Impeach (One of) the Motherfucker(s)
Maybe Nancy Pelosi is cooking up a masterful impeachment strategy using a recipe that is inscrutable to mere mortals but makes perfect sense to political gourmands, so stop banging your knives and forks on the table and shut up already. Okay, then.
But while we await a main course, can the House Democrats kindly serve up the impeachment of AG William Barr as an appetizer? That corrupt shitbird is destroying the rule of law even faster than the hirsute marmalade blob who appointed him. Here are two examples of Barr’s malfeasance:
- Barr straight-up lied about the Mueller report in his “summary” and was at least partly successful in allowing Trump’s phony “COMPLETE EXONERATION” narrative to take hold, acting as Trump’s personal attorney against the interests of US citizens in the matter of a foreign attack on our elections.
- Barr just put in a new team of lawyers to make up fresh lies to support a citizenship question on the US census, even after the last attempt revealed perjury by administration officials to cover up the real reason for the question, which is to dilute minority votes and consolidate white political power.
I’m sure there are plenty of other examples of Barr acting in a manner that is detrimental to the rule of law and inconsistent with his actual job description, which is to represent the United States in legal matters, not Donald Trump. And keep in mind Barr has only been on the job for five months! Greg Sargent has more details on Barr’s corrupt activities here.
As we’re so often reminded, impeachment is a political process, not a legal one, and the terms “high crimes and misdemeanors,” etc., mean what the House says they mean. Of course, the Senate would fail to convict Barr. But during the investigation, Americans who would guess “Roseanne’s husband?” if asked who “William Barr” is might become acquainted with the AG’s shady actions on behalf of Trump.
I’m not seeing a downside, plus it might help keep Democrats united. Contrary to popular belief, it’s not just Democratic Twitter that is being driven to despair by seeing lawmakers yawn and go on recess while this administration engages in massive and unprecedented corruption. Throw us a bone here. Impeach ONE of the motherfuckers, at least!
Open thread.
The perfect time to indict for your first bullet point will be following Mueller’s testimony. Patience…
I agree. There are several cabinet level officials who deserve impeachment, and Barr is at the top of that list.
@debbie: That’s expecting way too much from the testimony of someone known for being quiet and who has already said he won’t testify to anything not in his report. Plus a good bit of his testimony will be behind closed doors. The opportunity for impeachment is there, now, not in what Trump has done, but in what he has failed to do, i.e., publically accept the fact that Russia interfered in 2016 and take measures to ensure it doesn’t happen again.
I’ve thought for a while, since the attempted cover-up of the Mueller report, that going at Barr (first) was good strategery, and I’ve been frustrated with Pelosi’s/the Dems’ slow response, but I also see the couple of Dems willing to actually speak against impeachment (Colin Peterson of MN saying we need to gather the fact, Jeff Van Drew of NJ saying we need to “move on”) and I suspect there are a lot more who agree with one or the other and are keeping their heads down and hoping it all blows over. I think they’re wrong and stupid, they think they’re smart. Pelosi is one of those rare cats who knows politics down to the district level, and that’s the field she fights on. I wish all the emos would fight there too, and aim their fire outside the tent.
Justin Miller (@justinjm1) Tweeted:
NEW: Epstein charges today are virtually similar to acts Acosta chose not to prosecute https://t.co/PEX6WWPavo https://twitter.com/justinjm1/status/1148228922804514816?s=17
I despair of ever seeing any single participant in this administration pay any price whatsoever for what has turned into a perpetual shit firehose of behavior and activity. There has been so much done over so long and it is so overwhelming that any individual or individual act is completely diluted in the public awareness.
Sorry to be a bummer and nobody is more impeachment-forward than I but I am just beginning to take that attitude on as the only way I can live for a few more years. Hope for any kind of justice or comeuppance is just doomed and I can’t keep my hopes up any more. I need my energy to tend to my own life.
Amen Betty! Once again, a clear and rapier-like wit dissects the miserable life forms that Republicans have the gall to call “professionals “. Doughboy Barr has so much cholesterol clogging up that hamhead of his, that he can’t get two functioning synapses to converse with each other. Impeach that meathead for public hygiene reasons at least…
I don’t know. They certainly can’t remove him or significantly punish him. Does anyone know what the impeachment procedure is for cabinet level positions?
I know Mueller has already said he won’t testify to anything not in his report, but what I’m curious about is how he responds to the planned attacks by Gym Jordan and the other mouthbreathers. They’ve announced they’re coming for him hard.
https://www.thedailybeast.com/jeffrey-epstein-sex-case-heres-what-the-feds-found-in-his-manhattan-mansion?ref=home
Also, what a strange timeline I’m living in, that I read something called “The Daily Beast” for breaking news.
The name reminds me of the little “newspaper” that the teenaged John Lennon used to write and draw to amuse his classmates. “The Daily Howl” he called it.
I backed Pelosi using her judgment but I read all the same things you-all do and I’m doubting.
I also think inaction is bad for base Democrats, if we want to get them out to vote. They’re frustrated here. They don’t think anyone is doing anything, let alone “impeachment”.
I don’t know. I hope she has a plan.
Is Barr putting in a fresh team of lawyers to give a go at the census anything like sending the Dothraki into the dark to take on the White Walkers? “Here, you go first.”
I hope so.
IATMFA
All of them.
I complained a while back that Pelosi needs to move, but the vote a week ago on funding for the concentration camps provided some new data.
Despite Pelosi’s attempts to get conditions attached to the funding (like providing showers and decent food), a big chunk of the Democratic caucus voted with the Republicans just to shovel the money at DHS. They’re okay with what the administration is doing, apparently.
People who tolerate concentration camps are not going to vote to impeach Trump.
Amee Vanderpool (@girlsreallyrule) Tweeted:
Keeps coming up: previous Acosta case in FL where victims were never notified, which is required by law. Keep in mind, as we watch SDNY do everything by the book here, it will emphasize how truly egregious the actions of Acosta’s team and the FL judge were. #JeffreyEpsteinArrest https://twitter.com/girlsreallyrule/status/1148253415186882562?s=17
This impeachment I can agree with.
😒😒😒😒
Andrew Feinberg (@AndrewFeinberg) Tweeted:
SCOOPLET: Ali Alexander, the pro-Trump operative whose tweet questioning @KamalaHarris’ ethnicity was retweeted by Donald Trump, Jr., is among those who’ve been invited to Thursday’s White House Social Media Summit.
https://t.co/vzr2g04JDQ https://twitter.com/AndrewFeinberg/status/1148273172682293249?s=17
@trollhattan:
More likely that Shill Barr and Roberts are having ex parte communications, wherein Roberts tell Barr EXACTLY what argument he wants to see to be able to give give them cover.
Yes, I know it’s not before SCOTRP at the moment. I have little doubt it will get back there, tout de fucking suite, so that the census forms can be printed in time, etc.
🙄🙄🙄
chris evans (@notcapnamerica) Tweeted:
Wait, @MeghanMcCain is trying to draw a comparison between Joe Biden working with segregationists to oppose bussing — and Barack Obama eulogizing Robert Byrd — someone who completely disavowed his racist past and was praised by the NAACP? https://t.co/lzmtrOeyoB https://twitter.com/notcapnamerica/status/1148276594911436801?s=17
@germy:
Shill Barr and his Dept of Injustice minions will just chuckle, and say, “Oh, boys will be boys, am I right?”
@Cheryl Rofer:
Wasn’t she hamstrung by Schumer’s weak negotiating in the Senate?
Epstein just pleaded “NOT GUILTY”
@Cheryl Rofer: A new WaPo/ABC (I think) poll came out this weekend that showed Trump’s approval rating ticked up slightly. It’s still bad, and it didn’t go up much. But it’s depressing as hell that it would go up AT ALL when reports about the child concentration camps were all over the news. Are 40-something percent of Americans okay with that? Maybe.
As for the House Dems and the Senate bill, I don’t know enough about what was in the bill to hazard a guess on what it means that Pelosi couldn’t keep the coalition together to defeat it. Was it a huge, sprawling bill with all kinds of provisions, or was it a straight funding bill for DHS?
@rikyrah:
Unpossible! Schumer’s the savviest, smartest, kick-assingest Senate Minority Leader we’ve ever had! (Where “ever” is defined as “the last six months.”)
@SFAW:
Ooh, very paranoid and thus, perfectly imaginable from this maladministration.
I suspect very similar communications occurred with Kennedy before he cleared the path for dear li’l Brett.
Barr is the right target, but how does McConnell keep getting a pass? Why is he allowed to *shrug* the media off, when it’s clear he and his criminal wife are the ones enabling and abetting every crime of this administration?
@SFAW: This is what I told my husband, that it wouldn’t surprise me one bit if the current DOJ tries to find out exactly what rationale Roberts would accept for the citizenship question, so they can use it. This DOJ is so corrupt, why not?
@Betty Cracker:
No. They love it and have been waiting all their lives for a president who would do shit like this.
Yup, but I believe that poll has been one of trump’s strongest, not quite an outlier but usually on the higher side of his ~40% number. I’ve been checking Silver’s and Enten’s tweets to see if they confirm that, but they haven’t. I think a Quinnipiac poll just last week showed him at 38%
@rikyrah:
I would like to see a list of those 129 names.
@trollhattan:
It’s not paranoia if they really are out to fuck over the part of the country that still believes in democracy and the rule of law.
May I propose that we refer to anyone who votes for unconditional DHS funding for the camps as part of the Holocaucus?
