Sources say president has "retreated into a cocoon of bitterness and resentment."–> https://t.co/F79ICbrGgC
— Mark Z. Barabak (@markzbarabak) November 13, 2018
“Trump, stung by midterms and nervous about Mueller, retreats from traditional presidential duties” —
For weeks this fall, an ebullient President Trump traveled relentlessly to hold raise-the-rafters campaign rallies — sometimes three a day — in states where his presence was likely to help Republicans on the ballot.
But his mood apparently has changed as he has taken measure of the electoral backlash that voters delivered Nov. 6. With the certainty that the incoming Democratic House majority will go after his tax returns and investigate his actions, and the likelihood of additional indictments by special counsel Robert S. Mueller III, Trump has retreated into a cocoon of bitterness and resentment, according to multiple administration sources.
Behind the scenes, they say, the president has lashed out at several aides, from junior press assistants to senior officials. “He’s furious,” said one administration official. “Most staffers are trying to avoid him.”
The official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, painted a picture of a brooding president “trying to decide who to blame” for Republicans’ election losses, even as he publicly and implausibly continues to claim victory…
Funny how this guy is so often hailed as an innate PR genius.
"Trump told aides he thought he looked “terrible” and blamed his chief of staff’s office…for not counseling him that skipping the cemetery visit would be a public-relations nightmare."https://t.co/ipu4qmAqv0
— Helen Kennedy (@HelenKennedy) November 14, 2018
As Peggy Noonan once said: Let us savor. From the Washington Post, “Five days of fury: Inside Trump’s Paris temper, election woes and staff upheaval”:
… During his 43-hour stay in Paris, Trump brooded over the Florida recounts and sulked over key races being called for Democrats in the midterm elections that he had claimed as a “big victory.” He erupted at his staff over media coverage of his decision to skip a ceremony honoring the military sacrifice of World War I.
The president also was angry and resentful over French President Emmanuel Macron’s public rebuke of rising nationalism, which Trump considered a personal attack. And that was after his difficult meeting with Macron, where officials said little progress was made as Trump again brought up his frustrations over trade and Iran…
First lady Melania Trump shared her husband’s irritation and impatience with some of the staff. On Tuesday, amid reports that the president had decided to oust deputy national security adviser Mira R. Ricardel over tensions between her and other administration officials, the first lady’s office issued an extraordinary statement to reporters calling for her firing…
Melania Trump said in an October interview with ABC News that the president had people working for him whom she did not trust and that she has let her husband know. “Some people, they don’t work there anymore,” the first lady said…
First Lady Hillary Clinton channeled Eleanor Roosevelt; First Lady Melania Trump channels Edith Wilson.
…“Trump needs adulation, so heading into the midterms, holding these rallies, he was cheered and it became narcissistic fuel to his engine,” Brinkley said. “After the midterm, it’s the sober dawn of the morning.”…
The weaker and more aggrieved he feels, the harder he attacks and the more lies he tells. Hard to overstate how enraged he is feeling.
— Tony Schwartz (@tonyschwartz) November 14, 2018
It’s not just that the POTUS is historically awful at the easiest parts of his job, it’s that the people who are supposed to cover for him are awful at theirs too.
— Schooley (@Rschooley) November 13, 2018
Notice how Fox News stops tweeeting, and Trump stops Presidenting? https://t.co/23E2ZVl68A
— Dana Houle (@DanaHoule) November 13, 2018
Does anyone else find it suspicious that @FoxNews hasn’t tweeted in over 4 days?
— Alyssa Milano (@Alyssa_Milano) November 13, 2018
Accounts that have been dark… pic.twitter.com/rq6BXlPpf4
— Liz Malone #ProtectMueller (@Lizerenity) November 13, 2018
Let's be honest. Trump has spent most of his Administration in a cavern lit by Fox News programs, wailing about his misfortune. He did take a 2 month break from that to campaign, thinking that the election would prove people love him.
It turns out … they don't love him.
— emptywheel (@emptywheel) November 13, 2018
germy
Jill Stein has been tweeting again.
Old School
There are reports that the Twitter silence is a boycott centering around video showing Tucker Carlson’s address, but there doesn’t seem to be anything official confirming a conservative boycott.
Daoud bin Daoud
May The Malignant Mango Manbaby™ go every day of his miserable life spent in useless rage!
Elizabelle
I think this was my favorite sentence from the WaPost story:
Pretty much.
The Pale Scot
May is about to release the papers concerning her negotiations with the EU
Stand by with the Home Alone MaCaulay face
OMG, BBC reporter actually said “could they, would they? end limerick with your own ideas.
The DUP members look like the Slitheens’ skin suits, from Dr Who.
schrodingers_cat
@Elizabelle: The bull is a graceful symbol of virility, unlike D2H2 (Doll Hair Doll Hands)
schrodingers_cat
Idiot in chief, lit the Diwali lamp 4 days after the festival was over. Left out Hindus in his tweet. And made some other graceless comments. The selectmen in my town of a couple of thousand have more poise and grace than the man in the WH.
Platonailedit
Why? The totus thug should be happy and proud. He once again proved in Europe last week that he is the very epitome of ugly american.
Elizabelle
@schrodingers_cat: I think your garden variety animal of any sort has more virtues than Trump.
Frankensteinbeck
He happens to be what Republican voters and the media like. It’s not really a calculated strategy, because that implies he could do anything else. He can’t.
japa21
Apparently Melania is the one that wears the pants in the WH. What a wuss Donald is, to allow himself to be ordered around by his wife.
Donald the Wuss should be a new meme.
MattF
I’m guessing indictments a-comin’ in. But, also, it could be that moment when the lickspittles all suddenly realize that Trump is not, after all, a genius.
Camel’s backs do break, eventually.
donnah
When one card falls, the rest of the deck follows. Trump was super pumped up from his Public Adoration Rally Tour, and now that is over until he starts campaigning for 2020. So no big venues of waves and cheers. Then the election that he believed would vindicate him and prove his popularity and leadership comes along and he sees the hard numbers of losing the House and not radically changing the Senate. Then he fusses with Teresa May and pouts like a child in France, alienating other world leaders when he can least afford to. Rumors of NKorea not listening to demands for disarmament, cold shoulder from Putin…and then Melania whining about East Wing nonsense. And with the grim reaper/Mueller standing in the shadows, Trump must be strung as tightly as a bow string.
