Cowardice Chasing Stupidity

Welcome to a stupid enterprise--emissaries from the Trump Administration appearing in Riyadh ready to deal away things they have no control over to appease Russians who our best intelligence indicates have no intention whatsoever to end the war in Ukraine.  They sat there and discussed what we were willing to stipulate without Europe or (and ESPECIALLY) Ukraine there, like their input would not matter. 

Because what the hell is the country that was actually invaded even doing in the picture, right? Let alone our NATO partners, huh? Like, what ABOUT Poland?

The picture above is a portrait of "cowardice chasing stupidity". Collectively, they might know what they are doing has no fucking chance in the world of leading to anything productive because of course not--but they are all dancing to Trump's incredibly foolish tune. 

A Republic--If You Can Keep It

 

This is what the New York Times chose to publish on Independence Day just one week after the Supreme Court ruled that Republican presidents are above the law. pic.twitter.com/URoJg6ohru

— @StephenWolf.bsky.social (@PoliticsWolf) July 4, 2024

The New York Times, which has been going out of their way to promote "Biden is too old and must drop out" editorials this week, decided the way to follow up on that terrible trend was to platform some mook who wants to pretend voting is a bit of hogwash. Well...not just some mook. Matthew Walther is a Catholic conservative (although it's hard to say if he just sort of is a hater in general--he calls the Constitution a "231-year old piece of toilet paper" in this screed against the Tea Party libertarians) --just like Leonard Leo and Steve Bannon and the derpsticks who ruled Trump is kind of/sort of a monarch.

Encouraging people not to vote (especially if one does, in fact, vote--possibly for Tulsi Gabbard which feels like fuckery) is a kind of voter suppression. Which is weirdly in line with Russian active measures to undermine confidence in voting. 

Democracy depends upon an engaged, informed population. The press can be a valuable part of that process of informing and engaging citizens--or it can do whatever this is. The chattering classes who write about politics are, when not encouraging apathy, so stuck on horserace politics that in the discussion of possibly replacing President Biden on the ticket have invented a fantasy horserace to write about. 

Is there nothing else to write about? Maybe how often Trump was mentioned in Epstein court documents? His new Saudi project? What Ivanka and Jared are up to in Albania and with whom? Anything to do about Project 2025--but especially how it would permit foreign nasties to interfere in our elections? (I remember when Trump wanted to cooperate with Russia on "the cyber"--do you?)

TWGB: All the Bad Guys

 

Convicted Felon Trump bragging about colluding with Russia in front of all our faces because his supporters are rubes that will support him no matter how treasonous. pic.twitter.com/TKaQfkcZpG

— Tim Hannan (@TimHannan) June 4, 2024

It is fitting that convicted felon Trump chose to once again advise us that he was colluding with Russia just as we hear President Biden make a very clear statement regarding Trump: "All the bad guys are rooting for Trump, man." Putin is a bad guy who has taken a prisoner--effectively a hostage. He's a terrorist. And Trump says, basically, that his terrorist friend will release the hostage if he wins the election. 

Imagine that kind of friendship. "My hostage is your hostage." It sounds like...Trump is a goddamn terrorist too. A hostage taker. 

This is something people need to understand about Trump--in fact, it's something that our foreign allies already do. David Rothkopf, writing for The New Republic, describes the fear of a Trump presidency folks in the former eastern bloc countries experience, knowing he's willing to bargain away their freedom. McKay Coppins in the Atlantic reports in a similar vein: allies are worried that we do not appreciate the threat of a transactional and authoritarian leader inimical to the concept of democracy. 

TWGB: The Bride at Every Wedding

 

The highlighting of the above screenshot is courtesy this Tweet from Ben Collins, wondering what exactly Trump is doing here. But I'm the idiot who does TrumpWorld Grab-bags, so I know. He's too clever for us, is Trump. He can't scarper. He won't go scuttling away in the dead of night--why no! he's too famous for that! He won't go abseiling down the wall of the tower he will, Rapunzel-like, be held in. Not even if you gave him enough cable.

He's thinking about it though. Does he think Daddy Vladdy has an extraction team ready to escort him to a well-appointed dacha? Because it isn't 55 years ago, and Russia can't even invade neighbors or land spacecraft on the moon like they used to. They tie up loose ends a very different way now. (He's 90. I mean nothing by this. Of course, I don't. Also...) 

