As the Daily Show put it: “Hard to believe that Donald Trump having sex resulted in something worse than Don Jr.” Many people are trying to Present President Trump’s Thursday indictment as evidence of a historical first in U.S. jurisprudence, one that brings us in line with the public prosecution policies that are the norm in most other advanced democracies.
It was a grand jury, a group of people, that voted to indict. Bragg is just one man doing his job. But authoritarians never defer to juries or any laws when they're in charge, which, as you point out, Trump actually is in the republican party. In many ways the wailing supporters are more reprehensible than Trump himself because he lacks any self-awareness needed for character, but some of them used to know something about decency before they forfeited their souls to the Sirens' call to power. And their high blown demands in the name of "the American people" are the most annoyingly pretentious and manipulative of all because a majority of us voted for Joe Biden and Kamala Harris.
Yes,Judith ! The message that everyday Americans issued the indictment. Also ,as I was reminded of today, the original case against Cohen was brought by TFG’s DOJ.Same facts sent Cohen to jail. So TFG’s own DOJ proved there was a crime !
yeah, and when the Repugs argue (as they have nee arguing) that the DOJ found the case to lack merit, they're leaving out that they were so ordered by that master of balanced, unweaponized legal principles, Bill Barr.
you know, the tubby fellow who published a six-hundred paged "autobiography" about his "hardscrabble" boyhood spent attending the Horace Mann School (one wonders if he was anybody's boy toy there) and Columbia College from his degraded perch on Riverside Drive.
Speaking of majorities, there is a Trumpist crank in our blue neighborhood who puts out signs along his yard the way Burma Shave used to do on the highway, one word per sign. Now he writes This Is What You Get When You Vote For An Asshole. BIDEN.
my sentiment exactly. but there are so many security cameras all over the place, there's a certain risk involved. I have an asshole just across the street who hasn't taken down his Lee Zeldin posters and it's a perpetual temptation. plus there's a good chance that a Lee Zeldin asshole in this neighborhood would also have a gun.
I have a policy I've tried to observe since 2015, which is not to probe very deeply into the politics of the people around here with whom I get along very well but who, I suspect, are supporters of TFF and his ilk. I've done pretty well with it, but the other day, this guy I frequently run into (who's a sweet guy, has obviously hard life and, most important of all, adores my dogs), who said hello and immediately went into a bullshit rap about "these fucking Progressives." I cut him off and said we should agree not to have this conversation because I am certainly one of the people he hates. so we laughed and settled down a bit, but BOTH of us had that little nagging thing going on about trying to find out HOW MUCH of an asshole the other guy was.
this was NO FUN. but, at the same time, it was a LITTLE BIT FUN.
I ended up by saying that he might as well consider me a commie for his purposes (for his purposes, I am) and he should just deal with THAT. and if he couldn't, that was also cool.
what surprised me about the upshot of the "conversation" was how much less I regretted the whole thing than I assumed I would.
I have a LOT of friends. shedding a few of them is something I can live with, if I must.
it was also very clear how "spotty" (this is being very kind) his information was. I betcha nobody reading this is very surprised...the "upstairs neighbor" I have sometimes bitched about in the past was somehow not aware about the DeSantis anti-knowledge campaign and considers me brainwashed. but he also rejects the Frankfurt School and the famous (and, from my point of view, intellectually essential) Tavistock Centre because they represent "social engineering." this is all LaRouche.
it seems to me that the largest part of parenting could easily be dismissed as "social engineering," right?
On the other side of the street there are those signs that say we love everyone no matter where they are from, who they love, etc.. Tolerance, you know. The old crank knows he is outnumbered and tolerated.
Maybe add some quotation marks around the statement, which would clearly attribute it to Biden. Then again, the need to clarify for the Repubs would require adding “in 2020” to the statement.
Someone might mention to these yahoos that once you’ve found the witch it’s not a hunt anymore. May the Republican Party spend the rest of its time and treasure pissing up this ridiculous rope they’ve conjured for themselves.