Not to make light, but to bring light, because these motherfuckers are skipping down the path to Wannsee pretty fucking fast.
At age 20 Jeffrey Epstein, who had no college degree, was hired to teach at the exclusive Dalton School in NY, where the headmaster was … oh, but you’ll never guess … AG Barr’s father, Donald Barr.
Their world, it is very small indeed.
Oh my
@Frankensteinbeck:
“I don’t know. They certainly can’t remove him or significantly punish him. Does anyone know what the impeachment procedure is for cabinet level positions? ”
As far as IANAL me can tell, same as for the president. Article II Section 4 says “The President, Vice President and all civil officers of the United States, shall be removed from office on impeachment for, and conviction of, treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanors.”
Lawyers here have anything to say on it?
The real danger of not impeaching is the power that it will give to whatever third party candidate pops up to claim both sides are unfit to vote for. Democrats have now lost two elections because of third party spoilers, but keep pretending that standing against corruption isn’t absolutely necessary for winning Presidential elections.
We are going to be facing the whole Epstein mess, with Clinton brought up constantly. I’m guessing that the ratpackers are assuming that Bill Clinton being in a room or a plane with an underage girl somebody else raped will drive more votes away from the Democrats than Trump actually raping an underage girl will from the Republicans. Somebody had Pizzagate ready to roll within hours of new Trump evidence coming out. The Dems can’t even be bothered to set up investigations for blatant lawbreaking.
@Frankensteinbeck: Undoubtedly true of Trump’s base, but I’m not convinced it’s true of 40%-plus of the general population. Doesn’t square with support for immigration, which is huge.
Epstein’s lawyer calls the victims prostitutes:
@germy: Hes a registered sex offender so wouldnt possession of these photos violate….SOMETHING!?
@Cheryl Rofer:
After everything he’s been though legally, he kept that shit? Another moron-genius we’ve got here.
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: There are a lot of Dems in Congress as experienced as Pelosi who think they have to impeach Trump (and Barr). She’s not the font of all wisdom and not unbiased. Nobody wants to admit this is relevant, but it’s a plain fact that Pelosi’s power to drive the agenda in the House becomes far less absolute once impeachment hearings begin. She wants to pass a bunch of feel-good bills that the Senate will ignore, imagining that that will help Democrats running in 2020. I think she vastly overestimates the value of DOA bills that the vast majority of Americans will never even hear about.
@Cheryl Rofer:
I think that is dead wrong and deeply insulting to decent Democratic leaders who want the right measures but lack any means of achieving them. Pelosi had no leverage that could have led to those measures being enacted. Basically, she was in the position of saying to McConnell and Trump, “Do what I want or no funds for relief of suffering in the child concentration camps.” Trump and McConnell could have lived with that forever, being indifferent (at best) to suffering and keen to blame it on the Democrats. Any leverage she might have had disappeared when the Senate passed its bill, which was not her fault. When faced with a situation like this one, the best thing to do is get what you can as quickly as possible and move on to the next round. Pelosi’s job is to be able to count and to achieve what is possible. We don’t need virtue signaling in pursuit of the unattainable. To claim that she is therefore “okay” with what the administration is doing is repulsive.
@germy:
If they’re prostitutes they’re of Epstein’s making.
Does he happen to be using Robert Kraft’s legal team? They seem adept at making obvious things disappear.
I’ve pretty much g-ddamned lost patience with Pelosi et al.
I don’t believe there is some masterful eleventy dimensional thing going on. Our Democracy depends on us peons getting the pitchforks out for all of these folks.
One step I’m taking is participating in the Lights for Liberty event in Aurora, CO. I hope to heaven that thousands show up at each major protest. This has to shake the complacency out of our elected officials.
Waiting for 2020 is a fools game. The crisis is now.
@jl: Mechanics of impeachment are in Article I, but those seem to be same for all impeachments of executive and judicial branch officers, except to specify that Chief Justice presides over impeachment of the president.
@Cheryl Rofer:
UH HUH
UH HUH
@Zinsky: Once again it would be really nice if this blog comments had a vote up/down function. It’s really frustrating and makes it less interactive. Meanwhile,
^^^^
@Cheryl Rofer:
Then we start asking them uncomfortable questions about their vote. Let’s see how this plays with them. They really need to feel the heat not just from Democratic voters, but everyone else who has a conscience.
When they show up for their town halls, that’s when you get them.
It is getting more difficult to imagine anything happening to Trump or any of the inner circle unless:
1. he loses his re-election bid
2. ever, if he, God forbid, wins re-election
The list of things he should have to answer for grows by the day. I simply don’t understand the Democratic leadership. I would crawl through a bed of hot coals to vote against Trump in 2020, but there are are plenty of people (especially 18 – 24 year olds) who need a lot of motivation to turn out and vote.
@rikyrah: I hope some local offices, the state or the city, can make some quick claim to that evidence, and get copies
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Collin Peterson is in an R+12 district. He has to sounds very cautious and conciliatory. But that doesn’t have to be the party’s main line.
@Kay: I think we need to be helping to orchestrate a wave of contacts to House members about this. The only way Nancy moves is if her caucus makes her. I am getting 10 or 20 fundraising emails a day from candidates. Time to start writing to them and saying “impeach Barr if you want any $$ from me.” (Yes, yes, I’ll donate to the candidates, but why not put a little stick in with the carrot?)
@PST: It was the House Democrats who voted with the Republicans who are apparently okay with the concentration camps and the administration’s excuse that it just needs more money to make them okay. I pointed out that Pelosi was trying to do otherwise. Please read before commenting.
Pelosi has the leverage, and she tried to use it – it’s called a Democratic majority in the House. But apparently not all those Democrats are willing to put conditions on the concentration camps. So there’s a big question in my mind whether they would vote for impeachment.
@Kay:
I hope her plan is something smarter then “let the voters judge Trump in 2020” as we have ample evidence too many voters are stupid, lazy and/or closet Nazis.
@Raoul:
You know impeachment won’t stop or remove Trump, right? That nothing in the word *impeachment* would compel any more compliance from the stonewalling WH than the House’s oversight requests have engendered? That the best outcome of impeachment is President Pence? The House is getting the courts to back up their subpoenas, because if the courts need the word *impeachment* to force compliance with the House’s Article I oversight duties, then we’ve already lost, because the executive branch will never comply with a House subpoena again. And if you’re putting your faith in Trump’s buddies in the Trump loving media to cover *impeachment* hearings in good faith, then I have a bridge to sell you.
I’m guessing that one element of Pelosi’s approach is to know how many of the Democratic Representatives will vote for impeachment as of now, and I’m further guessing that the current answer is “about half”.
Call your Representatives. Call your Senators.
@germy: Well, clearly! He’s a boy being a boy and from a good family so shouldn’t be tried in an adult court and ruin his future, but all those 14-year-olds are hardened experienced tarts and should be in the slammer.
@trollhattan:
Why wouldn’t he ? He has the entire Republican party supporting him and the President. Fuck.. maybe Barr will make this all go away too.
@Michael Allen: Oh, and putting replies about fifty feet below the original post being replied to is another crap feature on an otherwise great blog.
@the Conster:
Because we’re not allowed to discuss exactly how he could be removed, since there are no legal/peaceful methods to do so.
@Frankensteinbeck:
I’m sure they’ll love the trials and nooses that come after too, just like last time.
One thing I cannot understand in any way is the lack of push on people ignoring Congressional subpoenas. Why shouldn’t people ignore them? The Democrats act like that it is no big deal. Why not make an example of someone and actually do something the next time a subpoena is ignored? Maybe a fine that increases by the day?
@Michael Allen:
Downvote.
I wish the Democrats would do better on their messaging about what they ARE doing. They are filing lawsuits, etc. but it all seems to be staying under the radar. Of course, our awful media giants aren’t helping either.
@TenguPhule:
He has to be voted out, or the rest of the Senate GOPers could vote him out of majority leader. Why doesn’t the media hound him, instead of Pelosi?
@SenyorDave: Congress can issue a subpoena, but it is the DOJ which has to take enforcement action. Ideas about how to get Barr’s DOJ to do that are encouraged.
@Cheryl Rofer:
Allred
Axne
Beatty
Bera
Bishop (GA)
Blunt Rochester
Brindisi
Brownley (CA)
Bustos
Carbajal
Cartwright
Case
Casten (IL)
Castor (FL)
Cleaver
Clyburn
Cohen
Cooper
Costa
Courtney
Cox (CA)
Craig
Crist
Crow
Cuellar
Cummings
Cunningham
Davids (KS)
Davis (CA)
Dean
DelBene
Delgado
Demings
Deutch
Doyle, Michael F.
Eshoo
Finkenauer
Fletcher
Foster
Frankel
Fudge
Garamendi
Golden
Gonzalez (TX)
Gottheimer
Green, Al (TX)
Harder (CA)
Hayes
Heck
Himes
Horn, Kendra S.