What Trump is saying is "poor, poor, pitiful me" because he is far too rich and famous to disappear and that's just an incredible burden. He's too recognizable--what is he to do, shave his head? Wear sweats? Quel dommage, mais no. Even so, he's known from Jibib to Atlantis.  

Maybe Kushner has an in with the Saudis. I understand they can make people disappear. 

Am I being unnecessarily dark? Sigh. I am cutting up the revelations of the soul-baring of a narcissist who wants you to identify with his plight. Usually, it's only in banana republics a former leader needs to fear coming to justice for a planned coup. Usually, it's only in banana republics a leader plans one. He is, as Francis Albert (who didn't care for him, BTW) sang, doing it his way. And oh! the melodrama! 

Main Character Assassination Coordinates, I Think?

 

So, I'm trying to understand the problem of Elon Musk and his disastrous turn as the head of Twitter, which I think he didn't really want and hardly knows what to do with, and I come back to the meme of the "Main Character" of Twitter. Elon Musk became the main character of Twitter by buying it, but the point of the parable of the main character is that every day there is one, and you should not be it. And yet, Musk offered himself up not to just manage Twitter as a free speech absolutist who hates the things people say, but to possibly fuck it up beyond all recognition. 

I have to think so from the way he's been doing things. If his fucking it all up isn't purposeful, I'd have to think he was actually quite dumb. And that's a very mean thing to think, isn't it? After all, his mum tells us he's very clever, and that has to account for something, yeah?

I just want to point out for posterity that almost every sensible bullied kid from the jump has understood that absolutely nothing would be made better by one's mom dipping her oar in to promote the idea that one's baby is *so* very clever and good. It is absolutely the genesis of another degree of roasting. 

But here's the fun part--Mr. Free Speech banned talking about the obvious diaspora going on by Twitterstans hauling off to Post and Mastodon and Tribel and all of them. Except Parler, TikTok and some other glaring omittances. Anyhow, he admitted there was a drift to bankruptcy going on with the social media site he sort of forced himself to take on. 

And it most definitely is affecting his other business concerns. And his falling Tesla stock is not just a happy accident regarding his poor stewardship of Twitter. It's about Tesla issues, as well. It just takes a push to realize that sometimes a genius isn't actually the savant one wants them to be. 

Anyway, he fronted that the problem with the journos he banned was doxxing him--revealing his "assassination coordinates". Jesus Christ on a pogo stick, really? Anyway, his personal story of dangerous doxxedology got realtime debunked.  

So, what is the main character to do now?

Post a poll to determine how to exeunt stage terminal main character, that's what. 

I actually will link this to Twitter because in my hope of hopes, Google snipes the off-cost social media shoulda been and we have a SM that is less evil. Of course, I'd settle for Mad Monk Dorsey again. I don't trust Musk and think he's screwing shit up on purpose as a possible provocateur. He wants the disinfo people, the Nazis, the illegitimate dialogue, the fuckery. He showed his pasty ass. But he can't be the main character on Twitter and still be Space X and Tesla fronting. He can't. What is more valuable? He has to get back to where, as the Beatles put it, he once belonged. What makes him money. 

I'm still not leaving. He's the one who sucks. 

Giving Trump a Good Thinking Over--

 

I don't think it's even rare that Americans of no small patriotism and no short memory have some episode of shudder or start at some random interval of their day and think to themselves--"Donald Trump had access to the nuclear codes!" and it seems like a bad dream, the kind of paralytic nightmare where a weight as thick as a body lays across you as you struggle to awaken, but it is broad daylight, the night terror has been out of office for well over a year, and some part of you wants to believe that Freddy's son is politically dead. He was impeached twice. He was a one-term wonder. The scary clown won't come back and eat you. 

And then some dumb muppet in Ohio auto-Darwinates by picking a fight with the FBI for the honor of defending a pussy-grabbing silver spoon narcissist who used his charisma and talent for spectacular lying to drive a crowbar in the center of our national fault-line. All because the FBI executed a warrant on Trump, and that was supposedly not "OK".  

The idea that Trump can actually do wrong may be foreign to some people (not me, hell no!) but given that supposedly responsible and sober-minded elected GOP officials are also giving the twice-impeached and one-termed Trump some cover seems really ill-advised. Because what if all outwards signs are actually true, and he ultimately does turn out to be, as he as time and time again proved himself, a no-account dead albatross affixed to an anchor? 

