Trump didn't answer a question about whether it is inevitable he’ll be impeached.
He left the Oval. Which is unusual. Usually *we* leave the Oval. pic.twitter.com/GgbUc3OO0K
— Jennifer Jacobs (@JenniferJJacobs) September 30, 2019
If he can remember as far back as his ‘glory’ days, I’m guessing he’s seeing a bunch of flailing idiots performing so badly that no amount of post-production editing will be able to frame them as mighty gladiators…
What a disaster. McCarthy would knock himself unconscious struggling his way out of a wet paper bag. https://t.co/fvoSk9ohYq
— Will Wilkinson ?? (@willwilkinson) September 30, 2019
Kevin McCarthy is not very bright, and it shows.
Jake Tapper calls out Rep. Jim Jordan over his baseless Hunter Biden accusations: "It's facts and I would think that somebody who's been accused of things in that last year or two would be more sensitive about throwing out wild allegations against people." pic.twitter.com/HkqSVGwZey
— Blake Jones (@BlakeThought) September 29, 2019
Used to be, the sheer what-next novelty of the Trump Oval Office Variety Show was good for drawing viewers. Now, there’s more market share in pigbladdering the minions. And what minions they are, folks!
"You have your non-answer" — watch Chris Wallace grill Stephen Miller about why Trump thought it was appropriate to use his private attorney to dig up dirt on Biden — and not let Miller get away with obfuscating. pic.twitter.com/wKr1fpIX5Z
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) September 29, 2019
Even his beloved Fox News! Look, when you’re reduced to letting Stephen ‘Nosferatu’ Miller represent you on visual media, well…
Definitely in the, “If the law and the facts are against you, pound the table and yell like hell” phase of this thing. https://t.co/pEYeCBfaqg
— Schooley (@Rschooley) September 29, 2019
Nice try, Kneepads.
Have rarely seen Giuliani back down during a TV interview, but he yields somewhat after Maria Bartiromo continues to press him on GOP criticism. Toward the end of the interview, he responds, “What am I supposed to do, keep silent?”
— Felicia Sonmez (@feliciasonmez) September 29, 2019
Maria Bartiromo, still loyal: Do you *want* to make things worse for yourself and your capo, Rudy? Do you not remember the OneL law school rule about shutting the feck up when you’ve dug yourself into a deep hole?
ROBERT DE NIRO giving zero…well you know pic.twitter.com/ON0r7rzauT
— Dankwa Brooks (@DankwaBrooks) September 29, 2019
Now this — this really hadda hurt Donny Dollhands. To be dismissed, for all the world to see, by Mr. Goodfellas tough-guy movie star himself! Oh, the humanity!
Trump, we’ve been told, is a visual learner. What he’s seeing right now is that, visually, he’s… not in a great place, so to speak. LET. US. SAVOR.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
Please to be adding Kevin McCarthy saying trump was getting paid by the Russians.
I thought there was a video of that moment, or at least audio, but I can’t find it
mrmoshpotato
pigbladdering?
And can we please not besmirch the name of Count Orlok by associating him with that Nazi trash?
cain
As De Niro says “fuck em” and chanelling our dearly departed commentator efg.
Joihn Revolta
De Niro channelling efgoldman!
rikyrah
Untitled Zandar Game (@ZandarVTS) Tweeted:
Bill Barr declared war on his own agencies and worked with foreign intelligence to try to sink his own investigation.
Man, you thought the IC leaks were bad *before*? https://twitter.com/ZandarVTS/status/1178790811598757889?s=17
rikyrah
Chris Murphy (@ChrisMurphyCT) Tweeted:
It’s not that they all didn’t know about the corruption.
It’s not that they knew about it did nothing.
They knew about it – came to the conclusion it was cool to use the the power of the presidency to destroy a political rival – and facilitated it. https://twitter.com/ChrisMurphyCT/status/1178799394898022400?s=17
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@rikyrah: I wonder when Mueller’s staffers start leaking. At the very least I’d bet a couple of mortgage payments that Fredo took the Fifth.
geg6
These guys be-clowning themselves for all the world to see has been hysterically funny. You can’t help but laugh at them. But then it hits me that our country is being torn up and the Constitution trashed, innocent people are having their careers stalled and ruined and people here in the US and overseas are being hurt and even dying because of what these mother fuckers have wrought. And I stop laughing and start crying. This shit has got to stop.
Ohio Mom
When this is finally all over, and the Trump administration is no more, we will be told that the Constitution’s balance of powers worked as intended, the press did its job, and so on.
My response will be, Um no, we should never have gotten to the point we did. Something needs fixing so we are never in a similar pickle again.
rikyrah
Tea Pain (@TeaPainUSA) Tweeted:
Let this sink in.
