Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Too often we hand the biggest microphones to the cynics and the critics who delight in declaring failure.

Republicans do not pay their debts.

Thanks for reminding me that Van Jones needs to be slapped.

People are complicated. Love is not.

Why is it so hard for them to condemn hate?

Yeah, with this crowd one never knows.

Shallow, uninformed, and lacking identity

Speaking of republicans, is there a way for a political party to declare intellectual bankruptcy?

Damn right I heard that as a threat.

… riddled with inexplicable and elementary errors of law and fact

Whatever happens next week, the fight doesn’t end.

Republicans don’t trust women.

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

Some judge needs to shut this circus down soon.

Republican obstruction dressed up as bipartisanship. Again.

They are lying in pursuit of an agenda.

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

Pessimism assures that nothing of any importance will change.

Come on, media. you have one job. start doing it.

Do not shrug your shoulders and accept the normalization of untruths.

It’s easy to sit in safety and prescribe what other people should be doing.

I’m sure you banged some questionable people yourself.

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

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

You are here: Home / Open Threads / More Bad News for Trump and His Minions!

More Bad News for Trump and His Minions!

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This post is in: 

I very much hope that the former guy was counting the days until Judge Beryl Howell was no longer Chief Justice, assuming that she would be less of a threat to him.

The following people will now be required to testify –

 U N D E R   O A T H

– Mark Meadows – Former Trump Chief-of-staff

– John Ratcliffe – Trump’s former Director of National Intelligence

– Robert O’Brien – Trump’s former national security adviser

– Stephen Miller – Former Trump top aide.

– Dan Scavino – Former Trump deputy chief of staff and social media director

– Nick Luna – Former Trump aide – John McEntee – Former Trump aide

– Ken Cuccinelli – Former top DHS official.

Bye-bye executive privilege!

My two favorite names on that list are Mark Meadows and Stephen Miller.

Your favorites?  (besides all of them!)

Trump is Expected to Appeal

Attorneys:  what court would hear this appeal?

I read this morning that  Trump is likely NOT going to appeal the ruling that required Corcoran to testify.  Why?  The speculation was that if Trump appealed, it would go to the Supreme Court, and then the Supreme court would get to see all those Corcoran documents NOW, and it would not be good for them to see direct evidence like that at this point in time – because he is relying on them to be his ace in the hole at the end.

No idea whether that speculation is true or not, but it does make sense to me, at least.

Meadows, other top Trump aides ordered to testify in Jan. 6 probe as judge rejects claims of executive privilege  (ABC News)

A federal judge has rejected former President Donald Trump’s claims of executive privilege and has ordered Mark Meadows and other former top aides to testify before a federal grand jury investigating Trump’s efforts to overturn the election leading up to the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol, multiple sources familiar with the matter tell ABC News.

Meadows, Trump’s former chief of staff, was subpoenaed along with the other former aides by Special counsel Jack Smith for testimony and documents related to the probe.

Trump’s legal team had challenged the subpoenas by asserting executive privilege, which is the right of a president to keep confidential the communications he has with advisers.

MORE: Trump fighting to bar use of White House lawyers’ grand jury testimony in special counsel probe: Sources
In a sealed order last week, Judge Beryl Howell rejected Trump’s claim of executive privilege for Meadows and a number of others, including Trump’s former Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe, his former national security adviser Robert O’Brien, former top aide Stephen Miller, and former deputy chief of staff and social media director Dan Scavino, according to sources familiar with the matter.

Former Trump aides Nick Luna and John McEntee, along with former top DHS official Ken Cuccinelli, were also included in the order, the sources said.

Trump is likely to appeal the ruling, according to sources briefed on the matter.

Open thread.

Reader Interactions

187Comments

  1. 1.

    JoyceH

    This is Big, IMO. This looks like the final link in the chain, connecting the White House to the rioters. I’ve always been convinced that WH staff were communicating directly with the rioters, but have never been sure that any of the investigators could prove it. Getting testimony from the ‘Willard War Room’ should provide that.

  2. 2.

    scav

    I can’t imagine even writing the sentence stub “Trump is appealing . . . “ without getting the dry heaves.

    My personal bet is he’s consulting his PR-fundraising staff and Drama coach long before having any of his lawyers bring him coffee.  After, of course, his extensive consultation with his ego and flinging a little ketchup.  “What good is mere paper and paper about minions, disposable firebreaks.  I’m ready for my Lock-up Now!”

  4. 4.

    Frankensteinbeck

    he is relying on them to be his ace in the hole at the end.

    Trump seems incapable of understanding that people might stop loving him.  I read his faux-tweets and the rumor he wants to be in cuffs as him believing he can stir up a Jan 6th style riot when he’s arrested to prove to the legal system that he’s untouchable.

    Except who turned up on Tuesday to block his supposed arrest?  Anybody?  Where were the protests?  Nobody is willing to riot for him anymore, and he just can’t grasp it.

    Same with the Supreme Court, but more so.  They’ve been shrugging at almost everything he brings to them.  He has not gotten the consigliere service he wanted. They have their lifetime appointments, and now he’s just somebody that they used to know.

  5. 5.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    I gotta say, I’ve been tantalized by Meadow’s role in all this. I think he’s one of the dumber and weaker members of the inner circle, while at the same time being one of the truest believers.

    I’m not predicting it but won’t be surprised if we eventually learn he, and his very high-powered lawyer George S Terwilliger (the Third!) have been quietly and very strategically and deniably cooperating

  6. 6.

    Old School

    I’ve seen that speculation, but it doesn’t make sense to me.  Trump would expect the Supreme Court to be his ace in the hole both now and later.  He wouldn’t expect it to be an either/or situation.

  8. 8.

    JoyceH

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: ​
     

    I’ve been tantalized by Meadow’s role in all this.

    I find him baffling. He’s one of the few Trump supporters who’ve managed to stay silent (and largely invisible) since leaving office. Has he done a single interview? And Hutchinson’s description of him on 1/6, he sounded like a man in catatonic shock.

  12. 12.

    Frankensteinbeck

    @JoyceH:

    I’ve always been convinced that WH staff were communicating directly with the rioters

    I always figured that everybody, everybody involved was just running their mouth and having violent fantasies, until the crowd got to the Capitol and the usual level of defense wasn’t there.  Then the mob got into ‘we can do whatever we want with no repercussions’ mode, and the fantasy became reality.

    But maybe I’m wrong!  Maybe someone seriously believed they were planning a coup.  The giant unanswered question remains why was there only a fraction of the police coverage of the Capitol that there should have been?

  15. 15.

    Sister Machine Gun of Quiet Harmony

    @Cameron: The rioting ardor cooled after a LOT of people went to jail, there were no pardons, and Trump never regained office… so it was all for nothing. They looked like chumps instead of heros.

  18. 18.

    Old School

    @WaterGirl: I believe that is what they are suggesting as well, but I can’t see Trump believing that.  He would think his Supreme Court should side with him regardless of the evidence.

  20. 20.

    Baud

    If the order came down last week, Trump should have already appealed and sought a stay.  I wonder when the testimony is scheduled for.

  21. 21.

    Brachiator

    @Frankensteinbeck:

    Trump seems incapable of understanding that people might stop loving him.

    Very true.

    I read his faux-tweets and the rumor he wants to be in cuffs as him believing he can stir up a Jan 6th style riot when he’s arrested to prove to the legal system that he’s untouchable.

    He is looking for his “I am Jesus” moment. He might have some perverse value to the GOP as a martyred former president.

    But the masses are not going to risk jail for him.

