UPDATED #redacted version just released… pic.twitter.com/GR15mOxojl
— Rob NY (@RobHNY) August 26, 2022
If we never get to see TFG hauled off to a supermax cell, I will at least enjoy watching him and his criminal cronies scuttle around desperately making excuses and pointing fingers at each other…
for the record when i get in trouble it is also an assault on democracy, and, dare i say it, human civilization itself https://t.co/dzLzJSqmo3
— World Famous Art Thief (@CalmSporting) August 26, 2022
One of the things I best remember, from the Summer of Watergate, was how every time Nixon’s Repub enablers convinced each other that the worst had been faced down… something even nastier and less defensible would be uncovered. Today’s Repubs don’t even have that threadbare security blanket; they know there’s always worse, they know TFG will say it out loud, and they know his loyalist supporters will never shut up about it.
Two months till the midterms, fellas!
Not placing any markers. But it’s gone from highly improbable to very plausible, approaching as likely as not. https://t.co/WGLkXGwrMz
— MostlyRedactedHat (@Popehat) August 26, 2022
our big sweaty boy’s been scrapbooking pic.twitter.com/tCCw5mwfjO
— kilgore trout, death to putiner (@KT_So_It_Goes) August 26, 2022
They're going to preserve Trump's body under glass like Lenin and his followers will pay like $20 to take a selfie with his slowly decaying corpse. Within a few weeks someone will claim they were cured of an ailment by being in his presence.
— Jort-Michel Connard ?? (@torriangray) August 26, 2022
Despite his body being on public display, rumors will persist that he fled the country to begin preparations with Putin to free America from the woke liberal mob. They'll wait with bated breath for Russian tanks to roll in to liberate them.
— Jort-Michel Connard ?? (@torriangray) August 26, 2022
His corpse will be replaced with a Wish quality knock off of his hall of presidents robots, or possibly a robot from the rockafire explosion. No one will notice.
— Jort-Michel Connard ?? (@torriangray) August 26, 2022
Eric will begin appearing in public wearing his father's scalp like some kind of talisman, screaming to on lookers that now he holds the mantle. He will eventually be hospitalized with a serious skin infection.
— Jort-Michel Connard ?? (@torriangray) August 26, 2022
Remember the American military trying to winkle Noriega out of his compound in Panama by blasting hard rock in the small hours? TFG is old enough to remember this novelty hit…
LeftCoastYankee
That song is much creepier without Dr. Demento’s intro….
“Udderly Mad” (rather than “Utterly”) is in line with the lecherous creepy I now detect in the song (no longer being 10 years old).
Freemark
Imagine if Hilary had been found to have a single Top Secret memo from the State Department in her possession. Every media outlet would have been screaming to hav her tried.
Poe Larity
Damned those Librarians!
I always thought they were suspicious with all those books and their Dewey Decimal scheming.
opiejeanne
@Poe Larity: I think those particular librarians use the Library of Congress system.
eddie blake
@Freemark: iirc, she had three documents that were made classified AFTER the fact.
(linear time has always been a problem for the fascist gop, see: uranium one “scandal”)
sukabi
the disturbing part of those Jort-Michel Connard tweets is that it’s entirely possible all of that could happen….
Mai Naem mobile
I don’t want to ever hear from any member of the GOP boasting about the GOP being the party of a strong national defense, of patriotism and of law and order. It wasn’t just ftfg. It was all his damn effing GOP enablers. What a bunch of cowards.
Ms. Deranged in AZ
That last Twitter feed by Jort kinda reads like the plot of a Carl Hiaasen novel.
Edmund Dantes
Here’s the thing, if you aren’t going to indict trump for this, you might as well just give up the game. Pack it in as far as the idea of no one is above the law.
There are no plausible paths to innocent mistake. He didn’t really understand. You gave him a year of negotiation to make it right. Something no other person in this place would get. So either this stuff matters or it doesn’t and we should just admit they are just pretty words and fairy tales we use to delude ourselves.
You can’t get to this point of completely undermining the entire national security apparatus of the government and go “salright, learn your lesson for next time”. Cause we already used up that lesson with Nixon.
Trump has to be prosecuted. Even if their is a high probability of jury nullification if enough MAGA people get on the jury.
