.It’s Day 9 of the actual trial! Day 13 if you include jury selection.
Best sources of live blogging that I have found.
Josh Kovensky (TPM) live blogging
Mark Sumner (Daily Kos) live blogging
Anna Bower (Lawfare) on twitter
Hello from 100 Centre Street, where Trump’s criminal trial on 34 counts of falsification of business records is set to resume.
The sun is shining in New York City, but the forecast in the Manhattan criminal courthouse looks like it could get a little Stormy… pic.twitter.com/nn9pTSYj8J
— Anna Bower (@AnnaBower) May 7, 2024
Tyler McBrien (Lawfare) on twitter
It’s a gorgeous morning at 100 Centre St (pictured left), where I’ll be covering Lucky Day 13 for Trump’s hush-money-election-interference NY criminal trial for @lawfare
Join me for the ride 🧵⚖️ pic.twitter.com/GTp6yv6Y6q
— Tyler McBrien (@TylerMcBrien) May 7, 2024
Adam Klasfeld on twitter
Good morning from New York.
It’s a sunny and temperate morning outside the lower Manhattan courthouse for Trump’s criminal trial, but reportedly, we’re in for a Stormy day in court, Daniels’ attorney told the AP.
Follow along here. 🧵
— Adam Klasfeld (@KlasfeldReports) May 7, 2024
Still loving this awesome image, courtesy of Baud.
Open thread.
WaterGirl
Stormy weather predicted today! And I’m not talking about the rain and thunder we are presently experiencing in Illinois right now.
Jackie
And Chicken💩 aka TIFG quickly pulled down his post this morning, attacking Judge Merchan and Stormy😂
Tony Jay
Oh, that song is just crying out for a situational rewrite.
oldgold
Surprised McDougal is not testify before Stormy.
I like that the prosecution is alternating between the mundane, but important document trail, and the salacious. But, usually, you like to take the witnesses in the order the events transpired.
JWR
Lol. From the TPM Live Blog:
Sounds like penile descriptions are welcome. Donaldo can prove otherwise by taking the stand and showing his “evidence”. ;)
NotMax
@Tony Jay
Also too that other tune.
Trivia Man
Defense objects …”we dont want any sexy talk. This is a documents trial”
Prosecutor: tough shit. We won’t describe any genitals but we want to get on the record they ‘did it’ and she hated it.
Bonus editor fun: NBC news live blog said they “want to illicit her testimony…” im pretty sure they said “elicit”.
NotMax
Mushroom pizza for the jury on lunch break?
//
citizen dave
Hey I walked by that building a few weeks ago on one of my two days walking around Manhattan.
It’s Primary Election day in the Hoosier State. Orange Man and Haley on that ballot; and Joltin’ Joe on mine. Although there are no contested Democrat races on my ballot, going to vote anyway. A bunch of nuts are running on the R side for our next governor. All of them think the 2020 Presidential election results are not legitimate…
H.E.Wolf
@oldgold:
One of the many things I appreciate about watching experts is that I often learn something that an expert knows, and I don’t.
A very mundane example: one of my co-workers at a long-ago job started taking photography classes, and eventually became a professional photographer.
I was one of the volunteer subjects for a portrait photography class assignment, and I got to see my co-worker in action behind the lens: so professional, even at that stage! It was a fascinating glimpse into a skill set I didn’t have.
JPL
@NotMax: 🫢
Jackie
Is Judge Merchan aware that TIFG has a conflicting schedule?🤔
I guess TIFG can prerecord his speech OR have his body double attend Barron’s graduation…🙄
Scout211
Smirking jurors. LOL
Jackie
@oldgold: Is McDougal on the potential witness list?
I believe Pecker/National Enquirer paid her off and TIFG never reimbursed him, so there’s no TIFG to McDougal money trail.
JPL
trump’s attorney is trying to argue that trump used a ghostwriter, so he didn’t necessarily write the book. trump must be so proud!
Mike E
I’m going to go out on a limb and predict Stormy won’t be crying on the stand, unless it’s from uncontrollable laughter.
oldgold
@Jackie: Yes.
Almost Retired
I was unaware that Trump wrote a book entitled “How to Get Rich.” Um….be born that way?
TBone
@NotMax: I had that delivered last night and JUST ate the leftovers!
TBone tribute to Stormy continues 🎶
m.youtube.com/watch?v=n0-FwK6Rn1U
lowtechcyclist
I said this in the overnight thread, but I think that image (your bitch called again, he needs more money) needs to be plastered on billboards all over red areas of swing states.
OzarkHillbilly
Keeping trump in his seat is a full time job.
WaterGirl
@oldgold: I’m guessing that it might have something to do with wanting to sandwich Cohen between two compelling witnesses. Plus documentation.
Searcher
Say what you will about New York, but I’m willing to bet we’ve locked up more corrupt politicians than any other US State.
prostratedragon
But Tuesday’s just as bad.🎵
lowtechcyclist
@NotMax:
Nah, have it sent to Trump and his defense team.
schrodingers_cat
@NotMax: Eeww brain bleach please.
TBone
I wish they could play this in the court room when Stormy strides in and takes the stand
🎶
m.youtube.com/watch?v=kq_GSIw0X0w
Spanky
As far as associating songs, at least no one has attempted “Riders on the Storm”.
Yet.
NotMax
@Spanky
“Stormy takes the stand” scans perfectly.
:)
Scout211
The Republican curse of the ghost writer. LOL
CNN
See also Kristi Noem.
smith
@lowtechcyclist: This group has been putting up billboards in swing states/areas for a while. Some of them are pretty hard-hitting, so you might want to suggest it to them.
Geminid
@citizen dave: This morning’s Politico Playbook linked to an article about the Indiana Governor primary. The reporter was struck by how the 5 contenders were focused on national political issues and paid little attention to Indiana matters.
oldgold
The Judge is going to be vigilant in keeping as much of the overt sexual information away from the jury. Where it could get interesting is on cross. Bove, who has proven he is not very good at cross, is not going to do the cross of Stormy. Susan Necheles is expected to do the cross. She is going to have to be very careful not to open the door to allowing Stormy to tell her tale in a manner that eviscerates Trump and lights up the media.
brendancalling
T’was midnight on the Stormy D
My mushroom dick small as a flea’s…
Omnes Omnibus
@oldgold: Maybe McDougal is going to be one of the last witnesses. I have no idea how compelling her testimony may be or how credible she will be, but if the prosecution thinks she’s good, she may be a memorable witness for the near the end.
For the non-lawyers, the idea is primacy/recency. Jurors remember the witnesses at the beginning and end your presentation of your case. You also bury the necessary but problematic witnesses (Cohen) in the middle.
Scout211
He does need a babysitter.
LAO
@oldgold: Well, for what it’s worth, I can attest to Susan Necheles’ talent. She’s a very good defense attorney.
smith
@LAO: Interesting how little cross-examination she’s been doing so far in this trial, given her reputation. Some commentators have noticed that she’s been declining to sign some of the more frivolous motions, so maybe she has some reservations about their strategy.
sdhays
@Trivia Man: The jury is fortunate that Judge Merchan is running this trial and not the House Republicans. Otherwise, who knows how many dick pics they’d be subjected to?
citizen dave
@Geminid: Thanks for that. Yes, the ads this season, with 5 (4 had money to be on the air) R Gov. candidates, were obnoxious and crazy. My wife and I often had to mute the sound. Only 1 guy is a traditional business R guy, but the one way ahead in the polls is our current trumper Senator. Based on the ads, I can only imagine how high the border/Finish The Wall (doesn’t this imply you failed the job?)/being trump’s bitch must test among their voters.
Indiana is doing pretty well after 16 years of two sane business-style R governors, but things might be about to change. The statehouse changed over to nutsville, of course.
NotMax
@LAO
Same was previously said about Blanche, AFAIK.
oldgold
“For the first time since opening arguments, there is no seating left in the courthouse.”
Gee, I wonder why?
LAO
@smith: I personally know her, not well but professionally. She’s not MAGA and she’s an ethical practitioner. So, I’m sure Trump isn’t a fan.
ETA: SN will go hard at SD. She’s not a softy, but she’s not unethical.
catclub
@JWR:
Of course there is a reason women were not considered able to _testify_.
lowtechcyclist
@smith:
Thanks for the suggestion! I’ll send them an email.
cain
@Mike E: I’ll be interested in what persona she’s going to put on – she has her porn actress one of course, but she’s pretty smart although she did get taken in by that clown lawyer, Avanetti ! He’s in jail, so she won that too.
UncleEbeneezer
@Omnes Omnibus: So funny, I was just yesterday taking an online training for communicating with children 10 and under (tennis coaching) and this was a key point: Whatever you most want them to do, save that as the last thing you tell them because usually anything before that goes right out the window.
Harrison Wesley
Jeffrey Toobin has counseled Trump to present a hands-on defense. “I know why/there’s a twinkle in my eye/Stormy Daniels…” Good day for a porn star martini.
oldgold
@LAO: She is going to earn her money today.
Dealing with people from the adult trades in the courtroom is treacherous. And, I have the scars to prove it.
japa21
@LAO: Stormy is no pushover. Plus, I, pretty sure she has been told what to expect. Actually, it’s nice to know Trump has one competent attorney.
TBone
susiemadrak.com/2024/05/07/republican-thugs/
cain
@LAO: what she doing on that defense team – lol. Sounds like something that you’ want to stay far from if you care about your reputation.
coin operated
@japa21:
Seconded. I follow her on the twitter machine and she is ruthless when dealing with hecklers on that platform. Sharp wit.
