;)
The Conversation -- August 27, 2024
⭐ Tierney Sneed of CNN: "Special counsel Jack Smith on Tuesday filed a superseding indictment in the election interference case against ... Donald Trump, slimming down the allegations against the 2024 presidential nominee in light of the Supreme Court's immunity ruling. Prosecutors have not dropped any of the four charges that they initially brought against the former president. However, the newly retooled indictment has carved out some of Trump's alleged conduct, including allegations about the attempts to use the Justice Department to promote his false claims of election fraud. It also adjusts how prosecutors describe the allegations they are continuing to bring about Trump's election subversion schemes. 'The superseding indictment, which was presented to a new grand jury that had not previously heard evidence in this case, reflects the Government's efforts to respect and implement the Supreme Court's holdings and remand instructions in Trump v. United States,' the special counsel's office said." ~~~
~~~ The Washington Post's story is here. Politico's report is here. The new indictment, via the court, is here. The original indictment filed about a year ago, also via the court, is here. As Kyle Cheney & Josh Gerstein of Politico write, "The new document also eliminates a long list of top government officials who had informed Trump that his claims about election fraud and anomalies were false, including top intelligence, Justice Department, homeland security officials and White House lawyers. Smith's original 45-page indictment, unveiled last August, included claims that Trump sought to use the Justice Department to advance ... an unlawful and fraudulent effort to overturn Joe Biden's victory. Those details, which the Supreme Court described as largely outside the reach of prosecutors, have been omitted from the new, shorter charging document."
Looneytoons for Trump Join Transition Team. Patrick Svitek of the Washington Post: "... Donald Trump announced Tuesday he has added Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Tulsi Gabbard to his transition team, giving key roles to two former Democrats who endorsed his comeback campaign in recent days.... 'We're working on policy issues together,' Kennedy told former Fox News host Tucker Carlson. 'I've been asked to come onto the transition team, to help pick the people who will be running the government.'" The Hill's story is here.
Latest from Whiney Baby: I Will Debate. Patrick Svitek of the Washington Post: "... Donald Trump said Tuesday he will participate in a debate next month against Vice President Kamala Harris, two days after he suggested he could skip it. 'I have reached an agreement with the Radical Left Democrats for a Debate with Comrade Kamala Harris,' Trump said on his Truth Social platform, confirming the debate will be Sept. 10 in Philadelphia. Trump agreed earlier this month to take part in the ABC News debate, which will be his first debate against Harris since she replaced President Joe Biden as the Democratic presidential nominee. But Trump threw the debate into uncertainty Sunday when he criticized ABC as biased in a social media post and suggested people should 'stay tuned' about his participation. The campaigns spent Monday sparring over whether to preserve a rule from Trump's June debate against Biden where the candidates' microphones were muted when it was not their turn to speak.... Trump himself sent mixed messages [about the mic disagreement]...."
Trump Campaign Runs Vanity Ads. Sam Stein in the Bulwark: "Donald Trump's campaign is set to run cable news ads this week so they can be seen at the ex-president's Mar-a-Lago club and surrounding environs. The South Florida expense is likely to have no impact on the course of the election. Palm Beach County is a Democratic stronghold in a Republican state that Trump has little chance of losing. But Trump's staff is at some risk of incurring his wrath if he -- and his Palm Beach pals -- don't see his ads at Mar-a-Lago, a factor that insiders say compelled the purchase." Thanks to Akhilleus for the link. Also see his commentary in today's thread.
Charles Pierce of Esquire: "Well, luckily for the former president*'s campaign, it wasn't raining on Monday, when he grotesquely used Arlington National Cemetery as a campaign prop because, as we know, he gets a little nervous around soldiers' graves in the rain, and he says things that require him to lie his ass off later. Most recently, of course, he devalued the Congressional Medal of Honor in favor of a bauble he draped on Rush Limbaugh and the wife of one of the sleaziest of his sleazy donors.... As a citizen of the United States, and therefore someone with a stake in places like Arlington, I choose to look upon his presence there as obscene."
Arkansas. Annie Gowen of the Washington Post: "In a state that touts itself as 'the most pro-life state in the country,' where abortion is prohibited except to save the life of the mother, timber country in southeast Arkansas is an especially dangerous place to give birth. Arkansas already has one of the nation's worst maternal mortality rates, and mothers in this area die at a rate exceeding the state average. Ninety-two percent of recent maternal deaths were preventable, a state review committee found."
In today's Comments, RAS provides us with a handy rapid response to Trump's complaint that Biden & Harris flubbed the Afghanistan withdrawal. See Michael Gold's NYT story linked below; see also NiskyGuy's commentary in today's thread: ~~~
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Presidential Race
Don't get too excited, by Kamala Harris's poll numbers keep getting better. Domenico Montanaro of NPR reports.
