Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

After roe, women are no longer free.

Accountability, motherfuckers.

“Cheese and Kraken paired together for the appetizer trial.”

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

Everybody saw this coming.

No Justins, No Peace

Let’s not be the monsters we hate.

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

Cole is on a roll !

The truth is, these are not very bright guys, and things got out of hand.

Within six months Twitter will be fully self-driving.

That’s my take and I am available for criticism at this time.

We are builders in a constant struggle with destroyers. let’s win this.

We’re not going back!

I’d hate to be the candidate who lost to this guy.

Sitting here in limbo waiting for the dice to roll

Stamping your little feets and demanding that they see how important you are? Not working anymore.

“And when the Committee says to “report your income,” that could mean anything!

Second rate reporter says what?

Not so fun when the rabbit gets the gun, is it?

Chutkan laughs. Lauro sits back down.

In my day, never was longer.

When your entire life is steeped in white supremacy, equality feels like discrimination.

Republicans seem to think life begins at the candlelight dinner the night before.

You are here: Home / Politics / Trump Indictments / Be Still My Beating Heart

Be Still My Beating Heart

by | 207 Comments

This post is in: , ,

I had my first moment of doubt yesterday I wondered if Jack Smith made the wrong call in going with the charges in Florida, because I’m pretty sure Cannon is going to fuck with the process again and again, and it enrages me.  Apparently the framers of the constitution never imagined that the threat to the republic would be coming from inside the house.

DOJ and Jack Smith (LIVE) Now 2
I’m here to fuck up MAGA world and chew gum, and I’m all out of gum.

Petulant senators can stop things dead in their tracks for no good reason, and single judges can make ridiculous rulings on ridiculous cases and millions of people have their rights or their benefits or their dignity taken away.  (Sorry, I digress, my inner rage is bubbling to the surface.)

But maybe Jack plans to give Cannon enough rope to hang herself and will then the 11th Circuit will step in and force her to recuse?

For now, we are on this bumpy road with Cannon so we just have to take the ride and see what happens.

This, though, lifts my spirits.

What does it usually mean when a grand jury deliberates all day without calling any witnesses?  I know, I know!  Pick me!

So who’s up for some good news today?

I won’t even link to it, but Trump suggesting that the coke in the White House is Joe Biden’s, and then literally saying “we can’t have a crackhead in charge of the nuclear arsenal” is just too much.  It would be too funny, if it weren’t so awful, and too sad at the same time.  We DID have a crackhead in charge of the nuclear arsenal, and his name was Donald Trump.

Speaking of indictments, I got the Trump documents indictment for my birthday on June 13.  (Maybe I need some of that chocolate fudge cake to get me out of this mood?)  When I was younger, I used to celebrate birthday month.  Today is July 12, the last day of indictment month.

Pretty please may I have another indictment, this time for election interference or Jan 6?  I can make enough cake for everyone, if that would help.

I need to get off the rollercoaster ride of hope and frustration.   Is anybody up for sharing good political news in the comments?

Open thread.

Reader Interactions

207Comments

  3. 3.

    WereBear

    If I were a teen girl, I would have a poster of Jack Smith on my wall. That’s how highly I esteem his prosecutorial acumen.

  5. 5.

    WereBear

    Also, I am Ihazcats on Threads, though a long and complicated tale that can be boiled down to, “Every time I think I’m out, they pull me back in!”

  8. 8.

    MattF

    I assume everyone in the DOJ knew what Garland did by appointing Smith. As did all the Congressional Republicans and Democrats, as did everyone in the White House. You get, you earn a reputation. Smith is a prosecutor, not a high-level managerial bureaucrat. And he’s very very bad news for Donald Fucking Trump.

  9. 9.

    dmsilev

    It’s really something when there are multiple simultaneous grand juries discussing (additional) indictments of a former President. I know we’ve sort of gone through a slow-boiling-of-the-frog procedure over the last several years, but it’s worth taking a step back and marveling in shock at just how shitballs insane the current situation is.

  10. 10.

    NotMax

    So far (this time) Cannon has not engaged in any procedure untoward, unexpected, egregious or overtly partisan.

