;)
Wednesday
May102023
May 11, 2023
Afternoon Update:
Michael Sisak of the AP: "Donald Trump was ordered Thursday to appear by video at a May 23 hearing in his Manhattan criminal case after a judge this week set rules barring him from using evidence in the case to attack witnesses. Judge Juan Manuel Merchan scheduled the hybrid hearing -- the former president on a TV screen, his lawyers and prosecutors in court -- to go over the restrictions with Trump and to make clear that he risks being held in contempt if he violates them. The case is continuing in state court even as Trump's lawyers seek to have it moved to federal court. U.S. District Judge Alvin Hellerstein, who is considering the transfer request, issued an order this week setting paperwork deadlines and a hearing for late June. Merchan, still in charge while that drama plays out, agreed to instruct Trump on the rules by video, rather than in person, after a prosecutor reminded him last week that bringing Trump to court would present mammoth security and logistical challenges." ~~~
~~~ Marie: Yes, this is 4th-grade stuff, wherein the judge plays the school principal & the former POTUS* is the class bully: "Now, Donnie, if you say bad things about the other kids, we're going to have to give you detention." It is my person hope that Donnie gets detention. And if the Secret Service guys don't care for the detention facilities, well, they deserve the discomfort for deleting all the insurrection-related messages from their devices.
Supremes Continue to Encourage Public Corruption. Adam Liptak of the New York Times: "In a pair of unanimous decisions in cases involving defendants convicted of fraud for actions during Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo's administration in New York, the Supreme Court on Thursday again limited federal prosecutions of public corruption. One case concerned Joseph Percoco, a former aide to Mr. Cuomo convicted of taking illicit payments to benefit a Syracuse-area developer. The other involved Louis Ciminelli, the owner of a Buffalo construction firm convicted of fraud in a bid-rigging scandal in connection with Buffalo Billion, a development project championed by Mr. Cuomo, a Democrat. The rulings were the latest in a series of setbacks for prosecutors from a court that has become increasingly skeptical of federal charges of public corruption in state government."
Oliver Darcy of CNN: "It's hard to see how America was served by the spectacle of lies that aired on CNN Wednesday evening.... It felt like 2016 all over again. It was Trump's unhinged social media feed brought to life on stage.... Trump frequently ignored or spoke over [Kaitlan] Collins throughout the evening as he unleashed a firehose of disinformation upon the country, which a sizable swath of the GOP continues to believe. A professional lie machine, Trump fired off falsehoods at a rapid clip while using his bluster to overwhelm Collins, stealing command of the stage at some points of the town hall.... CNN and new network boss Chris Licht are facing a fury of criticism -- both internally and externally over the event." ~~~
~~~ Marie: Most commentators are giving Kaitlan Collins props for trying (but failing!) to fact-check Trump. To that, I say bull. If Collins wanted a thumbs-up from me -- and I first thought this anticipating the fiasco, not after the fact -- she would have had to tell Licht she was not going to sit there as Trump & the Gang's patsy & punching bag. No real journalist would have agreed to participate in that forum in that format with that audience.
~~~ Conser-vo-tive Charlie Sykes of the Bulwark: "Critics had worried that giving the indicted, twice-impeached, coup-plotting, chronically lying sexual predator an unedited, live television forum might turn out badly. The reality, however, was far ghastlier: a sh*tshow for the ages, and a moment that captured the thorough degradation of both our politics and the media. 'It was a f**king nightmare,' remarked one savvy observer, 'and it was programmed to BE a f**king nightmare.'... As Mehdi Hasan writes today, the 'ridiculous town hall format and an audience seemingly recruited "from the Mar-a-Lago parking lot"', put its own anchor in a position to fail.' Her bosses at CNN should have known that, but they made it clear last night that they had learned nothing. Or simply didn't care. Increasingly, Chris Licht is to CNN what Elon Musk is to Twitter." ~~~
~~~ Marie: What Mehdi Hasan said, perhaps in jest, was apparently true. Some pundit on the teevee said today that he recognized some of the audience members as former Trump operatives & campaign workers. ~~~
~~~ Marie: I know Trump said a lot more serious horrible things, but the one that got me was his claim that he had finished the wall. A wall is a physical thing, and the vast spaces between the few shoddily-built sections of border wall that went up during Trump's reign of terror are irrefutable proof that he did not finish the wall. He barely began it. Moreover, a lot of ink was spilled over the failures to build a wall (or to build any structure that was in any way a practical deterrent to unauthorized immigrants). The wall was not built. The wall is not there. Yet Trump just says it is there, and for his hallucinating MAGA masses, apparently it is there. This is an insane expression and acceptance of authoritarianism at its most stark.