Mike E
@cain: see: John Huston’s scene-stealer of a monologue, “Of course I’m respectable, Mr Gittes, I’m old.” Chinatown has much wisdom in it’s screenplay, even though the main character never seems to learn.
cain
@citizen dave: wait, Pence is sane business type? I think the other governors have been ok – I might even include MItch Daniels. He’s currently president of Purdue, my alma mater – he’s done ok from what I can tell. We don’t seem to have the same Palestinian protests there from what I can see so nothing to fuck up there.
Jackie
@cain: I saw somewhere that Avanetti is a possible witness for the defense – although he’d have to testify via Zoom, or possibly written testimony?
CliosFanboy
@oldgold:
details please.
smith
@TBone: They all want to cosplay as gangsters, from the Defendant on down. Interesting that the language echoes that of one of his famous threatening posts on social media. You come after me, I’m coming after you.
NotMax
@coin operated
Not gonna take it lying down?
//
TBone
@smith: there are allegations that Rump’s Mnuchin was in with Bibi on Hamas funding, saying it’s not funding terrorism (link to xit at bottom of link I posted). I don’t vouch for veracity until I see wider coverage of this story.
Xit:
twitter.com/djrothkopf/status/1787578372140253624
Geminid
@TBone: Those guys talk awful big for one tenth of the Senate. I noticed they didn’t or couldn’t get one Democrat to sign their extortion note.
prostratedragon
Aside: It’s their catwalk, and everyone else is just renting it.
TBone
@Geminid: the Susie Madrak post I linked has a photocopy of the letter with all signatories. My new shit list.
Anoniminous
@TBone:
How completely expected.
Threatening and sanctioning the ICC is an on-going activity.
mrmoshpotato
Title needed some fixing.
Soprano2
@Jackie: He’ll probably do the speech remotely.
Jackie
Annnd Stormy takes the witness stand. Reportedly TIFG appears “antsy.” 🤭
Luther Siler
@citizen dave: Our Senate race is contested.
JML
My University announced a 13% cut in faculty last night (and a 13% cut in “administrators”) to try and get our budget back in line. Cutting our program offerings from 136 to 90, which actually makes a ton of sense because 75% of our undergrads are in 35 programs and 75% of our graduate students are in 25 of our programs.
we simply can’t afford to be all things to all students any longer. But this will be painful. Everywhere else has been cut to the bone; all that’s left are teaching faculty. And they refuse to admit it, even when they’re teaching classes with 5 students or have departments with more faculty than students admitted to the major. or think that it’s fine when a faculty member moves halfway across the country and hasn’t set foot on campus in 3 years.
It’s going to be a spicy week, I think.
TBone
@Jackie: 🎶
m.youtube.com/watch?v=ZEQydmaPjF0
⚡⛈️ I thought she was already testifying as to her background though.
jonas
@JWR: Reminds me of the great 90’s Onion classic: “Lewinsky Subpoenaed to Re-Blow Clinton on Senate Floor“
NotMax
@Jackie
From fornication to formication.
;)
Jackie
@Soprano2: 🤷🏼♀️
Sid
@LAO:
This whole shitshow started with Trump going (semi)hard at Stormy.
TBone
Here’s another shout out to my favorite meme this year so far.
Snoopy, on his rooftop typewriter:
smith
Mark Sumner:
TBone
@smith: 😆 oh gawd the FLOTITS jokes BE BEST
Geminid
@TBone: Turkish journalist Ragip Soylu linked to a report about the Mnuchin connection with the comment, “Wow.”
The financial arrangements between Israel, Qatar and Hamas have been reported in general terms for a few years now, but lately more of the specifics have come to light. More nails in “Bibi’s” political coffin, I think.
The Qataris know the whole story. They’re normally discrete about such things, but if they want to put anything out they have Al Jazeera to do it.
TBone
Are Usay and Quday in court today for emotional support? I mean, Beavis and Butthead?
cain
@Jackie: Given all the lies he’s done – he would be murdered on cross. Not a credible witness.
smith
@TBone: Qusay is, along with parking garage lawyer Alina Habba. His nearest and dearest.
TBone
@Anoniminous: that fucking guy Pompeo needs his comeuppance also too!
TBone
@smith: 😆 I can never get the spelling right, how odd
smith
Oh, God. He told Stormy she reminded him of his daughter, and we know which one he meant.
Scout211
Oopsie!
TBone
The jurors are stifling laughter! They will remember this! ❤️
wjca
Or just go to Minnesota and give the speech. Blow off the graduation. And be amazed to pick up a contempt finding.
LAO
I can see why the defense wanted to keep SD off the stand. Trump is really coming off as a total sleaze bag. I’m not surprised he’s scum but this is really brutal.
jonas
@JML: Oof! That’s ugly. At least they’re spreading the pain among the administrators, too, it looks like. Figuring out how to deal with fluctuating enrollments and deciding which fields get more resources and which should be let go is tough. Should a curriculum be merely a matter of supply and demand or do colleges and universities have an obligation to support a wide range of disciplines regardless of which ones are momentarily more popular than others? On the other hand, is it fair to ask some faculty or grad students to teach overloads and oversubscribed classes semester after semester while some colleagues have just a handful of students and get paid the same?
smith
@Scout211: They hadn’t even been married a year, and they were sleeping in separate bedrooms. I always thought of that marriage as more of a business arrangement than anything else.
Scout211
Yes, and all accounts describe her like a witness who is very conversational and open, as if she’s hiding nothing. IANAL but it seems that would play well with the jury.
Scout211
Just want to read this again.
Peke Daddy
@TBone: Mob type threats from Republican senators. My stars and bars!
TaMara
One of the commenters on MSNBC said about Stormy: the prosecution needs to just get it done with her. Get it in and out. (close paraphrase)
And I became 13 years old again and couldn’t help but snicker
citizen dave
@cain: Oh shit, I completely forgot about Mike Pence being Governor of Indiana. LOL.
I was thinking about Daniels and our current guy, Holcomb
ETA: Actually feeling pretty good I could forget about Pence. Maybe eventually we can all forget the orange guy too.
Scout211
CBS
So the show was fake. Duh.
You remind me of my daughter?! Ugh. Ewwww. The man is disgusting.
citizen dave
@Luther Siler: Yes, thanks for that reminder. Also my Dem House race. I stand corrected–I did look up my ballot earlier this morning.
TBone
@TaMara: 😆
JML
@jonas: We used to be almost 18K for enrollment and we’re now at 10K. You simply can’t support all the niche programs you created when enrollments were high and you had the faculty lines to support them all. Some of the programs reductions are more administrative than anything else; we had a “BA in Nursing” on the books, but no students enrolled in it: the BS is the primary degree for that department and is going strong. But others are tiny programs where there are more faculty teaching the degree than students enrolled.
You can still have a lot of breadth to your educational options and paths for students to explore with 90 programs. But some of these majors are just fading out here, and part of it is we have too many faculty who have no interest in recruiting for their own discipline. They expect someone else to do it for them, which we simply don’t have the staffing for (and then complain when we engage 3rd parties for marketing and recruiting support that we’re wasting money).
We’re struggling to support arts programs on campus in part because the high schools are dropping a lot of these programs too. You could sustain performance majors when you also had students getting the teaching degree for middle school or high school, but as those positions have withered so have those students. Same with some of the languages; if you want to major in German you’re going to need to go somewhere else, either larger or more specialized.
It’s tough, but you have to make choices.
TBone
Stormy, keep up the good work! ❤️⚡🎶
m.youtube.com/watch?v=uTyGszQ76EU
🩷🩷🩷🩷🩷
m.youtube.com/watch?v=u5zOpaYJRd4
Old School
@smith:
Wasn’t Barron a newborn at this time? I can’t imagine Trump allowing a bassinet next to his bed and have a baby crying multiple times throughout the night.
JWR
I wonder if they’ll ask her specifically about the sex, and if she really said it was the most forgettable 3 minutes of her life? ;)
smith
@TBone: I’m really hoping her testimony goads the Defendant into testifying himself.
Old School
@Jackie:
Or do both.
StringOnAStick
@smith: She has proven to be quite snappy with hecklers, and you just know she’s been planning for this testimony. They’ll be something memorable before she’s done testifying.
TBone
@smith: he’ll testify outside the court room again. And maybe go to lockup for the night some time soon. They’re prolly giving him extra sedation today when they’re on break to prevent explosive episodes 😆 you KNOW he’s shitting himself hearing this and seeing the jurors stifle their laughter 🥰
StringOnAStick
@Old School: If I was an image manager, I would tell him to say he’ll give that speech but show up late, apologise and go on about how wonderful it was to see his son graduate. You know, create some family man cred. All stage managed of course.
different-church-lady
Seems to me that in addition to the actual case, the prosecution is intent on dinging up Trump’s image as a winner in all of life.
I dunno if it’s going to work, or backfire, but it couldn’t happen to a bigger asshole.
wjca
Perhaps the initial layoffs will concentrate some minds on that front.
Scout211
Darn it.
different-church-lady
@LAO:
“You say total sleazebag like it was a bad thing!”
TBone
@different-church-lady: now I want to hear the gronking bird from the other day. “ASSHOLE. ASSHOLE. ASSHOLE!”
🤣
different-church-lady
@Scout211:
“Ms. Daniels, we do not need you to specify the exact species of mushroom…”
smith
@Scout211: It’s ok, we’re still getting the good bits:
Spanky
@Old School:
To be honest, I’d say the same thing for Melania.
catclub
@TBone: I have always thought Pompeo was the most competent and dangerous of the Trump appointees. Luckily the majority of the GOP does not share my opinion.
wjca
Tell him to do it, sure. But expect him to actually do it, once he’s on stage and on a roll? Don’t bet anything you can’t afford to lose.
zhena gogolia
@JML: So at your institution, the admissions office allows faculty to do their own recruiting? That’s quite unusual.
smith
The judge is still unhappy about the level of detail in the testimony, but from this distance, it looks like most of it is being volunteered by Daniels. How do you tell a witness not to say so much?
gene108
@TBone:
As the USA is not a member of the ICC, what leverage do these dozen dipshit Republicans think they have?