I mean, this is just a thought experiment here, but what if, after suspected Russia/Wikileaks collusion, and the Trump Tower meeting with Gospozha Veselnitskaya, and the whole deal with Mike Flynn, and the Comey firing and the Oval Office Meeting with Lavrov with only Russian press in attendance and Helsinki and all this--it turned out that Trump never actually had any intention of putting America first, but only himself? After two impeachments. Both related to the attempt to secure a second term by filthy tactics. 

President Biden Has Not Forgotten

 

One of the most significant figures behind the 9/11 attacks, Ayman al-Zawahiri, has been taken out by way of drone while hanging out on a balcony in Afghanistan, at a safe house where he was hosted by Sirajuddin Haqqani. 

So, a couple of things--this demonstrates that we did not still need to be at war in Afghanistan for our principal counterterrorism mission to be continued. If someone wants to bring up the Doha accords, I'm just echoing what has already been established, the Taliban never renounced al-Qaeda. Not attacking our troops as we were pulling out was the bare minimum. Just as with the Osama bin Laden operation, this demonstrated the resolve of the United States to follow through in the pursuit of terrorists--where we cannot receive full justice, we will avenge. 

I would not be fully in character if I did not take the opportunity to backhand the twice-impeached one-term wonder who hosted the KSA-backed LIV golf tournament at his Bedminster property and dissembled that "we" never got to the bottom of 9/11. He too, could have gone after al-Zawahiri, but apparently did not know who that was. As to Trump's "successful" attacks of his own, I have never been persuaded he fully knew what he was doing. I mean really, I think he was clueless, you guys. We can pretend al-Baghdadi was a bigger get for a whole moment of stony silence in Trump's honor, if he likes. And I think he really would. 

I'm not short on memory. I think a lot of us consider the savaging of Trump at the 2011 WHCD followed by Obama's announcement that the US got bin Laden both scared Trump off of running in 2012 and began his supervillain origin story to become the only president to plan an attack on the US homeland himself. 

That should not be forgotten, either. 

Behind the First Tee at Bedminster

 

I'm committing this here, just because when something niggles at my brain, I have to blog about it to get it out of my system because otherwise no further blogging will ensue. There is an air of tragedy about being buried behind the first tee at one's second husband's favorite self-owned golf course. The site is but the first of what is intended as a family plot, graced with a low-profile and simple stone--far simpler than what I imagine Ivana Trump would have wanted for herself and lacking even the least personalization--only her name and dates of birth and death. Not "beloved mother and grandmother". Just the absolute starkness of her having existed. 

I can shudder at the likelihood that this is her final resting place because her second husband gets a tax break from his Bedminster property being a cemetery as well as a working farm (it has goats!) (I'm not joking about the tax break--the property is also proofed against tax sales in the event of bankruptcy.) And I still can't cast the idea (described as #staircasecancer on Twitter) of something dodgy about her death having taken place, out of my mind. 

Imagine her friends or non-Trump family who want to pay their respects having to go through Trump's business to visit her grave? I imagine it. It's hard to think of Trump joining her there, although I balk at the idea of this country letting the president of the insurrectionists rest at Arlington. I find it too easy to see him, also, at Bedminster--but in something much more elaborate.  Subordinating her in death by having a nice mausoleum erected. 

This is the same property where Trump welcomed the Saudi-backed LIV golf tournament, to the dismay of 9/11 survivor families and colleagues of slain journalist Jamal Khashoggi alike. Suddenly Trump, who once was certain that KSA was responsible for 9/11, insists that no one ever really "got to the bottom" of that tragedy. We most certainly have gotten to the bottom of that one, but has anyone ever gotten to the bottom of Trump's greed, or is it bottomless?

I thought we were never supposed to forget what happened there, although Trump's memory has often been selective. 

The result being that the tickets were on sale for $1-3 on StubHub as crowds stayed away in droves. That's sad, especially since Trump graced this even with the prestige of the presidential seal, which the former president is still using despite having no authority to do so. As if putting the US government's seal of approval over the sports-washing of a murderous regime. 

It's unsavory, unethical, illegal, and to the world outside of Trump World, it looks bad--although it does seem par for the course. 

Mazars: It's Not Us, It's You

 

The Trump Organization's longtime accounting firm Mazars said it no longer wants Trump's business, as it doesn't trust the financial documents the Trump Org has given them. https://t.co/2DJrMmR7bY

— The Daily Beast (@thedailybeast) February 14, 2022

There's a little joy in reading this "Dear Donald" letter only once you really entertain the implications: Mazars is saying we relied on information the Trump Organization provided to us and after looking at everything in a new light, we can't stand by the financial statements that lending institutions were basing their estimation of your financial ability to pay loans back on. They have apparently also turned over more than a half million docs to the NY AG's investigation.

