashed  the reputation of the now dead 17 year old at their son’s preliminary hearing on the felony assault and evading charges on the back injury.

    Tale as old as time – bad boy a little older with a ton of money meets a girl from the other side of the tracks and dazzles her.

  100. 100.

    Betty Cracker

    @Baud: I was just reading about that race recently, and I got the impression there really wasn’t much difference (policy wise) between the two candidates. Everything has to be a proxy war, I guess. The winner, Becca Balint, is a long-time Dem who is president of the state senate and used to be a school teacher.

  105. 105.

    Cacti

    @mrmoshpotato: Stuff your fat, fascist ass into a golf cart while all of the other G7 leaders are walking because they have the stamina, Dipshit Donny!

    I enjoyed the G7 group photo where “6’3″ Trump was visibly shorter than 6’2” Justin Trudeau by a couple of inches.

  107. 107.

    Geminid

    @Anyway: Why the quotation marks around the “Democrat” backed by Leahy? I haven’t followed  this race closely but I had the impression that it was one liberal up against someone who was more liberal.

    And please explain how the winner was Sanders’ protege. I understand that he endorsed her, but did he foster her career?

  109. 109.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    Michael C. Bender @MichaelCBender

    Jan Brewer said she’d support Lake only if she promised to prioritize policy and tell the truth about elections. “I want to hear her tell me she did all this because she wanted to win and that it got a little bit out of control,” Brewer said in an interview.

    Brewer, who supported Robson, described Lake’s primary campaign as mean, untruthful and untethered to public policy. “She went so far to the right that I don’t know if she can recover,” Brewer said. “And if she can’t, we’ll have a Democratic governor.”

    You may remember Jan Brewer from such Obama-era hits as “You can’t go for a hike in the desert without tripping over the headless bodies of good USian ranchers decapitated by illegals coming here to work in restaurants and hotels”. She’s Team Normal now.

    Gov. Jan Brewer rose to national fame defending the state’s immigration law and warning of rising violence along the U.S.-Mexico border, including a claim that headless bodies were turning up in the Arizona desert.
    But the claim has come back to haunt her after her stammering debate performance in which she failed to back it up and ignored repeated questions on the issue from a scrum of reporters.

    and yes, she was re-elected

  110. 110.

    HinTN

    @Baud: Bernie runs as a Dem in the primary, wins and then declines the nom to run as an Independent. It gets the competition out of the way.

  113. 113.

    germy shoemangler

    first they came for roger stone, and i said “great.” next, they came for alex jones and i said “good news.” then they came for donald trump and i said “this is also excellent”

    — soul nate (@MNateShyamalan) August 9, 2022

     

    while i’m not a fan of donald trump, it is chilling to realize that this could happen to any one of us after livetweeting 34 consecutive crimes

    — soul nate (@MNateShyamalan) August 9, 2022

  115. 115.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @HinTN:

    Bernie runs as a Dem in the primary, wins and then declines the nom to run as an Independent. It gets the competition out of the way.

    is that a Vermont thing? Is this guy a sign of New Hampshire bleeding into Vermont, cause this guy sounds very New Hampshire Republican to me (my italics)

    BURLINGTON, Vt. (WCAX) – Liam Madden, an Iraq War veteran turned antiwar advocate, won a three-way GOP contest for the U.S. House Tuesday night. But a day after winning, it’s still not clear whether the self-proclaimed Independent plans to accept the nomination.
    Madden, who works in the solar industry, has said his real goal for running was to break Vermont’s political mold and rethink the two-party system. “It’s a sacred responsibility to give Vermonters a choice between what we all know is a dysfunctional, corrupt, and war-like system of politics or the opportunity to have a renaissance of community and compassionate, civic-minded problem-solving,” he said earlier Tuesday.
    But Madden on Wednesday morning told WCAX that he would like to decline the nomination but does not want the GOP to choose a replacement for the November ballot. He said he is in talks with party leaders and that his decision is still “up in the air.”

  116. 116.

    Anyway

    @Geminid:

    I was going by a NYMag headline “The Heir to Bernie?” and

    A backer of Medicare for All and the Green New Deal, she was Sanders’s candidate, while Leahy supported Gray.

    The Bernie back’n’forths amuse me and I decided to contribute

  118. 118.

    Geminid

    @lowtechcyclist: Haikus are hard but country music is easy:

    “Counting burgers on the wall, that don’t bother me at all.

    Playing Cats from nine to five, for that wretched 45.