Mariana Alfaro & Niha Masih of the Washington Post: "More than 200 Republicans who worked for President George W. Bush, Sen. Mitt Romney (R-Utah) or the late Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) have endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris, warning in a letter that a second Trump presidency 'will hurt real, everyday people and weaken our sacred institutions.'... The letter is not only supportive of Harris but critical of Trump. In it, the Republican alumni say Trump presents a threat to the United States and countries around the world, saying that he and his 'acolyte,' running mate Sen. JD Vance (R-Ohio), 'kowtow to dictators like [Russian President] Vladimir Putin while turning their backs on our allies....'" ~~~
~~~ Selena Wang of ABC News: "General Larry Ellis, a retired four-star general who served in that rank under George W. Bush's administration, is endorsing Vice President Kamala Harris in a letter exclusively obtained by ABC News. This is the first time Ellis, who served as the commander of the U.S. Army Forces Command, has endorsed a presidential candidate, writing that 'this is not a decision I take lightly, but one I believe necessary.... Donald Trump has demonstrated that he is wholly and dangerously unfit for Commander-in-Chief. He praises and emboldens our enemies that seek to weaken our country. He has denigrated our brave men and women in uniform,' Ellis writes."
Eugene Daniels of Politico: "With just 15 days left until the scheduled Sept. 10 presidential debate between Vice President Kamala Harris and ... Donald Trump, negotiations between their two campaigns have hit an impasse over whether the candidates' microphones will be muted when it is not their turn to speak, according to four people familiar with the issue." MB: CNN played (11:20 am ET Monday) some sound of Trump's saying he didn't care whether the mics were on or off during Harris' remarks. IOW: Whatever passes from his very good brain to his motor mouth at any given moment. Daniels' story has been updated to reflect Trump's remarks. (Also linked yesterday.) And here's a print report by Kristen Holmes of CNN and others about Trump's "debate" with his own campaign about the rules of the debate. ~~~
~~~ Say, here's an issue the unfair moderators could ask Trump during the debate: ~~~
~~~ Show Us the Money. Steve Benen of MSNBC is wondering, "Shouldn't Trump release his latest tax returns right about now?... In May 2014 ... Trump promised to release his tax returns if he became a candidate.... In the years that followed, Trump ignored the modern bipartisan tradition, kept his tax returns hidden, broke a variety of promises related to transparency, and fought tooth and nail to keep the information from the public.... To simply not ask Trump about his recent tax returns -- putting him to peddle yet another round of dubious claims about IRS audits that are probably imaginary -- is to go easy on a major-party nominee for no reason. Indeed, the partisan asymmetry matters. On July 21, President Joe Biden announced that he would end his re-election campaign, and one week later, Vice President Kamala Harris released her tax returns from the previous 20 years."
Sahil Kapur of NBC News: "Kamala Harris is endorsing trillions of dollars in new tax revenues to fund her new policy plans, and her campaign is attacking Donald Trump for failing to outline how he'd pay for the multitrillion-dollar agenda he's campaigning on. Harris campaign spokesperson James Singer labeled Trump's agenda 'an inflation and deficit bomb'..., sparking a Trump campaign response blaming her for a 'Biden-Harris inflation tax.' According to nonpartisan estimates, Harris is proposing to spend about $2 trillion and raise $5 trillion in tax revenues over a decade. Trump is calling for about $5 trillion in tax breaks and spending while raising less than $3 trillion in revenue through tariffs. 'Hands down, VP Harris is being much more fiscally disciplined than President Trump,' said Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody's Analytics."~~~
~~~ Marie: When I was in first grade or before, I learned that if -- like Harris -- you had five apples and you ate two of your apples, you'd still have three apples. I don't think it was till I was in junior high that I was confronted with the complexity & curiosity of negative numbers: what if -- like Trump -- you had only three apples; could you eat five apples? Maybe Trump is just a more sophisticated mathematician than Harris, or maybe he's a macroeconomics whiz (his uncle taught engineering at MIT, which Trump has repeatedly cited as proof of his own very good brain), or maybe all those bankruptcies of his have caused him to think negative numbers are just fine.