Bill Barr has visited with foreign allies to smear our own intelligence agencies. The top law enforcement officer has weakened our national security and stained our integrity in the world.
He must be removed and prosecuted. https://twitter.com/TeaPainUSA/status/1178804800244342785?s=17
jl
Proverbs 16
18 Pride goeth before destruction, and an haughty spirit before a fall.
27 An ungodly man diggeth up evil: and in his lips there is as a burning fire.
28 A froward man soweth strife: and a whisperer separateth chief friends.
29 A violent man enticeth his neighbour, and leadeth him into the way that is not good.
30 He shutteth his eyes to devise froward things: moving his lips he bringeth evil to pass.
Duane
If Trumpov had any sense-HAHAHA- he’d make a deal and get out while there’s still a deal to make. Show us some “Art of the Deal” you blithering jackass.
Formerly disgruntled in Oregon
@geg6: “This shit has got to stop.”
Agreed! Fuck this shit.
Fair Economist
Thanks to Betty’s Centaur post, now when I see pictures of Trump I immediately notice his ridiculous swayback. Eurgh.
Duane
@rikyrah: Will that be enough to get Barr treason charges, or something similar? It sure as hell should.
Mike in NC
Hopefully when this is all over Trump, Barr, Rudy, and Pompeo will get adjoining prison cells.
cain
AOC weighs in on Kashmir:
jl
@Duane: I think a lot of them are guilty of several counts of solicitation of an in kind contribution to a political campaign from a foreign country. That should be enough to get Barr and several others out of office, and I hope into jail.
Edit: as for treason, I can’t believe we at war with all the countries that the Trumpsters hit up for clues on the SECRET SERVERS(!!!) or dirt on the notorious Biden international crime ring. Maybe Trump called up Andorra looking for Biden loot invested in the smuggling trade, who knows? But I haven’t checked the news in a few hours to see what Trump has been up to.
low-tech cyclist
@Ohio Mom:
It’s worth remembering that one of the two leading candidates for the Dem nomination sees it pretty much like that, while the other thinks that as soon as Trump is gotten rid of, the Republicans in Congress will wake up as if from a spell, and it’ll be like the days of Tip n’ Ronnie all over again.
Mary G
@geg6: I feel the same. It’s hilarious until I remember Ukraine needs the weapons to fend off Russia, and our troops aren’t getting what they need, and children are still in cages separated from their parents. It’s horrendous.
low-tech cyclist
@Mike in NC:
We should send ’em all to Gitmo, is what we should do.
Yarrow
Tick tock, motherfuckers. Traitors gonna pay.
Leto
@geg6: The hole we’ve dug ourselves, concerning our foreign partners/allies, is tremendous. Something that Trumpov’s election signals is that since it’s happened once, it can happen again. They will forever have it in the back of their collective minds that we could unleash an unstable monster upon the world, again.
HumboldtBlue
Nine-year-old Minnesota boy, already an accomplished runner, entered a 5K race this weekend and ended up winning the adult 10K race.
“I kept going”
jl
@Mary G: Sanders is finally waking up from his oblivious snooze on the need for structural reform. But I think after Warren comes first or second in the first caucuses and primaries, it will be between Warren and Biden. Maybe by time primaries roll around, enough Trumpster dirt will come out to convince public Biden approach won’t work. If some of GOP Congrssional leaderhip gets swept up, I think public will be convinced.
clay
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: If I remember the story correctly, there IS audio, but it hasn’t been released to the public. At first Ryan tried to deny they said it, but the reporter said, “I have it on tape” and then Ryan said, “uh… we were joking”.
I do wonder why we never heard it… and what else is on that tape?
rikyrah
chris evans (@notcapnamerica) Tweeted:
The recent reporting by the NYT and Washington Post suggest Attorney General Barr is complicit in Donald Trump’s lawless attempts at exploiting the White House for personal gain.
Who says we need to bring him back in front of @KamalaHarris?
https://t.co/apdTms5yip https://twitter.com/notcapnamerica/status/1178802143307948033?s=17
Elizabelle
LOL. William Kristol has an op ed in the FTF NYTimes.
He wishes.
jl
@Leto: ” The hole we’ve dug ourselves, concerning our foreign partners/allies, is tremendous. ”
Australia, Japan, France, Germany, Ukraine, Scotland (independent country by the time this is over), Lichtenstein,Iraq, etc. come to us and discreetly demand that the US reform itself before we can expect international cooperation. Like we used to do to banana republics.
Elizabelle
@Ohio Mom: Yes.
low-tech cyclist
@Mary G:
Ditto.
And have I mentioned that babies in motherfucking cages really needs to be one of the things we impeach Trump over?