    Snorting Adderal and dealing with this crazy zoo-

    Now don’t tell me, I’ve nothing to do.”

  119. 119.

    Ken

    @Baud: If people who are above the law aren’t above the law, what does that mean for all the people who aren’t above the law?

    Indeed, what is the point of the law if it applies equally to all? Where is the incentive to better yourself into a position where you are above the law?

  120. 120.

    germy shoemangler

    I live in a swing CD, and the entire campaign of GOPer @marcmolinaro is based on attacking Dem @PatRyanUC for attending a BLM protest that Molinaro also attended.

    Today's GOP is made up of outright fascists and "moderates" offering racist dog whistles. Those are your choices.

    — Joshua Holland (@JoshuaHol) August 10, 2022

  121. 121.

    Captain C

    @NotMax:

    “Here’s another bill from your lawyers, sir.”

    “I’ve told you over and over again, Mexico will pay for that.”

    Lawyer:  “OK, well, your retainer will cover the work up until now.  Unfortunately, given your record, we must stop all work on your case immediately, until another retainer of at least $10,000 is received by this office, and the check clears.  If you choose to obtain alternate representation, let us know where to send the records of this case.  Sorry, but we don’t know this Mexico fellow, or whether they’d be good for your debts.”

  122. 122.

    Geminid

    @Anyway: No problem. New York Magazine likes to stir up intra-party shit, though. A while ago they did a hatchet job on New Jersey Blue Dog Josh Gottheimer that concluded he made so much trouble for Joe Biden that Dems would be better off with a Republican in his seat.

  123. 123.

    germy shoemangler

    Pundits: Trump is going to laser focus on inflation and Biden won't have a response.

    Trump for the next two years; They raided my crime room, my beautiful crime room, they ripped it apart.

    — Le Brandón Sinistre (@agraybee) August 9, 2022

  124. 124.

    Betty Cracker

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: Wow, when you’re too out there for Jan Brewer — yeesh! I still recall seeing a train wreck clip from Brewer’s debate back in the day. As loathsome as she is, I cringed so hard in vicarious humiliation that I think I pulled a muscle. She was so terrible! But she got reelected anyway. Same deal with Rick Scott — he’s a godawful public speaker and was embarrassingly horrible in debates, but it doesn’t seem to matter.

  125. 125.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @Anyway: from that article, and only partially cromulent:

    Hanging over the American left has been the overriding question of what comes after Bernie Sanders. The 80-year-old Vermont senator is probably never running for president again and is, realistically, nearing retirement, no matter how vigorous he may seem. Obvious successors — someone who could mount a competitive national campaign while promoting democratic socialism or even unabashed progressivism — have not emerged yet. Most of the Squad members are too young or, in the case of Ilhan Omar, too polarizing: She barely survived a primary challenge last night.

    amazing how this image endures in spite of the facts, AOC (!) is the only member of “the Squad” who is under forty-five. Balint is 54. (ETA: fact check: Omar is 39)

  126. 126.

    germy shoemangler

    Welcome to Twitter, have a seat, we'll introduce you to the 23-year-old who will lecture you about how Democrats didn't try hard enough to improve the ACA, and once that's all set up you'll be assigned a socialist who supported Ron Paul up to 2015 to harass you forever

    — Le Brandón Sinistre (@agraybee) September 16, 2018

  127. 127.

    Betty Cracker

    @Geminid: Gottheimer truly is terrible, IMO, but it’s really hard to be so awful that your party would be better off losing your seat to the opposition — unless you have such a large majority it wouldn’t matter. Gottheimer doesn’t rise to that level because 1) he’s a nobody, and 2) our margin is so narrow.

  130. 130.

    Steeplejack

    Perspective!

    I’m no Sauron fan, but here’s why forming a fellowship to raid Mount Doom and destroy the One Ring is going to enrage his base.

    — Jokin Rokin Rokin Tolkien 🗡️🏹🪓 (@joshcarlosjosh) August 9, 2022

  131. 131.

    hueyplong

    It’s fairly sobering to contemplate the circumstances required for the pig’s base to become unriled.

  132. 132.

    Betty Cracker

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: Why is Rep. Jayapal never in that conversation? She’s got the policy bona fides, and she seems pretty deft at picking her battles and keeping her caucus together. Maybe it’s another cult of the presidency thing — she would be ineligible as an immigrant.

  134. 134.

    ian

    @Anyway:

    The Bernie back’n’forths amuse me

    We are at the point with them that I could just straight ad-lib how the thread will go every time we do them.