Scout211
@smith: But then this came after that.
It came after this:
hueyplong
@smith: Are Trump’s lawyers objecting
ETA: seems as though they are. They’ll need to be careful on cross not to open the door for more.
Bupalos
@Scout211: that seems like the most necessary part of the testimony possible, considering that the defense position is (I believe) that there was no encounter at all.
Spanky
@Scout211: Probable answer: “I felt nothing at all.”
Scout211
More details after the “too many details” warnings
smith
@Scout211: But he’s actually interrupting her testimony. I don’t see what the prosecution could have done to prevent this — it was a simple, direct and relevant question:
Trivia Man
@smith: I assume she is his Russian handler
hueyplong
@Bupalos: It’s ok for judge to curtail it now and then allow it on redirect if the defense lawyers “open the door” by challenging her on whether the event(s) happened at all.
Dorothy A. Winsor
@jonas: When I taught at Iowa State, there were (and still are) only three public universities in Iowa, and they all answered to one board of Regents. It may be different now, but at that time, the Regents practiced programmatic birth control. Each university had strong programs the others weren’t allowed to duplicate. Students sometimes had to choose which university based on what they wanted to major in
Scout211
This was amusing:
Yes, the sex was quite meh.
Scout211
Almost Retired
@Dorothy A. Winsor: Yep, as an Iowa native (but gone 40 years), that was my experience. Iowa State for engineering and Ag, UNI for teachers and Iowa for the Liberal Arts. Not surprisingly, all three campuses had very different vibes.
Brachiator
@Geminid:
Isn’t Al Jazeera now banned in Israel? Is this story getting to the Israeli public?
smith
@Scout211: This may be why the courtroom is subdued. From Sumner:
JPL
@different-church-lady: An Evangelical might say he’s a born again sleezebag.
Anonymous At Work
I think Daniels is only topped by Cohen on lists of worst witnesses so far, from what I’m reading. The question is whether the jury will sym/empathize with her discomfort about being forced into the situation, and adjust their view of her prior and wandering testimony to reflect that she was uncomfortable about the punchline.
Spanky
Wasn’t she also married at the time? Istm that the defense OR prosecution could bring this point up to support their argument.
Anonymous At Work
@smith: The punchline to her testimony. Will the jury work backwards through what she said previously from there? Will the defense cross-examination backfire with attacks on her, rather than the credibility? And how much besides the punchline matters.
Melancholy Jaques
@LAO:
But but, but . . . pundits assured us that Trump’s daliance with Stormy Daniels made him appear more vigorous and studly than faithful husband Joe Biden.
RandomMonster
I continue to be amazed that we’re reading about the presumptive Republican candidate for President of the United States sitting in a courtroom as a porn star recounts how he sleazily came on to her by laying on a bed in his boxers and a tshirt after she emerged from the bathroom. And the cheapskate never did buy her dinner.
Bupalos
@smith: I doubt the jury is going to feel that framing. People in general aren’t likely to allow an adult film star and producer any kind of naive vulnerability. Though I mostly believe it. It seems like Trump kind of led her towards the idea of “2 business people talking business” and she obviously had bad psychology around being in the adult entertainment industry.
smith
@RandomMonster: And Merchan really seems to be bothered by this. But I don’t see how you can have a trial that revolves around a sexual encounter without providing information about that event.
mapaghimagsik
I wish the orange failure would testify in his own defense, though i suspect even his lawyers aren’t that dumb.
Harrison Wesley
@TBone: In fairness, he’d be shitting himself no matter who was testifying. It’s his thing, his brand, you know? Them diapers ain’t gonna sell themselves.
YY_Sima Qian
Since this is an open thread:
I had thought that Hamas sending out the announcement of accepting a deal was purely a cynical tactic to make sure Israel gets blamed for any failure of negotiations, & it might still be the case. However, reading between the lines in the reporting here there might actually be a set of conditions that Hamas leadership could accept that would eventually release all of the remaining hostages in exchange for permanent ceasefire & some kind of path out of Gaza (& Israel for that matter), meaning Hamas’ political leadership have reasons to try to secure a deal. Makes sense as Hamas’ leadership presumably wants to avoid having the IDF roll across Rafah to catch/kill as many of Hamas’ remaining leaders & operatives as possible, not to mention a likely assassination campaign against the political leadership overseas. Whether they can bring Hamas’ military arm (such as the Sinwar brothers & Mohammed Deif) along is another question. The question for the Israeli leaderships is whether they are looking for reasons to secure a deal, or excuses to refuse. If there is will on both sides to secure a deal, the details can be ironed out.
OzarkHillbilly
@mapaghimagsik: Well, they were dumb enough to take him on as a client.
Trollhattan
@RandomMonster:
“Something, something, something that hussy gold digger trapped him because she wants $omething.”
And, scene.
smith
@Bupalos: I’m afraid you’re right. There will be an assumption that someone in her business would be prepared to handle a situation like this, and may not give her any benefit of the doubt.
It’s still true that there was a huge power imbalance here, that was actually increased by her being a porn star. If he’d actually raped her and she reported it, would anyone have taken her seriously?
Trollhattan
@YY_Sima Qian:
IMHO simplest answer: Bibi wants the war to continue as long as possible. Goalposts cleaned, lubed up and ready to roll.
NickM
I can’t see her affect, but if I were a juror I would feel sympathetic towards Stormy’s story of an awful childhood forcing her into sex work, reaching its nadir when she was almost forced into sex with the likes of Trump. It all sounds totally credible to me, and I don’t know that her line of work diminishes her credibility on any of the subjects she’s talking about.
citizen dave
@RandomMonster: It is an evergreen comment. These thoughts go through my head pretty much every day. We’ll get a big read on the state of the crazy of the electorate come November. But the war for reality and morals will go on.
Brachiator
@JWR:
I’m not that interested in knowing about the sex. But I am curious as to how the encounter happened. Did Trump treat it as a “p*ssy grab,” assuming that he could just have her without asking?
FastEdD
It looks to me like there are a lot of situations where the defense yells, “objection!” and the judge says “Sustained” but it doesn’t matter. The jury has already heard what the witness said and you can’t put the toothpaste back in the tube. Maybe it won’t be allowed as testimony but jurors have heard it anyway. A trial game played all the time.
wjca
And him repeatedly sustaining defense objections in this area can be helpful in refuting (entirely predictable) appeals claiming prejudice against the defendant.
Michael Bersin
@H.E.Wolf:
I’ve always considered portrait photography the most demanding. Well, after photographing freakin’ weddings.
cain
@LAO: well he is a sleazeball. Can’t wait for his evangelical supporters start talking about “imperfect vessels” and the like.
YY_Sima Qian
@Trollhattan: As Geminid has shared repeatedly, it is not just Bibi calling the shots these days. Now Gallant & Gantz are often more hawkish toward the Palestinians (both the WB & Gaza), Hezbollah & Iran than Bibi, the onus is really on them, whether they are looking for reasons to reach a deal or excuses to sabotage one. Of course, they could also be looking for a deal that ends the fighting in Gaza, at least for a while, so that the IDF can pivot north…
smith
@NickM: Even women with pristine backgrounds are routinely not believed when they’ve been coerced into sex in situations like this. It’s the classic date rape scenario.
In this case, she doesn’t see it as rape, but there does seem to have been an undercurrent of coercion. She says she started to leave when he showed up undressed on the bed but he stood in her way. She says she didn’t feel threatened, but noted there was a bodyguard at the door, and that the Defendant was bigger than she was. I think she came away with very mixed feelings about the extent to which she consented.
Trollhattan
@YY_Sima Qian:
Seems overly nuanced. Bibi is a willing vessel and his present attitude is no different from prior Bibi editions.
That said, there are indeed more radical and right-wing players here than Bibi and Peak Likud. These are dark times for the country because they are being led by the worst politicians available.
Wonder what that’s like?
NotMax
@cain
“Any port in a storm.”
//
Brachiator
@RandomMonster:
It seems like only yesterday when we were supposed to be outraged over the idea of a president getting a blow job from a volunteer intern in the White House.
Another Scott
I’ve been reading through the TPM live blog – thanks for the pointer.
I hope Ms. Daniels isn’t damaging her testimony by giving too much detail. :-/
Is McDougal going to testify? She might be an interesting witness (having a less salacious reputation than Ms. Daniels)… Let’s see… This USAToday piece says she “could” testify.
It’s good the prosecution has a strong case on the documents. Eyes on the prizes.
Cheers,
Scott.
smith
@Brachiator: IOKIYAR writ very, very large.
It’s not only this trial, but also the fact that he’s an adjudicated rapist, and still has the support of 60% of churchgoing “Christians.”
Omnes Omnibus
It is not a sexual assault trial. She could have been totally enthusiastic about the encounter and the payoff for silence would still be the issue. Dirtying up Trump as a sleaze is just a bonus.
The issues that matter here are whether she had sex with him and whether he paid her for silence about it.
Josie
@Omnes Omnibus:
And what his motivation was for wanting her silence–to protect his family or to win the election.
wjca
In fairness, cultures evolve. Yes, even among the reactionaries.
For example, back then the very idea of same sex marriage was enormously controversial. See the 1996 Defense of Marriage Act. Today, a married gay guy is a cabinet secretary, and, note, had no particular difficulty getting confirmed (the vote was 86–13). Things change.
JPL
@Omnes Omnibus: You’re right but it does help humanize her to the jury.