At the very least, that would send a message to Pence that if he becomes President, he’d better bring this abominable practice to an end, because if he doesn’t, there’d be immediate reason to impeach him. Preferably before the House votes to confirm his veep.
rikyrah
Ben Rhodes (@brhodes) Tweeted:
It’s never good for a democracy when the Attorney General is tasked with supervising the crimes. https://twitter.com/brhodes/status/1178792092987875328?s=17
patrick II
@jl:
We are at some kind of war with Putin – or more accurately he is with us, and that is the underlying cause for most of this. We need to acknowledge this to ourselves fairly soon, and start holding people seriously responsible for collaborting-
ThresherK
When Jake Tapper is emboldened to do this (like any first-year journo student would), it’s a sign.
rikyrah
?????
Red™️ (@Redpainter1) Tweeted:
I am a vegetarian for 20 years. I don’t drink. I quit smoking 14 years ago.
BUT…
The day Donald Trump resigns or gets removed from office, I will drink a glass of wine while eating a hamburger which I will follow with one long drag off a cigarette. https://twitter.com/Redpainter1/status/1178799037295874048?s=17
Elizabelle
Jessye Norman has died. Fabulous soprano. Aged 74. Rest in power.
HumboldtBlue
Yeah, good for Bobby De Niro and I watched that clip earlier, but he’s still a fucking anti-vaxxer the dumbass.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
Leto
@HumboldtBlue: I love this.
@Elizabelle: Dear Billy: go fuck yourself. You helped bring this about. Enjoy.
TS (the original)
And I wake up to this in Australia.
Trump asked Scott Morrison for help investigating Mueller inquiry into Russian election interference
I guess the State Dinner was the reward – gosh we didn’t even get any infrastructure aid. No good ever comes to anyone who tries to be bff with the president* It’s like bowing to the king – truly disgusting.
schrodingers_cat
@cain: And Sanghi trolls on Twitter were issuing death threats to Romilla Thappar.
low-tech cyclist
@Leto:
Twice. It’s happened twice.
Remember, Bush was bad enough in their eyes that when Obama became President, he got the Nobel Peace Prize mostly because he wasn’t Bush, and the torture and gratuitous wars of that Administration would stop.
Other countries were willing to assume that Bush was an aberration, and continue dealing with us as before. But now that it’s happened a second time, and even worse this time, it’s going to be a while before they can trust us again.
Oh, and fuck “look forward, not back.” It was a bad idea the first time (and I wrongly assumed it was for public consumption, and there would be a workaround), and it would be abominable after Trump.
Leto
@jl: I can’t wait for them to go before the UN and demand international vote inspection teams to certify that we’re not vote tampering/rigging.
Jay
JPL
@cain: I had a similar thought. fuckem
Leto
@low-tech cyclist: agreed; truth and reconciliation commissions. It way past time for this. Fuck their cries of “politicalization”. Fuck’em.
schrodingers_cat
@TS (the original): Giggle Sisters of PBS NewsHour were pooh poohing this development. Ds are making it look like a partisan witch hunt etc.
Aleta
I believe they’re asking the court to let them see the grand jury records because of the impeach. investigation.
Smedley Darlington Prunebanks (formerly Mumphrey, et al.)
Keep in mind Tяump’s First and Second Laws and you’ll never go wrong.
Tяump’s First Law: It’s always worse than you think with this guy. Always.
Tяump’s Second Law: The truth is, these are not very bright guys, and things got out of hand.
JPL
@Aleta: hmm That’s an interesting development. He’ll just lie about the lie though.
Ohio Mom
@Fair Economist: Yes, I can’t unsee that either.
Richard Guhl
@Ohio Mom: @Ohio Mom:
Have to agree that happy talk about how the system worked would be a false narrative.
What has been revealed is how easily broken our Constitutional government is and how much it requires unenforceable norms to work.
geg6
@low-tech cyclist:
That was always a specious argument. It is looking forward to make sure it doesn’t happen again. In order to do that, the bad actors of the past must pay a price for their crimes. The more powerful they are, the higher the price they should pay.
TS (the original)
@Duane:
He tried to do that with Nancy Pelosi – I think that option is past.
Mary G
Miss Bianca
OMG, this is petty, but in that Twitter photo you can really see that stance that Betty C was talking about the other day – Trump stands with his chest and his butt out like he’s missing his centaur-horse’s ass.
@Fair Economist: Right!
ThresherK
@schrodingers_cat: “Giggle sisters” is way more apt than PBS would like it to be.
Zinsky
I thought I had heard just about every colloquialism but you got me scratching with “pigbladdering the minions”. Please explain.
On the Trump impeachment issue, I am amazed at how quickly this thing is coming apart on El Trumpo. It’s almost biblical – the foolish man builds his house on sand (lies) and the slightest tide will wash it away. A line from Shakespeare that I always try to remember when the bullshit starts getting deep: “The truth will vindicate itself”.