Houlahan
Hoyer
Johnson (GA)
Johnson (TX)
Keating
Kelly (IL)
Kildee
Kilmer
Kim
Kind
Kirkpatrick
Krishnamoorthi
Kuster (NH)
Lamb
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Larsen (WA)
Larson (CT)
Lawson (FL)
Lee (NV)
Levin (CA)
Lipinski
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Luria
Lynch
Malinowski
Maloney, Sean
Matsui
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McBath
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Morelle
Murphy
Neal
O’Halleran
Panetta
Pappas
Payne
Perlmutter
Peters
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Phillips
Pingree
Porter
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Rose (NY)
Rouda
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Rush
Sarbanes
Schiff
Schneider
Schrier
Scott (VA)
Scott, David
Serrano
Sewell (AL)
Shalala
Sherrill
Sires
Slotkin
Spanberger
Stanton
Stevens
Suozzi
Thompson (CA)
Thompson (MS)
Torres Small (NM)
Trone
Underwood
Van Drew
Visclosky
Wasserman Schultz
Waters
Watson Coleman
Wexton
Wild
Yarmuth
@Cheryl Rofer: “Please read before commenting.” You aren’t THAT new here!!
@debbie:
Assuming his testimony does actually clarify the situation regarding the misrepresentation of the report, I agree. If his testimony also clarifies that DT would have been charged for his actions if he weren’t protected by a DOJ rule, I would expect that to be the point where Pelosi starts to publicly support impeachment hearings.
@rikyrah:
McCain is like a little kitten trying to swipe her paws at bells being dangled in front of her by her husband. Truly, she is an idiot.
@Gin & Tonic:
I mean, this is exactly right.
@rikyrah: Why exactly doesn’t Schumer get this level of shit?
@Cheryl Rofer: Here’s the list. Regular font is Dem, italics GOP (as far as I can tell). Some really disappointing names on the Yes votes. Gaaah.
Do we know the current D vote counts to impeach? Pelosi’s driving everyone nuts with her position, but she has blue dogs and fence sitters to whip, and if the numbers aren’t there, she isn’t going to move. (And yes, the numbers aren’t there partly because of her position.)
That’s some catch, that catch-22.
@trollhattan: If they are below the legal age of consent they cannot by definition be prostitutes.
@joel hanes:
If this were the case, I’d expect Pelosi to be studiously neutral about impeachment in public while she quietly tries to bring her caucus around. Instead, she’s been denigrating impeachment and its proponents ever since the Mueller Report.
Been doing that. Hoyer’s staff is probably tired of the sound of my voice.
@the Conster:
Because McConnell doesn’t give a shit. He gloats when given the media spotlight.
Pelosi still has moral values, putting pressure on her might result in change, where as everyone knows that short of McConnell’s life literally being on the line, nothing is gonna change his goal of eternal Republican rule.
@Raven: I will be more careful in the future before participating.
@Barbara:
I’ve pointed our repeatedly he’s a piece of shit that needs to be removed.
Apparently he has to be given a pass because like Manchin, he needs to coddled.
@LuciaMia: Possession of child porn is illegal, straight up, whether you are on probation or not. However, the issue of how old the person in the photograph is likely debatable for any girl who has reached puberty, so it might not be easy to convict. It sounds as if they have actual girls giving actual testimony about actual events in Epstein’s New York mansion.
@Barbara:
He has XY chromosomes.
@germy: Wow! Sorry to hear that Weingarten has taken this case. Was in law school with him and considered him a decent guy.
@germy: Please explain the alternative. Use concrete examples and do not “assume” the existence of any fact that cannot be demonstrated by actual evidence.
@Barbara:
All they need are a positive ID and birth record.
@Noncarborundum: THANK YOU!
Okay, everyone, start calling if any of these belong to you.
@Damien: I found a better site for organizing the vote data on HR 3401.
I’m very disappointed in Angie Craig & Dean Philips. They will be hearing from me!
Haven’t read comments. Have you seen that AG Barr’s dad was headmaster who hired Epstein to teach at that major prep school? Without a college degree, no less?
Just like with Kavanaugh, the interconnections of the upper class are mind-boggling! And now they’re coming out for ever more people to see.
@the Conster: As far as impeaching Barr, the topic at hand, I do not agree with your take.
@germy:
I guess I’m a fucking dimwit, because I don’t get Katz’s point. Is it that the Traitor-in-Chief should be re-elected, to prevent … what, civil war? Or is he saying that the Traitor-in-Chief should be impeached, because his supporters would not respond with violence? And would that be if he were convicted? Or acquitted? Or what?
@Cheryl Rofer: @Noncarborundum: Sure does seem like a lot of those people are the kind who would be okay with concentration camps. Especially Cummings, right?
@SFAW: I think he’s saying that we get a civil war but at least we have moral and legal high ground to do unto the other side before they do unto us.
The difference between Schumer and Manchin is Democrats will hold a NY Senate seat. Manchin is much more valuable to Democrats that Schumer is- Schumer is completely replaceable.
And it would be an upgrade. He’s done a God awful job since Trump was elected. I don’t know what it is, but he seems incapable of fighting Donald Trump. When’s the last time any of you heard or saw anything out of Schumer at all? He’s been AWOL since his NY buddy Donald Trump took the throne.
chris evans (@notcapnamerica) Tweeted:
GOP Pollster says Kamala Harris is too far left — @SRuhle says it sounds like she’s “too black”. Asks him what policy she’s too far left on, and he didn’t have an answer. https://t.co/BC92Pnxe6c https://twitter.com/notcapnamerica/status/1148287796874010624?s=17
@SFAW: I’m guessing Katz wants impeachment. Not sure if he understands the republicans won’t support that.
@Kay: I really believe Schumer has taken money from the same people who donated to trump.
We’ll see how serious they are about the public corruption part of the Epstein prosecution. We’ll see if they investigate that sweetheart plea deal, and Acosta and his prosecutorial team. Let’s see if they go after one of their own.
How exactly did that go down? Has Acosta been interviewed by the FBI? Why not?
Oops, wrong. Never mind.
The county prosecutor in Florida should be questioned too. These people aren’t immune. They’re part of this.
@PST: this. The airwaves would positively crackle with “Democratic members of Congress blocked humanitarian assistance to the DHS to care for detained children”.
The voting public isn’t known for parsing nuance.
@rikyrah: Huh…. I thought Harris wasn’t ‘authentically’ black enough, or not Jamaican enough, or somewhat to wide of being really Indian, or since she spent time in Berkeley not authentically from San Francisco. She spent a few years in our deadly enemy of the Great White North, Canada, right?
Almost everything you hear from these frauds is chum to see what bites, trial balloons to see what takes off. It’s garbage.
@Kay:
That would be during the last budget fight/temper tantrum.
Where he was following Pelosi’s lead. The only time he seems to do his fucking job.
@debbie:
It’s not my list; I got it from clerk.house.gov, the same place where @Raoul got his link.
@germy:
Something happens to people who have a long association with Donald Trump. He pulls them in. All of the people who knew him for decades in NYC have been completely ineffective as to oversight of him. I don’t know what the fuck it is, but it’s true of the NYTimes too. This is some kind of strange and horrible club. Like a clique.
@Barbara: Misread your comment so mine was a non sequitor.
Cousins from India (they now live in Singapore) left for Boston yesterday. Had a hectic long weekend and now I am recovering from their visit.
@Kay:
Most of Florida’s government and law enforcement would be better serving behind bars.
Pelosi also seems to be misreading what I see as a fundamental division-of-labor issue. On the one side, you’ve got the Democrats in Congress, particularly in the House. On the other side, you’ve got the Presidential candidates.
Pelosi doesn’t want to distract attention away from the work that the House is doing on “kitchen table issues.” Nice, but (a) nobody’s paying the least bit of attention to where the House stands on these issues, and (b) when the Dems nominate a candidate, the plan is that that candidate will set the Democratic agenda for 2021, not the House.
So answers to questions about what legislation the Dems would pass if they could, will come out of the nominating process. Those answers will be different depending on whether Biden or Harris or Warren or Sanders or someone else is nominated. But that’s where those answers will come from. Each candidate will advocate for a different set of priorities, and the Dem voters will choose a candidate. If that candidate wins the election, Pelosi will then try to get as much as possible of the new President’s agenda through the House.
So what should the House be doing? It should be doing what the candidates can’t do: either open an impeachment investigation, or open up other investigations – preferably investigations that can’t be blocked by Trump.
The House could investigate the charges of sexual assault against Trump made by roughly two dozen credible women.
The Senate Judiciary Committee last year failed to investigate a lot of questions concerning the honesty of Kavanaugh’s testimony in his previous confirmation hearings. The House Judiciary Committee could pick up where the Senate dropped the ball.
The House could investigate Acosta’s handling of the sweetheart plea deal he gave to Epstein.
The House could hold hearings on Barr’s handling of the beginnings of the Whitewater investigation under GHW Bush in 1992.
The House could investigate the circumstances surrounding the surprising bailout of the Kushners’ 666 Fifth Avenue property, and other iffy business transactions by Trump and members of his family since Trump was elected.
etc.
There is plenty that the House could do (besides impeachment, though that would be best, IMHO) that the candidates can’t. So it should do those things, and let the candidates debate the issues that will determine what the House will hopefully do in 2021.
@Kay: Your theory was that he blackmails them. That would make a lot of sense.
@satby: Which is why the vote should have been whipped to as narrow a margin as possible. Pass the abhorrent thing, because not funding would make things worse. But some of those yes votes are inexplicable to me.
I *just* got a fundraising email from Jason Crow here in CO that was all about his attempt to visit the Aurora facility. Which is commendable. But voting yes on conditions-free funding flies in the face of his rhetoric, so I emailed back to ask the campaign how they explain it.
Bad Pelosi, Bad!!
Can one person here who thinks she did the wrong thing on border funding please tell me what she should have done? Please?
1) She passed a very progressive bill with everything the progressive caucus wanted (minus a thing or two). Spending bills must start in the House. Great Pelosi, thank you.
