;)
The Commentariat -- January 27, 2019
Afternoon Update:
Felicia Sonmez of the Washington Post: "President Trump will secure the U.S. border with Mexico 'with or without Congress,' acting White House chief of staff Mick Mulvaney said Sunday, as negotiations over Trump's long-sought border wall begin anew. In an interview on 'Fox News Sunday,' Mulvaney declined to say whether Trump would accept less than the $5.7 billion in funding he has demanded for the wall. But he maintained that Trump is ready to use emergency powers to secure the border if Democrats continue to balk at his demands." ...
... Brent Griffiths of Politico: "Mick Mulvaney on Sunday refused to rule out U.S. military action to address unrest in Venezuela, following a week where ... Donald Trump distanced the U.S. from the country's ruler, Nicolás Maduro, by recognizing an opposition figure as Venezuela's true leader."
Brett Samuels of the Hill: "President Trump early Sunday pushed questionable claims about Texas officials reviewing voter rolls to warn of 'rampant' voter fraud and advocate for 'Strong vote ID.' The president alleged that 58,000 noncitizens voted in Texas, and that 95,000 noncitizens registered to vote. His tweet was apparently spurred by a 'Fox & Friends' segment on the figures at about 8 a.m.... In fact, The Texas Tribune reported that the Texas secretary of state's office announced Friday it had flagged 95,000 registered voters who it said should be reviewed to determine whether they are U.S. citizens. Of that group, 58,000 cast a ballot in at least one election from 1996 to 2018, The Texas Tribune reported. The identified individuals provided some form of documentation when obtaining an identification card that showed they were not citizens, the news outlet reported. However, it's unclear how many are still not U.S. citizens, as some may have been naturalized."
Still Whining. Brett Samuels: "President Trump late Saturday railed against the indictment of Roger Stone, insisting that he did not work with his longtime confidant 'anywhere near the Election' and complaining that the focus should instead be on obstacles his campaign faced in 2016. In a series of tweets, Trump cited allegations in Stone's indictment that data was released during the 2016 campaign to damage then-Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton. The president suggested he was subject to similar campaigns, pointing to the so-called Steele dossier, which he dubbed a 'total phony conjob.' The dossier contained several salacious allegations, some of which were unverified, about Trump's relationship to Russia. The dossier was published by BuzzFeed in January 2017, after the election. The president also argued via Twitter he was subjected to 'one sided Fake Media coverage (collusion with Crooked H?),' and 'bias by Facebook and many others.'"
Lauren King & Ali Dukakis of ABC News: "Roger Stone, following a pre-dawn arrest at his home in Florida and ahead of an arraignment in Washington on Tuesday, said that he would discuss cooperating with special counsel Robert Mueller, if asked.... 'Have you ever had any conversations with the president during the campaign or since the campaign about Russia or the Mueller investigation?' [George] Stephanopolous asked. 'None whatsoever,' he said. 'Categorically. ... Zero. Zero.'" Mrs. McC: Okay, case closed. Trump is off the hook. ...
... Rosalind Helderman, et al., of the Washington Post: "In indictments and plea agreements unveiled over the last 20 months..., Robert S. Mueller III has shown over and over again that some of President Trump's closest friends and advisers have lied about Russia and related issues.... The remaining question -- for both Mueller's team, as it works on a final investigative report, and for the American people -- is why.... The deception by Trump advisers that has led to guilty pleas so far does have a common throughline: Much of it centers on their interactions about Russia.... Steve Hall, who retired from the CIA in 2015 after 30 years of running and managing Russia operations, said..., 'In my view, those lies -- what was lied about and under what condition the lies were told -- contribute to a counterintelligence pattern that has begun to emerge pointing to senior members of the Trump team being involved with the Russians.'..." ...
... Mrs. McCrabbie: I get a kick out of the way some of Trump's defenders give him the benefit of the doubt by arguing that all of Trump's associates are all liars & generally untrustworthy.