Mel
@NickM: This, absolutely. I just hope the jury can get past any Puritanical bias and instead really hear and understand that.
TBone
(Pilfered from elsewhere)
She’s being assaulted 😆
hueyplong
@Omnes Omnibus: Agree. The amount of sympathy (if any) her tale generates is not what’s important for a conviction. She’s getting the “had sex and was paid to keep it quiet” thing done. The rest is the amount (if any) of Schadenfreude we get from knowing Trump has to sit there and witness people hearing the tale of what a shit he is.
Origuy
The circumstances of the sexual interaction are relevant because it’s been portrayed in the media as pay for play, with Stormy as a willing participant in return for a large amount of money. But it’s really date rape, with hush money coming from campaign funds. If she hadn’t been a porn star, and he hadn’t been a billionaire, he could have gone to jail for sexual assault. (Unlikely, though, even these days.)
TBone
@hueyplong: I can’t wait to hear what Joy Reid has to say!
hueyplong
@TBone: Seems like a high tech lynching to me.
I’m not interested until/unless Varney starts dragging her in the direction of a gravel pit.
TBone
@hueyplong: 😆
Omnes Omnibus
@Josie: I am not sure she can shed light on that. That will be for other witnesses.
@JPL: They don’t have to like her. They just need to believe her.
Anonymous At Work
@Another Scott: McDougal smells like a witness that the prosecutors can pull out late or as a rebuttal witness, depending on the tactics the defense uses. “This was all blackmail from a professionalized rumor-mill, egged on by Michael Cohen wanting more money and a government job” is one line that presents a problem for TFG because “It did happen, let’s call more witnesses” is the pre/re-buttal.
John S.
@TBone: Perpetual victimhood is a requirement for being a Republican.
Bupalos
@Mel: I’m afraid what the Jury will not get past with this testimony in general is that it’s simply muddy, and muddies up the water in making the case that Trump’s motivation was all about the election.
It sounds at points like Daniels didn’t want the story to come out either. At other points she did. At some points like she was trying to make money off it, at others like it wasn’t about money. It’s all kind of complicated and just underlines that motivations can be complicated… which does not help this case that is all about creating a “1 leads to 2 leads to 3” kind of simplicity.
Anonymous At Work
@TBone: I want someone to ask her “How old were your children before they were safe from the gravel pit treatment?” A bird-dog trained puppy wouldn’t know any better than a 2-year old child about creating problems.
TBone
I hope Hillary is having a great time today!
twitter.com/MaggieReed91892/status/1779977573424148643
TBone
@Bupalos: I’m not over thinking it, and the jury isn’t supposed to either.
hueyplong
@Bupalos: I might be willing to bet a small amount that the jury isn’t as befuddled as you think they are.
NotMax
@Omnes Omnibus
In the case of Ms MacDougal, his colluding with, coercing, soliciting or otherwise having direct knowledge of any arrangement involving a third party to make payments in violation of election law (such violation a charge for which Pecker was granted immunity as part of an agreement to testify for the prosecution).
Obligatory IANAL.
MazeDancer
@Origuy: Trump said “Thought you were serious” about getting ahead in Hollywood as Stormy started to leave.
Every powerful producer to every powerless woman. Harvey Weinstein in action.
zhena gogolia
@hueyplong: Yeah, sheesh.
Soprano2
@Scout211: That could be another sign of dementia. I couldn’t leave my husband alone in public for two minutes unless I could see him. I’m afraid to drop him off at the door of a building unless I can keep eyes on him the whole time.
oldgold
On cross, the best course would be to be extremely brief or no cross at all. Stormy’s testimony, while scintillating, does not go to the gravamen of the criminal case. And, on cross, she can hurt you badly. Particularly, if you open the door to a salacious re-direct.
Trump’s lawyers know this, but I expect he is so butt hurt over this testimony that he will insist they go after her; particularly, as to the alleged sexual interlude. If they do, it is going to be a very perilous endeavor.
Hoppie
@different-church-lady: Guessing, probably Amanita Phalloides subs. Hadrianus.
Brachiator
@wjca:
Hypocrisy pretty much stays the same. Conservatives who blasted Clinton fall all over themselves to excuse Trump.
ETA. I note that these are side issues with respect to the charges against Trump, but the political dimension and how voters will process this trial is just as important as the trial itself.
Also, it is ironic that Trump may have paid hush money out of concern for how it might have affected the election; and now he must try to control reaction to this trial, no matter the outcome, in order to control how revelations might affect the upcoming election.
Matt McIrvin
Teri Kanefield thinks the prosecution chose a flimsy theory of how what they’re charging is a felony (conspiracy to commit election interference). She thinks they would have done better to pursue campaign finance law violations. So I haven’t been getting my hopes up.
But she also (surprisingly to me) says she’d bet on a conviction, simply because most criminal trials that actually happen end in conviction, and Trump’s egregious behavior probably won’t endear him to the jury.
terikanefield.com/wheres-the-beef-trumps-manhattan-criminal-case-and-some-mind-bending-legal-puzzles…
Who knows.
JWR
@TBone, @hueyplong: Yeah, I don’t find her testimony confusing at all. She’s just making it clear that the sex occurred.
Another Scott
@JML: Change is hard, but always necessary. It’s the only way progress happens.
Good luck!
Cheers,
Scott.
Soprano2
@Geminid: You see that in MO, too. They talk about “securing MO from illegals” and “firing liberal prosecutors”, but say little about how they’ll improve MO. Since the R’s have been in charge here for 20 years, what else can they do?
Ironcity
@TBone: poor baby. But not assaulted like Cricket.
StringOnAStick
@Hoppie: Heh, A knowledgeable mushroom reference! Hat tip!
Soprano2
@JML: I talked to someone from the staff of my alma mater in 2019 – she was one of the people who had lunch with donors. She told me that in 5 years there was going to be a “demographic cliff” for colleges because the graduating high school senior classes were going to be a lot smaller for a few years. She said there would be colleges that wouldn’t survive it. She told me some of the stuff they were doing to weather it – more night classes, more reaching out to non-traditional students, trying “up” their game for regular students.
mrmoshpotato
@Origuy: So for the umpteenth time, the orange shitstain is more of a pile of shit than the media reports. Son of a bitch.
JWR
Adding this Eric Trump tweet from a little while ago only because it hasn’t been mentioned before:
Sounds like flop sweat to me.
Bupalos
@hueyplong: I can see where you could get to just the simple takeaways and say they were established- there was a sex relationship here. Trump didn’t act like he cared much about Melania finding out, only the election made that matter to him.
But she just put a lot out there that might hopefully be damaging to Trump outside the case…. but I’m not excited about cross with all the handles she gave them.
mrmoshpotato
@JWR: Oh Eric! Shut the fuck up, GUMS! Go cry to your American Psycho brother!
comrade scotts agenda of rage
@Soprano2:
Yup, always trying to Out Kansas, Kansas.
The only time they pay attention to local issues is when the locals vote on something statewide (like the puppy mill ban or so-called ‘right-to-work’…for less) that runs counter to the RWNJ agenda, then they get right down to crafting legislative ways to thwart the vote.
Hoppie
@StringOnAStick: Actually saw one in Orlando once, in wood chips in hotel landscaping. Quite the, er, spectacle.
smith
@JWR: This is one reason they really do have to have some detail about how this encounter came about. The defense could argue that she was the one who came on to him in order to entrap him in an extortion scheme that had nothing to do with the election. I don’t know if the defense can abandon the “it never happened” line at this late point, but that kind of alternative explanation might be attractive.
TBone
@JWR: 😆 📢 hit dog hollers!
Guy on MSNBC just now made a great point: all of this is GREAT for the prosecution because it is showing just how much Rump didn’t want Stormy’s story to come out, which is, after all is said and done, the reason why he brought this all on himself.
rikyrah
@Soprano2:
What illegals?
What border are they trying to secure?
Tony Jay
@JWR:
Extortion for what, Eric? You’re saying that money changed hands to try and keep a sexual encounter between Stench and Stormy out of the news?
Isn’t that the prosecution case in a nutshell, Eric?
Trollhattan
@TBone:
“Americans love our dogs. Most of us, anyway.”
Not only is she immolating her political career, she’s even poisoning the future Fox gig. Hellooo, NewsMax.
Trollhattan
@JWR:
“I know extortion buddy, and this isn’t pure, it’s not even extortion.”
“I’m Eric.”
Redshift
@Bupalos: One of the things the jury will surely be instructed about is that the motivation the prosecution is trying to prove doesn’t have to be the only one. Lots of potentially criminal conduct has multiple motivations, and that alone doesn’t get you off the hook for the one that’s illegal.
Also good to remember that part of the trial is to get all the evidence introduced and in front of the jury. Closing arguments (as I understand it) is where the prosecution will connect things up; they’re not relying on the jury making all the necessary connections at this point. (Again, from what I understand, the prosecution is very limited in how much of that they can do at this point — they can try to make sure witnesses to talk about the things they need, but they can’t interpret.)
Geminid
@Brachiator: Any Israeli can dial up Al Jazeera on the Internet just like you and me; they just can’t get get the TV feed through a regular channel now, and the Jerusalem bureau has been raided and shut down. But this story reaches Israelis through domestic and other international media as well.
I would point out though that I was talking about how the Qataris could lay it out in detail if they want to through Al Jazeera, not that they will. They don’t really need to because the general outlines are already well-known. The Mnuchin connection is a newly reported element though.
scav
@Trollhattan: Yeah, I mean the whole “It wasn’t a puppy it was a working dog!” line of defense over shooting it does rather rhyme with the party’s embrace of gutting child labor laws and workplace safety regulations. “It’s not children we’re maiming, it’s employees!”