Peter Baker & Nicholas Fandos of the New York Times: "President Biden sought to drive a wedge among Republicans in their escalating dispute over spending and debt on Wednesday, effectively reaching out to moderates in hopes of convincing them to break away from Speaker Kevin McCarthy rather than risk triggering a national default that could throw the economy into a tailspin. Appearing in a competitive suburb with a vulnerable House Republican in his sights, Mr. Biden accused Mr. McCarthy of pursuing a radical strategy at the behest of the "extreme" wing of his party loyal to ... Donald J. Trump, putting the country in economic jeopardy in a way that he said reasonable Republicans of his own era in the Senate would not have done."
Jared Gans of the Hill: "President Biden trolled former President Trump on Wednesday over a contentious appearance at a CNN town hall on Wednesday, with Biden asking for supporters to donate to his reelection campaign if they don't want 'four more years of that.'... The White House press pool traveling with Biden reported that the president did not watch the town hall while on Air Force One on his way back from a trip to New York. The report indicated that televisions were tuned in to CNN on the plane's flight to the destination earlier on Wednesday but were switched to MSNBC on the way back." ~~~
Marie: Today is hardly the first day I've had to weigh which GOP reprobate gets top billing.
They were there proud. They were there with love in their heart. That was unbelievable and it was a beautiful day. -- Donald Trump, CNN appearance May 10, 2023, speaking of January 6, 2021, insurrection ~~~
~~~ Shane Goldmacher & Maggie Haberman of the New York Times: "Donald Trump is still Donald Trump. His 70 minutes onstage in New Hampshire served as a vivid reminder that the former president has only one speed.... CNN's decision to give him an unfiltered prime-time platform was a callback to the 2016 campaign, even as the moderator, Kaitlan Collins, persistently interjected to try to cut him off or correct him.... The audience's regular interruptions on behalf of Mr. Trump were like a laugh track on a sitcom. It built momentum for him in the room -- and onscreen for the television audience -- and stifled Ms. Collins as she repeatedly tried to interrupt him with facts and correctives.... 'You're a nasty person,' Mr. Trump said to her at one point.... No matter how vulgar, profane or politically incorrect Mr. Trump was, the Republican crowd in New Hampshire audibly ate up the shtick of the decades-long showman." Worth reading, if you have the stomach for it. Best section: the one headlined, "He deepened his legal jeopardy with comments on investigations." ~~~
~~~ The Party of Misogynists. Abigail Weinberg of Mother Jones: "As soon as journalist Kaitlan Collins mentioned the verdict [in the E. Jean Carroll case] during this evening's CNN town hall with the former president, the audience of Republican-leaning New Hampshire voters started to laugh. 'I never met this woman. I never saw this woman,' Trump said, before launching into a mocking retelling of Carroll's allegations about what Trump did to her in a New York department store. 'What kind of a woman meets somebody and brings them up and within minutes you're playing hanky-panky in a dressing room?' Trump swore 'on my children' that the alleged attack never happened, despite a jury of nine people unanimously finding otherwise. He also repeated an insult he has frequently lobbed at Carroll, calling her a 'wack-job,' to rapturous laughter from the audience." ~~~
~~~ In case you're interested but refuse to watch, the New York Times liveblogged Donald Trump's CNN fake town-hall appearance, which he lied his way through. ~~~