    Can’t we move on people?  It’s the past- eyes on the present!

  136. 136.

    Scout211

    Those anonymous sources have confirmed that there is a confidential informant.

    The raid on Mar-a-Lago was based largely on information from an FBIconfidential human source, one who was able to identify what classified documents former President Trump was still hiding and even the location of those documents, two senior government officials told Newsweek.

    The officials, who have direct knowledge of the FBI’s deliberations and were granted anonymity in order to discuss sensitive matters, said the raid of Donald Trump‘s Florida residence was deliberately timed to occur when the former president was away.

  138. 138.

    Geminid

    @Betty Cracker: Gottheimer got a lot of people mad because he wrote the notorious letter calling on leadership to decouple the BBB and Infrastructure bills, and eight of the nineteen other Blue Dogs signed it. That caused a big uproar. I think Speaker Pelosi gave Gottheimer a time out because he didn’t make another peep for a while. Then a few weeks later the Speaker decoupled the two bills and Gottheimer voted for both.

    I noticed last week that people were expressing pre-disappointment with Gottheimer as a prospective defector on the IRA vote. He and fellow New Jersey  Reps Mikie Sherrill and Tom Malinowski had been talking “no SALT, no bill” previously. But they will vote for this bill, and follow the House tradition of starting a SALT Caucus to press for raising the cap on the SALT deduction that Republicans imposed in 2017.

  139. 139.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @Scout211: I don’t know where this story will lead but I would not want to be a work-a-day employee or a non-Ornato (it could be him) Secret Service agent for the next few weeks

    Also, it’s Tiffany.

  140. 140.

    Deputinize Eurasia from the Kuriles to St Petersburg

    @Captain C:

    Point of Order – I’m a lowly street lawyer in flyover country who has done a number of cases involving $10K retainers over the years.

    We’re talking 6-7 figure retainers here (7 for anything involving Trump). These cases are time-sucks to the point of being career killers.

  144. 144.

    lowtechcyclist

    @Geminid: Very nice!

    JFTR, I wasn’t attempting haikus, I was riffing off of William Carlos William’s poem about the red wheelbarrow.

  145. 145.

    Martin

    @Betty Cracker: She is good at that. The issue I think is that you need politicians who can communicate with the growing base of young voters, and that’s a very small club right now – AOC, Omar. To some degree Porter. Fetterman should he win the senate race is proving to be quite good.

    This is Biden’s biggest weakness and why there’s talk of someone else in 2024. Dem comms to under 40 voters is atrocious. Jayapal isn’t terrible at it, but not particularly good either. Dems need to motivate the whole voting base, not just the 50+ ones.

  150. 150.

    gene108

    @Geminid:

    Sen. Menendez said he’d try to introduce elimination of the SALT limits into the Senate version of IRA, and elimination of SALT limits would be a consideration on voting for IRA.

    He ended up voting for it.

  152. 152.

    Barbara

    @different-church-lady: Do the people who write these op-eds actually think that they are not subject to search warrants if they are suspected, for instance, of having received classified information?  It’s true that the government is generally very careful where the press and elected officials are concerned, but if they really thought you were holding onto a trove of classified information you didn’t have the right to, then yeah, you too might be subject to search warrant that tries to recover those things, which, coincidentally, might be evidence that you or someone else committed a crime.

  154. 154.

    Betty Cracker

    @Martin: Good point. I’m not sure what it is exactly. It can’t be an age thing because Sanders is older than Biden. A perception of “authenticity,” whether based in reality or media savvy? Beats me

    ETA: To clarify, I don’t mean I’m puzzled that Sanders is more popular among younger voters than Biden — I get that. Their “brands” are very different. My point is age isn’t a factor since younger voters DO like Sanders.

  155. 155.

    Geminid

    @Martin: The really good criminal defense attorneys don’t need trump to build their reputations. He’ll probably get some second rater like some of the attorneys representing J6 defendants. From what Marcy Wheeler says, some of them are pretty shabby.

    And then there’s Dershowitz. That would be fun. I imagine Sidney Powell would also like to be part of trump’s bad-dream team. But she may not have a law license this time next year.

  158. 158.

    Cameron

    @Betty Cracker: Maybe it’s “whoever can break us out of what is suffocating us, even though we’re not sure what it is.”  Everybody who’s anywhere below the higher levels of the middle class is aware of getting screwed, but figuring out the reasons for it and the solutions to it – that’s supposed to be what the politicians do.

