All that access journalism apologia Maggie Haberman did for Trump during his administration, soft-selling Republican insanity, explaining away Trump's hate and bigotry and unhinged madness, boy, that really paid off for her. pic.twitter.com/i77oUxDZZr
— Stonekettle (@Stonekettle) October 26, 2023
Actually, I suspect Haberman is probably congratulating her own brilliant marketing right now. She made bank playing courtier to TFG while he was the biggest draw in the media, but he completely ruined the best-seller stats for her ‘I was there!!!’ book when he not only blew the election, but tried a self-coup that will always be on his permanent record. Now that he’s in steep decline, she’s turning herself into Joanie of the Narrative Arc, sacrificing her own privacy to draw the deranged assault of the failing tyrant. Or something in that media neighborhood.
IMO, this is a good thing: If Our Major Media has decided there’s more (rage) clicks in what passes for its cheapjack imitation of Operation London Bridge than in continuing to fluff the unfluffable… then TFG will be memory-holed, no matter how much longer he befouls the walls of Mar-A-Lago or his cult befouls our commonwealth.
And speaking of chocking, or choking…
BREAKING – Trump has tantrum in court, storms off in a huff after judge fined him for violating court order.
Instead of holding his usual press appearance inside or outside the courthouse, Trump ran away — with the secret service agents chasing after him.
— Tristan Snell (@TristanSnell) October 25, 2023
Cohen: When was the last time you ever saw Trump in front of a microphone in under five seconds and listen to the way he’s speaking like he ran out of oxygen.. pic.twitter.com/ITAMOsF4sT
— Acyn (@Acyn) October 25, 2023
b i t c h always talks s h i t in front of the cameras to try and impress his followers. Never has NOTHING to say in front of judge.
— Positive Brothers (@pblkbrothers) October 25, 2023
Sister Golden Bear
Paging Betty Cracker, paging Betty Cracker. First-ever Florida Man games will feature beer belly wrestling and ‘evading arrest’ obstacle course.
Frankensteinbeck
Oh my god. He keeps repeating ‘Perry Mason’. The dumbass for real actually sincerely thought he was going to pull some TV show dramatic reversal that would win everything in one genius gotcha move.
I know he’s this stupid. The shit-for-brains believed there was a server in Ukraine with Hillary’s emails on it! But sometimes it just… hits me, like a fresh revelation.
EDIT – He planned this. He PLANNED it. He sat in that courtroom waiting to spring his trap, thinking he had it all solved. I just… the funny thing is, he IS television. He’s such a 2 dimensional cartoon villain that he does things no real person ever would.
Alison Rose
Why does he capitalize random words like he’s Emily fucking Dickinson.
HumboldtBlue
Trump in a huff, watching his world burn before his eyes. Ya gotta love that.
Also, seeing as though it’s Balloon-Juice after dark, here’s some BBC for a chuckle or two.
Frankensteinbeck
@Alison Rose:
Common technique of creating proper nouns (‘Trump Hating judge’ for example) out of regular words and phrases, to highlight them as specific or important. It’s questionable but not weird grammar. Trump is just a theatrical, self-important idiot who both overuses and badly uses the technique.
danielx
@Sister Golden Bear:
I gotta admit, this is in the running for top ten most Florida headlines ever:
Yarrow
So what I get from this post is that the media ecosystem has decided that TFG is a loser and they’ll make more money from articles about his downfall. That sounds like good news!
dmsilev
@Alison Rose: I’m getting more of a General Ripper from Dr. Strangelove vibe from him. Sap and Impurify Our Precious Bodily Fluids.
dmsilev
@danielx: I’m guessing no second date after that?
HumboldtBlue
@danielx:
So… we’re not gonna split the bill, then?
Citizen Alan
I@Frankensteinbeck: I’m pretty sure atm that he thinks Perry Mason was a documentary.
piratedan
and the thing is, based on ALL of the shit that is on his legal agenda… this is a relative sideshow regarding Cohen’s lawsuit. He’s still got election interference, J6, Trump Org tax fraud and the secret documents cases out there with an additional sexual assault follow up from E. Jean Carroll.
If he’s losing his shit here… can only imagine what is waiting for him when he’s the main attraction.
also Mr. Smith Prosecutor sir, can we start seeing some members of Congress indicted for their J6 activities…. pretty please?
kma815
Can we henceforth refer to her as Maggot Hagerman?
prostratedragon
Midnight in Chicago: “Asturias,” Albeniz; Perez, piano.
