Every Picture Tells A Story

 

https://t.co/4WcVZ6oW4w pic.twitter.com/RvHmjuyWIN

— Julia Davis (@JuliaDavisNews) March 22, 2025

I am trying not to see Steve Witkoff's interview with Tucker Carlson in the worst possible way and there is not actually a not-bad way to view it. First of all, Tucker Carlson? Second if all--we are just going to pass on with a straight face that the former KGB agent prayed after the Butler incident as if that is not serious applications of narcissist lube?

And of course we are, because Witkoff is another fucking significance-junky looking to get high off ego strokes. This is a personality the Kremlin is totally aware of. But what sends me is the idea of a portrait.

Trump's "charity" slush funds was all about Trump portraits.  All Trump ever wanted to know about himself was that he oughta be in pictures. (Can someone help me with a thing where I wonder why Trump sees himself as Norma Desmond, Grizabella and Evita?) He's a just a diva. And Witlesskopf is playing very stupid and credulous, too.

And it doesn't appear to be an act. 

Not for the first time, I find myself wondering if anybody knows how to play this game? Look, stupid rich fuckboys, I THOUGHT, at least were sent out in the world with some idea that the world was going to try to blow smoke up their skirts and to be careful of being rolled. Ane here these putzes sit, heaven's own bocce balls. Innocent as little fawns in a sunlight-gilded bower in the eye of a sniper rifle. 

The Lie Trump is Servicing

 

While people are wondering whether Ukrainian President Zelenskyy needs to do some backtracking to make proper amends and all that and get back to the table with the US, Russian foreign minister Lavrov is out here calling this man a traitor to the Jewish people and basically a "Nazi". This has been a big part of Russian propaganda. It is, for so many reasons, especially disgusting to project this made-up bullshit to this man, who comes from a heroic family that fought against the Nazis, for the very obvious reasons. 

If the reasons aren't obvious to you--get off the internet, read books, touch grass. What the fuck is wrong with you? Why would you believe stupid made-up shit just because it matches the thing you want to believe? Shouldn't what is actually true matter? 

Trump has proposed that Zelenskyy is somehow the reason, being elected to the presidency of Ukraine in 2019, for the invasion that started in 2014 and which his own good buddy Manafort knows a whole lot about. (I get why Trump faithful try to step around all that. It's messy for them, no?) 

Lab-Created Bullshit

Some western observers don't quite understand why General Igor Kirillov was a legitimate military target (see: what is a "general"?)  or understand that lying war criminals are actually bad. Kirillov was behind the dumb propaganda that there were US/Ukrainian biolabs about to threaten the RU/UKR border. I always thought this was a little bit of a backhand at the US for claiming mobile biolabs in Iraq before 2003. But it is totally not the case and never was. And the fuckers who play games with the Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant have no business talking up Ukrainian "dirty" nuclear bomb threats anyway.

Which brings me to Elon Musk, incoming US president in fact if not in name, who is goofing with a government shutdown even before his old-age addled proxy is sworn in, threatening the GOP Speaker (presumptive) of the next Congress and also lying his dumb goofy pale face off. He says this on his dumb loss-leader propaganda site:

A Reckless TrumpWorld Round-Up

 

I'm trying to take a moment of Christmas clarity to see the good in the world around me, and while I've never been a Suzy Silverlinings, I did notice the SEC seems to have decided to pay attention to some of Elon Musk's financial shenanigans regarding the purchase of Twitter. Basically, everyone who was wide awake in 2016 saw that social media was a powerful tool in shaping world events, and Elon bought in. Comms for his worldview is an expense in general, but he gets back what he's lost financially in DOGE and influence. 

It's a neat thing, using money to buy influence to get more influence to get more money. Here's a David Bowie song:

Tucker Carlson's Daddy Issues

 

Just so we're up to date on this, not that long ago, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau (my imaginary boyfriend from Canada) testified that Tucker Carlson was a paid propagandist for Russia. Which I really don't need more "proof" about because we are looking right at him. Like Tucker is that guy you absolutely know is a sell-out. 