  160. 160.

    MisterDancer

    @Scout211: Wow. The rest of that Newsweek article is a…ride:

    The effort to keep the raid low-key failed: instead, it prompted a furious response from GOP leaders and Trump supporters. “What a spectacular backfire,” says the Justice official.

    There is all of this “the FBI failed to keep it low-key” bollicks that elides that there’s literally no way any such raid could be such!

    And the article assumes, w/o evidence, that the FBI was unaware of the risk of blowback. The story is that they knew the risk, and did it anyway, and thus there must be a reason why!

    Good reporting on the informant, but that section underlines that news outlet’s decline into Conservative gibberish and bias.

  162. 162.

    Redshift

    @jonas:

    I wasn’t aware that AGs are parties in civil suits, but I guess they are!

    I knew, but I wasn’t as aware before the Orange crime wave, that lots of white-collar and corporate crime is enforced through civil actions instead of criminal. I’m assuming it’s not because those crimes aren’t bad, but because damages and consent agreements are more effective in stopping them than throwing a few of the executives in jail (and it now doubt helps that the burden of proof is lower.)

  165. 165.

    rikyrah

    Hungry and Hopeful In DFW (@Kennymack1971) tweeted at 8:33 AM on Wed, Aug 10, 2022:
    Republicans and their media enablers are shook because unlike the Mueller investigation there’s nobody leaking from DOJ or the J6 Committee. They don’t know what they have or why they’re gathering what they’re gathering. They can’t properly out together talking points. Down BAD. https://t.co/ERqb4KIq5j
    (https://twitter.com/Kennymack1971/status/1557359471705432068?t=1o5vANepPSyw-4H7LVD6VQ&s=03)

  166. 166.

    Ken

    @Geminid: I’d think he’d need to have several lawyers available, given that there are cases being made in New York, DC, and Atlanta. Or is this covered by reciprocity agreements?

  168. 168.

    Barbara

    @germy shoemangler: Most of the replies are spot on but this one really made me laugh:

    But you don’t understand! Betty and Bob from Saginaw are really socialists at heart, we’re just not screaming at them enough!

  172. 172.

    Ken

    @MisterDancer: the FBI failed to keep it low-key

    They were doing pretty well until the subject of the warrant stood up with a metaphorical bullhorn and screamed “WITCH HUNT”. Then the media and half of Congress chimed in…

  174. 174.

    Miss Bianca

    @prostratedragon: So, running people over and packing stun guns at a funeral amounts to “comical mayhem”, according to the Daily Beast?

    I wonder what would count as “tragic mayhem”?

  176. 176.

    Scout211

    @MisterDancer: Agree that there is a lot in that article.  Some “both-sides” but some information detail that other reporters haven’t yet covered.  Like there was a grand jury involved in April of this year.  When Trump said that all the relevant records were given back to the Archives, the Archives disagreed and went to the DOJ.  Then a grand jury:

     

    In late April, the source says, a federal grand jury began deliberating whether there was a violation of the Presidential Records Act or whether President Trump unlawfully possessed national security information. Through the grand jury process, the National Archives provided federal prosecutors with copies of the documents received from former President Trump in January 2022. The grand jury concluded that there had been a violation of the law, according to the Justice Department source.

  178. 178.

    Lapassionara

    @Baud: Yes, and as I recall, there were 2 emails that were retroactively deemed to be classified, but were not marked classified at the time she got them (or sent them). In any event, there should have been no classified information on either State.gov  or in her account.

  180. 180.

    Central Planning

    @Scout211: I am not a lawyer, and it will probably be clear to those that are at the end of my question.

    “When your family, your company, and all the people in your orbit have become the targets of an unfounded, politically motivated Witch Hunt supported by lawyers, prosecutors, and the Fake News Media, you have no choice,” the former President stated.

    Why can TFG invoke his 5th amendment rights to protect other people? I thought it was only for self-incrimination, not incriminating others.

  181. 181.

    Another Scott

    Meanwhile, …

    TV journalist Marina Ovsyannikova, who made international news over a live-on-air anti-war protest, has been detained.

    AlJazeera

    It always seemed weird to me, but the idea that VVP wasn’t going to punish her always seemed far-fetched. We’ll see.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  182. 182.

    Geminid

    @gene108: I’m all for raising the SALT deduction, maybe not to $80,000 as was in the BBB bill. Menendez and Sanders said they would cut it back when the bill made it to the Senate.

