Well would you look at that!
NEW: Former Trump official confirms that WH started placing Trump call transcripts into NSC’s codeword system—effectively concealing them—sometime after Mexico, Australia transcript leaks in 2017.
Experts say doing that poses whole host of natsec risks. https://t.co/WpcngAUS1K— Natasha Bertrand (@NatashaBertrand) September 26, 2019
From Natasha Bertrand at Politico (emphasis mine):
After 2017, when verbatim transcripts of his conversations with the leaders of Australian and Mexico were leaked to the press, the White House began to restrict the number of officials who had access to the transcripts. One former Trump administration official confirmed that the White House started placing transcripts into the codeword system after those leaks.
April Doss, who served as senior minority counsel for the Russia investigation on the Senate Intelligence Committee and, prior to that, as a top attorney at the National Security Agency, said the S//OC//NF designation of the memo “seems like a typical level of classification for that kind of call.”
That classification indicates that the disclosure of the call would cause “serious damage” to national security, cannot be disseminated by anyone except the originator, and is prohibited from disclosure to foreign nationals. A code word classification, meanwhile, is top secret—a level higher than secret—and then further compartmentalized by adding a code word so that only those who have been cleared for each code word can see it.
Doss said it would be “highly unusual” for this kind of routine call between world leaders to be placed into a system that’s used for information about the nation’s most highly compartmented programs. “It risks undermining a whole host of important national security activities,” she said, noting that “most if not all” officials who would need to have access to call readouts as part of carrying out their regular duties in advising on foreign affairs and implementing the administration’s policies “would not have access” to the codeword system.
The president has ultimate classification authority and it’s an open legal question whether he’s bound by executive orders, including one signed by Obama in 2009 that says information can’t be classified in order to “conceal violations of law, inefficiency, or administrative error” or “prevent embarrassment to a person, organization, or agency.”
But it would be squarely within the whistleblower’s rights, as governed by the 1998 Intelligence Community Whistleblower Protection Act, to sound the alarm over the potential violation of that executive order, Doss said—especially if it was done by the president’s staff. That in turn could at least partly be why the IC IG considered it to be within the intelligence community’s purview, despite the DNI’s determination that it fell outside their jurisdiction.
A former intelligence official who served on Obama’s National Security Council, but who wished to remain anonymous to discuss the NSC’s codeword-level system, agreed that storing a transcript on that system “would severely limit those personnel able to view it.”
While limited in what he could disclose about the system without revealing classified information, the official said, “The bottom line is that if the administration attempted to upload the transcript to that system it would have been to make it nearly impossible to share. The system was not intended for unclassified material.”
He added that he’d “never” seen a presidential transcript stored there. Pfeiffer said that he could not recall ever seeing a transcript stored there, but said it would’ve only been possible if a president’s calls “touched on compartmented matters requiring that protection.”
As I delineated this morning, misclassifying this information by upclassifying it so it can be “locked down” prevents those who need to know this information from actually being able to access it and know it. Doing this to protect the President from himself, creates a serious insider threat and counterintelligence problem for the United States because it makes it almost impossible for senior national security and intelligence personnel to know what they need to know to both accurately and effectively carry out US national security and foreign policy, as well as to protect US interests because they do not know what the President is saying to, hearing from, agreeing with, and/or agreeing to do in his conversations with foreign leaders. The fact that the people that the President has hired into senior political appointments at the White House are unable to control themselves enough to not settle scores between themselves by viciously leaking about each other and the President to the press is not an excuse to mishandle and misclassify US government information. It is a good reason to hire better and more professional people.
And since the White House Counsel’s Office allegedly approved doing this, Don McGahn, Pat Cipollone, and their staff need to be brought before the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence and the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence to explain what it was and is they’re doing regarding classification of information. Their clearances should also be stripped and their access to classified information stopped immediately.
NotMax
“Make sure the Kremlin gets the password, okay?” //
Fair Economist
Seems a slam dunk to subpoena all such transcripts to the Intelligence committee now that Trump has admitted using the system to conceal illegal campaign manipulation.
guachi
Maybe it’s because I’m in the IC, but this seems really bad.
We get annual training in this area saying it’s a bad thing and you shouldn’t do it (upclassifying to prevent embarrassment).
How this didn’t get passed along to Congress is beyond belief.
catclub
Why is this not law already? EO is not law.
dmsilev
Weren’t we assured that he was going to hire only the best people? Are you saying that …Trump lied? I’m shocked, shocked.
