This fucking guy:
Good morning. Your Republican nominee has been up all night rage-tweeting. pic.twitter.com/mL1ovBY1bm
— pourmecoffee (@pourmecoffee) September 30, 2016
Well, Trump would know from a con. But in this scenario, he is the mark. The D-list political operatives in the Trump organization who are capable of comprehending voter demographics must have been begging their asshole boss to zip it about Machado. But he just can’t shut the fuck up about her. He waited until his handlers fell asleep and then went on a rage-tweet tear.
I think on some level, Trump realizes Clinton outfoxed him during the debate. She laid a rake in his path, and he stepped right on it. But his Hindenburg-sized yet fragile ego is unable to process such a scenario, so he’s desperately trying to alter reality by stepping on the rake over and over, just as he did in his inexcusable feud with the Khans.
It’s difficult to imagine a framing more perfectly suited to alienate the suburban moms whose votes Trump desperately needs than clips of the candidate fat-shaming Miss Universe, rating women’s bodies like the leering creep he is and cruelly bullying female employees. Maybe Clinton can set him up to denounce infants, puppies and kittens next.
The beauty of this scenario is that Trump seems determined to flail around and make things worse for the next week and a half. Then he’ll stomp into the October 9th debate loaded for bear, a serial adulterer and documented sexist itching to tear into Clinton for her husband’s behavior.
And it is a town hall-style debate with questions coming directly from voters, so chances are he broaches that subject with maximum ham-handedness. Popcorn futures are sky-high.
ETA: Also, kudos to CNN for finally mentioning the fact that Trump’s “brain trust” comprises gross old sexist pigs who have no standing to criticize Bill Clinton, let alone Hillary:
An excerpt:
Days after patting himself on the back for not invoking them on a debate stage, Donald Trump and his campaign are attempting to use Bill Clinton’s sex scandals to cast a shadow on Hillary Clinton.
For any candidate trailing by around 20 points with women in most national polling, this plan of action might seem, at best, curiously wrongheaded. But Trump is a special case — the twice-divorced nominee, who carried on a long affair that disintegrated his first marriage in a howling tabloid spectacle, is uniquely unsuited to finger-wagging.
Still, the irony does not seem to have resonated with his campaign brain trust. On Wednesday, they put out talking points encouraging surrogates to chat about Monica Lewinsky, Gennifer Flowers and Paula Jones. A day earlier, Trump (who is overweight himself) hit back at claims he’d body-shamed a former Miss Universe by noting to Fox News that “she gained a massive amount of weight.”
Odd, but not surprising. Especially when you consider the rogues gallery of advisers Trump has drafted in over the past few months — a pasty collection of older males, mostly media executives and politicians, with a long rap sheet of marital infidelities, sex scandals and worse.
I’ve been astonished at how the Trump camp got away with bringing revolting sexual predator Roger Ailes into the inner circle without much blow-back. Glad to see some coverage of this.
dr. bloor
The Cuervo gold and the fine Colombian making tonight a wonderful thing yet again.
BudP
I made a fortune in popcorn futures, but then lost it all trading butter. The margarines were brutal.
MattF
I agree that the town hall format is perilous for Trump. It’s also a format where Hillz excels.
And as for the 3am tweet, Jen Rubin is, again, desperately seeking Trump alternatives. Ain’t gonna happen. Sad.
sigaba
If the “town hall” audience doesn’t swoon for his antics he’s just going to assume they’re all Democratic ringers and the whole things is rigged.
Tom65
Classic Narcissistic Personality Disorder behavior. The guy is seriously mentally ill.
SenyorDave
I see Trumps doing ads where he’s going all in on the Clinton Foundation being a pay for play operation, pretty much implying its a phony charity. I’d like to se an ad where someone contrasts the two charities, pointing out his self-dealing. In fact, maybe just point out that self-dealing is just another term for stealing. I just have this recurring nightmare where he has so many scandals brewing that low information voters will just assume they are both equally corrupt and it all washes out at the voting booth.
maurinsky
I wonder what Trump’s lack of sleeping is doing to his brain? My ex-husband didn’t sleep much, would go 2-3 days without sleep, then get up after 4 hours, and he was really losing it.
Facebones
He must’ve gotten a hold of more of that cheap speed he loves so much. Sad!
Droppy
Drunk Uncles are usually too old and drunk to tweet. After head of the RNC, I bet one of the worst jobs in the universe must be deputy assistant something-or-other on the Trump campaign. Because, a) you wake up to stuff like this; b) you’ll get blamed for it; c) you are a soulless moron because you work for Trump on purpose; and d) you won’t get paid anyway.
JPL
It’s Hillary’s fault link
Plantsmantx
This isn’t even the worst thing he’s done during the campaign, but it feels like the last straw. He should end his candidacy- now.
hellslittlestangel
I had looked forward to the first debate with dread, and only watched it because I was stuck at work with nothing to do. But I think I’ll be recording the second one, so I can watch it over and over, slow-mo-ing Little Gloves’ worst moments. I love you, Hillary Clinton.
Brachiator
Dear America.
Please rent and watch “The Caine Mutiny” over the weekend. Then imagine an obviously unhinged Donald Trump as president, tweeting about how some White House staffers ate all his strawberries.
The Other Bob
I was very pleased to see my liberal, integrated neighborhood covered with pro-Trump door hangers this week. It is nice to know that the Trump campaign has no clue how to target persuadable voters and is completely wasting its money.
Monkeyfister
Betty, he’s already gone after the infants, and shamed mothers out of his rallies.
Jeffro
@Tom65:
Between the timing and the content, I think we’re gonna have ourselves a media field day today…no telling where this one’s going to end up!
amk
Wanna bet he will go all ‘crooked hillary’ right in her face in the next debate?
What a fucking abomination for a candidate for the world’s super power.
Tokyokie
I like Trump’s intimating that Clinton helped Machado become a U.S. citizen. Clinton stepped down as secretary of state 3 1/2 years ago, and the naturalization process, assuming the applicant has already satisfied the residency requirements, takes about 9 months, give or take 3 months. If Clinton had helped Machado become a citizen, she’d have become one several years ago. But then, this asshole believes that Obama’s people faked his birth in Hawai’i. Because, doncha know, blacks and Latinos can never accomplish anything without the assistance of white race traitors.
SRW1
I suppose soccer moms are gonna storm The Porn tonight, as The Donald gave them marching orders.
the Conster, la Citoyenne
Anecdotes are not data, but he’s lost the die hard Republican men in my office, who are conservative but they’re not crazy. They think he’s crazy – the debate was really their last straw, and after this… I can’t help think that this behavior will end up bleeding white men away from him, who live and work with women whom they know and respect. I can’t see any voting group that this helps him with.
waspuppet
It’s excellent to focus on the fat-shaming and general misogyny; I just hope someone somewhere also asks Trump or one of his surrogates what exactly would be wrong with Hillary’s campaign finding Machado and signing her up as a citizen. This idea that there’s automatically something shady about a Democrat actually trying to win an election is another deep-seated bit of conventional wisdom that needs to be rooted out.
PPCLI
Trump is diving even deeper into the sewage than before. The sleazier quarters of the right-wing internet have been buzzing about a purported sex tape by Machado. Snopes has pointed out that it is actually a (distant) look-alike porn-named Angel Dark. (The tape seems to have been renamed by some people with Trump-level morals and posted on the internet to exploit Machado’s fame.) Trump is openly accusing her of having had hardcore sex on video for money.
Snopes link
Machado did indeed pose nude for Playboy, but since Melania posed nude as well, even the Republican false outrage machine can’t make any hay of that.
Every single Republican ought to be asked if they believe someone who FALSELY claims that a woman has a sex-tape out and urges people to watch it is what they regard as presidential material.
Bruce K
Meanwhile, in the Trump war room, after discovering Baldrick’s clever plan to keep Trump off Twitter was to change the Twitter password to “password”, Edmund Blackadder VII is now trying to figure out how to get fired from the campaign in a way that doesn’t ruin his reputation.
Seriously, though, this displays a lack of self-control that would make any rational person hesitate about trusting the man with a Nerf ball, never mind a nuclear arsenal.
amk
RaflW
@MattF:
Face it, conservatives. The only way you might, possibly, maybe save your party is to vote for Hillary. I know! It’s a cruel world, innit? But for the GOP to possibly, maybe get a clue, Republicans have to show up to the polls, and then Clinton needs to win decisively.
Then possibly, maybe, the ragtag set of morons posing as the GOP elite might understand that their party is fully off the rails and gonna crash hard.
It’s an unlikely scenario. The only thing more certain than the GOPs intrinsic (and overt) racism is their misogyny. Couple that with decades of Clinton derangement syndrome, of course Jen and all her nice respectable conservative pals are in a bind. Sad!
Keith P.
This is gonna bite Trump in a couple of ways – first, Snopes says the sex tape Trump is referencing did not have Machado in it. Second, she posed nude in Playboy, but Trump is on the tape from, what, 2 months ago praising his own *wife’s* nude photos as art (or tasteful. I can’t remember the wording)
Elizabelle
Trump has found his exit strategy. Finally. Or so we think.
I’m amazed the kids/others didn’t get him out of the campaign way earlier. He’s ruined his brand, people are on to his tricks, and he’s going to be in even more legal trouble than Paul Manafort.
And I hope President Hillary lets the chips fall where they may. Someone suggested she might call the DOJ dogs off federal charges, but how can you do that and not illustrate the U.S. has a two-tiered legal system?
But first, to elect President Hillary.
And I am disappointed in USA Today for not endorsing her. Staying home or voting for Gary “Where is it, again?” Johnson is not going to protect us sufficiently from Trump.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
I’ve seen it reported in a few places that he likes to stay up late, eating candy and watching cable news and now, apparently, twittering. Not a doctor, but… sleep deprivation and wild swings in blood sugar?
and you’ve gotta figure that Pence will say something dumb during the Veep debate that will launch another round of the quest to regain dominance. I wonder if Pence has been trained to always refer to him as “Mr Trump”, or if he’s been given permission to say “my friend, Donald…. J Trump”
RaflW
This is an interesting take on Trump’s wakeful worrying:
comrade scott's agenda of rage
@RaflW:
Jen Fucking Rubin suffers from classic Republican Detachment Disorder. Her and her ilk deserve this.