TBone
Holy shit, they’re trying SO hard to run distraction interference that they hired a swimsuit model as RNC spox and she’s the daughter of Russian immigrants. The quotes here are…😆🤣
crooksandliars.com/2024/05/rnc-hires-bikini-model-be-their-new
smith
The Defendant just posted a copy of an affidavit Daniels signed in 2018 stating she never had sex with him. Her story has gone back and forth over the years, something she’s going to have to explain. I wonder if the prosecution will bring it up before the defense does.
smith
@TBone: Hmmm, a bimbo with Russian roots. How very on-brand for the GQP.
oldgold
@smith: If he did so, that is a blatant violation of the Gag Order.
Redshift
@Geminid: In the DC area (Ms. watches local news) we’ve been getting horrible ads for the WV Governor primaries. Apparently the biggest issue facing West Virginia voters is that trans people might exist somewhere. That and “woke” are all the ads talk about, including from the supposed “Democrat.” It must be great that life in WV is perfect and everything else they might need government for has been solved. Grrr…
Scout211
O. Felix Culpa
Per TPM live blog, Blanche now wants a mistrial declared over Daniels’ testimony.
ETA: See Scout211 at #217.
Bupalos
@smith: Currently Blanche is trying to get a mistrial on the basis of her testimony bringing in the issue of consent and prejudicing the jury.
No way he’s going to get that ruling. But it’s setting the table for appeal.
Old School
@smith:
Where?
His Truth Social has posts calling for a mistrial and saying:
“This Witch Hunt is FALSE ANCIENT HISTORY that was fully adjudicated by the Voters in the 2016 Presidential Election.”
cain
@smith:
That might work for males, but women are never going to buy the argument of entrapment as a group. Religion across the globe always have some story about males being trapped by women – like they would be completely pure if it wasn’t’ for these women! Like men aren’t dogs – crickey.
Scout211
@Scout211:
JBWoodford
@StringOnAStick: Or cap tip, as the case may be.
Matt McIrvin
@Soprano2: There are a lot of private primary and secondary schools going out of business these days. My daughter’s shut down at the end of last year and she had to transfer to the public high school for her senior year–which, to be honest, she’d been mulling over doing anyway because of the greater variety of classes there, but it was a big bureaucratic mess for a while there.
One of her classmates transferred to another private school and then THAT one shut down within months.
TBone
Judge Merchan already told Todd that his credibility is in the shitter (right next to those newkewlar sekrits). Expected nothing less than demands and howls of “UNFAIR!” He’s doing his client’s bidding.
Redshift
@Old School:
Pity that probably can’t be introduced as evidence — he’s practically confessing that this was all about the election.
cain
@Soprano2: The upcoming generations are going to be a lot smaller. A labor shortage will be good as it will drive businesses to be better at compensation, and give unions a leg up.
Pretty soon, just about every sector is going to be hurting for people. You can’t build AI powered robots withouts people, at least not initially. Although, it will be curious how revenue works then because AI robots don’t make any money.
piratedan
still kinda begs the question, then why did DJT authorize payment to her if “nothing happened”? Considering his past behavior of not even paying for the services received from all kinds of other “vendors”, and the defensive affadavit that Daniels signed sure does reek of her being paid off for “something”. The issue isn’t that he paid her, it how he paid her and doesn’t that kind of defeat the whole purpose of the case itself?
smith
@Old School: Here’s the link Mark Sumner posted:
twitter.com/TrumpDailyPosts/status/1787894013070340379
smith
@cain: Gee, it’s kind of too bad we can’t get people to come here from other countries to take up the slack.
TBone
@smith: ankle shackles time soon approacheth. Let the Finding Out commence!
Scout211
gene108
@cain:
Really need to rethink what economic success is. For the last 200 years, the globe has been running on a model of more consumption equals economic success – more cars sold year-over-year, for example, is successful.
I don’t think the business community is open minded enough to question their own assumptions of what success should look like to make a smooth transition to a lower consumption world.
jonas
@cain: I think most companies are figuring automation will take care of everything. Of course there’s always the question of who will be left to buy their product after everyone’s been put out of work by robots or computers…
Another Scott
@Scout211: That was fast.
Good.
Cheers,
Scott.
JWR
@Redshift:
Plus, this wasn’t fully adjudicated by a lot of your voters because you covered it up, dipstick.
geg6
@hueyplong:
Yeah, I kind of think they are a bit more savvy than our commenter gives them credit for being.
Not to mention the thousand things he’s already done in front of the jury to alienate them. Stormy hasn’t alienated them, I bet.
Marcopolo
In another of Trump’s legal cases, Newsweek just reported that Jack Smith has a couple of images of classified docs they found on Nauta’s phone. And that he shared at least on of those images in a text. This would go to the argument that these docs were definitely note stored in a secure fashion. Also looks pretty bad for Nauta—you know if the trial ever happens!
Link: newsweek.com/photo-evidence-trump-classified-documents-case-walt-nauta-phone-1897561
JWR
@Another Scott:
Quick, someone tell judge Cannon!
jonas
@piratedan: Well, he claims it was to avoid embarrassing his family or something, even though “it never happened.” Yeah, right. As if any of those people are capable of shame or embarrassment. But you’re right: the legal issue isn’t paying off a porn star, it’s committing business/accounting fraud to do so. Had Trump just written her a personal check and not told anyone, we wouldn’t be here.
ETA: and of course the whole campaign finance angle is there, too. He was clearly working to keep this stuff from harming his campaign.
Another Scott
@gene108: Like with software, we won’t own anything any more. Perpetual lease payments, is my guess.
“Your lobster thermidor dinner tonight is $15/month*.”
* – to be billed annually, with expected 7% inflation.
:-/
Cheers,
Scott.
Citizen Alan
@cain: I dunno about that. When The Rapist Judge Kavanaugh was getting grilled by the Senate, I was shocked when my RWNJ sister said that she absolutely believed him because she had two sons and she was terrified of the thought that they might someday be falsely accused of rape. When I brought up the fact that she also had a daughter who was just starting college, she completely dismissed the possibility of the daughter getting date-raped at a party because “I raised her better than that.”
smith
@Marcopolo: If the trial ever happens. “Judge” Cannon just put off another required hearing, with no new date for it scheduled.
Steve in the ATL
@jonas: UBI!
Redshift
@Scout211:
IANAL, but I suspect that arguing the jury was prejudiced by testimony you didn’t raise an objection to is probably not strong grounds for a mistrial.
Citizen Alan
@Redshift: It is not. Pretty much every issue not preserved by an objection is waived on appeal.
geg6
@Matt McIrvin:
And I’ve read numerous attorneys’ takes that say the case is much stronger than they had expected. These people can say whatever they want. I don’t listen to or accept the reasoning of any of them. Talking head attorneys have been as disappointing to me the last 8 years as has every other talking head. They don’t know shit unless they are working the case, are a member of the jury or are the actual plaintiff or defendant.
geg6
@Soprano2:
If they really wanted to do something that will help them weather the coming storm, they would get rid of all the highest paid administrators and coaches. That would drive down cost of attendance, thus making college look attractive again, and not affect education one single bit. Ask me how I know.
Steve in the ATL
@geg6: except for Kirby Smart, of course
Burnspbesq
@TBone:
One imagines a call from Blinken, the gist of which is “ignore those assholes, and do your job the way you know it’s supposed to be done.”
geg6
@smith:
Ooooo, Donnie’s violating the gag order again!
TBone
@Marcopolo: I read somewhere yesterday that the defense is claiming they had no notice of this, despite being provided classified discovery material in this regard months ago. As a matter of fact, it said the whole contents of his phone were provided to the defense, with special attention paid to this very thing.
smith
@geg6: I’m not convinced it is a violation. It’s not really an attack — he just simply posted without comment a document that was just now introduced into evidence. I’m not sure Merchan will want to go to the mat over that.
Redshift
@geg6: Yep. There was an analysis a few years back of the increase in the cost of college, and the vast majority of it comes down to state governments cutting funding and administrations larding on a lot of middle management.
ETA: Not doubting your info from personal experience, just noting that there’s plenty of evidence it’s widespread, too.
Fair Economist
@TBone: Even Fox has joined in on dogging Noem.
TBone
@Fair Economist: 👍 waiting for the next candidate who does a spectacular flameout to outdo Krusty. There will be many contenders in my flaming clown awards ceremony.
Redshift
@geg6: Yeah — I don’t agree with Teri Kanefeld on everything, but one thing she’s very strong on is that the incentive for TV lawyers is to fill time even if they don’t know anything, and to stoke outrage, neither of which is conducive to conveying accurate information. (Not very different from cable as a whole, but at least there’s the distinction that pundits and commentators do that sort of thing in any environment, whereas working lawyers and legal scholars are less likely to elsewhere.)
TBone
@Burnspbesq: 💙 one ringy dingy…
JWR
From the ruling denying a mistrial:
Does this play into a later appeal, that there were not more objections? (IANAL, as if U couldn’t tell. ;) )
Geminid
@Burnspbesq: Blinken probabably doesn’t want to see those ICJ warrants go out either. I think that is the position the US government has communicated to the ICJ. But NSC spokesman John Kirby has said the aministration does not believe the ICJ should be penalized or threatened either.
One interesting aspect of the rumoured charges is who apparently will not be indicted: War Cabinet member Benny Gantz. Gantz has helped oversee Israel’s war effort since October 12, but it’s his colleagues Netanyahu and Gallant at risk, along with the IDF Chief of Staff, Halevi. My guess is this is because the international community has high hopes for Gantz as Israel’s future Prime Minister and they want to keep his slate clean, and the ICJ understands this.
Another Scott
@Redshift: Yup.