Border Patrol Asked to Find Evidence for Trump's Oft-Repeated Horror Story. Dara Lind of Vox: "It's become a staple of ... Donald Trump's riffs on the horrors of the US-Mexico border...: Human traffickers gag women with tape so they can't even breathe before packing them into vans and driving them across the border illegally. But two weeks after Trump had started talking about tape-gagged women -- when a January 17 Washington Post article had questioned the claim — a top Border Patrol official had to email agents to ask if they had 'any information' that the claim was actually true. The email ... was sent as a 'request for information' by an assistant Border Patrol chief, apparently on behalf of the office of Customs and Border Protection commissioner Kevin McAleenan.... It asked agents to reply within less than two hours with 'any information (in any format) regarding claims of tape-gagged women -- and even linked to the Post article 'for further info.' Vox's source indicated that they and others in their sector hadn't heard anything that would back up Trump's claims, but wasn't sure if agents in other sectors had provided information. However, no one from the Trump administration has come forward to offer evidence for the claim, either before or after the internal Border Patrol email was sent.... It's extremely hard to prove that such things have never happened -- especially because the president has access to classified information that experts speaking to journalists do not."
Carl Hulse of the New York Times: "The toll exacted on government operations and federal employees by the record 35-day stalemate -- not to mention the political costs to those in the White House and on Capitol Hill -- was so punishing that it is giving momentum to a longstanding call to prohibit the government disruptions that have become a regular facet of Washington hardball.... Members of both parties said it was past time to enact legislation that would essentially mean the government would remain open at existing spending levels when an impasse such as the fight over the border wall was reached, rather than shuttering parts or all of the government." Both Sens. Rob Portman (R-Ohio) & Mark Warner (D-Va.) have introduced legislation that would prevent shutdowns. House "Speaker Nancy Pelosi also welcomed the idea on Friday, saying in a meeting with news columnists that she wanted to explore the possibility of legislation that would serve as a shutdown prevention act."
Ben Zimmer in Politico Magazine on the history of the term "ratfucking." Fascinating, to a words person. Thanks to unwashed for the link.
If you've missed all the news since Friday, here's a fairly accurate recap:
*****
The Trump Shutdown, Ctd.
On Friday, reporters used the word 'cave' to describe Trump's actions in over a dozen headlines, so often that Merriam-Webster reports a 1500 percent increase in searches for the word -- presumably, for its function as a verb. -- Matt Stieb of New York
Mike DeBonis of the Washington Post: "Trump's capitulation -- agreeing to reopen the federal government after a 35-day standoff without funding for a U.S.-Mexico border wall -- generated rave reviews for [Nancy] Pelosi from fellow Democrats and grudging respect from Republicans who watched as she kept an unruly party caucus united in the face of GOP divide-and-conquer tactics. Pelosi (D-Calif.) emerges from the shutdown as a stronger leader of her party -- and more popular with the public, by early measures -- as Democrats eye aggressive efforts to counter Trump's agenda through ambitious legislation and tough oversight. That suggests the shutdown might have been a strategic misstep for Trump, in addition to a tactical error.... Trump and White House officials appeared to fundamentally misjudge Pelosi's support among Democrats and her resolve to hold firm against border wall funding.... There appears to be little appetite on Capitol Hill for a reprise of the draining shutdown. Trump's Plan B -- declaring a national emergency and tapping military construction accounts to fund the wall -- has unnerved many Republicans and spurred Democrats to prepare for litigation that might not be settled before Trump's term is up."
Kevin Liptak, et al., of CNN: "As ... Donald Trump announced in the Rose Garden on Friday that his quixotic bid to secure more than $5 billion for a border wall would end with no money, he was met with applause from his Cabinet secretaries and senior aides. But the clapping belied a pervasive sense of defeat. Instead of emerging victorious, many of Trump's allies are walking away from a record-breaking government shutdown feeling outplayed, not least by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. The President is now more unpopular than he was before the shutdown began, sacked with blame for the 35-day lapse in funding. Friday's announcement was an extraordinary comedown that left many in the White House and those who support Trump marveling at the futility of the preceding four weeks of brinkmanship. In the eyes of some aides and outside advisers, an entire fruitless month has passed that cannot be recouped.... 'Today is not a cave but a grave for Stephen Miller policies,' [a Trump] adviser said, acknowledging it's not clear at all that Trump is ready to make that kind of course correction."