Corner Stone
Trump is advising people to find and watch a hardcore sex tape. Still wrapping my brain around that one.
Fester Addams
@BudP:
Got caught in a shortening squeeze?
germy
Yes, but why stay up all night repeatedly stomping on the rake? Are we sure he doesn’t drink?
The next debate, the Town Hall debate: Is it being held in Trump country? And if so, can we expect a ton of really stupid questions for HRC about Whitewater or Paula Jones?
Elizabelle
@amk: Maybe he was up watching Shimon Peres’ funeral?
Nah. I didn’t think so either.
But I woke up to find PBO speaking, and he was sane, humane, and marvelous. As always.
Tokyokie
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Despite his claims to being in superb health, given his weight and what we’ve heard is his diet, I would be shocked if his blood glucose was within normal parameters. (High blood glucose is consistent with frequent urination at night, which is consistent with being awake at odd hours to rage-tweet.) And I also doubt that his ego would allow him to admit to being diabetic, and therefore it’s probably untreated.
Fair Economist
@amk:
I think Dean is on to something with the cause of the sniffling.
germy
@PPCLI:
An important point that many are missing. She didn’t star in any hardcore movie, someone who looks like her did. And drumpf’s operatives seized on some clickbait link falsely linking her to the film.
It’s true she posed for Playboy, but so did… uh… someone else.
Betty Cracker
@germy: The debate is in St. Louis, and the audience is undecided voters, which in this election is a marker of deeply stupid people, IMO.
germy
@Betty Cracker:
Oh great. Stupid questions from stupid people. This might work to drumpf’s advantage and HRC’s disadvantage, if she makes the fatal error of rolling her eyes or sighing.
RaflW
@Tokyokie: Given the timeline, if Clinton helped Alicia become a US citizen, then she was doing a mitzva as a private citizen. I doubt she did, but I give a giant so what.
Trump is rapidly going around the bend. The commenter upthread who recommended The Cain Mutiny is onto something!
Anonymous At Work
The real money is getting Trump to denounce PSL. That’ll end things with suburban women.
Adam L Silverman
@Corner Stone: Patriotism isn’t easy or convenient. So do it for the flag, mom, and apple pie!
maurinsky
@the Conster, la Citoyenne:
My office does not have too many conservatives in it, but the two we have are not voting for Trump, one of them has resigned herself to voting for Clinton, the other isn’t sure what she’s going to do.
Major Major Major Major
There’s also Machado’s murder accessory allegations, which aren’t spectacularly relevant but it would be something that ACTUALLY happened that he could point to.
scav
“Anytime you se a story about me or my campaign saying ‘sources said’ DO NOT beleive it!, There are no sources, they are just made up lies!” The proof of authenticity is ‘a lot of people are saying’ plus an ‘I don’t know’ and reiteration. Sad.
Weaselone
@shomi:
I don’t think you actually read the comments.
SenyorDave
@germy: Oh great. Stupid questions from stupid people. This might work to drumpf’s advantage and HRC’s disadvantage, if she makes the fatal error of rolling her eyes or sighing.
I believe the questions are screened in advance by moderators, so one would think they would be reasonable.
PST
I want a president who knows how to spell judgment. I’m not a stickler. We all make mistakes. But when you use a word in every third sentence or so you ought to learn the spelling eventually. It just goes to confirm the suspicion that no one around Trump feels comfortable correcting him.
Roger Moore
@sigaba:
Shorter.
dr. bloor
@germy:
The audience consists of “undecided” voters hand-picked by Gallup. So, common clay, etc. etc.
gogol's wife
@RaflW:
If only Trump were as easy on the eyes as Bogart, I might be in a better mental state.
Helen
Jon Lovett, Jon Favreau, and Tommy Vietor are KILLING IT on Twitter and trolling the hell out of Reince, Paul Ryan, and Sean Spicer on this. It is brutal.
RaflW
@comrade scott’s agenda of rage: Oh, I agree. It is painful and worrying to watch this all going down, but what Trump is doing is ripping the enormous bandage off the 1000s of painful sores otherwise known as ‘respectable conservatism.’
I hope Johnson’s one-two punch of idiocy this week may do at least some similar damage to the other conservative fantasy, libertarianism.
Iowa Old Lady
Just back from the gym where a guy was talking about how Clinton “destroyed” the women Bill had affairs with. I’ve heard that before but I don’t know what it means. Does anyone here?
Adam L Silverman
If I was advising Secretary Clinton, and I’m not, I would approach this as a PSYOPS strategy. So keep tweeking him on this until he says something direct and directly to her in her presence about President Clinton’s well known fidelity issues from the 1980s and 1990s. At that point her response should be:
Cat48
Political Wire had a link to the purported sex tape which appeared in the Sun. It showed her and a male under sheets. That is all. Not hard core porn. She is still popular in the Hispanic community and after the debate, there was a surge in Hispanic voter registration in several states out west. I think Nate has a chart. The more Trump rails about it may produce similar registration numbers. :)
RaflW
@gogol’s wife: Perish the thought. If he were handsome rather than a Cheeto-faced, ferret wearing shit gibbon, we’d be in far worse shape in this election.
Am I ugly-shaming him? Yes. Yes I am.
germy
@Major Major Major Major: Here’s a comment someone left on the NYMag story:
Amir Khalid
What the fish? FYWP eated my comment, and the naughtiest word i used in it was “kablooey”.
jonas
@SenyorDave:
Hey reporters! Looking for easy leads on election stories? Whenever Trump accuses “Crooked” Hillary of some corrupt dealings or whatever, start investigating Trump for the same thing. His projection is just gob-smacking.
Humboldtblue
@Brachiator:
I don’t know, Brach, Queeg never told us to go watch a sex tape.
(That’s such a great scene)
Joel
@Adam L Silverman: “Kobe, tell me how my ass tastes?”
bk
@shomi: Jesus Christ will you please shut the fuck up already?
Adam L Silverman
@Iowa Old Lady: Its a true belief among Conservatives that Secretary Clinton personally worked to destroy and defame every woman that accused President Clinton of harassing, assaulting, raping, and/or just having a consensual affair with them. David Bossie and the guy who coauthored Roger Stone’s last book with him on Secretary Clinton have been pushing this stuff for decades. Every so often someone either drags Juanita Broaddrick out or she puts herself forward as the archetypal example and standard. These usually are accompanied by the claims that Secretary Clinton, President Clinton, or the two of them together have long been having their opponents and critics executed. It is coded language that only makes sense to the initiated.
(I am NOT asserting that Ms. Broaddrick does not believe what she has long claimed happen, nor am I claiming that she should be simply discounted, but my understanding is that every investigation has demonstrated that there is no there there to her claims.)
RaflW
@germy: if she makes the fatal error of rolling her eyes or sighing
She kept it together for 95 minutes of Trump dissociative disorder. She’s been campaigning for office on and off for decades. She’s been FLOTUS.
She won’t roll her eyes or sigh.
MattF
Considering Dorothy Rabinowitz’s endorsement of Hillz, David Frum cracks a joke on Twitter:
Pretty funny, actually.
Adam L Silverman
@Cat48: The claim is that Ms. Machado was one of the stars of Apprentass 4. The woman that is being claimed as Machado is actually Angel Dark.
imdb.com/title/tt0496656/fullcredits/
Apprentass 4 (2005 Video)
Here’s a picture of Angel Dark:
crackberry.com/sites/crackberry.com/files/styles/w325/public/images/wallpaper_20100430074644_1490271…
Cat48
@Iowa Old Lady:
I can’t remember her doing anything. She called them “bimbos” per an article I read, but not to their face. She didn’t supply the info, I think it was Stephanopolis who included some of the things she said in her own home. Curious how that destroyed them.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Iowa Old Lady: the Clinton political operation’s defense in the early days of the Lewinsky thing was that she was a stalker, IIRC ML herself told Linda Tripp to say that. They’re saying HRC called her a “loony” or something, but I don’t remember that. I think with Paula Jones, they’re leaning on Caravelle’s “drag a hundred dollar bill through a trailer park” comment. Juanita Broadrick claims that after her encounter with Bill, HRC grabbed her hand, looked her straight in the eye and said that she (H) really appreciated all of JB’s help in the campaign; this is said to have been a threat all the more menacing for its understatement.
Bobbo
Also too, can you imagine a President who is up all night rage-tweeting?
NorthLeft12
Actually Betty this is very bad news for the Dems and Hillary Clinton. This episode demonstrates his fitness to be commander in chief.
When that 3AM phone call comes Deadbeat Donald will already be up and on Twitter ready to swing his mighty wit, wisdom, and gibberish onto whatever emergency has arisen.
germy
@RaflW: She wiggled her shoulders like a cat about to pounce. I don’t trust her. :)
Roger Moore
@PPCLI:
You’ve heard of yellow dog Democrats? Well these people are orange shitgibbon Republicans.
hovercraft
@sigaba:
Don’t you get it yet? Trump is a hard scrabble American who ha pulled himself up from the wilds of Queens with only a small loan, the best education money could buy, and his wits to get him to where he is today. He is the ultimate self made man, who has had to fight against the rigged system every step of the way. Yet despite all the obstacles pitted against him, here he stands, on the precipice of pinnacle of the world, the greatest man to ever live. He can almost taste it, and yet this bitch and all her minions are standing in his way, trying to deny him the chance to prove to everyone that he is too good enough.
LAO
I was worried that the lack of Bundy trial today would leave a void in my day — thankfully, Trump stepped into fill that void. I don’t have enough popcorn.
hovercraft
@maurinsky:
Just look at him and you have your answer.
dr. bloor
@Adam L Silverman: “Robert Rosenberg” is quite a porn screen name.