Now, you could ask yourself how this white supremacist-identified misogynist stays around after his break with Fox News, but wow. I dunno. Some people probably do feel like his break with the mainstream (I know, I get the joke--it's the joke I'm actually making) gave him freedom and power to be more truthy, or whatever.  But I think he really just has to bite down harder on his schtick, and that is entirely what he did just now bigging up Trump at Turning Point, by referring to the US rejecting Trump as a willful little girl and Trump, vengeful, as a disciplining Daddy figure. 

Can one's mind's eye vomit? Because I think my forebrain just virtually puked a little. 

The Russia Campaign Reminds Me--

 

This is what Tenet Media was broadcasting for Putin in the U.S. They support Elon Musk, Trump, RFK Jr, and violent protests. 1/ pic.twitter.com/s3C2BPCZl6

— Karen Piper (@PiperK) September 8, 2024

If you take a look at the topics above, you'll note among other things--misogyny.  This was a key part of the 2014 "Gamergate" dry run and a big part of the attacks on Hillary Clinton. It's why my ears perked up at the allegation that gamers were part of the Russian disinfo targeting for the 2024 election. (And minorities--that voter suppression technique that was used pretty well in 2016, both by Brad Parscale for Trump as he admitted and by the Internet Research Agency on "parallel tracks".) 

Flashforward to 2024, and we have Tucker Carlson, whose Putin interview and Moscow supermarket adulation were both deemed surprisingly cringey even to producers of Kremlim-inspired sludge, calling women in the US military: feces. 

Tucker Carlson is revolted by our war wounded.

He compares them to literal shit.

He will almost certainly have a position in the second Trump Administration.pic.twitter.com/5QSoyVvHjH

— Veterans For Responsible Leadership (@VetsForRL) September 8, 2024

Tucker Carlson is Trying to Be "Useful"

 

Sad propaganda ronin Tucker Carlson has attached himself to the Russian shogun in the hopes of being viewed as valid, important, and not a fucking parasite in one of the most parasitical moves imaginable. He is going to serve us an interview of Vladimir Putin as if he were a western journalist who would do an even marginally tough job. 

We know what has happened to Russian journalists who challenge Putin (look at the date of her death--see anything?). We know what can happen with legitimate western journalists. Tucker Carlson, however, is mostly safe (even if he broke with the desired narrative for the moment--of course western journalists want to interview Putin, but Carlson won an HONOR!) Actually, Russia media love Tucker Carlson so much.  He's essential!  He shows that even in the West, Putin is respected. And in return, Carlson carries Putin's message to Americans, who are, frankly, easily impressed and dumb as hell. 

Hillary Clinton, who isn't brand new to any of this, calls Carlson what he rightly is: a "useful idiot." But she also delivers a fairly chilling coda:

It’s really quite sad that not just somebody like Tucker Carlson who has, as I said, been fired so many times because he seems unable to correlate his reporting with the truth, but also because it is a sign that there are people in this country right now who are like a fifth column from Vladimir Putin.

...

“There is a yearning for leaders who can kill and imprison their opponents, destroy the press, lead a life that is one of impunity and bound by any laws,” she continued. “There’s a yearning among certain people in our country for that kind of leadership. And I find that absolutely gobsmacking terrifying.”

Unqualified Shitheadery

 

Vivek Ramaswamy says he'll pardon Donald Trump "Because that will help reunite the country,”

Vivek Ramaswamy will never be president.
(Video: ABC News) pic.twitter.com/IkIXLXHkRN

— Republicans against Trump (@RpsAgainstTrump) September 3, 2023

Yeah, no. The idea that pardoning Trump would "unite the country" is dumb as hell. It already assumes that most people want him to be pardoned, and I don't think they do. He lost the 2020 elections and the upcoming trials are not going to be pretty for him. But if most people did, and there was nothing absurdly, obscenely wrong with any of Trump's activities:

Why is your stupid ass running against him in the Republican primary, then? And the same question goes for the fools who raised their hand to say they would vote for Trump, if he was the 2024 primary winner, and was also convicted of any of his 91 charges.  Once again--what is the play? Are they praying for a meteor strike? Do they think the King of the Hermit Kingdon of Mar-A-Lago is going to stroke out on a gilded toilet passing a big greasy hamberder very conveniently in March 2024 or thereabouts?

For that matter, when Tucker Carlson darkly suggests that Trump is likely to be the recipient of a hit, aren't we all pretty well aware it would benefit his would-be Republican successors far more than it would Democrats? 