So many have failed the character test already. You mentioned many of the known ones. Sadly, people who I thought were salt of the earth, turned out to be Lot’s wife. Love your first sentence…
Lyndsey Graham begging for dollars on Faux news for his beloved Trump. How pathetic! What does trump have on him that he’s willing to further humiliate himself? Although Marge, Boobert, Goober Gomer, and the rest of that traitorous group make me want to jump off a cliff, Stefanik makes me wish I had already jumped. Her smug fealty to trump is more than I can take. There is no evidence of character in this group or any other republican.
The more I’ve seen of Lyndsey Graham over the years the more tragic he seems. I know, I know. We can’t can’t let our guard down, we can’t let up on calling out these fascists. But that man has been carrying around so many ghosts and secrets and insecurities for all of his life. And you know what I mean. So I agree with you Karen, he is pathetic. But not only because he’s sold himself to a golem who would gladly use his insecurities to dreadfully wound him. We all saw Graham nearly come to tears begging for money for the golem. I am not convinced, however, he was crying for Trump. He may have been crying for himself.
I think about Jan 6 on the Senate floor when he said it had been a fun ride but he was done with Trump. Then he was harassed by a bunch of maggots at the airport and he did a complete about face and resumed his devotion to trump. He may be a tragic empty suit, but he is still a danger to our democracy
Yessir, the GQP has no character whatsoever, but it is full of characters…once Conservatives were honored as wise men, now the leaders of the GQP are a bunch of wise guys. Where once it was Sense and Sensibility, now it’s nonsense and insensibility, falling from the Party of Lincoln to a party of fratboys and goobers, united only in their hatred for the things that Lincoln espoused in his speeches, to tear apart the Union that Lincoln tried so hard to mend and preserve. All in the name of a vile, soulless travesty of a human being who represents themselves so well and who is their last, best, and only hope for their future…
but I'm confused about the blade metaphor. do you mean it in the sense of being extraordinarily accurate and precise or in the sense of going through all the motions perfectly, but with no actual blade? I am assuming the former, but the latter is also fun to consider.
I'm thinking of that first killing in "Seven Samurai" in which Takashi Shimura cuts his giveaway pigtail to go in and kill the guy it's necessary to kill. the guys leaves the house he's in (appearing unhurt), stops suddenly and is dead before he hits the ground.
The press keeps talking about the political problems for Alan Bragg. In Manhattan, where he the D.A., Trump did not carry a single precinct in the 2016 GOP primary, the 2016 general election, or the 2020 general election. Familiarity has bred contempt, indeed.
On MSNBC last night, one of the Central Park 5, Dr. Yussef Salaan, pointed out that Tuesday, April 4th, when tRump will be arraigned, is the 55th anniversary of Martin Luther King's death: "The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice.”
"In 1989, Mr. Trump placed full-page advertisements in four New York City newspapers, including The New York Times, calling for the state to adopt the death penalty for killers. He made clear that he was voicing this opinion because of the rape and assault of Trisha Meili, a woman who had been jogging in Central Park."
I was watching Lawrence O’Donnell and he said Trump would be arraigned Tuesday afternoon. And that song started playing in my head and it just fit. It’s a great song.
Another great column, sir..... The lamentably sad fact about the Republican Party and the current party leadership in the House is that they could not organize a shitting contest in a dysentery ward.....
I’m struggling to catch up with my reading this morning... turns out I may not have the stomach to get through it all, so here we are. One thing they say, especially Goon, “The American People” makes me instantly irate... I am an American and NONE of them speak for me. Not. One. Of. Them. I don’t think they even know real American people... they only know and parrot their fellow swine and demigod. This was my first read. I have several remaining. I don’t think I’m doing very well...