WarMunchkin
I can’t this election anymore. New plan: Give Donald Trump to Elon Musk after the election and see if we can launch him to Mars on a one-way trip.
germy
@Adam L Silverman: Thank you. I’m so sick of the “so she appeared in hardcore porn, so what?” She DIDN’T.
She posed for Playboy. Same as someone close to drumpf’s campaign. I mean, besides Ms. Flowers.
Iowa Old Lady
@Adam L Silverman: But what do they say HRC actually did? What does “destroy” mean in this context? Did she get them fired? Run them out of town? What?
NorthLeft12
@Droppy: Hmmmmmm, a multiple choice question?
All of the above?
Adam L Silverman
@Joel: I’m not following.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Iowa Old Lady: I wandered into a RW twitter stream the other day, and learned that HRC gave the stand down order the night of the Benghazi attacks because she didn’t want to offend the Libyan gov’t. Facts mean nothing.
MattF
@Adam L Silverman: This is an important point. A presidential candidate invoked a nonexistent sex tape to try to shame a woman who said the candidate has problems with women. At 3am.
Roger Moore
@Betty Cracker:
Or ones willing to lie to get into the debate.
Taylor
OT I haven’t seen much discussion here of the Hoboken train crash, which is going to have a profound impact on the Northern NJ and NYC economy. The under-reported story here is the starving of NJ Transit for money by the Christie administraiton:
The federal government has been trying to get all railroads in the country to install technology for slowing trains that go past a stop or enter a station too fast, but NJ Transit keeps getting extensions.
There is a theme here.
hovercraft
@the Conster, la Citoyenne:
He’s been polling at 50/50 with white men with college degrees, for a while, the media hasn’t focused on that bit of data because his problem with suburban women has been so much worse.
The Dangerman
@Adam L Silverman:
Oh, so THAT’S what got the Orange One upset; a name ripoff of his Apprentice show and he didn’t get a cut of the action.
Iowa Old Lady
@Cat48: @Jim, Foolish Literalist: I have faith in Clinton’s team but if Trump says Clinton “destroyed” these women, that’s hard to defend against even if name calling mostly in private is the extent of what Clinton did. It’s hard to phrase the argument.
Elie
This is a very sick man. I dunno if how sick he is will manifest itself before the election, but he is on the verge of something either mental or physical or both. He seems completely out of control and apparently no one on his team has the answer. Imagine this guy for a minute as President… I just cannot accept that this will happen. He is deranged and dangerous.
the Conster, la Citoyenne
@NorthLeft12:
Anonymous At Work
@Betty Cracker: Who the hell are they, what the frak are they undecided about, and how many have died from sheer ignorance or stupid accidents since Monday?
Kay
Of course it’s a complete coinky-dink that Trump only attacks people who are non-white.
The judge, the Khans and this woman. He finds those people particularly offensive and uppity.
Adam L Silverman
@LAO: Off to Garrets with you!
chopper
@SenyorDave:
considering the post has yet another story today about trump’s foundation (apparently they didn’t even file the paperwork necessary to allow them to legally solicit funds), this line of attack is getting dumber and dumber.
O. Felix Culpa
In addition to the fat-shaming, the misogyny, the lying, and all-around hatefulness, Trump – and presumably his followers – can’t tell the difference between two dusky Latinas because, you know, they all look alike.
D58826
and on the daily beast there is a piece about Russia meddling in the election and the fact that the GOP doersn’t care. Short version:
1. continue to investigate Hillary/e-mail
2. refuse democratic requests to ask FBI to investigate the Russia link.
Our ‘good Germans’ patriots in action again.
thedailybeast.com/articles/2016/09/30/gop-blocks-probes-into-trump-russia-ties.html
Adam L Silverman
@dr. bloor: I think I went to elementary school with a Robert Rosenberg.
PPCLI
@Elizabelle: When people say “Trump is absolutely unacceptable and unfit to be president and will bring the apocalypse and his hair looks ridiculous but I can’t vote Hilary either” they are normalizing Trump and suggesting that Hilary is Trump-level bad. They are giving Trump a huge boost, whether they realize it or not. They shouldn’t be allowed to wriggle out with that dodge. Do you want a president who falsely accuses women of having made hardcore pornography and urges you to watch it, or don’t you? Who broke the Cuba embargo while puffing himself up as a Castro opponent or not? Who has a foundation that served as a personal piggy bank to pay legal obligations, or one who has a foundation that has kept millions of people with AIDS alive? Because that is the choice, and saying “They’re both unacceptable” is to choose the slandering, Castro-dealing, lawless-foundation owner.
Cacti
This is why I think Trump is bipolar. For anybody who’s had a bipolar friend or family member, this has all the markings of a manic cycle.
bemused
Oh man. Just imagine if the town hall debate was tonight after Trump has been totally insane ranting at his rally during the day and rage tweeting all night. Not that I think he will be able to gain any bit of control of himself by Oct. 9.
khead
@Humboldtblue:
“If you want to do anything about it I’ll be outside. I’m a lot drunker than you are, so it will be a fair fight”. I can watch this movie (and Stalag 17) over and over.
Also, Jezebel is having a field day with these tweets. Especially the “MY worst MissU” phrase.
hovercraft
@germy:
They knew or should have known it wasn’t her yesterday, it was debunked early. Like the birth certificate he just wanted to smear her. He’ll do his whole some people are say, I don’t know, schtick.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Elie: I’m reasonably confident he’ll lose, but the fact that he has so much support is sickening and more than a little scary. A lot of his support is merely partisan, and another good chunk just dumb people seduced by the idea that the solution to any complex problem is really simple (we’ll be “tough”. Oh, Okay why didn’t anyone think of that?), but there’s also that hard core of racist resentment that he has brought out into the light, and made worse
Major Major Major Major
@germy: well I said it wasn’t relevant.
Kay
Let’s list who stood up to Donald Trump. It’s a short list.
We have to excuse the federal judge because he’s not allowed to hit Trump back, which is probably why Trump went after him.
So we have Rosie O’Donnell, the Khans and a former Miss Universe. They’re braver than anyone in GOP leadership.
Pathetic.
Underpaid_Propagandist
Two-faced Schmuck of the Day:
theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2016/09/what-undecided-voters-should-know-about-the-media/502385/
PPCLI
@Brachiator: I am absolutely in love with the vision of Trump clacking ball bearings in his hand and muttering about his mastery of “geometric logic”.
hovercraft
@Helen:
A testament to Obama’s ‘judgment.’
Adam L Silverman
@Iowa Old Lady: I think it means she said mean things about them while trying to harm them privately and discounted their claims publicly rather than, as a good feminist and defender of women, accepted the claims and fought on their behalf for justice. So there are too truth claims being made: 1) she publicly denigrated them while trying to harm them privately and 2) hypocrisy over not taking their claims seriously. My understanding is that neither can be substantiated. Ms. Broaddrick’s claim about Secretary Clinton’s response of shaking her hand firmly and thanking her for all her help is that she really wasn’t shaking Ms. Broaddrick’s hand and thanking her for all her help, she was threatening her and telling her that she was going to deal with her if Broaddrick said anything.
amk
@Iowa Old Lady: huh?
Adam L Silverman
@MattF: He likes the night life, he likes to boogie…
Amir Khalid
@Adam L Silverman:
I’m not sure if Hillary would be that obvious or go that far, but I think you’re spot-on about her team working a PSYOPS strategy on Trump.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Kay: Pastor Timmons, before whom Trump looked like he might wet himself. I was thinking if any of the town hall questioners are women of color, he’ll get very flummoxed, but if the audience is Gallup-selected undecideds, I’m thinking it will be a rather pale audience.
the Conster, la Citoyenne
@hovercraft:
He can’t afford to lose any white support, since he needs basically over 70% of the white vote to even have a chance. David Plouffe in Slate yesterday isn’t worried about Hillary’s chances, and he’s the only one whose judgment I trust this far out. Like someone else said, Trump’s supporters are trying to go up a down escalator, and for every person that Trump’s vulgar racist sexist fascism appeals to, he loses two who are on the fence about him, like the 3 or 4 white guys in my office. Romney got way more college white men than Trump will, and Trump’s unable to stop digging.
germy
@hovercraft: From LGM:
hovercraft
@Humboldtblue:
This may also be why the @Baud campaign never caught fire.
PPCLI
@dr. bloor: Damn! That is clever.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
just saw this, from a Stein supporter
and apparently Cole’s friend Greenwald is coming to Trump’s defense on the Cuba story
Timurid
@Betty Cracker:
To fill a room with undecided voters the organizers had to pay ISIS and the Taliban for their remaining stock of American hostages.
sigaba
Gawd there are FOUR Apprentass‘s now? Stupid Hollywood franchise mentality, do something original!
@hovercraft: Lets face the fact that Trump isn’t trying to rule the world or run the country, he just wants the notch on his belt and bragging rights that he finally got Barack Obama.
This guy and his supporters aren’t running for the office, they’re running a protest campaign against small-l liberal democracy. It’s all just a sham to them and Hillary’s most disqualifying fault is she actually makes a pretense to governance.
Jinchi
At least that proves that, when the phone rings at 3 a.m., Trump will be awake to answer it. (He’ll probably tweet about it first, though)
hovercraft
@Iowa Old Lady:
She said mean things, that destroyed them. Monica is running an anti bulling thing because Hillary bullied her.
liberal
@Tom65: Yeah…while a lot of the claims about “my candidate will be cooler under stress than your candidate” are subjective and IMHO not really useful, he’s clearly crossed the threshold of “has such severe mental health issues that he/she should not be chief executive.”
Cat48
@Adam L Silverman:
Yes, I read about that at Snopes. There’s a link at #22 above about her. The Right always has to destroy anyone who threatens Trump. He’s talked about for a week so he’s inflicting the damage himself.