    That’s not to say she won’t, just that for right now things look to be unfolding in a SOP manner.

  11. 11.

    bbleh

    Uhhh, good news, good news, hmmm …

    How ’bout: Republicans from the Krazy Kidz Kaucus spent a chunk of the day beating up on Republican FBI Director Chris Wray for … uh … wrongthink or something.  Can’t imagine that goes down too well with the iron-butt-plug Lawn Order Republicans.  (“You damn kids …!”)  They just can’t help themselves: if there’s somebody they can Other in the most over-the-top way possible, they’ll do it, Republican FBI Director or not.  They’re like that blue sucking thing in Yellow Submarine — they just keep sucking (heh) until they suck themselves up.

  12. 12.

    sab

    @WereBear: I only just opened an Instagram account to try to communicate with another jackal last month. I didn’t understand how to work it so that fell through (messages evaporate? So the e-mail address she sent is just gone?)  But then I realized I could see my niece in California account so that was cool.   But does having an Instagram account mean I have a Thread account I don’t know about?

  13. 13.

    WaterGirl

    @NotMax: oh, I wouldn’t say that exactly.  She let Trump and company screw around for a month getting a lawyer.  She didn’t bring the hammer down on the Trump lead attorney who hasn’t even fucking applied for his clearance.  etc etc.

    She is letting things slide, and that’s not a good sign.

  14. 14.

    FelonyGovt

    Every time I read the latest completely unhinged excrescence from Trump I want to tell him: “You raging asshole. You only got elected President once because of Russian election interference, James fucking Comey and the media making a mountain out of email mishandling, 20,000 or so morons in Michigan, Ohio and wherever, and a vengeful God that we should have known was screwing with us when the Chicago Cubs won the 2016 World Series [no offense to Chicago or the Cubs].”

  16. 16.

    FelonyGovt

    @sab: No. My understanding is you have to get a separate Threads account. I’m on Instagram, but not Threads.

  17. 17.

    CaseyL

    In the Eating-Their-Own category, Ray Epps – a Trumpy who loved Trump, voted for him twice, encouraged the riots on J6, and was even one of the rioters – is now suing Fox News (paywall) for disseminating the lie that he was actually a Federal agent provocateur.  The resulting threats ultimately forced him and his wife to sell their house and move.

    The story does not say whether he still supports Trump.  My guess is, he absolutely does… just not Fox News.  Maybe.

  19. 19.

    bbleh

    @MattF: I happen to think that every time TFG even hears the name “Jack Smith” he breaks out in big orange drops of flop-sweat.

  21. 21.

    Old School

    So Birthday Month ran from June 13th – July 12th?  Or June 1st – June 30th?

  25. 25.

    bbleh

    @WaterGirl: ain’t it wonderful?  We don’t have to raise a finger!  Just hum quietly, get things done.

    “Never interrupt your enemy when he is making a mistake.”

  27. 27.

    Elizabelle

    I would not call TFG a “crackhead.”  A crackpot, a Russian asset, an insurrectionist. Yes.  I do suspect TFG Jr. and Kimberley have got some serious problems with the powder.

    WRT Russian influence:  wasn’t the Biden administration going to put out a fuller copy of the Mueller Report, with less redactions?  Has anything happened with that?

    The same bad actors can make a lot of trouble in 2024.  Now with AI assistance.

  29. 29.

    sab

    @MattF: I have three follows: the other jackal, my sister and my niece. I don’t think we are ready for the big time. I think I’ll pass.

  30. 30.

    OzarkHillbilly

    The Sting@TSting18
    When Harry Met Sally… is 34 years old today
    ‘I’ll have what she’s having.’
    This line, delivered by Rob Reiner’s mum, was suggested by Billy Crystal. Katz Deli, where the scene was filmed, has a plaque on the table which says, ‘Where Harry Met Sally, hope you have what she had!’

  31. 31.

    bbleh

    @Elizabelle: isn’t it pretty much accepted — and importantly, uncontradicted — lore from way back that he abuses Adderall routinely?  Not a crack-head, a crank-head.