TWGB: The Apple of Putin's Eye

 

There might be some residual gasps in the collective politics-viewing audience at the idea that Trump doesn't want to do any debates but get over yourselves--Trump never did. I remember when he ran a weird veterans' charity telethon thingie that ultimately resulted in a settlement regarding his fake charity, just for the purpose of dodging a primary debate in 2016. (His kids were even sentenced to "how not to rip people off" school.) He never changes. And in his circumstances, why debate? How awkward would it get, after all, him with the two impeachments and four so far indictments and 91 charges? 

He of all people knows he has the right to remain silent. (But can he?)

So of course he has to give something in return to focus your weary eyes on himself, so he's sat with Fox News has-been Tucker Carlson for what will certainly not be just an hour or so of indulgent ball-stroking. I'm sure the taint will be involved. (Oh, my goodness! Was I scatalogically minimizing Carlson's professionalism? Fuck no. Everyone knows paying attention to the taint is essential good whoring practices.)

Where was I? Oh, anyway, Trump says the weirdest things in the friendliest of interviews--like when he just recently told us he was the apple of Putin's eye, and that's why he'd be able to finagle the deal to end the war in Ukraine. 

Epps

 

Ray Epps is suing Fox News for lying about him being a fed who instigated the Capitol riot because that isn't what happened at all, even if some people, even apparently some US congresspeople, seem to think this was definitely a thing. 

Is the FBI protecting Ray Epps? pic.twitter.com/t0YPNbkEs7

— Congressman Troy E. Nehls (@RepTroyNehls) July 12, 2023

(Mah gawd Texas--why do you have to do "shitkicker" so hard?)

But he was just a very committed Trump guy who has a family and is a real flesh and blood conservative, who, for whatever reason, Fox News and especially Tucker Carlson, decided to make into a scapegoat. He wasn't any different than any other person doing 1/6 stuff on 1/6, and there Fox News was, pretending he was somehow extra culpable for the melee (when didn't Fox News go really hard to pretend the machines were a problem and spread conspiracy theories about the 2020 election? Basically, being more culpable than anyone but maybe Trump campaign people for what went down, based on utter bullshit? As th Dominion suit shows and the Smartmatic suit also will?)

Fox News and believers in Fox News propaganda like the representative I bothered to name have caused this guy real harm. I don't share his political views, but I don't have to in order to understand that what he has experienced is appalling. He might be culpable for his actions that day--but not responsible for anyone else's.

Trump on the other hand, and his little minions like Rudy Giuliani...they have a lot to answer for. And I hope the discovery in this case sets a lot of people straight about the wrong ideas they have absorbed. 

Fox, Untucked

 

You know, the sweetest thing about Tucker Carlson getting the axe was he didn't even seem to know he was on the block. He closed out Friday's show clearly expecting to be back on Monday, and apparently only found out he was going, going, gone ten minutes before Fox News officially announced it. So as far as the mutual agreement to part ways goes, it sounds like Fox wanted him to depart and Tucker Calrson wasn't starting it with the security taking his shit out of the building. 

So what makes a huuuuugggge cable media company part with their most recognizable figure? Oh, let me count the ways--wait a minute, how about I don't, but just suggest that the ledger, even if it suggested losing Carlson was a big loss, was nothing compared to his potential liability. The Dominion settlement was a big hit, the Smartmatic one promises to be even bigger, Carlson's former booker is suing, and Ray Epps already sent a cease and desist letter. 

Settled, But Not Over

 

Of course, I gasped with a bit of disappointment when we were just about to hear the opening arguments in the Dominion defamation case against Fox News, and then the delay...and then the news of a settlement. I know, $787,500,000 is not chump change, and Fox News definitely settled because they did not want the trial to go on but, but...

The dragging! Where was the great, beautiful Fox News dragging? I wanted to see Fox News hosting hoisting themselves on their own petard. Where's the spectacle? Where's the schadenfreude? 

It was, perhaps, never to be in this case. Here are the details: 

Dominion's legal team pursued a "to the pain" strategy, intending to inflict maximum discomfort for Fox and its proprietors in order to secure as big a payout and as public an apology from Fox News as possible. For Fox and its controlling owners, Rupert and Lachlan Murdoch, it was worth the cost to pay for the spectacle to go away. 