Tom Sullivan of Hullabaloo: "Donald Trump has grumbled his entire adult life that 'the world' is laughing at 'us' (meaning the United States). Mr. Bundle of Insecurities harbors deep anxieties about being laughed at himself. He's not very bright. He's undereducated. He's overweight. He's a 'tycoon' who sucks at business and cheats at golf. He got where he is with daddy's money. Underneath the bluster and bullying in recesses of his psyche he dare not explore (self-examination is for the weak), he knows it.... Michael Tomasky at The New Republic [writes]: 'Harris's campaign so far has been a work of genius on several levels, but maybe the most ingenious stroke of all has been the decision to mock Trump -- to present him not only as someone to fear, but also to ridicule....' Trump the Cowardly Bully needs to be respected and feared. Calling him a fascist or an authoritarian empowers him, feeds his ego;. In his mind, it brings him one step closer to admission to the brotherhood of dictators whose acceptance he most desperately desires. 'Sustained ridicule has the potential to reinforce the downward spiral Trump is now in,' Tomasky writes. He fears being laughed at? Pummel him with guffaws." (Also linked yesterday.)
Michael Gold of the New York Times: "... Donald J. Trump wrapped himself in military imagery on Monday, attacking the Biden administration over its withdrawal from Afghanistan. Observing the third anniversary of a deadly suicide bombing in Kabul, the Afghan capital, he visited Arlington National Cemetery, then later spoke in Detroit to a gathering of National Guard members. During his remarks in Detroit, at a conference for the National Guard Association of the United States, Mr. Trump blamed President Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris for the bombing and America's chaotic withdrawal from Afghanistan, which he argued led to the conflicts in Gaza and Ukraine.... He repeated his promise to demand the resignations of senior military officials involved in the withdrawal. He also repeated his insistence that he could bring the wars in Ukraine and Gaza to an end immediately after being elected, though he has yet to offer specific plans for doing so."
Amanda Marcotte of Salon: "Despite much of the press carrying Donald Trump's water by accepting his feeble attempts to pretend to be 'moderate' on abortion, he showed his true colors again last week. In an interview with CBS News, the GOP candidate insisted he had 'no regrets' about ending abortion rights by appointing three justices hand-picked by the Federalist Society to overturn Roe v. Wade.... Democrats offer Republicans one chance after another to vote for birth control rights, and every time, Republicans vote against it. Increasingly, major MAGA leaders are admitting out loud that they are coming for birth control.... [JD] Vance's comments about 'cat ladies' must be understood through this anti-contraception lens. One in 4 women will have an abortion at some point in life, but contraception use is near-universal. Over 99% of sexually experienced women have used birth control.... The Harris campaign is going hard on the reproductive rights issue this election, forefronting both the ongoing health crisis caused by abortion bans and warning the public the Republicans are just getting started."
Don't let Kamala Harris fool you. Not only does Harris support taxing service workers' tips, news reports confirm Biden and Harris have weaponized the IRS to confiscate your tip money. Biden and Harris have literally unleashed the IRS to harass workers who receive tips. -- Voiceover in Trump campaign ad released Sunday
... the Trump campaign claims Harris can't be trusted on her no-tax tip plan because the IRS proposed a plan to streamline three programs to help employers calculate tip income. But the proposal has been shelved. So, leaving aside the exaggerations about what the proposal would do, it's simply false to claim Harris 'literally unleashed the IRS to harass workers who receive tips.' -- Glenn Kessler, Washington Post
Rich Lowry, editor of the right-wing National Review, infamous for writing a New York Times op-ed about getting a hard-on (okay, he described "little starbursts" on account of the Gray Lady) when Sarah Palin spoke at the 2008 RNC, has written another hilarious op-ed for the Times, this time arguing that Donald Trump can win the election on character; that is, on which candidate is "qualified, trustworthy and strong, and does he or she care about average Americans[.]... Everything has to be connected to the deeper case that Ms. Harris is weak and a phony and doesn't truly care about the country or the middle class." ~~~
~~~ Marie: Perhaps in our infinite universe, there is a sort-of parallel planet out there where (a) Republicans are the serious people, (b) Donald Trump is indeed a man renowned for his fine character, and (c) Rich Lowry is a beloved stand-up comedian. Clearly, there is no possibility of (a) or (b) here on Earth I, but as for (c) -- Lowry has potential. What a card!
Amy Wang of the Washington Post: Robert "Kennedy [Jr.]'s latest bizarre story involving a dead animal has prompted a push by one environmental group to look into whether Kennedy committed felonies if he did indeed saw off a whale's head and strap it to the roof of his car. In a letter Monday to government officials, the Center for Biological Diversity Action Fund requested that the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) open an investigation into whether Kennedy violated the Marine Mammal Protection Act and the Endangered Species Act.... According to Town & Country magazine, Kennedy once heard that a dead whale had washed up on Squaw Island in Hyannis Port and 'ran down to the beach with a chainsaw, cut off the whale's head, and then bungee-corded it to the roof of the family minivan for the five-hour haul back to Mount Kisco, New York.' 'Every time we accelerated on the highway, whale juice would pour into the windows of the car, and it was the rankest thing on the planet,' Kick Kennedy, Robert F. Kennedy's daughter, told the magazine then. 'We all had plastic bags over our heads with mouth holes cut out, and people on the highway were giving us the finger, but that was just normal day-to-day stuff for us.'" (Also linked yesterday.)