Not having a reliable source of (quasi-) no-strings money, universities have to chase grants and sell services to industry. Grants have reporting requirements, audits, rate-of-spend requirements, meetings, layers of oversight, and all the rest. Working with industry means that you have to have patent lawyers who know who owns what. Working with the DoD has all kinds of requirements. Etc, etc. One needs more administrators for that.
Not excusing it, but it’s yet another example of how “saving taxpayer dollars” is expensive.
:-/
Cheers,
Scott.
TBone
@smith: is it maybe an attempt to besmirch the credibility of the witness, tho? Off limits was my understanding.
smith
@TBone: Could be. Let’s see if the prosecutors bring it to Merchan as a violation.
TBone
@smith: 👍 I’m waiting for Todd to step in a big pile of stoopid with his cross. Barn door style.
smith
@TBone: Blanche isn’t doing the cross — it’s Susan Necheles. I guess both sides thought it would go better woman to woman.
Belafon
@Scout211: Isn’t the job of a prosecutor to bias the jury against the defendant? There are obvious guardrails built into the constitution, but biasing is the goal.
Lyrebird
WORD!!!!
On more than one occasion, the CEO of Japan Airlines has either lowered or skipped his paychecks, just keeping stocks or whatever, to keep the airline going during economic tough times. Here is a link about one of those times.
I remembered that when I was first told how much a big sports university coach makes, and there was noise that the U Conn president didn’t make as much, it was millions of dollars, and they were raising tuition… I though fkin A, why not be like that Japanese CEO? Take the same pay as the most senior business professor and put the rest towards scholarships.
TBone
@smith: righto, I forgot. Still waiting for the barn door to be flung wide. I mean, they didn’t even bring their objections timely!
hueyplong
@Belafon: It’s a variant of the truth having a liberal bias.
Well, what it really is, is a stuck pig squealing, and I’m here for it.
Lyrebird
@TBone: I forget, are you one of our legal jackals? Were you saying or someone else saying recently that when Habba didn’t object, she lost out on some opportunities to lodge complaints later? IAONAL
O for obvs
TBone
@Lyrebird: IANAL but worked for many species in many specialties.
Martin
@jonas: There are good arguments that universities – especially university systems should specialize their campuses somewhat. Obscure language programs are a typical example – if you try and support these everywhere there’s just not enough demand, so spread them out – have one campus do east asian languages and another do NA indigenous ones, etc.
There are costs to doing this for students and scholarship. There’s an argument that scholarship shouldn’t be parceled out like product demand, but should be valuable to the community for its own sake. A lot of academia doesn’t find its value for years or decades.
But in the end, in the US, a university is selling a service to a set of consumers. That’s the system we seem to want. It is a much more competitive space than people realize, or should be. You have about one private college close each month, and you have states with declining enrollment looking at closing/consolidating publics as well.
JWR
NBC live blog:
hueyplong
@JWR: No shit, NBC, she’s being crossed.
This is stupid commentary.
Uncle Cosmo
Not sure if this is still true, but in my day no campus in the University of MD system was allowed to offer a degree in any discipline that another campus already offered – and most were already offered at the flagship campus in College Park near DC.
When I became a graduate assistant at the Catonsville campus in southwest Baltimore County campus (UMBC, est. 1966), the position** came with 9 credit-hours of tuition remission per semester anywhere in the system, but to do a master’s in Statistics I had to do it 30 miles down the road at College Park. I started in fall 1973, just in time for the first oil embargo, with a car that got all of 14 mpg. After that I took classes at UMBC and eventually got an MS in Applied Mathematics from them – with a concentration in statistics, it was the same or similar coursework for the most part, and (as the saying goes) it was like pissing one’s pants in a blue serge suit.***
** FTR there were so few actual graduate students at UMBC that they had to hire assistants for courses independent of whether they chose to attend the grad school. When I got my degree it was one of a half-dozen awarded, including the first ever PhD.
*** “It gives you a nice warm feeling all over, and nobody else notices.” Anyone who recalls blue serge fabric will know just what I mean; the rest of yinz….
smith
@Belafon: I think their point is that the overall creepiness of the encounter is irrelevant to the charges, so shouldn’t be admissible.
My sincere hope is that the Defendant will take the stand (please, please, please!), at which point the prosecution can bring up the E. Jean Carroll case to impeach his reliability as a witness. Those facts will resonate with what we heard this morning, since one of the Defendant’s key arguments in both cases is that no sexual encounter/assault ever happened.
Lyrebird
@TBone:
:-)
nicely put
smith
Wow, big old hailstorm in Chicago right now.
TBone
“Orange turd” I SAID WHAT I SAID 😆
TBone
@Lyrebird: 💙 it took a long time before I found anyone I respected enough to stay on board with. I was even begged to stay, more than once. Finally, I found a firm full of Dems, a rarity in my former locale.
JWR
@hueyplong: Like, no shit, Sherlock.
lowtechcyclist
@Martin:
So if private colleges are closing, and enrollment is declining at public universities, are fewer college-age people going to college, or are we in one of those ‘baby bust’ phases? Were people not having kids during the Bush presidency?
TBone
@lowtechcyclist: I know I wasn’t!
lowtechcyclist
@Uncle Cosmo:
“Your eyes, your eyes, they shine like the pants of a blue serge suit.” (pause) “That’s not a reflection on you, it’s on the pants.”
-Groucho to Margaret Dumont (can’t remember which movie)
David 🌈 ☘The Establishment☘🌈 Koch
@smith: Ghost of Mike Bilandic making an apperance
Warblewarble
@Geminid: It’s leave Gantz alone he’s our favourite genocidist.
lowtechcyclist
@TBone:
My wife and I were trying, but we weren’t having much luck. By the time we adopted the kiddo, Obama was President. :-)
Harrison Wesley
@TBone: “Orange turd?” You’re talking about the famous summer-time cocktail of the Florida Republican Party?
TBone
@Harrison Wesley: on cross, it was from a tweet by Stormy brought up by the defense attorney.
Hee hee on the cocktail. Orange creamsickle BLECH
JML
@Uncle Cosmo: Yeah, it’s much more the wild wild west when it comes to that, in part because we don’t necessarily have the same kind of system and levels of control. My university started out as a teachers college and we were merged together with some other public universities that started out the same way (or as Ag schools) into a system with all the community and technical colleges (2-years) about 30 years ago. But it’s still a bunch of individual kingdoms doing what they want with limited “system” control.
the demographic cliff has had a couple of waves, but the first one started 10 years ago and we’re hitting another one right now. The other problem is of course, the fact that we’ve made college into a transactional experience, rather than a transformational one. Getting through as fast as possible as cheap as possible is the mantra for people outside the the elites or maybe some of the other privates.
It’s sad that a lot of programs are going down. Some good people are going to be forced out. But a lot of them are ones who didn’t evolve, too.
TBone
@lowtechcyclist: awwww another happy ending 😍
ETA when I was contemplating adopting, a woman came into the law office. Her adult adopted children had all moved back home and were bullying her AND THERE WASN’T A DAMN THING SHE COULD DO. I immediately flushed that idea!
lowtechcyclist
@Warblewarble:
Yeah, I’m going: just how is he not just as deep in this as the other two?
Best way to have Israel run by people who don’t commit war crimes against the Palestinian people is to try the people who do.
smith
Earlier in the cross-exam, Necheles was suggesting that Daniels has changed her account of her encounter with the Defendant from previous versions, but Olivia Nuzzi just posted an exerpt from an interview last year that seems to me to be substantially the same as her testimony this morning.
nitter.poast.org/Olivianuzzi/status/1787924994581798942#m
lowtechcyclist
@TBone:
He’s sixteen now, which means he more than occasionally drives us nuts, but he’s a good kid.
jonas
@geg6: There is definitely administrative bloat, especially salary bloat, at a lot of institutions that could be profitably trimmed. But it’s also true that some of the biggest drivers of administrative expansion in higher ed over the past decade or two have been in accessibility and diversity — attempting to make the university attractive to non-traditional students. As the pool of college-age people in the US shrinks, schools have to get creative about attracting applicants and convincing people that college is for them (and keeping them enrolled once they’re there). That requires a lot of support services and money for scholarships.
TBone
@lowtechcyclist: ya done good! I know I was a handful of a teenager 😉 but grew out of that awkward stage. Mostly…
The poor woman I posted about was unsuccessful in trying to get our Sheriff to evict. The kids were threatening her, doing drugs, having people in, etc. but they had rights so she was shit outta luck.
Martin
@lowtechcyclist: We peaked in 2011. We’re down about 2.5 million students. Now, Covid is part of that, but we were down notably before that.
Generally speaking blue states have flat or rising enrollment, red states have declining. Small privates are collapsing in favor of more prestigious schools. Rankings are all important.
Eyeroller
@Another Scott: Grants are of minimal benefit to the university as a whole. They fund summer salary for faculty. They fund postdocs. They fund graduate students. Any equipment purchased has to be used exclusively for the funded project. The university does charge overhead, which is usually around 50%, but most of that goes to the additional administrative costs for administering and auditing grants. One thing they don’t do is fund undergraduates (except as low-paid lab helpers sometimes).
I don’t know what all this supposedly excess middle management is, but a lot of it is required for monitoring compliance with federal and state regulations and laws.
rikyrah
Molly Jong-Fast (@MollyJongFast) posted at 1:55 PM on Mon, May 06, 2024:
This Alvin Bragg case is really coming together, you really understand why Trump spent 100 million dollars of donor money to try and punt these cases
(https://x.com/MollyJongFast/status/1787556878613922158?t=edMqqgtP0sd9Y6DIGUrHgA&s=03)
TBone
Bucknell is going gangbusters. Built a huge, brand new, butt ugly complex of dorm buildings this year. Always building something or other. Not hurting for enrollment or donors. Last year they built a huge solar installation.
rikyrah
Katie Phang (@KatiePhang) posted at 8:37 PM on Mon, May 06, 2024:
NEW: Judge Cannon enters an Order “temporarily staying” the requirement for Trump to have to file his CIPA Section 5 notice in the MAL classified documents case.