I was watching Shimon Peres funeral,this morning while Trump was going nuts on Twitter. BBC did a nice job. It makes me sad he is gone.
ruemara
@Weaselone: s/he doesn’t actually read the posts.
randy khan
I know this has been asked before, but are we *sure* that Trump’s Twitter account hasn’t been hijacked by a drunk frat boy? (With all due respect to Cole’s fraternity guys, who seem to me likely to be smarter than this even when they’re drunk.)
Trentrunner
Just noting for the record: If HRC loses (and she very likely won’t, etc.), I am proud that she herself–not surrogates–has called out Trump for what he is: racist, bigoted, misogynist, thin-skinned, lying, ignorant, unhinged, dangerous. HER WORDS. No “Clintonesque” parsing or oblique suggesting, just straight-up calling Trump what he is and explaining the consequences if he’s elected.
Good on ya, Hillary. Brave, and true.
debit
@Anonymous At Work: I work with a supposed undecided. She has always leaned Republican because she likes the idea of someone who claims to have simple solutions for complex problems. She said after the debate that Trump made “good points” but that he also repulsed her. However, she flat out hates Hillary and won’t vote for her no matter what. After the debate she then said that she wished the press paid more attention to Gary Johnson. “I’d like to hear what he has to say!” Haven’t talked to her since his disaster on Hardball. :)
I think undecideds are actually Republicans who haven’t quite worked up the nerve to admit in public that they really want to vote for Trump, but are too ashamed.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
You think Trump follow HRC’s tweets? I have a hunch he does
Nom de Plume
The happiest people on earth this morning: the producers of The Apprentass series.
raven
@Iowa Old Lady: I just came from the Y too. Know what I saw? About 40 severely disabled kids walking, or being wheeled, into the locker room for their once-a-week swim. I thought about what their folks must think when they see this fucking asshole making fun of a guy with a disability.
RaflW
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: This, too, from 5 mins ago!
liberal
@Jinchi: Oops, shouldn’t have launched that nuclear missile! Sad!
Kay
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Absolutely. The look on his face! “Who is this…person approaching me”. That’s besides what a douche move it is to begin with, going into her place as a guest and smearing his shit all over the walls.
He was poorly-raised. He has no redeeming qualities.
germy
@sigaba: What if the four Apprentass’s were the original, and drumpf’s reality show was the porn parody?
liberal
@Timurid: I’m pretty sure there was a news article about how even the Taliban think Trump’s an idiot.
Barbara
@Cacti: My sister and I have long argued about whether our father had a classic bipolar disorder or something else. She informed me that certain anxiety disorders can escalate into what look like episodes of mania. I think her point was that our father never had depressive states — that he cycled between sort of normal and mania — staying up for days, unable to sleep, worried over a lot of things but especially things related to his job. I am not an expert, but Trump’s loss of control appears to be associated with obsessive, reactionary anxiety over having been insulted and made to look ridiculous, rather than an organic brain disturbance of the kind that manifests itself in bipolar disorder.
Humdog
@Iowa Old Lady: I do not think it will be hard to defend against. All she has to say is “I have no idea what you are talking about. My husband and I went through a very difficult time but we worked hard to repair our marriage. You dont just declare bankruptcy on a marriage, Donald.” and watch Drumpf lose his shit, again. If Donny comes back with a “you were mean” or some such, I still don’t know what you are talking about.
germy
@Kay:
He tried to be polite in her presence, and then the next day when he was safely far away he was all “Did you see that crazy lady? All shaking and shit? Somethin’ was going on with her!”
Kay
She’s just asking. She has concerns :)
This is the fun part of brawling. I hope she’s enjoying herself. I bet he’s fun to bait.
liberal
@the Conster, la Citoyenne: Don’t forget the thing on fivethirtyeight that says registration not surging among white working class men (or something like that). Yay.
rb
@hellslittlestangel: ROFL at ‘little gloves.’ That is priceless.
Trentrunner
OMG, Hillary is hitting Donald with the chair right now on Twitter:
liberal
@Barbara: My armchair diagnosis: narcissistic personality disorder, plus adult ADHD.
Personality disorders (“axis II”) are very hard to treat.
germy
@raven: My nephew was severely disabled, and my father was a POW with untreated PTSD. His grandson’s disability caused him even more pain. I hate drumpf with the heat of a million suns.
I don’t want him just to lose, I want him beaten, humiliated and ruined.
dmsilev
@Corner Stone:
Theory: Trump has an ownership stake in whatever company owns the distribution rights to said hardcore tape.
liberal
@Trentrunner: The sweetest thing is that it’s both politically good tactics (drives up support among women, especially college educated) and morally right.
Seanly
I live in Boise, ID. It is a purplish stain on a bright red state (the long-serving mayor, most of Boise city council, my local representative, and state senator are all D). Last night we saw a Clinton ad during prime time. This morning we got treated to a Trump ad.
While the Clinton ad had a theme and single message, the Trump ad was almost just a collection of buzz words and stock images. They must think that Trump’s odd way of communicating in incomplete sentences is appealing.
Reminds me that I need to look into early voting or absentee ballot as I might have to go to Seattle for 6 months for work.
Betty Cracker
@germy: Classic coward’s move, which he replicated with Clinton and Lester Holt at the debate. Onstage he was giving himself a tuggie about having too much integrity to say “very rough things” about Clinton and her family, then he skedaddled off stage to spread those ideas via the media and has been doing so ever since. At the event, he commended Holt on being fair, but later, he complained the debate was rigged.
Brachiator
@randy khan:
That’s the sad thing. Trump doesn’t drink, but he stays up all night tweeting this crazy shit.
Also, I don’t know if it’s true, but I’ve heard that Trump is repulsive. People say that when he tries to get intimate with Melania, she responds, “Donald. I’m not in the mood. Why don’t you do a little tweeting.”
It’s just what I’ve heard.
Droppy
@Brachiator: The Queeg of Queens
Betty Cracker
@Kay: Dammit, Twitter! Stop being interesting when I have work to do! ;)
MattF
@dmsilev: Possible. My theory is that ninety minutes of unavoidable physical proximity to Hillary Clinton has driven Trump completely crazy.
liberal
@Underpaid_Propagandist: Yeah it’s really weird that reporters and house editorials are biases against a f*cking fascist.
Kay
@germy:
Why doesn’t he know how to act? He’s not the boss in her church. People learn this by 5 years old. He’s 70 and he’s crashing around breaking things.
hovercraft
@RaflW:
This whole week has him in a tizzy, he lost the debate, and his usual bullshit spin was knocked down and literally laughed a by the press, Merchado and Hillary refused to be beaten down, and almost more importantly than anything else, the all important polls have turned against him. His path to victory is disappearing right before his eyes. The media is savaging him as bad as they did over the Khan family, and for what this Spanish whore, why does anyone give a damn what he says about her she’s a nobody. It’s not fair.
amk
hillary is donalding him even in the twitter world.
liberal
@Betty Cracker: Coward, or more precisely bully/abuser?
PPCLI
@Adam L Silverman: @Iowa Old Lady: Whenever I’ve seen any reference to anything Hilary is actually reported as having said or done, it is mostly Hilary speaking with friends in private and saying harsh things.
I imagine that Ivana said some harsh things in private about Marla Maples when she and her kids were confronted with the front page of NY tabloids blaring “Best Sex I Ever Had” on every streetcorner. But I find it hard to see how anyone could hold those remarks against Ivana, and I certainly wouldn’t call them “an attack”. I expect Donna Hanover had harsh things to say to her friends in private about Guliani’s sex-toy aide when Booty Call Rudy announced to the press he was getting divorced before telling Hanover and the kids. I can’t blame Hanover for that, and it’s hard to imagine anyone would. I dare say Newt’s second wife had some choice words to friends about Callista, after Newt showed up in wife 2’s hospital room with the divorce papers as she was treated for cancer. I wouldn’t hold that against Newt wife 2, frankly.
What kind of standard are we expecting of Hilary, that she should not say harsh things about Monica Lewinsky, who actively pursued her husband, knowing he was married?
[Aside: For the record, despite the obsessive repetition by the Republicans, Monica was NOT an “intern” when she had her dalliance with a married man. She was a paid employee of the Pentagon, far away from the White House though of course technically subordinate. She had been an intern once, but that’s irrelevant. I was a teenager once and nobody calls me a “teenager”.]
RaflW
@germy: Yup! She wiggled her shoulders like a cat about to pounce. I adored that. Of course she is a guarded person. And people dislike how obvious that is. But the shoulder wiggle was a clue into why the people she works with daily apparently like and respect her, enjoy working with her, and are fiercely loyal. That wiggle was a tell. A really positive, endearing tell.
eta: she’s guarded in no small part because she’s been hounded by a terrible press corpse for years
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Trentrunner: It’s almost like the Clinton campaign had some kind of strategy to turn up the heat as election day grew closer. Remember when “Hillary took August off! and we’re doomed!”
Gotta say, whoever figured out his Machado thing would get under his skin so badly deserves all the praise Caravelle and Steph got back in the 90s
Nemo_N
CNN is describing Hillary’s responses as a tirade of her own.
Both sides!
hovercraft
@liberal:
They watched the debate and their assessment afterwards was that he’s an ignorant buffoon. This from the Taliban, your nominee GOP.
the Conster, la Citoyenne
@Trentrunner:
Wait until Obama makes getting under Donald’s skin his job, for the whole month of October.
dmsilev
Let’s step back a second and look at the strategic situation. Trump got his ass kicked in the first debate, and rather than assessing what went wrong and how he can do better in the next debate, he’s spent 4 days and counting fat-shaming a former pageant winner. And there’s just over 1 week to go until the next debate.
the Conster, la Citoyenne
@Nemo_N:
CNN who employs a Trump campaign official to opine. They’re the absolute worst.
sigaba
@dmsilev: Maybe I’m saying too much but a neighbor of mine and a drinking buddy owns a third of PornHub (he’s rich as Croesus and basically just does art photography now). He’s got his personal foibles but from a strictly business perspective I don’t see him investing with Trump. People like Larry Flynt seem a little too sharp to make that kind of deal.
hovercraft
@Trentrunner:
Pedestrians on Fifth Avenue better be careful.
germy
@dmsilev:
His version of “debate prep”
Cat48
@Cacti:
I agree, classic bipolar behavior. He has all the symptoms that occur during a manic phase of the disease.