    Republicans didn’t cut down the SALT deduction in a fit of egalitarianism. They did it to punish blue states that funded higher levels of services through local and state taxes. I think the idea was to foster tax cutting state and local Republicans who want states like New Jersey to be more like Tennessee. Democrats cleaned up in affluent suburban districts the year after and I think capping the SALT deduction played a role in flipping some of the 40 seats we won in 2018.

    Menendez argues that even if the SALT deduction is raised New Jersey taxpayers will still put way more money into the federal government than the state gets back, and I think he has a point.

    I’ll never take it, but I see the deduction as an indirect subsidy to local and state governments. As long as there are limitations I’m for it.

  183. 183.

    Betty Cracker

    @Cameron: Right, and that’s a great explanation of why younger voters tend to gravitate toward progressive pols. I get that. But my question is who among that group is seen as a leader and why.

  184. 184.

    West of the Rockies

    Who might the Trump warrant confidential informant be?  It’s gotta be somebody wayyyy inside.

  187. 187.

    Martin

    @Betty Cracker: Bernie’s success is from the good comms approach from the dirtbag left, something that the establishment left lacks. That’s the gap that needs to be closed. Bernie doesn’t need to possess the comms ability because he has followers to do that. Biden is just gaining a bit of it now with the dark Brandon stuff, but there’s no real durable comms for the establishment left to lean on, so candidates need to bring it/build it themselves.

    I’m not saying that’s impossible for someone over 40 to do (see Fetterman), but considering the number of over 40 politicians we have and the rarity of good communicators with under 40 voters, I’d say it’s culturally incompatible. Witness the various democratic socialist countries that have elected young women as leaders.

    A lot of the establishment manner of comms is centered on being cautious in word and tone to get on the Sunday shows given that equal time was eliminated in the 90s and you need permission for a producer to put you on. But modern comms is very different. You can say whatever the fuck you want on social media, provided you are willing to deal with the backlash. No pre-filtering for maximum viewership, and no need for the very serious tone over outrages in a post 9/11, climate-change-will-bake-us-all-soon environment. Time is short, so say your mind and go on offense. If there’s an outrage, be outraged. No ‘I’ll speak my mind in 30 years when I’m president.’ Everyone under 40 expects to be dead in less than 30 years from climate change.

  191. 191.

    Geminid

    @Betty Cracker: I think some younger Black Democrats see Lauren Underwood as a leader. She’s starting to break into the larger conversation now.

    I believe Underwood is only a couple years older than Ms. Ocasio-Cortez. Underwood has not staked out an ideological position, though, and did not join any of the three ideological caucuses when she entered Congress in 2018.

  192. 192.

    Frank Wilhoit

    @rikyrah: ​
     This is exactly right. Their nerve always fails them; but typically only after unacceptable collateral damage. That means that our job is to make their nerve fail sooner.

  193. 193.

    Baud

    @Betty Cracker:

    @Martin:

    Since the goal isn’t to win over young people, but to win elections, I’m not sure why Bernie and AOC should be emulated nationwide.  Regardless of what one feels about them, their style of politicking (as opposed to policy) hasn’t been nationally successful. Fetterman may be different, but I thought his appeal was more broad based, and he is a unique character that might not be replicable.

  194. 194.

    Geminid

    @Cameron: Speaking of Fetterman, Politico Magazine put up a long article about him yesterday, titled “Opinion: John Fetterman is trying an experiment Democrats need to pay attention to.” It’s about Fetterman’s effort to win votes in red, rural counties.

  196. 196.

    Ken

    @Frank Wilhoit: As I recall, there was (is?) a Russian joke about the two main Soviet newspapers, Pravda (“Truth”) and Izvestia (“News”), to the effect that there is no izvestia in Pravda, and no pravda in Izvestia.

  197. 197.

    Mo MacArbie

    @Central Planning: It’s bullshit. Don’t try to parse it for legal propriety; you’ll break your brain. Just know that Trump was ready to let the truth vindicate him, but manly men came to him with tears in their eyes saying, “Sir, you must take the fifth to protect your family.”

  199. 199.

    Ken

    @trollhattan: As I recall from Adam’s post last night, the Ukrainian ministry of defense said that they could not comment on the cause of the explosions, but reminded everyone that smoking in unauthorized areas can be dangerous.

  200. 200.

    C Stars

    The GOP is like the borg. When the Kansas vote happened, their pundits immediately sent messages out to operatives/nominees to avoid talking about abortion. They communicate in lockstep. I mean, their congresspeople will frequently blast out the exact same talking points, same wording, on the same day, and no one seems to think this is weird.