He’s pissy and he’s going to be dangerous because he’ll be unpredictable. This is not a diplomat, a sage, or a even decent human being. He’ll be lashing out right and left, making up lies and seeking vindication. It’s going to be a rough week, or more.
geg6
How these WH staffers must hate themselves to have tethered themselves and their families’ fortunes to that piece of shit fouling the Oval Office. I’d feel sorry for them but, unfortunately, I really don’t care, do you?
germy
So! Is Friday the day for Mueller indictments?
JGabriel
LA Times via Anne Laurie @ Top:
Show him a mirror.
[Pause.]
On the other, maybe not. Now that I give it further consideration, I suppose there’s at least a 50/50 chance that Benedict Bloodsucker has no reflection.
Cermet
Maybe he will OD on his med’s or at least, step off a rather high chair next to a balcony railing. One can hope.
FlipYrWhig
As far as I can tell Donald Trump *gestated* in a cocoon of bitterness and resentment and he’s been living in it ever since.
Ceci n est pas mon nym
@donnah:
He announced his campaign for 2020 within days of taking the oath of office, one more norm he has broken. Those rallies ARE campaign rallies.
As long as his outrages are confined to Twitter and he keeps his hands off our country, he can stew in his cocoon of bitterness and resentment all he wants.
Until the indictments and perp walk.
So idle speculation on the end game: When he goes full Hitler-in-the-bunker and actually nails shut the door to the living quarters, leaving only a Big-Mac-sized slot in the door, who will he take in there with him?
Kay
George W Bush did this after the financial crash. Remember that? All of a sudden Hank Paulson was President- the free marketeers all ran away and hid as their belief system crashed around them. It was one of the most cowardly things I’ve ever seen. There was a petulant quality to it- like we had NOT appreciated him and now he was just going to call off of work every day.
They’re baby-men. Not grownups.
MattF
@Ceci n est pas mon nym: Ivanka. Maybe Jared. Maybe.
JGabriel
@germy:
Could happen anytime between today and next Wednesday.
Or, if Mueller’s confident he’ll be around that long, he might wait until right before Christmas, just to really piss off Putin’s Puppet – or even till January, if he wants to wait until Dems control the House.
Platonailedit
May’s cabinet falls in line and backs her brexit ‘plan’. Now to await boris, the monkey’s tantrums.
SenyorDave
@donnah: This is not a diplomat, a sage, or a even decent human being.
THis point needs to be always emphasized. Trump is incapable of anything resembling empathy because he is an awful human being. The Pittsburgh synagogue shooting happened 10 days before the election. Trump’s first reaction was that it wouldn’t have happened if there had been armed guards. Not sympathy for victims. A tragedy like Pittsburgh offers a huge opportunity for a president to look presidential – emphasize healing, bringing people together. If Trump had done any of that the media would have started talking about the Trump pivot, how he showed the country how much he cares, etc. [Fortunately] Trump cannot do that, it is simply not possible.
FelonyGovt
A wax museum in San Francisco has temporarily installed an insultable Trump figure. I particularly like this: “Every other wax figure at Madame Tussauds has human hair, but Trump’s orange mane could not be realistically duplicated with anything human. The sculptor settled on yak hair…”
Kay
I bet Michigan really bothers them. They thought they had scored a permanent nutjob far Right majority there. They were sniffing around for national resources to exploit. Build some crappy scam-business.
MattF
@Platonailedit: There’s quite a long path to go before Brexit is approved, but this is the very first step.
Chyron HR
@MattF:
That’s the one with the big flappy ears, right?
JGabriel
@FlipYrWhig:
Probably as fair a description of Mary Anne Trump as any.
Roger Moore
Not quite. He’s been avoiding most traditional presidential duties, like appointing people to all the offices that require a presidential appointment and actually making important decisions, for most of his term. What he was doing before the election was holding campaign rallies where he could bask in the adulation of his cultists. That is a role of the president as party leader, but it isn’t a duty of his office. Now that the campaign is over, he doesn’t have the same party leader duties, so his inaction in his official duties stands out more. He’s probably also in a funk because he obviously failed so badly at the party leader stuff, given how badly his party did in the election, so he’s even less inclined than usual to do his real job.
Ceci n est pas mon nym
@SenyorDave: I’ve read articles on sociopathy and comments from actual sociopaths on how they navigate society. They often learn to be charming even though they actually feel no human connection. They learn what sort of emotional responses to mimic without actually feeling those emotions.
Trump is so far outside the norms of human behavior that he doesn’t even appear to know what emotions to pretend to.
MattF
@Ceci n est pas mon nym: However, it seems we have an answer to the question of whether he ‘realizes’ that he’s lying all the time. He does, for some value of ‘realize’.
Kay
This is genuinely great news for us:
The Cheney’s- their finger on the pulse of the nation. We’ll have to remind younger people how extremely horrible they are. They won’t know.
Caracal
@germy: GS needs to crawl back under the black rock that is her home and STFU. Forever.
Brachiator
Is Amazon stocking these cocoons of bitterness? I’d like to order a few as Christmas gifts for right wing nutcases.
@Elizabelle:
What a wonderful description.
JGabriel
SF Chronicle via FelonyGovt:
Everyone should go take a look at the accompanying photos on that article. The sculptor really did a great job of capturing Trump’s uncanny lack of humanity.
eric
@Kay: an excellent choice because she tested out that message in a purple state just like where the battles will be in 2020……oh, wait, nevermind
Brachiator
@Platonailedit:
Boris may want to order a cocoon of bitterness and resentment. And also maybe put one aside for Jacob Rees-Mogg.
MattF
@JGabriel: It’s quite possible that the original isn’t human hair.
WaterGirl
@JGabriel: You are right!
The Moar You Know
The most powerful man in America is a sulky crybaby with less impulse control than my dog. Awesome.
JGabriel
@Kay:
I’m sure Liz can do that all on her own. Besides, I’m not sure they’d believe us until they see it for themselves.
__________________________
Edited to Add:
TPM:
So, Liz Cheney thinks the GOP’s strategy problem – the same GOP that’s gone full tilt on racism, xenophobia, transphobia, misogyny, Islamophobia, climate change denial, and so on, the same GOP that comes out in full support of the NRA and *More Guns for Wackjobs* every time there’s a mass murder – Cheney thinks the GOP’s problem is that it’s not *aggressive* enough?
What’s their goal? To make *Nazis* look moderate?
eric
@Brachiator: maitre d, cocoon for two.
FlipYrWhig
@Roger Moore:
How much experience does he have doing a real job? I figure he’s always been like this. Shout, say random shit, count on other people to pick up the pieces, and wait for the accountants to dump money into his account.
Kay
Oh, bullshit. They’re only covering it because they’re hoping to see Pelosi humiliated. One of the Democrats should bring up a policy issue. That’ll clear the room.