Turning it over a little further, the Trump Organization has to find accountants that will want to deal with a sprawling business that seems to have multiple sets of books, and lend their reputation to sorting out Trump's. That could be a problem, you think?  Even if current loans weren't in jeopardy, refinancing them in case several were about to come due in the near term could be an issue, perhaps? 

This is the sort of thing that should have been obvious in 2016, if not before: Donald Trump is financially corrupt and corruptible and had come to use foreign lenders more often.  Does he separate his own financial interest from the interest of the US? Can he make that kind of moral judgment?

Who knows if his secret document stash was a kind of collateral for potential foreign investors, so to speak?  That this person was ever in the White House will never not shock me.

That he is still considered a GOP leader and likely 2024 front-runner is a disgrace.

The Pompeo Effect

The State Department watchdog that Trump fired on Friday has since been told that he is physically barred from returning to the State Department even to collect his belongings.

If Pompeo and Trump have nothing to hide, why take this extreme measure?https://t.co/2IgJRaR3HJ

— Citizens for Ethics (@CREWcrew) May 19, 2020

What's funny is, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo is supposed to have requested that the IG investigating him be fired for "undermining the State Department" and claimed he did not know that he was being investigated. But we have moved on from Pompeo and his wife were using his office and personnel for things like errands and dog-walking, to the more troubling news that Pompeo certainly knew the IG had questions for him about a Saudi arms deal, to finding out that Pompeo also was having many fancy parties on the taxpayers' dime for what looks like building a contact base for his future political parachute, not anything to do with diplomacy.

And aaaalllll of this came to light in just days. I think the "Streisand Effect" should have a new name, huh? Also, why do I get the sneaky suspicion based on the way the IG has been locked out of his office that there is more information to come?

Oh yeah. Because in TrumpWorld, if it looks bad, it is bad. That's why.

A Virulent "Hoax"

Trump calls coronavirus criticism Democrats' 'new hoax' and links it to immigration https://t.co/Q2JfVQtklA

— The Guardian (@guardian) February 29, 2020

"Hoax" seems to be Trump's magic word for dismissing any news he doesn't particularly care for. The story about Russian assistance to his 2016 campaign? He calls it a hoax--but it certainly isn't. The impeachment over his abuse of office in holding military aid over Ukraine's head to extort an investigation into Hunter Biden? He calls it a hoax, but the details of the extortion plot are quite clear when you eliminate his apologists' obfuscations. And now that the stock market, what Trump believes to be a key indicator of his strong economy (it isn't) is being affected by the spread of the COVID-19 outbreak, and cases here in the US are documented with some accounting of Trump Administration cock-ups, Trump and his pitiable lickspittles like Mulvaney and Pompeo are comfortable suggesting that this, too, verifiable as many details may be--is a hoax. The virus only exists to fuck with Trump's re-election plans. Pay it no mind.

Of course, if it was a "hoax", that wouldn't entirely explain why, consideration of the coronavirus enters into postponing a summit with Asian leaders. That much is real. But I guess, the hoax part is supposed to be the bit where a whistleblower was removed for pointing out that infectious disease protocols were not observed when dozens of Health and Human Services workers met with Wuhan evacuees, who were not tested, and these personnel afterwards just....went about their business. We aren't supposed to note that the Administration hobbled our pandemic readiness, or that crisis management after the fact is a poor substitute for preparedness when a crisis does hit.

Could it Happen Here?

Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu has been officially charged with charges in three corruption cases involving bribery, fraud and breach of trust, which, given his inability to form a government and the likelihood of another vote this year, is not great news for him. I don't pretend to understand much about Israeli politics, but this event reminds me so much of something....it just makes me ask questions, is all.

Like, bribery, fraud and breach of trust--those are pretty bad, right? So, if a leader basically seemed to be engaged in bribes, whether of other governments, or just, like, accepted them, like maybe other world leaders or international businesses gave Trump shit-tons of money in expectation of favors, that would be pretty bad, right? Like if it turned out that Saudi Arabia was renting tons of Trump property for no good reason or just wiring money to the US, and then Trump made decisions about ignoring an obvious murder or just let them have their way regarding military attacks on Yemen or whatever--that would look really like corruption. Or if they leaned on Qatar with a blockade and then Qatar bailed out Trump's son-in-law on a property that was hemorrhaging money--that would be bad, right? 