MattF
Note that there’s more news Trumpery to come today.
amk
@Nemo_N: of course, they did. ‘cuz calling out mindless tirade is a tirade. assholes.
the Conster, la Citoyenne
Ella in New Mexico
Some are saying the whole thing is Trump’s version of 11th Dimension Chess so that the media covers his smearing of a beauty queen instead of his Cuba-ban violation and new stories about his foundation not being registered in NY.
Makes sense-his supporters don’t need to hear anything of substance, plus they’ll flock to this “US Magazine”-style trash and totally agree with him that a beauty contestant can’t be fat. And she was in a sex tape!!!! He saved her, doncha know!
Seanly
As an aside, I liked on Samantha Bee’s Wednesday show when she joked about married women voting for Trump or at least that’s what we tell our hubby. When I worked in Harrisburg, PA, a lot of the guys talked about how it was traditional to sit her down & tell the lil missus how to vote. Big tradition! Strong, very strong! My own thought was always – what a complete ass.
dmsilev
Poke…. poke…. poke….
Barbara
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: I doubt if they knew it would send him on such an extended tailspin, though his reaction to the Khans probably gave them reason to believe it might. Seriously, ALL HE HAD TO DO was acknowledge his prior comments and say, “it was long time ago, I wouldn’t behave that way now and I wish her the best.” And then, nothing. Nothing would have happened and some people would have formed a more favorable opinion of him for his humility. Trump seems to think that the measure of a person is to never be challenged, when the measure of a person is how they behave after being confronted with a challenge. This is completely self-inflicted damage. It’s just astounding that he can’t learn such a simple lesson.
D58826
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: and a bit more on Trump’s relationship with women
billypenn.com/2016/09/29/former-inquirer-reporter-recalls-that-time-trump-called-her-a-c-t/
Trentrunner
@PPCLI: Exactly. Saying angry, mean things IN PRIVATE about your husband’s female paramour doesn’t revoke your feminist card.
It makes you a fucking human being.
Brachiator
So, let’s see. I’m hearing hard core Trump supporters praise him for being a liar, thief and tax cheat, because that’s what successful businessmen do to get ahead and stay on top. Besides, if he paid taxes, the money would only go to the dregs and freeloaders who feel that the government should take care of them.
And then these nimrods somehow pivot and insist that as president Trump would know exactly how to make the system work for all Americans, and is so selfless that he would never seek legislation that would benefit himself, his family and his businesses, even though this is exactly what he has done all his professional life.
So, let’s review. “Crooked” Hillary, bad for America. Crooked Donald is everything that America needs.
Meanwhile, back at the ranch. The Chicago Tribune has endorsed Gary Johnson. Stupid over Crazy.
MattF
@Ella in New Mexico: Violates ‘Trump’s Razor’. The stupidest explanation is the true one.
scav
@dmsilev: Guard is going to have a link to the live streaming for those playing in real-time.
sigaba
@Ella in New Mexico: This is a reasonable assumption but let’s admit it, undecideds weren’t going to hear about his embargo running or foundation chicaneries anyway, or were likely to care. All the misogyny stuff is just so much more emotionally resonant.
Of course it DOES succeed in blowing Hillary’s campaign appearances off the agenda for a another day. Undecided voters may be disgusted by Trump, but given how the media has covered the campaign, they could be forgiven for not being aware anyone else was running.
PPCLI
Indeed. It would go to Romney’s do-nothing 47% ers, the legendary ones who don’t pay Federal Income Tax. You know… people like Trump.
“If Trump paid taxes, the money would just be squandered on people like Trump!”
Gelfling 545
@Iowa Old Lady: Not so hard really. Ask for a description of any action she can be shown to have taken against them. Or any contact between them. If they’re “destroyed” by their paramour’s wife calling them a bimbo they are too unrealistic to walk around unattended.
low-tech cyclist
@Iowa Old Lady: I dunno about the others, but you know who ruined Monica Lewinsky’s life? Ken Fucking Starr. Because of him, and only because of him, she’s defined forever by her sex acts with Bill Clinton.
As far as that rat bastard and his crew were concerned, her life was just collateral damage in the Clinton hunt. Fuck ’em all with rusty farm implements.
Brachiator
@the Conster, la Citoyenne:
Shit, the first time I glanced at this, I read it as.
I would pay good money to see that.
@Barbara:
That’s not who Trump is. Trump is he who must be vindicated.
He pointlessly, strangely, brought up Rosie O’Donnell during the debate. That was also years ago, and is totally irrelevant. And he also insisted that he was “right” to bash her. Why? Who was he trying to convince? Some invisible avatar?
raven
@germy: roger that
D58826
We have reached the point that to say the US is a third rate tin horn banana republic is an insult to tin, horns and banana’s. From Digby: ‘After watching Johnson and his running mate Bill Weld, the former Republican governor of Massachusetts, in Wednesday night’s town-hall meeting with Chris Matthews, I think maybe they should let Johnson in the debates so more of these voters could see exactly what they’re voting for. The risk is that while Johnson would reveal himself as a bizarre and ignorant man, he might just make Republican presidential nominee Trump look smart and competent by comparison.‘
My bolds.
digbysblog.blogspot.com/
RaflW
Just happened to notice that even horrible person Peter Wehner has piled on. Though I can’t really say why I care. Maybe just so I could call him horrible person Peter Wehner. Carry on.
hovercraft
@Ella in New Mexico:
In Miami the Cuban vote will hear all about his Castro dealing no matter how much chum he puts in the water. Which may cost him Florida.
Joel
@Adam L Silverman: It’s a classic NBA diss.
Matt McIrvin
@MattF: Only one Trump alternative left.
Sunny Raines
@Betty Cracker: amen to that. You could throw Johnson, stein, and avowed abstained (cough, protest voters) in there among the imbeciles. Never a clearer more important pro-America vote in generations than the opportunity to vote for HRC.
low-tech cyclist
I still can’t believe we’re now in Day 4 of Trump having a temper tantrum about Alicia Machado.
And since ‘Miss Housekeeping’ has been lost in all the noise about the fat-shaming, let me add this: I have colleagues at work who are Hispanic. They’re not ‘Miss Housekeeping.’ They’re great people, and they’re skilled at statistical stuff that Trump could never master if he had another lifetime to do it in.
And yes, my cleaning lady is Hispanic, and the cleaning crew at work is largely Hispanic. But you know what? They’re more than just that. They’re people who work hard, and I would expect they take pride in what they do because they’re damned good at it. And I’m sure they’re doing what they’re doing so that their kids can have better options in life than they do.
They have a hell of a lot more to be proud of than Donald Trump will ever have. He has no business, no right, to denigrate them.
germy
@low-tech cyclist:
I think Linda Tripp deserves some credit, for insisting she “go public”
(public. With an “L”)
Iowa Old Lady
I suppose Clinton could always ignore what he says about her, read Trump’s tweet stream from this morning, and say, “When a powerful person tries to destroy a woman, Donald, this is what it looks like.”
rk
Why does it matter if she has a sex tape? She doesn’t , but even if she did it makes no difference. He said what he said twenty years ago. Her sex tape does not make what he said or did o.k. Unbelievable that a thrice married adulterer who says the foulest things on the Howard Stern show and everywhere else is being moralistic about a sex tape. This is male (white) privilege in all its ugly glory.
Tokyokie
@RaflW: Well, for starters, the immigration process is handled by the Immigration and Customs Enforcement Service, which is part of the Department of Homeland Security, not the State Department. Anyway, the way I remember it from when the spousal unit was naturalized, we submitted the application, got a letter back a few months later with an appointment time for seeing an examiner, and once that interview was done, we came back later in the day for the swearing-in ceremony with others who’d finished the process that day. A friend in the State Department could conceivably get the appointment scheduled for a week or so after the application is submitted, and could let the examiner know that a favorable outcome was expected, but Macho’s recent naturalization doesn’t fit with that sort for favor-granting.
The difficult part about the immigration process is gathering the paperwork for the initial immigration visa (and in many cases, this will be done through U.S. Embassy officials in the prospective immigrant’s home country), then standing in line for hours on end to have the temporary visa upgraded to a permanent one, then standing in line for hours on end to renew the permanent residency visa (green card). Once a permanent resident has accumulated the requisite number of years to apply for citizenship, the process is fairly straightforward and can be accomplished in 6-12 months, depending on the size and the workload of the local ICES office. Although during the Bush administration, the fees for the process were raised dramatically to discourage permanent residents from becoming citizens.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@germy: Let’s not forget Jonah’s Dam, Lucianne Goldberg, who IIRC brought Tripp and Starr together.
There was a time I knew all those details and names and connections like the back of my hand. Strange days, indeed.
@Iowa Old Lady: Nice.
Anonymous At Work
@debit:
1. That poses a lot of concern for the townhall questions.
2. Yeah, seeing that as well, a lot of Republicans who don’t want their party to be the white supremacist party.
3. And Hillary spontaneously growing a penis would probably boost her approval rating by 5% at least.
Matt McIrvin
@Bruce K: I would watch that show.
JR in WV
@BudP:
Maybe the best wurst pun in the history of snack foods on Balloon-Juice!!
raven
@low-tech cyclist: Our house painter brought me food when I had my hernia surgery. When I posted it on our neighborhood listserv other folks chimed in that he and his wife had done the same for them. Oh yea, they are Mexican-Americans.
Brachiator
@shomi:
Let’s play a game. Jeff Spicoli (Fast Times at Ridgemont High) or Gary Johnson:
This is U.S. History, I see the globe right there.