Luke Broadwater of the New York Times: "Members of the newly formed House task force on the attempted assassination of ... Donald J. Trump took one of their first investigative steps on Monday, traveling to the site of the shooting in Butler, Pa., to scrutinize the scene.... But even as the Republicans and Democrats said they were pushing ahead on their bipartisan investigation, authorized last month by a unanimous vote of the House, a small but vocal band of right-wing lawmakers who have circulated conspiracy theories about the shooting said they were conducting their own simultaneous inquiry.... [Rep. Eli] Crane [R-Az.] has made the baseless suggestion that the shooting was part of a coordinated campaign by Democrats or shadowy government actors to stop Mr. Trump from being re-elected. [Rep. Cory] Mills [R-Fla.] has said that he had a hard time believing the security breaches that preceded the assassination attempt were not 'intentional as opposed to fecklessness.'" ~~~
~~~ Marie: This reminds me of my childhood when on the Saturday morning kiddies' movie show at our local theater, cartoons accompanied every feature.
Juliegrace Brufke of Axios: House Republicans, including leadership, are upset that one of their wingier wingnuts, like Marjorie Taylor Greene (Ga.), Andy Biggs (Az.), or Anna Luna (Fla.), will force a vote on impeaching President Biden. To spare House members in toss-up districts, Republicans tell Axios the impeachment vote will be a massive fail. ~~~
~~~ Besides, House Republicans are very, very busy with other urgent matters: ~~~
~~~ Rebecca Beitsch & Emily Brooks of the Hill: "House Republicans, who had spent much of the past 3 1/2 years investigating President Biden..., have launched a series of investigations into Vice President Harris and her running mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz.... [They] are now re-aiming their congressional firepower at Harris's limited role in migration and border policy and Walz's China ties.... In the weeks since Biden dropped his reelection bid, some GOP committees have made a noticeable stylistic change to their press releases and letters, adding '-Harris' to many products that previously criticized only the 'Biden administration.'"
Alan Feuer of the New York Times: "Federal prosecutors began their bid to resurrect the moribund classified documents case against ... Donald J. Trump on Monday, telling an appeals court in Atlanta that the trial judge had improperly thrown out the charges. In a filing to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit, the prosecutors argued that the judge, Aileen M. Cannon, erred last month when she handed down a bombshell ruling that dismissed the case on the grounds that Jack Smith, the special counsel who brought it, had been appointed to his job illegally. The ruling by Judge Cannon, who was placed on the bench by Mr. Trump, stunned many legal experts for the way that it upended 25 years of Justice Department practice and flew in the face of previous court decisions about the appointments of special prosecutors reaching back to the Watergate era.
"Issued on the first day of the Republican National Convention..., Judge Cannon's ruling also gave him a major legal victory at an auspicious political moment.... 'The district court's contrary view conflicts with an otherwise unbroken course of decisions, including by the Supreme Court, that the attorney general has such authority,' the prosecutors wrote, 'and it is at odds with widespread and longstanding appointment practices in the Department of Justice and across the government.'" Politico's report, by Josh Gerstein & Kyle Cheney, is here. (Also linked yesterday.)
Holly Bailey of the Washington Post: "Attorneys for Donald Trump pressed a Georgia appellate court to remove Fulton County District Attorney Fani T. Willis (D) from the 2020 election interference case, accusing her of 'repeated public display of racial animus' toward the former president and his co-defendants, which they contend has jeopardized Trump's right to a fair trial.... Trump's attorneys ... accused Willis of using [a January 2024] speech [at a historic Black church in Atlanta,] and other public remarks to falsely depict Trump, his co-defendants and their attorneys as racists." (Also linked yesterday.)
Zachary Cohen of CNN: "An Arizona judge has set a trial date of January 5, 2026, for allies of ... Donald Trump charged for a criminal conspiracy to overturn the 2020 election.... The Arizona case is now the only criminal case related to the 2020 election -- at either the state or federal level -- to currently have a trial date on the calendar as other separate efforts to similarly prosecute Trump and his allies in other jurisdictions all face uncertain futures. Several defendants, including conservative attorney John Eastman and multiple Arizona Republicans who served as fake electors, were present in the courtroom for a hearing Monday. Former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, former Trump lawyer Rudy Giuliani and Christina Bobb..., the top lawyer for the RNC on election integrity, joined the hearing virtually."