Home Alone at the White House, Donnie Hosted Some of His Crazy Friends. Maggie Haberman & Annie Karni of the New York Times: "President Trump met last week with a delegation of hard-right activists led by Ginni Thomas, the wife of Justice Clarence Thomas, listening quietly as members of the group denounced transgender people and women serving in the military, according to three people with direct knowledge of the events. For 60 minutes Mr. Trump sat, saying little but appearing taken aback, the three people said, as the group also accused White House aides of blocking Trump supporters from getting jobs in the administration. It is unusual for the spouse of a sitting Supreme Court justice to have such a meeting with a president, and some close to Mr. Trump said it was inappropriate for Ms. Thomas to have asked to meet with the head of a different branch of government.... The meeting was arranged after months of delay, according to the three people. It came about after the Thomases had dinner with the president and the first lady, Melania Trump, the people said.... Others attending included Frank Gaffney..., who has advocated curtailing immigration and has repeatedly denounced Muslims, and Rosemary Jenks, who works for the anti-immigration group NumbersUSA...." Mrs. McC: "Taken aback"? These are your people, Von Clownschtick.
Joshua Partlow & David Fahrenthold of the Washington Post: "... on Jan. 18, about a dozen employees at Trump National Golf Club in Westchester County, N.Y., were ... fired because they are undocumented immigrants, according to interviews with the workers and their attorney. The fired workers are from Latin America. The sudden firings -- which were previously unreported -- follow last year's revelations of undocumented labor at a Trump club in New Jersey, where employees were subsequently dismissed. The firings show Trump's business was relying on undocumented workers even as the president demanded a border wall to keep out such immigrants.... In Westchester County, workers were told Trump's company had just audited their immigration documents -- the same ones they had submitted years earlier -- and found them to be fake.... The firings at the New York golf club -- which workers said eliminated about half of the club's wintertime staff -- follow a story in the New York Times last year that featured an undocumented worker at another Trump club in Bedminster, N.J. After that story, Trump's company fired undocumented workers at the Bedminster club, according to former workers there.... The firings highlight a stark tension between Trump's public stance on immigration and the private conduct of Trump's business."
Annie Karni & Maggie Haberman: "Jared Kushner ... was confident in his ability as a good-faith negotiator who could find a compromise to end the government shutdown.... Buoyed by his success in helping pass a criminal justice bill, Mr. Kushner ... agreed to take the lead when the president asked him to find a way to end the monthlong stalemate. But negotiating a broad immigration deal that would satisfy a president committed to a border wall as well as Democrats who have cast it as immoral proved to be more like Mr. Kushner's elusive goal of solving Middle East peace than passing a criminal justice overhaul that already had bipartisan support. For one, Mr. Kushner inaccurately believed that moderate rank-and-file Democrats were open to a compromise and had no issue funding a wall as part of a broader deal.... And Democratic leaders like Senator Chuck Schumer, party officials said, did not believe that Mr. Kushner had the power to circumvent Stephen Miller.... Mr. Trump, White House aides said, has been frustrated at everyone around him for not delivering a deal he can accept. And he has become wary of his son-in-law's advice on this issue, the aides said."
This Russia Thing, Etc., Ctd.
Karen Yourish & Larry Buchanan of the New York Times: "During the 2016 presidential campaign and transition, Donald J. Trump and at least 17 campaign officials and advisers had contacts with Russian nationals and WikiLeaks, or their intermediaries, a New York Times analysis has found. At least 10 other associates were told about interactions but did not have any themselves.... Among these contacts are more than 100 in-person meetings, phone calls, text messages, emails and private messages on Twitter. Mr. Trump and his campaign repeatedly denied having such contacts with Russians during the 2016 election.The special counsel has also investigated connections between the Trump campaign and WikiLeaks, which released thousands of Democratic emails that were hacked by Russia before the election." The story includes a handy interactive chart & related charts laying out the who when where & lies. Mrs. McC: There's NO COLLUSION! and even if there was, there's nothing wrong with it. WITCH HUNT!!!
"Nancy"'s One-Two Punch. Inae Oh of Mother Jones: "Fresh off her decisive victory over ... Donald Trump in the fight to end the longest government shutdown in US history, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi released a scathing statement on the other damning news of the day: the arrest of the president's longtime adviser Roger Stone.
The indictment of Roger Stone makes clear that there was a deliberate, coordinated attempt by top Trump campaign officials to influence the 2016 election and subvert the will of the American people. It is staggering that the President has chosen to surround himself with people who violated the integrity of our democracy and lied to the FBI and Congress about it.