What Jefferson was saying was, Hey! You know, we left this England place ’cause it was bogus; so if we don’t get some cool rules ourselves – pronto – we’ll just be bogus too! Get it?
All I need are some tasty waves, a cool buzz, and I’m fine.
[My brother’s gonna shit! ] Make up your mind, dude, is he gonna shit or is he gonna kill us?
Matt McIrvin
@Iowa Old Lady: It means that Donald Trump said that.
Mike J
Why was Trump was up at 3am telling us to watch a sex tape? Possibly so people won’t be talking about his tape:
Josh Gerstein @joshgerstein
NEW: Trump deposition video to go public as soon as today. Judge rules campaign-ad fears no basis to keep secret
? Martin
@Barbara:
It’s easy to entertain that counterfactual, but the reality is that if Trump was capable of that, Clinton likely wouldn’t have bothered laying that particular trap. I don’t think people are giving the Clinton campaign nearly enough credit for just how devious this trap was. Trump got totally blindsided by it, Clinton had ads already cut and running within hours of the debate, two media outlets had stories embargoed until after the debate. It hit every one of Trump’s weak points and outmaneuvered his campaign in a way you’d expect a presidential campaign to outwork a city council race. Consider the ‘mirror’ ad which contrasts Trumps statement against pictures of young girls looking at themselves. That puts a question in voter’s minds about Trump as a role model that they maybe didn’t consider before. And then Trump walks into this trap only to create new content for that very ad. Any claims that he’d matured and moved past shaming women are now silenced. She can go back and re-edit that ad, keeping the visuals and adding dialogue just of him attacking Machado. In some ways that would be even more powerful than the first ad because it now puts evidence in place of what was previously set up as a concern.
And because Clinton sprung the trap at the end of the debate, that pretty much guarantees that it’ll be a topic at the next debate, so she gets an entire additional cycle out of this. Trump will still be talking about this 2 weeks from now. The degree to which this was engineered by the Clinton camp is really impressive. The delivery of it during the debates was a bit forced, but in hindsight that really doesn’t matter because it’s so clearly a straight-up (and fair game) hit job.
So if Trump wasn’t inclined to fall for this, I’m pretty sure Clinton would have put some other item in that slot that would have hit Trump’s weak point. Maybe about Cuba, etc.
hovercraft
Trump pleaded the Fifth 97 times during depositions for his divorce from Ivana. he used the Fifth to avoid admitting he committed adultery, and he wants to be the arbiter of morality.
Shell
So is Trump turning into Sideshow Bob? How soon should he be tweeting “Die, Hillary, die!”
MattF
@shomi: Farenthold tweets that between 1990 and 2015, the Trump Foundation spent a grand total of $211 on legal fees.
germy
Lin-Manuel makes a one-act musical out of a single run-one Trump sentence.
amk
@rk: Howard Stern has the honesty to say donnie belonged in his show and Hillary belonged in the white house.
Adam L Silverman
@Joel: Okay, I don’t follow basketball.
Underpaid_Propagandist
@liberal:
I’m in the media. It’s anything but liberal, believe me. Even on the evil, elitist, non-Heartlandic East Coast. The “Libertarian” jackass’s opening remarks in the Atlantic article refarted every neo-fascist lie about the “liberal” media.
PPCLI
@Shell: And his aides would explain he was writing German: “The Hillary, The!”
hovercraft
@low-tech cyclist:
You have to remember that there is a whole other media planet out there. Just because crap is not front and center in the MSM, does not mean that it’s not getting the business in Spanish language TV. I’m sure the Miss Housekeeping and the Castro business are big, bigly, news there right now. There has been a big surge in registrations just since the debate. Trump may think because FOX and right wing radio are ignoring these stories, that they’re not a big deal, but they are.
amk
gopolitico headlines now
Trump jumps into gutter.
Trump adviser in Florida resigns, citing discomfort with campaign ‘direction’
Former Miss Universe hits back at Trump’s ‘slander and lies’
/
It must be killing them.
hovercraft
@Tokyokie:
Pesky little things like facts and details don’t matter. After all those stories about the Clinton Foundation all found nothing wrong, but the fact that there were questions means there is a legitimate reason for all and sundry to call for it to be shut down.
artem1s
@the Conster, la Citoyenne:
please tell me these guys are in Ohio or at least another swing state!
different-church-lady
@germy: Methinks she has enough discipline to show compassion for the audience while simultaneously focusing all the contempt on “Donald” with a laser-lens.
glory b
@Adam L Silverman: I think she also declined to testify under oath, or said that nothing happened, and retracted her retraction later.
In any event, she was unreliable enough that even Ken Starr decided not to use her.
dmsilev
@MattF: Yes, but what about all the legal work he had done that he never bothered to pay for?
chopper
it’s still crazy to me that the republican party nominated a guy whose bedrock political principle is “no fat chicks”.
Barbara
@rk: A lot of people have sex tapes. I mean, I don’t have a sex tape but it never ceases to amaze me how normal this kind of stuff has become. Do they even live in the real world?
MattF
@dmsilev: Fair point.
D58826
@low-tech cyclist: The guys who do the landscaping at my apt. complex are almost all Hispanic and they work hard in the hot N. Carolina sun to keep the place looking nice. Hot job. Earn every cent of what they make.
Jeffro
@Trentrunner:
IAMNOTMELTINGDOWNOVERTHATFAT#&$%LYING$*$#&#AAARRRRRRGGGGHHHH
Omg, this is going to be a horrible and great day…
PPCLI
@hovercraft: Concerning Machado, the salience of the topic would be especially high because she is, as I understand, a fairly recognizable soap opera/dance competition figure on both Univision and Unimás.
Barbara
@? Martin: I agree, but it’s still astounding that a candidate would do himself in with such an easily avoided faux pas. It confirms the outlier nature of his personality.
raven
@Barbara: I’d call hims a dick but a dick has a head!
glory b
@Kay: Well, to be fair, there was the disabled reporter. Don’t forget people with disabilities.
JR in WV
@Roger Moore:
I am proud to be a yellow dog democrat – to compare that honored state to any condition of Republicanism is a dire insult to those of us who would rather vote for a fine yellow dog rather than any kind of Republican.
After all, yellow dogs are almost certainly cuddly (when clean), friendly, love their family, eat everything on their plate, and are willing to bite sneak thieves if necessary to protect their family.
Name me a Republican who would do half that for an adoptive family!!
randy khan
@dmsilev:
Or maybe it’s an official licensee of The Apprentice.
the Conster, la Citoyenne
@artem1s:
Massachusetts. But, they were BIG Bush supporters and donors, admittedly hard core conservative. A tweet from yesterday from the host of a very conservative Iowa radio station acknowledge, in no weasel word language, that Trump and his boy’s club of fat shamers confirmed every single negative stereotype that liberals have of conservatives, and then called them morons. So, there’s a lot of discomfort showing such blatant misogyny. Racism is one thing, but men live with women.
D58826
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: It got to the point, that other than the DNA on the blue dress, there was so much money, 15-minutes of fame, book deals floating around that it was impossible to believe anything thing any of them said. I’m not saying Bill was Innocent but the stories kept changing:
1. Paula Jones story kept getting worse and worse
2. Juanita Broaddrick denied the rape for years and then suddenly changed her story
3. Starr had to give Kathleen Wiley two immunity deals because she lied after the first one
4. all of the women from Trooper gate were figments of David Brocks imagination.
Humboldtblue
@khead: Both are so good.
hovercraft
Uncle Joe on the Tonight Show last night, gives his take on the debate.
Jeffro
Speaking of “this fucking guy”, Brooksie has an amazing take today on ‘The Death of Idealism’.
yes, it’s basically a “both sides” kinda thing, but that’s what we’d expect, right?
Here’s a howler, where he relates attending one of The Donald’s parties in the 80s (Don, were you that desperate?)
Even back in the 80s, Bobo went for the “sociological entertainment”, not the insider stock tips and the blow. Sad!
ET
There are A LOT of reasons Trump shouldn’t be anywhere near the White House (even as a guest), but his complete lack of impulse control should be at the top of the list. He seems to be completely unable to not respond to intended provocation or not so positive comments directed at him.
Humboldtblue
@hovercraft: Not drunk and angry enough?
Corner Stone
Not that SNL is or ever was impactful across broader society, but I can only imagine the kind of furious skit write-ups they are going through right now to do a segment on late night twitter rage by Trump.
Point being, we already think he’s a clown, buffoon and a joke. But when he starts getting the treatment by SNL, and late night talk show hosts start giving that kind of portrayal wide coverage, it might actually move the end result in a measurable way. It’s the old laughingstock theory, and I think it can be happening starting this weekend.
MattF
Interesting article from Jeet Heer on whether Trump is fascist. Heer’s not sure– calls Trump fascistic rather than fascist. But I disagree.
I think fascist movements are different in different countries, so you can’t point to a specific feature and say that because Trumpism fails that specific test, it’s not fascism. Trump’s blend of fascism and grift is uniquely American, and it’s the genuine article.
hovercraft
@PPCLI:
Yeah, she was a carefully laid land mine, designed to create maximum damage. He’s highlighting a fictitious porn career, but to many people she’s a known character from their favorite stories.
Aleta
He’s trying to reducing coverage of the NYS paperwork violation story and the Cuba story. I have no idea how consciously he does this, but he’s done it a lot.
Major Major Major Major
@MattF: I tend to agree with you–when fascism comes to America, it will be something like a con artist deadbeat real estate developer rather than what it looks like more traditionally. America!
@Aleta: But he’s been on this particular tear since before that story came out.
SiubhanDuinne, liberal mob enforcer bitch
There was one point in the Alicia Machado exchange at the debate that hasn’t had any attention AFAIK:
I remember reading about Machado several months ago, and seeing the video of Trump hauling her along to the gym with a gaggle of reporters in tow. Can’t recall where, but it was certainly “out there,” and being reported (albeit in a fairly desultory way). This isn’t a new story, by any means. So when Trump’s immediate response to hearing her name is to shout “Where did you find this?” one, two, three times — well, it’s just bizarre. I don’t even know what to make of it.
vhh
@Anonymous At Work: PSL = what?