Brachiator
Elsewhere, California is getting more and more blue.
When Trump emerges from his cocoon of bitterness, like Dracula arising from his tomb, I expect him to get back to trying to punish California for defying him.
Martin
I’ve said all along they will carry Trump out of the White House. I think that’s increasingly likely from here on out. Inside he knows he’s a loser (look at the insults he throws – they are all projection) and rather than accept that he demands external validation that he’s not a loser. Telling a lie and having the crowd accept it is sufficient, for a while. You’ll note that the rate and scope of the lying has only grown in an increasingly desperate effort to feel validated. Most people can’t sustain this over long periods of time, but extremely wealthy or famous people can. They have the resources to shape their environment enough to keep it going. Trump, however, has hit the end state. He’s lost the ability to shape his environment – the White House is a fishbowl more than a bunker. All eyes are on him, which feels good when it’s positive, but when it’s asserting that he’s a loser, he can’t cope. He can’t overpower the WaPo. He can’t overpower House Democrats. He can’t fully deny the election results. He can’t fire he way out of this, or hide for a few months and re-emerge with a new venture like he used to do. He’s trapped, and he’s going to be forced to come face to face with his own limitations, something he probably hasn’t had to do in half a century. He will continue to spiral outward until it breaks him.
I almost feel bad for him. His kids should have intervened ages ago. They should have spoken out against him running for office. But as he’s doing harm to so many other people, I don’t care what happens to him. The sooner we reach the endgame the better.
JGabriel
@MattF:
It’s quite possible that the original isn’t human.
Karen S.
@SenyorDave:
The media has set the bar so low for Drumpf and he can’t still can’t clear it. But of course he can’t because things like the tragedy in Pittsburgh and the Remembrance Day/Veterans Day ceremonies in France and at Arlington National aren’t about him.
Martin
@JGabriel:
Extinction burst. We’re gonna run the white supremacy playbook right to the end. More voter suppression. More gerrymandering. More pain and suffering until whites become great again.
Mnemosyne
@schrodingers_cat:
The Giant Evil Corporation is only just doing their first Diwali party today, but I think they had scheduling issues because they waited too long to try and book things. Hopefully they’ll get it together and have it at the right time next year.
Last week, I was pulling into the parking garage at our apartment and there was a group of people standing outside waving sparklers around. I was like, “WTF?” and then I saw the women were wearing saris and was like, “Oh, right, it’s Diwali.”
JGabriel
@FlipYrWhig:
As a New Yorker who’s lived in the same city as that asshole for about three decades, and who knows people who know him, I can confirm that what you figure is indeed correct.
Kay
@JGabriel:
She ran a lobbying grift after Bush II that was a real flop. She was sending direct mail to Ohio from a PO Box in Virginia. I remember thinking “WTF does Liz Cheney know about RTW in Ohio?”
They never go away. They’re always waiting for the next opening. It’s only interesting because they must feel threatened with Trump in charge, like this is going south fast. The Bushies ready and waiting to fill the void at the top.
Barbara
@Martin: His adult kids long ago figured out that the only way to his heart or at least his consideration of their financial well-being is through flattery. They are the worst offenders of all. They are and will always be supporting figures in his universe, eating at his trough. Doing anything that would diminish his standing is simply unthinkable to them.
Dorothy A. Winsor
@Roger Moore: I don’t think he has the faintest idea what a normal president would do on a day-by-day, hour-by-hour basis. When I think about it, I don’t either. Is that abnormal?
Mandalay
So Kasich is floating trial balloons on twitter for running against Trump in 2020:
Anyone else? Haley has already said no, so Romney is the only other possibility I can think of. All the rest are Trump’s playthings, and terrified of him.
Brachiator
@Ceci n est pas mon nym:
Ivanka.
JGabriel
OC Register via Brachiator:
Making Orange County the place the GOP went to die.
debit
@Barbara: Evidence:
dmsilev
Seen elsewhere on the Internet, Trump will emerge from his cocoon transformed into a bitterfly.
rikyrah
@Kay:
truth
Mike in NC
Feeling down in the dumps, is he? Great. Time for Fat Bastard to schedule another hate rally in a shithole state that he carried. Our tax dollars at work.
Gin & Tonic
@Martin:
Not me. Not even “almost.”
Mnemosyne
@Ceci n est pas mon nym:
That’s what marks him as a narcissist, not a sociopath. There’s a certain amount of overlap because they’re both Cluster B personality disorders, but narcissists are too disconnected from the people around them to be able to read them successfully. They usually rely on doing whatever they want and daring other people to try and stop them.
MattF
@debit: But, you know, there has to be a real test at some point. Who, among the applauding crowd, will actually scuttle over to a puddle of spittle and lap it up?
Patricia Kayden
@germy: I’ve yet to hear Dr. Stein explain her dinner with Flynn, Putin and Company in Russia before the 2016 election. That’s one odd egg.
debit
@MattF: Don Jr.
It appears my earlier exclamation of dismay and disgust has disappeared. Probably for the best.
Martin
@Brachiator:
Californian’s are literally dying in fires. We’ll come out on top in the end. To quote a great man, “We’ll launch our own damn satellite.”
Orange County went from being a Republican stronghold. In many ways the Republican stronghold, in the sense that unlike Alabama, Orange County is what the party of Reagan always wanted the GOP to look like. In 2 years OC voted for a Democrat for president for the first time in decades, and I expect by tonight or tomorrow night Democrats will be leading in every OC district – CA 38, 39 (flip), 45 (flip), 46, 47, 48 (flip), 49 (flip). That’s remarkable.
On the counts, it looks like these are almost entirely mail in ballots received on or after election day. Provisional ballots come next, which I expect will be more Dem friendly, but may not be. We’ll see.
Brachiator
@Mandalay:
Right now, I don’t expect Trump to have any significant opposition. Romney could provide comedy relief, much as Harold Stassen did in 1984, when he was the token opposition to Ronald Reagan. Stassen got 0.19 percent of the primary vote.
The Republican Party wrecked itself in order to accommodate Trump. They can’t undo the self-inflicted damage and change direction.
The Moar You Know
@Dorothy A. Winsor: No. It’s not abnormal. There’s a lot to it. All I know it’s a ballbuster of a job. Ever W, who was pretty fuckin’ lazy when you get down to it, came out looking twenty years older than when he went in. He took the duties far more seriously than the current president, another sentence I never thought I’d be typing.
I am pretty sure it does NOT involve nothing but watching clips of yourself on TV while eating McDonalds naked in your unmade bed, which so far as I can tell is what Trump is doing. The president’s duties are being fulfilled by whoever John Kelly farms them out to. I’d like to know who those people are. It is not the Kushner maggot or his vile wife, or either one of Trump’s worthless boys.