    I think where we get them is by having a sense of humor. Making fun of their strange groupthink ideas, using humor to call out how out of step they are with society. I mean, seriously, they are rehashing ultra-racist political theories, banning books, and trying to bash gays–the 80’s Atwater playbook is the only one they HAVE. We need to make fun of this, because it’s stupid and ludicrous. And for the next generation of voters, the 80’s are a curiosity, not a memory–they will be able to laugh at it in a way that those who lived through it can’t. I don’t get why establishment Dems seem so dead set on taking these idiots seriously. AOC can be achingly earnest and altruistic, but she got where she is using memes and social media slapbacks. She’s genuinely funny and clever. So is Fetterman.

  202. 202.

    Geminid

    @trollhattan: Two large explosions just a couple seconds apart, with no reports of incoming missiles. That sounds like someone placed IEDs.

    Someone took pics of a wrecked fighter plane. There may have been more. There was also video of a lot of damaged cars in a parking lot. One had a 2×12″ plank sticking out the driver side window. Shit was flying!

  207. 207.

    different-church-lady

    @rikyrah: ​
      Manipulators always assume everyone else’s motivation is to manipulate. It’s a belief that drives their compulsion: they must manipulate before they get manipulated, because (in their minds) manipulation is the only human condition. Thus, any action against them must be motivated by a desire to manipulate, and the only response possible is to manipulate back.
    Once you have this understanding of how they think, it becomes much easier to defend yourself against them.

  208. 208.

    trollhattan

    @Geminid: The before and after sat images in that Twitter link seem to reveal an entire flight line is gone. We’d have to know when the before images were taken and the likelihood of that representing conditions at the time of kaboomski. Seems a lot worse than early indications implied.

  210. 210.

    prostratedragon

    @Miss Bianca: It certainly suggests why the offender wasn’t invited. But I’m amazed that the operator of the cemetery felt implicated enough to issue a disclaimer. Never would have occurred to me to blame them.

  212. 212.

    jonas

    @Geminid: Ukrainian sources now acknowledging that it was an operation carried out by special forces. Damn that was some serious sabotage.

  214. 214.

    different-church-lady

    @Geminid: ​
     

    It’s about Fetterman’s effort to win votes in red, rural counties.

    If you can do it without pandering to racism, prejudice, and hatred, then I’m all for it.

  215. 215.

    Cameron

    @Geminid: He actually shows up. In all the years I lived in Pennsylvania, I don’t recall any politician who visited every county in the state. I think that counts for a lot.

  217. 217.

    Barbara

    @Geminid: Fetterman isn’t “trying this” as an experiment — it seems to me, as a person who grew up in his neck of the woods, that Fetterman has always considered these people to be “his” kind of people.  He happens to be politically liberal, but he knows where they are coming from and shares their vocab and so on.  ISTM that Tim Ryan is in this camp as well, though he is of course very different from Fetterman in many ways.  This was really Bill Clinton’s secret power as well.  It was not a power shared by Hillary.

  219. 219.

    Annie

    @SiubhanDuinne:

    IIRC Miss Hinchliffe and Miss Murgatroyd, in Agatha Christie’s A Murder Is Announced, ran a farm where they raised pigs.

     

    it sounds like a really interesting course.  Do you have a syllabus yet?  Would love to see it.

  220. 220.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @Cameron: FWIW Mandela Barnes has visited every county in WI as a part of his campaign.  He is doing a kickoff event with Tammy Baldwin on a farm tomorrow.

  221. 221.

    Dan B

    @Betty Cracker: My former rep and charismatic star in Seattle, Jayapal would be a great replacement for Maria Cantwell.  Her base is immigrants and every minority community and some unions.  I don’t know how she dies with big money.

  223. 223.

    trollhattan

    @jonas: If true, great, because it contradicts Vlad’s declaring Crimea Roosha for Rooshans. Operation like that probably don’t work without lots of inside intel and assistance. Maybe everybody not feeling Rooshan after eight long years’ occupation.

  224. 224.