I prefer to think that a majority of Americans are not like djt. They don't begin the day thinking of ways to dupe the dupable or con the con-able. They don't ride down a "golden" escalator to make an announcement - I think that ride down was a metaphor for where djt was going to take the nation, and that has certainly been the case in some circles. Thankfully, not in all. I happen to agree that if Nixon had been indicted for criminal behavior the nation MIGHT have learned something from the process during a time when there was a republican party. David Brooks, last night on PBS, believes Ford did the right thing although it cost him the election in 1976. It does not seem to matter to DB that a majority of Americans believed Nixon should be held accountable and therefore the "pardon" was nothing more than whitewash over a very dark time indeed. He did seem to believe that djt has rightfully been indicted. I am just sorry that GA did not come in first or the DOJ. But...as someone wrote int he NYT letters, New Yorkers have known for years that djt is a criminal and engaged in criminal behavior. His indictment, according to these New Yorkers, is long overdue. If only Barr had not swept the whole russia investigation under the rug. Lots of "if only's". The reality is now that there is no republican party. There is no conservative party as such because the republican party is dead. They have no ideas. There one ploy now is to keep too many dumba** people riled up so they won't look at the other things this crowd of fascists is up to. Onward and Upward. DA Bragg, thank you for carrying through on the investigation. I cannot wait to hear the 30 counts and the names of any additional folks named in the indictment. Finally - thank goodness there is not some silly little talkative white girl at the head of the NYC Grand Jury who had to get her face on tv in GA. Maybe that is one reason nothing has happened there yet.
It was a grand jury, a group of people, that voted to indict. Bragg is just one man doing his job. But authoritarians never defer to juries or any laws when they're in charge, which, as you point out, Trump actually is in the republican party. In many ways the wailing supporters are more reprehensible than Trump himself because he lacks any self-awareness needed for character, but some of them used to know something about decency before they forfeited their souls to the Sirens' call to power. And their high blown demands in the name of "the American people" are the most annoyingly pretentious and manipulative of all because a majority of us voted for Joe Biden and Kamala Harris.
Yes,Judith ! The message that everyday Americans issued the indictment. Also ,as I was reminded of today, the original case against Cohen was brought by TFG’s DOJ.Same facts sent Cohen to jail. So TFG’s own DOJ proved there was a crime !
yeah, and when the Repugs argue (as they have nee arguing) that the DOJ found the case to lack merit, they're leaving out that they were so ordered by that master of balanced, unweaponized legal principles, Bill Barr.
you know, the tubby fellow who published a six-hundred paged "autobiography" about his "hardscrabble" boyhood spent attending the Horace Mann School (one wonders if he was anybody's boy toy there) and Columbia College from his degraded perch on Riverside Drive.
Speaking of majorities, there is a Trumpist crank in our blue neighborhood who puts out signs along his yard the way Burma Shave used to do on the highway, one word per sign. Now he writes This Is What You Get When You Vote For An Asshole. BIDEN.
Maybe they could be "lost" one night...
my sentiment exactly. but there are so many security cameras all over the place, there's a certain risk involved. I have an asshole just across the street who hasn't taken down his Lee Zeldin posters and it's a perpetual temptation. plus there's a good chance that a Lee Zeldin asshole in this neighborhood would also have a gun.
I have a policy I've tried to observe since 2015, which is not to probe very deeply into the politics of the people around here with whom I get along very well but who, I suspect, are supporters of TFF and his ilk. I've done pretty well with it, but the other day, this guy I frequently run into (who's a sweet guy, has obviously hard life and, most important of all, adores my dogs), who said hello and immediately went into a bullshit rap about "these fucking Progressives." I cut him off and said we should agree not to have this conversation because I am certainly one of the people he hates. so we laughed and settled down a bit, but BOTH of us had that little nagging thing going on about trying to find out HOW MUCH of an asshole the other guy was.
this was NO FUN. but, at the same time, it was a LITTLE BIT FUN.
I ended up by saying that he might as well consider me a commie for his purposes (for his purposes, I am) and he should just deal with THAT. and if he couldn't, that was also cool.
what surprised me about the upshot of the "conversation" was how much less I regretted the whole thing than I assumed I would.
I have a LOT of friends. shedding a few of them is something I can live with, if I must.
it was also very clear how "spotty" (this is being very kind) his information was. I betcha nobody reading this is very surprised...the "upstairs neighbor" I have sometimes bitched about in the past was somehow not aware about the DeSantis anti-knowledge campaign and considers me brainwashed. but he also rejects the Frankfurt School and the famous (and, from my point of view, intellectually essential) Tavistock Centre because they represent "social engineering." this is all LaRouche.
it seems to me that the largest part of parenting could easily be dismissed as "social engineering," right?
so much bullshit, so little time.
That last sentence.
On the other side of the street there are those signs that say we love everyone no matter where they are from, who they love, etc.. Tolerance, you know. The old crank knows he is outnumbered and tolerated.