~~~ Akhilleus, in yesterday's thread: "Please tell me what kind of town meeting excludes all members of one of the two major political parties? That's not a town meeting, that's a rally. I heard that CNN was inviting Rape and Treason Boy because they wanted to hear 'all sides'. If you invite only Republicans and the chimerical independents, how is that getting all sides?" ~~~
~~~ Erik Wemple of the Washington Post: "John King, the network's veteran political analyst, hinted at the emptiness of the evening: 'He is who he is, and he is who he was.'... This is what CNN does. Town halls, debates, live coverage on location -- CNN is a breaking-news colossus that loves nothing more than making its own breaking news.... [Their] team of top-notch professionals, as it turns out, can't design a format that does two things at once: present a live interview with Trump while at the same time providing viewers with a comprehensive inventory of true and false claims." ~~~
~~~ ** Adam Gabbatt of the Guardian: "Appearing at a CNN town hall, Donald Trump immediately launched into a series of debunked, nonsense claims about election fraud, speaking nearly non-stop for more than five minutes. Trump steamrolled over attempted interruptions from Kaitlan Collins, the CNN interviewer, as the town hall immediately turned into what many had feared: an opportunity for Trump to lie about dozens of topics, almost completely unfettered, across 60 minutes of primetime television. From 8pm to just after 9pm, there was never a moment when CNN or Collins had any semblance of control. Trump lied about election fraud and about the January 6 insurrection. He obfuscated on trade tariffs and the aims of abortion advocates, and claimed, wrongly, that he had 'finished' the wall.... According to CNN, the audience in Manchester, New Hampshire, was made up of 'New Hampshire Republicans and undeclared voters', but in reality the crowd [-- almost all men and mostly white --] might as well have been scooped up from a Trump campaign rally. They laughed, whooped and applauded as Trump dished out a stream of his greatest hits." ~~~
~~~ David Smith of the Guardian: "The nausea came gradually, then suddenly, and with disconcerting familiarity. We had been flung back in time to the political hellscape of 2016. Only the second time around, it was somehow worse. Donald Trump..., appearing on CNN for the first time since that fateful election year, lied and lied and lied. He was a leviathan of lying, a juggernaut of junk, an ocean liner of mendacity that left little boats of truth spinning and overturning in its wake.... What may have come as a rude awakening to the pundit class is that many in the audience in Manchester, New Hampshire, were lapping it up and cheering him on." MB: Even though I didn't watch the Trumpfest, reading about it makes me feel sick, too.
Trump Is Still Defaming Carroll. Lola Fadula of the New York Times: "'This is another scam,' Mr. Trump said in a video posted on his Truth Social platform, one of a series of posts that continued into Wednesday morning. 'It's a political witch hunt.' Mr. Trump said in the video that Ms. Carroll had been financed 'by Democrat operatives,' and that 'she totally lied about it.' He appeared to be referring to Reid Hoffman, the co-founder of LinkedIn who has a long history of funding Democratic candidates and causes, and who helped pay for certain costs and fees associated with Ms. Carroll's lawsuit.... Mr. Trump also criticized Judge Lewis A. Kaplan of Federal District Court, who presided over the case, calling him a 'terrible person' who was 'completely biased, and should have recused himself.'" (Also linked yesterday.)
