TWGB: Impeaching Trump By Accident?

 

We are not at a serious point in this Biden impeachment inquiry--that much is sure. In the spirit of Jim Jordan, who has unseriously referenced random unrelated things like the 1/6 pipe bomb, the bag of coke in the White House, and the leaked Dobbs opinion, to do what other than pretend the Biden Administration is awash in scandal, I don't know, let me get my inappropriate rhetoric on:

You know how we have all these options in the "dairy" section of the supermarket these days? Vegan and lactose-free vegetable-and-nut based milk substitutes showing up on our shelves to give options to people who either can't or prefer not to drink animal milk? Anyway, I see these varieties and am pretty happy that people have choices to fulfil their own unique dietary requirements and tastes. Almond and oat milk both taste pretty good to me. But I see some people complain: How can you milk a soybean? How can you milk a cashew? 

Well, I don't know about that. What I do know is that in this impeachment inquiry, the House Republicans don't have beans and they don't have nuts, so I don't know where they think the milk is coming from, but the cow done died ages ago. 

And that is why in the image above, Rep. Raskin is smiling and Comer looks like his life is flashing before his eyes. 

What the Biden Impeachment Inquiry is About

 

Earlier this year, I wrote a blogpost about the House GOP Biden impeachment inquiry back when I agreed with Rep. Raskin that this inquiry has been an impeachment about nothing, but now I'm pretty sure I see exactly what's it's about. Thanks to Rep. Troy Nehls, we can all appreciate what it's for: "Donald J. Trump 2024, Baby!"   (Okay, I lie--I always knew it was exactly about that.) 

I mean, Trump's legal fund money is going to Trump himself and his PAC money is paying his own legal bills, so why not have the taxpayers fund an anti-Biden campaign for him? And that's what he wants, so that's what every little GOP congressperson in the House gave him. 

I mean, here's a snip about what Trump wants from July:

Former president Donald Trump called on congressional Republicans to withhold military support for Ukraine until the Biden administration cooperates with their investigations into the president and his son Hunter Biden’s business dealings.

The demand, delivered at a rally in Pennsylvania on Saturday, echoed Trump’s conduct at issue during his first impeachment, when Trump withheld aid from Ukraine while pressuring the country’s president to announce an investigation of Biden.

“Congress should refuse to authorize a single additional shipment of our depleted weapons stockpiles … to Ukraine until the FBI, DOJ and IRS hand over every scrap of evidence they have on the Biden Crime Family’s corrupt business dealings,” Trump said at the rally. He added that any Republican lawmakers who didn’t join the effort should face primary challenges, a tactic he used last year to unseat Republicans who voted to impeach him for inciting the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection.

That little bit there? "Echoed Trump's conduct at issue during his first impeachment." It's a great touch because it sure does! The US conditions aid to Ukraine (although the Republicans in congress are playing their fund-denial games with border security) and the pay-off is dirtying up Biden so that Trump can win re-election! See how in those paragraphs, you can understand who is doing what for whom, to get what in return? And what should happen to GOP reps who don't do what Trump wants?

Yeah, well, after all the "inquiring" that Comer, Jordan, and Smith have done so far, we still don't have anything like that for how Hunter Biden paying back his loans equals political favors the senior Biden was going to do for...anybody.  

Now, Hunter Biden showed up yesterday and called out the House GOP over their subpoena shenanigans, letting them know he would give a deposition, but not behind closed doors. Sounds to me like he isn't hiding something, the House GOP are. After all, I remember when they just hated closed door depositions. Then they realized that if they used closed-door depositions, their failures wouldn't be nearly as, um, public.

And then they could keep up the lying. And I while I certainly could expect less from them (I mean, MTG wants to toss around revenge porn again, I just know it), I trust they will continue to limbo under my expectations. 

Jim Jordan--Ineffective Thug (UPDATED)

 

There's a handful of things we know about Jim Jordan, who might have a vote Thursday to once again not be named Speaker of the House--he's Trump's minion (small, yellow, attendant to a real villain, speaks gibberish), he turned a blind eye to sexual abuse when he was a wrestling coach, and he's never actually passed any legislation at all during his congressional career.  Based on his failed votes so far for the gavel, I'm not even sure he can count votes.

But the thing I really am impressed with is that his manner of whipping votes for the speakership is open thuggery. Just right out there--strongarming folks. It's like he realized he could not win people over with his record or his winning personality, so, he just went directly to intimidation tactics. 

So when the wife of a Republican representative gets anonymous messages about her spouse, that's sort of gross, right? It's a bad look. If you want to unite the party behind you--how is threatening people the way to convince them you're looking out for the team?

It seems more like a way to say Team Jordan is a party of one--out for himself. 