In the face of 37 indictments, the President's continued actions to undermine the Special Counsel investigation raise the questions: what does Putin have on the President, politically, personally or financially? Why has the Trump Administration continued to discuss pulling the U.S. out of NATO, which would be a massive victory for Putin?
Lying to Congress and witness tampering constitute grave crimes. All who commit these illegal acts should be held accountable to the fullest extent of the law.; We cannot allow any effort to intimidate witnesses or prevent them from appearing before Congress.
The Special Counsel investigation is working, and the House will continue to exercise our constitutional oversight responsibility and ensure that the Special Counsel investigation can continue free from interference from the White House. -- Nancy Pelosi, Speaker of the House
Marcy Wheeler of emptywheel: "[I]n spite of the fact that [Roger] Stone has been rat-fucking for almost a half century, and in spite of the fact that Stone was willing to risk major prison time as part of a cover-up, Stone utterly fucked himself by keeping incriminating materials around and leaking them out via journalists. If Ronald Reagan is rolling in his grave today because the Air Traffic Controllers showed that by working collectively they could be more powerful than a President, then Richard Nixon is rolling in his grave today that a guy still branded with his face failed the cover-up so much worse than Nixon himself[.]" --s
Peter Zeidenberg in the Daily Beast: "... [Roger] Stone should begin getting his affairs in order. Barring a presidential pardon (always the wild-card possibility with a POTUS like Trump) Stone will be convicted and receive a very substantial prison sentence. This is as close to a slam-dunk case as a prosecutor will ever bring.... Do not expect to see special counsel Robert Mueller make any attempt to flip Stone and have him cooperate.... Stone is too untrustworthy for a prosecutor to ever rely upon. He has told so many documented lies, and bragged so often about his dirty tricks, that he simply has too much baggage to deal with even if here to want to cooperate -- which seems unlikely in any event.... Stone has nothing to sell that Mueller would be interested in buying." ...
... Julian Sanchez in a New York Times op-ed: "... the true target of Friday's F.B.I. actions [against Roger Stone] was not Mr. Stone himself, but his electronic devices.... Reports ... noted that federal agents were 'seen carting hard drives and other evidence from Mr. Stone;s apartment in Harlem, and his recording studio in South Florida was also raided.' The F.B.I., in other words, was executing search warrants, not just arrest warrants.... [According to the indictment,] in a text exchange between Mr. Stone and a 'supporter involved with the Trump Campaign,' Mr. Mueller pointedly quotes Mr. Stone's request to 'talk on a secure line -- got WhatsApp?'... Though it's not directly relevant to his alleged false statements, the special counsel is taking pains to establish that Mr. Stone made a habit of moving sensitive conversations to encrypted messaging platforms like WhatsApp -- meaning that, unlike ordinary emails, the messages could not be obtained directly from the service provider. The clear implication is that any truly incriminating communications would have been conducted in encrypted form -- and thus could be obtained only directly from Mr. Stone's own phones and laptops." ...
... Roger Stone, the Missing Link. James Risen of the Intercept: "Since his name first surfaced in connection with the Trump-Russia inquiry, Stone has behaved in public like a clown, reveling in his cheap celebrity while also taunting Mueller and the press.... But the indictment shows that Stone has some serious legal problems, and that his role as a possible link between the Trump circle and the cyber-assault on the Democratic Party and Hillary Clinton's campaign can't be laughed off or easily dismissed.... If the indictment is borne out, Stone's actions come very close to making him the key missing link in the Trump-Russia collusion narrative.... While the charges against Stone don't deal with the underlying question of collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia, the Stone indictment still brings Mueller's probe closer than ever before to the heart of the matter." ...
... Adam Davidson of the New Yorker: "A frequent guest on InfoWars and other fringe conspiracy-media outlets, [Roger] Stone has presented himself as somewhat desperately trying to foster communication between Trump and [ WikiLeaks' Julian] Assange. But the e-mails in the indictment show that Stone may have played a crucial role in the election, intervening with both the Trump campaign and WikiLeaks to influence the timing of key events.... One must still allow [that Trump] was, somehow, an innocent dupe surrounded by scheming scoundrels[.]"
... Betsy Woodruff of the Daily Beast reproduces some of the e-mail exchanges between Roger Stone & Randy Credico (Person 2). Extremely scatological. "Stone and Credico's relationship ... has found its way into the investigation of the century. And it highlights one of the most amusing realities of the special counsel's into Russian meddling in the 2016 election: Mueller, a notoriously serious and straight-faced law man, has spent a huge amount of time dealing with clowns.... A few days before his indictment, he texted The Daily Beast to say he would expose monstrous misconduct by Mueller's team if indicted." ...
