More questions today.
Trump Crime Cartel
Destined for Failure Open Thread: No Peace in the Middle East *This* Year…
Is there a better expression of Israel-America relations than an ultra right wing pseudo peace plan being released to distract from the Israeli Prime Minister getting indicted while the American President is mid impeachment
ā Canadian Bread Price Fixing (@MenshevikM) January 28, 2020
When he puts the idiot son-in-law in charge, you know the boss has no interest in a workable solution…
They get to āearn their way to dignityā, which for everyone else is inherent because they are human beings. https://t.co/irlFPUiYSD
ā Soledad O’Brien (@soledadobrien) January 29, 2020
Good thing Jared spent all those years working on a peace plan. https://t.co/vTiCRQiudK
ā Julia Ioffe (@juliaioffe) January 28, 2020
JERUSALEM ā The only immediate consequence of the Trump peace plan ā and possibly all that will ever come of it ā was the green light President Trump gave to Israel Tuesday to expand its territory by effectively annexing vast stretches of land it has long coveted on the West Bank.
On paper, the plan offers the Palestinians a state, at last, as well as a partial four-year settlement freeze while they mull it over.
But Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will not wait, saying that he would move Sunday to apply sovereignty over the strategically vital Jordan Valley and to all Jewish settlements in the West Bank.
The move would take in up to 30 percent of the occupied West Bank, and for the first time establish what Israeli leaders have coveted since capturing the territory in the 1967 Six Day War: a permanent eastern border for Israel along the Jordan River, recognized by the United States…
The green light from the White House outraged Israeli supporters of a more generous accommodation with the Palestinians and alarmed those who have warned that any annexation could set off renewed violence.
āItās worse than any of us could anticipate,ā said Nimrod Novik, a longtime peace negotiator and former aide to the Israeli leader Shimon Peres.
The Palestinians had no hand in the planās drafting, having cut all ties with the Trump administration after it recognized Jerusalem as Israelās capital. But while they reacted with predictable anger, there was no threat of specific action and little to suggest that their relationship with Israel would fundamentally change…
Much more detail at the link.
well it got some people to stop fighting… https://t.co/0vOEyN7KZX
ā YYZedd (@Zeddary) January 28, 2020
Destined for Failure Open Thread: No Peace in the Middle East *This* Year…Post + Comments (27)
Impeachment Trial – January 29, 2020
Today is the first of two question days. The Democrats are said to have been collecting questions to eliminate duplicates and organize them into topics. What’s your question? Will it be asked?
No recollection…
In the “Lumpy rug” thread below, valued commenter Sab pointed out that one reason GOP senators are so reluctant to hear from John Bolton and other witnesses in Trump’s impeachment trial is that they’ve got their own dirt to conceal. Right on cue, The Tampa Bay Times published a story about a conversation Trump had with Lev Parnas about Florida Senator Rick Scott.
The story is based on the 80-plus minute recording where Trump was heard making a thuggish-sounding order to “take out” a U.S. ambassador. At the same event, Trump also talked to Parnas about then-Governor Rick Scott, who was running against a long-time incumbent Democrat for the senate seat:
About halfway through the recording, Parnas mentioned he lived in Florida, prompting Trump to ask how Scott, then Floridaās governor, was faring in his U.S. Senate campaign.
āRick Scottās good,ā said Parnas, who was indicted in October on charges that he and his business partner, Igor Fruman, steered hundreds of thousands of dollars in illegal campaign contributions from foreign donors. Both are now key figures in Trumpās impeachment proceedings.
āIs he going to win?ā Trump asks.
Parnas responded: āItās going to be close, but I think weāre going to pull it out.”
He repeatedly referred to Scottās election effort as āwe,” suggesting an intimacy or involvement with the campaign. Parnas also told Trump: āWeāre doing a fundraiserā for Scott in May and mentioned having lunch with former Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi, now one of Trumpās impeachment defense lawyers.
The article reviews the federal indictment of Parnas and fellow Giuliani-adjacent goon Fruman for illegally dropping hundreds of thousands of foreign-sourced dollars on Republican candidates. It recounts how the pair also contributed heavily as individuals and through their company to Scott and the current GOP governor of Florida, Ron DeSantis.