Funny, isn’t it, how Trump was so concerned about naming his kid after himself “in case he’s a failure” and that’s exactly what the little shitbag turned out to be?
germy
@Patricia Kayden: She was laying the groundwork for world peace. At least that’s how she explains it.
BruceFromOhio
Yes, please go away. Go far away. Don’t come back. And take your Twitter accounts and all your idiot followers with you.
Roger Moore
@Dorothy A. Winsor:
I think it’s perfectly normal for an ordinary citizen not to know the details about what an ordinary president does hour by hour and day by day. I’m a big believer that the ideal government is one that’s well enough run we can afford to ignore it most of the time, and that includes ordinary people not needing to know the details of the president’s schedule. I do think it’s wrong for somebody running for an office not to understand what’s involved in the job they’re running for, and I sure as hell don’t think it’s OK for an office holder not to know or care about what they’re supposed to be doing with their time.
Kay
I don’t know about the rest of them but Tim Ryan is horrible, so just be wary :)
P-H-O-N-Y, from the get-go.
Tim C.
@geg6: There’s a moment in one of the last episodes of “Band of Brothers” that’s been in my mind. One of the American soldiers is on a truck going past a huge column of surrendered German soldiers. And he loses it. He just starts shouting at them. “WHAT DID YOU THINK WOULD HAPPEN? INTERRUPTING OUR LIVES TO COME HERE AND…” I could probably find a clip of it somewhere. That’s how I feel when talking to Republicans who have sads about Trump.
MattF
Dems have now gained 34 seats, according to the NYT.
Dorothy A. Winsor
@Roger Moore: The presidency is one of those jobs where you have to structure your own day. I suspect Trump isn’t good at that.
Brachiator
@Barbara:
Trump as a farcical King Lear…
Sadly, none of them are Cordelia. They are all monsters on the grift, looking for the most they can boost for themselves.
Mandalay
@debit:
I think this exhibition of sycophancy is qualitatively different from the one early in Trump’s presidency when Priebus et al had to sing Trump’s praises to keep their jobs.
All of these executives are many millions of dollars richer directly because of Trump. They really do think he is great. The incompetence, the racism, the misogyny, the national debt and the lies are irrelevant sideshows to them; tax cuts are how you win the hearts of the rich.
Patricia Kayden
@schrodingers_cat: Our dogs and cats have more grace than Trump. That’s a very low bar. I wonder if Republicans will inch away from him now that they no longer fully control Congress. He’s disgraceful and keeps getting worse.
A Ghost To Most
Shit Hitler is a symptom. Malignant Cancervatism (TM) is the disease.
MattF
@Brachiator: Cordelia was sweet, but a little cold.
jonas
@geg6: I’m always bemused by these staffers who gripe to reporters about how the president is being, for the millionth time, a narcissistic, petulant man child. “The wtf are you doing working for him?” is my response. The man is manifestly unfit for office and here you are…
Mnemosyne
@Kay:
I’m convinced that what they’re going to try to do is install a younger woman as a figurehead “speaker” and then be the power behind the throne. It’s what Tom DeLay did, so of course they think it’s a great idea.
I still think Nancy is smarter than they are and will manage to outmaneuver them, but I’m worried that the incoming freshman class of reps could be snowed by the propaganda and vote against her without realizing how they were manipulated.
Yarrow
Speak of Republicans, this is interesting:
And as we’ve discussed a bit before, cracks between evangelical women and the GOP already starting to form. It’ll be interesting to watch that demo going forward.
MCA1
@Ceci n est pas mon nym: He’s too lazy to be one of those high-functioning sociopaths.
I’d imagine learning and then mimicking actual human behavior the way many sociopaths do is hard work and requires a longterm expenditure of mental energy. It’s not so much that his narcissism is so raging it prevents him from recognizing the patterns or faking them, but that, true to form, his laziness made him settle on just being a gigantic asshole at all times and breaking every norm available, knowing that 99% of the time conflict avoidance in others will let him ride.
Roger Moore
@The Moar You Know:
Like father, like son.
JGabriel
@WaterGirl:
Danke.
Jeffro
@Martin: Here’s an endgame for Trumpov: resign, or we’ll RICO your ass(ets). Humiliation or humiliation + broke, which do you want, jackass?
Roger Moore
@Dorothy A. Winsor:
Some, but not completely. A big part of the job of the Chief of Staff is to structure the president’s day for him so he doesn’t have to spend time doing it himself. The president is still supposed to set the priorities, but the CoS takes care of the details.
JPL
TRUMP: “If you buy a box of cereal — you have a voter ID”
@samstein
JPL
@jonas: Some of them might have to pay the bills, and can’t afford to leave. I hear you though.
TenguPhule
What emerges is a caterpillar with a very small proboscis.
Yarrow
@Kay:
If anyone is in one of these #FiveWhiteGuys districts get on the phone and call their offices and let them know this isn’t acceptable.
Roger Moore
@Jeffro:
I have a better idea. The endgame is a choice between running off to live in exile or spending the rest of his miserable life in maximum security prison. There’s no skipping out on punishment for his many crimes by offering to give up his ill gotten office.
WaterGirl
@debit:
I clicked and now I can’t decide whether to go with Wow or Oh my god.
TenguPhule
@germy:
Speculation is he’s still waiting for the elections to finish.
I sure hope not, because depending on the recounts and appeals, it could be a damn long wait.
Sloane Ranger
Michel Barnier, the EU top negotiator, now speaking. It seems they’ve kicked the Irish border question down the line. Negotiations to continue until 2020 with a backstop of NI and UK remaining in some sort of customs union if no agreement reached. If I’ve understood correctly, the Gibraltar border and British military bases in Cyprus issues have been agreed.
Agreement is over 500 pages long so will take time to digest but may not survive getting through Parliament, where almost everyone hates it despite not having read it.
TenguPhule
@Ceci n est pas mon nym:
He could never keep his hands off country first. What makes you think he’ll start now?
ruemara
@The Moar You Know:
FTFY
@jonas: They’re ticks on the bloated carcass.
@Roger Moore: That’s where I am. Exile with confiscation of assets or the military punishment for treason and his name struck from the records except as a traitor. But I am a traditionalist in somethings. Like blood eagles.
Brachiator
@MattF:
Shakespeare’s female heroes tend to be plain speakers. But they are not cold.
MattF
@Sloane Ranger: Is there a summary somewhere?
TenguPhule
@donnah:
This is Donald Trump.