JaySinWA
@dmsilev: Better necromancy than no romance at all?
ETA putting the dark into BJ after dark.
JaySinWA
@piratedan: This one’s for the money. If they dismantle Trump Inc. then his entire defense falls apart.
mrmoshpotato
@kma815:
Works for me.
piratedan
@JaySinWA: ahhh, ty… I thought that this was Cohen’s countersuit but its actually the Trump Org gig. Still, this would crumble his “business empire”….. would be great to see that entire family garnished, but Ivanka has already hung her garter on a different sugar daddy.
Kinda feel bad for the youngest kid, what an entirely fucked up life he must lead.
Lacuna Synecdoche
Is it me or, at the end, when Trump’s walking through the doorway with Eric trailing behind, does Trump look every inch of 5’7″?
Alison Rose
Colbert had a great segment of tonight’s monologue on the Maine shooting and Republican inaction on gun control. (Clip should go to the right point, but if not, it starts around 6:40)
eclare
@HumboldtBlue:
LOL….
Lacuna Synecdoche
@kma815:
I could be wrong, and often am, but I think Trump misspelled Magat in that comment.
eclare
The liberal redneck on Mike Johnson
https://x.com/traecrowder/status/1717568733097652523?s=20
Apologies I am still on Twitter. I think some of you use nitter, hope that works.
eclare
@danielx:
Wow. That is one way of saying no.
eclare
@Alison Rose:
That was great. Colbert has always been good at empathy, probably because of his past.
HumboldtBlue
@eclare:
Fuck the splitters, I’m on Twitter until it detonates like the space ball the space nerds talk about.
Try it neow! Try it neow!
danielx
@eclare:
Inquiring minds want to know: was there a second date?
Alison Rose
@eclare: Yeah, it always feels very genuine.
prostratedragon
@piratedan: Aren’t there problems getting evidence without running into speech and debate issues? Something like that has been holding up the exploitation of Scott Perry’s phone for over a year.
eclare
@HumboldtBlue:
Hahaha…he didn’t even mention how he fixed some guy’s dog. Going down with the ship, baby.
Tim in SF
Wow, I don’t remember Cohen ever being this funny or entertaining. He really knows how to stick the shiv into TFG.
Captain C
Michael Wolff’s much more timely and salacious and interesting book probably didn’t help her sales either.
piratedan
@prostratedragon: well…. that may be the case with Perry’s phone, but they’ve had the Meadows texts for over a year now with his immunity position. Granted IANAL, but as we can see, the coup is STILL in progress and it would seem that perhaps almost 3 years after the fact that something other than the Trump J6 should have dropped. Believe me, I understand how important it is to take out the King, but the money behind them and that little cadre that is continuing to hold the country hostage is wearing pretty thin and the repercussions of not multi-tasking on all of the MOC and the financiers is just allowing them to find other ways to fuck the country over.
cain
@danielx: That’s pretty much America’s relationship with the GOP/Trump.
Tehanu
@Frankensteinbeck: thank you! “… he IS television…” — that’s really good.
Villago Delenda Est
@kma815: MAGAt Haberhack.
cain
@Tim in SF: I remember two years back or so when reporters were asking him questions and he looked vicious and he would say vicious things.
Getting out of Trump’ world I think saved him. I’m glad he can finally live with himself and channel that energy and go after Trump.
I would love to see the Michael Cohen biopic.
BeautifulPlumage
@JaySinWA: thank you, thank you for this. It will come in handy with Halloween coming up. But then, do zombies have a season?
Shalimar
@Sister Golden Bear: Evading Arrest Obstacle Course sounds like Florida Man got drunk and watched I’m Gonna Git You Sucka.
Ruckus
@Tim in SF:
Cohen has had plenty of time around him to get the entire picture a few dozen times over that SFB/TFG is as worthless human being as it is possible to be, in humanity or money.
RaflW
I spent much of today (it’s late Friday evening here on vacay in the Antipodes) mulling our shit show nation and why I have a return ticket in 12 days.
If the Villagers are finally souring on TFG, that’s probably good news. It seems a tad early, tho (to be choosy). I think he should be the irremovable millstone from the R ticket when he clearly faceplants as a candidate.
Frankensteinbeck
@piratedan:
No, no. This is the second Trump Org suit. The first is over and declared his empire will be dismantled. How that works, I don’t know. This one is whether he’ll be fined $250 million on top of that. The dismantling happens after this second suit is decided, for some reason.