Miriam Jordan, et al., of the New York Times: "A federal judge in Texas temporarily blocked on Monday a Biden administration program that could offer a path to citizenship for up to half a million undocumented immigrants who are married to U.S. citizens, ruling in favor of 16 Republican-led states that sued the administration. Judge J. Campbell Barker of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas [-- a Trump appointee --] issued an administrative stay that stops the administration from approving applications, which it started accepting last week, while the court considers the merits of the case. In suspending the initiative, Judge Barker said that the 67-page complaint filed on Friday by the coalition of states, led by Attorney General Ken Paxton of Texas, raised legitimate questions about the authority of the executive branch to bypass Congress and set immigration policy.... The administration can continue to accept applications for the program, but can no longer approve them, according to the order. The suspension initially remains in place for 14 days while the parties submit arguments in the case; it could be extended." The CBS News story is here. ~~~
~~~ Marie: You can bet that if Trump is elected, his administration will use these applications to round up the applicants and deport them, tearing them away from their families.
Brad Dress of the Hill: "U.S. Army Pvt. Travis King is expected to plead guilty to several charges the military has brought against him, according to his lawyer. King was deployed to South Korea but expected to return home in July 2023, when he ran into North Korea during a tour of a town on the border. King, who is charged with 14 counts for an array of alleged offenses, will plead guilty to five of those charges on Sept. 20 before a military judge in Fort Bliss, Texas, according to his attorney, Franklin Rosenblatt. After pleading guilty at a general court-martial to those counts, which include desertion, the Army will drop the other charges he is accused of, Rosenblatt added."
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Georgia Elections. Nick Corasaniti of the New York Times: "Democrats sued the Georgia state election board on Monday, arguing that measures approved by the board this month seeking to alter the election certification process in the state were illegal and could create chaos on Election Day. The lawsuit claims that the board intended to give local election officials a broad license to 'hunt for purported election irregularities of any kind, potentially delaying certification and displacing longstanding (and court-supervised) processes for addressing fraud.' The lawsuit was filed in state court by local election officials, political candidates, the Democratic National Committee and the Democratic Party of Georgia with support from Vice President Kamala Harris's presidential campaign.... In a statement announcing the lawsuit, Democrats pointed to praise that members of the state election board received from Mr. Trump, and recalled the Trump effort to overturn the result in Georgia in 2020.... Brad Raffensperger, the Republican secretary of state, chastised the state election board this month, stating that the last-minute changes were undermining confidence in elections and risking the integrity of the election." ~~~
~~~ Rachel Maddow said last night that Georgia's governor, Brian Kemp (R), has asked the state's attorney general to determine whether or not he, Kemp, has the power to replace members of the state's board of elections.
Texas Elections. Crystal Hill of Democracy Docket: "Texas Gov. Greg Abbott (R) announced Monday the state has removed over [more than!] one million people from its voter rolls since Republican legislators passed a sweeping voter suppression law three years ago.... In 2021, Abbott signed Senate Bill 1, a package of anti-voting measures including one that criminalizes ballot harvesting and another that requires the Secretary of State to conduct audits of elections every two years. The laws, passed in the wake of the 2020 election, were met with fierce opposition from pro-voting groups and Democratic Texas legislators. A lawsuit filed against Abbott over the legislation in September of 2021 is ongoing." MB: In February 2024, the Texas Secretary of State reported that Texas had almost 18 million voters on its rolls.
Texas Elections, Ctd. Marie: I linked this New York Times story yesterday, about Ken Paxton's brownshirts "voter integrity unit" raiding the homes of Latino voting activists, most of whom were Democrats. Here's one case worth highlighting: ~~~
~~~ Brad Reed of the Raw Story: "An 87-year-old Texas woman who complained about local seniors not being sent mail-in ballots had her house raided by officers for the state's election integrity unit. The New York Times reported that Lidia Martinez, a retired educator who lives in San Antonio, was shocked last week when officers came to her house at 6 a.m. and informed her that they were searching her residence because she had filed a complaint about residents in her area [not] getting their mail-in ballots. Martinez says she's spent decades volunteering with the League of United Latin American Citizens to help seniors in the Latino community register themselves to vote.... The officers at her house asked to see the voter registration cards that she had collected. After informing them that she didn't have them at her house, they proceeded to search the property and left with her laptop, her phone and some documents."
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Israel/Palestine, et al. The New York Times' live updates of developments Tuesday in the Israel/Hamas war are here.
Ukraine, et al. Marc Santora of the New York Times: "There are many ways to kill and be killed in Russia's war with Ukraine, but Ukrainian soldiers say that glide bombs are perhaps the most terrifying. They are free-fall bombs, many left over from the Soviet era, but now outfitted with pop-out wings that feature satellite navigation, turning them into guided munitions. Referred to alternatively as 'KABs' or 'FABs,' they weigh between 500 and 6,000 pounds and are packed with hundreds of pounds explosives. A single blast can reduce a high-rise apartment building to rubble and obliterate even concrete fortifications.... In recent months, Russia has used the bombs to devastating effect, tilting the balance of fighting in eastern Ukraine in Moscow's favor and allowing Russia to continue to make steady gains in Donetsk region. The bombs have also allowed Russian forces to raze whole towns and villages with ever greater speed."