He thinks he will get away with everything. Because he always has so far.
I would pay good money to be there when he learns otherwise.
JPL
@WaterGirl: I remembered when that happened. It’s similar to his cabinet meetings where they all kiss his feet, but more evil. Give me tax breaks..
Jeffro
@Roger Moore: I would definitely prefer your choices be the only choices presented to him. I think many, many charges will await him the day he leaves office and I can see him thinking he will lawyer up…but I can also see him fleeing to Mother Russia, too. Who knows? But he sure isn’t going to get re-elected in 2020.
Manyakitty
Does it seem to anyone else like this has been a relatively slow news day? Especially after all the indictment hype of earlier this week. I need to see some perp walks! Maybe Large Adult Son 1?
TenguPhule
@Sloane Ranger:
What do you mean, almost?
WaterGirl
I really shouldn’t be laughing at this because it’s horrifying and terrifying that the person who could say this is the president of the united states:
Martin
@Gin & Tonic: I can’t help but see him as someone with a disorder. With a lot of disorders, the person suffering from it can’t often see the harm being done, or can’t figure out how to correct it. Depression works this was as well. You need to rely on people around you to help, at least when things get really bad. His kids should have been those people, and they weren’t. Instead they enabled him and put him in a situation that is bad for him, knowing full well that his disorder causes him to seek out such situations. This is akin to helping a drug addict find the nearest dealer. They need help.
My wife mentioned last night why elected Republicans seem to be such horrible people. I said it’s because Republican voters demand or at least tolerate horrible people. All of those people at rallies cheering on his racist lies are going to kill him. They’re the ones destroying the GOP, not the reps themselves.
MCA1
@Martin: I think it’s time for a fuller accounting again, since I’ve sort of lost track with all the late counts a week+ after election night. If those two additional seats in Orange County flip, how many is that in total for Democrats in the House this cycle? 36?
Sinema puts the Democrats back at 47 Senators (asterisk for the two Independents), right? So if by some miracle either Espy or Nelson were to win, then it’s only a net loss of 1? That’s pretty good for the worst map imaginable.
Anyone have a good source with an updated count on all the state leg flips? Getting close to 400?
Brachiator
@Sloane Ranger:
Very interesting. The EU appears to be doing its best to help the UK over what might have been a very difficult issue, the Irish border question. I imagine that even an agreement to postpone a resolution must upset the crap out of the DUP.
TenguPhule
@MattF:
The deadline is next March.
TenguPhule
@Caracal:
if that rock should happen to crush her underneath it, I won’t complain either.
JGabriel
@WaterGirl:
I think Oh, FFS is probably the de rigueur reaction.
Dorothy A. Winsor
@JPL: What? Has the man never bought groceries?
TenguPhule
@JGabriel:
Is this a trick question?
GregB
Trumpy is locked away in his fortress of derpitude.
MattF
@WaterGirl: Just imagine the howls of outrage if there was -any- evidence whatsoever that this was happening.
TenguPhule
@Martin:
Uh no, this is a dangerous mistaken belief. He still has that ability. But it would have to be really crazyball shaping. And that’s not really comforting.
JGabriel
@TenguPhule:
Could be, though I’m not sure why. The point is for the prosecutor to not affect the election. Whether or not the count is complete, there are no more votes to be cast, so it should be fine for Mueller to file indictments at this point.
debit
@WaterGirl:
That’s his favorite line. It’s a DISGRACE I think it’s disgraceful! And you no one ever asks him, exactly what is the disgrace? What IS going on? Can you prove it? What’s your source?
I wish our media would take a lesson from this guy.
TenguPhule
@Manyakitty:
Calm before the storm.
Mandalay
@Kay:
Speaking of tea party tactics, the odious tea party animal Dave Brat, who just got slung out of office, had this in his written concession statement:
Except Brat voted against giving the military a raise less than two months ago. He wisely avoided mentioning that he also voted for all of Trump’s tax cuts despite having a balanced budget as the cornerstone of everything he stood for since he ran for election in 2014.
Beyond shameless.
Brachiator
@Manyakitty:
I don’t know. If Trump really is having a melt-down, who knows what the ramifications of this might be.
TenguPhule
@JGabriel:
Could be he’s trying to make it clear he’s no Comey so the FBI has a clear example of how things are supposed to be done.
Or he could be waiting until Pelosi is speaker to cut out the Republicans from the line of command when Pence and Trump are indicted simultaniously.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@JGabriel: Yes, this, short of Trump doing a full born Hitler Downfall style rant followed by a mass suicide of the GOP leadership while screaming “you liberals won’t have us conservatives to kick around anymore” streamed live on You Tube, were is the GOP left go with the emotional outbursts?
Martin
@Jeffro: Doesn’t work that way. He did nothing wrong, because reasons. Only people he trusts can talk him down. That’s his kids and Melania, and pretty much nobody else as far as I can tell. If he did something wrong and the people he trusts didn’t call him out on it, then it must have actually been okay.
You put that kind of threat in front of him and he’ll escalate. He’ll keep going until he’s handcuffed or he’s dead. He can’t back down because he can’t face himself as a loser. I’m not saying to not do those things, but don’t expect him to resign. He can’t. Hitler was also a narcissist and that ended with a gunshot in a bunker.
Brachiator
@MattF: From BBC News:
The story includes a link to a document summarizing the 585 page agreement in more detail.
ETA: One of the links is to the full 585 page draft agreement.
TenguPhule
@Dorothy A. Winsor:
Donald Trump has never paid for anything using his own money in his life.
Matt McIrvin
@Mnemosyne: Whatever they do they better not screw around. I don’t care so much if they elect Pelosi or some other Democrat, but if they split the actual vote and elect a Republican Speaker that would pretty much be the ultimate self-own.
Manyakitty
@TenguPhule: I know…but still! Come ON.
@Brachiator: Reasonable. Maybe they’re keeping him medicated and stuck in front of a tv playing back one of his old rallies or something.
JGabriel
@TenguPhule: Heh. I suppose the answer is already self-evident.
TenguPhule
@MattF:
All of em, Katie.
They signed away their dignity as part of the NDA.
Manyakitty
@TenguPhule: This is a good rationale.
Martin
@TenguPhule:
I think we’re saying the same thing. Yes, there are many more rungs to this ladder, but then we’re in the territory that even Hannity and Pirro start to waver and either the folks at the rallies stop cheering, or the Secret Service decide that anyone who would cheer is too much of a threat. We do have enough checks and balances in this system still working that I don’t think there’s much further he can go and still keep the appearance of support. It is possible to out-crazy Fox News. It’s not a state I want to see either, but their depravity isn’t entirely bottomless.