  35. 35.

    catclub

    Petulant senators can stop things dead in their tracks for no good reason,

    They can only do this when backed by a majority of their own party, at least.
    The entire senate can steamroll any single senator, but not if said senator has the support (or at least non-opposition) of their own party.

  38. 38.

    Elizabelle

    @Formerly disgruntled in Oregon:  Yeah.  Would not be surprised if he is abusing Adderall.  Or whatever his drug of choice.

    Allegedly Elon Musk is attempting better living through chemistry, too.  Perhaps a cornucopia of “enhancers.”

    ETA:  bbleh brought up Adderall earlier.

  41. 41.

    WereBear

    @sab: Instagram is how they want people to join Threads. Also, app only. Download the app and it asks for Instagram. But also, email & password.

    But the rush shows how much Twitter has deteriorated.

  47. 47.

    sab

    We are supposed to be able to see Northern Lights in Ohio tonight. I am sixty-nine and this has been on my bucket list since before there were bucket lists. Since I was about nine.

    Then they said too bad. Despite your usual NE Ohio summer drought, Nature has decided to cloud up tonight. As per usual if there is something you want to see in Ohio night skies, Ohio mostly chuckles and says “oops, no.”

    After our rainy mornimg, our rainy afternoon isn’t happening.  Maybe clear skies tonight?

    ETA Focused too much on my stepkids and not enough on grift in my adult life, so we cannot afford a normal trip to Iceland to see Northern lights. Boarding five cats and a dog ain’t cheap. Plus airfare etc.

  48. 48.

    bbleh

    @MattF: indeed it is, at low doses relative to those taken by serious speed freaks, intended to take advantage of the “paradoxical” (ie we got no real idea wtf is going on) effect of amphetamines in calming patients with certain disorders, eg ADHD.  But of course in non-patients, it has the usual effect like … amphetamines!  And yeah, amphetamines can be both physically and psychologically addictive (and I would guess the latter is just as important as the former if not more so in the case of Adderall abuse).

  49. 49.

    MattF

    @sab: I saw the Northern Lights one night in Ithaca— everyone sat out on the big hill leading from the men’s dorms up to the main campus at Cornell— and went: OOOOOOOOOHHHHHHHHH.

  50. 50.

    WereBear

    @sab: I wish you the best of luck. I moved north 20 years ago and all I got was a hand-sized green glimmer from behind a cloud.

    But yes, it was thrilling :) Good luck! Is it worth a drive?

  54. 54.

    bbleh

    @WaterGirl: @WereBear: I think I read somewhere that you use your Instagram account to sign into Threads, and there may be some formal “ok yeah sign me up for Threads too” step, but then you can’t unsubscribe from Threads without deleting your Instagram account.

  59. 59.

    UncleEbeneezer

    The collective head explosions and screeching from the GOP when Federal and GA indictments for 1/6 drop are going to be such wonderful music to my ears.  And then there’s still the PAC/fundraising crimes too.  The LIV Golf investigation, etc.

  60. 60.

    sab

    @WereBear: If we think it is feasible, we are two miles away from Cuyahoga Valley National Park, which means very limited artificial light.  So it all depends on the solar flare and cloud cover.

  61. 61.

    Citizen Alan

    Apparently the framers of the constitution never imagined that the threat to the republic would be coming from inside the house.

    One thing I have realized over the last 30 years is what a catastrophic unforced error the Civil War was for the slave states. They would have gotten far better results if they’d just stayed in the Union, gummed up the machinery of government through legal means, and then blamed all the resulting problems on Lincoln. “Let us keep our slaves or we shall make the nation ungovernable” would have probably worked as a strategy.

  62. 62.

    WereBear

    @bbleh: Since I can’t log in to my Instagram, and yet it recognized it and took it, means I am in thrawl and must visit the mysterious lady at the edge of the woods with all the cats…

    Wait, that’s me.

  68. 68.

    Citizen Alan

    @pat: Why would Mitch intervene when one of his lackeys is causing such fury among liberals? He doesn’t care about the military or the country.

  71. 71.