2). The Senate passed a different bill with (I think) slightly more money for the humanitarian CRISIS on our border, but without some of the very good detailed stuff passed by the House.
Ok, elected speakers of the House here at BJ, what was she supposed to do? The President is giving a speech tomorrow….
*Something that would totally own the Senate!11!!. And get funding passed and make the President sign.*
Which equals — PONIES!
I have lots of Pelosi criticisms,* but I at least pretend to make up something that could have happened instead of just bitching about her. What happened sucks but beware the loudest boos.
*Right now I wish she would stop running down some of the new women in her caucus.
One in eight voters needs to be locked up for the good of the country.
@TenguPhule:
Too broad, as usual. In THIS case law enforcement wanted him prosecuted. It was the county prosecutor who thwarted that.
@Noncarborundum:
Yeah, I misread it. Sorry.
@Omnes Omnibus: I noticed Waters, Schiff, and Porter on that list as well.
@schrodingers_cat:
That was Michael Cohn’s specialty.
@Immanentize:
Kicked Schuemer in the balls repeatedly after he fucked up her plan?
I don’t think people who say this understand the Constitution.
Oh, no, you can’t impeach Barr! The GOP dominated Senate would never convict. It. It. It would only anger Trump supporters and cause them to turn out in droves during the election!
Just kidding. Why not a two-fer! I say impeach the shit out of Barr AND Trump. An appetizer followed by the main course.
Given the arrogence of not only keeping the library of files after the earlier “conviction” with identifying names no less, wouldn’t those files likely still be time-stamped, as will all the texts and emails? I don’t think priving age is going to be a problem. Not that the lawyers involved won’t try to muddy the waters of the court of public opinion by calling them all prostitutes, legal definition go hang. What’s the equivalent of the thin blue (or cassocked) line for guys in business-suits?
@Immanentize:
I think Pelosi’s problem is she posed it as a POLITICAL problem, so not impeaching has to be politically beneficial for Democrats. Since it doesn’t seem to be, she’s proving her detractors right.
I was on her side but I even I see it as a problem, because the base think they aren’t doing anything and that’s frustrating and demoralizing and they can’t go into 2020 with a demoralized base.
The political plan had to WORK. That was key to its success as a plan :)
@scav:
The Elephant brigade?
@jl: This is correct. Any person that must be confirmed by the Senate (which certainly includes the cabinet and federal judges) are all subject to removal from their office by impeachment.
Check out Alcee Hastings, one time federal judge impeached for bribery, now a sitting congressman from Florida.
@Noncarborundum: Cummings and Clyburn??
@Immanentize: I’ll expand on what I said a bit ago: Yes, Dems don’t have the Senate votes, so having this bounced back to the House stripped of the good things was unavoidable.
But then you whip the vote and pass it with about 45 yes votes from specific seats that have an electoral analysis that says they need it (a la Colin R+12 Peterson in MN). Symbolic, maybe, but much more defensible than the caucus voting 129/95/11 (Y/N/Other).
@🐾BillinGlendaleCA: And Sharice Davids. Maybe AOC was right to support her opponent in the primary.
A vote for this bill or a vote against it does not necessarily say anything about Congress critter’s stance on the camps.
@Raoul: repeating the part where I said most voters don’t do nuance. If you’re explaining you’re losing, remember?
“Rep.Crow, please explain your no vote against more funding for the migrant detention facilities” . Yeah, that’s a winner*
* And I would have preferred that Pelosi’s plan had prevailed, but I also would have preferred a meteor had taken out both Trump and Pence on the dias at their 4th of July clusterfuck.
@TenguPhule: Oh, I’ve no doubt there are a few donkeys in with all the asses. But I just thought of a tagline, might even be their motto: “When you’re a star, they let you do it. You can do anything . . .”
I wonder if the shit-stains in Florida who let Epstein off with a slap on the wrist are shocked to learn he kept videos and files after they let him off the hook. Did they really think he would straighten up and fly right after their gift? Dumb fucks. Epstein is a wealthy pedophile, but he’s still a pedophile.
@Kay: I think Pelosi has been waiting for the sort of person who dislikes trump but thinks impeachment is ‘going too far’ to wake up from their ‘Oh, it’s all just politics…” coma. I know I have. But I’m increasingly pessimistic. And my baseline is pretty pessimistic.
@Immanentize:
Don’t know. I am not sure we really know why Schumer and the Senate Democrats caved in.
However, it’s funny that some Balloon Juice folk want Biden to swear that he will never never never ever work with the GOP and then praise Pelosi for wisely accepting a compromise.
Agree with you here. This only helps the Republicans.
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: It is weird that that Washington Post poll got so much attention. As far I can tell any motion in poll aggregates is well within the noise– Trump’s numbers are flat; nothing’s going anywhere. You can basically ignore any and all news stories analyzing the possible causes of small motions in a single poll, because the real reason is very likely to be “sampling error” even if the one poll moves outside its MOE.
@schrodingers_cat:
I think I’m talking about “blackmail” in the sense that Trump knows them, was in or around their circle of people for years, and he knows a lot about them. We saw this in action with Morning Joe. Trump threatened them. Then he made good on the threat and released what he knew that would embarrass them.
When Truman Capote wrote about the fancy people he spent time with they were furious. Capote said, rightly, “I’m a writer. If you didn’t want me to write about you you shouldn’t have let me in”. It didn’t matter when he was just Donald Trump, conman and delightful eccentric, so amusing, what fun, but now Trump has enormous power. Do you really doubt he doesn’t use it to threaten and intimidate? Of course he does.
@Kay:
Kay, the county prosecutor is the only person who got a conviction!
And it was a sex offense conviction too.
I have heard Acosta suggest there was some personal coersion aimed at him by the Epstein team. I bet the FBI has talked to him.
Also, if he had possession of kiddie porn, yes that is a separate crime, but being labelled a sec offender in many states means being on forever probation about certain things like possession of such material. It will be much easier to violate his Florida probation than it will be to try him in Federal court.
@TenguPhule:
Ok, that would have been just and proper.
@Brachiator:
Wisely accepting a compromise or refusing to let her caucus be smeared as not supporting humanitarian aid?
I was a huge believer in Pelosi. At this point I think she needs to be checked for a pulse.
@satby: “I voted against a blank check for an unaccountable agency to keep kids in camps where they don’t belong. You’ve seen me at the Aurora facility on multiple occasions. I could not in good conscience give 4.5 billion taxpayer dollars to this racist, family destroying agency, even if the fake news title was ‘humanitarian'”.
@scav: Who says the files weren’t from events post 2007?
@Kay: I’m sure that’s true, but unless more people like Michael Cohen decide to sing, we may never know the extent of it. Scenarios like the Falwell Jr. – pool boy thing have probably happened repeatedly. Now Trump can weaponize the intelligence agencies and DoJ to gather dirt on enemies. Does anyone doubt he would? The only question is whether the people in those agencies would resist, and the jury is still very much out on that, IMO.
@Omnes Omnibus:
Thank you.
I am alarmed by the overheated comments on this blog.
Democrats trudging down the path to Wannsee? Uh, no.
Grow up, people.
Ben Penn (@benjaminpenn) Tweeted:
To those who think Epstein’s arrest for sex trafficking is irrelevant to Alex Acosta & his ’08 lenient plea deal w/ Epstein, Labor Sec Acosta now enforces trafficking. Yet last week his DOL made it easier for traffickers to get off the hook. https://t.co/cSJrYocFhW https://twitter.com/benjaminpenn/status/1147992816926318593?s=17
@Immanentize:
I’ll applaud if they actually go after their own but I don’t have a lot of faith they will. Something happened there. Federal prosecutors made decisions that are indefensible. That should be investigated to see if there was corruption.
Interesting that the first prosecutorial team didn’t find any of this. He has 4 residences. Did they search any of them?
@Kay: I agree, but I think it is still early to make a 2020 statement. I have long said that proceedings against Barr are important including impeachment. AND, that in no case would I start anything like impeachment until September, after the summer distractions have ended for most people. So let’s see what goes down in September.
The momentum and the moment are gone. Too little, too late from the house dems.
The voters made this mess and hence they should clean it up as well.
@Kay: I really think that the material is going to end up being new. That is, post Epstein’s previous conviction. This is what that guy does — has sex with and provides underage girls for rich guys. And probably is more inclined to do so as he gets older? Otherwise, how can the feds prosecute him under the previous NPA?
@Kay:
The New York Establishment, the New York social scene, is its own little world. Like the DC Beltway. Old rich farts envied Trump. He was a brash bad boy and rich like them (at least on paper). He was one of their own. I think Maureen Dowd said that she originally covered Trump for the NYT society pages. But neither the Times not the Post nor the Daily News, as far as I recall, ever had any of their business reporters seriously look into Trump’s financial activities.
@Plato:
I disagree. But you hysterics are always correct, right? Hair on fire helps one think better, hmmm?
@Elizabelle:
Ha! I know it’s a bit over the Nazi top, no?
By the way, the original Wannsee movie in German was the most chilling film I ever saw. Yay for the Czech underground who rid us of Heydrich.
@Kay:
I have been following this case because of Maddow. If I am remembering correctly, the original folks gathering evidence had over 100 victims.
@Raoul: You realize the Democratic Whip of the House (Clyburn) voted against the bill?
Hard to get members to vote against their own Whip.