Tony Jay
Speaking of obsequious media courtiers starting the process of turning against their former date, this article in the FTFGuardian has all the hallmarks of starting life as a full-service bubbler performed upon the pasty creeps running the modern Nu-New Labour Party, but through the miracle of passive-aggressive editing now reads more like an exposé of an internal Party faction that began seriously conspiring to oust the popular leadership as early as 2017 and replace it with an easily manipulated front-man through whom they could purge the Party of anyone and anything that could challenge their grip on power.
I said back in 2020 that the FTFGuardian would swing against Starmer’s regime once an Election was in the offing, this is part of what that looks like.
p.a.
Heh. Have his lawyers told tRump that yet? Could he understand it if they did?
It’s telling that the easiest, sometimes the only, times the MSM stands on its hind legs is when they are attacked. Guarantors of the Public Weal!
Frankensteinbeck
@p.a.:
My best guess is that he thought he was going to overturn both trials with his Cohen objection. That’s why he lost it so bad when the judge denied him.
eclare
@Frankensteinbeck:
That is my understanding. Although the judge had ruled he thought he had a “gotcha!”
brantl
@mrmoshpotato: How about Maggoty Haberman?
Geminid
Maryland Congressman Paul Sarbanes has announced he will retire after this term. Sarbanes’ represents the 3rd CD that includes Howard County and the town of Columbia, west of Baltimore and north of DC.
This means Maryland Democrats will have primaries next year to fill two open seats. Rep. David Trone is running to succeed retiring Senator Ben Cardin. His 6th CD extends from the western DC suburbs north and west to the Pennsylvania and West Virginia state lines.
Rep. Trone’s principal primary opponent is Prince George’s County Executive Angela Alsobrooks, who was recently endorsed by Governor Wes Moore.
Shalimar
@Frankensteinbeck: Legally it is more complicated than that. Trump has already lost in summary judgment on the main issue against him. The Trump Organization is controlled now by a court-appointed agent. Parts of it definitely will be sold off to pay the judgment.
The trial is to decide the remaining issues New York sued Trump over, and to establish the total damages. Which will most likely be many times the total value of all of Trump’s LLCs. Everyone expects the entire organization to be sold off piecemeal, but we still need the final judgment and appeals before any dissolution can happen.
Frankensteinbeck
@Shalimar:
Thank you for the details! I admit, and maybe this is petty and unworthy of me, I am hoping Mar-A-Lago is included. It is featured on Trump Org’s homepage so it seems like it must be owned by that doomed organization.
EDIT – Which means he did think he was overturning the original case. That’s funny. My god, he’s a dumbass.
Princess
Honestly who even knows who Perry Mason is? I’m an old and I know but even I’m too young to have ever watched it. I bet half his voters are saying Hunh?
SiubhanDuinne
This is very clever. Brava!
eclare
First forty five minutes on Morning Joe were pro gun control, that was the only topic. I know I’m an idiot, but I hope things are changing.
satby
@prostratedragon: His hands were a blur! Fantastic.
Jackie
@dmsilev: That was the second date!
Tony Jay
@Princess:
It’s the way he uses it as well. Just “Perry Mason!”, like it’s a well-known shorthand for “Exciting last-minute turnaround that exposes the real evildoers and frees the good guys from legal threat!”
I mean, I know that’s how the Right’s propaganda machine works (Benghazi! Hunter’s Laptop! 9/11!) but the realisation that that’s how his lickspittles have to explain things in order to get Baron Rotbrain to remember them… that’s just delightful.
Geminid
Some Mideast news: last night US F16s operating in northeast Syria bombed two Iranian-backed militia bases. This was in response to recent drone attacks on US forces in the area.
This is a volatile part of the region, with American troops, American-backed Syrian forces led by the Kurdish YPG, American Arab allies who have been fighting the YPG, Iran sponsored militias, Syrian government forces and a contigent of Russian troops. There is also a Turkish-backed militia, and Turkiye has waged a bombing against YPG assets over the past two weeks.
At least there was some good news from the Caucasus region. Speaking at a conference in Tbilisi, Georgia, Armenian Prime Minister Pashinyan expressed optimism that his country and Azerbaijan could sign a peace treaty before too long. He also announced a “Crossroads for Peace” initiative whereby roads and rail lines blocked since 1993, when Armenia and Azerbaijan fought a very bloody war, will be reopened.