    Jay

    @sab:

    come North to Canada in the winter. You don’t even have to go very far north. All you want is no/minimal light pollution, a clear night, and a forecast of a Northern Lights event. You can drive.

    When we lived in the hills south of Kamloops, many a time we saw the Northern Lights. They are not as spectacular as in the Artic, (they don’t make any sound and are generally blue green), but they are still stunning.

  72. 72.

    pat

    @Citizen Alan:

    Guess you’re right.  And with MTG and rump both proclaiming that we should just GET OUT of NATO, the prospect of a repub pres and congress is terrifying.  These nuts are not going away.

  73. 73.

    tobie

    Someone may have posted this yesterday but I just read that Milan Kundera passed away yesterday at age 94. I didn’t keep up with his fiction but The Unbearable Lightness of Being was a book everyone had to l read and discuss in the early 1980s. That and 100 Years of Solitude are the last serious novels I remember being overnight international sensations.

    https://www.theguardian.com/books/2023/jul/12/milan-kundera-the-unbearable-lightness-of-being-author-dies-aged-94

  74. 74.

    WereBear

    @Citizen Alan: what a catastrophic unforced error the Civil War was for the slave states

     
    If you read the fascinating book, The Myth of the Lost Cause, you will discover just how hard they worked at insisting on their delusions, and acting on them.

    Maybe… they were the First Wingnuts.

  75. 75.

    Kay

    @sab:

    Focused too much on my stepkids and not enough on grift in my adult life

    lol

    We all should have done more grifting :)

  77. 77.

    Elizabelle

    @Chris Johnson:  Wall Street Journal apparently did a story on Musk and Silicon Valley drug use, although it’s paywalled.

    So:  I figure High Times is a credible source on that one.
    Report: Elon Musk Takes Ketamine
    The Wall Street Journal did a deep dive into the “drug movement” among Silicon Valley’s elite.

  78. 78.

    Jay

    @raven:

    the Ship in the Ice  is no longer there.

    No Ice since 2016.

    She is now a Whale Watching ship out of Tronsberg.

  80. 80.

    UncleEbeneezer

    @sab: Sorry.  I’ve never seen them either.  They (along with ocean bioluminescence) are definitely on my bucket list too.

  82. 82.

    WaterGirl

    @bbleh: Yeah, their whole scheme with Threads pisses me off. “you have to use all our stuff to use one piece of it” is total bullshit.

    Why people who want to hop onto a new system – owned by yet another gazillionaire who can do whatever the fuck he pleases after people are using it and dependent on it – is totally beyond me.

  88. 88.

    pat

    @WaterGirl:

    Did I get that link here?  Of Ted Lieu questioning Wray?  And every one of the trump people who was convicted was convicted by a trump appointee.  Don’t remember all the names, but he was totally exonerating the FBI.

  91. 91.

    Hardheaded Liberal

    Some probable context on today’s grand jury from a retired civil rights lawyer (me). I don’t have any inside/special insight, but just sharing what I think are reasonable expectations for NOW, since I think the investigation probably still has a ways to go before TFG is indicted for J6.

    If an indictment(s) is/are returned, there is a good chance they will be sealed for at least several days.  No news this week is not necessarily bad news.  And we very likely have to wait for indictments of TFG, Roger Stone, & other ringleaders – Special Counsel probably is looking to flip some more cooperating witnesses before going there.

    An indictment at this point would most likely be for the false electors scheme.  It might or might not go all the way up to TFG – if not now, later will still be possible as to TFG, especially if more defendants are flipped to cooperate after they’re indicted.

    Other possible indictments now could be the scheme for the military seizing voting machines (IIRC includes an Executive Order TFG may have signed), separately or tied in with the shenanigans of Jeffrey Clark trying to become Attorney General.

    And remember, above are Likely/Possible based on public reports of the evidence collected & witnesses interviewed.  We may see nothing, or something else entirely.

  93. 93.

    smith

    @Jay: The epidemic of paranoia among the deplorables about who among them is a fed may spare us from another J6 when TFG loses in 2024.

  96. 96.

    WaterGirl

    @JPL: You should have seen me trying to select the “featured image” for his submission this week.