@Raoul: Good reply, but the end result would have been(edit) NO increased funding for those facilities at all. And the perfect being the enemy of the possible slight improvement in hellacious conditions. IMO, that’s not an outcome worth the cost. In yours, it is.
@Brachiator:
New York “elite” were well aware Trump was a buffoon. Did you see him among the glitterati on benefit committees? Did he have to resign from a bunch of corporate boards?
No. Because it was well known that he was a buffoon, welshed on promises, particularly where his $$ was concerned, his advice is worthless, and his business acumen is fictional.
I am very curious why the FTF NYTimes has acted like it does. Something is wrong within that corporation.
@rikyrah:
[Virtually WHUT???…]
OK, now. If we’re talking impeachment of corrupt constitutional officers, how is Acosta, friend and helpmeet to pedophile rapists, NOT at the VERY TOP of any list! This guy needs impeached, indicted, disbarred, prosecuted and punished in the worst way.
@rikyrah:
This Acosta guy is either a pedophile himself, or is owned and operated by someone in the mob who protects pedophiles so they can pay the mob to keep them out of jail. Hard to blackmail someone in prison, but a rich guy walking the streets is easy pickin’s for someone with film of the dirty deeds.
@Kay:
And they can’t go into 2020 with the great mass of low information voters – aka the ones who will determine who wins = believing that Trump & the Republicans haven’t really one anything wrong, Mueller found that Trump was totally innocent, Democrats just don’t like him, both sides, etc.
There are a lot of us that don’t understand what the plan is and we suspect that there is no plan.
@SFAW: I think Katz is saying that Trump, post election loss, would be even more unconstrained by norms and laws than he already is, so November 2020 – January 2021 would bring new levels of horror. But these days, “new levels of horror” is basically the new definition of “tomorrow”, so I don’t think it’s a particularly compelling argument for impeachment.
@satby:
And the result has been good for us too. Instead of Trump saying “the Democrats wouldn’t fund help to the border” at his big speech and for the next several weeks he has been forced to say that “things at the border really are not bad.”
This is a real win for Dems (and Justice)
@Immanentize:
It isn’t just Pelosi, it’s the whole top end of the leadership. They should have forced a showdown by refusing to take up the vote until the administration addressed the children in cages. They should have screamed child killers on the news every effing night.
But now the great mass of Americans believe there is nothing really wrong going on with the camps. It’s all just crazy far left BS.
@Brachiator:
You’re right. I was living there then, and it was all about The Donald’s bad boyness. All of them, but especially Liz Smith, were gushing in their coverage and couldn’t get enough of his brashness.
@James E Powell:
You need to get out more. Balloon Juice is not the country at large, and you and others are disparaging a lot of people who do not deserve it.
Watch out lest some of you become part of a closed loop, too.
‘Protesters as terrorists’: growing number of states turn anti-pipeline activism into a crime
The Republicans are telling us in advance exactly what they plan to do about your protests.
@Spanky:
I think you meant Clyburn voted FOR the bill….
@debbie:
Let me be blunt here. We’re all friends.
Trump is acting like the landlord of one of his buildings. He treats refugees and immigrants like cockroaches, to be swept up and contained. He expects, no, demands that the people he puts on the job react accordingly.
Trump continues to praise ICE and DHS. He continues to brand immigrants and refugees as diseased criminals. Unless blocked by court action, he continues to mistreat the people rounded up.
He has never acknowledged any need to react in any humanitarian way. Fox News and his base fully accept the idea that the people who try to come hear deserve whatever happens to them.
It is foolish for the Democrats to worry about any smears. The smears will come anyway, and it will always be bullshit.
Now, maybe Pelosi did the best she could. I am not going to bash her. And AOC and company need a better strategy than mere protest.
But Trump is not going to change. He will never treat refugees and immigrants decently unless forced to. And even then he will try to get around it. He is focused on the idea that people he views as unworthy are vermin and he is determined to keep them out of this country.
The Democrats need to understand this.
Meanwhile, Mr. Barr is still up to his old tricks….
@Raoul: I just dropped Anne Laurie an email suggesting a post about the various Lights For Liberty events happening this Friday. I plan to go to the one at Foley Square in NYC and would love company.
@Brachiator:
Point of order, court action has not stopped him from continuing to mistreat people.
@Immanentize: Ever read :Laurent Binet’s HHhH?
In the News today. https://buffalonews.com/2019/07/08/new-law-allows-congressional-access-to-trumps-new-york-state-tax-returns/?utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=puma&utm_source=Facebook#Echobox=1562604615
@James E Powell:
Shutdowns don’t work, they end up burning the party that initiates the shutdown.
@J R in WV:
First, Acosta is not in the same position as he was when he agreed to the plea deal so he probably cannot be impeached as Secretary of Labor for official acts when he was not in that office.
Second, Acosta is not a horrible human being. I know a lot of public defenders in FLA who support him. Plus, there have been some suggestions of coersion but we don’t know about that yet.
The case against Epstein was not a slam dunk, and his team was doing everything they could to keep victims from testifying. I think Acosta did a shabby thing, but I don’t think he was paid off or involved or anything other than a bad US Attorney.
@rikyrah: exactly. Robert Byrd had enough sense to be ashamed of his racist past. He once said “I have to live every day knowing that my obituary will say I was a member of the Ku Klux Klan”
James Eastland, Strom Thurmond, Jesse Helms all died as proud and unrepentant racists.
I’m so old I remember when I was told we shouldn’t be concerned about all those army and national guard troops being marshaled to the southern border.
@Immanentize: Hey there. Sorry to hear that your trip has been delayed by lack of water. And yes re the Czech patriots who took out Heydrich, and the effectiveness of propaganda when relentlessly deployed. Alas.
Lack of water. Not a problem in DC today, apparently. Amtrak service disrupted for a while. White House basement offices taking on water! 11 inch rise in a local waterway (Four Mile Run in Virginia, across the Potomac.). Cars floating and flooded.
Four inches of rain in one hour this morning.
The Chinese hoax strikes again.
@trollhattan: I suspect this is like the National Enquirer safe with Trumps files in it. The photos are insurance. It’s telling the public corruption unit is involved.
I’d feel a lot better about the SDNY on this case if Preet were still the USDA there. Berman seems fine, but I see no reason to trust any Trump appointee.
@Immanentize:
He’s on noncarborundum’s list at #69.
@Immanentize:
His willingness to serve Trump says otherwise.
@Brachiator:
Amen. I was about 85-90% satisfied with Obama (his treatment of immigration was one of my dissatisfactions, though it was mild in comparison).
But he was functionally a moderate about a ton of things. He was smeared and attacked endlessly anyway.
I’ve watched decades of Democratic defensive crouch earn us nothing from moderate conservatives, but seen that defensiveness just embolden the right in their attacks.
If Jason Crow is in any way struggling to hold a non-freshman incumbent House seat in a D+2 district in an election against a Republican who will have to somehow defend or at least be associated with Trumpism, then voting Yes on that DHS bill won’t save him. (FTR I don’t think he’s at risk, though of course he has to run a solid re-election campaign. I mention him because of an upthread convo.)
@Elizabelle:
Donny from Queens was never going to be One of Them. Never.
They already knew enough about good old dad.
Everything is fine, there is no need to panic. //
@Gin & Tonic:
No I haven’t. But I will. Does it discuss Churchill’s desire to get the Czechs off their asses by forcing the horrible reprisals he knew would follow?
@Elizabelle:
And…
On Thursday, while at lunch, I overheard two older white guys talking about religion. I looked over and noted that one guy had a book solely devoted to Exodus with him.
A lot of their discussion was about Christ and mercy. So I was a bit surprised when I heard them talk about how we could never absorb all the immigrants who want to come hear and how Trump was right to shut things down.
I certainly do not believe that this represents a majority view, but I continue to be sadden at how Trump has defined the terms of the debate.
Wheeeee!
@Spanky: Abigail Spanberger and Jennifer Wexton are on that list too. I see a lot of good people on it.
Abigail took out Tea Partier Dave Brat, who is now Dean of the Business School at Jerry Falwell’s Liberty University. Great place for an Ayn Rand acolyte with a divinity degree. But: Primary them!
Get a grip, people.
@Elizabelle:
To be clear, I said “skipping.”
And just to be clear, funding concentration camps with no strings or conditions does kinda seem like one more step down the road. This is LITERALLY a Parkway to hell being paved with good intentions; we’re watching it happen.
The Hollow Caucus is doing nothing.
@Immanentize:
The House can impeach an official for any reason, including wearing the wrong color of tie.
@Brachiator:
I don’t argue with any of what you’ve said about Trump, but I would argue against Democrats giving the GOP issues to use against them, like voting against humanitarian aid.
@Michael Allen:
Oh, and having a link to the original post incorporated in those replies doesn’t make any diff to you? Fuck you for not knowing how to use a web page, ass.
@Spanky: That list at 69 is those Democrats who voted with Republicans to pass the Senate version in the house. I looked it up, he was a “yea.”.
But your point is correct. When the Whip votes Yea, the caucus usually follows. And they did.
@TenguPhule: not clear why Danske Bank misery and Deutsche Bank misery are related.
They both are in Europe and start with “D”?
@J R in WV: That’s what I find irritating about LawyersGunsMoneyBlog. Their nested comments.
@TenguPhule:
Fair enough. But this is one of the few places where there has been any strong opposition to Trump.
And it bothers him and causes him to brand courts as being full of Democrat judges.
BTW, I expect Trump to do an Andy Jackson and defy the Supreme Court over the Census question.