David 🌈☘The Establishment☘🌈 Koch
What makes an indictment likely is the obstruction.
He actively hid files from the FBI. He falsely declared he no longer retained files. He refused to respond to subpoenas.
Jager
@Ms. Deranged in AZ:
Like the one where Melania is having a red, hot affair with her Muslim Secret Service Agent?
David 🌈☘The Establishment☘🌈 Koch
I noticed that not a single one of them said he was innocent.
The ones who defended him said they didn’t like the precedent set by the search. But no one said he was innocent. Even Rand Paul who said the FBI planted materials by definition admitted he was holding classified documents.
satby
So discussion about this is all over twitter: “Last year, a top-secret memo sent to every C.I.A. station around the world, warned about troubling numbers of informants being captured or killed” Trump Inquiry Fueled in Part by Concern Over Human Intelligence Sources in Documents Trump Improperly Took. (Tweet includes a ink to NYT article, which of course is paywalled, sorry). Edit: oh, she has a gift link in a tweet below.
satby
Kinda have to wonder how much the ginned up fauxrage about student loan forgiveness expressed by the GQP was an attempt to divert attention from the revelations about the kinds of documents tfg had and the probability he’s already sold the intelligence.
satby
guess I’m the only one awake 😅
Tony Jay
This story will reach its natural apotheosis when Trump, indicted for numerous crimes, including espionage, drop dead of a brain embolism when the courtroom doors open and the prosecution wheels in the Mar-el-Largo fax machine to enter it’s Sent log into evidence.
Are they truly that stupid? They appear to be.
Geminid
Florida has its Governor candidates choose their running mate for Lieutenant Governor. CBS Miami reports that Charlie Crist has picked Karla Hernandez-Mats, a teacher and the current head of United Teachers for Dade, the largest Miami teachers union.
Hernandez-Mats also serves on the board of its parent union, the Florida Education Association. The FEA endorsed Crist early on, and helped persuade the state’s AFL-CIO to endorse Crist this summer.
Crist’s choice of Hernandez-Mats ensures that the issue of public education will be in the forefront of his campaign. Local Democrats responded with with enthusiasm:
Crist will introduce Ms. Hernandez-Mats today at his official campaign kickoff event. The rally will be held at Miami’s Hialeah Middle School, where she taught special needs children for 10 years.
Joey Maloney
I think it also ensures lots of foot soldiers from the Florida Education Association to help out his campaign.
OzarkHillbilly
@satby: Unfortunately, I am awake too. Since 10 last night.
mrmoshpotato
Go on.
🐾BillinGlendaleCA
@satby: Nope…the Trona Pinnacles.
Geminid
@Joey Maloney: Ron DeSantis said “hold my beer,” and then proceeded to smack a hornet’s nest with his tiki torch.
satby
@OzarkHillbilly: Good morning? Sorry about the insomnia. Woke up at 1:30, but got up at 4, so I feel ya.
@🐾BillinGlendaleCA: ohhh, spectacular! I’m going to need one of those!
And time for me to get ready for the farmers market. I hate dark mornings while it’s still summer 🙁
Frank Wilhoit
@Tony Jay: I envision that fax machine as a 1965 prototype taking up an entire 19″ rack.
Baud
@satby:
@OzarkHillbilly:
Woke. You guys are woke, not awake. Jeez.
Baud
@🐾BillinGlendaleCA:
Nice.
p.a.
Speaking of fax machines, Fox is going pretty big on the dangers of MaryJaneWanna, indicating I think
1) Summer programming doldrums
2) Institutional “demographics, not to be broadened” attitude
3) Keeping “rapist hordes at our southern border” holstered until closer to the election
4) Endemic laziness caused by knowing its audience will swallow anything they puke out.
Tony Jay
@mrmoshpotato:
@Frank Wilhoit:
Amidst the sudden chaos, as the judge rat-a-tats their hammer and the stricken former President leaks a pool of weak piss onto the courtroom floor, son turns to son-in-law and hisses –
“We unplugged that, right? Right?”
A single plucked eyebrow arched slowly across a sheen of Botox.
“Of course. We’re not all as stupid as you, Eric.”
WereBear
@Ms. Deranged in AZ: Makes his novels about the ecology loving ex-governor almost not deranged :)
prostratedragon
Guardian has long excerpt from unfinished memoir by Michael K. Williams.