Mary G
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Mary G: when she’s good…
Leto
@Miss Bianca: I can’t unsee Dick Tent, now, any time he’s sitting. ?
OT: HRC and Chelsea will be on Colbert tonight, talking about their book, “The Book of Gutsy Women”
Elizabelle
@Zinsky:
pigbladdering the minions. Yes. Explain.
Also: did we ever figure out what Jeffro/Another Scott/whoever meant with ENNT or whatever a few days back? Seems to be some acronym, or maybe the Myers Briggs for Cluster B types.
What did it turn out to be? (Have missed a lot of threads.)
PeakVT
Time to start impeachment proceedings against Barr.
TS (the original)
@jl:
Not Australia with the current PM – He is here to assist the president*
Aleta
@Aleta: You know I think the House Dems have been busy setting things up. (Rather than doing nothing as some accused.) The Jud. Cmt. voted to allow Nadler, when he decides to, subpoena Kushner, Sessions, Kelly, Flynn, Rosenstein, Jody Hunt, Rob Porter for their obstruction investigation. (Reported July 11) As far as I know (I could be wrong) he’s only subpoenaed Lewandowski and Dearborn so far.
Then (reported on July 25) the Oversight Cmt. authorized subpoenas for “records and documents tied to the use of private texts and emails for official business by Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump, Acting Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney and other officials.”
Good timing. Trump and Pompeo called Ukraine on July 25.
Fair Economist
@Elizabelle: So sorry to hear she is gone. She had just such an amazing voice and such wonderful expression. Her recording of Vier letzte Leider by Richard Strauss spoiled me from any other version I’ve ever heard. She was just *so* good.
Dev Null
@clay: Scuttlebutt had it that Evan McMullin made the recording. Seems that a lot of people knew about the tape.
Transcript here.
Miss Bianca
@Elizabelle: @Zinsky: Fools – as in “licensed” fools, clowns and court jesters and such, often carried pig’s bladder balloons with which they smacked people in the crowd.
JoyceH
The news keeps showing clips of that Stephen Miller interview – it’s a sign of the weird disconnect from reality that anyone would put this guy out there to be persuasive. Miller is That Guy that we all remember from college, the guy who, if he’s arguing in favor of the Golden Rule, you’d start to oppose it, because he’s just. so. OBNOXIOUS.
Matt McIrvin
@Elizabelle: I thought it was the sound of a game-show buzzer, like on Family Feud.
Leto
@Mary G: If we don’t keep propping up the unqualified white men, the system will collapse! And we can’t have that!!! ?
West of the Rockies
@Elizabelle:
What a voice.
TS (the original)
@schrodingers_cat: I see it as our PM falling all over trump – no sane PM would have accepted a state dinner with trump – the prior one (who Morrison challenged) would definitely not have gone. To Australia it is deeply disturbing & to me it is trump using those dealing skills to con another country’s leader.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
SFAW
I don’t know if this was covered in another thread, but: TPM is reporting that Fishmouth Grassley and Ron “Box o’ Rocks” Johnson are asking the DoJ ‘If They’re Probing Link Between Ukraine And Clinton.” Because it’s all Hillary’s fault, I guess.
Out-fucking-standing.
Elizabelle
@Fair Economist: Her death seems to have taken the NY Times by surprise. They have been scrambling to put together a full obituary. Cause of death was septic shock and organ failure; she’d apparently suffered a spinal injury in 2015. I wondered why we never heard anything about her in a long time.
And I don’t listen that much to opera, but thought she was such a magnificent presence. Regal is right.
chris
@JoyceH: I’ll see your Miller and raise you a… GORKA! jfc
Mary G
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: I am horrified by that, suffering from extreme chonkiness myself.
jimmiraybob
All the Trumpeteers are auditioning for jobs at various Trump properties for after the fall. Preferentially, in non-extradition countries.
Leto
@chris: Continuing proof that we live in the dumbest fucking timeline possible.
SFAW
@Elizabelle:
Yes.
Jay
A Ghost To Most
@Miss Bianca: worthless fact,: the surname Register is derived from Regent’s Jester, my mother’s research determined.
JaySinWA
@chris: I wonder if Seb Gorka sees himself as a new Kissinger?
I thought I saw a picture of Pompeo sitting with the old criminal.
Jay
Elizabelle
Jessye Norman: youtube: Dido’s Lament: When I am laid in earth. Just gorgeous.
I think opera is the perfect music to accompany Trump’s downfall. I never ever listen to him, if I can in any way avoid it, and I don’t put up with the lying liars our both sides media puts up.
So this will be a good year to read and to listen to opera (it can be the soundtrack to these traitors flapping their pieholes) and the too soon gone Jessye Norman.