JGabriel
@debit:
I always assume the disgrace Trump’s referencing is his own presidency.
Mnemosyne
@Martin:
The people he trusts never, ever call him out on anything. They reassure him that HE did the right thing but someone else screwed up, so now they’re going to fix what someone else — not Trump — broke.
They enable him, because that’s the only way to live with a toxic narcissist. If they can’t find a scapegoat for his mistakes, they just lay low and hope the storm blows over soon.
JGabriel
@TenguPhule:
In more ways than one. Wintry mix forecast for most of the Northeast over the next couple days.
The Moar You Know
@ruemara: Nope. Just isn’t true anymore.
Most powerful person in the world, well, a few months back before the elections I would have said “Angela Merkel” but she’s lost most of her clout in Germany these days and is lame ducking until their next elections. And Europe has no equivalent as of yet. So I’m gonna go with Xi Jinping.
We have lots of money and a lot of the nukes, but we’re broken. We can’t even do the Easter Egg roll on the White House lawn anymore without fucking it up to the point of worthlessness. And the entire world knows it. It’s not going to be an American in my lifetime again. I’m OK with that, but there will be repercussions to it that the citizens of this nation will feel.
TenguPhule
@Martin:
Yes please.
Mandalay
@MattF: This link give a good summary of the objections from Jacob Rees-Mogg.
Of course Rees-Mogg is after May’s job, so he’s not exactly an impartial observer.
Kay
@WaterGirl:
It doesn’t work like it used to, though, the ridiculous voter fraud claims. They beat that to death. Only their base believe it now.
Updated voting administration laws won all over the country. People just want to vote in an orderly and convenient and fair process. The golden era of voter fraud fraudsters is over. It’s as dead as terrorism fear-mongering. The bullshit they exploit has about a 15 year shelf life.
Mnemosyne
@Matt McIrvin:
I don’t think there’s much danger of a Republican being elected Speaker, but we could well end up with a conservative Democrat like Hoyer or Tim Ryan who sells themselves as the alternative to Pelosi.
Or, as I said, a figurehead speaker run from behind the scenes by the conservative Democrats. And the “left” would be thrilled with that because it would “prove” that the Democrats are all secret conservatives who can’t be trusted and you fools never should have voted for them in the first place rather than staying home in protest like we told you to.
sdhays
@Kay:
To be fair to W, I think this was less cowardice than being completely out of his depth. He was (is!) an extremely mediocre intellect. I’m reminded reports after the election which described him reading the speech he was supposed to deliver from the Oval Office just before going live on TV and asking why we were giving billions to the banks who destroyed the economy – and President Paulson basically told him to shut up and read it. He literally wasn’t in control, pretty much ever. The difference was that he was able to play along other times because he at least understood “war good, Democrats bad”. But dealing with a crisis of Republicans’ making? He didn’t even know what he was supposed to pretend.
He was a much shittier and incompetent President than the media likes to pretend he was.
ruemara
@The Moar You Know: Yes & no. We are greatly diminished, but there’s also the fact that our military might & our economic might is nigh unparalleled. That has not changed & is why electing Trump was so dangerous.
Haroldo
@Yarrow:
I just got off the phone with a staffer of Mouton’s local office here in MA. Moulton is tallying constituent calls on this matter, and I let the staffer know of my disappointment with ol’ Seth.
JPL
@TenguPhule: He had an interview with Daily Caller and twitter tells me that he thinks you need a voter ID to buy cereal. Broward County has people voting twice. They go back to their car and changes shirts and hats.
Matt McIrvin
@Kay: The exception is voter ID. Most people are for it and will not be convinced otherwise. We might have to push for forms of ID that do the least damage.
Sloane Ranger
@TenguPhule: Well, Teresa May doesn’t hate it and they’ve just interviewed a Tory MP who talked it up so that’s at least two MP’s!
TenguPhule
@Martin:
I think we’re in disagreement over how much further the Republican party is still willing to go. The Hannity’s may be hedging their bets by trying to appear less cultish, but its far too late for that. They’re all in at this point. All of the people who supported him have no choice but to keep going where he’s leading them, because all exits off this road to hell lead to personal indictments at best. Their capacity for depravity is limitless if it promises them being able to avoid any punishment or retribution for their treason.
Trump still can order a military strike against any other country and the officers have no choice but to obey or resign. And the current crop of generals didn’t get to be generals by being moral creatures willing to do what was right. These folks date back to the Bush regime of GOP butt kissing.
Gravenstone
@Roger Moore:
You know full well that Trump is fundamentally unable to accept blame, for anything. He’s casting about for scapegoats anywhere and everywhere. It started election night with his bizarre rant about how all the Republicans who fell refused his “embrace”. In his mind, he’s still golden, it’s everyone else who’s failed.
TenguPhule
@JPL:
The GOP puke funnel is already insisting this is a practice run by Democrats to steal the 2020 election.
All accusations are confessions.
jonas
@Yarrow: And between older and younger evangelicals. Self-identified evangelicals tend to be white (of course) and older. You have younger evangelicals, to be sure, but they’re 1. not as numerous, 2. more diverse and 3. not the hyper-partisan, single-issue voters their parents and grandparents were. They are most certainly not at home in the current Trumpist GOP.
Kay
Be ashamed, buddy. You used those people in a political stunt. Commandeered them to work on behalf of the Republican Party. An honorable person would have resigned rather than do it, but you’re not that.
LuciaMia
Dont forget the Groucho glasses!
boatboy_srq
Melania may be channeling Edith Wilson in more ways than you suggest:
Sloane Ranger
@Brachiator: They’re outraged – of course, that’s their default condition.
Gravenstone
@eric:
Tahnee Welch not included.
TenguPhule
@Kay:
This would be the same base Trump is trying to radicalize into going full Nazi.
They’re already accusing Democrats of using this as practice to steal the 2020 elections.
Violence is already sporadically erupting from Trump’s green light to hate non-whites. I think its about to get worse.
danjos
@Ceci n est pas mon nym: Has anyone else noticed that his eyes seem completely void of life? Freakishly zombie like.
JPL
@Kay: TRUE. The idea that Kelly and Mattis were the good guys was bullshit. He also said that his mother told him stories about how difficult it was to come into the country but she did it legally. BTW She came to this country as a baby from Canada.
Ruckus
@JGabriel:
Well, going over the top has been their only working plan so far. Culminating in drumpf. Although he may be the exact opposite of what most people would consider over, and he is more like a crappy journey to the bottom.
TenguPhule
@Kay:
Sadly Mattis has no shame.