  22. 22.

    JoyceH

    @Frankensteinbeck: ​
     

    I’ve always been convinced that WH staff were communicating directly with the rioters

    I always figured that everybody, everybody involved was just running their mouth and having violent fantasies, until the crowd got to the Capitol and the usual level of defense wasn’t there. Then the mob got into ‘we can do whatever we want with no repercussions’ mode, and the fantasy became reality.

    I think the people most involved DID expect to occupy the Capitol. They came prepared. They brought zip ties to take prisoners. They. Built. A. Gallows. On January 5th, Bannon was smirking on his Podcast that tomorrow would be ‘totally different’ than what people expect. He knew in advance it was going to be more than a protest. The rioters in the Capitol LIVE-STREAMED their activities – they thought they were the vanguard of what was going to be a successful rebellion. What eventually brought about the end of the insurrection was – the foot soldiers at the Capitol thought the police and military were going to be on their side. When that turned out to be incorrect, the thing collapsed. But they went into it expecting the whole thing would end in Trump’s triumphant reinstatement.

  23. 23.

    Mr. Bemused Senior

    @Frankensteinbeck:

    I always figured that everybody, everybody involved was just running their mouth and having violent fantasies, until the crowd got to the Capitol and the usual level of defense wasn’t there. Then the mob got into ‘we can do whatever we want with no repercussions’ mode, and the fantasy became reality.

    But maybe I’m wrong! Maybe someone seriously believed they were planning a coup.

    If you mean a military coup, where the generals join in, I think probably they knew that wasn’t happening, but Trump and his minions were dead serious about keeping him in power. Certainly it had its clownish aspects (Rudy, Sydney Powell, Lin Wood, et al.) but think about John Eastman, the fake electors, on and on. They meant it and they still do.

  24. 24.

    Anonymous At Work

    First, who actually knows something about which they want to lie?  Meadows, definitely.  Miller, not sure.  He might be proud of “We accepted Electoral results that we liked and didn’t accept ones that went against us because [insert dog-whistle for racist, bigoted, anti-Semitic, etc. reasons here.”

    Second, the question is who is STUPID about their lies?  Meadows, again.  None of them have a strong reputation for brain power but lies trip up liars.  Inventing details and then sticking to them over hte course of hours of questioning?

    Finally, SCOTUS doesn’t want to deal with this.  Either the Justices openly proclaim their political loyalty over oath of office OR they reveal that Federalist judges are RINOs and should never be appointed to the bench by any true Republican ever again.

    So, my picks are Meadows, Cuccinelli and Ratcliffe.  They have the reasons to lie, the resumes of political hacks lacking the brains to escape their lies, and insufficient imagination to anticipate Jack Smith’s questions & prior evidence.  Meadows especially needs to remember: WDCHS (What did Cassidy Hutchinson Say?)

  26. 26.

    Geminid

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: Meadows’ posture in this inquiry is an unknown quantity. He could have a lot of legal exposure, enough to get him a very long sentence. Meadows is no Roger Stone, and I think he’ll  take a deal.

    My theory of Meadows is that he thought he could manage Trump, and Trump gave Meadows that hope to suck him in. Trump’s good at that.

    Meadows also hoped that after a successful reelection campaign, he would have the inside track to succeed Senator Richard Burr. Instead he ended up trading a safe House seat for more trouble than he could ever have imagined

  27. 27.

    Sister Golden Bear

    Temporary win for trans people, the Democratic governor of Kentucky vetoed one of the most horrible anti-trans/don’t say gay bills, which would ban trans kids access to gender-affirming health care and restrict the bathrooms they can use. The bill also bans discussion of sexual orientation and gender identity in schools and allows teachers to refuse to refer to transgender students by the pronouns they use.

    Unfortunately the bill passed the legislature with a veto-proof majority, so the veto will probably be overridden next week. But kudos to the governor doing what he could.

  28. 28.

    Roger Moore

    @Frankensteinbeck:

    Trump confuses people doing what he wants with them loving him.  He thinks that everyone who worked with him when he was president did so because they had joined his personality cult.  Now he’s discovering some of those people were just using him and are happy to discard him once they got what they wanted.

    The Supreme Court should be at the top of the list in that category.  On the one hand, he wasn’t the one who chose the people he put on the Supreme Court; he just rubber stamped the decisions of the Federalist Society.  On the other hand, now that they’re on the Supreme Court they really have nothing more to get from him.  They can do whatever they feel like, and there’s really nothing more he can do.  I think some of them will still do stuff he likes, but it will be because they want to advance fascism, not because they love him personally.

  29. 29.

    Sister Golden Bear

    @JoyceH: Absolutely agree.

    they thought they were the vanguard of what was going to be a successful rebellion.

    Some of them even showed with t-shirts pre-commemorating the attack. They thought they’d be heroes under the Trump dictatorship.

  30. 30.

    JoyceH

    I do hope that Smith separates his two investigations and goes ahead and charges the documents case, because J6 is complicated! I expect that one to involve scores of indictments. 

  31. 31.

    Shalimar

    @Baud: I had some sympathy with the “Garland isn’t doing anything” crowd before the Smith appointment.  Whatever was happening was very opaque.  But it’s kinda embarrassing not to notice that the car went from 0 to 100 in an eyeblink and hasn’t slowed down since.

  33. 33.

    ...now I try to be amused

    @Frankensteinbeck:

    he is relying on them to be his ace in the hole at the end.

    I suspect the Supreme Court is more likely to be the institutional GOP’s (or what’s left of it) ace in the hole to finally eliminate Trump without getting their fingerprints on the knife.

    [Crossposted with Roger Moore.]

  34. 34.

    brendancalling

    This is where I would ordinarily say I hope TFG has a stroke, but in this case I would prefer him alive so he can face charges and spend the rest of his stupid, miserable life in jail until he dies.

  35. 35.

    kalakal

    @JoyceH:

    The rioters in the Capitol LIVE-STREAMED their activities – they thought they were the vanguard of what was going to be a successful rebellion.

    So many of them are so locked into their bubble they genuinely believe they are the vast, popular majority. They were going to be welcomed as popular liberators, like the Allies rolling into Paris in 1944. And they expected as much. The thought they’d encounter not just resistance but actual consequences was never there.

    Now most of them know there are consequences and have gone back to being keyboard heroes.

  36. 36.

    bbleh

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: concur on both points.

    @Cameron: @Sister Machine Gun of Quiet Harmony: the mob is fickle, and this mob was used and discarded like Kleenex. Trump has always assumed loyalty goes only one way, and — as in many things — he’s generally got away with it.  Until now, anyway.

    @Baud: maybe they got a little spooked by the last time they did an emergency appeal for a stay of one of Howell’s orders and got slapped with a half-day deadline to submit briefs. One hopes for a repeat.

    @JoyceH: @WaterGirl: me too.  And even if their hopes were significantly misplaced, and they were just useful idiots, I think they really did believe.  I also don’t think they are, by and large, the sharpest tools in the shed.

  37. 37.

    WaterGirl

    @Sister Golden Bear: I think most of us feel like we are being battered in a hail storm of terrible Republicans on a regular basis, but I can only imagine what it’s like if you are a transgender person.

    I can only imagine that these days it feels like one Cat 5 storm after another.

  38. 38.

    Mike in NC

    Fat Bastard should have zero privileges, executive or otherwise. We need a nice long perp walk with him and his henchmen.

  39. 39.