Ladyraxterinok
@schrodingers_cat: Looked her up. Will try to find and read some of her work.
Why are trolls attacking her? What did she do or say? Isn’t she retired?
Duane
@Leto: The republican party dug this hole and it’s deep enough to bury them. Like Germany did the Nazi filth. That could help restore confidence in the US government.
Elizabelle
Where’s baud?
SFAW
@JoyceH:
He’s one of maybe ten persons in this country who could make Ted Cruz seem comparatively OK. Of course, the other nine are also working for Shitgibbon.
MCA1
This is all crumbling so fast it’s dizzying. Let’s recap all the stuff that has made me ALREADY forget that shitbird GOP Rep. Chris Collins, he of the insider trading on his cell phone from the Rose Garden, resigned like three hours ago. In the last day and a half the following has occurred or been learned:
– Trump called for the Chair of the House Intelligence Committee to be brought up on treason charges
– This while he was giving thumbs up to some talibangelical calling for civil war over impeachment
– Barr has been overseas in his capacity as Att’y General of the United States attempting to get other countries to try and discredit every intelligence agency of the US, as well as the FBI (which he of course is supposed to oversee)
– Pompeo was on the Zelensky extortion call
– Dotard pressured Australia to fuzzy up the Papadopoulous story that started the whole investigation into Russian hacking in ’16
– Rudy Giuliani got subpoenaed by the House Intel Committee
– House lawyers claim Drumpf lied under oath on his written answers to Mueller
It is fucking raining shoes out there.
schrodingers_cat
@Ladyraxterinok: She is an eminent historian of Indian history and she has been outspoken against the rewriting of history to fit the Sangh’s Hindutva narrative. She asked the government to clarify what they mean by urban naxal. (Naxalbari in West Bengal was the birthplace of a leftist rebellion in the 70s IIRC. BJP stooges like to label academics, and activists who question the government as urban naxals (west coast elite like epithet) and then throw them in jail. It did that with 4 eminent activists, who have been in jail for over a year under trumped up charges.
JWR
@Miss Bianca:
Kavanaugh, I once noticed, has a similar posture. Very strange, very odd. (Maybe it’s leaning against a podium too long?)
Jay
Mary G
Cacti
Well, so far we know that no less than the POTUS, Attorney General, and Secretary of State were involved in overt criminal activity.
But any impeachment activity needs to be drawn out through 11/2020 to inflict maximum damage on every Republican.
Zelma
I did history for a living and, of course, one of the questions I always tried to answer, however imperfectly, was why. I keep asking why someone of supposed intelligence falls in with someone like Trump. I understand why some of them are there. I mean, for Rudy, it’s the grift. He’s been associating with low lifes for money ever since 9/11. Likewise Gorka. But Barr is harder to fathom. OK, he’s an authoritarian and believes in the unitary executive. I get that. By why would he think that Trump is worth it? What’s in it for him?
And then I remember that he’s a devout Catholic and was somehow associated with Opus Dei. Is it abortion? is that a driving motivation? I know more than a few seemingly intelligent and generally decent people who have sold their souls to Trump because of the abortion issue. If Paris was worth a mass, is the abolition of abortion worth the loss of American democracy, the Constitution and our standing in the world? So it would seem.
Leto
@Elizabelle: campaigning? Not sure, haven’t seen him all day.
Aleta
So Trump just pulls Barr, Pompeo, who else? out of their offices whenever he likes, to fly around asking other countries to help him attack the US ? At least he could pay for the trips himself, instead of billing us. And today Gorka is traveling with Pompeo on State Dept. business?
lumpkin
These people are so accustomed to talking to people even stupider than they are that they’re overwhelmed when someone actually questions what they say.
Roger Moore
@Zelma:
Don’t underestimate the importance of race in all this. Obama’s election drove a lot of racists completely around the bend. They can’t accept that white people aren’t in control of the country anymore, and they’re willing to do whatever it takes to take it back.
Cheryl Rofer
@Zelma: Don’t forget power.
Although being Trump’s errand boy to talk other countries into doing a crazy investigation your own intelligence services want nothing to do with seems like less than power.
ETA: I think Roger Moore may have it.
zhena gogolia
@Zelma:
Barr is a devout Catholic? Can you be that without believing in God? Because he doesn’t.
“Everybody dies.”
Mnemosyne
@Zelma:
There are quite a few Americans who think that sacrificing our democracy and their souls is a small price to pay for making abortion illegal. They are willing to do literally ANYTHING for that goal.
Putin and his propagandists figured that out and have been pushing that button as hard as they can. ?
J R in WV
@Leto:
NO offense, but fuck truth and reconciliation, I want Grand Juries, petit juries, trials and convictionsl That’s the truth I want. Jail time will do for all the reconciliation I need. 10-20 years, they’ll be quiet when they get out.