News Lede
New York Times: "Italian authorities have opened a formal investigation into the actions of James Cutfield, the captain of the superyacht that sank last Monday off the coast of Sicily, killing seven of the 22 people on board, including British tech billionaire Mike Lynch. Mr. Cutfield is under investigation for possible manslaughter and to determine whether his actions negligently caused the shipwreck, said his lawyer, Aldo Mordiglia."
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Reader Comments (31)
So yesterday, I heard a piece that took a close look at Harris’s plan to halt taxes on tips for service workers. Several economists were cited as well as audio clips of workers giving their opinion. All well and good. But actually not.
I don’t recall hearing any such deep dive into this idea when it was floated (stolen from Ron Paul) by Trump.
But this is par for the course, right? Trump comes out with all kinds of promises to do this and that. Nothing from the media. Biden or Harris announce some policy idea and it’s “Call out the Spotlight team! Get Larry Summers on the horn! Where are my investigative reporters? Go out to Iowa and ask MAGA hats in some roadside diner what they think. We need a 6 minute package for the 10! Let’s go, people!”
They carry Trump’s water. Harris’s water bucket they line up to shoot holes in it, then when it leaks out, they piss in the puddle and say “Look! Her idea smells bad.”
Speaking of media mendacity…
Okay, now maybe I’m waaay too sensitive about this stuff, but first impressions matter. So too, first sentences. The Alan Feuer piece in the Times yesterday (linked above) about Jack Smith’s efforts to continue the absolutely vital prosecution of the Orange Monster’s theft and illegal retention of classified top secret documents describes the case as “moribund”, in other words, pretty much dead.
Here’s the thing. It’s NOT dead! There are a number of avenues that can be tried to bring this criminal piece of shit to Justice. Describing it as moribund, just nine words into the piece seems to be saying “Well, this thing is toast, so maybe it wasn’t all that important in the first place.”
Maybe I’ve got my Media Helping Trump detector set too high, but I’m always looking for these sorts of weasel words that offer succor to a career criminal and cast aspersions on any attempt to hold him to account. Too much? It might not be intentional. After all, moribund is a great word, and writers are all about great words. But words are powerful things. The case only seems moribund because of a hyper partisan sneaky-ass judge who has found a cozy home in Trump’s pocket. I probably wouldn’t have had a problem with the use of that word if the way this case has been garroted by Loose Cannon had been made clear from the jump (especially to casual readers who might not have followed this case with much interest).
And okay, you could say, there aren’t many casual readers scanning ledes in The NY Times. Okay, then do it as a matter of journalistic integrity.
I might be off base on this one, but my internal alarm bell went off the second I saw “moribund” connected to a case against Trump.
This case is very much alive.
Fuckers.
@Akhilleus: Yeah, the "report" you heard may nor may not have mentioned that Trump cried foul, complaining that Harris copied his plan. That's true, and both plans suck for a number of reasons, according to several analyses I read.
But I don't suppose the "report" you heard also mentioned that Harris is planning to mitigate her no-tax-on-tips plan to mitigate some of the probable excesses built into Trump's plan which would let rich people classify most of their income as tips so they could avoid paying federal income tax.
Even when she copies Trump in a pure-pandering proposal, Harris's pandering is not quite as bad as Trump's.
Marie,
It did not mention that.
@Akhilleus: I hadda look up the meaning of "moribund" to get a handle on this, and here's the definition, according to the Googles, citing Oxford: "at the point of death" and "in terminal decline."
Miss Judgy Cannon threw the case out. Goodbye, kaput, you Jack Smith don't have the right to bring the case at all. Ever. Get out! So I think the case was moribund -- or "at the point of death" -- at least until Smith made an effort to revive it.
Neal Katyal & Andrew Weissmann said on MSNBC last night that Smith's case was such a winner that the 11th Circuit would not only overturn Cannon's ruling but might remove her on the "three strikes" theory, what with their having overruled her twice before. I am not that optimistic.
Moreover, I'm not sure moribund implies "not worth saving." Even forensic scientist Bobby Kennedy Jr. might describe his own political career as moribund, but I imagine he thinks it's worth saving to fight another day (or at least get him a job in Trumpworld). In fact, I thought Joe Biden's candidacy was moribund, but obviously I supported it as worth saving -- until a better alternative suddenly became possible.