He is Starscream and determined to have his crown or die trying.
Dorothy A. Winsor
@Matt McIrvin: And for automatic access to the ID. Iowa Rs enacted a voter ID law last year. It was totally unnecessary, but it had a provision whereby the registered voter list was cross referenced with the driver’s license records, and any registered voter who did not have a driver’s license was automatically sent an ID. At least, that was the theory. I’ve moved, so I don’t know how that worked out.
Gravenstone
@Mandalay: Oh goody a Reagan callback just to seal the deal with, who exactly?
schrodingers_cat
@Kay: If the generals, who many had pinned their dwindling hopes about this administration on were really honorable they would never have agreed to become a part of this shit show. Or stood behind the President as props when he signed the Muslim ban executive order.
They would have stood up to T like Sally Yates did.
tobie
@Mnemosyne: The left has wanted Pelosi’s head for some time and the media has rewarded them mightily for the hostility. I first saw Rashida Tlaib on TV in Feb 2018. Why was she spotlighted? Because she loudly and proudly opposed Pelosi. The hate was literally her ticket onto national TV. I don’t see her changing her tune any time soon.
Barbara
I clicked on the link to LA Times above and in the middle of that article read the following:
He won’t even meet with a head of state who comes to him. How could that be normal?
BC in Illinois
I am waiting to hear from Nicola Sturgeon on the Brexit details. If, as it seems, the proposal gives a different status to Northern Ireland in regards to the EU market, than the rest of the UK, it will face solid opposition in Scotland. If Northern Ireland has access to the single market and Scotland does not, a new vote on Scottish independence would not be out of the question.
Whether that’s economically feasible remains to be seen. The Scottish National Party is firmly committed to Scotland’s future in the EU — trade, travel, immigration, the whole package. More commitment to the EU than to the UK.
Mnemosyne
@Matt McIrvin:
The biggest problem is that a lot of states have been requiring a birth certificate to get a voting ID, and there is a cohort of older African-Americans born at home in the South who either have no birth certificate or don’t have one that the state will accept. They were born at home because the segregated hospitals at the time refused to admit Black patients.
The documentation requirements need to be a LOT more forgiving, especially for older people who were born before documenting everything was as necessary as it is now.
Also, states should be required to provide a FREE copy of someone’s birth certificate for purposes of voting. They already do that for veterans who are trying to claim benefits, so let’s do that for voters, too. Remove that $40 poll tax.
gvg
I think Mueller may have to wait till a new House is sworn in to drop indictments. I think the current GOP would try and cover everything up and get charges in from to judges who dismiss them, etc. If some things get ruled on, we don’t necessarily get to redo them later. I have been worried about the lame duck period for a while as I don’t trust them. It shouldn’t be necessary, but I am afraid it is. Of course some of the most likely treasonous people lost their elections, but not all of them. they don’t get the attention he does but some of them I suspect of just as bad.
Mnemosyne
@tobie:
I actually suspect that Tlaib and other anti-Pelosi Democrats may change their tune once they actually meet her face-to-face and realize they were misled. That was apparently a very common thing that happens with Hillary Clinton as well — people meet her and realize that she’s not actually the caricature that they had been told she is.
Nancy is an old campaigner. Look how deftly she handled AOC yesterday and got her to send out a message of unity. I suspect she’s going to be able to win over people like Tlaib, too, once they actually meet her.
Aleta
Re WH use of Acosta, and the hearing
From Jason Schwartz @JasonSchwartz
TenguPhule
@schrodingers_cat:
Actually they had only two options. Follow orders or resign.
They decided to follow orders. And once again, they will have to be taught that its not an acceptable excuse for Crimes against Humanity.
Yarrow
@Haroldo: Thanks for calling! Other people need to call too. Call your reps, everyone! Let them know you back Nancy SMASH!
Ruckus
@Martin:
The reps are giving them the opportunity to be shitty people they want to be. The reps don’t get a pass.
Brachiator
@tobie:
The purity pony left has long been co-opted by right wing conservative media and duped into opposing anyone who is a leader of the Democratic Party. The left reflexive see any Democratic Party leader (and of course, the party itself) as part of the Establishment. The GOP hits Pelosi and the Democrats from the other side, painting her and the party as wild eyed radicals. Lefty purity ponies should know better by now, but they just can’t help themselves,
TenguPhule
@Aleta:
I suspect Acosta is hung better then Trump.
When Trump is hanged, I will point and laugh.
JPL
@Aleta: Trump needs to held responsible for causing civil unrest, and that is putting it politely. He is fucking monster, who will be personally responsible when reporters are killed.
Since efg is around let me just say fuckem
Mandalay
@JPL:
Right, and the adulation and veneration that all “the generals” received from the media when they were appointed was completely absurd. Flynn turned out to be a crook. Kelly turned out to be a racist and a massive liar. Mattis has turned out to be Trump’s lackey. McMaster seems to be the only one to remain unscathed.
Barbara
@Aleta: It would be hard to argue that they could not remove people who are shouting out of turn or disrupting an event. Likewise, they can make decisions based on trying to cover a wide range of media in a limited space. What they can’t do is allocate spots based on what someone has written. The rules have to be viewpoint neutral. Thus, the fact that they are stating that they can remove people who are disruptive is significant because it shows that they know they would lose on the broader point of removing anybody for any reason, even if they are making that argument. In a normal situation, the court would make them state why Acosta was removed and if it was for being disruptive it would refuse to even get to the constitutional issue, because it would not be necessary. CNN, of course, would dispute the disruption argument as pretextual, which could lead to a hearing on the facts.
TenguPhule
Speaking of Kabuki
Theatre at its worst.
Yarrow
Ha! I just called my Rep’s office and a young woman answered the phone. I said I expected my Rep to support Nancy Pelosi for Speaker and I couldn’t believe that after this election and the number of women and people of color that were elected to the House that these five white guys were trying to overthrow Nancy Pelosi, a woman, for Speaker. Are you kidding me?! The woman on the phone sounded so grateful for my call and said they were tallying constituents’ calls on this issue.
Juicers, call your Reps and express your support for Nancy Pelosi! Let them know we’re out here. Especially if your rep is one of the guys listed above, but even if not it’s good to help stiffen the spines of the rest of them.
tobie
@Mnemosyne: @Brachiator: Here’s hoping Mnem’s right. I’d much rather be talking about the Democrats’ legislative agenda than caucus politics.
TenguPhule
@Mandalay:
He was also the only one that left without being arrested.