Trump expects all branches of government, including the courts and the Federal Reserve, to bend to his will.
@catclub: Major financial institutions issuing profit warnings and jobs cuts out of the blue. Deutsch bank literally told their employees this morning that they were laid off.
Speaker Pelosi is making statements about the liberal wing of her party that are contemptuous. That’s just stupid politics on every level. I agree with Waldman at WaPo. She could have just said that she (and most of the the caucus) don’t agree with AOC and her like-minded colleagues, but that that is part of being The Big Tent Party. But no, she makes really, really stupid statements that make her (and by association, the rest of the House Dem leadership) look and feel even older and more out of touch with, arguably, a large part of the base of the party.
To what end?
@🐾BillinGlendaleCA: I suppose that’s true. Just like police can arrest you at any time for anything including wearing the wrong color tie. But that too is wrong. There is a constitutional standard, doncha know, and it would have to be a particularly ugly tie to meet it.
@Spanky: @Immanentize: This thread has me confused as to what I’m for and what I’m against. I’d make a hell of a legislator.
What are we voting on again?
@Immanentize: No, not that I recall, but it does deal with the Czechs’ trying to impress Churchill. It’s a bit, um, different than a traditional “historical novel” – it’s almost a memoir about writing a historical novel, interspersed with the novel.
@Brachiator:
I predicted this in 2017. It was pretty clear what was coming.
@Brachiator:
The horrible part is that they’re starting to do so.
@TenguPhule: a lot of that has to do with the trouble DB got into in their own country: https://www.dw.com/en/deutsche-banks-5-biggest-scandals/a-46510219
This is some of the fallout, long overdue*
Full disclosure: worked on that account supporting the financial and commodities traders at the CBOT and Merc. I know people probably losing their jobs today… But the smart ones got out last year. The writing was on the wall back then.
Wow, it only took three years for the headlines to finally get here.
@germy:
I just don’t read their comments. It’s funny, but there was a whole LGM post recently telling people there to stay on topic or else!
As a regular here I just laughed and laughed.
@Immanentize:
My problem with the prosecution is they treated it like a prostitution case, which is exactly how Epstein’s lawyers wanted it treated. I think they did that because of the status of the victims. They’re throw away girls. Not valuable.
That was the whole game. Once they went along with that it was over.
I also am really tired of federal prosecutors saying things aren’t “slam dunk”. They’re not guaranteed convictions. Sometimes in their careers they are going to have to risk losing. The objection isn’t that they lose too much. It’s that they don’t try.
@Elizabelle:
Wasn’t there something in Matthew about God and Mammon?
@Chief Oshkosh:
Agree. My theory is that Does maybe twerked her statements to make a good fight. As Other Scott says, beware elipses!
@Spanky:
Trump: Great president or greatest president?
@Chief Oshkosh:
Pelosi’s right. They’re just 4 votes. Interesting that the 4 are all Justice Dems from deep blue districts. I don’t trust them, at all, and it’s interesting that you never hear from the freshman women like Davids and Spanberger and Porter and Hill and Underwood and McBath who have actual accomplishments but don’t have a twitter clap back game.
@catclub: It’s the Russian money laundering that may link them. When they talk about Danske Banc Estonian money laundering, it is not Pioter the farmer doing that.
@Gin & Tonic: Yesh. And that camel and the eye of the needle …
The evangelical$$$
@Gin & Tonic: sounds fun. Getting it. Thanks
ETA. favorite odd novel in that vein is “Austerlitz” by W.G. Sebald. It was so great. Messed with my head for months afterwards which I love about fiction.
@Chief Oshkosh: and how much of what you’re claiming Pelosi has said is coming from that fountain of truth and misogyny Maureen Dowd?
@Immanentize:
Disqus is a clusterflock but LGM has some of the funniest comments in the solar system. Come for the phalanx of professors, stay for the snark. e.g.,
@satby: Thank you. I had trouble with that comment too.
If anyone is interested, the latest issue of the Library of Congress Magazine is out and it all suffrage related. There are some great images generally, but they aren’t all historical. There were a few from the most recent Congress. There is a short piece by Nancy Pelosi as well toward the back of the issue. You can read it here.
@trollhattan:
Yes, that is hilarious. Maybe I’ll try again. It’s just that some of their commenters are just so damn ad hominem mean. I’ve got enough of that in my law life.
Democrats could come up with a cohesive strategy to attack the Trump Administration on environmental issues- clean air and water.
Clean air and water are popular and Trump is vulnerable on it, which is why he’s planning a 72 hour lie-fest on it.
Get ahead of him. Be a team. He’s dumping this huge vulnerability into their lap and the only response will be half-assed “fact checking” hours after the lies are told.
If they’re not going to impeach they could actually do some politics. The broad Democratic base doesn’t care – they want them to win. On something. They have to work over the summer. They can’t take 2 months off.
@debbie:
Trump supporters have explicitly rejected the idea that immigrants and refugees merit humane treatment.
To paraphrase the Deed Scott decision, Trump regards refugees and immigrants as “beings of an inferior order” with “no rights which the white man was bound to respect.”
The GOP has nothing that can be used against the Democrats. Nothing. People need to reject this self defeating pretzel logic of giving a shit about what the GOP might do. To the contrary, the Democrats need to pound home the idea that they have a common sense view about immigration which is not open borders (another right wing bugaboo) and which includes basic human decency.
@Cheryl Rofer:
For those interested, that tells us all we need to know about Nancy’s refusal to bring an impeachment vote to the floor, even just for an investigation. She’d lose. She’s the best vote-counter in history, and she knows she’d lose.
@satby: That’s been my operating theory since I read the article Sunday. Like I said before, lots of interesting things in the article if you just skip all that MoDo says.
@Kay:
I think corruption also resonates. Stealing from taxpayers….
@Betty Cracker:
‘
Or maybe that is exactly why he was left off the hook? They probably all sit around and molest girls and boys.
@Immanentize: I’ve had Sebald recommended to me but have yet to read any of his work. I tend to read more non-fiction. But I just finished Salvatore Scibona’s The Volunteer and can’t recommend it highly enough.
@Immanentize: added benefit! supreme arrogence doesn’t have a best-before date.
Do a full-bore “Trump is polluting the air and water” campaign. Bring speakers and do different locations. Attack him before he defends.
“Not impeaching” is not a job. If they’re not going to impeach could they at least do normal adversarial politics, like they might with a President Bush or a President Romney? We’re getting the worst of both worlds. We’re getting people who are so busy NOT taking extraordinary measures they have completely stopped taking ordinary measures too.
@satby:
All of it. Media like Costa and Dowd loves bashing Dems, wants to sit at the popular fun girls table with cute AOC and her Justice Dem girlfriends and participate with them in talking about the mean old bitch who isn’t impressed with them and makes them do their homework. This is the same media we’re supposed to believe will cover *impeachment* hearings (of what, exactly if the House demands for testimony and documents keep being stonewalled), in good faith and proper outrage to “educate” the clueless morons who don’t know anything, even now, about Trump’s criminality.
@Immanentize: Hmmm. Might have to read the column. Usually do not click on MoDo, but will read for the underlying content.
I hope she is not babbling about Barry or Bambi or whatever, within ….
Breaking news at the Guardian right now: Pelosi calling out Trump on census question.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/live/2019/jul/08/trump-news-today-usa-womens-world-cup-invitation-pelosi-2020-democrats-latest-updates?page=with:block-5d239a7f8f08d0b6ca52ca48#block-5d239a7f8f08d0b6ca52ca48
@Kay:
First I agree that treating it like a “prostitution ring” was wrong from the git go. But it was good defense work.
Second I am firmly against the “let’s take everything to a jury and let God sort em out prosecution attitude. That hurts poor people of color way more than it might occasionally create a win over a rich person. There is an official standard on federal court — is it more likely than not that a jury will view the evidence as a basis for conviction.
Now I wrote a while big article about how that works against women of color in rape cases (especially if they also are poor, not literate, and may be sex workers). I think the language of human trafficking has turned prosecutors around some on the prostitution ring concept. But we’re not done yet. Look at Kraft.
@Chief Oshkosh: Well, if it helps, Pelosi’s spokesperson said the quote was taken out of context.
It is Mo Do, so…
@trollhattan:
Funny!
@Immanentize: I fully expect significant amounts of the seized material were created following his slap on the wrist from SDFL.
@satby:
But, but: the woman doesn’t do anything, and Dems are just sitting around on their asses, since they’re not screaming to impeach at. this. very. damned. second. They’re worthless. Spineless. They don’t have a plan. They don’t do their jobs. They don’t care.
@Elizabelle:
She gets her shots in against Obama and Hillary — just read it for what Pelosi is trying to say (and imagine all the selective editing). I am sure MoDo is sleeping off her victory drunk for creating a “dems in disarray!” multi-day story.
@Chief Oshkosh: @glory b: Wait, CO is basing his(?) criticism of Pelosi on a MoDo column? Alright then.
He is fucking violating a court order. Every time they are not slapped down, they go further.
@glory b:
I believe it too. She probably said it, but surrounded by praise for the new members, a discussion of their passion, etc. As you say, it a friggin MoDo gossip column.
OT. Trump is at it again. His latest Twitter blast (from the Guardian).
Trump loves the Queen. He loves authoritarian rulers, even if their powers are only ceremonial.
The ambassador’s private messages dumped on Trump. I kinda side with those who believe that the revelation was designed to smoke him out so that he could be dismissed by pro Trump conservatives, to give Boris Johnson a little extra boost.