You mention other alternatives, but if somebody in DOJ can't bring a case against Trump's stealing federal documents, I don't know who can. I suppose main Justice could gather up Smiths' findings and refile against Trump. But Merrick Garland. It's possible that some citizens' group could attain standing since Trump effectively stole from the people on accounta that thing about "we the people" being the government and all, but I think the confederate Supremes could wiggle out of that with aplomb.
Per Michael Gold's article above, if you make it to paragraph 9, you finally read: "The Biden administration has noted that Mr. Trump made a deal with the Taliban in 2020 that set a timeline for America’s exit..."
The first six words obscure the fact that TFG MADE THE DEAL THAT SET THE TIMELINE FOR WITHDRAWAL! If Biden/Harris had been able to negotiate a different arrangement, they would have made a BETTER deal than the "great negotiator."
The whole No Taxes on Tips thing is a little bit like what grocery store chains call loss leaders. You put up a big ad touting a certain product at a low price just to get people in the door. Sure, you’ll lose money on chicken breasts at 1.99 a pound, but you make it back on all the other overpriced stuff in the store. It’s a loss leader. It gets your attention.
So, you make an announcement about no taxes on tips. It might not be the greatest idea, but its easy to understand. You’re not talking about some recondite economic policy that requires you to go all John Maynard Keynes to figger out. Plus, you get to say “No taxes”! Always a plus.
My point being, there will be plenty of policy announcements (on both sides) that absolutely require a deep dive (even though it almost never happens with Trump’s bullshit, except on sites and in journals most of the voting public will never see). This ain’t one of ‘em. But it’s an easy way to make Harris look bad.
Billionaires
Afghanistan withdrawal facts
NYT media coverage
Marie,
Yeah, like I said, I might have been a bit overboard on that one, but the case is very much not dead. And Merrick Garland could absolutely bring the case on his own. That ain’t never gonna happen though. He only went with Jack Smith so it wouldn’t look Pah-litticul.
Fat load-a good that did.
See, the Traitors don’t give a shit about looking political. They know they can win because Democrats like Garland will go full Möbius strip not to look that way. And while he’s gyrating in the front yard, they break down the back door and rifle the safe.
If Harris wins, I hope she puts someone kickass in at Justice. I wanna see those treasonous sum’bitches SUFFER, baby!
Look, Ma! I’m on TV!
Okay, this is funny.
Mr. “I’m more beautiful than Kamala Harris” is spending thousands of dollars to run one his poplin’ fresh propaganda ads on local TV stations in and around Palm Beach. First, there’s not much chance he’s gonna win there. He got his ass beat there last time around. It’s a rare blue spot in a red state. On the flip side, he won the state pretty comfortably last time as well. DeSantolini Land is pretty safe territory for authoritarian Nazi scumbags.
So why lay out good money for an ad that won’t do much one way or the other?
So he can see his jowly mug on the TV screen, that’s why. “Hey, look! I’m on TV!”
It’s possible he wants big donors living near him to see the strange fruit of their donations, but really…
As the writer in this piece suggests, “Florida’s not at risk. But staffers are risking anger from the boss (and some donors) if he doesn’t see his own ads.”
And now, my favorite song: “Me, me, me, me, me!”
At least SOME of the millions he’s been raking in don’t go straight into his pocket.
Keep getting “post submitted” but it never shows up. This often happens with posts containing links, or longer posts. I wonder if that has something to do with it.
@Akhilleus: Still awaiting a reply from Squarespace. I'll send them another note this morning. I'll mention the "longer posts" theory, as that does seem to be what's happening.
Asha Rangappa
"The Power of "NO"
You can’t say yes to what you want until you say no to what you don’t want.
Harris’ nomination tapped into a deeper, unconscious emotion, the Kryptonite of fascists everywhere: Hope.
If hope can beat fear to remove a dictator [Pinochet] after 17 years, it can certainly prevent one from coming to power in the first place."
Tom Nichols, writing in The Atlantic, has a few things to say about Lowery and his hilarious op-ed, and other "anti-anti-trumpers"
"Lowry and others in that group never became full-fledged MAGA warriors. Many of them hated Trump...they just hated Democrats more. But they also hated being reminded of the spirit-crushing bargain ...
Power is power, and if getting the right judges and cutting the right taxes has to include stomping on the rule of law and endangering American national security, well, that’s a price that the stoic right-wingers of the greater Washington, D.C., and New York City metropolitan areas were willing to pay."
gift link:
The Conservatives Who Sold Their Souls for Trump
Last week, three of my posts did not show up, each had links.
Today -- history. It is what it was.
American envoy to Paris, T. Jefferson, wrote to William Stephens Smith (John Adams' son-in-law) November, 1787. TJ's subject was to convey informal thoughts about the proposed US Constitution. As was his habit, the first pages of the letter contained accounts of correspondence and other business and musings.