Kristine
@🐾BillinGlendaleCA: stunning photo.
JWR
Far be it from me to go out of my way to praise the intel agencies, but damn it, I paid good money for them to collect all this cloak and dagger stuff, and Fat Boy here treats it like used toilet paper. Literally.
JPL
Good morning!
Dorothy A. Winsor
@🐾BillinGlendaleCA: Those are amazing pics. You let me see things I’d never have seen on my own.
Geminid
Politico reports that McConnell’s Senate Leadership Fund is pulling half of its advertising reservations for the Arizona Senate race. Polling shows Senator Mark Kelly holding a consistent lead over Republican opponent Blake Masters. The cutback leaves $8 million to spend boosting Masters in October. Kelly’s campaign and its allied PACs have $40 million on hand.
The Senate Leadership Fund also pulled a smaller amount of money from the Alaska Senate race. The top two finishers in that state’s open primary were Lisa Murkowski and Kelly Tshibaka, both Republicans. Tshibaka has trump’s endorsement, but Murkowski is favored to win the four candidate, ranked choice runoff election in November.
RedDirtGirl
@Ms. Deranged in AZ: His early novels are my go-to yearly re-reads!
Baud
@Geminid:
Happy about Kelly.
WereBear
@JWR: That tweet made me laugh out loud. But I’ve been an easy mark, lately.
Baud
@JPL:
Good morning.
HinTN
@🐾BillinGlendaleCA: It’s perverse but I really like the shot of the Milky Way with the road. And the stars in Long Lake, O.M.F.G!
Math Guy
I think he’ll be indicted and then work out a plea deal whereby he doesn’t serve a day in prison, the RNC pays his fines, and he is barred from ever holding public office again. Then he will raise funds from the rubes for his campaign to reverse the charges and be reinstated as the real president. Sigh.
David 🌈☘The Establishment☘🌈 Koch
@Frank Wilhoit:
Those things were huge (photo) They weighted 46 lbs. I’ve never seen one in person. But they use one in the movie “Bullitt” to transmit criminal records. It blows your mind.
lowtechcyclist
@satby:
Usually I’d have been up, but by some miracle I slept until 6:20am today. I feel lucky when I sleep past 5.
They just gotta lock the fat orange bastard up. As others have said, if we don’t do so for violations this egregious, we can throw out the entire notion that no one is above the law.
I’m happy to give AG Garland the time to make his case airtight, but I feel like we’re nearing the point where a second-year law student could manage that.
Low Key Swagger
@lowtechcyclist: I rarely sleep more than 6 hours, sadly. I feel ya. One disturbing take I heard this morning on MSNBC is that the nature of these documents might make it impossible for the DOJ to prosecute. I mean, they’ve managed to indict, try, and convict others in the past…do juries have to have access to the documents in question to reach a verdict?
Geminid
@Math Guy: My Atlanta friend also predicts a plea deal under which trump would be barred from future public office. I don’t like the idea. It would allow trump’s adherents to say this was the government’s motivation all along. But my friend still fears trump as a candidate, and I do not.
Gvg
@Edmund Dantes: It’s not true that no other person would get this kind of exemption from the law. They also protected Nixon from most of it, Reagan, Both Bush’s, Scooter Libby, and quite a few other republicans. It’s become so normal that we don’t always even recognize it. They don’t go to jail. Sometimes they don’t win an election that they thought they were entitled to but it’s not always clear that that is why and they can still win later. They and their voters think that is right and they keep trying to win us over by offering to reinstate or pardon our sides crooks as if that would make us happy. They don’t even notice that we stop voting for our crooks.
A part of the problem is that a significant portion of the Republican voters are crooks and they think that is normal, that everyone else is too. I think that may be part of the problem with all of them actually. They grew up around bad people. The bad people said they were good people. Everyone around them said up is down….
Changing things means more white collar crime prosecutions, which means carefully more judges and prosecutors and court officials. We should also carefully cut back on the poor and minority persecution. Cop harassment for nothing is a waste of resources but it’s amazing how outraged the barely middle class can get about thee homeless and the mess of some litter and begging. You have to keep it under control or you will lose all the next elections and have HOA natzis in charge of everything. People pay attention to the little trivia next door and not the big fancy crimes by important people and that is part of why we are where we are I think.