ETA. Both Tory candidates are full of shit. But I would love it if Conservative Party voters ended up going with Hunt as the lesser of two evils.
@TenguPhule:
Slapped down, BY WHO?
@Gravenstone:
I wonder if this was the emergency that required Pence’s return to DC?
Probably never know
@Elizabelle:
Anyone can call Trump a white supremacist.
If nothing happens in the House or Senate, what good are those words other then fodder for the “all talk, no action” accusations from a third party candidate?
@the Conster:
Traditionally by the very same judges they’re disobeying.
@Gravenstone: Also, if the seized stuff was from before and his actions were too, then the previous Non-Prosecution Agreement would prevent any US Attorney from prosecuting anything but possession of pron.
@Brachiator:
He’s doing his best to change that impression.
😺
@Elizabelle:
You know what? Fuck that strawman crap.
News flash: it’s possible to believe Pelosi is abdicating her responsibilities and fucking us over WITHOUT being a hysteric or a reader of fucking MoDo.
@rikyrah:
it sounds like she’s “too black”
and too female
and too uppity
@the Conster: by WHOM?
@David 🎅🎄Merry Christmas🎄🎅 Koch:
wut.
@David 🎅🎄Merry Christmas🎄🎅 Koch: And just FYI, I think BS’s 18 mil. Haul included 6+mil transfer from previous fundraising period. So he took in no more than Harris.
@eemom: It’s also possible to be wrong about that, eemom.
@Omnes Omnibus: There we go.
@TenguPhule:
Will the Justices send federal marshals after him?
@Omnes Omnibus:
I was expecting Stevein to make that point.
I saw somewhere (Twitter? or maybe here) a comment about the irony of the House passing so many good bills that will either die in the Senate or never even get a vote, but Ms Pelosi won’t allow impeachment hearings because the Senate won’t convict. I thought it was a fair point. I am frustrated with her position and I hope she has a secret, foolproof, vetted, multi-pronged plan to move us back toward justice and rule of law, etc.
Between Rachel Maddow and BJ, I hold on to some shreds of hope, and I keep doing the things I can do to help.
Swalwell dropped out. Fundraising numbers must have sucked.
Nothing against Swalwell, but I’m hoping a brace of contenders follows his lead. It’s probably too early to worry about a too-large field, but worry I do…
Funny looking MoDo.
@Immanentize:
I saw the same movie years ago, and it profoundly affected my thinking about the Holocaust. Unfortunately, it’s only available on VHS now, whereas a movie entitled The Wannsee Conference is on amazon Prime. The good one is Die Wannseekonferenz. As I recall, it takes place in real time and other than the first few minutes during which the conferees are enjoying cocktails, is entirely based on minutes of the meeting. Heydrich comes across as not merely the Übermensch monster we’ve seen countless times in movies, but also as a corrupt, bullying political hatchet man as well. Thanks to the Czechoslovak patriots who eliminated the bastard, who died a very painful and well deserved death from sepsis. The superficial wounds he suffered in the attack should have been easily treated, but a Scottish researcher, rather than a Nazi, discovered penicillin. Eichmann comes across as a toadying file clerk, which humanizes him and makes the evil he countenanced even more nightmarish.
@Immanentize: Well, apparently neither you nor I were around at some point last week to make a Wall Of Voodoo reference and he picked up the slack, so I think that covering this one for him is only fair. Plus, it grated on me.
@Joy in FL:
Can you explain to me what the benefit is of a failed impeachment? There are popular bills that can be passed by a simple majority if they were brought to the floor by McConnell. The Senate needs 2/3 to convict, and of course why anyone would think President Pence would be any better is beyond my ability to comprehend (just as evil but without the dementia and incompetence). Passing legislation is what House leadership’s job is.
@the Conster:
For the Nth + 1 time, Impeachment is not just a fucking vote in the House to send to the Senate.
incredible, considering it had such an early start time (8 AM on the west coast)
What are you talking about? Impeachment doesn’t remove nor stop him, whether Articles of Impeachment end up in the Senate or not. What’s your point?
@Immanentize:
Have you read The Rings of Saturn? I love that book.
For some reason I was devastated when Sebald died in a car crash. It was so unexpected, and I looked forward to reading much more from him.
@the Conster: Constitutional law scholar Laurence Tribe wrote about it here. Bottom line, IMO: whether or not Trump should be impeached is an issue on which reasonable and informed people can and do disagree.
@Elizabelle:
Sure, it’s possible. Nothing about the self-righteous sneering of you and others amounts to a convincing argument against that position, however.
Come to think of it, what IS your argument? Aside from mockery and “I trust Pelosi”, that is.
Which trust is becoming less rational and more cult-like with every new set of footprints trump and mcconnell plant on her — and our — faces.
@Betty Cracker:
Oh yes, the sternly worded House censure that’s supposed to shame the traitor, criminal, serial sexual assaulter mob boss who stole the election with the help of the Russians.
@the Conster: I guess you didn’t read the linked piece because Tribe isn’t advocating censure.
@David 🎅🎄Merry Christmas🎄🎅 Koch:
And the England women got the highest viewership ratings for any broadcast this year in the UK.
Pay them.
@Betty Cracker:
My bad – it’s a strongly worded *resolution*. That should do it.
@trollhattan:
@Frankensteinbeck: QFT – if my Trumpette friends and neighbors are any indication…very depressing…
@the Conster: Actually, it’s not just a “resolution” either but full-blown impeachment without the necessity of giving Republicans an opportunity to “exonerate” in the Senate. But WTF does Laurence Tribe know about this — he’s only a constitutional law professor at Harvard.
@Betty Cracker:
What would compel WH compliance with House oversight requests if they took this impeachment path, any more than what the House is already fighting for in court in their oversight capacity? What will *impeachment* hearings be about, actually, if the WH continues to stonewall and refuses to allow testimony or documents be released? They’re defying SCOTUS on the citizenship question. That’s what we need to watch.
@Joy in FL: It’s not that the Senate won’t convict, it’s that she wouldn’t have enough Democrats’ votes to successfully impeach. Which is probable given her caucus’s wobbly vote on authorizing the Senate’s version of the funding bill.
@satby:
Good point. Waldman does base part of his piece on Dowd’s work. OTOH, Waldman’s larger concern, and I agree with him, is that Speaker Pelosi is developing a habit of not sticking to The Big Tent statement when it comes to AOC, her kindred spirits, and many in the base.
@Betty Cracker: and what does that accomplish months and months before the election? Nothing happens, nothing changes, he’s not stopped or kicked out. If this occurs in the week before the election, I’d support it, but I’d like to see the courts reinforce the House’s Article I power of oversight without calling it impeachment, or the executive branch in the future (if there is anything left) will never comply with House oversight requests ever again without it attached to an impeachment inquiry. What a nightmare.
@the Conster: I’m not a lawyer, but some attorneys argue that courts would treat compliance demands more seriously and expeditiously during an impeachment because the constitutional right to evidence in that case is so compelling. I agree that we need to watch the administration’s attempt to defy SCOTUS closely. Suppose Trump says “fuck SCOTUS” and orders the citizenship question added to the census anyway? Is that impeachable, or is impeachment just off the table no matter what because the Trump people won’t cooperate, the media sucks and the Republican Senate won’t convict?
@eemom: Your comment is not worth replying to. It is beneath you.
@Betty Cracker:
I mean, if the courts don’t defend Article I powers, and SCOTUS is defied, it’s over. Time to march on Mitch McConnell and the other Senate GOPers until they do their job to stop the madness because only they can. The media is useless, that’s for sure. Oh, and vote them all out in 2020 because that’s the only way TO BE SURE.
@Gin & Tonic:
You might like The Rings of Saturn. Not a traditional novel in any sense. Informative Times review here.
Or you might be more interested in On the Natural History of Destruction (1999; German Luftkrieg und Literatur). Wikipedia: “[In it] he wrote a major essay on the wartime bombing of German cities and the absence in German writing of any real response.”
@the Conster: To be clear, of course Speaker Pelosi is right about AOC and group being just 4 votes (5, actually). But saying that versus a more a “we agree to disagree” statement or “hey, it’s a big tent and we’re not always going to agree” would’ve been much better.
Again, this is not a one-off for the Speaker. She’s been saying things like this for a while – on tape and in context.
To what end?
@Betty Cracker:
The courts may treat those demands more seriously – that doesn’t mean the WH will. THAT’S THE ENTIRE PROBLEM.
@the Conster: Unlike the House, courts can compel compliance.
@Omnes Omnibus:
Point taken about MoDo. Waldman is saying that this is another example of the Speaker being condescending to the youngsters. The pattern is worrisome.
@Cheryl Rofer: Reposting, from a comment last month:
The official final vote in the House (on HR3401, accepting the Senate bill) is here.
I can’t believe that some of us are still arguing about what Pelosi should have done about this bill. She fought a good fight and lost. It’s just one battle, and there’s only so many policy demands that can be put in an appropriations bill.
Cheers,
Scott.
@Elizabelle:
Fuck you and your vacuous self-righteousness and condescending bullshit, pal.
How’s that for “beneath me”?
@cain: The House bill failed in the Senate Yeas 37: Nays 55.
How is screaming at Democrats in the House going to overcome that little problem?
(sigh)
Cheers,
Scott.
@Elizabelle: Actually, you may want to go back and read several of your comments here. I’m sure you didn’t mean to be condescending, but that is certainly how some of your comments read.