Because those aren't "champagne and cigars" kinds of bribes. It just seems to me like, if Netanyahu could get indicted over there for something like this, well? Maybe charging a sitting president here wouldn't be such a bad idea. 

Of course, I think (and I don't pretend to understand Israeli politics, once again) that Netanyahu should step down because the government situation is already fraught and he will be very occupied in his self-defense.  After all, once former US President Nixon realized that his presidency would be consumed by scandal, that's exactly what he did, despite his absolute landslide 1972 re-election. 

Of course, Nixon called the whole thing a "witch hunt" at first, and Nixon mega-fan Pat Buchanan actually did write about how an impeachment attempt was a coup d'état. (I love Rachel Maddow, but I will never love how Uncle Pat was a fixture for a while on her show. That 1992 "culture war" speech of his struck me as a war on me when I first heard it, and it did her as well. I guess you could say I have always been in favor of deplatforming Nazis (and Nazi-symps), not parading them as if they were tame. They are never tame.) 

Ditto Trump and Netanyahu. But, in a democracy, we accept that all elected people have term limits, right? We expect them to be held to standards that demonstrate they are working in the public trust--not for their own benefit? It is not a coup when the system of government stands, and the laws and customs remain in place, because governments are made of laws--and human beings are fallible, and no one singular person is essential. 

Anyway, I'd like very much if we did away with the idea that the sitting president is immune to indictment in the event of serious charges of misconduct. Barring that, it would just be great if Trump fans would stop barking about how accusing Trump of things he apparently did and even inquiring about his impeachment is somehow a coup. The Founders put impeachment in the Constitution as a lawful means of dealing with an unlawful public servant. It is not a coup. 

This Approach to Foreign Policy Looks Inconsistent

BREAKING: Amid Pres. Trump's decision to remove US troops from northern Syria and his vocal criticisms of US military presence in Middle East, Pentagon announces the deployment of more US troops “to assure and enhance the defense of Saudi Arabia.” https://t.co/bPdc9T4D5O

— NBC News (@NBCNews) October 11, 2019

I don't really have a lot to add to this announcement that I haven't already said with respects to Trump and Saudi Arabia. We've got another announcement of manpower deployment for Saudi Arabia, on a Friday, amidst a sea of bad Trump news. Trying to reconcile the move with any sense of strategy--a "Trump Doctrine"--just doesn't make sense, any more than the Syria move makes any sort of strategic sense. There's nothing that should have been unpredictable about what Turkey is doing now, and there's no, to use a phrase "unknown unknowns" about what engagement with Iran to defend Saudi Arabia ('s oil)is likely to mean--it's a likely clusterfuck.

But is it inconsistent? I have a standing joke with respects to Republican conflicts of interest: "If one always acts in one's own self-interest, there's no conflict." Trump is the apotheosis of that maxim. I am not above assuming he would use our folks in uniform for his ends because he is not above doing it. It's not even very well hidden.

UPDATE: Mnuchin says we could shut down Turkey's economy with sanctions if they don't knock off what they are doing. I mean, we aren't doing it right now, but. We could.  From the Pentagon, we're "very disappointed" in Turkey right now.

UPDATE: Some ISIS militants have escaped prison and Turkey has bombed US Special Forces in an apparent error.

TWGB: We Could Call it "Floodgate"

This feels like it's going to be one of those weekends where the news just doesn't stop--given the penchant for the media to call scandals by names ending in "-gate", maybe we could call what's going on now, "Floodgate", for the deluge that is now pouring out. 

Regarding TrumpWorld, I've had a little maxim: "It looks bad because it is bad." The White House meeting with Lavrov and Kislyak back in May 2017 looked bad. We knew it was bad when Trump admitted firing Jim Comey to slow the Russia investigation--that was bad! But just now we're hearing that Trump also said that he did not mind Russia meddling in US elections because the US meddles in the elections of other countries. As in, everybody does it, so, um, keep doing it?

It's funny that this part of the conversation never leaked--we were assured instead that the conversation was "wholly appropriate". Maybe Trump convinced people that was a "perfect conversation" too?

This cynical attitude reminds me a lot of how Trump responded to Bill O'Reilly, comparing the United States to Russia, in regards to Putin having journalists killed. He said then "There are a lot of killers. You think our country's so innocent?" As if who doesn't have the odd reporter killed every now and then? Way of the world!  Given the inappropriate things he says in front of a camera with everyone watching, can we really be stunned if his one-on-one interactions are hair-raising?