... Abigail Tracy of Vanity Fair: "... Stone was not indicted on charges of collusion or conspiracy. Rather, as Trump attorney Rudy Giuliani noted, he was indicted for process crimes. Which invites the question: could Mueller not find an underlying crime?... Glenn Kirschner, a former federal prosecutor..., specifically highlighted text messages from [Randy] Credico -- identified as 'Person 2' in the court filing -- to Stone on or around October 1, 2016..., that stated, 'Big news Wednesday ... now pretend u don-t know me .. Hillary's campaign will die this week.' Kirschner called that clear evidence of a conspiracy. 'Really, in 15 words, we can see collusion; we can see the cover-up; we can see the conspiracy; and we can see that the whole point of this is to kill Hillary's campaign in a way that relies on stolen information to do it,' Kirschner said. '... you can prove the case with those 15 words.' 'The Stone indictment is yet another indictment of a person close to Trump working with the Kremlin,' said Neal Katyal, a top Justice official in the Obama administration. 'Either Trump was in on it, or he goes down as the most clueless boss and president in the 242-year history of the Republic.'"
... Mrs. Bea McCrabbie: The argument popular among -- and giving comfort to -- Trump supporters is that Mueller is mostly charging Trump factotums with "process crimes": lying to investigators, obstructing justice, etc. In my view, that's pretty cold comfort. First, there's no reason to think Mueller has packed up his indictment machine. But more important, these "process crimes" all raise the question of why. If there were no underlying crime, there would be no reason to lie or obstruct justice or commit perjury or tamper with witnesses. These "process crimes" all are pointers to underlying crimes. Mueller could not have charged these process crimes if he didn't know pretty much what his targets were trying to hide; that is, what the "big" crimes of conspiracy, election fraud, hacking, etc. ...
... Remarks by Adam Davidson, Neal Katyal & others suggest that if Mueller never directly fingers Trump, Trump's only viable defense will be, "I had no idea what-all was going on right under my nose." Watching the Trump Crime Family in action really is like watching an episode of "Law & Order" where prosecutor Jack McCoy is trying to reel in the big-fish mob boss when the only solid evidence he has is against wise guys like Biscuits & Books (Biscotti & Libretti).
** Spencer Ackerman of The Daily Beast: "The new leadership on the House intelligence committee is eager to revive the panel's probe into the connections between Donald Trump's camp and Russia, an urgency underscored by the latest indictment of a Trump associate accused of lying to its investigation. But three weeks into the Democratic-controlled Congress, House Republicans haven't taken a critical step necessary for the committee to begin any work at all. The House Republican leadership has yet to name the intelligence committee's Republican membership for the new Congress, with the exception of retaining Devin Nunes as ranking Republican. Without doing so, the committee is stalled -- no hearings, no internal business meetings...(This Republican intransigence was first noted by The Rachel Maddow Show.) It's not clear what the holdup is." --s
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Rod Nordland & Mujib Mashal of the New York Times: The United States and the Taliban are closing in on a deal to end America's longest war after six days of some of the most serious Afghan peace negotiations to date wrapped up on Saturday. The talks in Doha, Qatar, lasted much longer than planned and longer than any previous attempt to end the 17-year conflict, and both sides publicly reported progress -- a rarity. The chief American negotiator, Zalmay Khalilzad, said on Twitter that the talks were 'more productive than they have been in the past' and he hoped they would resume shortly.... 'We have a number of issues left to work out. Nothing is agreed until everything is agreed, and "everything" must include an intra-Afghan dialogue and comprehensive cease-fire,' he said." ...
... Mrs. McCrabbie: This is the first time I can recall something like good news coming out of the Trump administration. Any other "good news" I can remember has been fake. If negotiations proceed successfully, please, Allah, don't let Trump put his thumb on them.