Leto
THE GRIFTING MUST NOT STOP:
Per WaPo: RNC solicited money for Trump’s reelection with forms that look a lot like the official census
Mary G
Twitler’s tweeted a video ripped off from a-Ha’s “Take on Me” where he appears and disappears and I am rooting for disappearing into jail.
trnc
@Leto:
One way to minimize that is to amend the constitution and create another requirement to become president – be elected to office at the municipal, state or federal level and serve for at least 2 years. First, it’s a reasonable requirement because the top job in any large organization requires relevant experience. The Perots and Schultzs of the world can kiss my ass.
Second, no way would DT ever have “settled” for becoming anything less than top dog.
J R in WV
@Elizabelle:
It isn’t an acronyn, it’s the sound an alarm makes, like General Quarters, FIRE, Collision Alarm, etc. Think BLAT, BLAT, ENNT ENNT… ertc.
I dunno about PigBladder stuff… good question.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
Former Republican ‘critter David Jolly just called for the impeachment inquiry to be expanded to Pence, Pompeo, Barr and the Director OMB, which suggests some scandal I haven’t even heard of yet. I’m all for it, but I don’t know how that would work, and I doubt the skittish caucus would go for it. Reminds me that I’m always meaning to go and look at how Jolly, who’s as righteously nagging at Democrats to magically fix everything as any BernieBro on twitter, campaigned when he was essentially on the ticket with trump in ’16. He lost to Charlie Crist, no?
@Cheryl Rofer: On power: I was thinking the other day about Mnuchin, a Master of the Universe type who was rumored in early 2017 to be part of a pact with Tillerson and Mattis that the would all stand together, two resigning if any one of them was fired (poor Rex). I think he used to be a big Dem donor, too (?). I think about how he commandeered a government jet to fly his little trophy wife around to watch the eclipse. He could have hired a tricked out jet probably more comfortable than the one he got, he probably owns one, but the power of ordering up a military flight appealed to him. He has Alexander Hamilton’s old job. His wife apparently thinks she’s a “Madame la Ministre” at Versailles in 1745. All the glamor and prestige and the hob-nobbing (did they get into Buckingham Palace? the Vatican?) that go with an official position, the icing on the cake of being a billionaire.
Ladyraxterinok
@Jay: Could you periodically update us on these people?
Thank you for your many links. Stuff I was unaware of.
Leto
@J R in WV: So the same thing that we did to Germany post-Nazis (and again in 1992 with E/W reunification), or what South Africa under Mandela did post apartheid? Yes, truth and reconciliation commissions. Those include jail time. It needs to happen.
Jay
Trump Says If There Is Another Civil War He Will Get a New Note from Podiatrist. – Andy Borowitz
Yarrow
@Zelma:
Don’t leave out the possibility that Barr did things and there’s kompromat on him. He may be doing everything now because he can’t not do it.
chris
@JaySinWA:
More like, “Kissinger is a wimp. I am Gorka!”
Ladyraxterinok
@schrodingers_cat: Thank you. That’s terrible. She’s pretty old, isn’t she? Prison especially not good for her.
Thank you for your many posts about
India history, politics, music, and movies. Opened a whole new world to me.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Zelma: race, abortion, a changing culture he disapproves of, fears, resents, hates…. the way to fight it all, long term, is stacking the judiciary
Jeffro
@Elizabelle: @J R in WV: Yes, yes, a thousand times already (LOL)…all I meant by “ENNNT” was that game-show ‘wrong answer’ sound.
I was unaware that all internet traditions require the more…traditional…”BZZT” sound. Noted for next time! =)
Moving on…don’t y’all just hear that submarine dive klaxon most every time some new Rudy G or Pompeo news flash comes across the wires? I do! (But I’m not going to try and spell it phonetically here, no sireee…)
schrodingers_cat
@Ladyraxterinok: She is not in jail but others labeled urban naxals such as Sudha Bharadwaj, Gautam Nawalkha etc are and Gauri Lankesh, Govind Pansare and Kalburgi are dead (assassinated by RW goons). She is old, she is 87.
ETA: I am glad you like my posts.
Jeffro
@Zelma: @Yarrow: I have to believe that with regards to Barr, trumpov is the true authoritarian he’s been waiting for his whole life. Side motives like Catholicism or whatever aside, I think he just wants to be indisposable to someone willing to hack and slash the opposition.
We’ll find out more down the road, I believe.
Procopius
@patrick II: You had it right the first time. Under Obama, our State Department threw out the idea of “resetting” relations on a better basis and pivoted to antagonize the Russian Federation.