SiubhanDuinne, liberal mob enforcer bitch
@vhh:
Pumpkin Spice Latte.
hovercraft
@the Conster, la Citoyenne:
If you are talking about Steve Deas, he has never been a fan of Trump’s, during the primaries he along with Charlie Sykes were often on TV denouncing him. I’m not sure if he caved once Trump won, but he’s more of a “Christian conservative republican”, who didn’t buy the Bible is the best book ever written conversion. If he was a supporter he was a soft one.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
I imagine Trump in Disney villain (or Dr Evil) tones: “There has been a breach in the non-disclosure agreements…”
Botsplainer, Cryptofascist Tool of the Oppressor Class
@Corner Stone:
I WILL NOT go try to find it. I swear….
the Conster, la Citoyenne
@MattF:
Adam Gopnik has already covered this ground, and more accurately.
Botsplainer, Cryptofascist Tool of the Oppressor Class
@SiubhanDuinne, liberal mob enforcer bitch:
I said it before, and I say it again – I really hope he had her sign one of his nondisparagement agreements, and his screaming cocksucker asshole stereotype lawyers move to enforce it.
catclub
@PPCLI: THIS. She is a big deal in latino media which most of us do not see. I sure don’t.
But sometimes I hear about it. I heard that kicking Jorge Ramos out of a Trump news conference is still remembered there.
PPCLI
@SiubhanDuinne, liberal mob enforcer bitch: Jonathan Chait tweeted that this was the sort of response you get from Disney cartoon villains: “Where did you get that? Where did you get that?” He was delighted and amazed, as I am, to see it actually occur in real life.
Major Major Major Major
@SiubhanDuinne, liberal mob enforcer bitch: efg is hands-down the leader in “go fuck yourself”, btw.
the Conster, la Citoyenne
@hovercraft:
Yes, I think it’s that guy. I only know my local conservative radio blowhards are all in with Trump.
RaflW
@The Dangerman:
Assumes facts not in evidence. For all we know his tweet last night was just part of the larger pattern of Trump marketing, sorta like his hosting a ‘press conference’ that was actually a 30 min infomercial for his new DC hotel.
the Conster, la Citoyenne
I’m in moderation, because of the name of a kind of gaming establishment beginning with c. Why oh why do we have a mod filter that trips over that word in this particular election cycle?
hovercraft
@Botsplainer, Cryptofascist Tool of the Oppressor Class:
Adam already found and linked to it upstairs. I think it’s to the porn, or maybe just to something about it? I did not click.
waspuppet
That’s because he’s no longer at Fox and thus has no jobs to give out.
MattF
@the Conster, la Citoyenne: It’s a problem. I fell into the same trap a couple of days ago.
waysel
@Mike J: Depositions regarding what case about what?
Frankensteinbeck
I told you. That debate was the worst night of Trump’s life. He was laughed at on stage, in front of a national TV audience, defeated and pushed around by a woman. On the night he showed up planning to put her in her place, no less. No, he can’t let this go. It is not just possible but likely he will stew over this the rest of his life.
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Greenwald has always shrugged his shoulders at racism and misogyny, then gotten back to attacking the real enemy of all civil libertarians, Democrats.
Elizabelle
@Nemo_N:
The lengths to which cable, especially, goes for false equivalency, and to normalize Trump. The PBS Snooze Hour is also infected.
Although, for CNN, it’s refreshing to hear they’ve stopped the wall to wall coverage of the Hoboken train crash.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
I realize all of this has been in the public domain and it was just a matter of somebody looking for it, but a part of me wonders if Hillary Corleone didn’t order Robbie Mook-Hagen to put this oppo research horse’s head in Trump’s bed
at this point, I think it’s just a matter of time before somebody– Howard Dean, Caravelle, Brock– brings up Ivana’s rape allegation.
Hoodie
@? Martin: Cuba would not be in the same league in terms of effectiveness. Trump is not a policy guy. His personality is his Achilles heel; he’s vain, greedy, selfish, racist and misogynist. They could hit him on any of those or a combination thereof, but the greed and selfishness is what really undermines his message of taking on economic elites, because that activates the radar among the Trump-curious that he’s just a con man taking them for a ride. People hate to be suckered.
I wonder if he doubled down on the Machado thing to distract attention from the other big hit of the debate — his stupid admissions regarding taxes. There was a lot a buzz about that initially (Trump admits he doesn’t pay taxes!), but that has been buried in the search for Machado sex tapes. Trump is a loathsome character, but don’t assume he’s crazy or stupid. He may be wagering that the press will be distracted by the scent of sex, which makes it likely he will not only persist with Machado, but also move on to the Lewinsky scandal. Not sure if that will work for him but, like any pig, he loves being in the muck.
Brachiator
@D58826:
The stories didn’t change that much, especially Paula Jones’. But Bill Clinton is not running for president, so I’m not seeing much reason to re-visit any of this in a foolish attempt to hold Hillary responsible for Bill’s actions.
hovercraft
@catclub:
Jorge Ramos is the number one most trusted person in news, in all the surveys of Spanish media consumers. In the real world, not just as a slogan,so disrespecting him was a huge mistake, and the fact that he has maintained his professionalism, and doesn’t bash him every night, elevates the respect he gets from his viewers even more.
scav
@the Conster, la Citoyenne: But infighting amoung the hard-core traditional base — in Iowa! — is probably more amusing (for us) than anyone easily written off as coastal media elite. Scores of old white men will be further worked up into a rage and up all night twittering or ranting at taverns or their wives.
SiubhanDuinne, liberal mob enforcer bitch
@Major Major Major Major:
I don’t doubt it for a minute.
Frankensteinbeck
@Aleta:
Nuh-uh. Trump has a long, LONG, well documented history of being thin-skinned and obsessively holding grudges. This was exactly what it looks like. He couldn’t sleep last night because he’s so angry and humiliated.
JCJ
@Adam L Silverman:
Huh. I always picture you in my mind as NBA commissioner Adam Silver
batgirl
@MattF: I have a close family member that is part of “Deranged Clinton Haters for Clinton.”
Brachiator
@Hoodie:
For some people the American Dream is to be rich and to have a smart attorney who makes it so that you don’t have to pay any taxes.
Of course, this kind of thing begs the question of how you satisfy the conservative wet dream of building a huge military if no one is paying taxes. Pass the hat to take up a collection to buy an aircraft carrier?
hovercraft
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Donna Clinton and her team began opo research on this guy a year ago when he took the lead in the primary. Remember back in the spring when the campaign and Priorities, and hell even Media Matters kept saying relax, we got this, there’s plenty out there that hasn’t been aired yet.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Aleta: @Frankensteinbeck: I think the Cuba and Foundation stories are too technical to move any votes from people who are movable, except maybe some old RW Cubans in FL (and elsewhere). Which I’ll take.
Corner Stone
I don’t know why MSNBC’s chyron says, “Trump Blasts Clinton, FMR Miss Universe In Early Morning Tweetstorm”.
That would imply he somehow made coherent points in his tweeting. Which he did not.
? Martin
@Hoodie:
That’s precisely my point, though. A Trump that wouldn’t fall for the bait on Machado wouldn’t be presented with that trap. It would be a different trap that plays against a different set of weaknesses. Barbara was wondering why Trump couldn’t just let this rest, and the reason is that he can’t, and if he could, this would never have been presented to him in the first place, instead some other trap against some other weakness of this übertrump would have been presented, and maybe it would be on policy, etc. One you invent a hypothetical Trump who is able to take responsibility for his actions, you open the door to a Trump that has weaknesses in other areas.
RaflW
@debit:
I remember people like her (including my sis-in-law, who is actually a delightful and thoughtful person but moderately conservative, like MitBot 1.0 Massachusetts conservative) wanting to know more about Ben Carson when he was sort of invisible too, a year ago summer. And Johnson appears to be acquitting himself about equally now.
The sad fact for moderate conservatives: Your movement is utterly, totally bankrupt. No one who could be in leadership wants to be. Either they have hidden under a rock, or they are off making bank in various predatory fields of ‘capitalism’. The movement is cancerous and decayed. Do something about it or STFU.
waysel
@Aleta: I agree. I think Sniffles, or at least Ailes or Bannon, knows well the value of throwing the press off the scent by way of distraction. May even be part of Grifting 101.
Corner Stone
@hovercraft: He knows what he did.
JCJ
@Jeffro:
That reminds me of the Robert Bork quote front-paged by Doug! back in 2012…
? Martin
@Corner Stone: I would go with ‘Trump suffers psychotic break and promotes sex tape on Twitter”.
Ruckus
@hovercraft:
Very good!
Now, what have you done with hovercraft?
scav
@waysel: Pretty sure it’s about the Restauranteur pulling out at the DC hotel. Nice, even if relatively minor in itself (don’t know) but it’s at the intersection of Trump and latinos (see above), Trump and staff (LV wages boycott, the cute women at golf courses thing, plus also Miss Universe as staff echo and who knows what else) and Trump lawsuits in general. Easy for reporters to find stuff lying anout to make the piece longer or more relevant — well, and for any others to do likewise, bien-sûr.
Shakti
Has it been conclusively established that Trump doesn’t know how to use HootSuite or Tweetdeck? (Just asking, I don’t know why any campaign would schedule tweets for five am and 3 am: to reach voters in Alaska and Hawaii?)
RaflW
@Barbara:
Trump’s father appears to have made his love conditional on Donald only being a winner, never a loser. It seems trite and may be just BS armchair psych, but indeed I agree that he cannot tolerate being made less-than.
The fact that he resorts to insult and outrage rather than actually doing the things that well adjusted people might do to improve themselves, that just seems to be narcissistic laziness. But it’s crippling when combined with the conditioning he may have received as a child.
