TWGB: Are You Buying What He's Selling?

 

Donald Trump said he learned about murder victim Ruby Garcia's "contagious laughter and when she walked into a room, she lit up that room" from her family. The family denies speaking to him, and that language appears in her obituary as reported in Trump's beloved New York Post. pic.twitter.com/RjeuEdLdIW

— Matthew Gertz (@MattGertz) April 3, 2024

I think I want to start this one with a weird lie--Trump said that he met with the family of Ruby Garcia and they talked with him about her and--that did not happen. It really looks like he "remembered" stuff from an obituary he read. I first wondered if he was conflating meeting with Ruby Garcia's family with meeting with Laken Riley's family. That doesn't seem to be it.  He just plumb forgot, after a long history of telling fictional "Sir" stories about strapping big men with tears in their eyes who sing his praises, that if you talk about real people, they can contradict you. 

That's not normal. Most people would understand that you don't lie about something like that. Trump does not. 

Most people would not go out of their way to violate a gag order, either. Trump would, though He would continue to lie about the relatives of a judge in one of his trials, and even insist it was necessary for him to do so. It would seem like he's either really just too dumb to know when to shut up, or maybe he thinks getting tossed in jail will earn him valuable martyr-points. (Jail is bad. Peter Navarro says so.) 

My question today is--are you buying what he is selling? It's a simple question--is this guy Mr. Honesty?  Are any Trump fans ready to wake up and smell the bullshit yet? 

We've got some fun, fun, fun stories about Truth Social today. It was reiterated that yes, Virginia, Truth Social was carried over the finish line to the IPO date by Russian money. And this is connected to the brothers who just pled to insider trading, because that's a very auspicious way to start a business.  And if you want to know where Trump sits in all of this, it's suing the Celebrity Apprentice guys who hooked him up with this scheme for poor management. He wants their shares. The value of the stock he has might be slipping so he saw what they had and went:

You know how he does--possession being nine tenths and a third of the law, or whatever--oh wait: that's his Mar-A-Lago documents strategery!

TWGB: Where Did it Go?

 

So, it looks like Trump is broke. He got Chubb to do his E. Jean Carroll thing, but they'll be fucked if they are standing his fraud trial bond. His lawyers say he can't get that bond, and no shit. This man had debts before he even ran for president. He has big loans from all kinds of people. And he barely owns any properties at all in full or outright. This is actually a pretty old story--Trump never has been worth what Trump says he is.  Trump's value has been about Trump's word--and we know what his word is worth now. 

Even after the NY AG seizes his properties, he may still owe. That's where we are. Because I don't know for sure that he put anything up for collateral for the Chubb bond for the Carroll case, but probably? And what isn't encumbered? 

But here's my naïve question for you all, my readers, in all seriousness, if Trump has been overstating his property valuations to get favorable loan terms, and evading taxes on his business wherever he could, and engaging in various frauds, like Trump University and his slush fund charity and so on, and money laundering and the like--where does his money go that he can't find a half billion in liquidity? Is it a thing where the money is gone and he's just a whole shitting inept businessman who frauded his face off and still ended up in a hole? Or did he invest elsewhere (offshore, you could say) where the money is available to him and he isn't letting other motherfuckers get hold of it? 

Do you think if he graciously lets us see his tax returns for the last couple of years like a responsible presidential candidate, we'll even know? 

TWGB: The Only Winning Move

 

The disqualification trial of Fulton County DA Fani Willis saw a decision that enabled the case to continue, as Willis stays on while her top prosecutor, Nathan Wade, leaves the case--but we also learn that the judge in the Trial, Scott McAfee, faced threats and was concerned about getting security for his family. This is appalling, but not an unusual feature of TrumpWorld. McAfee, a conservative, will be treated by MAGA as having been somehow biased (I checked Twitter--they are GRUMBLING) when it is hard to objectively state what was uncovered in the trial more than a mere appearance of impropriety. 

He made as fair a decision as he could. He chided Willis for her conduct. It's not enough. 

From what I can tell, the lesson of TrumpWorld is similar to the lesson of playing "tic-tac-toe" in the 1983 movie WarGames--the only winning move is not to play. It means a little something different here though--it's the choice of game. You don't win at appeasing MAGA. You win only by doing your job. In other words--how about a nice came of chess?

Mike Pence knows this one. He just recently explained why he could not endorse Donald Trump, his old running mate, for president. Trump required him to do something illegal and unconstitutional to show his loyalty and he could not. In return, his life was threatened, and Trump to this day considers Pence "disloyal". It seems clear that to Trump's mind, you cannot serve two masters: the Constitution and Trump.  It also stands as a stark warning to other would-be GOP VP nominees--he will not be someone you serve with, just someone you serve. I can only ask what the conscience of a conservative has to say about that.