Marco Rubio, Venezuelan Revolutionary. Peter Baker & Edward Wong of the New York Times: "... Senator Marco Rubio ... has become a lead policy architect and de facto spokesman in a daring and risky campaign involving the United States in the unrest that is now gripping Venezuela. Through sheer force of will and a concerted effort to engage and educate President Trump, Mr. Rubio has made himself, in effect, a virtual secretary of state for Latin America, driving administration strategy and articulating it to the region from the Senate floor, as he did the other day, and every television camera he can find. Perhaps no other individual outside Venezuela has been more critical in challenging President Nicolás Maduro."
** Annals of Journalism, Ctd. Amanda Arnold of New York: "In the past three days, about 1,000 writers, editors, and other media workers lost their jobs — a number that will continue to increase over the next week. On Wednesday evening, Verizon (which owns HuffPost, Yahoo, and AOL) announced it would be laying of seven percent of its staff; not long after that, The Wall Street Journal reported that BuzzFeed would cut soon cut 15 percent of its staff. Earlier that day, Gannett Co., which owns more than 1,000 daily and weekly newspapers across the country, had cut approximately 400 jobs -- a devastating blow to small newsrooms and the local communities that depend on them.... Many are laying the blame on Facebook and Google, which monopolize digital ad growth, as well as poor decisions on the management level. 'This isn't happening because of market inefficiencies or consumer preferences or social value,' HuffPost senior reporter Zach Carter tweeted. 'It's happening because two very large companies have taken the advertising revenue that journalism outlets rely on and replaced it with nothing.'"
Public Service Announcement:
... "Ah, Ah, Ah, Ah, Stayin' Alive, Stayin' Alive." Alex Horton of the Washington Post: When Cross Scott of Arizona came across an unconscious woman, he had no training in CPR, but he did remember that episode of "The Office." While others called 911, Scott "crawled onto the woman and began compressions while singing the [Bee Gees'] song aloud, he told the [Arizona Daily] Star.... The woman ... awoke after a minute and threw up, according to the Star. She was then taken to a hospital."
Beyond the Beltway
Arizona. Yvonne Sanchez of the Arizona Republic: "Kelli Ward, the bomb-throwing conservative former state senator and loyalist to ... Donald Trump, upended the race to lead the Arizona Republican Party by beating the establishment favorite and incumbent GOP chairman, Jonathan Lines. In doing so, Republicans from across the state on Saturday chose a more right-wing vision headed into the 2020 election cycle where Arizona is poised to reach battleground status. The election [of Ward] could have far-reaching implications for how the party messages to voters and how it spends money on races."
Florida. Mark Stern of Slate: "... a Florida ethics probe into [Andrew] Gillum's [D] conduct as Tallahassee mayor has made his political future cloudier than it once appeared. On Friday, that investigation took a new, serious turn, when a state commission found probable cause that Gillum violated ethics laws by accepting gifts from lobbyists. This latest development, reported in the Tallahassee Democrat, should not be confused with the FBI probe into corruption in Tallahassee, which looks to be uninterested in Gillum. But it's still a blow to his political ambitions -- a splotch on his record that arises from alleged conduct that might be generously described as unseemly. Until now, Gillum has waved away criticisms of his behavior as a partisan smear campaign. Friday's decision undermines that defense, giving future opponents legitimate grist to attack his character.... Throughout the campaign, he insisted that he paid his share of the lavish excursions and never accepted gifts from lobbyists. That narrative is now almost impossible to believe."
Kansas. Jacey Fortin of the New York Times: "Three men who were convicted of plotting to blow up a Kansas apartment complex where Somali refugees lived have each been sentenced to at least 25 years in prison, the Justice Department said on Friday. 'The defendants in this case acted with clear premeditation in an attempt to kill innocent people on the basis of their religion and national origin,' Matthew G. Whitaker, the acting United States attorney general, said in a statement. 'That-s not just illegal -- it's morally repugnant.' During the trial last year in Wichita, Kan., prosecutors portrayed the men as aspiring domestic terrorists who were preparing to bomb the apartment complex in Garden City, Kan., which is home to a makeshift mosque and a community of Somali immigrants. The men, who called themselves 'the Crusaders,' were arrested about four weeks before Nov. 9, 2016, the date they had picked for the bombing." ...
... Mrs. McCrabbie: Looks as if Matt Whitaker is not hoping for a new job in the Trump administration.