    Baud

    @Shalimar: Yeah, I made a similar point in the morning thread. What’s the point of continuing to talk about DOJ being slow when you can see that they are moving?  Even if you were right that they started off slow, there’s no going back in time.  Update your talking points already.

  40. 40.

    WaterGirl

    @Roger Moore: I agree.  Trump feels like they owe him because he “gave them their jobs”.  They got what they came for and have no further use for him.

    I am not at all sure that he understands this yet.

  43. 43.

    Sure Lurkalot

    @Sister Machine Gun of Quiet Harmony:

    They looked like chumps instead of heros.

    True, true. That they believed the raging orange narcissist was going to cover them is a clear sign of not paying attention to the guy’s life long M.O. He only protects those who have the goods on him, with receipts.

    And now several of the chumps are felons and that status comes with restrictions and hardships that will plague them for years.

  44. 44.

    cliosfanboy

    I hope Ken Kookinelli trips all over his own feet. A friend of mine knows him. My friend said when you meet him he seems nice, but you quickly realize he’s totally nuts.

  46. 46.

    Roger Moore

    @Frankensteinbeck:

    I always figured that everybody, everybody involved was just running their mouth and having violent fantasies, until the crowd got to the Capitol and the usual level of defense wasn’t there. Then the mob got into ‘we can do whatever we want with no repercussions’ mode, and the fantasy became reality.

    My gut feeling is that there were at least two groups.  One group were Trump fans who showed up thinking it was going to be another typical Trump rally and then got swept up in the violence when the riot started.  Another group were the hard-core who were in touch with people in Trump’s inner circle.  They were planning for a coup, knowing Trump was using his power to make sure the capitol was inadequately defended.  There was probably also a third group of people who came expecting a violent clash with Antifa and were plenty happy to turn their sights on the Capitol Police instead.

  48. 48.

    sdhays

    My read on SCOTUS: We have at least a majority for “soft-fascism” – making sure Republicans are treated much better by the law than Democrats and making up rules and laws to further that. But there doesn’t seem to be a MAGA majority on the Court.

    They’re happy to put their thumbs on the scales for Republicans and conservative causes, but Trump himself is beneath them. He’s just not worth generating the criticism over, especially when doesn’t make it easy to help him by executing all of these increasingly serious crimes.

  49. 49.

    WaterGirl

    @sdhays: I don’t think that the Supreme Court or the elected Republicans understand that while they appear to be getting everything they want in the short run… there will be long-term consequences of the unexpected variety, and history will not look upon them favorably.

    I think they have driven the car off the cliff but don’t yet understand that the car they are riding in is in free fall.

  50. 50.

    Roger Moore

    @Geminid:

    My theory of Meadows is that he thought he could manage Trump, and Trump gave Meadows that hope to suck him in.

    I also suspect Meadows thought he could use the investigations for his own purposes.  If you remember, he was the one who provided a bunch of messages to the January 6th committee, then stopped cooperating when they demanded he turn over everything.  I continue to believe he did that because he thought he could settle scores by selectively providing the committee with messages incriminating the people he wanted incriminated.  So yeah, he’s not very smart.

  52. 52.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Frankensteinbeck: I believe that Trump’s inner circle genuinely believed they were going to overturn the election result and keep Trump in office. The ultimate goal was to get Congress to certify slates of fake Trump electors under John Eastman’s theory of state-legislative sovereignty. The proximate goal was to prevent certification of the election from happening on Jan. 6, 2021 by creating and declaring a state of emergency.

    Several big things went wrong. The first one was that left-liberal counter-protesters refused to take the bait, and stayed away from Washington on Jan. 6–they were supposed to start fighting with the insurrectionists so that Trump could call in the National Guard to quell the chaos and declare that regular business at  the Capitol had become impossible.

    Another was that when the insurrectionists stormed the Capitol, Trump’s narcissism took over and he said “no, let them play–they’re my guys, they’re on my side.” That increased the damage and bloodshed but it also meant that they couldn’t play along with the original script even with a one-sided insurrection.

    Another was that Mike Pence actually refused to play along.

  53. 53.

    sdhays

    @Sure Lurkalot: That they believed the raging orange narcissist was going to cover them is a clear sign of not paying attention to the guy’s life long M.O.

    If they were aware at all, they just thought people were lying about him. None of them ever stopped to think, “Ok, but ‘what if’ they’re NOT?”

    Of course, that’s the kind of thinking you get from people whose first rhetorical tool in an argument is to accuse others of being pedophiles. “We lie about Democrats all the time, so obviously they do it too!”

  54. 54.

    lowtechcyclist

    @Frankensteinbeck:

    The giant unanswered question remains why was there only a fraction of the police coverage of the Capitol that there should have been?

    I remember telling my wife that morning not to worry, there’d be a couple thousand LEOs waiting at the Capitol for the protesters to arrive.

    Just one of the many times since 2015 that my predictometer has demonstrated that it doesn’t work anymore.

    But I too want to know the details on this: who (officially) gave the order, who in the White House (as I expect) really gave the order, and the names of everyone involved who made sure that the Capitol would be insufficiently protected on 1/6/2021.  Because there should have been a couple thousand LEOs in wait at the Capitol – even someone like me just following the news knew that a shitload of potentially violent protesters were going to show up there that day – and it was more like a few hundred.

  55. 55.

    The Moar You Know

    I bet Scavino can destroy Trump if he actually talks/tells the truth, which he will not.  Unlike most of these other mooks, Trump is his only lifeline.

  56. 56.

    patrick II

    So, you cannot use Executive Privilege to cover a crime.

    We have also learned this week that Attorney-client Privilege cannot be used to cover a crime.

    There should be another type of right that should not be absolute and one that should not be able to be used in the commission of a crime.  A Pardon should not be an absolute power and it should not be able to be used in the commission of a crime — particularly such high crimes that threaten the United States constitution or democracy.  If you happen to elect a criminal as president, it’s like leaving a loaded gun on top of the Resolute desk.

  58. 58.

    Anonymous At Work

    @WaterGirl: I’d add that the Federalist Society doesn’t realize that they sided 100% with Trump and face a decision either to out their members as 100% partisan hacks or to become exiles and RINOs from elected Republicans and their voters.  The former could see court-packing on the menu in 2024 but the latter will see membership as a red-line for Republicans hoping to score a Trump endorsement for (re-)election as an open issue in primaries.

  60. 60.

    HumboldtBlue

    @Shalimar:

    I think the key reason is ignorance. Even among this august body of learned nerds dweebs, spaceoids, weirdos, stoners, mods, and rockers, there are very few who are familiar with DOJ procedures and that ignorance, combined with the in your face egregiousness of the entire Trump regime with apparent impunity leads to frustration and that is expressed in sarcasm and cynicism.

    We also happen to live in a country where the wealthy and powerful rarely face the most serious consequences of their very serious criminal actions.

    @WaterGirl:

    I think most of us feel like we are being battered in a hail storm

    That is literally happening outside my window.

  61. 61.

    sdhays

    @WaterGirl: That’s my hope. I wish Senate wasn’t such a challenge for the next election, but maybe what they’ve done has sowed enough seeds that they can reap some more radical disappointments in 2024.

  62. 62.

    Burnspbesq

    This ruling by Judge Howell is just as well-founded as the one re Corcoran, although the issues are somewhat different. I expect the D.C. to dispose of the appeal quickly, in an order that will be the judicial equivalent of “GTFO, clown.”

  63. 63.