ETA: Having said that, I don’t agree with eemom. No need to bring a flamethrower to a garden party, eemom. We’re all on the same side here…pretty much.
@Betty Cracker: How? I mean what does that look like at the White House? Congressional subpoenas are enforced by… wait for it…. the DOJ.
@Chief Oshkosh: because she’s had it up to here with those 4 shit stirrers?
@Chief Oshkosh: I do think this place is getting hysterical. I do get tired of people slamming Nancy Pelosi. Not everyone is from a safe, safe, safe district like AOC. While she’s great for getting attention and helping to move the Overton window, I think a lot of people (here, too) get unrealistic ideas of how hard it is to make change.
I don’t think we should be a mirror image of the rightwing outrage machine, and sometimes I see tracks of exactly that here.
I have not tracked down Pelosi’s full comments, and I don’t trust much of anything I hear without several credible sources. That goes for Rachel Maddow and everyone else. Too much rumor-mongering out there. (And could she not see what an attention hound Michael Avenatti was? Confirmation bias there. Watch out for it.)
In my “condescending” manner, I wondered if it’s unbelievable that Pelosi gets as tired and frustrated as the rest of us. It’s easy to run your mouth. It’s harder to get things done.
@Matt McIrvin: Trump’s polling is, as DeLong reminds us [about economic statistics], basically stuck. Little has changed. 40+/-a few% of the country would follow him through the gates of Hell.
Grr…
Cheers,
Scott.
@Chief Oshkosh:
also, WRT “to what end?”
Maybe to give some cover to her dozens of members from non-safe safe safe seats who are tired of dealing with their own left of left constituents and their expectations, unreasonable and otherwise?
It is, as you say, a big tent. With a bunch of people from difficult districts, that get “redistricted” (ie. gerrymandered) frequently to make it even harder.
@Elizabelle:
Any district where a Democrat can’t win campaigning against CONCENTRATION CAMPS needs to carpet bombed to rubble, the survivors paved over and a fresh wave of immigrants imported to rebuild.
@TenguPhule: Has Pelosi come out in favor of concentration camps? Have any of the Democrats?
Why you are always talking to me of tasty, tasty pie.
@Elizabelle:
I fully agree. Pelosi has to herd cats. I don’t think moving the Overton window involves Reps from deep blue seats getting in stupid twitter fights with Dem leadership, though. Threatening to primary Hakeem Jeffries seems like a bad move. My guess is he’ll be the next Speaker.
@Elizabelle:
eemom:
Elizabelle:
Wait! So little is beneath eemom. She shows up here when she is upset with the world, and tries to take it out on her “friends” here. Or whatever sets her off to attack people who might actually agree with her, until she starts calling us names…
I gave up responding to her quite a while ago. No point.
@the Conster: Thanks. And it’s herding cats in order to benefit all of us, unlike Trent Lott who thought he had a hard job. (Senate, I know, but point holds.)
@J R in WV: eemom is much more charming in real life, trust me. But she does get on these kicks …
@Elizabelle:
JFC, this is why eemom was pissed at you. You make bad faith accusations completely off tangent to what was actually said.
Being against Concentration Camps should be a 100% Democratic uniter. That Only Pelosi and half the House caucus plus less then half of the Senate Democrats can get their act together on this is a BAD THING. Any House Democrat who’s not speaking out against the camps because they fear for their reelection chances says very bad things about that Democrat and that district.
@the Conster: So all is lost, welcome to the dictatorship, the president is above the law? Well, I guess that’s one point of view
I don’t happen to agree with it, but we’ve come full circle to my original point, which was that reasonable and informed people can and do disagree on the wisdom of impeachment. YMMV.
@Betty Cracker:
Thanks for this link. I had not seen this before. I may have to finally subscribe to WaPo since I have run out of free articles.
I think that Tribe is deeply full of shit. Packed full of it. He is also writing more as political pundit than constitutional scholar, and so way beyond the bounds of his area of expertise. His grasp of history is weak as well. But it was useful to read this piece.
But I am not going to bash Pelosi. That horse is dead and not even Bones McCoy can revive it.
ETA. Trump above the law? Perhaps, if the GOP continues to provide cover for him. And not even Tribe offers a solution to this.
@Elizabelle:
What is Pelosi “getting done” at this point? Can you answer that?
I won’t even bother with the ludicrous assertion that AOC’s seat is safer than Pelosi’s. OMFG.
Finally
what part of FUCK YOU AND YOUR CONDESCENDING BULLSHIT do you not understand?
@Betty Cracker:
As long as we have the House all is not lost, but it’s only 1/2 of 1/3 of government. We need the other half, even more than we need the executive. We need to hold the House above all though. That’s why I trust Pelosi. She was instrumental in winning it back and no one knows more about what’s going on than she does. That’s why the election is EVERYTHING.
@the Conster:
Nothing blind and cult-esque about that, nah.
Do you people even hear yourselves?
@the Conster:
Yes, and Pelosi and her ilk are not going to win it for us by being craven chickenshits.
@Brachiator: I don’t know that Tribe’s view is correct, put I definitely put more stock in his grasp of constitutional law and history than in, say, yours. The point is, reasonable people can and do disagree.
@Betty Cracker:
The edit time ran out on my other note.
I wanted to throw in a couple of things. Trump supporters are happy, hell, eager to suspend the rule of law as long as they get what they want and as long as other people are hurt. Here they see the law as a mere technicality that “prevents shit frum gettin’ done.”
And in America, white people often love to pass the most viscous laws imaginable to oppress poor and non-white people, and then blame these people for not respecting the rule of law.
The thing is that “respectable people” never believe that the whip will ever come down on them even though they clearly see it flaying others.
All is not lost yet. But like the song says,
Ooh, see the fire is sweepin’
Our very street today
Burns like a red coal carpet
Mad bull lost its way
War, children, it’s just a shot away
It’s just a shot away
War, children, it’s just a shot away
It’s just a shot away
@eemom:
Please don’t bother. Because the only one who made that “ludicrous assertion” is you. I was not even thinking of Pelosi’s seat. I was thinking of the Dems who won seats previously held by Republicans.
@Elizabelle:
Pot, Kettle.
@Betty Cracker:
Wow. That was an unexpectedly low blow, and not like you.
We are all lovers of politics here, and I have often been amazed at how much people know about history and politics. I was careful to distinguish between Tribe’s obvious expertise as a constitutional scholar and his political punditry, where he is just another mook, but one with an op ed column. Here I am happy to go toe to toe with him. And confident that I would do well.
I don’t find Tribe here to be reasonable or credible, but I appreciated being made aware of his views.
@Elizabelle:
Still waiting to heart what Pelosi is “getting done,” unless you didn’t say that either.
@eemom: I don’t feel like I need to have that conversation with you, eemom. I really do not.
You are belligerent. Scoot away now and go bully someone else.
To be really condescending, and practical at the same time, go walk a dog. Everyone will benefit.
@Betty Cracker:
@Brachiator:
Of course Tribe is an expert on constitutional law and history, but given how little precedent impeachment has in either, I think it’s fair to say that his opinion on the question that confronts us today as a matter of politics is not entitled to particular deference on those grounds.
And it IS an opinion that “reasonable minds can differ,” with which I do not agree….anymore than I would agree that reasonable minds can differ about whether a fire department should pour water on an out of control wildfire.
@Elizabelle:
Got nothing, huh?
@eemom:
To be fair, sometimes its better to drop a shitload of non-combustible dirt/chemical retardant instead. Because sometimes the fire is so hot that water pretty much vaporizes on impact.
@Elizabelle:
You have attacked people’s opinions on this thread and elsewhere based on nothing more substantive than accusations of hysteria that you’re soooo very tired of. So yeah, let’s talk about what a belligerent bully *I* am.
@TenguPhule:
Fair enough. What I really meant was, I don’t think reasonable minds can differ about whether it’s right for a fire department to let a wildfire rage on unchallenged.
@eemom: I’ll just leave this here.
@Michael Allen:
Are you new here? It was settled long ago that that there would never be nested comments or like/dislike buttons.
@eemom:
Gee, who should I trust? some rando commenter on Balloon Juice, or the House Speaker who got the ACA passed through the House with the public option? [insert clown face emoji here]
@Brachiator:
BUT HE’S A CONSTITUTIONAL SCHOLAR!!!
Guess what? He knows no more about the consequences of a failed impeachment than I do, because it’s NOT A LEGAL PROCEDURE. It’s a political one, and one which THERE IS NO PRECEDENCE FOR. Nixon resigned, Clinton was acquitted. The GOP is all corrupt and in charge of the Senate and the DOJ and the White House, the media is all in for Trump because they’re all his buddies and probably went to one or more of Epstein’s parties *cough*Jeff Zucker*cough*, the electorate is siloed into information and entertainment vectors because of Netflix, Fox, etc., and wouldn’t know a fact it was shoved up its collective ass with a hot poker, NOR DO THEY CARE. They know what they already know. Tribe’s in that lovely little Harvard ivory tower with opinions the same as Dershowitz. All these asshole men are finding it fully lucrative to shit talk Nancy Pelosi while remaining UTTERLY USELESS when they’re not being either overtly awful or criminal.
@Omnes Omnibus:
ok, ok, I’ll find a new analogy. Sheeyit.
@the Conster:
psst: this ain’t 2009.
Clown face indeed.
@eemom:
O SNAP you really got me there
@eemom: Hehe.
Cheers,
Scott.