    This one for sure!  No, this one.  No, this one!  I basically had to close my eyes and point to one. :-)

  97. 97.

    sab

    @Jay: Seriously could you give us useful advice about this?  My grandmother had Canadian first cousins.  Her mother was Canadian, went from Toronto to nursing school in Chicago. I loved going to Canada until I grew up, life intervened and I got too busy and too far away.

  98. 98.

    WaterGirl

    @pat: I would love to see Ted Lieu questioning Wray!  Or Sheldon Whitehouse.  Or any number of people in the House.  Maybe Dan Goldman.

    Wray is a lying, slithering snake who seems to be made of teflon no matter what he does, what he doesn’t do, and what he lies about.

  99. 99.

    WaterGirl

    @sab: I swear I checked on that earlier this week.  Sigh.

    That means I spelled it wrong in Monday’s OTR post.  Belatedly fixed, not that it helps.

  101. 101.

    WaterGirl

    @Hardheaded Liberal: Can you clarify which grand jury you are referring to when you say “today’s grand jury”?  Because I think more than one is active this week.

    I appreciate you sharing your expertise with us, though! :-)

  102. 102.

    Nelle

    @sab: In my younger life, I was in the perfect place to see northern lights – an island off the north coast of Alaska.  Except I was there when the sun was up 24 hours a day for two months, and even when it began to dip below the horizon, in late July, it didn’t really get dark.

    One time, though, I stayed in Alaska into September.  We were camping near our friend’s cabin, the northernmost cabin on the Ambler river, about 50 miles from the nearest village.  Two weeks of nightly gorgeous lights.  They actually crackle.

    My husband, flying up on the North Slope in winter (small plane) said that flying among the northern lights is surreal.

  103. 103.

    pat

    @WaterGirl:

    I got a link and since I was primarily on BJ (my phone) I assumed it came from here.

    It was interesting that to every question, Wray said something along the lines of “that’s what I recall.”  Just a strange way to answer.  “Yes” would have sufficed.

  106. 106.

    sab

    @WaterGirl: Isn’t he an artist in our midst? We always need to check there. There are artists there not even identified by their jackal names. But good artists.

  108. 108.

    Baud

    What does it usually mean when a grand jury deliberates all day without calling any witnesses?

    They can’t come to consensus on what to order for lunch.

  109. 109.

    Chris Johnson

    @Elizabelle: I mean, he tweeted about how ket is so great compared to psych meds.

    Nobody does that unless they’re on ket LOTS.

    Ket is for horses, you dumb motherfucker! :D

    The class of billionaires we get these days… I don’t think the inventors of capitalism quite anticipated billions being controlled by individuals out of their minds on drugs, just saying…

  110. 110.

    Geminid

    I thought this was good news in a way: NATO leaders and their spouses gathered outside before their big banquet yesterday evening. and I saw a there were a lot of pictures taken. One showed the wife of Turkish President Recip Erdogan, in a stylish blue outfit.

    She was wearing a matching headscarf, and some Westerners probably went “Eeew, Muslim fundamentalists!” But while the Erdogans are devout Muslims, they are not fanatics. And I think it’s good that there is one Muslim nation in NATO. Other Muslims can look and say, “Well, at least they’re all not all dam’ Yankees.”

    Anyway, it occurred to me that Mrs. Erdogan does not travel overseas often, much less hobnob with world leaders. So it was good to see Mr. Erdogan holding his wife’s hand. Erdogan gets called a lot of names, many of them justified. But I think he is an attentive husband and that is a good thing.

  112. 112.

    Steeplejack

    @pat:

    Wray wanted to be very precise, because the (Democratic) rep was asking him yes-no questions about when so-and-so was indicted, when NARA requested docs from Trump, when Trump responded, etc. At one point he explicitly said he wanted to defer to the record just to make sure everything was correct.

    The last thing you want is for Wray to make a mistake and then Fox and Newsmax start braying about “Wray lies to oversight committee!”

  113. 113.

    trollhattan

    For the second year, Runner Girl was part of the Voice in Sport group testifying on Capitol Hill on behalf of the Fair Play for Women Act before Senator Chris Murphy’s…subcommittee? (not an expert on the proper terminology) He’s the Senate sponsor.