Sec. 5 requires Trump to disclose to the Government the classified materials he intends on using at trial.
Joyce Alene (@JoyceWhiteVance) posted at 10:26 PM on Mon, May 06, 2024:
This case was set for trial on May 20, which obviously won’t happen. It should have been ready to try by the end of last year. Extending the 5(a) deadlines indefinitely is the same thing as giving Trump an indefinite trial delay.
(https://x.com/JoyceWhiteVance/status/1787685468668350875?t=rhPIVqRZKQZvqcmCzfMb3g&s=03)
Eyeroller
@lowtechcyclist: Baby bust. Birth rate has fallen quite a bit. It’s not likely for just a “few years” either. Especially since we don’t seem to want younger people to come here from other countries. Universities and colleges have also pretty much saturated the market of “traditional” students (young people right out of high school, especially those who can pay at least some of the costs) and have to try to encourage enrollment by others.
rikyrah
Acyn (@Acyn) posted at 10:07 AM on Tue, May 07, 2024:
Johnson: President Trump has done nothing wrong… it has to stop and you’re going to see the Congress address this in every possible way because we need accountability. All these cases need to be dropped because they are a threat to our entire system t.co/Vvg6pQRU52
(https://x.com/Acyn/status/1787861735174734030?t=lst3CFYaKAOvNsa6qfq1oQ&s=03)
TBone
@rikyrah: 😆😆😆😆😆😆😆😆😆😆😆😆😆 next candidate for my flaming clown party awards!
WaterGirl
Today has been a day – I’ve only gotten thru comment 20. So I have two questions:
Anyone up for a quick summary of today’s proceedings?
Is it time for an open thread besides this one?
Trivia Man
@WaterGirl: yes and yes
WaterGirl
@Trivia Man: oops, I was asking for a quick summary. Not offering to provide one, because I haven’t been able to follow it at all.
I will put up an open thread.
edit: oops, I see that David Anderson put one up 3 minutes before I got mine posted, so I pulled mine and will put it up in half an hour.
Martin
@jonas: Biggest expansion that our data showed was in non-encumbered revenue generation. Basically – new revenue sources for the schools (which include those coaches). College sports make a LOT of money for campuses because you don’t have to pay the players. Coaches are not only usually free, but the money generated is unencumbered, so you can use it for anything – academics, infrastructure, etc. Usually it mostly gets plowed back into the thing making money.
Top admins are usually hospital admins and hospitals usually financially carry the medical school. Gifts and giving which are always revenue positive. Technology transfer is growing in manpower and salary and is also revenue positive. Penn has surprisingly large real estate holdings with admins that oversee that. UCLA operates 4 hotels. We did semiconductor R&D, prototyping and testing as a service. All of these administrators pay their own salary.
But off of state or student money, accessibility and diversity I would agree are the areas where new types of positions were being created. Mental health was where we couldn’t expand fast enough.
Trivia Man
@Martin: Im encouraging college aged women i talk to to vary carefully consider what health cate for them might be like in red states.
JWR
@rikyrah: That slimeball. I really wish the 11th circuit would intercede.
Geminid
@lowtechcyclist: In 1948, when Yitzak Rabin was a 23 year-old Major in the Palmach, he signed the order forcing residents of Ramla and a neighboring town to evacuate to the Jordananian-controlled West Bank. That was an estimated 70,000 people, the single largest expulsion of the Nakba.
In 1967 Rabin was the IDF Chief of Staff who oversaw the conquest of Gaza, the West Bank and the Golan Heights. Later, as Defense Minister during the first Intifada, Gantz issued the notorious “break their bones” order to IDF soldiers putting down the riots. The order did not state that policy in so many words but that is how it was commonly understood.
But Yitzak Rabin is still seen as Israel’s greatest potential peacemaker, and the Oslo Accords he negotiated may yet form the template for a Two-state resolution of this long-standing conflict.
My point is, we are not going to find people with clean hands to create peace between Israel and the Palestinians; not on the Israeli side and not on the Palestinian side either. Not to mention the men leading nations like Saudi Arabia, the UAE and Egypt which are working towards a settlement. So I have no problem with Benby Gantz being shielded from ICJ prosecution, if that is in fact what is going on here.
Matt McIrvin
@Eyeroller: The US’s current population pyramid is interesting–there’s a Millennial population bulge, the children of boomers, but those people are heading for middle age and Gen Z is a smaller cohort like their mostly GenXer parents:
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_the_United_States#/media/File:USA_Population_Pyramid.svg
Tony Jay
@rikyrah:
Fixed that for you, Pastor PornPop
hueyplong
@Tony Jay: Jeez, I had assumed from the inanity that the Johnson was Ronny Johnson.
There is a Gabby Johnson joke hiding in there somewhere (sort of hoping to spare the children yet another dose of authentic GOPer gibberish).
Martin
@Eyeroller: Funding grad students isn’t a trivial thing. But grants are expected to be a break-even enterprise within the categories you listed. But there are two benefits you didn’t list:
Captain C
@smith:
He could be a loud snorer, or have those jimmy legs.
prostratedragon
So … there had been some pressure as far back as the parking lot, but we start getting written agreements and hush money only with the campaign, and fairly late stages at that.
Tony Jay
@hueyplong:
It might be, I just assumed it was Micro Mike trying to toss around empty threats in a vain attempt to appease the Mean Greene Soon To Be Has Been.
rikyrah
UH HUH
UH HUH
Biden-Harris HQ (@BidenHQ) posted at 10:38 AM on Tue, May 07, 2024:
Mike Johnson says Republicans must take total control of government so they can enact their Project 2025 agenda, including a national abortion ban, or else America is “facing very serious threats” t.co/g3s4Nzve6F
(https://x.com/BidenHQ/status/1787869591839875495?t=VLqLLSo_XHO1i2C_oyXuWw&s=03)
Martin
@Trivia Man: the problem is blue states aren’t growing their enrollments – even CA which had declining population for a few years (growing again) never saw a drop in college demand. And paying out of state tuition is how you get into college debt trouble.
But where my institution was declining 100,000 applicants a year, schools like Ohio State – a big, flagship university was struggling to fill seats.
You have the demographic swings that Matt mentions, but that doesn’t apply in CA where our immigrant community has a different (and much younger) age profile. Dept of Education was warning states about this drop in high-school enrollment while in CA it was surging. I had to keep telling them that they needed to tailor that message because it was misleading schools in CA, TX and some other states that were only going to see increased demand. And because these were first generation and general lower income students, they weren’t going to head out of state, they were going to flood into community colleges and the regional state schools.
And in states that are seeing declining enrollment, student filter upward into the more prestigious schools which is why the small privates are getting clobbered. Also, a lot of the small privates are religiously affiliated, and this generation of students just isn’t, so they’re less appealing.
Martin
@Captain C: I think more likely it’s a small pee-pee and a thick wallet.
Eyeroller
@Martin: My university has a lot of what would have once been handled by the old-timey sexist-named positions of “dean of men” and “dean of women.” Now they’re just student deans (they have a different title here which I won’t mention) and there are quite a few of them and they have staff. And they are busy.
Matt McIrvin
@Martin: Yeah, the most local college my daughter applied to is actually religiously affiliated, and that wasn’t particularly a plus (though it wasn’t as much of a minus as I expected either). She didn’t choose that school though; it was decidedly a safety school.
Matt McIrvin
@Martin: CA’s pyramid is interesting actually–the drop-off at younger ages isn’t as pronounced, but you can still see it for the littlest kids. And the Millennial peak was much sharper.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_California#/media/File:California_population_pyramid_in_2019.s…
Brachiator
@Geminid:
Got it. Appreciate the clarification.
This seems spiteful. What is the point?
Martin
@Matt McIrvin: CA will backfill the youngest student drop-off through immigration. It always has.
Eyeroller
@Martin: Translational research only works in certain fields. In a lot of respects, it has led to a loss of investment in pure science, which translational/transfer research ultimately depends on. We have a Patent Foundation which keeps most of the money that doesn’t go to the “inventor” (to seed more patents, of course–and to pay lawyers). I got a modest sum from our Patent Foundation a long time ago when a technology I’d worked on went private (and ultimately flopped). So I’ve had some interactions there.
There are different rankings systems. There’s Useless News which apparently exists as a zombie that issues rankings of undergrad and grad programs. Their criteria are questionable and seem easy to game. There are the R1 and R2 rankings which have nothing to do with undergraduate education quality, as you observed. There is the total research expenditures ranking. I was recently looking at the NIH’s compilation of that. They don’t report per capita by faculty headcount, so obviously larger universities will tend to have larger expenditures. It’s also basically impossible to be in the top 50 without having an affiliated medical school. (I think UC Berkeley may not have one and still managed to be highly ranked, so kudos to them.)
oldgold
In my opinion Trump’s stonewall topped with barbed wire defense is a big mistake. His lawyer’s must know this, but are being driven to it by their client. Following this path is what is making their cross ineffective.
geg6
@jonas:
Coaches that make millions and presidents that make almost as much, not to mention the mansions they are given rent-free to live in, would more than cover what it costs to provide support services (at least reasonable ones, like food pantries…not fancy dorms or spaces dedicated to each and every specific demographic possible, leaving no spaces for students who don’t care for such singling out) and funding for bills. Gee, maybe even tuition cuts could be considered if they didn’t waste millions and millions and millions of dollars on fancy sports complexes, private planes and wealthy and bloated administrators. The football coach at my university makes about 12 times what the president does (though there are so many vice presidents and chancellors and directors that also get six figure compensation). The football money does nothing for students that aren’t athletes. It all gets thrown into the athletics coffers and the typical student gets no benefit whatsoever from athletics. They don’t get to use the fancy facilities, get poor graduate students as personal tutors, full ride scholarships or any of the stuff that all that cash gets spent on. And they still have to pay for the tickets to the football games. Let’s require them to use the football money for something good for students, whether for scholarships or tuition decreases or facilities and perks for all students.