WereBear
@David 🌈☘The Establishment☘🌈 Koch: I worked in places that still had them, but they were antique then.
Geminid
@Geminid: Charlie Crist’s running mate is a second generation union member. Karla Hernandez-Mat’s father was an accountant in Honduras, but after emigrating to Florida he worked as a farm hand, cutting sugar cane and picking tomatos. Then he was offered an opportunity for training and collective bargaining by the carpenters union, and he joined. From Floridapolitics.com.
lowtechcyclist
@Geminid:
I would hate any sort of plea deal that exempted Trump from any meaningful consequences. We’re at a point where, as a society, we desperately need to reestablish the principle that nobody is above the law. Too often, the rich and powerful skate. (I’m still pissed about robosigning from the Great Recession.)
If he skates, even with a plea deal admitting guilt and barring him from future public office, that’s too close to nothing in the eyes of most people. Even a huge fine wouldn’t change that, given all the times over the past six or seven years that his finances have magically gone from disastrous to sitting pretty.
Anything where guilt is practically a given at this point, given the evidence (including obstruction from Mueller’s investigation AFAIAC), he needs to be indicted and tried, and if convicted, he needs to receive the same sorts of sentences that similar but non-influential offenders would receive.
JWR
@🐾BillinGlendaleCA: What everybody else said! Damn, dude, the Milky Way really looks as if it’s just hanging there in the sky, almost 3-D, even! My favorite? The one looking down the road. Very nice.
Geminid
@Geminid: floridapolitics.com also has a report on the first poll taken since Charlie Crist’s primary victory. It showed DeSantis leading Crist 51%-47%, within the poll’s 3.5% margin of error. The poll found weakness in DeSantis’ support among independents, who broke for Crist 52%-39%.
The article noted that when respondents “were educated about DeSantis’ position on property insurance, abortion…and his treatment of broadly popular entities like Disney and the Special Olympics, enough voters moved to turn the Governor’s race into a tossup.”
O. Felix Culpa
@satby: I wasn’t awake when you posted the link, but I am now. From the NYT gift article:
topclimber
@lowtechcyclist: I could live with a plea bargain where he admits guilt. Sentence him to probation subject to his cooperation in ratting out his underlings. The latter would would go a long way toward making the dwindling number of MAGA faithful understand how far from a god this joker is. It might make them less likely to bite when the next wannabe Trump offers a properly baited line.
Then I think…did this jerk endanger folks on our side by his mercenary or malicious or just damn cavalier use of classified information? If so, he has to do time.
Just make it solitary confinement, out of concern for the mental health of any poor cellmate. Can you imagine having to put up with the endless whining and self-adulation?
Ben Cisco
@Math Guy: FFS
Amir Khalid
Just for some perspective.
Until very recently, many Malaysians were unconvinced that Najib Razak would ever see the inside of a jail cell. We feared that his still-considerable influence would keep him a free man, maybe even get him a royal pardon and let him resume his political career. Well, the facts of the SRC International case were unanswerable: some US$10 million in company funds were indeed re-routed to his personal bank account, and he did spend the money. So, after exhausting his appeals, into the hoosegow he went.
But the law isn’t done with him. Two days after he was jailed, another of his trials resumed: faces several counts of embezzling a total of US$400 million from 1MDB itself, laundering the money, and abusing his power to do so. He’s looking at more jail time and billions in fines. And as the convictions pile up, his chances of a royal pardon will only diminish.
I believe TFG is headed for a similar future.
sab
@Low Key Swagger: Frank Figliuzzi was saying MSNBC last night that the likely prosecution would be for obstruction. Prosecuting espionage would require revealing too much about the underlying documents, so the security people would say prosectuion would be to dangerous.
Geminid
@Geminid: Correction: the Impact Reseach poll reported by Florida Politics had DeSantis leading Crist 51-46%, not 51-47%.
Ken
Huh. Anecdotally,
But by all means continue.
Geminid
@Amir Khalid: I think you are correct as to trump’s future. The process will be frustating to many though. Between pretrial and post trial appeals, trump could go three years between indictment and imposition of sentence.