For Fox, what evidence dribbled out in court hearings and court documents piled embarrassment upon embarrassment upon disgrace: 

Fox News chief executive Suzanne Scott warned her colleagues against running fact-checking segments by the network's own reporters debunking lies about election fraud, even as it gave such bogus claims acres of prime real estate.

The payout was a business decision between businesspeople, not a retribution against Fox News by the Avenging Spirit of Informed Democracy.  The thing that pisses me off isn't that they settled for a Very Interesting Sum, but that Fox News wasn't expected to make things right with respects to broadcasting the truth, on their own airwaves, in various timeslots, to correct the false impression they had created. 

And yet, the SOB thing about the Fox model, and right-wing media in general, is even the correction would be seen as something being "forced down their throats" by the liberal establishment, because this is the exact kind of fuckery they did on the brains of their loyal watchers. Faith, as in the belief in things unseen, and the ability to unhear what they never wanted to know. The Fox News watchers know what they want to believe and expect Fox to give it to them.

I really feel like only an exquisite dragging of the liars and jackasses who read "news" for Fox would have really done the necessary business.

Dominion says they will go on to make suit against other malefactors, and well, good luck to them. Maybe they will financially ruin some smaller outfit than Fox (OAN? Newsmax?) but undoing a lie is like trying to get toothpaste back in the tube. 

Now, Smartmatic says they are going to finish the job. I love that for them, and us, and Fox, if that's true. I still say Fox is in trouble--because I can't convince myself the bubble has yet been created that can't eventually be pierced, and I think the docs that Fox was hiding with respect to Rupert Murdoch must be very not great for them to have been hidden. 

But perhaps I should by now know to keep my hopes lower in the stratosphere. 

UPDATE: I find it interesting that investors are concerned that the business model has some real liabilities regarding coming onto contact with the truth. 

Oh! I Think I Get it Now!

 

It has come to my attention that Tucker Carlson is at it, again, and laying it on rather thick about how poor Jack Texeira is a TRUTHTELLER! Being MARTYRED! For giving us the actual ugly truth about the war in Ukraine.  

Carlson loves grievance. It's his thing. And he seems to love Putin. And Here's the amusing bit--the truth-telling that Carlson is running with? Is a lie. The figures he cites on his show from the leaked docs are doctored. 

Fox News host Tucker Carlson on Thursday rattled off seemingly made-up casualty figures from "leaked intelligence" to argue that Ukraine is losing the war with Russia.

But the actual leaked classified United States documents show that more than twice as many Russian soldiers as Ukrainian troops have been killed. 

During his "Tucker Carlson Tonight" broadcast, the Fox News star said that the leaked documents show "Ukraine is in fact losing the war."

So it looks like he's doing two things here: making Texeira out to be a hero in the mode of Rittenhouse, Perry, Zimmerman and Babbit, while also promoting Putin's propaganda. But actually, there's a third thing he might be doing here--see, after telling us mishandling classified information is bad, actually, when Reality Winner does it, there's someone else who seems to have mishandled classified information lately:

Trump, who is likely to be charged under the Espionage Act. So I think the ground for pretending what Trump did is just fine is a part of this messaging as well. 

God, Fox News sucks, and Carlson sucks harder. 

Fox News is in Deep Shit

 

So, let me preface this with the obvious caveat: I am not a lawyer, and I don't have the gall to play one on the blog. But when I say it looks to me like Fox News is pretty fucked based on all the news I've been reading today--I mean, I don't think you actually have to be a lawyer to recognize their position is basically in deep shit. Today, their lawyers got told off for withholding information because they wanted to screw about regarding whether Rupert Murdoch was considered an executive at Fox News or just Fox Corp. or whatever. 

That was pretty dumb. And then there were the tapes: a Fox News producer recorded conversations where Trump campaign officials and Elite Strike Farce lawyers alike admitted they didn't really have a basis for what they were doing. They were just cynically pretending there was election fraud because they didn't want the election to be over for whatever (maybe monetary, maybe not) reasons. MSNBC got hold of these recordings, and yeah, this is very problematic for Fox--and for Trump. I can see it being of interest not just in this Dominion case and maybe the Smartmatic case, but also of interest in Trump's Georgia case and of interest to Jack Smith's investigation, because it connects Fox News lying about the election with January 6.