The Armenians won the 1993 war and then the Azeris won a second war in 2020. Last month, Azerbaijan took over the holdout Armenian district of Artsakh, recognized as Azeri territory by the terms of the 2020 ceasefire agreement. Now the two nations no longer have something to fight about and can turn their attention to rebuilding their homelands.
LiminalOwl
@BeautifulPlumage: Well, yes… https://youtu.be/6FndvMeXUgU?si=Vq9dKYI14REXmE7U
Jackie
@Alison Rose: Colbert is spot on.
Frank Wilhoit
@Princess:
There are times when it appears that the appeal is confined to people over 75, and you do begin to wonder how many of them are still around; but then you realize that, from a political marketing standpoint, “how many” is not the right question. The intensity of their emotions is what matters, because it is contagious.
Princess
@Frank Wilhoit: I’m sure all that is true but I still find myself thinking, man, you’re complaining that Biden is old? At least he lives in this decade.
Nukular Biskits
Good mornin’, y’all!
Got one for Betty Cracker in the “My governor is worse than your governor!” competition.
You’ve gotta see the original tweet but here’s the text:
Link to the absolutely stupid tweet: MS Gov Tate Reeves tweet
He took the side of cigarettes simply to be a defiant jackass.
Frankensteinbeck
Just imagine this from Trump’s perspective. I’d bet money it’s true, so imagine:
Trump has a plan. He has spotted the mortal flaw in his enemies’ plan, because he is so much smarter than them. With a dramatic gesture in front of the world, he’s going to skewer the case against him, snatch victory from the jaws of defeat just when his enemies thought they’ve won. His business empire will be intact. He’ll have scored a massive political victory that will make the election a landslide. Everyone will know the cases against him are just political persecution by his enemies, and they’ll fall apart. He’s going to sweep the board because he’s a genius who utterly defeated his enemies with one trick only he could have pulled off.
He’s actually in the courtroom, because he’s been waiting to spring the trap. He’s about to experience up close what is probably the greatest victory in his life. He has his gloating speech prepared to tell the world how he’s the real victim but he triumphed anyway. He didn’t prepare a speech for if the trick failed. How could it fail? He’d spotted his enemies’ fatal flaw. He had this locked up!
Then his lawyer makes the kill and demands the dismissal, and the judge tells him nope, this minor detail changes nothing, he’s still fucked.
My god.
Dorothy A. Winsor
@Shalimar: Your description of Trump’s situation made my heart go pitty pat.
mrmoshpotato
@brantl:
That works too.
Matt McIrvin
@Frank Wilhoit: People over 75 are the most consistent voters in the entire population, so any rational political strategy will over-weight appeals to them.
Matt McIrvin
@Princess: There was a new Perry Mason series recently, that made it more of a noir from what I understand (I didn’t watch it). The audience probably still skewed old.
mrmoshpotato
@Nukular Biskits:
Someone needs to ask his dumb ass which is his favorite cancer.
MisterDancer
Sadly, that makes sense from that side’s perverse POV. There are still a LOT of Americans addicted to tobacco. And we tax it heavy, and obviously, for good reasons.
Re-litigating why cigarettes have a soft ban for much of America would, depressingly, resonate, esp. in poorer areas — of which MS has a bunch. (I cannot recall, offhand, how connected MS was/is to growing tobacco; if so, there’s another connect.)
Eunicecycle
@Frankensteinbeck: that’s EXACTLY how it played out in his mind. So much of his lawyers’ court room antics and badly argued motions are just to mollify him that they are FIGHTING FOR HIM, using his own poor understanding of the law.
Matt McIrvin
@Frankensteinbeck: Marcy Wheeler thinks Trump isn’t even trying to win these cases, because he knows he can’t; he’s playing a purely political strategy to leverage his losses as points of outrage, to become President again so he has effective immunity from the law and can pardon himself out of the federal criminal convictions.
I do think this is a rational course of action for him– it’s the only one with any chance of success, and its chance of success is, if not over 50%, at least significant. It won’t bring the Trump Organization back (unless he can overthrow the constitutional order so thoroughly that civil law as we know it no longer exists), but he could probably parlay it into money in other ways.
Eunicecycle
@MisterDancer: traveling through MS about 5 years ago (maybe longer, time is weird) they still allowed smoking in restaurants. We asked for a non-smoking area, which was so close to the smoking section it really didn’t matter.
SFAW
@SiubhanDuinne:
Yeah, that one jumped out at me. I wish I could turn a phrase that well.