    Roger Moore

    @WaterGirl:

    Trump is used to dealing with subordinates, not equals.  He assumes everyone needs to keep coming back to him for favors that he can use to keep controlling them.  He doesn’t know how to deal with people who don’t depend on him, and he sure as hell doesn’t know how to deal with it when some of his favors actually free people from needing future favors.  He’s used to being a big fish in a small pond, and he was just completely unprepared for being let loose in the ocean.

  64. 64.

    lowtechcyclist

    @JoyceH:

    I think the people most involved DID expect to occupy the Capitol. They came prepared. They brought zip ties to take prisoners. They. Built. A. Gallows.

    And they had an arsenal of guns waiting across the river in Virginia, where the gun laws are a good deal looser, ready to bring over if needed.

  65. 65.

    trollhattan

    Missing names:
    Peter Navarro
    Wilbur Ross
    Pompeo
    Possum Queen
    DeVoss
    I could go on.

  66. 66.

    Suzanne

    @Anonymous At Work:

    I’d add that the Federalist Society doesn’t realize that they sided 100% with Trump and face a decision either to out their members as 100% partisan hacks or to become exiles and RINOs from elected Republicans and their voters. 

    In all honesty, though…. why do you think they care? They got what they wanted. The GOP doesn’t care if we think of them as bad people, or hypocrites, or amoral, or partisan hacks, or whatever. They will do what they came to do: consolidate power for themselves.

  67. 67.

    Another Scott

    @lowtechcyclist: First, you have to remember that there are lots and lots of law enforcement agencies in DC with different responsibilities – DC Police, Metro Transit Police, US Park Police, FBI, Capitol Police, etc., etc., etc.  There wasn’t one order from above saying “do this”.  It doesn’t work that way – there are too many separate agencies.

    After the violence in the preceding summer and fall, Mayor Bowser and others were worried about TFG using an excuse to declare martial law and call out the Army (as he threatened to do in Chicago and Portland, etc.).  That’s why she told counter-protestors to stay away.  That’s why she had DC police doing traffic control and staying away from the Capitol.

    I’m sure there were similar concerns at the Pentagon, and sensible people were trying to find ways to keep TFG’s people’s hands away from the levers that called out the National Guard and the like.

    It looks like the Capitol Police were willfully blind about the potential for violence and didn’t bother to follow-up on the the pointers they were given, and didn’t bother to prepare.

    There are many, many parts to the story, and some of it is already out there (but you have to dig a little).

    My $0.02.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  68. 68.

    Roger Moore

    @Sure Lurkalot:

    That they believed the raging orange narcissist was going to cover them is a clear sign of not paying attention to the guy’s life long M.O.

    I don’t think this is right.  Trump does have some history of helping people who work for him.  He’ll turn on them if it’s in his interest, but he understand the need to reward people for doing him a good turn.  The big problem for the insurrectionists is that they failed, so it’s Biden’s DOJ that’s in charge rather than Trump’s.

  69. 69.

    lowtechcyclist

    @brendancalling:

    This is where I would ordinarily say I hope TFG has a stroke, but in this case I would prefer him alive so he can face charges and spend the rest of his stupid, miserable life in jail until he dies.

    This. I want him to be convicted of sufficiently serious crimes to have to serve many years in prison, and I want him to be alive and cognizant for all of those years.

    @Shalimar:

    I had some sympathy with the “Garland isn’t doing anything” crowd before the Smith appointment.  Whatever was happening was very opaque.  But it’s kinda embarrassing not to notice that the car went from 0 to 100 in an eyeblink and hasn’t slowed down since.

    This too.  Anyone who hasn’t noticed this by now, it’s hard to say what clue-by-4 would suffice for them.

    I’m really starting to believe that the DOJ will make “no one is above the law” a reality, at least in this instance.

  70. 70.

    Burnspbesq

    @Suzanne:

    There’s also an old country song by that name, written by Jack Clement. First recording I know of was by Porter Wagoner and Dolly Parton.

  71. 71.

    Sure Lurkalot

    @patrick II:

    If you happen to elect a criminal as president, it’s like leaving a loaded gun on top of the Resolute desk.

    Especially when our legal system relies on a 50 year old memo that as long as your ass sits in the chair behind the resolute desk, you’re above the law. And the unwritten 60-day rule that handcuffs prosecutions in election years. And the long lived practice in our country to look askance at the criming of the wealthy and powerful.

  72. 72.

    p.a.

    I wouldn’t rely on the Supremos to ‘establishmen Republican’ tRump into oblivion.  I’d love to see public pressure on tRump’s appointees to recuse themselves from anything private citizen tRump gets before them.  They won’t, but this court is illegitimate, and the more it’s exposed as such, the better.

  73. 73.

    Cameron

    @patrick II: My (limited) understanding is that if you’ve received a pardon, you can no longer plead the Fifth in connection with the crime you’ve been pardoned for, and can be charged with contempt if you try to do so,

  74. 74.

    Roger Moore

    @WaterGirl:

    I don’t think that the Supreme Court or the elected Republicans understand that while they appear to be getting everything they want in the short run… there will be long-term consequences of the unexpected variety, and history will not look upon them favorably.

    I think they don’t really care.  They know the stuff they want is unpopular and unlikely ever to become popular, so they can’t get it without backlash.  Better to use the power they have now to get what they want and use the power to deal with the backlash, rather than try fruitlessly to convince people to like their unpopular program.

  75. 75.

    Raoul Paste

    Given these developments, and Trump’s recent inflammatory language, you have to wonder what Trump’s Waco rally will be like on Saturday.   Boom or bust?

  76. 76.

    patrick II

    @Cameron:

    That is my understanding too.  So, have you seen Manafort, Flynn or particularly Stone called back to testify under oath?

  77. 77.

    lowtechcyclist

    @Another Scott:

    First, you have to remember that there are lots and lots of law enforcement agencies in DC with different responsibilities – DC Police, Metro Transit Police, US Park Police, FBI, Capitol Police, etc., etc., etc.  There wasn’t one order from above saying “do this”.  It doesn’t work that way – there are too many separate agencies.

    I just have a hard time buying into that.

    First of all, there may have been a lot of different agencies, but they were all either DC government, or Federal.  The latter can be corralled and brought in as needed.

    And I’m sorry, but it was fucking obvious that they were going to need a couple thousand cops.  Maybe several thousand, if counter-protesters had showed up and the cops had to keep them all apart before Trump tried to declare martial law.

    I want to know who saw that and was trying to pull together an adequate force, and who for whatever reason was pulling against that, and what their reasons were, and who they were talking to.

    Maybe some of the more innocuous bits and pieces of the story are out there, but it defies credulity that nobody in all these agencies said, “you know, we’re going to need a shitload of police at the Capitol on the sixth” and nobody sent word up the ladder that it would take more resources than any one department had, so it was going to take a coordinated effort.

  79. 79.

    danielx

    @Frankensteinbeck: ​
     On being sentenced to hard time, one of the January 6th defendants commented “I can’t believe I’m going to jail for for this guy”, or words to that effect. I suspect that kind of thinking is having an impact. Go to a rally? Sure! Go to the slam? Not so much.

    Also: invest in ketchup futures!

  83. 83.

    WaterGirl

    @patrick II:

    So, you cannot use Executive Privilege to cover a crime.

    You also cannot use Executive Privilege when you are no longer the President!

    Executive privilege lies with the unitary executive – UNITARY MEANS ONE! – and that is the current serving President of the United States.

    (not yelling at you, just yelling at everyone who says he can’t use executive privilege because he committed a crime.)

  84. 84.

    lowtechcyclist

    @cliosfanboy:

    I hope Ken Kookinelli trips all over his own feet. A friend of mine knows him. My friend said when you meet him he seems nice, but you quickly realize he’s totally nuts.