Governor Abbott is Who He Is

 

I could write rather a lot about what pardoning a man who said he was thinking of killing people on his way to work, who did plow into a crowd of peaceful protesters who were exercising their 1st Amendment rights, and then fatally shot someone in the crowd who was lawfully exercising his 2nd Amendment writes would mean: the sanctioning of murder based on whether you agreed with the choice of victims--

But let's face it, Gov. Greg Abbott of Texas choosing to do just that based on Fox News and the opinions of no less an intellect and subject matter expert on this than Kyle Rittenhouse is very, very on brand, And saying more just feels like a waste of words, in a way. 

TWGB: The Doldrums

 

I don't know if this is anyone else's experience here in the longform blog community, but my engagement stats are in the doldrums, and I think it has a little bit a lot to do with the waiting. We're waiting on the indictments we feel like we were promised. But the chief purveyor of the arrest threat against Donald Trump came from Donald Trump for his own team's clicks, likes, and of course, remunerative values, and our hopes getting up was only a sideshow. 

But I do love getting my hopes up. I never set my sights on last Tuesday. That seemed a lot like forcing a response from the Trump brethren and cistern (is that not the right term?) and not really a signal to us lefties. But I want Trump to get a comeuppance. It is about the idea of justice being for all for me, and also for his fanclub understanding that his transgressions are not some hoax or joke but are real. I follow MSNBC lawyer folks and pretend Glenn Kirschner isn't blowing smoke up my skirt that we are gonna get a "Trump gets his time in the barrel", and yet there's a planned monthly break through most of April and I can't stand it. 

Why? Tell us we aren't getting an indictment now and fucking rip the Band-Aid off, Bragg you SOB, if that's how it is! Unless, unless, unless, unless...there's more to the story.  And I can't pretend I know, and I also can see a "strategery" behind postponing an indictment for a guy who tried to force the announcement of one. To get him when he expects it least. 

TWGB: I, Too, Hate Trump Passionately

 

While Tucker Carlson has been entrusted with the 1/6 footage and is doing his best to show as little of the American carnage as he actually potentially could, a funny thing leaked out from the Dominion defamation case against Fox News: Tucker Carlson hates Donald Trump passionately. 

Whatever my differences with Carlson--boy, do I get that one! Trump is a shaved ape wedged into a badly fitting suit. He has the verbal finesse of a clever toddler and the instincts of a zoo-raised silverback--just madly jerking off and beating his chest to the applause of people who enjoy that sort of thing. 

This becomes a TrumpWorld Grab-Bag when you pause to consider that Fox News made Trump, the President, a thing. Would we have had Trump, the President, without Fox News? I'm not so sure. I think CNN and others gave Trump a platform and took him seriously because they wanted to see what Fox News was supposedly looking at. To connect with those viewers that they thought Fox had captured. Simple suburban and rural and exurban folks of the land. The common clay of the American experience. You know. 

I mean. You know.

What Tucker Carlson Does is Lie

 

Kevin McCarthy said last year "no one would disagree" that Jan 6 was a violent insurrection.

Tucker Carlson disagrees, and now McCarthy is helping him lie about what happened. https://t.co/o4HL8DEFjc

— Arthur Delaney 🇺🇸 (@ArthurDelaneyHP) March 7, 2023

If you give information to a propagandist, you get propaganda. I'm not here to tell you how Tucker Carlson's narrative is wrong --you, my readers, know it is. We need to organize a pushback about why Carlson is to be disbelieved. Because some people just don't know what he is.  A monster. 

UPDATE: This post was just a placeholder until I had more to say. I wanted to see the reaction--of course, Carlson fans and pro-insurrectionists like MTG will pretend that the handful of minutes Carlson showed somehow negate footage we've already seen. We know from the trials of the insurrectionists what they did, how many were armed, the damage they have done. 

What McCarthy has wrought by giving Carlson access to the footage is another kind of damage. Minimizing what happened that day is like normalizing it--making it okay for something like this to happen again. 