SFAW
After reading That Insane Mofo’s “New York is crime ridden and dying” BS, it occurred to me that there’s probably a higher per capita crime rate at Mar-a-Loco, and/or within “his” companies, than in any city in America.
But, of course, he’ll “save” it, the way he “saved” Perdue’s and Loeffler’s campaigns in ’20.
Matt McIrvin
@Nukular Biskits: There are still tobacco/cancer denialists out there–it’s an alt-med conspiracy theory, that Big Pharma etc. knows the true cause of cancer and is covering it up by talking about the danger of “burning leaves” which could never give you a disease.
Ken
The post title “The ‘King’ is Dying” did the same for me, but it was another dang metaphor. However, it did make me ponder how Trump would react to getting such bad news from his doctor, and in the following months as he awaited death. With the same grace and quiet dignity we’ve come to expect from him, I’m sure.
Frankensteinbeck
@Matt McIrvin:
And that’s the flaw in the theory, isn’t it?
evodevo
@danielx:
This WAS the second date LOLOL
A Man for All Seasonings (formerly Geeno)
@brantl:
I always preferred Access Sally for Haberman.
geg6
@Frankensteinbeck:
This exactly.
Geminid
@Frankensteinbeck: Rationality is a positive virtue that people are relectant to ascribe to Donald Trump. But he has a low, criminal cunning that at times can make him a rational actor, I think.
Chris Johnson
Your proposal is acceptable ;)
Since that will be in about a week, here you go. Take this if you want to live bsky-social-i7v34-xfz4p
Chris Johnson
turns out Balloon Juice has been by far the best place to share bluesky codes, because they get used by real live jackals :)
artem1s
@Frankensteinbeck:
This is so spot on. In his mind he’s still waltzing onto the set of The Apprentice – brilliant, perfect crafted argument in hand – all he has to do is recite his little memorized bit of script, loftily declare the judge a LOSER and a FAKE and BINGO! the whole prosecution is FIRED!
This guy has always believed reality TV is real.
Uncle Cosmo
@kma815: I’ve been thinking of her as Maggot Horriblewoman since forever. Though I admit, Access Sally is both pithier and more to the point.
Uncle Cosmo
@Geminid: Umm, I presume you mean Congressman John Sarbanes, son of the late Senator Paul.
Meanwhile David Trone is spamming Youtube with Senate campaign ads loudly touting how he never takes contributions from big donors, which is the Democrat-acceptable half-truth that he’s rich enough to self-fund. Let him go back to running his liquor store empire.
Paul in KY
@danielx: Straight up attempted murder and armed robbery there, IMO.
Geminid
@Uncle Cosmo: Thank you for the correction!
Yes, I don’t think David Trone will be missed. I doubt he can beat Ms. Alsobrooks. She seems like she’ll make a good Senator
Angela Alsobrooks would be Maryland’s first Black Senator, and the state’s first female Senator since Barbara Mikulski.
Paul in KY
@mrmoshpotato: Sometimes TFG does come up with some good nicknames…
Paul in KY
@Tony Jay: He can only be talking to his olds there.
Memory Pallas
@Chris Johnson:
I am one of the Nitter work-around people, but I am ready to call it quits now. Got any more Blue Sky Codes?
satby
@Memory Pallas: if you don’t get one email me at skinluvvers at gmail dot com. I have one I can share.
The Lodger
@Geminid: So is Jamie Raskin out of the Senate race then?
Ruckus
@Frankensteinbeck:
SFB has been 6th fiddle his entire life. Then he got a public promotion – to president, and his ego, which is all he was gliding along on his entire life and is far fatter than his fat ass, grew to even more epic proportions. He’s trapped in a world of extremely oversized ego and deteriorating, aging mentality, which was never all that and a bag of chips in the first place. His entire life has been lying and bullshit, and he’s the only one that doesn’t know it and besides, is far more than incapable of admitting it, let alone believing it.
Ruckus
@Geminid:
But he has a low, criminal cunning that at times can make him a rational actor, I think.
No, he doesn’t. Never has. It may be criminal but cunning it isn’t. He, as the old saying goes, has no oars in the water. And rationality has never been in the same room with him. Or the same state. The only thing he’s got going for him is an ego the size of Utah and the operational level of a 1952 Chevy 4 door sedan that has been sitting in the junkyard since 1959 and is now unrecognizable as anything more than a rusted out pile of useless crap.
Geminid
@The Lodger: Yes, Jaime Raskin announced a few weeks ago that he would pass on the Senate race and seek reelection to his House seat.