Maybe add some quotation marks around the statement, which would clearly attribute it to Biden. Then again, the need to clarify for the Repubs would require adding “in 2020” to the statement.
Damn.
I think I would would struggle with resisting the temptation to make the last four disappear.
My experience (with a neighbor christianproudoathkeeper) if you take the signs down is:
1) they know who took them down
2) they put newer, bigger ones up
3) they insist you need to go to the school board with them to stop the pornography
4) they mention something about Biden taking our guns
5) they ask if you need any trees taken down, got the chainsaw all sharpened up.
So when we give folks directions to our homes, about a sentence into it they interupt to say, "Oh, past all those crazy signs?"
Someone might mention to these yahoos that once you’ve found the witch it’s not a hunt anymore. May the Republican Party spend the rest of its time and treasure pissing up this ridiculous rope they’ve conjured for themselves.
Now THAT is a bumper sticker waiting to happen - "once you've found the witch its not a hunt anymore" - Perfect!!
So many have failed the character test already. You mentioned many of the known ones. Sadly, people who I thought were salt of the earth, turned out to be Lot’s wife. Love your first sentence…
Lyndsey Graham begging for dollars on Faux news for his beloved Trump. How pathetic! What does trump have on him that he’s willing to further humiliate himself? Although Marge, Boobert, Goober Gomer, and the rest of that traitorous group make me want to jump off a cliff, Stefanik makes me wish I had already jumped. Her smug fealty to trump is more than I can take. There is no evidence of character in this group or any other republican.
I saw the clip of Lindsey Graham on Ruth Ben-Ghiat’s post. It truly appeared as if he was ready to cry…Tears for Fears ?
your garden-variety drama queen of a certain age often has a real gift for creating real tears when called upon to do so.
yeah, Lindsey probably had a wretched childhood but so did lots of people who aren't lifelong assholes.
The more I’ve seen of Lyndsey Graham over the years the more tragic he seems. I know, I know. We can’t can’t let our guard down, we can’t let up on calling out these fascists. But that man has been carrying around so many ghosts and secrets and insecurities for all of his life. And you know what I mean. So I agree with you Karen, he is pathetic. But not only because he’s sold himself to a golem who would gladly use his insecurities to dreadfully wound him. We all saw Graham nearly come to tears begging for money for the golem. I am not convinced, however, he was crying for Trump. He may have been crying for himself.
He's just a spineless coward. All that may be true - I for one don't doubt it for a minute - but his constant buckling under leaves me despising him.
I think about Jan 6 on the Senate floor when he said it had been a fun ride but he was done with Trump. Then he was harassed by a bunch of maggots at the airport and he did a complete about face and resumed his devotion to trump. He may be a tragic empty suit, but he is still a danger to our democracy
Exactly - he'd sell us out in a minute to avoid having someone yell at him. He already has.
Yep
EXACTLY!
and a coming attraction: tomorrow's picture will be a recent one of just Jubal.
in fact, Karen, you've inspired me. I'll do it right now.
Oh Jubal, what a beautiful friend.
I think you are right Gary.
The only good Republicans are pushing up daisies. Harry Truman
I love the way you make fun of, and nail these losers... like Opportunistic striver Elise Stefanik.
she might be the most pathetic of them all because she so transparently doesn't believe a word she's saying.
Yessir, the GQP has no character whatsoever, but it is full of characters…once Conservatives were honored as wise men, now the leaders of the GQP are a bunch of wise guys. Where once it was Sense and Sensibility, now it’s nonsense and insensibility, falling from the Party of Lincoln to a party of fratboys and goobers, united only in their hatred for the things that Lincoln espoused in his speeches, to tear apart the Union that Lincoln tried so hard to mend and preserve. All in the name of a vile, soulless travesty of a human being who represents themselves so well and who is their last, best, and only hope for their future…
I’m a Maine voter. I think its time we hear from Susan Collins. She hasn’t weighed in yet.
We await her ‘concerns’.
On a related note, I’ve thought for some time, that a fitting motto, below the republican elephant logo would be: Ex Ore Cacas
Much appreciate your swift, sure clarity. Your pen is as the blade of a Zen meat cutter.