Here is a quote from the first pages, in which TJ was riffing on the perfidy of Albion; the Brits had been running "fake news" in the print media about how the Americans were falling into anarchy and would soon be reduced to failed states.
"... Wonderful is the effect of impudent and persevering lying."
By "wonderful" TJ meant not that it is a pleasure to behold, but that the lies are disproportionately effective ... because they are repeated often and are boldly false.
TJ could make the same observation today. As they said in Paris in his day, "Plus ca change, plus c'est la meme chose." But they had cedillas then.
"Mainstream media on a path to irrelevance
Clearly, political strategists don’t need traditional media as much as they once did. And the media have richly earned this drop in status. Too many political journalists are marinating in the Washington cocktail culture, writing for each other and for their sources – in service to the political industry, not the public.
The value added of journalism is doing investigations that matter, putting news events in context, confronting prominent liars, and drawing fair conclusions that inform the public.
Major media had their audiences and their ratings formulas and they weren’t inclined to risk their profit margins to confront the right’s increasingly brazen assaults on the truth. It was the triumph of the earning curve over the learning curve.
If they keep normalizing fascists and trying to find a safe space between facts and lies, they’ll be paving a path to their own irrelevance."
@Patrick: I too have a ç, n'est-ce pas? Of course I copy it off of the Googles, or if I wanted to go to more trouble I could use html code to get it: ç. I don't think I can show you the html code,
but it's "& c cedil ;" without spaces and without quotation marks.
Cedilla…isn’t that the French version of that giant Japanese monster who spits out fire? The difference is the Cedilla spits out Brie. Now I’m waiting for the sequel, “King Kong vs. Cedilla”. Kong loses cuz he can’t do html.
C’est dommage.
An option for "other" letters is to look at your Character Map found in System Tools. For example:
Alt+0199 forms Ç
Alt+0231 forms ç
(Press and hold the Alt key while typing the numbers).
The map shows the keystroke combination needed in the lower-right corner of the window.
"We’re working on policy issues together,' Kennedy told former Fox News host Tucker Carlson." -LMAO
Almost as funny as Lowry talking about highlighting Trump's character to impress the voters.
Fatty announces that he, ignorant, racist felon, whale beheader RFK, Jr. and whack job Tulsi Gabbard will be working on “policy” issues together. What policies? Who gets what in the Great Grift? These knuckleheads working on “policy”? It’s like Moe asking Larry and Curly to help determine the day to day implications of Kant’s approach to Deontology.
Talking about character, Trump has a color coded atrocity key about him to better categorize the terrible stuff he has done.
"Lest We Forget the Horrors: A Catalog of Trump’s Worst Cruelties, Collusions, Corruptions, and Crimes
The Complete Listing:
Atrocities 1–1,056"
@unwashed: I couldn't use your system in Windows 11 because I couldn't find the Character Map, but this worked:
1. click Windows+r This opens a run window
2. type charmap in the Open box in the run window; then
3. click OK This opens a font box from which you can choose a
font (or not) AND a character choice box from which you can
choose one or more characters available in that font (I didn't have
to choose the correct font)
4. select ç
5. copy ç
6. paste ç into your comment.
Lotsa steps, but it does work.
So I think today's lesson is just apologize for not using a cedilla. The work involved ... Merci à tous ...
So the lowly Supremes have let (apologies to Richard Scarry) lowly worm Clark skate.
They are stand-up guys.K
@Ken Winkes: I'm confused. I don't think the feds ever indicted Clark. So he's been skating all along, fed-wise. Is there another case the Supremes have let him off the hook? (Wouldn't surprise me.) Thanks.
I believe you are describing the same window as I was. You just got there by a different path. In order to make things easier, I make a list of the keystrokes for characters that I use most frequently.
± alt+0177 plus/minus
° 0176 degree
Ø 0216 diameter or capital Ø
ø 0248 small ø
Å 0197 capital Å
å 0229 small å
Æ 0198 capital Æ
æ 0230 small æ
Marie,
My language was probably a bit loose ("accused," not "indicted"), but this from the WAPO's updated article:
"The removal of those allegations also means the indictment no longer accuses someone referred to in the original document as “Co-Conspirator No. 4,” but who is identifiable from details in the indictment as former Justice Department official Jeffrey Clark."
@Ken Winkes: Thanks. Yes, I did read that in the WashPo revised story. I do think it's possible that the Supremes' presidential* immunity ruling could so divorce people like Jeff Clark from the center of the story that they will get off from indictments brought in other jurisdictions. But, as of now, we're still at status quo: acting-AG-for-two-hours Jeff is in trouble elsewhere (including at the D.C. bar, which is recommending he be disbarred) & in Georgia, but there are no federal charges against him.