Coincidentally, DeSantis also had “no recollection” of meeting Parnas when the feds scooped Rudy’s pals up. DeSantis donated the funds he received from the pair to charity, as did Scott in the wake of the indictment. The article notes recent WSJ reporting that indicates Parnas turned over texts between himself and DeSantis to the House Democrats. I mean, who among us hasn’t carried on text conversations with complete strangers, right?
Meanwhile, Parnas’s attorney, Joseph Bondy, is tweeting out photos of his client with various GOP bigwigs and encouraging Republican senators to vote for witnesses and a fair trial. Here’s one from this morning:
This @PamBondi, with Lev Parnas? https://t.co/OXj9J9012H pic.twitter.com/Wuqfmlomsk
ā Joseph A. Bondy (@josephabondy) January 28, 2020
Parnas, the Forrest Gump of Republican corruption, seems to have a lot of receipts. So yeah, good point, Sab. Any guesses on which Republican will get the next attack of amnesia?
Impeachment Trial – January 28, 2020
Let’s see what kind of lies and smears the Republicans can come up with today. And whether they take note of John Bolton’s book. The commentary from lawyers yesterday on my Twitter feed was that a good lawyer incorporates new material into their argument. Once again, I probably won’t be watching most of it.
One corner of a very lumpy rugā¦
As the Ukraine scandal was blowing up a while back, Kay pointed out that given Trumpās well-documented greed and corruption, we can be certain he abused his power for personal gain in interactions with other countries besides Ukraine. She suggested the exposure of Trumpās malfeasance in Ukraine is lifting just āone corner of a very lumpy rug.ā
The Times got its mitts on further excerpts of Boltonās book, which lifts other corners and implicates AG William Barr:
WASHINGTON āĀ John R. Bolton, the former national security adviser, privately told Attorney General William P. Barr last year that he had concerns that President Trump was effectively granting personal favors to the autocratic leaders of Turkey and China, according to an unpublished manuscript by Mr. Bolton.
Mr. Barr responded by pointing to a pair of Justice Department investigations of companies in those countries and said he was worried that Mr. Trump had created the appearance that he had undue influence over what would typically be independent inquiries, according to the manuscript. Backing up his point, Mr. Barr mentioned conversations Mr. Trump had with the leaders, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey and President Xi Jinping of China.
Mr. Boltonās account underscores the fact that the unease about Mr. Trumpās seeming embrace of authoritarian leaders, long expressed by experts and his opponents, also existed among some of the senior cabinet officers entrusted by the president to carry out his foreign policy and national security agendas.
Barrās spokeswoman denied the conversation ever happened and accused Bolton of projecting his own views onto Barr. Why did Bolton go to Barr in the first place? Was it not obvious to him Barr is up to his neck in Trump’s fuckery? Maybe itās harder for wingnuts to accept that Barr is a corrupt Trump flunky with his own agenda because he’s been a DC fixture for so long?
Youād think the cautionary tale Bolton sees in the mirror while trimming his iconic mustache would be a clue, but oh well. Or maybe this is Boltonās opening salvo in a bid to discredit Barr with fellow Republicans should the entire Trump scam collapse? If so, I wish him godspeed, the warmongering shit-stain.
Anyhoo, The Times article cites Boltonās earlier allegation (in a private speech) that Trumpās eagerness to curry favor with Turkish President ErdoÄan by torpedoing an investigation into a Turkish bank is related to Trumpās business interests in the region. (The investigation was restarted when the corrupt move to quash it attracted unwanted attention — shades of the aid release in Ukraine!)
Bolton also alleges that Trump gushes over Chinaās President Xi and relaxed sanctions on a Chinese telecom over Republican and national security agency objections because Trump required Xiās assistance after painting himself into a corner with the trade war.
Outside Bolton’s claim that he raised concerns with Barr, this isnāt new information — the bank investigation and telecom sanctions removal always looked fishy as hell. And Trumpās gonna Trump, so Iām confident any investigation into Trumpās behavior in any interaction with a foreign or domestic entity, including a Girl Scout cookie sale, would reveal a cesspool of self-dealing and fraud.
But itās good that the topics have been reintroduced in the middle of the impeachment trial, if only to remind the Republican senators currently engaged in a massive cover-up of just how lumpy the rug theyāre standing on is — and how quickly it could be snatched out from under them.