Pennsylvania. Jan Murphy & Charles Thompson of PennLive: State "House Republican leaders have called on state Rep. Brian Ellis to resign from office ... to take care of his family and address the sexual assault allegation that is the subject of a criminal investigation by the Dauphin County District Attorney. In their statement, House GOP leaders acknowledged a criminal investigation is taking place.... Ellis is accused of sexually assaulting a woman, who works at the state Capitol, following an encounter with her at a Harrisburg bar in October 2015.... The state's Victim Advocate Jennifer Storm, who is working with the woman, said on Friday that the woman was not voluntarily intoxicated the night of the alleged assault but rather incapacitated by a drug" --s
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Reader Comments (17)
The Art of Someone Else’s Deal?
“Mr. Trump, White House aides said, has been frustrated at everyone around him for not delivering a deal he can accept.”
Isn’t Fatty the ginormous deal maker from Planet 9? The guy who promised to dealmake us all silly? I thought he was supposed to be making the deals, not sitting on his fat ass watching the TV and munching fast food while waiting for some flunky to do the work.
I give him credit for trying anyway. He’s attempting to paint his abject capitulation to Nancy Pelosi as “his deal to reopen the government” and save all those poor furloughed workers. As if someone else shut down the government. And anyway, calling his unconditional surrender a “deal” is like hearing your mother telling you to put out the light and go to sleep, doing as you’re told, then calling that a great deal.
Good boy, donnie. Now try not to pee the bed or no more Super Sized Cokes before bedtime. How’s that for a deal?
Can’t you picture the Emperor Hirohito in 1945 announcing that he and his guys on the USS Missouri has just made a great deal for the Japanese people? “It’s not a surrender. We had those Americans over a barrel!”
@Akhilleus: Ha ha. The Emperor Trump as the Emperor Hirohito. Trump chose the wrong venue to "proudly" announce his "deal" to end the shutdown. Since he is so fond of Robert E. Lee, it would have been way more appropriate for him to have hopped over to Appomattox to surrender.
Marie,
Love the image of General Fatty on a horse (laboring under all that weight) riding up to Appomattox courthouse to surrender his sword to General Pelosi (she’d have to be smoking a big ol’ US Grant cheroot). Too bad he fired the evil Keebler Elf, he could have gone as his adjutant since he already has all the Confederate officer’s crap.
@Achilleus: Maybe a Clydesdale, though a hobbyhorse would be more appropriate.
Something I was thinking about after headlines like these hit the media circle: "Trump caved"–-"Trump capitulated"–-"Nancy trumped Trump" and so forth. What if there were these headlines instead:
"Trump is Finally Doing the Right Thing" or something similar that would send a positive message instead of rubbing salt into that widdle wound of the big baby. I say this because it only makes it doubly difficult for any sort of agreement on the forthcoming bill. Since we are dealing with a dolt that needs constant affirmation let's give him kudos for something and maybe he'll "cave"again but believe it is another Presidential victory.
And who in hell made Ann Coulter someone with purchase?
Years ago watched a documentary on Roger Stone. Someone answered when asked about him–-"He is the slippery eel of some deep dark waters and I wouldn't trust him with my dog."
Interesting how dogs seem to play a big part in all these mob tales. Perhaps we'll encounter a horse's head in the bed of someone before this is all over.
Since RCers appreciate the meaning of words, here's an interesting piece about the lexicological history of a term that's become ubiquitous in todays' politics, ratfucking, by Ben Zimmer on Politico.
@unwashed: Thanks. Great article. I'll link it up top later.
@ PD
I agree about the media's vicious shaming of Drumpf's accumulating embarrassments. While I personally think he deserves as much withering criticism as one can serve up, daily and right to his orange face, it's not at all helpful to have the major MSM networks all release the hounds on such a sensitive and unstable ego. For the country's sake, maybe he should be treated with kid gloves when he's so obviously down and wounded. Dotard Donny is surely beside himself hate-watching CNN and MSNBC in bed right now as talking heads all disrobe the disintegrating armor the Man Child has worn into battle since the day he descended down the escalator, surrounded by his paid useful idiots.
He's going to come back next week with a flurry of shiny objects to distract from his inadequacies, probably sparking outrage by repackaging insults about Mexican "rapists" or "diseased" Central Americans, or raging against homosexuals in the military, or .... On second thought, fuck him. Kick him when he's down. He's deserves no respite.
@PD Pepe: Trump did not, IMO, "finally do the right thing." He pretended he'd somehow "proudly" put together a "deal" to re-open government, then went on to recite a litany of lies about the horrors of immigration & the need for wall before promising to go around Congress if he didn't get money for wall within three weeks.