Fair Economist
@Mnemosyne: I like the idea of twisting the right’s voter ID nonsense back on them with a national ID system. There are a lot of crazy conservative conspiracy theories about national ID (mark of the beast, FEMA camps, etc.) and a lot will refuse to get them. I like the idea of their own nutty obsession blocking their own voters from the polls.
TenguPhule
https://apnews.com/7733065a8e0a4a448d46046ca50817b8
Utah Republican behind in tight race sues to halt vote count
I did not even know this race was yet to be called.
schrodingers_cat
@TenguPhule: Kelly and Mattis were retired only McMaster was active duty.
chopper
@Kay:
when pelosi keeps her leadership after the vote she should toast to tim ryan with a bottle of “dago red wine”, just cause fuck him.
Lapassionara
@Matt McIrvin: Some form of ID has usually been required, but not a picture ID. These are new and in many places onerous to get. When I first started voting, I could show a utility bill or bank statement with my current address on it. Now many states require something with a photo. For people who drive, their DL works, but many people do not drive. This is where disenfranchisement comes in.
Barbara
@TenguPhule: So wait a minute, stop counting when she is behind in the count? I guess she didn’t get the right play book on how to take advantage of phony voter fraud allegations.
Jeffro
@Mandalay: Beyond shameless, agreed. Hey, the Abby Spanberger store is still up and running – go grab some of that historic swag while you can, it makes great stocking stuffers!
Also F U Dave Brat
Barbara
@chopper: I am guessing that Nancy Patricia D’Alesandro Pelosi would not use the term Dago even among friends and family.
Lapassionara
@gvg: I thought Mueller had to send proposed indictments to Rosenstein before filing. Is that accurate? If so, then the person to send indictments to is now Whitaker, technically. So there may be indictments ready, but not yet sent to the AG, because there is a question about his capacity to hold office and also his need to recuse.
Mnemosyne
@Brachiator:
I’m trying to remember the old cliché about a battle plan never surviving contact with the enemy. Or another one similar to that, but less martial.
Either way, I suspect that the new elected representatives’ existing preconceptions about Nancy Pelosi are not going to survive actually meeting and interacting with her. Some of them may continue to cling to their ideology above actual reality on the ground, but if they do, they’re going to be pretty lousy reps for their districts and will end up being one-termers.
chopper
@JPL:
so…i can bring box tops to the polls?
Brachiator
@jonas:
This is not entirely true. From 538:
White evangelicals are wholly in on Trump, but this only alienates other groups, who refuse to buy in to Trump’s cruelty and bigotry.
Elements of the media contribute to this alienation by assuming that all evangelicals are white, and by treating devout nonwhites as though they are invisible.
chopper
@Aleta:
to which he turned and said “according to your mom i already am”
Hob
@Mnemosyne: There’s a nicely executed portrayal of a sociopath on, of all places, season 3 of Daredevil. You see the guy as a kid being coached by his therapist to at least simulate empathy, by saying things like “that sounds tough, I’m sorry.” Then when he’s an adult, you can’t help noticing that he uses the same phrase every time, because he’s still just doing it by rote.
I think it’s safe to say that Trump wouldn’t be able to keep that up.
Annie
Now that’s a little harsh on Edith Wilson. She genuinely loved Woodrow, and she either ran a successful business (a jeweler in Washington), or had the smarts to stay out of the way of the people who did run it.
Martin
@Ruckus:
I don’t mean to give the reps a pass, but if the reps stand up, then the voters will just find a different shitty rep. That is, the elected GOP can’t really fix this because they’re the symptom, not the cause. You can’t win at deplorable whack-a-mole. The only way to fix this is to take them out of power entirely.
Brachiator
@Mnemosyne:
I agree. Right now, this is not a major issue. We shall see.
Formerly disgruntled in Oregon
@Yarrow: I just called Kurt Schreader’s office and expressed my concern with his opposition to Pelosi, and my support for her returning as Speaker after this historic win.
I’m not technically in his district, but am close enough that my address used to be in his district in the 1990s, and could very well be so again in the 2020s. Nevertheless, his staffer was polite and took down my info.
barbequebob
@TenguPhule:
good thought but caterpillar stage comes before cocoon, not after
sorry, I’m a naturalist
debbie
Nothing has made me happier today than hearing of Trump’s unhappiness. I hope it eats him alive.
debbie
@debbie:
Well, there is one thing. Fox filing an amicus brief for CNN. That had to kill Trump. Et tu, Fox?
John Fremont
@Gin & Tonic: Me neither, Trump spent years insinuating Obama was a fraud with the birth certificate issue. Now that Trump is being shown to be the fraud , you reap what you sow!
Comrade Scrutinizer
@Brachiator:
And how did things work out for Cordelia?
debbie
@John Fremont:
The Law of the Universe triumphs again! You get back what you put out. Period.
Uncle Cosmo
@Roger Moore: Road apples don’t fall far from the horse’s ass.
notoriousJRT
@JGabriel:
Rim Shot.
evodevo
@Martin: His kids would never have intervened … Jared saw this as a unique grifting opportunity to solicit funds to get him out from under his billion dollar debt problem. Probably Uday and Qusay saw other opportunities. No, they’ll all go down – sooner rather than later, I hope.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@TenguPhule: Cut it out Teng, the Nazis only worked in Germany because the “Moderates” solution to the Great Depression was massive spending cuts. At the point any for sane German it was a choice between the Nazis or the Communists and even then the Nazis needed an assist from Hindenburg’s people to get in power.
Matt McIrvin
@TenguPhule: The news is weird. She’s behind, but based on the sources of outstanding votes, she actually has a pretty good chance of winning if she just lets it run.
Bobby Thomson
@Kay:
I had a completely different reaction to that and his conspicuous absence after 9/11. Dude goes on benders.
Bonnie
Does any one know how much trump’s campaign rallies cost the taxpayers???????
BruceFromOhio
@Jeffro:
Who can spell it for him in a way he might understand it? Because this sounds like a great way to end this fucking nightmare pronto.
@WaterGirl:
*shivers* thanks for the advance notice, I’ll take your word for it!
artem1s
@Martin:
the GOP has become a the Broad-Breasted White Turkey of political parties. It can’t reproduce without human intervention, it’s so over-bred for market purposes. It would have died off ages ago without constant interference. The GOP are running out of people and things for their base to hate vote against. I think we are coming to a time when the GOP can’t hold seats in moderate red states without significant voter suppression and ratfuckery.
artem1s
@Yarrow:
Not happening anytime soon. they need to take back their own homes and churches first. they are never going to support a minority or female candidate if their own church/god/religion rejects women’s humanity and agency. they are as bad as the papists ghouls who tolerated pedophile priests but jeebus weeps if a woman gets ordained.