Can these cretins possibly be the children and grandchildren of WWII vets?
she's a joke.
but I'm confused about the blade metaphor. do you mean it in the sense of being extraordinarily accurate and precise or in the sense of going through all the motions perfectly, but with no actual blade? I am assuming the former, but the latter is also fun to consider.
I'm thinking of that first killing in "Seven Samurai" in which Takashi Shimura cuts his giveaway pigtail to go in and kill the guy it's necessary to kill. the guys leaves the house he's in (appearing unhurt), stops suddenly and is dead before he hits the ground.
yeah, I think you mean the former...
From your first Comment I read about the Tonkin Gulf Incident too now, your words assure me I’m on the right side of reality. Thank you, TC.
There is no more republican party. They have burned it to
the ground.
The press keeps talking about the political problems for Alan Bragg. In Manhattan, where he the D.A., Trump did not carry a single precinct in the 2016 GOP primary, the 2016 general election, or the 2020 general election. Familiarity has bred contempt, indeed.
Sorry, couldn’t help myself
https://youtu.be/b5N7qHmEgxA
Good one.
definitely.
On MSNBC last night, one of the Central Park 5, Dr. Yussef Salaan, pointed out that Tuesday, April 4th, when tRump will be arraigned, is the 55th anniversary of Martin Luther King's death: "The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice.”
"In 1989, Mr. Trump placed full-page advertisements in four New York City newspapers, including The New York Times, calling for the state to adopt the death penalty for killers. He made clear that he was voicing this opinion because of the rape and assault of Trisha Meili, a woman who had been jogging in Central Park."
Holy mellotron, Batman!! Perfect choice, Karen, thank you! I have always loved the Moody Blues.
For Tuesday’s arrangement? That’s always been such a cool song.
I was watching Lawrence O’Donnell and he said Trump would be arraigned Tuesday afternoon. And that song started playing in my head and it just fit. It’s a great song.
That it is. I enjoyed listening to it again. 👍🏻
Karen, Thank You!!!!
Very interesting reading your list of the various Trump Republican echo chambers.
Fox News is today's Der Sturmer .
Another great column, sir..... The lamentably sad fact about the Republican Party and the current party leadership in the House is that they could not organize a shitting contest in a dysentery ward.....
I’m struggling to catch up with my reading this morning... turns out I may not have the stomach to get through it all, so here we are. One thing they say, especially Goon, “The American People” makes me instantly irate... I am an American and NONE of them speak for me. Not. One. Of. Them. I don’t think they even know real American people... they only know and parrot their fellow swine and demigod. This was my first read. I have several remaining. I don’t think I’m doing very well...
I prefer to think that a majority of Americans are not like djt. They don't begin the day thinking of ways to dupe the dupable or con the con-able. They don't ride down a "golden" escalator to make an announcement - I think that ride down was a metaphor for where djt was going to take the nation, and that has certainly been the case in some circles. Thankfully, not in all. I happen to agree that if Nixon had been indicted for criminal behavior the nation MIGHT have learned something from the process during a time when there was a republican party. David Brooks, last night on PBS, believes Ford did the right thing although it cost him the election in 1976. It does not seem to matter to DB that a majority of Americans believed Nixon should be held accountable and therefore the "pardon" was nothing more than whitewash over a very dark time indeed. He did seem to believe that djt has rightfully been indicted. I am just sorry that GA did not come in first or the DOJ. But...as someone wrote int he NYT letters, New Yorkers have known for years that djt is a criminal and engaged in criminal behavior. His indictment, according to these New Yorkers, is long overdue. If only Barr had not swept the whole russia investigation under the rug. Lots of "if only's". The reality is now that there is no republican party. There is no conservative party as such because the republican party is dead. They have no ideas. There one ploy now is to keep too many dumba** people riled up so they won't look at the other things this crowd of fascists is up to. Onward and Upward. DA Bragg, thank you for carrying through on the investigation. I cannot wait to hear the 30 counts and the names of any additional folks named in the indictment. Finally - thank goodness there is not some silly little talkative white girl at the head of the NYC Grand Jury who had to get her face on tv in GA. Maybe that is one reason nothing has happened there yet.