And don’t get me started on the lack of state funding. We’re the state’s flagship university and we only get anywhere between 8% and 12% of our funding from the state, depending on how many Republicans are in the majority of the state legislature and if a Republican is governor.
NotMax
@JWR
Suggestion for Eric.
In future don’t press “Send” on your Things To Do Today reminder diary.
//
Sister Golden Bear
@Captain C: Or constant farting.
Burnspbesq
@smith:
First 90 degree day of the year in Austin. The 100 degree days are coming.
Eyeroller
@geg6: A lot of the huge salaries of coaches comes from private endowments, essentially. At state institutions the state contribution is still pretty high, but not in the millions. University presidents used to be paid less handsomely–my husband used to say that they were now being paid enough to attract non-academics like former Republican politicians and ex-military and bidnessmen, and that wasn’t a good thing–but at most universities $1M or even $3M (still on the high end) is a drop in the bucket of the budget. $1M at an R1 would pay for about 4-5 “star” faculty.
There have also been studies that show most of the big athletic booster donors give a piddling amount, if anything, to the academic side. They aren’t interested in that.
There’s still a lot of state money (in our case) along with donor money going to sportsball training facilities and upgrades and on and on and on. Currently a main road through campus is mostly closed so a new scoreboard can be installed at the football stadium. The old one had a 4:3 Jumbotron and I guess everybody expects 16:9 4K Jumbotrons now. No idea who’s paying for that.
Geminid
@Brachiator: Yes, spite. Maybe also throwing a bone to the right wing. Israelis have been griping about Al Jazeera’s coverage of this war since October 8, and Knesset members have been threatening to ban them from the airwaves for months.
And I guess the government wanted to show it could actually get something done because they’ve been gridlocked on about everything else, kicking cans like a new draft law down the road.
I don’t know much about how exactly Al Jazeera operated as a broadcast or cable site in Israel. It might have been their standard Arabic news channel, maybe with some extra Israeli news in the mix. Twenty per cent of Israelis grow up speaking Arabic and plenty more have learned tbe language, some fluently. But maybe Al Jazeera has an English language channel as well and that got banned.
They definitely publish a written English version of Al Jazeera. Saudi Arabia has a site similar to Al Jazeera, called Al Arabiya. The UAE has a site called something like The National: MENA, as in Middle East+North Africa. They all seem fairly good, without too much cheerleading for the governments that control them. The fact that their governments will use them to express foreign policy goals is a good thing to know, especially in the case of Qatar which has been a key diplomatic player in conflicts including the US withdrawal from Afghanistan.
Martin
@Eyeroller: UC Berkeley has some important affinities with national labs – LLNL and LBNL.
But yeah, this trend in universities has been quite damaging to the pure sciences, but the NSF hasn’t helped matters there either by signaling that they favored proposals that had more of a pathway to commercialization. Pure science in the US has been in trouble for a long time – it was shaky even when I was in grad school 3+ decades ago.
And if you’re outside of STEM, well, you can pretty much just go fuck yourself – the university isn’t about to put a team together to help you get a grant.
Another Scott
@Martin: Yup.
Plus, big-name research gets good press and visibility and attracts undergrads who want the chance to learn from big-name researchers (even if it’s barely by osmosis).
Some great research can be done by dedicated faculty almost anywhere. Lots of early nuclear physics was done under the stands of a squash court with a pile of graphite blocks, after all. ;-) But some things require multi-million dollar machines, and those multi-million dollar machines require more millions in support facilities and more millions in staff and support people who are willing to stick around and put in the hours, days, and years, to prove that the investment was worthwhile.
(Talking mainly about big, multi-year grants, various “centers”, etc. here) If chasing grants was just a break-even thing, there wouldn’t be such fierce competition. There are many, many benefits to winning grants that go beyond the dollars and cents.
Cheers,
Scott.
Kay
Bravo:
Senators Tina Smith, Bernie Sanders, Martin Heinrich, Richard Durbin, Brian Schatz, Mazie Hirono, Peter Welch, Chris Van Hollen and Jeff Merkely
The Biden Adminstration had a deadline tommorrow to report to Congress on whether they were complying with US and international law on weapons supplies to Israel. They just announced they will miss the deadline and won’t be reporting.
But 88 Democrats in Congress want them to answer this question. I don’t think they can put them off forever.
Martin
@Eyeroller: Universities are increasingly politicized (just look around) which is why politicians are attractive at the flagships. If it wasn’t for that, I don’t think they would be nearly as appealing.
$1M will get you 4-5 star faculty in many disciplines but it’ll get you 1 in engineering, medicine, etc. You’ll need half of that or so for salary and benefits, with any additional salary coming off of their grants, buying out teaching. But there are other costs – start-up funds and other kinds of support. They might need a dedicated or near-dedicated pre-award analyst, etc. which will also get covered primarily out of grant overhead, but you still need to put that money up. Star faculty soak up more of your PR staff, your IT support, etc. They often need a dedicated assistant. It really adds up. It’s why those endowed chairs become so important.
Geminid
@Geminid: Speaking of Middle Eastern English news sites, I found another good one in Rudaw English. It operates out of Erbil, the capital of the Kurdish Regional Government in Northern Iraq, and is part of a Kurdish language news outfit called Rudaw.
Iraqi Kurdistan is a very interesting place. The 6 million or so Kurds living there have effectively been autonomous since the aftermath of the first Gulf War in the early 1990s. Minorities are treated well and it’s probably the safest place to live in the immediate region.
That will change soon in the northern mountains, where Turkiye intends to launch a major campaign against the PKK organization that has waged an insurgency against the Turkish state since the early 1980s. The offensive will take place on Iraqi territory but evidently the Turks have worked this out with authorities in Baghdad and Erbil who themselves have no use for the PKK.
So even if the war in Gaza can be ended, a new one will be starting soon a few hundred miles to the northeast..
lowtechcyclist
@TBone:
Good Lord, someone needs to feed that girl! The closeup pic looks like they put makeup on a corpse. Her arms look like they were borrowed from a famine victim.
lowtechcyclist
@Geminid:
After Germany surrendered in 1945, Speer, Donitz, and some other people on that level assumed that they’d be part of the post-Hitler German government because who else was there? While in temporary prison facilities (before most of them wound up in Spandau), they were drawing up plans for that government – Speer recorded the fact of these conversations either in Inside the Third Reich or in his Spandau diaries, I can’t remember which.
We know how that worked out: turned out there were others who could lead Germany after all. I’m willing to believe Israel can find someone with hands a bit less dirty.
As far as the example you give, sure, I believe Rabin could have changed a great deal between 1967 and the 1990s. Excuse me, but I don’t believe it’s reasonable to hope that Gantz might similarly change between 2024 and 2024.
Matt McIrvin
@lowtechcyclist: There was a hilarious Mitchell and Webb sketch about that–not terribly historically accurate, but it’s all about Donitz learning that Hitler is dead and he’s head of the Third Reich, and raving about his big dreams and plans, and (while explosions echo in the distance) his underlings have to gently explain to him that he’s only there so that there’s somebody to surrender…
Kayla Rudbek
@lowtechcyclist: probably the baby bust from the Gen Xers not having children. I’ve noticed that not a whole lot of my college classmates have signed up for our reunion this year, and I think that part of it is that they are dealing with children in high school and college who are graduating. Of course I went to a Catholic university so virulently pro-Natalia’s unlike most of my generation.
Kayla Rudbek
@Kayla Rudbek: should be “virulently pro-natalist” stupid autocorrect
Trollhattan
@Kayla Rudbek:
I’m objectively pro-Natalia, finding it a lovely name and having known a few.
Geminid
@lowtechcyclist: I wonder if you knew there was a person named Benny Gantz a year ago. Now you are making pronouncements about him like you know all there is to know, as if he’s some Nazi general, and the region and the world are going to treat Israel like they did Nazi Germany.
But like it or not, that’s not how President Biden and most Democratic leaders see Gantz, and that’s not how Israeli voters see him and they count too.
Less importantly, the EU countries also seem to like Gantz and I suspect that is why the ICJ apparently is not eager to indict him.
Uncle Cosmo
Re the coaches, it depends. Is the college competitive in intercollegiate sports, or has it been historically? Is there a sufficiently large alumni cadre that’s sufficiently flush to donate serious cash to the athletic program and prepared to do so? If the answer to both questions is Yes, then between contributions and notoriety, athletics may be serving a purpose on the balance sheet. If not, not.
Re the administrators, no argument. I wonder whether the top dogs in the school administration took the same haircut as the lower ranks. I’d guess no – like corporate top dogs, the SOBs on high always wildly overestimate what they bring to the table and how they therefore should be overcompensated.
jonas
@geg6: Yeah, but how much of those fancy sports expenditures, particularly the football or basketball coach’s salary, or a new arena or something, comes out of the general fund vs. a special booster club fundraising pool? Managing the general fund that supports basic learning, faculty salaries, etc. is usually a whole different enchilada, particularly at big sports schools.
Miss Bianca
@geg6:
And if they’re working the case, they shouldn’t be saying shit about it in the first place.
Anoniminous
@lowtechcyclist:
Just wait until he tells you he’s a Republican.