My Atlanta friend thinks that trump will accept a plea bargain early in the process. But Warren conditioned this prospect on trump being compos mentis, of sound mind. I questioned this. I think trump’s narcissistic disorder is only deepening, perhaps compounded by early stage dementia. He has no one in his inner circle willing to tell him the truth. He cannot attract defense lawyers of stature, and at this point I’m not sure he really wants to.
Also, trump’s public cheerleaders are egging him on, and he sees the money he raised after the FBI search as validation. trump seems likely to keep digging his hole deeper.
Scout211
Reposted from upstairs. This thread is more appropriate for this:
CNN posted the 12-page filing the F-POTUS team submitted to the judge requesting the special master.
They also have an analysis.
Ruckus
@Freemark:
Every media outlet would have been screaming to hav her
triedhung.FIXITFY
lowtechcyclist
@Gvg:
And this is hardly new. Back during/after Watergate, I can’t tell you how often I heard that ‘they all do it, Nixon was just the one that got caught.’
Steeplejack
@Geminid:
Is allocution a requirement in a guilty plea? I cannot imagine TFG* standing up in court and verbally admitting anything at all. But a plea deal might work if it bars him from holding office ever again. And I would love to see house arrest, if not jail time—restricted to Mar-a-Lago for a good stretch of time, preferably including a sweltering summer or two. A guy can dream.
* Not gonna call him FPOTUS. With “POTUS” in there it still gives him too much respect, as in any at all.
lowtechcyclist
@Ruckus:
I presume they wouldn’t be demanding gender reassignment surgery for her.
Geminid
@Steeplejack: Any house arrest at Mar-a-Loco would run up against the rezoning of that estate to a private club, which stipulated that guests could not stay more than three consecutive weeks. If Palm Beach officials faced the prospect of trump becoming a long term prisoner there, I expect they would sue to stop it.
Fort Jefferson, on one of the Dry Tortugas, might be a better place. That’s where the infamous Doctor Mudd was imprisoned for setting John Wilkes Booth’s broken leg. Mudd was freed after four years, as a reward for helping suppress a deadly epidemic.
Fort Jefferson is now part of the National Parks system, and draws over a hundred thousand visitors a year. But it is the largest brick masonry structure in North America, and just one corner would provide spacious accomodations for trump, guards and medical staff, as well as a Secret Service detail. As extra punishment, Steve Bannon and Roger Stone could be jailed with him.
PaulB
Not quite. There were quite a few messages that contained classified information, both at the time and information that was retroactively classified, more than just three. There were, however, only three that were actually marked as classified at the time she received the email, according to Comey at his infamous press conference.
Two of those were emails about potential upcoming phone calls with foreign dignitaries. It’s routine to classify such information (the schedule of the call, talking points, etc.) until the phone call is either made or the SoS decides to not make the call, at which point the material is no longer considered classified. Comey never revealed the details about the third email, as far as I can tell.
Even though those three messages did contain a C marking somewhere in the body of the text, none of them were properly marked as classified. “Three emails, out of 30,000, were found to be marked as classified, although they lacked classified headers and were only marked with a small ‘c’ in parentheses, described as ‘portion markings’ by Comey,” according to Wikipedia.
Chief Oshkosh
@Steeplejack:
With no internet or phone connectivity. Period. He should be allowed to watch Fox. This will allow him to see how the world has passed him by, and how inconsequential he is or ever was.
A nice side benefit of this outcome would be that all those people in the Bedminster area will get a lot of relief if Trump never visits again. The rich shits around MAL pretty much deserve Trump as a neighbor (and in any event, have enough money to avoid the worst of their neighbor). The NJ and PA towns around Bedminster don’t.
Obvious Russian Troll
@🐾BillinGlendaleCA: Now *that* is a beautiful shot.
Steeplejack
@Geminid:
I thought Trump already blew through that years ago, because Mar-a-Lago supposedly couldn’t be used as his personal residence, which of course he proceeded to do.
Geminid
@Steeplejack: He did. I think the rezoning agreement is still in place, though and city officials could put their foot down if trump’s presence would be indefinite.
But we’re talking about an eventuality that I think is some years away. By then, trump may have to be put in the high security federal prison/hospital in Missouri, where they sent the guy who shot Gabby Giffords and others.