The New York Times' main story on George Anthony Devolder Santos' indictment, by Grace Ashford & Michael Gold, is here. ~~~
~~~ ** Adrienne Vogt & Aditi Sangal of CNN: "Rep. George Santos has been charged on a 13-count indictment, according to court documents unsealed Wednesday. The charges include seven counts of wire fraud, three counts of money laundering, one count of theft of public funds, and two counts of making materially false statements to the House of Representatives.... Santos is now in federal custody, according to a spokesperson for the Eastern District of New York. Santos was taken into custody in Melville, Long Island, where the FBI is housed, a law enforcement source tells CNN. From there, he was taken to the courthouse in Central Islip." One item in this liveblog includes a facsimile of the grand jury indictment. (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~
~~~ Saving George Anthony's Vote. Annie Karni of the New York Times: "Since the day he set foot in Washington, Representative George Santos of New York has been shunned by some of his fellow Republicans and protected by Speaker Kevin McCarthy, who has consistently defended his right to serve in Congress despite the fictional persona he created and the geyser of falsehoods he told to win election. His wide-ranging indictment on Wednesday, in which Mr. Santos was charged with wire fraud, money laundering, stealing public funds and lying to Congress in federal disclosure forms, did nothing to change that dynamic. Some rank-and-file Republican lawmakers intensified their calls for his resignation, but Mr. McCarthy and other House G.O.P. leaders, operating with a slim and fractious majority, said Mr. Santos should be allowed to continue to serve in Congress." ~~~
~~~ Marie: Because George Santos is the kind of guy you want to have making decisions for the American people. ~~~
~~~ From the New York Times liveblog: "[Rep. George] Santos, 34, pleaded not guilty to all charges at a hearing in federal court on Long Island on Wednesday afternoon.... Santos was released on $500,000 bond secured by three individuals, whose identities are not public. He will be confined to New York, Washington, D.C., and places in between. He may travel to other places with advance approval." The liveblog includes a copy of the indictment. ~~~
~~~ Rebecca O'Brien: "Broadly, George Santos has been charged in three schemes outlined in the indictment: First, a fraudulent political contribution solicitation scheme, in which prosecutors say Santos and an unnamed Queens-based political consultant induced donors to give money to an LLC he controlled. He then used the money for personal expenses, including to buy designer goods and to pay off personal debts. Second, an unemployment insurance fraud scheme: Prosecutors say that in June 2020, in the early months of the Covid-19 pandemic, Santos applied for government assistance in New York, even though he was at the time employed by a Florida-based investment firm and drew an annual salary of $120,000. And, finally, the indictment says Santos misled the House of Representatives about his financial condition. In May 2020 -- during his first, unsuccessful campaign -- he is accused of overstating one source of income while failing to disclose his investment firm salary. And in September 2022, when he ran a second time, Santos is accused of including a number of falsehoods in his financial disclosure form." ~~~
~~~ Grace Ashford: "Away from the prying eyes of reporters in a secure wing of the federal courthouse, Santos is getting the full perp treatment. Likely that includes fingerprinting, photographs and a preliminary interview. He will be arraigned at 1 p.m." ~~~
~~~ MEANWHILE, in Brazil. Grace Ashford & André Spigariol: "... Brazilian law enforcement authorities will conduct a hearing on Thursday on an allegation of check fraud. The matter, which stemmed from an incident in 2008 regarding a stolen checkbook, had been suspended for the better part of a decade because the police were unable to locate him. The case was revived earlier this year and a hearing is scheduled for Thursday." (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~
~~~ Scott Lemieux notes that not only has the greatest volleyball player in CUNY history been indicted, he is counting on Matt Taibbi "to get to the bottom of this Deep State conspiracy." (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~