The White House has known this, apparently since the beginning. We are also now learning that information regarding calls with many world leaders were treated differently after there had been a couple of leaked transcripts. This apparently includes to Vladimir Putin and Prince Mohammed bin Salman. Well, naturally. My best guess for why the air-tight restriction to prevent leaks? It's because they "look bad". And it's because the general situation....is bad.

Wagging, Like a Dog!

It is still a little amazing to me that Saudi Arabia, whose defense spending is pretty enormous, managed to have half their petroleum capacity imperiled by a drone strike (which was temporary damage) from either the Houthis or Iran (or on behalf of the Houthis by Iran, or the Houthis with Iran's help--whatever)--because shouldn't they have more hardened defenses around an obvious target like that, given the length of time they have been engaging on war with Yemen? (Or was reporting on this incident a little magnified?)

I don't know. I have a hard time understanding why Saudi Arabia is waging genocide in Yemen and why the US has continued being complicit with that, I only know that Trump used a veto to keep sending weapons to Saudi Arabia-- and the reaction of Donald Trump, on a day when the talk was all about whether he tried to extort a foreign leader into investigating a potential political rival, was to announce that the US was now going to send US military personnel.

Because the oil was hurt, you guys. Thoughts and prayers for the oil.

I'm just saying that the timing is interesting, is all. I'm not suggesting that this president would try to transform the news cycle from a scandal about some violation of campaign finance and abuse of power and the high crime of bribery (which would not be new, in this presidency, am I right?) by trying on the gravitas of being a "war president", because that isn't what Trump is doing, exactly.  I will suggest that Trump is pulled by his need to appeal to his base, which means appearing strong, even if that means strong and wrong, just as much as it means changing the subject. And then there is his unique take on US military power as a protection racket.  Trump has long seen it a waste of US resources that the American military is world cop--and would prefer to see it be more profitably used as "hired muscle"--by preferred customers willing to pay cash.

I think this Iran/Saudi Arabia thing was in play whether or not the whistleblower story became news or not, but the timing of the deployment isn't lost on me. This also scuttles the possibility of Iran nuclear talks, verifying as certain the knowledge that we'd be better off if Trump just stayed with the damn Obama deal. And Trump has demonstrated he can't help but plunge us deeper into every level of the suck--whether in Afghanistan, or anywhere else.

I don't like it. Trump is a man of few tricks (misdirection and frauds--like birtherism and his voter fraud claims), but the press sometimes gives him belly rubs for them. Like a dog! So weird for a man who uses "Like a dog!" in the way he does.

(No insult intended to actual dogs, who deserve better.)

Not a "Liberal" nor a "Democrat", Anyway

Trump and MBS are meeting on a high floor of the Imperial Hotel in Osaka right now. Trump calls the Saudi crown prince “a friend of mine” and says it’s an “honor” to be with him. pic.twitter.com/4EMhkS4Mqj

— Jennifer Jacobs (@JenniferJJacobs) June 28, 2019

This stupid weekend, Donald Trump met with Putin and joked about getting rid of journalists and meddling in elections, wholeheartedly endorsed Prince MBS by claiming no one "pointed a finger" at him for killing Jamal Khashoggi (well, except for the UN and the CIA), made a pointless photo-op trip to meet Kim in North Korea that highlights how little has been achieved with all his friendly palaver (and, because what is a Trump stunt without a Big Lie, also falsely claimed other presidents begged for such an opportunity), and revealed his ignorance of more or less recent desegregation history and the concept of western liberalism, by considering "busing" as being about transportation choice and liberalism as boiling down to a Bob Hope California "fruits, flakes and nuts" type punchline. WE can at least rest assured that he is not a liberal in the western sense, or even a small "d" democrat, because he doesn't even know what those things are.

And yet he represents the US abroad.

He's unfit in so many, many ways, but they've been normalized. Any part of this shitshow should have been cause for days-long raking over the coals, and yet he will endure the entirety of this bare-ass display without due whipping. But what really astonishes me is the assholes are going to try to make Daddy-Minder and patent-collector Ivanka normal, too:

Ivanka Trump appears to be trying to get involved in a talk among Macron, May, Trudeau and Lagarde (IMF head).
The video is released by French Presidential palace. pic.twitter.com/TJ0LULCzyQ

— Parham Ghobadi (@ParhamGhobadi) June 29, 2019

That not everyone will put up with another generation of ineptitude is....something. But a bit more than side-eye would be nice.