    MisterForkbeard

    @Scout211: Lots of information in that article:

    1) Trump was literally hiding classified documents and refusing to hand them over
    2) The FBI was tipped off by an insider that Trump was deliberately hiding these records
    3) Trump signed a bill in 2018 that made this exact thing a felony
    4) A grand jury concluded this was a crime
    5) The Secret Service was notified ahead of time, but Trump was not because they believed he might destroy the evidence
    6) The FBI got 10-15 boxes of items from three rooms – not only was there a lot of material held back, but they apparently knew just what to look for

    So… he did it, unsurprisingly. And it doesn’t appear to be a mistake on his part, it was deliberate and he knew it was illegal. And has since lied about it.

  225. 225.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @Baud: I think it really is one of those necessary but not sufficient things.  Barnes is putting in the work.

  227. 227.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @Martin:

    Bernie’s success is from the good comms approach from the dirtbag left

    “Bernie’s success”? tying for first with the “I can see cornfields of bipartisanship from my heartland back porch” version of Buttigieg in a couple of low-turnout and rather painfully un-representative contests before getting steamrolled in electorates that actually look like the Democratic Party and broader electorate?

    also he’s been protected from having to face the consequences of his overly simplified (not to say dumbed down) over-promising by the magnitude of his electoral failure. It falls to centrists like Biden to win elections and and govern in prose and thus disappoint the (perhaps understandably…. perhaps) naive voters who believed in his irresponsible “THERE IS NO REASON WE CANNOT HAVE {X} IN THIS COUNTRY….” rhetoric, when in reality there are mill-yunns and mill-yunns of reasons, starting with the structure of our actual politics and government that doesn’t lend itself to “look out the window, Mitch”

  228. 228.

    NotMax

    @misterpuff

    Cletus the Slack-jawed Yokel

    Had a very pock-marked schnozz…
    ;)

    @Geminid

    imagine Sidney Powell would also like to be part of trump’s bad-dream team. But she may not have a law license this time next year.

    Pace Rand Paul, she’ll simply conjure up her own accreditation office.
    //

  229. 229.

    Geminid

    @Barbara: You got me to check back to see if I’d gotten the headline right, because I quoted it from memory. And it turns out the headine read, “John Fetterman is running a test….”

    I only skimmed the article, but Fetterman’s approach was similar to that of Ohio’s Tim Ryan as described in a long Washington Post article last fall..

  231. 231.

    zhena gogolia

    Has anybody watched Diana: The Musical on Netflix? It is so bad it’s hilariously great.

  232. 232.

    Citizen Alan

    @Betty Cracker:  Based on my occasional forays into Facebook, I genuinely think it’s because a lot of young people who are ignorant of economics, history, and basic human nature genuinely think that if Bernie Sanders became president he would somehow abolish capitalism.

  233. 233.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @MisterForkbeard: as Josh Marshall says, the current incarnation of Newsweek is a… questionable source, but if it’s true that Christie crony Wray launched this raid without telling his boss(es)… boy howdy

    Josh Marshall @joshtpm 38m

    2/ The piece also suggests that Garland didn’t know about the search in advance and that it was essentially an effort to recover classified documents, as opposed to evidence in an ongoing crime. Piece says Wray was the highest the decision went in the chain. (thread)

  234. 234.

    Citizen Alan

    @rikyrah:

    Let me once again state that I never ever had” michael Steele is the same one” on on my “know your Republican” bingo card.

  235. 235.

    hotshoe

    @Another Scott:

    Yep. Recollect black and brown and poor men who were given decade sentences merely because they were sitting in the car when their buddy decided to rob a 7-11 or something like that. As far as I recollect, no legal requirements to prove that guy was part of the planning or intended to take the risk of harming a clerk or anything except “he was there”.

    Robbery with a fountain pen should follow those standards. He was there, he signed the paperwork, should not be a requirement to prove that he intended to rob the taxpayers by fraudulent mortgage/tax valuations.

    The innocent who was misled by his corrupt accountants? Yeah, he can whine about it to his cellmate.

  242. 242.

    Josie

    I can only think of two reasons why anyone would hold onto certain classified documents when they handed over the others. Either they plan to make money off of them, or the documents are evidence of wrongdoing. Can anyone think of other reasons? Serious question.

  244. 244.

    Shana

    @SiubhanDuinne: There’s also P.G. Wodehouse’s Love Among the Chickens published in 1906 but not about women raising chickens. It’s Ukridge in his only appearance in a novel.

  246. 246.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @zhena gogolia: I’m gonna wait for confirmation that Garland didn’t know before giving in to theories inspired by, say, the recollection that Wray was recommended for the job by Chris Christie

  250. 250.

    Ken

    @Josie: Sentimental value, for example the letter from the predecessor. But that would only apply if the person was capable of sentiment.