The "right thing," by the time we got to Friday, would have been to prostrate himself before the nation, apologize profusely for his abhorrent hostage-taking in which he inconvenienced millions, put the flying public in danger, severely stressed hundreds of thousands of civil servants & federal contractors, many of them low-paid, tanked the economy for the quarter, & once again made the U.S. the laughing-stock of countries with functioning governments thruout the world.
At this point, if he wants to do the right thing, he'll procure a resignation letter from mike pence before signing his own resignation letter with big, fat letters & flying off to Moscow or someplace in Trump1. President Pelosi, I presume.
@safari: Agreed. The MSM, for the most part handled Trump just right, and so did Nancy Peloso. She didn't gloat when he folded, but she did invite cameras in to see her ceremoniously sign the continuing resolution (handing out pens & all), then whacked him on the Stone indictment. Badda bing, badda boom. With dignity & grace.
@Marie: Well of course WE know he did not do the right things–-plural–- but he's crazy enough to start a war or some other disastrous intervention if he feels he has failed miserably especially with a woman! If we have concluded that he is a big baby then we have to deal with him like we do with little ones that always want what they want when they want it or refuse to comply: Kid won't drink his milk: You give him a choice"Do you want a half glass or a full glass of milk? Kid then perks up–-hey, I have a choice here–-I am in control and ops for the full. Simplistic example for dealing with this dolt but I fear this man's capacity for evil. His closing down the government because he didn't get what he wanted is proof enough to show that he would go to any length to get revenge.
And yes––of course "kick him when he's down, He deserves no respite"––I take great satisfaction in seeing this––I hate this man and hate what he is doing to this country but I want a deal made that will pass a decent bill without one cent for that damn wall and if we have to smooth–-soothe–-some of his feathers I'd be willing to do it.
@PD Pepe: As you now can see above, Michael Che agrees with you.
@Bea: Your response to Akhilleus's imagery of Trump's surrender, in which you reference a hobbyhorse, immediately brought to mind Laurence Sterne's Tristram Shandy and his particular use of the term. It's been about 35 years or so since I read the book, so I consulted with Mr. Google, who led me to Schmoop and the following:
"If we're going to talk hobby-horses, Uncle Toby's obsession with building fortifications has to come up. This hobby-horse is so weird that Tristram freely wonders "whether he was really a HOBBY-HORSE or no" (1.24.3), our first clue that the toys aren't a simple symbol for an obsession or a hobby. Toby is so into fortifications that they begin to define his identity. And who wants to be friends with War Guy?" (https://www.shmoop.com/tristram-shandy/hobby-horse-symbol.html)
OK, so we're talking with the Taliban, but it's likely we'll be at war with Venezuela any day now unless saner heads prevail. (And how likely is that?) So yeah, War Guy. Also, too, "something there is about a wall."
We're lucky to have Nancy Pelosi on our side.
@Rose: Thanks. Human nature doesn't change much, & we can usually find apt parallels for today's characters in literature. Trump usually shows up in comedic novels & farces.
As to war in Venezuela, I just linked a story a wherein we learn that Mick Mulvaney was on Fox "News" saying Trump wouldn't rule out a military response there. Great.
During the Stephanopolous interview, Stone mentioned that he's setting up a GoFundMe page to help pay for his defense (I thought he was rich?). He also mentioned that Mueller's case was "thinner than piss on a rock."
I think I'll send him some.
Beyond the beltway:
'Out of the mouth of babes', Greta Thunberg tells the Davos economic glitterati at the World Economic Forum that she (her generation) doesn't want the hope of politicians and policy wonks - she wants panic - as if our house is on fire.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M7dVF9xylaw
She warns that no one [at Davos] is speaking clearly about the specter of climate change. No one is speaking clearly about the infeasibility of endless economic growth. I've tried to unpack the high level economic forecasts from CEOs and world leaders speaking there, but this smart girl has pulled back the curtains. Check it out.
Trump has once again confused fantasy with reality. I think Trump has watched too many of the Taken, or similar, movies where some young woman is kidnapped, tied up, and thrown in a trunk or back of a van. Now because he forgot that he changed the channel away from fox news to a movie channel we get to hear him endlessly talk about women being bound and gagged crossing the border.