Jay
Top House Armed Services Republican Mac Thornberry won’t seek reelection
https://www.politico.com/news/2019/09/30/republican-mac-thornberry-wont-seek-reelection-011926
TomatoQueen
Pig bladdering, among many other things, is described gleefully in Gulliver’s Travels & I submit we live in times Swiftian enough to merit a re-read.
Ladyraxterinok
@Zelma: I know some people for whom abortion is the only evil they can see. Children in cages, rape, torture—all simply do not exist.
japa21
Regarding Gorka, IIRC he was unable to get a security clearance. How much do you want to bet he will be in on discussions where classified material is discussed and Pompeo is fine with it?
Ken
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Just spitballing here, but maybe some of the money that’s been diverted from the military budget (and who knows where else) hasn’t gone into The Wall but into The Donald’s pocket?
Jay
@Ladyraxterinok:
Will do.
Somewere in the US there is a Canadian Military trained, explosives expert Nazi still running free.
moops
@JoyceH: They are using Stephen Miller since he is probably the only WH person that is not implicated in the Ukraine call. He’s a fascist lunatic, but not a GOP bagman. So, he’s about all they have they can put in front of the camera and not have the interviewer pop out a surprise on-air caught-in-your-own-lies moment.
Jeffro
@Ladyraxterinok: That is the epitome of today’s trumpublicans (and all authoritarians, really): ‘look away…just look away…’
Because that’s what you have to do, when all they are about is evil upon evil in service of what they’ve deluded themselves into thinking is ‘good’. Their inflexibility, their inability to adjust to data, to a changing world…it’s all part of that same mindset.
‘Look away from the AG of the United States visiting foreign countries looking for something, anything, to undermine…our own law enforcement and intelligence agencies. Look away from the president* himself, Mr. Innocent, melting down on Twitter hourly. Look away from how McCarthy and Graham have pivoted from “Putin pays him” and “nominating trumpov will destroy us…and we will deserve it”
Look away, look away…
Jay
‘Clueless’ actress Stacey Dash was arrested in Florida on a domestic battery charge for pushing and slapping a man across the face following a “verbal argument,” police said.
https://www.nbcnews.com/pop-culture/celebrity/clueless-actress-stacey-dash-arrested-domestic-battery-charge-florida-n1060396
Ladyraxterinok
@Mnemosyne: JimBakker periodically trots out babies delivered to unwed mothers at his wife’s project Lori’s House.
They are preparing a major fear-mongering blitz on evil liberal elites who will ask women when baby is born if they want child to be killed.
Misrepresentstion of NY law passed and a discussion by a VA or NC governor.
In 04 election GOP put homosexuality questions on the ballot in swing states to bring out the Evangelicals. It worked!
Another Scott
@Elizabelle: It wasn’t me, I don’t think. I’m not sure what you’re thinking of.
Cheers,
Scott.
moops
@Yarrow: Barr does all of this because being a GOP bagman is his identity. Like Rudy, he is all-in on destroy the Democrats and create a one-party GOP forever government. I would not be surprised to hear all the same fever-swamp conspiracy ramblings fall out of his mouth in the next few weeks. The idiot went to foreign governments to get dirt on our own CIA and FBI. He is a Derp State whackhead. That’s what Rudy meant when he was all jabbering about HIM being the real whistleblower and hero. They really think this. They want foreign governments to find (or manufacture) scandals about our own IC.
They are nuts.
Elizabelle
@Another Scott: Hello there. It was Jeffro, and the ENNNT turned out to be a sound. Now we know.
Cheers.
Jay
@Jeffro:
Opus Dei is quite the Organization with quite the history, from money laundering, Nazi smuggling to terrorism.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opus_Dei
Uncle Cosmo
@rikyrah:
This just might be the inflection point.
I’ve expressed some concern that we not put too much trust in the IC (CIA/FB!/NSA etc) to help bring Trumpolini down, because the IC will always do what’s best for preservation & prosperity of the IC – which in their collective mind is not always (not even generally) what is best for reaffirming democracy & the rule of law in the USA.
This sort of shit, however, is the equivalent of going to the mattresses – it threatens them directly and essentially. Once “what’s best for the IC” looks like doing whatever is necessary to rip the whole criminal, traitorous gang out by the roots, there won’t be a (metaphorical) dumpster big enough for their (metaphorical) bodies to bleed out in.
Ladyraxterinok
@schrodingers_cat: Is any of this getting any ongoing national publicity in US? Just one story then nothing is pretty useless.
Procopius
@Mary G: Sounds like the Ukrainian Prosecutor General more closely obeys the law than American law enforcement officials are used to.
Matt McIrvin
@Zelma: There are a lot of people in the United States who were never keen on democracy in the first place. And especially not if it means non-whites and/or women get a vote. The Opus Dei types (and their Protestant counterparts) always had a divine-right-of-kings streak.