~~~ Steven Attewell in LG&$: "There's nothing novel or complicated ... about these crimes: in all these cases, Santos just lied to people about money and then when they gave him money, he took it and spent it. The campaign finance scheme is depressingly basic -- rather than playing the usual (and these days pretty much legalized by the Supreme Court) game of using no-show 'consultant' positions and the like to turn campaign finance dollars into personal funds, Santos just lied to people that a shell company was a 501(c)(4) independent expenditure organization, got them to wire money to that shell company, and then spent the money on himself. The Unemployment Insurance fraud is both deeply ironic -- Congressman Santos is a co-sponsor of a bill to crack down on UI fraud [MB: see Tony Romm's report, linked below] -- and similarly unoriginal. Santos had a no-show job that paid him $125k a year and then lied to the Department of Labor and the state of New York in order to collect a comparatively piddling $24 grand. He couldn't even manage to pull off a proper PPP scam like the cool kids in Congress." ~~~
~~~ Marie: I'd like to point out to Merrick Garland that the New York Times first raised questions about George Santos' fake biography on December 19, 2022; this is, fewer that five months ago. Later reporting by the Times and other outlets brought to light some of Santos' suspect financial stunts. So five months ago, Garland's DOJ knew nothing about the matters on which it led a grand jury to indict him yesterday. That is to say, the DOJ can move fairly quickly to bring indictments against elected officials. So how come, Merrick, we're still not seeing any indictments against Donald Trump for leading an open rebellion against the United States -- a rebellion viewed by millions of people around the world -- two years and five months ago? ~~~
~~~ Tony Romm of the Washington Post: "The House is preparing to vote this week on a Republican-backed bill that would clamp down on fraud in the nation's unemployment insurance program, mere days after Rep. George Santos &-- ... a co-sponsor of the legislation -- was indicted in federal court for allegedly bilking the benefits. The Republican proposal seeks to empower government officials to recover funds stolen during the coronavirus pandemic, when criminals laid siege to historically generous federal jobless aid, contributing to an estimated $190 billion in taxpayer losses. While Democrats share a desire to combat fraud, they largely oppose the GOP measure, arguing that it is likely to harm innocent Americans. The White House, meanwhile, has threatened to veto the proposal, which for weeks had not garnered much attention in a capital that finds itself enmeshed in a fiscal crisis."
Bupkis on Biden. Luke Broadwater of the New York Times: "After four months of investigation, House Republicans who promised to use their new majority to unearth evidence of wrongdoing by President Biden acknowledged on Wednesday that they had yet to uncover incriminating material about him, despite their frequent insinuations that he and his family have been involved in criminal conduct and corruption. At a much-publicized news conference on Capitol Hill to show the preliminary findings of their premier investigation into Mr. Biden and his family, leading Republicans released financial documents detailing how some of the president's relatives were paid more than $10 million from foreign sources between 2015 and 2017.... But ... their presentation underscored how little headway top G.O.P. lawmakers have made in finding clear evidence of questionable transactions they can tie to Mr. Biden, their chief political rival." Politico's story is here. ~~~
~~~ Philip Bump of the Washington Post: "Asked directly by reporters whether there was any evidence of the president's involvement, [House Oversight Committee Chair James] Comer [R-Ky.] fell back on insinuations. 'We're pretty confident that the president was very knowledgeable of what his family was doing,' he claimed at one point -- which, of course, is very different from Biden's being a beneficiary of foreign contributions himself. If it's even true, which Comer didn't assert.... Then, of course, there's the question of [Donald] Trump and his family. Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington estimates that Trump's various business interests pulled in as much as $160 million when he was president, cash mostly flowing in through overseas properties. But there was also foreign money coming in domestically, as when Saudi interests repeatedly booked large blocks of rooms at his hotels.... That's just Trump himself, mind you. His family also benefited from that spending.... In articulating the nefarious things Hunter Biden allegedly did, they can't help but demonstrate how Trump and his family engaged in similar behavior."