All Clowns, No Ringmasters

 

The GOP search for a new Speaker of the House is quite the circus--but it looks like it's all clowns and no Ringmaster. Harriet Hageman seems to think she is a rodeo clown and brought a lariat to signify this is not her first rodeo. Nancy Mace wore a scarlet A which stands for "adultery" because she helped cuck McCarthy for Jim Jordan, who Trump endorsed and who--didn't get the most votes in the GOP conference about that. She said she supported Jim Jordan because...you know, I don't care what Nancy Mace says is the reason for anything she does? 

Oh, and George Santos was hit with a superseding indictment for credit card fraud and identity theft. And because Steve Scalise wouldn't answer him on the vital issue of whether he'd be spared from an expulsion attempt from his NY delegation, he's now a "bigly" anti-Scalise guy. Nice. He's got big and bronzed ones, for sure. 

TWGB: TrumpWorld is Definitely Not OK

 

You know, all I wanted to do last night was post a little bit about Rudy Giuliani fixing to sue President Biden, but I fell asleep at the computer because it got so deep in the weeds, and as of today, there was more to the story:

Look, I think it's great that Rudy Giuliani found lawyers to take this case even though he is being sued by some of his other lawyers for not getting paid and can't seem to keep a Georgia-based counselor to save his behind. He's getting sued by Hunter Biden, of course, and by a former employee alleging sexual assault and harassment which is a case involving details that are profoundly stomach-churning. But these guys believe enough in Rudy Giuliani to pursue a case where his allegations are that Joe Biden's crack about Giuliani being a Russian pawn spreading disinfo cost him his reputation and millions of dollars of business--

In a way actually being a source of Russian disinfo, making wild pronouncements about a stolen election with shoe polish running down his face, putting on a presser at a landscaping service, farting COVID into the face of his stolen election co-counsel, losing his license to practice because of his shoddy ethics and being so frequently intoxicated that it's part of the investigation into the attempt of the Trump Team to steal the 2020 election are not the ACTUAL THINGS that screwed Giuliani's reputation? 

The Impeachment About Nothing

 Rep. Jamie Raskin (D, National Treasure) was one of the most persistent voices of sense in Thursday's House impeachment hearing, and his comment that this was an "impeachment about nothing" gives me the title of the post. Maybe it's about bribery? But who got bribed and for what by whom? 

Usually, you would want to establish a quid pro quo, right? I give you "X" and you give me "Y". You give me an investigation into Joe Biden and I'll release military aid, for example. This is not so clearcut. Is the bribe coming from Burisma to get rid of the prosecutor who was manifestly not investigating them? Is the bribe coming from Chinese businessmen because yadda yadda yadda? (That Hunter Biden was drawing a loan based on his investment to pay major debts is actually pretty plausible, given what we know of his circumstances at the time.) 

What the GOP House established was they were GONNA GODDAMN FIND a reason. They were going to take this impeachment business seriously. They didn't all stick around or provide any evidence or anything, so I don't know how literally they are taking the impeachment business, but man, they are serious. 

Raskin proposed subpoenaing Rudy Giuliani and Lev Parnas. Oh. The Jimmies (Comer and Jordan) didn't like that idea.  The damaging data of the liberated laptop loses a bit of its shine when you consider the irregular provenance. 

TWGB: They Want to Impeach Joe Biden?

 

Ok, you have questions: "How is the declaration of Speaker McCarthy (R: Gimp) a TrumpWorld Grab-Bag post?"

Oh gosh, I think it's because Trump told them to do it. Trump said, out loud and also in private, to the House GOP that they wanted to go on ahead and try to impeach Joe Biden because he got impeached, too, and wasn't that some kind of RIGGING? Which is funny as fuck, because the investigation that the House GOP are going to do into Joe Biden the year before the 2024 election is the exact same sham investigation that Trump extorted Ukraine President Zelenskyy for sparking his own first impeachment. And even some current GOP House members can kind of admit that.  (And sadly, Rep. Ken Buck, who is a Tea Party conservative in you'd think good standing, is likely to be looking at some Liz Cheney treatment for his honesty.) 

So, what do we know? Well, we know Kevin McCarthy's round and fuzzies just get passed between MTG and Trump and he unilaterally called the investigation because he belatedly realized he might have a hard time with the votes. And GOP centrists all sighed a sigh of relief because actually, this impeachment thing might be seen as a real partisan clusterfuck since they spent so much time decrying the "politicization of government."

And here they are. 