Of course, there now has been pushback from reality-based people who understand what actually happened. But an essential part of the GOP base will want Carlson's story because they are uninterested in the truth.  They will want lies about 1/6 in the same way they still want lies about the 2020 election--and Carlson still gives that to them too. 

But at the heart of this is: A coward gave an important task to a liar, and fools will lap up the result. It's disgraceful, but the GOP has major problem and it boils down to cowards, liars, and fools. 

Ukraine and the Dubious Ally that is Us

 

I chose an image from FOX Mushroom Farm (you can't honestly call them a news network) because Tucker Carlson is for some reason, the Voice of Russia on the pretend-news. He loves being Russia's mouthpiece. He is the Father Coughlin of Neville Chamberlains. He's so in love with Putin that all that Putin wants to do is all right with him. He will appease this dodgy ex-KGB asshole until his tongue is sore and his throat hurts. He loves him some big Vlady Daddy energy, And of course, he wants to spotlight Kevin McCarthy's muse, Marjorie Taylor Greene (who incidentally wants a civil war that would weaken the homeland), who is supposedly not an entire moron with an ugly soul when she calls a man trying to keep his country alive while his people are being genocided a "pimp".

There's a part of me that could watch both of these soulless fucks get sledgehammered into oblivion and sleep as soundly as if the Baby Jesus gave me heaven's own propofol.  

There's another part of me that knows that sledgehammers don't operate themselves. 

Anyway, a year ago, Russia engaged in a full-scale assault on a country that didn't do anything but try to repulse an ongoing incursion into Crimea, Donbas, etc. just an ugly little conflict where Ukrainians were dying because Putin wanted it that way. The same Putin who had been strategically fucking with Western governments to try and get the most favorable to his fuckery types of people in office. You know--right wingers. The way we think he sponsored Trump. Like they keep doing. 

Skepticism and Scumbags

 

There is a flaw in the construction of "just asking questions" speculations--not all questions are created equally, have equal merit, or come from a place of good faith. When right-wing pundits, gadfly social media owners and even elected officials speculated that there was something "more than met the eye" regarding the break-in at the Pelosi residence and vicious hammer attack on the husband of the Speaker of the House, it's not hard to see what the point of that was--to deflect from the violence in current RW rhetoric and to imply that the Pelosis deserved violence. 

Police reports and court filings have now filled in the picture: the break-in appeared on a security camera that hadn't been manned. The assailant had broken in with a hammer. It's been verified, from DePape himself, that he went there with the intent of kidnapping and breaking the kneecaps of Nancy Pelosi if she did not tell the truth, because he believed that the Democratic party, of which she was the leader, was full of lies.

Think about that--what it means to "tell the truth" to a person who believes weird anti-vax, Qanon. and election denier conspiracies. Imagine what having to please a violent, demanding lunatic and say only what pleased him would be like. 

If that sounds a little like a metaphor for the bigger picture of how people are coping with the reality of heightened threats of political violence where a media ecosystem exists (Fox News, Newsmax, freaking Mike Lindell TV, whatever that is) that promote unhinged lies and poor mental hygiene--well, bingo. 

Glenn Greenwald @ggreenwald weighs in on the Paul Pelosi attack:

"Skepticism itself can never be wrong ... Even if evidence does emerge later on to prove it, the skepticism itself was not just valid, but necessary." pic.twitter.com/4ClCuPMnVb

— The Post Millennial (@TPostMillennial) November 2, 2022

When an argument is made to dismiss the actual conspiracy theory (that the altercation was not political at all, but that Mr. Pelosi was assaulted by a much younger gay lover/prostitute) by claiming that people were "just asking questions" like responsible skeptics, I smell a rat.  

It might be reasonable to hold an open space for the possibility that the assault was committed by someone who was non-political, although the threats against the Speaker are well-known and that it was likely to be political would be irresponsible to dismiss. It is unreasonable to play a game of connect the dots with dots that don't even exist. 

(Which also hilariously highlight stereotypical conservative biases--it's San Francisco; what makes more sense than a squalid tussle between an elderly queer sugar-daddy and a hippie hustler? I mean. who the hell else lives in SF?)

But even if the insinuations weren't unnecessary in themselves, the use of an 82-year-old man's fractured skull as a punchline tells be what kind of people we are dealing with--see the title of the post?

It isn't skeptics.