Another Scott
@Elizabelle: Everyone here, except me, types too fast. ;-)
Cheers,
Scott.
Ladyraxterinok
@Jay: I think some on SCOTUS have Opus Dei ties. And group has strong organization in DC. And group runs schools for boys.
I think I read Santorum had a son at an Opus Dei school.
schrodingers_cat
@Ladyraxterinok: Not much AFAIK. I am doing my squirrel’s share, over here and on Twitter. NYT had a drooling op-ed whitewashing Modi after the Houston rally.
Uncle Cosmo
@JoyceH:
You think I’m kidding? Ecco! Click and be appalled.
Miss Bianca
@A Ghost To Most: Worthless, perhaps, but fascinating nonetheless! I had no idea “Register” was in fact a surname!
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Ladyraxterinok: I believe all five of the conservatives are right wing Catholics, if they’re not actually members, I’m sure they have lots of friends who are, same with Scalia. Alito in particular gives me an Inquisition vibe.
Ken
@Uncle Cosmo: Metaphorical. Right.
jonas
@rikyrah:
I will host a whole-pig bbq, drink straight from a bottle of Whistle Pig, and then light up a Montecristo wrapped inside a Snoop Dogg-sized spliff.
Uncle Cosmo
@Leto: Doesn’t this qualify as mail fraud? Not that Foo Barr & his Department of Injustice will prosecute it…
Omnes Omnibus
@Ohio Mom: @Richard Guhl: Find me a system of government that does not rely on unenforceable norms to function.
schrodingers_cat
@Ladyraxterinok: I leave this here, this title track for Aamir Khan’s talk show Satyameva Jayate (Truth alone Triumphs). Which is a good window into the diversity of India.
ETA: Aamir is one 3 Khans who have ruled the Hindi movie (Indian) box office for close to 30 years now. He is much loved.
Jay
Uncle Cosmo
@Jay: For a second I thought you typed Marv Throneberry…
Matt McIrvin
@Omnes Omnibus: I forget which old-timey philosopher of government it was (Hobbes?) who pointed out that even the cruelest tyrant can’t operate by fear alone, because he’s just one guy–he needs enforcers, and he needs to keep *them* in line even though they could easily collectively take him. Ultimately it all has to run on something else. Or it doesn’t.
Omnes Omnibus
@Matt McIrvin: Sounds like Nicky M to me.
Matt McIrvin
@Omnes Omnibus: Probably.
Feathers
@Zelma: Yep. One thing to realize is that authoritarian follower is a personality type. They will always be with us. They are never a majority, but propaganda and uncertain times can activate enough of them to cause real problems. Bob Altemeyer has written an invaluable guide, important if you want to understand what is going on. He wrote it after he retired from being a psychology professor for 40 years and it is free for download on his website: The Authoritarians
@Ladyraxterinok: @Jim, Foolish Literalist: Sonia Sotomayor is not a right wing Catholic! The rest certainly are. Interestingly, there are a large number of converts to Catholicism in the upper eschalons of conservative nutbar DC. Apparently, they found right wing evangelical Protestantism insufficiently authoritarian and cruel. They used to blame all the evil they did was required by the Pope, now they are merely more Catholic than the Pope. Interesting side note from watching all this happen from the sidelines, “traditionalist” Catholic parishes identify themselves by removing the possessive from the name of the patron saint of the church. Thus St. Rita’s of my childhood became St. Rita Catholic Church, where Scalia’s son was the pastor. Why drop the s? One of my Dad’s friends said it was that the God Squaders don’t want all those saints getting too big for their britches.
Fair Economist
@Ken:
MAYbe? hahahahaha you’re so polite.
surfk9
Are we at the point where Democratic candidates should be standing up and saying that if other countries cooperate with trumps ratfucking the election, there will be serious consequences for our relationship should the candidate win
laura
@Cheryl Rofer: I’d argue that it’s not just power, its unquestioned, unaccountable power.
sdhays
@Ken: I hear there’s a great place near the Miami Airport with “ample parking”. The proximity to the airport makes it really convenient to fly the workers to the
fencewall every day.Chris Johnson
@Matt McIrvin: Sounds like CGP Grey’s “Rules For Rulers“: worth a view.
Bruce K
@Matt McIrvin: Not familiar with that one – though I’d love to see the source! – but it reminds me of something similar Machiavelli said in The Prince: while it may be more effective to get the people to fear you than love you, you don’t want them to hate you. “Inspire fear in such a way that, if he does not win love, he avoids hatred” is how the translation goes.
And something I think Trump and company don’t get: it’s not just their base that matters, it’s the entire population. They don’t seem to give a damn what those they’ve deemed the Enemy think about them, just so long as they continue to wield power, and it’s becoming apparent that they’ve incited hatred among people who are well-positioned to destroy them.