  251. 251.

    Citizen Alan

    @Annie:

    I’ve always been fascinated by those 2 characters. Given her general conservativism, it seems unlikely that Agatha Christie would have a lesbian couple in one of her mysteries. But damned if those 2 women aren’t coated that way.

  252. 252.

    MisterForkbeard

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: Agree that newsweek isn’t the best source, though they seem to be doing a lot of “unnamed source in X tells us that”, etc. Better sourced than most of the nonsense we see.

    And yes – it was interesting that they say it was fully self-contained and just part of a normal, law-keeping operation and it didn’t go higher than Wray. That’s good and bad, though I would have expected it to get to Garland.

  260. 260.

    Matt McIrvin

    @NotMax: His “Private Snafu” training films for the Army (with Chuck Jones) were often pretty risqué, especially the ones about avoiding honeypots and sexually transmitted diseases.

  261. 261.

    stinger

    @Annie: Hinchliffe and Murgatroyd also raised chickens and ducks (Ch. 1), and when they arrived at Miss Blacklock’s for the party, Hinchliffe asked how her ducks were laying (Ch. 2). These are two female-led households, though Miss Blacklock is not actually engaged in farming.

    Aside from poultry, A Murder Is Announced (published in 1950) features the aforementioned lesbian couple, fully accepted by the gentry in the village of Chipping Cleghorn (*this close* to Leghorn!) and treated with sympathy by the author.

    Brilliant opening chapter, where the mail carrier delivers the morning papers to certain houses of interest, and we learn quite a bit about the individuals who will soon be murder victims and/or suspects simply by the newspapers they subscribe to.

  262. 262.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @stinger: PD James often has “coded lesbian” couples like this, it’s much more explicit in one book, I can’t remember which. Death in Holy Orders, maybe? definitely a later one

  263. 263.

    Feathers

    @Citizen Alan: They definitely are. There are other queer characters too. Mr. Pye in The Moving Finger. Agatha Christie was definitely Tory, but she is very sympathetic to the working class and servants. It reads as very condescending today, but when compared to contemporaries, she can be surprisingly egalitarian.

    If interested, highly recommend the Shedunnit podcast, devoted to Golden Age detective fiction. One of the early episodes is on Queer Coding and well  worth a listen. One of the things an academic she interviews brings up is that golden age fiction often has surprisingly positive depictions of homosexuals. Partly because it was easy to introduce them as characters, make everyone suspect them because gay, only for them turn out to be innocent and vindicated.

    One of the nice things about this podcast is that the host, Caroline Crampton, is English with a lovely voice. She also comes from a journalism background, so it’s researched and edited, running under 30 minutes.

  270. 270.

    kalakal

    @SiubhanDuinne: The last house I owned in England was built in 1922. There was complete documentation going back all the way. Included was a clause that owners were forbidden to keep chickens*

    * They were were also forbidden from boiling blood in the back garden

  271. 271.

    Ceci n est pas mon nym

    @Lapassionara: and as I recall, there were 2 emails that were retroactively deemed to be classified, but were not marked classified at the time she got them (or sent them).

    This is called a “data spill”. It’s a huge pain in the neck and involves an enormous amount of work by security people to clean up. But it is not a crime.

    I once almost turned on a guy in the lunch line at my organization who was mansplaining to his lunch companion why Hillary should go to jail. “She should know what the rules are”. Everything in me was wanting to round on the guy and say “SO SHOULD YOU, YOU MORON! YOU KNOW DAMNED WELL YOU WOULDN’T BE CHARGED WITH A CRIME IF THAT HAPPENED TO YOU!!!”

    But I didn’t.

  273. 273.

    kalakal

    @Scout211: Moral of story is you DO NOT fuck with archivists. They would rather eviscerate their own children than lose a single page of their precious collections.

  274. 274.

    kalakal

    @Geminid: Those videos were taken by people who knew what was going to happen and were within a few miles of the dumps. Switchblade 300 drones have a range of 6 miles, fly very low at between 60 & 100 mph, can be preprogrammed and carry a charge equal to a small grenade. They’re really hard to detect as they’re tiny & silent. Slamming a few of those into an ammunition dump would be interesting

  275. 275.

    Geminid

    @kalakal: My friend Joan has a house in the Charlottesville, Virginia neighborhood of Belmont. She told me that the zoning excludes use as a slaughterhouse. When I suggested she include that information in the promo for the airbnb unit she rents out,  for some reason Joan did not agree.

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