Jim Jordan is Defending Putin's Puppet

 

"I could see that he loved it" -- Trump on what Putin said to him about Ukraine in private discussions pic.twitter.com/bn6Frny9Al

— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) April 12, 2023

Donald Trump has always just been a tool for Putin, just a dopey, underinformed somewhat ineffectual businessman who has been handled because of his wealth by foreign influence from the beginning. There is credible reason to believe that if Trump won a second term instead of massively losing, he would have finally "winked" at Putin to do his damnedest with respects to Ukraine.

I don't know why GOP Representative Jim Jordan thinks he needs to protect Donald Trump from all threats as if he was his very own smol bean--but Jordan is a sketchy guy himself. Maybe Trump has dirt on him, maybe not. Maybe he seriously does believe Trump is his smol bean. I never succumbed to whatever charisma Trump is supposed to have, but maybe this is his influence on his supporters, they see him as their hero and also as a small baby who needs to be protected.

MAGA doesn't want us to fool around with their sweetheart, Donald J. Trump. Because he puts America first? Heh! While he's talking up the dictators in China and Russia we are supposed to believe he's strong on. He says the US radicals are the greatest threat--to the whole country, or just to his political future? Anyway, Jordan hasn't got any right to interfere in New York business, and Bragg isn't about to let him.

Alivin Bragg is suing Jim Jordan for using federal US dollars to fuck around with state business to prevent a lawful investigation into a one-time NY citizen. In the meanwhile, Trump's support is cratering because America is tired of his act. 

I'd love to see Trump's dogged supporters go down with their Titanic leader. They seem dead set on putting him, not this country, first.

TWGB: Start the Steal, They Meant

 

So, let's start this TrumpWorld Grab-Bag with Jim Jordan, who was introduced into the conversation a bit ago when his text to Mark Meadows was revealed without attribution. To make this controversial, The Federalist leapt in to "help" by outing the originator of the text as Jim Jordan, so there, and obviously, not attributing Jordan was a kind of fuckery, are we doing this right? No, Federalist overpaid airheads, you are not. Yeah, we could have narrowed this down to the eagerest of beavers, and just because he was only forwarding yet another memo in the dark arts of how to steal an election because you are the president right now and maybe can isn't actually a better look. 

So, okay, Jordan was only passing on the legal opinions of Joseph Schmitz to add to the McEntee, Ellis, Eastman, Whosits, Whatsits, Dewey, Cheatem, and Howe memos. I was already familiar with this name because I do this thing. He was part of the Clinton email hunt way back as part of Trump's early foreign policy team in the 2016 campaign. I never forget anything--it's actually a passion of mine to never forget. And this is the sort of useful SOB who served Trump's putsch.

It was Jordan, not Schmitz, who got the Medal of Freedom for services rendered, but oh, well. Maybe next time, if as a country we are stupid enough to have a next time. (I know the Medal was supposedly for Jordan's defense of Trump during the first impeachment but actually, since Trump stays impeached and lost his election in part because he will never not be impeached, I prefer to believe it is for all manner of loyalty. All. Manner. of. Loyalty. An actual prize for most excellent ass-licking.) 

The Federalist thinks this is--okay? He was just passing on a thing he supposedly didn't think was a how-to about stealing the election?  So weird, because that's what throwing out uncounted votes would mean! 

So anyway, what else is news? Reuters did a piece on retired military folks (like, ahem, Flynn and Waldron) lending their credence and credibility to fake stories about voter fraud.  This reminds me of a couple of threads I have tried to follow on this blog, with varying success--the theocrats in the upper ranks, and the psyops perpetrated by military-affiliated people. It's astonishing to me that right-wing people would use their training to undergo a mission against the homeland for pay or whate...oh wait, I totally think that could be a thing!

In other news, Dominion wants discovery about the Murdochs' emails regarding the voter fraud lies that actually should destroy Fox News, because goddamn it, something should. Also, analysis has shown once again there really isn't any voter fraud to the extent that would move the needle for a national candidate. But for some reason, it's Republicans that think they will get away with it.  

Somebody Looks Nervous About Something

 

One tell that a person is keyed up over something is the gibberish that starts falling out of their faces. Take Jim Jordan and whether he talked with Trump on January 6th. He just couldn't remember when it might have been or what they had to talk about, but it turns out there was more than one call, Matt Gaetz was in on one of the calls, and the conversation had to do with whether Trump would please call off his angry hounds at the door. As if Jordan believed Trump had control of that particular situation. And that's pretty much what Kevin McCarthy went around with Trump about on the phone that day, too. 

But here's something interesting to me--while McCarthy has said he'd be fine testifying about that call before the January 6th committee, but he is indignant that his member, and himself, might have their phone records subpoenaed. Interesting. And he's not making any sense, nor is his spokesperson. 