TurnItOffAndOnAgain
@Geminid:
This could actually be good for us. I can imagine some non-tuned in mushy middle voter thinking a year or so from now “Maybe it’s okay for me to vote for Republicans again.” just in time for some more news about TFG’s crimes or trial to come out because all that is still ongoing at that point. Could be the gift that keeps on giving.
Steeplejack
@Geminid:
Okay. But I definitely want him to suffer some physical . . . something—inconvenience, if nothing else. Not just a legal slap on the wrist, however “serious” it is. I think what I want is some tangible public humiliation that he can’t ignore or explain away—or grift on!
Ruckus
@Tony Jay:
“Are they truly that stupid? They appear to be.”
It is far more than just appearance.
They run on the concept that if they all stick together and lie at the same rate/degree, they will not be prosecuted. They didn’t know any better. Doesn’t work with 5 yr olds but then these clowns have the mental range of a 4 yr old so anything is possible…..
leeleeFL
@Freemark: Feck tried, shot on sight! I do remember warning ppl of exactly this outcome on Day 2 of the beginning of tRumps campaign. They said Hillary was a traitor! Feck ’em! I hope they all have permanent intestinal problems
Geminid
@Steeplejack: I want to see multiple convictions, fines and prison sentences. I don’t care so much if trump serves out a sentence under some kind of house arrest, but it will have to be a place more secure than Mar-a-Loco because he will be a crazy-magnet.
Also, even if the feds can’t prove criminally culpability for the Insurrection, I’m hoping plaintiffs in civil suits can get large judgements against trump for the physical and emotional damage they and their loved ones suffered during that assault. I think the lawsuits filed are patterned after the successful civil suit filed against the organizers of the deadly Charlottesville rally of 2017.
But my vindictive side wants to see trump locked up with that loony Laura Loomer. That would truly be hell on earth!
Ruckus
@Geminid:
I tend to agree with this take.
SFB’s major driving force for all of his life has been having the most money for the least effort. By that I mean he didn’t seem to care how his money was made, as long as it didn’t cost him anything. Which meant screwing everyone else worse than he was screwing himself. And he was reasonably effective at that, until the spotlight was on him 24 hrs a day. Which of course his sparkling personality likes even more than free money. And he can’t seem to manage more than one catastrophe at a time, all the while he’s trying to juggle about 12 of them. IOW I think his time has come. He put himself in the brightest spot light possible and it has never gotten turned off, which makes it obvious that he’s juggling way, way over his head. And aging, really hasn’t gone well for him. The support among his fellow racist haters will subside as his magic power of hate and bullshit becomes far more obviously failing because he can no longer help them get their hate on.
stinger
@🐾BillinGlendaleCA: What a SPECTACULAR combination of Earth and… not-Earth!
Soprano2
@Gvg: People care about the stuff that affects them directly, that they see every day or every week. That’s why “doing something” about the visible homeless population is such a big thing with voters (sadly, the “thing” they want is for the homeless to just go away, and they don’t care how that happens). It’s why they don’t care about white collar crime unless it’s huge and obvious but care a lot about petty break-ins. However, at this point what TFG has done is huge, obvious, and easy to understand and talk about, so people will care.
Soprano2
@lowtechcyclist: My parents said this all the time!
Soprano2
@Geminid: Oh man, don’t send him to Fed Med, they already cause us enough trouble with what gets flushed down the toilets (how do you get a whole bedsheet down a toilet anyway?).
Enhanced Voting Techniques
That’s why I am sure Trump was using those nuclear secrets as his GM manual in his LARP and letting just about anyone who would join his role play group at Maro-Largo read them. I mean the guy was cosplay billionaire after all.
The Lodger
@David 🌈☘The Establishment☘🌈 Koch: That beast gives off a genuine Raoul Duke Mojo Wire vibe.
arielibra
@Geminid: Able was I…
Imagine an opera, set just in that dining room!
Chris Johnson
@satby: Ya mean like, if Trump was always a Russian asset and has been working this whole time to betray the USA to the Russians?
Fancy that.
bcw
This talk of a supermax prison for Trump is misplaced; history shows he could be detained indefinitely on a small platform surrounded by ramps.
BigJimSlade
@LeftCoastYankee: Dr. Demento is where I know it from, too. And, yeah, without the good doctor involved it’s definitely more stark.