Look! A White Hood Perfectly Fits Mr. Potatohead! Azi Paybarah of the Washington Post: "Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R-Ala.) said people identified as 'white extremists' and 'white nationalists' should be allowed to serve in the U.S. armed forces. 'We are losing in the military, so fast, our readiness in terms of recruitment,' Tuberville told radio station WBHM in an interview published online Monday. 'I can tell you why. Because the Democrats are attacking our military, saying we need to get out the white extremists, the white nationalists' and others who do not believe in President Biden's 'agenda.' In response, the reporter asked Tuberville, 'Do you believe they should allow white nationalists in the military?' Tuberville said, 'Well, they call them that. I call them Americans.'... [Later,] Steven Stafford, a spokesman for Tuberville, wrote in an email to The Post that the senator 'resents the implication that the people in our military are anything but patriots and heroes.'" An NBC News story is here. ~~~
~~~ Alexander Bolton of the Hill: "Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell (Ky.) said Wednesday that he does not support Sen. Tommy Tuberville's (R-Ala.) blanket hold on more than 180 non-political military promotions, which Democrats say is keeping qualified people out of key roles. 'I don't support putting a hold on military nominations, I don't support that,' McConnell told reporters.... Asked whether there is a way to resolve the impasse, McConnell said: 'You'll have to ask Sen. Tuberville about that.'... The GOP leader's comments came after seven former secretaries of Defense sent a letter to the Senate last week warning the hold on promotions is 'harming military readiness and risks damaging U.S. national security.'"
Annals of "Journalism," Ha Ha Ha. Jim Rutenberg & Steven Myers of the New York Times: "Fox News was hit on Wednesday with another defamation lawsuit, this one from a woman who said the network promoted lies about her that generated serious threats to her safety and harmed her career prospects. The suit was filed on behalf of Nina Jankowicz, the former executive director of a short-lived Department of Homeland Security division assigned with coordinating efforts to monitor and address disinformation threats to national security. Right-wing pundits and politicians falsely portrayed her group as part of an Orwellian bid to control the speech and thought of ordinary Americans. Ms. Jankowicz, a prominent specialist in Russian disinformation and online harassment, became the primary subject of their attacks. In 300 mentions over eight months on Fox last year, she was repeatedly demeaned and defamed in highly personal language, the lawsuit asserts. Hosts including Tucker Carlson, Maria Bartiromo and Sean Hannity said her job was 'to silence anyone who criticizes the Biden administration' and possibly even, as Mr. Carlson warned, 'get men with guns to tell you to shut up.'" An NBC News story is here.
Pam Belluck of the New York Times: "A panel of advisers to the Food and Drug Administration voted unanimously on Wednesday that the benefits of making a birth control pill available without a prescription outweigh the risks, a significant step in the decades-long push to make oral contraception obtainable over the counter in the United States. If the F.D.A. approves nonprescription sales of the medication, called Opill, this summer, it could significantly expand access to contraception, especially for young women and those who have difficulty dealing with the time, costs or logistical hurdles involved in visiting a doctor, reproductive health experts say. Approval is not a foregone conclusion, however." Read on if you're a potentially affected person. (Also linked yesterday.)
Way Beyond the Beltway
Ukraine, et al. The Washington Post's live briefing of developments Wednesday in Russia's war on Ukraine is here: "Ukraine needs more time before launching its long-anticipated spring counteroffensive against Russian forces, President Volodymyr Zelensky said. Speaking to the BBC and European public broadcasters, Zelensky said the offensive could proceed now 'and be successful' but would incur an 'unacceptable' level of loss. Ukraine has reclaimed more than a mile of territory near Bakhmut, military officials said Wednesday, marking a crucial breakthrough after months of pitched battles for control of the besieged front-line city.... Donald Trump refused to say whether he wants to see Ukraine or Russia triumph.... The former president also claimed he would end the war in a single day if he were reelected to the White House." ~~~
~~~ Marie: Trump says he wants to end the war so people will stop dying. Good reason, and very humanitarian, especially for a guy who doesn't care about anyone but himself. Now, if you had a viable idea about how to abruptly end a war so people would "stop dying" (-- an idea might even garner you that Nobel Peace Prize you've obsessively coveted! --) wouldn't you rush your idea to the real President, to the Pentagon, to the editorial pages, to anyone in authority who would listen? Yes, you would. Even without the Nobel Prize incentive.