    Since I was a Virginian for much of my life, I remember him.  Love to see him be one of those who gets the FO part of FAFO.

  86. 86.

    TriassicSands

    @JoyceH: This looks like the final link in the chain, connecting the White House to the rioters.

    I would expect a lot of Fifth Amendment references. Either that or perjury.

    It’s very hard for me to imagine what people who live in a fantasy world think or will do. Do they all have the same sense of being untouchable that TFG has? After January 6, one would think that openly threatening violence would be a bad idea. For Trump, it’s just business crime as usual.

  87. 87.

    danielx

    @JoyceH:

    Several of the people who worked in his administration (McMasters et al) have commented that they couldn’t believe how transaction-oriented TFG was (and is). Everything was viewed as a transaction (a deal!) with no future commitment and no regard for past commitments either, including long standing treaties and the like. It’s no great surprise he views “his” Supreme Court justices in the same light.

    “Someday, and that day may never come, I will call upon you to do a service for me.”

  90. 90.

    geg6

    @lowtechcyclist: ​
     
    Then someone needs to take a clue-by-four to Loomis and the vast majority of commenters at LGM because they are completely convinced that absolutely nothing is happening in the DOJ cases and that nothing ever will. No evidence to the contrary will penetrate their bubble of certainty about that.

  91. 91.

    WaterGirl

    @HumboldtBlue: It’s interesting when the weather matches what’s going on emotionally.

    The month that my mom was dying – October – we literally had gray skies (and sometimes rain) from the 1st to the 31st when she finally died.

    The world looked like I felt, and I’m not sure if that helped or hurt!

  94. 94.

    WaterGirl

    @Another Scott:

    It looks like the Capitol Police were willfully blind about the potential for violence and didn’t bother to follow-up on the the pointers they were given, and didn’t bother to prepare.

    From what I’ve read the foot soldiers in the Capitol police force did not expect all-out-war.  But I believe some at the top were part of the whole thing, willing to sacrifice the offices.

    I hope someone is investigating that, since the Jan 6 committee didn’t.

  95. 95.

    Baud

    @geg6:

    It’s always possible, although it seems unlikely, that DOJ thinks it lacks to evidence to bring charges against Trump.  I think the documents case is more likely to go forward.  The J6 depends on insider witness testimony more.

  96. 96.

    Geminid

    @Roger Moore: Meadows abruptly changed his posture towards the investigation. The question of what made him change course could be part of an obstruction inquiry.

  98. 98.

    Scout211

    @Sister Golden Bear: There was some discussion of that in a thread downstairs.  I was impressed with the governor’s message.  He used some of the words that anti-trans politicians use, but to support his veto.

    In a written veto message, Beshear said the bill allows “too much government interference in personal healthcare issues and rips away the freedom of parents to make medical decisions for their children.”

    He also warned that the bill’s repercussions could include an increase in youth suicide. The governor said, “My faith teaches me that all children are children of God and Senate Bill 150 will endanger the children of Kentucky.”

  99. 99.

    lowtechcyclist

    @WaterGirl:

    I think they have driven the car off the cliff but don’t yet understand that the car they are riding in is in free fall.

    In a Warner Brothers cartoon, the car would keep on going as if they hadn’t gone off the edge yet, until they looked down and noticed where they were.

    And then they would plummet.

    If they were on foot instead of in a car, they’d get to take a step or two back towards the edge of the cliff before plummeting.

  100. 100.

    geg6

    @Baud:

    I agree.  I think the docs case is pretty much a slam dunk at this point, but IANAL.

    I’ve had to curate my LGM reading the last year.  I almost never read the comments any more and I pick and choose which FPers’ posts I’ll read.  Cheryl and Farley are the only must reads.  And Shakezula when she deigns to post.

  104. 104.

    patrick II

    @WaterGirl:

    People successfully used executive privilege to avoid testifying to congress while he was president and headed off who knows what kind of troubles for him if they had been forced to tell the truth.

    Not yelling at you either, just sayin’.

  106. 106.

    WaterGirl

    @WaterGirl:  from the article linked in the tweet.

    Law360, New York (March 24, 2023, 2:23 PM EDT) —

    Russian email accounts sent a series of hoax bomb threats targeting the Manhattan district attorney and court buildings for three straight days this week amid a grand jury investigation of former President Donald Trump.

    An NYPD vehicle is parked near New York City courthouses
    Security has ramped up outside the Manhattan district attorney’s office and surrounding courthouses after a series of unsubstantiated bomb threats this week. (Frank G. Runyeon

    The unsubstantiated threats, now under investigation by the New York Police Department and FBI, were emailed to local government officials at a Manhattan community board, according to police. They came from Russian email addresses in the early morning hours on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday, listing government buildings and schools as the targets of alleged pipe bombs, according to the local board official who received them.

    “The FBI told me that they appear to be coming from Russia,” said Susan Stetzer, district manager of Community Board 3, who read the emails to Law360 Friday. The board received four email threats over the three days, often sent from @mail.ru domains under different names, she said. The NYPD confirmed the board was the recipient of the original bomb threat on Tuesday.

    The FBI declined to comment.

    The threats did not mention Trump or the grand jury mulling indicting him for an illegal hush money payment allegedly designed to tip the 2016 election in his favor, the local official said. Still, they used language that echoed his recent attacks on the case, referring to “the downfall of our country” and stating, “You people are destroying America.”

  108. 108.

    gvg

    @lowtechcyclist: But that was known all along. Pretty mush everyone who didn’t want Trump to try a coup made sure there were very few military or National Guardsmen within reach on purpose because Trump (the President) has the authority to take them over and order them to obey him. The Pentagon added extra steps before he could give troops orders, everything had to go by one of the generals first. This was all reported ahead of time. I think they were correct unfortunately.  The capitol police too, but they are really small and I guess he didn’t try. The only one O am not sure of it the DC police and I think the mayor was quoted also as planning to keep large numbers away from the President…on purpose. Remember Trump and his helpers wanted National Guard troops under their control.

    And it was in the news before January 6 even though it didn’t get a lot of attention.

  109. 109.

    WaterGirl

    @patrick II: Successful only because the fucking courts worked so slowly that by the time the lawsuits made it through the court, the point was moot because we were in another congress, and the Rs are running the House.

    If we had 15 on the SC, things could move along more quickly, as they should.

  110. 110.

    artem1s

    Meadows was #1 on my wish list. He seems the most likely to have NFLTG and pissed about what happened on 1/6 and the fact that he put his professional life on the line for that orange asshat. I’m hoping he sings like a canary about who else was involved in the pre-planning in an attempt to save his own ass.
    Tic Toc MFers

  111. 111.

    Chief Oshkosh

    @Baud: Baloney. You’ll be whatever we tell you to be, including a feckless fecking feck!

    Don’t disappoint The Base that supports Baud 2016! Baud 2020! Baud 2024!

  112. 112.

    Roberto el oso

    @kalakal: Absolutely agree. The J6 insurrectionists pranced around the District like they owned the place and seem to have been gobsmacked by the various reactions they received from the actual residents, who either ignored them or treated them like the out-of-town weirdos they were. The insurrectionists’ view of themselves and their popularity was then repeated with the various trucker convoys, who were treated at best like obnoxious nuisances.

  113. 113.

    gvg

    @lowtechcyclist: Honey, Trump was the president, the authority for most of the government. Nobody could order that stuff to prepare for him. It wasn’t some gang leader of foreign government, it was our sitting President.  As it was, our Generals were skirting the rules and trying not to get direct orders that would go against their oaths, but trying to act extra obscure or just apparently “not bothering” him with some things.