A Terrible Lack of Trust

JUST IN: Mattis ignored orders from Trump, White House on North Korea, Iran: report https://t.co/bPah2j4ocH pic.twitter.com/kK2gBcuVka

— The Hill (@thehill) April 29, 2019

One is reminded of Trump's very recent claim that "nobody disobeys my orders" when it has become clear that several people have ignored his instructions, and also have, in fact felt really relieved and like we all dodged a bullet because they did decide to ignore the crazy old man who watches too much Fox News. General Mattis apparently felt the impulse to try to inhibit Trump's "talking out loud" fumbling regarding foreign policy because he distrusted Trump's ability to assess the information he was given and thought he might be swayed by whoever the last person he talked to was.

Here's what bothers me about this--a Commander in Chief and top executive should actually be able to give directions that can be obeyed because they are clear and make sense, are timely and neither violate the letter of the law nor "burn" personnel by hanging them out to dry because their chain of command refuses to take responsibility. Trump doesn't seem to take in daily briefings to the extent that people who know him feel comfortable with his assessment of what is going on. He also has to be trusted as a person who appreciated historical alliances and recognizes the value of previous negotiations without trying to tear everything up and start from scratch--he has shown he can not be trusted in this way, because tearing everything up is exactly his plan. Also he lacks good planning about how to achieve deals, but that's another thing.

One recent episode to look at is the recent information that North Korea requested $2 million for the hospital bills of Otto Warmbier.

Trump administration agreed to pay $2 million ransom to North Korea for release of Otto Warmbier, but did not actually pay, says Bolton. @Kate_OKeeffe https://t.co/o7EKcufYUh

— Peter Baker (@peterbakernyt) April 29, 2019

An agreement was signed to pay this, and we received the all but deceased body of a once-vibrant young man. And the best that Trump officials can do now about what this implies is to blithely admit that there was no intention to pay, because Trump stiffs people all the time.

What's Good?

AOC is Pretty Good:

But his WhatsApp https://t.co/kLO3ZHvdbO

— Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@AOC) March 22, 2019

And this reply to her is also Pretty Good:

Tell me about it.

— Hillary Clinton (@HillaryClinton) March 22, 2019

And yes, this is and has been a Pretty Big Damn Deal:

What do Jared, Ivanka, Reince, Bannon, Gary Cohn, Stephen Miller, K.T. McFarland and Hillary Clinton all have in common? https://t.co/BYDSAjXg7s

— Philip Bump (@pbump) March 21, 2019

We've been treated to three years or so of "Lock her up!" regarding Mrs. Clinton's email server, which she had set up for sheer convenience. If what she had done was bad enough, even though it was not illegal and no ill intent could have ever been proven, what the hell are we supposed to think about the use of private email and an untraceable comms service like Whatsapp? Especially given the circumstantial details we do have about how this program is being used? And the very knuckle-headed possibility that such communications are being screenshot (on private devices?) and then sent through the properly retained (assumedly) White House server, with the information (screencaps) still stored on the possibly unsecure device (which can be retrieved under warrant, sort of making the use of WhatsApp just pointless but nonetheless still shady). Especially when some of that info had to do with nuclear deals with KSA. And look who all was in this nebulous and intel-insecure mix.

If National Security heads on the right don't come down on this like a ton of bricks with a "lock them up" attitude, I think we can safely say the case against Hillary Clinton was always made of sheer fuckery. And even if they do come down on this like a ton of bricks, let's just reflect that it even at a glance looks to be a way more intentional and audacious flouting of any electronics use guidelines than Clinton would have been dinged for.

TWGB: Investigations and Investments

Of all of the astonishingly stupid things I have seen in following the Trump/Russia investigation(s), the above Instagram post from Roger Stone qualifies as, well, pretty up there. He posted a photo of the judge assigned to his case with a caption bollocks-full of paranoid Deep State speculation. Of course, this was not going to go over well regarding his legal jeopardy, and even though his lawyers (probably twisted his arms) persuaded him to sign on to an apology to keep his ass out of further trouble, he is still going to pay the court a visit because yes, he is in further trouble.

I'm of two minds about why Stone made such a singularly dipshit move; it could very well be that Stone has simmered in the right wing fever swamp for so long that signifying to his digital comrades has more importance for him than not fucking up his bail terms. But it also seems possible to me Stone meets the qualifications of "crazy as a fox" and is trolling the court and his followers alike in a race to see who can benefit him--either he thinks fuxxoring any good will with Berman Jackson would result in a recusal (um, no, because that's a little too easy, isn't it, sunshine?) or because he feels fit enough to do a jail stand if his bail is revoked and that would do miracle sympathy-numbers for his legal GoFundHimself. And either way, standing up against the investigation earns him points with He Who Must Not Be Incriminated, the POTUS with the Mostest (ability to issue pardons).