Now, if Marjorie Taylor Green gets out in front of a camera and complains about her phone records being handed over and threatens the phone companies with being shut down, I guess I would tend to shrug a little bit at that because, um, she's certainly got a way about her. But when Republican House Leader McCarthy makes the same kind of nonsense threat, that's a little different. It's a congressional investigation into a riot/insurrection attempt that left over a hundred police officers injured in something like 1000 acts of assault and which caused damage not just to the building these member of congress work in, but to our democracy. 

It's not really any kind of over-reach for the committee to ask for those records, or for the phone companies to hand them over, even if only to rule out that GOP members of congress had any involvement. (Aside from promoting the Big Lie and making firebrand speeches in front of those people of course. Of course!)

But check out this gibberish from McCarthy's spokesperson regarding McCarthy's records: 

It is unfortunate how unserious and political Bennie Thompson has made this inquiry," Mark Bednar, a spokesman for McCarthy, said in a statement to CNN, referring to the select committee's chairman, when asked for comment on the minority leader being part of the preservation of records request. "A serious inquiry that was not politically motivated would be looking at why the Capitol was left so unprepared and how to prevent this from happening in the future -- and an authoritarian, unconstitutional attempt to rifle through individuals' call logs will not help answer that question."

Yes. A serious investigation into a crime would totally depend on looking into the cops and not the people doing crimes. This is....some kind of take, all right.

This sounds like people who want to cover something up, and you know, after Benghazi and "her emails", I'm so out of fucks with Republicans going, "Now now, we certainly wouldn't want this investigation to be POLITICAL."

Trump fans broke glass, spread feces on the walls, fought with law enforcements and tried to intimidate lawmakers for very political reasons. Crying about the politics of investigating that mess gets no sympathy from me at all. Yeah, it's political, and yeah, Republicans could turn out looking very bad--but its because of what they did and said, not because people bothered looking into it.

It looks bad because it is bad. And they look nervous and they should. 

Kevin McCarthy Isn't Stopping the 1/6 Committee

 

The coward, Kevin McCarthy, pulled all of his 1/6 Select Committee picks because Speaker Pelosi rejected two of them.  One of the rejected picks, Rep. Jim Banks would have been the ranking member, but demonstrated right from the jump that he had no business being on that committee with the actual words that came from his very own mouth. The other rejected pick, Rep. Jim Jordan, is such an obvious Trump Renfield that his selection by McCarthy is transparent sabotage. It is obvious that the selections were chosen with the expectation that someone was getting rejected, which was every bit Pelosi's right to do so as not to turn this important mission into a clownshow (which is becoming something of a GOP specialty.)

In other words, Pelosi was under no obligation to swallow McCarthy's shit, and his performative outrage about it is tiresome and staged. So of course, some political pundits treated it as if McCarthy got what he wanted (he would rather shutter the whole inquiry down, and he hasn't actually denied the committee the ability to be  as bi-partisan as he has allowed it to be). The reason the committee looks the way it does right now is because Kevin McCarthy could have had an actual bipartisan committee and told he members not to take the best deal they were going to get.

That's all on him. Every bit of it. 

So even though the taxpayer-salaried trolls may decide they need to perform a really stupid and futile gesture or two, as they did during the first impeachment, the inquiry will go on. The people who want to sniff about it for not being as bipartisan as it could be can just go ahead and do that (some would have no matter what the committee looked like) but need to bear in mind whose fault that is--

Just like we all know the big lie that sent the rioters to the Capitol was Trump's fault for spreading the big lie, and also the fault of some GOP party leaders for egging them on. It would be nonsensical for the committee to have people on it inimical to the goals of it, and who are also participants in the goddamn mess. 

All McCarthy has truly done is demonstrate his own unfitness for leadership, deep moral rot and invertebrate weakness. There's nothing there to applaud.

GOP Crime Incorporated

GOP Corruption Update (Just Tonight)

FL Governor Ron DeSantishttps://t.co/q6PsCkjp5c

GOP Secretary Chao (& McConnell)https://t.co/ivCkUqU3NV

Top GOP Member on Judiciary Committee, Jim Jordanhttps://t.co/Zn1gJK2nSl

Frmer GOP President Donald J. Trumphttps://t.co/WoMJthDKWk

— Jesse Ferguson (@JesseFFerguson) March 4, 2021

If they act like a mob, it's because they are the mob.

Hey, Let's You and Him Fight This Out

Ted Cruz may be an obnoxious little toad who sucks up to Donald Trump, a man who insulted his wife and accused his father of murder, and he may also be a signifying culture warrior who engages in empty online beefs, but never let it be said the he's beyond offering some one else's behind up for a fight with a 70-year old actor.

I believe the kids call this type of behavior "thirsty". But also "chickenshit".

 



Sad.