  114. 114.

    patrick II

    @WaterGirl:

    We agree then on the pardons.  And I think one of the reasons someone hasn’t challenged the absolute power of pardons is that they would not want the decision to be made by this Supreme Court and thus set an unfortunate precedent.

    Plus, even under a different Supreme Court, I doubt whether your friend, institutional-loving Merrit Garland, would want to change history.

  115. 115.

    Geminid

    @trollhattan: I think Pompeo may have steered clear of this whole mess. He’s a canny fellow, and he’d gotten what he wanted out of Trump.

    O’Brian, the National Security director, probably tried to steer clear too. I think it was no accident he was out of town January 6. He knew something was up.

  116. 116.

    lowtechcyclist

    @Another Scott:

    Mayor Bowser January 4 briefing video (the protest information starts around 7 minutes in).

    And??

    Let’s see: all DC Police were supposed to report that day, and the DC National Guard was supposed to be helping them.

    That’s all I learned from six minutes of watching that.

    I’d think that between those two organizations, there should have been sufficient strength available, certainly a lot more than was present at the Capitol on 1/6/21.

    Seriously, I’m not sure what you think I was supposed to learn from having spent so much time learning so little.

  117. 117.

    tobie

    Is Schödinger’s Cat around today? If it wasn’t bad enough that Modi had Rahul Gandhi arrested for defamation, he’s now gotten Musk to block 122 Twitter accounts of journalists and activists who are critical of him. News courtesy of Mike Masnick over at Mastodon.

  118. 118.

    Jackie

    @Roger Moore:”I also suspect Meadows thought he could use the investigations for his own purposes.  If you remember, he was the one who provided a bunch of messages to the January 6th committee, then stopped cooperating when they demanded he turn over everything.”

    He stopped cooperating when TFG brought the hammer down HARD. His book had just came out and he had to publicly say it was full of “fake news” – per TFG’s orders.

  120. 120.

    Betsy

    @…now I try to be amused: Exactly this. No GOP repercussions will be the goal of the  institutional wing of the GOP.  The big institutional wing of the party that’s remaining and able to take action is the courts — or, I should say, right-wing judges and justices.

  121. 121.

    oldgold

     

    The January 6th case is a damn legal quagmire. The documents case is relatively straightforward.

    Jack Smith, unlike Mueller, seems competent and to have an understanding that time is precious. I have high hopes an indictment in the documents case will come within the next 30 days in DC.

  122. 122.

    Philbert

    @patrick II: Agree much. The pardon power of the presidet needs limits. I worry Trump will promise pardons to anyone who joins his armed forces.

    Prediction: If he’s actually scheduled for jail, he will stroke/cardiac before reporting, like Kenny Lay.

  123. 123.

    WaterGirl

    @Jackie:

    His book had just came out and he had to publicly say it was full of “fake news” – per TFG’s orders.

    Pronoun confusion!

    Whose book? and who had to publicly say it was full of fake news?

  124. 124.

    patrick II

    @WaterGirl:

    I agree that presidental powers my not be used after one leaves the presidency — but citing the “Unitary President” legal theory would be the wrong theory.  That theory was put forward so Republican presidents would have nearly unlimited powers and could tell congress to go fuck itself.

    I hate to write this and run, but I am heading to the gym now.  Have a nice day.

  125. 125.

    Uncle Cosmo

    @cliosfanboy: ​For a minute I thought you typed “Kokkinelli,” which IIRC is a resinated Greek rose wine that I rather liked but haven’t come across for many years.​

  127. 127.

    piratedan

    I tend to be a bit less sanguine about this… I still believe that they (the GOP/Fascists/Federalists) are still at work attempting to consolidate power.  While Trump was useful, he still is useful as a distraction from the primary goal of allowing SCOTUS to entrench itself as a Conservative bullwark against wokeness and keeping themselves from becoming irrelevant.

    while there are myriad agencies with silos of responsibility regarding who is responsible for what, there’s plenty of tendrils to look at to try and determine the seriousness of the coup attempt, as mentioned previously, the staffing at the Capitol, the actions of some Capitol Police (not ALL) to allow the rioters access or at least little resistance… the dynamics of the rioters knowing which windows to break, where certain offices were and who they belonged to… the texts between lawmakers and the WH and the rioters, the behavior of the Secret Service, the delayed response from the Military (and if Trump would order support for the rioters actions).  The lack of follow up in arresting the rioters, the actions of GOP members in delaying the vote validation process, who paid for all of this?

    why in the hell did the FBI need to crowd source the identification of the rioters?  why have the sentences for an attempted coup been so light?

    am sure that others have similar questions…

  129. 129.

    Uncle Cosmo

    @lowtechcyclist: In a Warner Brothers cartoon, the car would keep on going as if they hadn’t gone off the edge yet, until they looked down and noticed where they were.​

    IOW, Schroedinger’s jalopy.

  130. 130.

    Redshift

    @Geminid:

    Meadows abruptly stopped cooperating when the committee subpoenaed his phone records, which fits in very well with the theory that he was dumb enough to think he could selectively feed them information for his own purposes and get away with it.

  131. 131.

    zhena gogolia

    @artem1s: What makes you think he was pissed about what happened on 1/6? Hutchinson’s testimony makes it clear he was okay with it.

  132. 132.

    lowtechcyclist

    @gvg:

    Honey, Trump was the president, the authority for most of the government. Nobody could order that stuff to prepare for him. It wasn’t some gang leader of foreign government, it was our sitting President.  As it was, our Generals were skirting the rules and trying not to get direct orders that would go against their oaths, but trying to act extra obscure or just apparently “not bothering” him with some things.

    Sure, he was President.  But there was no reason why they couldn’t protect the Capitol anyway, after all, he wouldn’t want the protesters invading the Capitol, would he?

    Sure, if you’re in Trump’s inner circle, and you want the insurrection to succeed, then sure. But we’re talking about people in various Federal law enforcement agencies who rarely if ever interacted with that inner circle.

  133. 133.

    Redshift

    @lowtechcyclist:

    Yeah, I agree. I don’t think Cuccinelli is as important as a bunch of the others, but after long experience with his malign influence in Virginia, I would be really happy to see him go through some stuff. Especially since he’s now running a DeSantis PAC and campaigning for him.

  134. 134.

    lowtechcyclist

    @WaterGirl: Great minds think alike. ;-)

    I love those old WB cartoons.  I occasionally pull out a disc and watch some of them.

  135. 135.

    Brachiator

    @Sister Machine Gun of Quiet Harmony:

    The rioting ardor cooled after a LOT of people went to jail, there were no pardons, and Trump never regained office… so it was all for nothing. They looked like chumps instead of heros.

    Part of the list of potential questions at a GOP presidential primary debate:

    Will you pardon Donald Trump if he is convicted of [various crimes]?

    Will you pardon the January 6 felons?

  136. 136.

    UncleEbeneezer

    @Shalimar: From the moment we found out that DOJ/FBI had seized Eastman, Clark and Perry’s phones, the whole debate about the seriousness of Garland/DOJ’s approach to investigating 1/6 really should have been over.  Seizing the phones of the President’s top-level attorney, a former DOJ attorney and a sitting Congressman, is absolutely through-the-looking-glass, unprecedented and extremely aggressive action by our Justice Dept.  DOJ has BEEN pushing hard against privilege claims even before Jack Smith was appointed.  We saw evidence of that in other court filings.  DOJ has BEEN aggressive from the start.  Jack Smith is continuing that trend, but many of the seeds for the fights that he is currently about to reap, were planted long before he arrived.  Which is why the claims that DOJ has been slow-walking everything have never made any sense.  If you followed this stuff closely, there has been a steady amount of activity coming out all along, surely with much more that we don’t even know about yet.