News Lede
AP: "The chief suspect in the unsolved 2005 disappearance of American student Natalee Holloway is poised to face charges linked to the young woman's vanishing for the first time after the government of Peru authorized his extradition to the United States.... [Dutch citizen Joran] Van der Sloot is in a maximum-security prison in the Andes serving a 28-year sentence for the murder of a Peruvian woman. Holloway, who lived in suburban Birmingham, Alabama, was 18 when she was last seen during a trip with classmates to the Caribbean island of Aruba.... She was last seen leaving a bar with van der Sloot, who was a student at an international school on the island. Van der Sloot was identified as a suspect and detained weeks later, along with two Surinamese brothers. Holloway's body was never found, and no charges were filed in the case. A judge later declared Holloway dead. [U.S.] federal charges filed in Alabama against van der Sloot stem from an accusation that he tried to extort the Holloway family in 2010, promising to lead them to her body in exchange for hundreds of thousands of dollars. A grand jury indicted him that year on one count each of wire fraud and extortion, each of which is punishable by up to 20 years in prison. Also in 2010, van der Sloot was arrested in Peru for the murder of 21-year-old Stephany Flores, who was killed five years to the day after Holloway's disappearance."
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Reader Comments (15)
Boo-hoo…My Kevin’s favorite drag queen is out on bail (who posted a $500,000 bond?) so’s he can bump and grind his way back to DC.
But here’s the best part. After being arrested, in part, for unemployment fraud, Kitara is racing back to Congress to cast his—I’m sure—well considered vote on a Republican bill to cut funding for fighting…wait for it…unemployment fraud!
This just screams “Party of Traitors”, does it not?
Just out of jail in time to vote for a bill that guarantees I won’t be caught again for doing what put me there in the first place. This is like Trump wondering if he can pardon himself. Today’s GOP. The Grift On Party.
@Akhilleus: According to the WashPo, the bill is to increase funding to fight Covid unemployment fraud, and George Anthony is a co-sponsor. I was wondering if -- when he signed up to co-sponsor the bill -- he saw the irony of it, or if he just sees himself as so above the law & unaffected by what governs the rest of us that he didn't even notice he was sponsoring a bill designed to catch crooks like him (if the FBI hadn't caught him first).
Marie,
Thanks for the clarification.
In so many ways Santos is like a mini-Trump, the lies, the exaggerations, the grift, the narcissism, the sleazy money making schemes, the blithe unconcern and contempt for the laws that govern “the little people” their cons victimize.
Of course, Santos is just a poor copy of the real thing, the thing which is far more dangerous, more criminal, and more arrogant.
So why isn’t Fatty having to bail himself out?
From a piece linked above:
Fox liars, when they target a Democrat trying to do a tough job, all jump on the bandwagon, talking points stapled to their foreheads. Here they complain about an official whom they claim was making “…an Orwellian bid to control the speech and thought of ordinary Americans…Hosts including Tucker Carlson, Maria Bartiromo and Sean Hannity said her job was 'to silence anyone who criticizes the Biden administration' and possibly even, as Mr. Carlson warned, 'get men with guns to tell you to shut up.'”
First, let’s talk about “Orwellian bids” to control thoughts and speech. Let’s talk about the book bans, let’s talk about elected officials being shut up, kicked out, defamed for speaking up while representing voters, let’s talk about “Don’t say gay”. As for “men with guns” threatening people, let’s talk about Proud Boys and Oath Keepers and right-wing militia assholes showing up at public places in body armor, brandishing enough guns to reenact D-Day, daring anyone to say a word.
Yeah. Stuff like that happens, the Orwellian cancel culture and the threats to shut up or else be shot.
But these things aren’t carried out by Democrats, by liberals. This crap is the calling card of Trumpbots, Fox watchers, and KKKarlson fans.
“Projection” doesn’t begin to describe what’s going on.
Senator Potatohead's syntax is so garbled, it's hard to understand. But here is a bit of that interview in which he said "the military" should include white supremacists ... who he calls "Americans."
"... because that is the most important institution in the United States of America, and our allies, is a strong, hard-nosed, killing machine, which is called our military.”