The Complete Fuckery of the Impeachment Trial
I haven’t had much to say about the complete shitshow that is the Senate impeachment trial because I really have nothing to add and I am aware that my abject cynicism regarding what I consider the inevitable outcome of this farce is offputting to others, but the whole thing is just fucking ridiculous. The House Impeachment Managers presented a clear a case for the removal of Trump as was possible given the “rules” of the trial set by that fucking traitor Mitch McConnell, and everything else is a sad fucking joke on the rest of us, from the Senators being unable to stay in their god damned seats to the oh fuck it why bother, you’re watching the same god damned thing.
When I was a young man, growing up in a college town, I spent a great deal of time at the college radio station. I got my FCC license when I was 14 back when that was a thing, and I had my own shows with my own time slots but I also spent a great deal of time serving as the engineer for the Monday Night Oldies show and for the Ashborne Hour (which was actually three hours) on Tuesday nights playing classical music. This was back when everything wasn’t automated and you actually had turntables and otari reel-to-reels, and my purpose was to control the show while the two older gentleman who hosted the shows chose the music and did the talking.
The fellow who did the Monday Night Oldies show was a fellow named John Graham, and he was kind of a big deal in the Pittsburgh Music scene (I’m friends with his son and still am, and his wife just died two weeks ago), and he loved to take me to the old reunion tours of 50’s music stars. So I got to go to a lot of those old reunion tour shows you see being played at sad venues that usually accompany a complimentary dinner of swiss steak and lots of mashed potatoes. At any rate, I saw a lot of the old last hurrah tours of people like Jimmy Beaumont and the Skyliners, etc. I wouldn’t go so far as to say it was precisely the kind of music that a 16 year old stoned deadhead would have as his first choice for entertainment, but, you know, it is experiences like that that made me who I am today.
Why am I telling you this? Because that is what the Trump defense reminds me of- the last hurrah tour of old white douchebags from the 80’s and 90’s gathered together for one last rendition of Blue Moon or Pennies from Heaven or Frankie Valli’s greatest hits (he is STILL alive, fwiw). You’ve got panty-sniffing serial leaker Ken Starr, who graduated from the Clinton trial to covering up sex crimes at Baylor, you’ve got serial predator and Martha’s Vineyard outcast Alan Dershowitz, perennial lunatic Jay Sekulow, and a cadre of other shitstains and ne’er do wells stinking up the joint and collectively making the American people dumber.
Imagine a murder trial where the prosecution is not allowed to introduce forensic evidence, talk to the witnesses, interview the police, examine the murder weapon or the autopsy report, followed by three days of the defense screaming “the prosecution provided no evidence.” Meanwhile the accused is sitting in his chair screaming that he is going to do the same thing to the prosecutor that he did to the victim and threatening the jury pool, and no one seems to notice or care. There’s the Trump impeachment in a nutshell.
The Bolton book apparently has some of the Senators slightly freaked out about just how fucking bad history is going to judge them, so now they are baking up some half-cooked idea that will get lots of media time but never come to fruition:
Sen. Patrick J. Toomey (R-Pa.), an influential conservative in the Senate, has spoken with several colleagues in recent days about possibly summoning just two witnesses to President Trumpās impeachment trial, with one called by Republicans and one by Democrats, according to three Republican officials.
Toomey has confided to GOP senators that proposing a āone-for-oneā deal with Senate Democrats may be necessary at some point, particularly with pressure mounting for witnesses to be called, according to the officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss private conversations. He has argued that such an arrangement could force Democrats to accept a Republican witness against their wishes or else risk having Republicans move ahead to acquit Trump, the officials said.
Toomey has spoken about his idea with Sen. Mitt Romney (R-Utah) and others, the officials added.
Why does there need to be a one for one? Are we this obeisant to the God of both sides that we need to “balance out” the witnesses? Why not just bring the witnesses who have something relevant to say, and if they don’t, well, don’t bring them. If that means the prosecution has 10, and the defense has only two, or vice versa, so be it.
But you know the answer, don’t you? BECAUSE HE’S FUCKING GUILTY, that’s why.
The Complete Fuckery of the Impeachment TrialPost + Comments (130)