  137. 137.

    Chief Oshkosh

    @WaterGirl: Who was wrong? I’m genuinely confused about this aspect of the discussion. Those that thought that Garland wasn’t focusing enough on Trump’s direct role in J6, like Congressman Adam Schiff or front-pager Betty Cracker? Or those who said, in the face of all available (but obviously incomplete) information, that Garland was always focused laser-like on Trump’s role and was moving as fast a possible?

    Certainly since Jack Smith has been brought in a big foot has been placed on the go-fast pedal. That is splendiferous. But it seems to me that Garland started focusing on Trump directly much earlier, right after Schiff (and other J6 members) started publicly voicing their frustration with DOJ. Of course, the order of events might very well not be due to causation. Garland certainly isn’t known for letting politics drive his behavior.

  138. 138.

    Another Scott

    @lowtechcyclist:

    Seriously, I’m not sure what you think I was supposed to learn from having spent so much time learning so little.

    I’m not sure what you’re expecting.

    That video, and the Q&A later on in the video, is an illustration that the DC government was trying to prepare. The acting DC police chief was talking about the information that they had that people were planning on bringing guns. He was talking about coordination with the Park Police. Bowser talked about how around 100 unarmed DC National Guard people were promised by the Army to help with traffic control to free up DC police to act elsewhere. Etc.

    It was a complicated situation with lots of various chains of authority. The video shows some of that complexity.

    If you were expecting 27 8×10 color glossy photographs with circles and arrows and a paragraph on the back of each one, well, I’m sorry you were disappointed.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  139. 139.

    WaterGirl

    The next shoe I want to drop:  other members of the House (and maybe the Senate, not sure) who were involved in the insurrection in one way or another.  I want them all cleaned out of government.  I know we won’t get them all, but I hope we can get a substantial number of them!

  140. 140.

    lowtechcyclist

    @gvg: And the Park Police, for instance?  A lot of them in the DC area, because there are areas under their jurisdiction in nearby MD and VA as well as DC.  They aren’t National Guard, and it would have been quite a challenge for Trump to order them to participate in a coup.

  141. 141.

    Bill Arnold

    @Old School:

    Jordan Klepper goes to the arrest protest.

    That video is very funny, thanks.
    I particularly liked the sign that said
    Satan + Soros
    = Reptile

  142. 142.

    topclimber

    @p.a.: Roberts probably has to get Thomas to recuse if a phony electors case comes to the Supremes. He might have to give Ginni T a free pass on this one in order to get her man to move over.

  143. 143.

    WaterGirl

    @Chief Oshkosh:  I was referring to people who are embarrassed because they doubted that Garland and the DOJ would go after the insurrectionists – at every level.

    It’s not up to me to tell anyone that they should be embarrassed about being wrong.  I was saying that it’s normal to be embarrassed IF you come to the conclusion you had everything all wrong.

  144. 144.

    UncleEbeneezer

    @geg6: Yup.  I had to bail on that place even though it was one of my first-thing reads every day (along with BJ) because it really has become just a circle-jerk of doom with most of the extremely confident commenters (and Campos and Loomis) showing that they have basically paid zero attention to all the well documented activity by DOJ since Garland took the helm.  It’s a good example of how cynicism can get so bad that otherwise intelligent people lose all ability to exercise critical thinking on certain subjects.  The irony of course is that they can’t see how much they look exactly like Glenn Greenwald, Freddie DeBoer, Michael Tracey, Matt Taibbi and other faux-Left fools who they love to dunk on.

  145. 145.

    oldgold

     

    The January 6th case is a damn legal quagmire. The documents case is relatively straightforward.

    Jack Smith, unlike Robert Mueller, seems competent and to have an understanding that time is precious. I have high hopes an indictment in the documents case will come within the next 30 days in DC.

  146. 146.

    lowtechcyclist

    @Another Scott: I guess you should have said the real info was in the Q&A, starting several minutes later.  I only watched the briefing proper, and there was next to nothing there.

    I wasn’t expecting 27 8×10 glossies, but I’m only going to watch so much video before I give up. Give me something to read, and I’ll read it, but fuck video of people talking, it’s just too damn slow.  Transcripts, or summaries, or something besides just having to sit there and wait for the information to drib and drab out.

    If that’s what you’ve got, then please be more specific about where in the video I need to watch.  I thought I’d already gotten to the end and learned nothing.

  147. 147.

    Redshift

    @lowtechcyclist:

    And I’m sorry, but it was fucking obvious that they were going to need a couple thousand cops.  Maybe several thousand, if counter-protesters had showed up and the cops had to keep them all apart before Trump tried to declare martial law.

    I don’t think there have ever been a thousand DC cops at a protest, even if they’re keeping opposing protests separate. There are less than 4000 on the entire DC police force.

    I think there was a serious failure to respond to the evidence that this was different and they were actively planning violence, and a big cop bias against believing that white people are dangerous. And I think there were members of the force who were on TFG’s side (more than the few we know of for sure), not enough to throw away their jobs by joining in, but enough to sandbag the response.

    I congratulate you on perceiving the threat in real time. I told out-of-town friends I didn’t think it was going to be a big deal, because every right-wing protest I’d ever seen in DC talks big and claims they’ll have huge numbers, and ends up with a sad few thousand that Fox carefully films with tight shots to make it look like a big crowd.

  148. 148.

    Chief Oshkosh

    @Matt McIrvin:

    Several big things went wrong. The first one was that left-liberal counter-protesters refused to take the bait, and stayed away from Washington on Jan. 6

    I agree completely. If fighting had started, Trump would’ve declared martial law and simply taken the capitol by force and held it. Just about anyone in power to stop that had already shown us that they would not stop this from happening, either because they wanted it to happen or because they just couldn’t think fast enough on their feet (the performance of General Milley on the day Trump had troops beat the shit out of peaceful protesters just do he got a Bible-holding photo-op comes to mind).

  149. 149.

    Kelly

    @topclimber: Thomas will never recuse. He will vote to protect his wife, her co-conspirators and walk away with both middle finger up in the air.

  152. 152.

    WaterGirl

    @Jackie: Meadows actually came out and said his book was full of shit?

    I mostly ignore all the talk of politicians and their always self-serving books, so I had no idea.

  153. 153.

    Chris T.

    Trump is expected to appeal

    But he won’t be appealing. That is, he’ll be unappealing.

  155. 155.

    Chris T.

    @Frankensteinbeck:

    Same with the Supreme Court, but more so. They’ve been shrugging at almost everything he brings to them. He has not gotten the consigliere service he wanted. They have their lifetime appointments, and now he’s just somebody that they used to know.

    “Wasn’t he the covfefe boy?”

  156. 156.