Long story short, Stone has an investment in Trump that he is willing to sink his liability further into. Maybe that's bad money. I have a theory that many of Trump's supporters right now are in a kind of sunk-cost deal with Trump where they think he'll compensate them for the cost of getting him elected, when getting him elected was the only benefit of their output they will ever, ever see.

Now, some folks necessarily thought they did have actual payable on election contracts as far as I can tell. Take Michael Flynn's dealings. He apparently did have a deal that would result in nuclear proliferation in the Middle East. And it now turns out that whistle blowers realize that nuclear know-how is about to be transferred to KSA, even though Flynn is long gone. It's possible this has something to do with Jared Kushner's relationship to Brookfield. Or maybe it just has to do with Trump's odd indifference to the concept of nuclear proliferation at all, as evidenced by his ignoring North Korea's continuing program and the scrapping of our treaty with Russia and also the promotion of the end of the Iran nuclear deal, that basically would result in us having no say or inspection over what they do. There is literally no thing in Trump's foreign policy that does shit at all re: nuclear proliferation except maybe encourage it.

But I tend to believe that most of TrumpWorld does revolve around some kind of quid pro quo, because Trump has gone so far above and beyond to try and shaft an investigation that would turn up nothing, if there wasn't anything amiss to be found.  I'm reading Andrew McCabe's Threat at the mo, and realize he is in a position of giving no fucks. His investment--career-long, was screwed by Trump with caprice or perhaps, a lack of judiciousness. The word that a CI investigation into Trump was accepted by the Gang of Eight, and that maybe Nunes was a little run'n'tell fool, should let everyone know how real the investigation is, regardless of one's investment in Trump as a political figure.

Trump is a tainted investment, and not solely because of the investigations against him, but because of how and why and what he's done to establish his knowledge of guilt and the behaviors he engaged in stemming from that. He is a likelier candidate for impeachment than reelection, in a world where facts counted more than feelings. And the conspiracy or collusion that gave the US this fool probably also hobbled our good ally the UK (although their politics was also pretty fucked and asking for it).

Anyway, we need to learn from this. Now. I would like to see Trump impeached. But the present GOP is too invested to understand why he is simply bad.

This Photo Op Was A Good Trump Day

On a day when the "fake news" noted that Trump was the first president since 2002 to not make a visit to the troops, Trump snuck into Iraq to take selfies and complain about Democrats. Sure, it might have been in part to offset the looming news that his purported "bone spurs" explanation that kept him out of Viet Nam (as opposed to a "high lottery number") was just a convenient falsehood. Or maybe it was just to keep Trump occupied and not Tweeting while the stock market corrected itself back to the black.

I don't know what the rationale was for Trump making the journey, and I imagine that for those servicemembers that think Trump is a straight-shooter, this was a fine thing. It was a sign that he and the spouse cared enough for them to show their faces, even if Trump was now telling them that the Syria pullout meant that those stationed in Iraq would now be the folks responsible for action in the event that ISIS went on being a thing. But he explained this in his best trying not to be an entire crass orifice way, by suggesting that other countries were getting away with giving so little while we give a fuckton. "We're no longer the suckers" he explained, while negatively characterizing the entirety of their previous mission.

We're a different kind of sucker, I hate to interject, but feel might be necessary. We're certainly different if we're now taking cues from Turkey and Russia and Saudi Arabia, instead of necessarily guarding US interests first.  He spoke out against Democrats and signed hats for military members, which in actuality, makes this thing more or less a campaign rally, rather then a simple holiday message from a CINC. Of course, he had to make a Big Lie about being the president who gave the troops a raise for the first time in a decade, and overstated the raise by rather a bit, because he lies all the time. And then he used a video on his social media to politicize his visit to the troops and wound up inadvertently giving away secret ops data regarding the Navy SEALS.

Eh, but these are just the kinds of things we've accepted Trump is going to fuck up--right? On the whole, a day when Trump is only a total op-sec fail and an apparent click-whore, is just fucking Wednesday. I hope the troops that are Republicans enjoyed and learned from their up-close and personal Commander in Chief visit. I already have an idea how any liberal leaning troops might have felt about it. And I don't envy them.