    The Act is a follow-on to Title IX and closes loopholes that allow schools to be out of compliance. It’s on his Book of Faces page.

  118. 118.

    Lyrebird

    @bbleh: Yeah the hearing with the FBI director was my good news, too.  Specifically, it is a good thing that Stone Mountain GA is represented by one Rep. Hank Johnson

    (Link to DKos diary with playable video of his remarks)

  120. 120.

    Jay

    @sab:

    So what Province are closest to, what border crossing, and how many hours driving?

    I can find you a route from there, a dark spot, and a decent affordable place to stay. Maybe even a couple of decent places to stay. Depends how small the location is. You will probably have to drive to the dark spot from there.

    I’ll try to find you a good weather link and a good Northern Lights forecast link.

    Then all you have to do is from December to February, look for good weather oncoming, a good Northern lights forecast intersecting, book your room and head north.

  122. 122.

    Lyrebird

    @Jay: Hi Jay!  From a thread last night, are you the one who posted the link to a Ukrainian video about “me, a friend, and two shovels” or something?

    I have been wondering if we should ask WG to make a music page of Ukrainian songs, and that one should be on there for sure.

  123. 123.

    The Kropenhagen Interpretation

    @Jay: Man, when the attempted fascist coup fails, they move to eating each other a lot faster.

  125. 125.

    Jay

    @sab:

    It can happen any time a strong enough solar wind hits the earths magnetic field,

    but in Southern Canada, ( I am assuming you don’t want to drive to James Bay or Cape Breton), winter is best, and there is less forest fire smoke.

  127. 127.

    WereBear

    Confirmed: Threads doesn’t have a text version of a pic option. Like their other products. So I just describe it in the text.

    Also I can use a third party app to make a thread on the Threads app which is open on my iPad, but if I press the write button at the bottom of myThreads app it crashes every single time.

  131. 131.

    Geminid

    @Baud: Diplomatic and security reporter Laura Rozen (@lrozen) quoted the White House press pool reporting on Erdogan’s and Biden’s remarks after their meeting yesterday:

    Erdogan: “Our meetings prior to this one were mere warm-ups, and now we are initiating a new process. This process is a process of five years, and now you’re getting prepared for the forthcoming elections, & with the forthcoming elections, I would like to wish you the best of luck.”

    To which Biden responded, “Thank you. I look forward to bring with you the next five years, Mr. President.”

    A new bromance?

  132. 132.

    pat

    @Steeplejack:

    OK, thanks for the response.  But he did have to admit that everything that happened to trump’s folks was because of an AG that or someone else that was appointed by tump.

  134. 134.

    patrick II

    @Jay:

    Another reason why these Jan 6 prisoners should never be on the street again — they are violent, intractable criminals.

  140. 140.

    WaterGirl

    @sab: I searched, and I couldn’t find an artists in our midst post with his work.  You should suggest that in hist post (on Friday, I think) !

  145. 145.

    FastEdD

    It took me three days to eat an entire Indictment Cake a month ago. Fortunately it was not a large cake, but it was marbled with peanut butter and chocolate chips. Yum. Looking forward to another!

  146. 146.

    Steeplejack

    @pat:

    Wray didn’t “have to admit” anything! He was agreeing with the Democratic rep and pushing back against the GOP bullshit. His phrasing was simply to avoid any possible mistakes or inaccuracies.

    Whatever his faults, Wray gave a stand-up performance today.

  147. 147.

    Suzanne

    @Baud: Feh. I love tastemaker dude music and sad dad rock as much as the next girl, but hot damn. Dance music is what summer is about.

  148. 148.

    Nettoyeur

    @MattF: I have taken Adderall in small quantities (5-10 mg in morning, regular not time release) for mild ADHD. If you hv  ADHD, you get a  brief rush, then some dry mouth and reduced appetite, get things doe  and sleep normally or even better voz u r, ironically , calmerIf you do not have ADHD, you might not sleep much at all. I didn’t find it addictive. Now almost impossible to get even with doc help, so I switched to non stimulant Stratteral, not as effective but OK.  Trump either takes a lot, or is not really ADHD, so he goes hyper.