    UncleEbeneezer

    @oldgold: The biggest difference between Mueller and Garland is that the former was investigating a current President, the latter is investigating a former President.  Big difference!!!  DOJ believes that current Presidents can’t be prosecuted, because doing so would deny voters their constitutional right to representation.  It would also completely f*** up the President’s ability to do their job which would could have all kinds of bad implications for the country and it’s safety.  It’s not a radical concept.  Once Trump became a former-President, now he can be charged.  Mueller’s hands were tied from the get-go by Rod Rosenstein and then AG Bill Barr.  The scope of his work was specifically narrowed not to let Mueller come to a conclusion on whether or not Trump obstructed Justice.  And Bill Barr lied about the Mueller Report saying that it exonerated Trump, when it did no such thing.  Bill Barr was never going to allow charges against Trump, even if Mueller had gone outside of the scope of his work and pressed for them.  On the flip side, Garland has said repeatedly that no person is above the law, DOJ will follow the evidence wherever it leads and act accordingly.  So far, this is exactly what we’ve seen.  And more importantly we’ve seen NO INDICATION that Garland thinks Trump is somehow off-limits, despite what many of his critics claim.

  157. 157.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Redshift: Cuccinelli and DeSantis are particularly birds of a feather. I remember when he was going after Michael Mann for daring to do climate science with state funds. (He picked on the wrong guy.)

  158. 158.

    Sister Golden Bear

    @WaterGirl: Being a trans person today obviously frightening these days, but even more, it’s just exhausting.

    Which is part of the Republicans’ strategy.

    Not only cause trans people to give up and go back in the closet, or flee the state, or commit suicide, but also it’s far harder for us to push for expanding trans rights (or even having rights at all) when we’re fighting defensive battles on 500+ fronts.

    Hell. I’m even a bit too emotionally drained at the moment to come up with something to say Transgender Day of Visibility on the 31st. Though I’m gonna give it a try.

  159. 159.

    StringOnAStick

    @WaterGirl: I think some of them were hoping to do exactly that, but that they are mostly true believers who figured they had their way in to the permanent R government that they want so badly.  I hope a bunch of them lose their law licenses, at minimum.

  160. 160.

    oldgold

    @UncleEbeneezer: No, the biggest difference is that Robert Mueller was cognitively compromised during the investigation he was supposed to be leading. It was a debacle.

  161. 161.

    Bill Arnold

    @WaterGirl:

    Russian Emails Behind DA Bomb Hoax Amid Trump Probe

    That the emails were from Russia seems clear from the reporting at least.
    That they are from Russians is less clear; some Republican political operatives have openly boasted about using email accounts hosted on Russian email services, considering them to be more secure vs the bad-from-their-point-of-view Democrat-controlled US executive branch.

  163. 163.

    Fleeting Expletive

    @Sister Golden Bear: I support you and wish that you, and we, were fortunate enough to live in a civilized time and place, where people behaved like rational grown-ups. What would it be like, to not have to know that there are people around to wish to harm others?

    Peace and good fortune to you.

  164. 164.

    Bill Arnold

    @zhena gogolia:

    Meadows, yeah, but Scavino is also a biggie.

    Scavino is under-estimated, IMO.
    He has also been one of the conduits from alt-right (and sometimes Russian-seeded/amplified) information swamps to D.J. Trump.

  165. 165.

    ...now I try to be amused

    @UncleEbeneezer:

    The scope of his work was specifically narrowed not to let Mueller come to a conclusion on whether or not Trump obstructed Justice.

    The Mueller Report did say, albeit indirectly, that while Trump couldn’t be prosecuted while in office, he could be impeached. Hint hint.

  166. 166.

    Mai Naem mobile

    @lowtechcyclist:  wasn’t there some reporting that the Capitol Police didn’t forward info onto other agencies. The Capitol Police chief had a book out and its got some info. Don’t forget there seemed to be quite a few Capitol cops who seemed like they were Trumpers. IIRC Mike Fannone said he voted for TFG. They may have bought into the RW blue line garbage and thought they were not going to be injured. More importantly TFG didn’t call in the National Guard fast enough.

  171. 171.

    Ken B

    @lowtechcyclist: Yeah, The Cooch is totally nuts. Also, too, evil. And not very bright.

    I had a friend (Walt) that gradually became a straight-ticket Republican voter over years. Walt always said that he wouldn’t vote for an extremist, citing Nehemiah Scudder as an example.

    When Cooch ran for governor, a bunch of his friends pounded on him hard, pointing out that The Cooch was Nehemiah Scudder. Walt eventually backed down and voted for MacAuliffe instead, mainly because he knew we would run his nose in every shitty thin Cooch did if he didn’t.

  172. 172.

    Geminid

    @Mai Naem mobile: Cheryl Rofer linked to an article on news site called Just Security that discussed the question ofwhy the DC Guard was not called in more quickly. The authors said that General Milley and others at the Pentagon were reluctant because if activated, the DC National Guard would have been under Trump’s command. I have not seen this question explored more, but I think the authors were not just speculating.

    Trump’s too lazy to have found this out himself, but Kash Patel had been put into the Pentagon to serve as Trump’s henchman, and he would have known. So would Michael Flynn.General

    Milley will retire soon, and I hope he’ll give his side of this and other stories.

  173. 173.

    oldgold

    @zhena gogolia:

    Yes and I watched Robert Mueller testify concerning it.

    If you do not believe me as to how cognitively compromised Robert Mueller was, here is Adam Schiff’s take on Robert Mueller:

    In his new book and an interview this week, Schiff (D-Calif.) revealed he would not have wanted Mueller to testify if he knew how “painful” it was going to be, saying Congress had to stick to shorter questions for the beleaguered special counsel.

    “I did understand immediately why his staff had been so protective and why they were so reluctant to have him testify,” he told NPR. “And I immediately told our members, ‘We need to cut down our questions. We can’t ask for narrative answers. We need to be very precise in what we ask. We need to have the page reference of the report ready.’”

    “And it was very painful. Honestly, it was painful. And if I had known, I would not have pushed for his testimony.”

  177. 177.

    Jackie

    @WaterGirl: He did! After TFG said so.
    Meadows thought TFG vetted it prior to publishing; but apparently a few subjects re TFG’s handling Covid weren’t. When TFG learned what was in the book, he said it was not true and said it was full of fake news. When Meadows was asked about it by the media, he “concurred it was fake news,” trying to get back into TFG’s good graces 😂

    https://m.youtube.com/watch

  178. 178.

    Mai Naem mobile

    @Geminid: i didn’t realize that. TFG really exploited the weaknesses in our system. I hope they have something better planned out for the future. I know its been pointed out already but too much is based on norms and traditions.

  179. 179.

    Jackie

    @Jackie: Wrong link! For some reason I can’t post the correct YouTube link😤

    It’s titled
    “Mark Meadows Now Calling Covid Story In Own Book ‘Fake News’”

  181. 181.

    Geminid

    @WaterGirl: I have not tried to verify this theory myself. But Cheryl Rofer is careful about who she links to, so I took the authors as credible.

    Maybe someone will come out with a well-researched history of January 6 that will pin this theory down. Like I said, Mark Milley may give his side of this and other stories.

  182. 182.

    WaterGirl

    @oldgold: You do know about the secret memos from Rosenstein that limited the scope of what Mueller could do, right?

    Between Barr and Rosenstein Mueller’s hand were tied as far as Trump went.

  185. 185.

    UncleEbeneezer

    @zhena gogolia: Yes.  The only problem I’ve ever heard intelligence experts cite about the MR was its’ limitations/scope (and then of course Barr’s disingenuous summary).  I really could care less about Mueller’s performance testifying.  Perry Mason incarnate was not gonna get any more GOP Senators to vote to Impeach.

  186. 186.

    oldgold

    @WaterGirl: Yes, I do.  Mueller should have gone public.
    I knew something was seriously wrong when they did not insist on deposing Trump and chose to rely on interrogatories. What a freaking joke that was.

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