What he MAY be seeking to convey to his listeners is that "the military" needs psychopathic killers ("hard nosed killers"). and that the white supremacists provide a proven, ready supply of such folk. They seem to like guns, tactical uniforms with little patches all over, lots of flags, wrap-around sunglasses, noisy vehicles and all that stuff, as well as shooting people and blowing things up. Why recruit a bunch of non-psychos, who require months of training to learn reflexive killing. when you can buy them off the rack ready to kill whatever they're pointed at?
So the Senator is giving Ron Johnson a strong challenge for "dumbest senator" by just pointing out that armies exist to kill things, and we can get them cheap by loading up on known psychos.
Patrick: Thank you for unraveling the bad syntax and presenting a perfect explanation for second dumbest doofus' riff on the best way to get cheap killers for our armies.
Seems the dim brain of the senator from Alabama may have formed the glimmering of an idea.
What he wants our military to be is the equivalent of Putin's Wagner force, recruited? from the best America's criminal world has to offer.
He might not have detected "The Dirty Dozen" was only a movie--and even in that band of scallawags, as I remember, there was not a White Supremacist among them.
Greg Abbott should be asked about how much he loves and appreciates that big beautiful wall that Trump finished so successfully.
Chris Licht moved from Late Night with Colbert at CBS to CNN. He went from producing reality-based comedy to last night’s nightmare. Even in his first days at CNN she seemed to be squashing truth to attract more “other side” viewers. Fire the fucker. Now.
Typo. …at CNN he…
Ken,
Maybe not a Mr. Potato Head type white supremacist, but Telly Savalas played a psycho racist in “The Dirty Dozen”. At one point he complains about having to “eat with niggers”, referring to the character played by Jim Brown (and I’m pretty sure you wouldn’t want to say that to Jim Brown offscreen).
By the way, Savalas’ character’s name was Maggot. Definitely a precursor to Trump’s MAGAts.
Akhilleus,
Thanks for correcting me. Do remember Jim Brown. Had forgotten the Savalas character. I seldom lie on purpose. I ain't no Maggot..
The Fat Fascist last night instructed his servants in the GOP Congress (ie, traitors), to allow the United States to default on its debts (which is unconstitutional) if Biden does not agree to their ransom demands.
If that’s not bad enough, the CNN story reporting this refers to the chief traitor as “President Trump”. Not ex-president or TFG, or candidate Trump. President. Which he is not.
We can expect CNN to go all in on authoritarianism in this election season. 2016 all over again. Except we didn’t know just how bad it would be. Now we do. But CNN obviously doesn’t care. They might be doing it for money, but I think they’re doing it to put Trump back in the White House.
Liberal media? It doesn’t exist.
Never has.
So a group of bribery suspects and their enablers (all nine said their own ethics rules were more than enough) rule that bribery corruption is legal, again.
I can't remember the last time the Supreme Court upheld a bribery conviction handed down by their fellow citizens.
Why has the media's approach in covering Trump since he announced he was running for president 8 years ago and Robert Kennedy Jr following his recent announcement been so different?
I find the comparison startling. Early on, NYT et al struggled in deciding whether to label Trump's endless, repetitious lies "lies". Yet they had no hesitation reporting/repeating his astounding fabrications and providing him primetime opportunities to repeat them ad nauseam. CNN's town hall is the latest example.
By contrast, Kennedy's entire campaign has been largely ignored because of his anti-vaccination argument even though it's not a key issue of his candidacy. Even to the extent it is, why the different different standard.
I'm not defending Kennedy's anti-vaccination argument, but imagine where we might be if Trump's falsehoods had been dealt with from the beginning in the same way ABC did when interviewing Kennedy. Ask him a question you know he will answer untruthfully, censor his answer, explain post interview what his correct answer should have been, and provide him minimal coverage thereafter.
This does raise a larger question: is it the media's responsibility to censor information and political candidates they find unacceptable? However one answers that question, the Trump-Kennedy comparison is puzzling.