RaflW
@Shakti: The overnight tweets were stamped as being from his Android. Appears they weren’t queued up.
And if they were? Also insane.
Ruckus
@Iowa Old Lady:
I’m sure you know that it doesn’t matter what she did, she destroyed these fine women who slept with her husband. So what if she actually did nothing? So what if there is no basis or rational thought here? They believe that she is a destroyer of worlds and people because she is a woman and a Clinton and a liberal, three of the worst things in the world. So what if it’s all bullshit?
Ruckus
@Taylor:
I think you answered your own question with the concept that NJ is not paying it’s way.
So where is the money going? That’s over $300 million that didn’t go to the Port Authority anymore, so where is it?
different-church-lady
@SiubhanDuinne, liberal mob enforcer bitch:
It’s like a real-life version of a poorly-written television courtroom drama, where the defendant has a meltdown under examination that gives away his guilt.
Mike J
@waysel: Restaurants in the old post office. Famous chefs (Zakarian, Jose Andres) backed out after he attacked the judge, didn’t want to be associated with him.
Tim C.
@debit: Yup the one virtue of the Trump candidacy has been dragging that wriggling squirming mass of hate out into the open, it’s been lurking in the dark too long.
catclub
@RaflW: I always wonder where in the stories of his childhood that his mother was. They always mention his father but never his mother. What is up with that?
Shakti
@RaflW: Yes, it would be even more weird to schedule rage tweets for a weird time.
My brain is resisting the idea that he stayed up half the night, tossing and turning to tweet this nonsense.
“She’s so fat, check out her sex tape,” sounds like the malicious envy of someone hate masturbating at 3 am.
James M Grandone
An old man lying in bed thinking about Miss Universe can be very frustrating, I would imagine.
Hoodie
@Brachiator: Maybe Average Joe would love not to pay taxes, but the fact that he pays taxes and Trump doesn’t while living in a gilded penthouse might just frost Joe’s balls.
Included among Trump’s multitude of weaknesses are his inability to focus, his lack of impulse control and lack of self-awareness, all of which played a role in his terrible debate performance. It’s interesting that he didn’t seem to realize how badly he did until after the post-debate punditry; he came off the stage thinking he did great. Not saying that either of his slipups regarding Machado or his taxes is not a problem for him, but he may be thinking that he can possibly survive Machado (“effing Mexicans and broads won’t vote for me anyway!”), but the tax stuff could be a hit below the waterline. He’s looking at historic defeat if the angry dumb white dude crowd starts peeling away.
Feebog
@germy:
I see what you did there…
Ruckus
@Cacti:
He’s not typically bi-polar. Where’s the “normal” cycle to offset the abnormal? I believe a true bi-polar person has to exhibit both. I’ve seen bi-polar up close and there is alternating between the rational and the manic that can happen without any noticeable triggers. He’s always manic. There is no rational to him.
catclub
Trump tweet storm was crazy. But it did shift the discussion away from “You don’t call anyone Miss Piggy, no matter what they look like”
to discussions of other things. In that way it is a partial win for him.
TriassicSands
Surely, there is video somewhere of Trump abusing animals or even killing them (after torturing them) for pleasure. Sadly, Trump is old enough that “video,” as such, didn’t exist when he was a kid, otherwise I imagine there would be lots of “footage” of Donald abusing small critters. He would have filled his social media pages with classic torture and snuff clips. Where are those elusive home movies? Donald couldn’t have destroyed them — I’m sure he still enjoys watching them for relaxation and as an expression of his power.
JR in WV
@hovercraft:
So, he would be the Walter Cronkite of Univision, then. And Trump threw Uncle Walter out of his fascist rally? Swell~!! For Hillery, swell.
I’m sure as a real professional Mr Ramos will bend over backwards to continue to report only the facts. It is a shame for Trump that the facts also lean so heavily in Senor Ramos’s direction.
What an ass Trump is!! Just point at a random reporter and tell security to “Throw that guy out!” Trump is lucky they didn’t rough him up a little bit, isn’t he?
Frankensteinbeck
@Shakti:
Staying up all night tossing and turning and tweeting when he can’t take any more is well within Trump’s established habits. This is the guy who STILL mails photos of his hands to the guy who coined the ‘short-fingered vulgarian’ joke.
Elie
@catclub:
His mom was a scots national who never became a US citizen and had a very hard head from what I remember written
Timurid
@? Martin:
It’s like all the counterfactuals about how Germany could have won World War II… “If they’d just been smart and done this…”
None of it matters, because in the end Hitler’s gonna Hitler.
SFAW
@germy:
Holy shit.
He’s Palin, without the brains. And I don’t mean Michael.
That sentence, were it entered in the Bulwer-Lytton contest, would be instant Hall of Fame material, and might end up destroying the contest, because who could ever come close?
SFAW
@Timurid:
Well, bombing Pearl Harbor was certainly not their smartest move.
SFAW
@Elie:
In other words, his whole birther thing was projection? Outstanding.
Calouste
@RaflW: That’s mostly American conservatives of course. I mean, Angela Merkel is a conservative, but she is not incompetent or deranged like the GOP. Can’t say I was a fan of David Cameron, but he brought out the hammer against American nitwits on more than a few occasions (“Of course it’s easier if you hold an Olympic Games in the middle of nowhere”).
NorthLeft12
@Barbara:
Frankly, this trait is consistently found in most conservatives IMO. They take personal offence if their ideas are challenged, mocked, or debunked. They seem to perceive it as a sign of weakness to try and politely rebut any arguments, and usually turn the volume notch up a few times and include some personal insults to defend their point. Stupid, obnoxious, and lazy? Of course it is! And this is why they love Deadbeat Donald as he does this exactly like most RWNJs think it should be done.
Gravenstone
@khead:
It finally occurred to me what the crux of all his hatred for Machado is, he probably propositioned her and she shut him down.
Aleta
Their narrative (and Trump, Eric and Giulliani started it right away) is that it’s H Clinton’s fault that he’s about to drag Monica L. around. H Clinton’s fault that he will now “embarrass Chelsea.” (This is a threat to Clinton that he will hurt her daughter if she doesn’t pipe down.) H Clinton’s fault that there will be increasingly ugly things appearing in weird places like the N Enqu about “my Miss Universe” (as he called her last night). (I won’t be surprised if paid witnesses pop up to scatter stories about her character.)
The media has a financial interest in putting out the stories about Alicia Machado (and probably Monica L. and other women) that his operatives are now giving them. Destroying (again) these women to help Trump’s cause, because “it’s news,” is right up there with anything the NYT or NBC has done.
Trump is very good at getting us to fixate on “How much weight did she actually gain– look how he exaggerates,” and “Is that really her in this photo/video,” and “Trump just said another outrageous thing about her.” It helps him and it helps the publisher get more money from advertisers, and it quiets down the attention given to his crimes and the lawyers who help him.
Brachiator
@SFAW: RE: It’s like all the counterfactuals about how Germany could have won World War II… “If they’d just been smart and done this…”
And imagine if it had been the Japanese instead of the Germans who had bombed Pearl Harbor!
NorthLeft12
@Corner Stone:
This is where you need the headline writers from the NY Post or News of the World to write those chyrons;
“The Donald Goes Ballistic!” “Crazed Trump Tweets All Night” “Trump Twitter Tirade: All Night Long”
LAO
Transcript of Trump’s June 2016 deposition is up at Buzzfeed.. I can’t believe there is a single persona that sees him as a successful business man. And, his persona is not an act.
Betty Cracker
@different-church-lady: It reminded me of when Scooby and Shaggy unmask the villain — right before the part about the meddling kids. But yeah, bad courtroom drama dialog works too.
Suffragete City elftx
@dr. bloor:
Perfect!!!
LosGatosCA
@Brachiator:
Well, what I heard was that Donald took some Viagra around 10pm and when Melania achieved total orgasmic bliss she called out ‘Alicia’ or ‘Michelle’, in any case not ‘Donald’.
4 1/2 hours later Donald was up as it were and then that’s when he hit Twitter in a rage instead of calling his doctor
Matt McIrvin
@Brachiator: Sshh, he’s rolling.
rikyrah
BWA HA HA HA AH HA AH AH AHHA
Jean-Michel
@amk: Howard Stern has the honesty to say donnie belonged in his show and Hillary belonged in the white house.
That was Springer, not Stern. But Stern has told the media that Trump’s “I told Howard Stern I was against the war” line is a load of horse puckey–which is obvious to anyone who has read the transcript or listened to the interview, but a substantial portion of our media can’t be bothered to do even that much, so Stern’s efforts are appreciated.
PPCLI
@NorthLeft12: Trump To Alicia: Drop Pounds!
PPCLI
@catclub: Though I’m not sure that “You don’t falsely say of anyone that they filmed a sex tape.” is more friendly terrain.
Seanly
@SiubhanDuinne, liberal mob enforcer bitch:
Yeah, I thought that was a strange exchange also. Maybe Trump has very bad memory.
liberal
@Timurid:
Yeah…some historian a long while back in some documentary was saying that if Hitler had just stopped at freeing Ukraine from the Soviets instead of going further and oppressing it himself, it might have really helped him during the war. Sure, if Hitler wasn’t Hitler.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
“Used my worst Miss U”
You really never got into the adult male world Donny, have you? We big boys make think that way about the girls, but you don’t say it to their faces, you idiot.
1,000 Flouncing Lurkers (was fidelioscabinet)
@hovercraft:
FTFY
Williamsib
Amazon showing signs of degradation due to climate change, Nasa warns wastewater treatment equipment water filtration companies The Wildlife Trusts say damming the estuary by having an old-fashioned barrage would use a devastating impact. Perhaps one of the most iconic Severn species, the Atlantic salmon, can be rendered locally extinct Photograph: Laurie Campbell/Wild Life Trusts ,UN calls on nations to adopt urgent drought policies
Rock (Cornwall) ,drinking water standards water filter company
watersinfo.org