  149. 149.

    Juju

    @FelonyGovt: Pennsylvania!  I would also add, you never got more ducking votes than any of your opponents and if we had a normal electoral system you would never have been president, you human traffic barrel with an embarrassing combover!!

  151. 151.

    Jackie

    @Jay: Oh my goodness! That’s my newspaper and Pasco is one of the cities in my Tri-Cities!

    I thought earlier news accounts said the Obama stalker was from Seattle?

  153. 153.

    noncarborundum

    The whole idea of something being based “out of” a place rather than in that place really confuses me and I wish it would get off my lawn.

  154. 154.

    Suzanne

    @FastEdD: I have a bottle of limoncello, but I have to admit that it’s sooooo strong that I find it difficult to have more than a sip. So I am thinking about trying a limoncello cake recipe.

  155. 155.

    KayInMD (formerly Kay (not the front-pager))

    My birthday is July 26, only 2 weeks away. New charges would be a sweet birthday present!

  161. 161.

    The Kropenhagen Interpretation

    @Juju: I prefer to think [Trump’s] adult diaper gets a good workout.

    You mean the one he chooses to believe he’s wearing by choice for fetish reasons while truly having as little control of his bowels as any of his other faculties?

  169. 169.

    WaterGirl

    @Baud: We could require birth certificates in order to be able to comment, but them Barack wouldn’t be able to comment here, and that would suck.

    Lurkers probably skew younger because they can’t be retired, so they can’t comment as much.

    Shorter WG: I think you’re right.

  180. 180.

    Jackie

    @Jay: LOL I’m not a subscriber – the less than 20 pages daily is ridiculously expensive and the on-line subscription is severely limited in content. Thanks for the Yahoo link!

  182. 182.

    Jay

    @Suzanne:

    go light on the limonchello, lots of club soda, no more than 3.

    Center yourself before standing up.

    Decades ago, took the Boys From Cleveland* to Il Portchino on Commercial Drive, “Little Italy” midway through it transitioning to “The Peoples Republic of:”.

    Sat on the patio, had tapas, choppino and mohito’s, and street watched. They found the mohito’s refreshing, the street watching fasinating, the food amazing, until after the third mohito when they tried to stand up.

    *CEO and Head of Sales of a Cleveland vendor. Of course I paid. I wasn’t allowed to even take a stick of gum from a vendor.

  183. 183.

    bbleh

    @Bill Arnold: yeah well re microdoses of psychedelics, ketamine, etc. for neural plasticity, while that’s certainly a real thing even without chemical assistance, and there’s evidence they can promote it, it’s not clear to me that their effects, either in promoting it or otherwise, are entirely or even mostly benign.  And research yes, but self-experimentation, come on.  Tell me he’s not using it simply as a euphoric.

    Anecdotally, I had a colleague WAY back in undergraduate days — a very intelligent guy at a very selective institution — who microdosed LSD regularly, over at least an academic year.  The long-term effects were … not salutary.  His thinking became increasingly disordered.  It even began to affect his speech.  I’m not sure he managed to graduate.

    Disordered thinking.  Sound like anyone else?

  184. 184.

    geg6

    @narya:

    One of my older sisters has a birthday tomorrow and July 18 is my oldest sister’s birthday.  They’d both be thrilled to get an indictment present.

  188. 188.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @sab: When I was in Ontario back in ’76, I saw the northern lights almost every night for damned near the entire month of September and half of October. They were pretty damned cool and I recommend that anybody who gets an opportunity to see them, do so.

    Then I came back to Misery and I haven’t seen them since.

    Next September my sons and I are going on a paddle trip in the Boundary Waters. I hope to see them then, again.

  189. 189.

    JPL

    @Steeplejack: The answer to the question on whether or not Russia intefered with the election should have been yes.   Instead Wray gave a word salad and then said most would think so, or some other measly statement.

  192. 192.

    cmorenc

    @WaterGirl: Cannon’s strategy is to tolerate just enough slow-walking delay tactics by team Trump to push the actual trial off until after the election, while not doing anything to seriously handicap Smith’s prosecution beyond her failure to expedite progress.  This creates a win-win situation for her – if Trump wins back the presidency, maybe she gets a promotion by Trump to the 11th circuit.  If Trump loses in 2024, she plays the trial straight-up, resulting in Trump getting convicted, mitigating the initial damage done to her rep from her earlier handling of screening the classified docs in obstructive fashion.  And someday a future RW GOP Potus elevates her to a higher court.

  194. 194.

    Ken

    @Bill Arnold: If this is the sort of neural plasticity that makes you think “I’ll make the hull out of carbon fiber” or “If I don’t install the noise suppression systems I can launch on 4/20 hurr hurr,” I will take a pass.

  199. 199.

    WaterGirl

    @geg6: Either way, Cannon should recognize that she is in WAY over her head and based on her experience alone she should recuse herself.

    Part of being a professional is knowing when you are in way over your head.

  203. 203.

    Geminid

    I bought a copy of Sunday’s Washington Post and I’m still reading it. I came across this obituary today;

    Susan Love, 75.

    Surgeon spent decades crusading against breast cancer

    Susan M. Love, an indefatigable surgeon, author and patient advocate who spent years crusading against breast cancer, including as co-founder of the National Breast Cancer Foundation, a grass roots group that has aggressively lobbied to increase federal funding for research into the disease, died July 2 at her home in Los Angeles. She was 75.

    Dr. Love had a simple explanation for her work fighting breast cancer:

       For years, Dr. Love said, interviewers came to her expecting to hear a tragic story about how she came to specialize in breast cancer, perhaps because she had been at the bedside of a relative who died of the disease.

    Certainly not, she said. In fact, “it was pure sexism” that lead her to focus on breast surgery in the 1980s, after she became one of the few women to graduate from her medical school, and one of even fewer women to go into surgery.

    “I was the chief resident in surgery at Harvard, and when I finished, no one offered me a job,” she told a UCLA interviewer in 2028. “So I hung up a shingle, and the people that were referred to me were all women with breast problems. And I found that I could make a bigger difference in that arena….

    “There’s always something unique that, as a woman, you can bring to the table,” she continued. “And the trick, I think, is not to give in and put up with the [garbage], but to make your own path.”

    Dr. Love broke ground in another area as well:

       Dr. Love’s advocacy efforts also extended to her personal life, as an out lesbian in the years before same-sex marriage was legalized. After she had a daughter through artificial insemination, she waged a legal battle to ensure that her partner, fellow surgeon Helen Cooksey, could legally adopt and co-parent their child, Katie. The Massachusetts Supreme Court’s 1993 ruling marked the first time the state recognized a joint adoption by a same-sex couple.

    “Helen and I have privilege ,” Dr. Love said the next year, “so it’s our obligation to pave the way.”

  204. 204.

    trollhattan

    @Delk:

    Shit. Kid’s got a connection at Midway headed back to Cali. Explains why everything’s delayed.

  205. 205.

    Hardheaded Liberal

    @WaterGirl: I mentioned the false electors first because prosecutor Windom was mentioned with the reference to the grand jury that appeared to be considering action (indictments?) today with no witnesses in attendance.  I believe Windom is lead prosecutor on the false electors case.  And there’s been a lot of news reports about false electors being put on notice that they’re targets, & some of them agreeing to be cooperating witnesses

    It seems virtually certain that there will be one or more indictments on the false electors strategy – but only the Special Prosecutor knows approx when.

  206. 206.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @trollhattan: probably a dead thread, but…

    Hannah Follman @HannahFollmanTV

    Current look at Chicago O’Hare International Airport. Shelter in place for several tornadoes! Stay safe out there

    I get claustrophobia looking at that picture. I’ve gotten a little wiggy in that tunnel when it was just crowded (‘current’ as of two hours ago. the storm has moved through but I think the Chicago (and St Louis and Detroit and Milwaukee) airports are gonna be a mess. I hope this storm has momentum to bring some rain up to the fires in Canada.

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