More seriously, any sense on whether Congressional investigators would be able to get hold of any such transcripts? I assume that the transcripts themselves don’t acquire Top Secret/etc. classification simply by virtue of being stored in the isolated system, but given what else might (legitimately) be stored there, doesn’t it make even targeted investigations much more difficult?
rikyrah
Tigerbeat on the Potomac with some actual reporting…imagine that.
jl
” it makes it almost impossible for senior national security and intelligence personnel to know what they need to know to both accurately and effectively carry out US national security and foreign policy…”
But what have those people ever done for Trump? Were they ever nice to him?
dmsilev
@rikyrah: They’ve gotten a lot better over the last few years, probably because a bunch of the worst reporters left, either to found Axios or to join places like the NYT.
worn
Well this is the wisdom that Kay, in her ongoing comments regarding this tawdry mess of an administration, keeps emphasizing: the quite predictable result of crappy hires is a crappy organization.
chopper
reminds me of the steele dossier. the more information comes out, the more of it ends up being verified.
trollhattan
So it turns out the info firehose was really a straw and only now are we getting the firehose. But what if it’s also just a straw?
Can somebody please stop the bus? I’d like off.
Mnemosyne
I’m assuming that the bots and trolls are going to lean heavily on the whole technically, it’s not illegal when the president does it part.
That didn’t really work out well for Nixon, but it sounds like that’s where they’re going to go with their defense.
Mnemosyne
@trollhattan:
Just wait until we get past the firehose and discover it was actually a geyser. Because what’s behind a geyser is a volcano.
trollhattan
@chopper:
Was it Nunes who brought up the damn Steele dossier, again, today? His opening statement was a doozy, made even crazier on the radio because of all his awkward pauses, presumably trying to read the hard words. Wonder if his cow was live-tweeting it?
jl
@Mnemosyne: They are still in the ‘it’s baseless fabrications’ at this point.
@worn: It is very unfair that all the top, the best, terrific, people who Trump appointed have let him down so badly. Very unfair.
Adam L Silverman
@guachi: It is really bad. And while I’m not doing anything in my consulting right now that is Intelligence related, I’ve spent the better part of the past 12 years as, at least, IC adjacent, which is why I’ve been able to help explain this all to you.
Raoul
This seems very sound advice. No snark, but who the heck is gonna make sure that happens, though?
—
And this thing with the NYT outing details of the WBer, and Trump making a mob style thinly veiled threat on their life? Baquet is absolute garbage. He may find himself an accessory to stochastic murder (makin’ shit up here, but I thope folks get my convoluted gist).
Adam L Silverman
@guachi: The same people that said the alleged crimes were legal were asked for legal advice on whether to pass the allegation on to the cops.
Adam L Silverman
@catclub: There is very little law pertaining to classification. It is considered to be almost the sole purview of the president, regardless of who is president. As to whether this President is bound by the 2009 executive order will depend on 1) whether he issued a new one rescinding it and 2) whatever whacked justification Don McGahn and Pat Cipollone came up with to allow this to happen.
Adam L Silverman
@dmsilev: They can subpoena the material. The members of the committee have clearance and need to know (justification for access) as a result of being elected members of Congress and on the intelligence committees. Members of their and the committee staff have the appropriate clearance and, as their staff, can be granted access. The question will be is how long it will take to win the fight to get all this material.
Adam L Silverman
@rikyrah: Natasha Bertrand is one sharp reporter.
Adam L Silverman
@worn: Personnel is policy.
Yutsano
@Adam L Silverman:
You’re assuming there is one. I don’t see much sign of that happening other than not raising a peep when the President suggested it.
Roger Moore
@worn:
It all starts from the top. A leader who’s afraid to hire anyone who’s smarter or more competent than he is will have crappy subordinates.
Adam L Silverman
@Mnemosyne: Nixon didn’t have Fox News, Rupert Murdoch owning both the NY Post and the Wall Street Journal, Sinclair owning a buttload of local TV stations and requiring editorial fealty on news focus, Rush Limbaugh and other right wing radio talkers, Breitbart, Gateway Pundit, a number of their fellow travelers, as well as Bill Barr running DOJ and Mitch McConnell running the Senate. Nor the Mercers and the Kochs funding all sorts of fringe right crap. If Nixon had all that, hell, if he only had half of it, he never would have been impeached, never would have resigned, and would have served out his term.
Adam L Silverman
@trollhattan: Several times. He also mispronounced Steele as still.
JPL
This might have been mentioned but Mike Rogers reported that the way they released the whistle blower report was released, it was easy to discover who that person was. Something smells rotten to me.
Sorry if this has been mentioned.
Adam L Silverman
@Raoul: I don’t know at this point because we are so far through the map and off the looking glass that I have nothing to navigate by.
Martin
So, the information was so sensitive that it couldn’t be shared inside the US, but the foreign government on the other end of the call wasn’t bound by that set of rules, so could consider ‘hey, what could I get from Trump in order to keep this stuff secret?’.
Great plan, guys. You volunteered to be a revenge porn victim.
Adam L Silverman
@Yutsano: I’m not sure the President knew enough about classification in early 2017 to suggest it. Neither would Preibus or Bannon or Conway or Schlapp or anyone else around the President in the White House at the time. None of these people had any experience for the jobs they were doing. McGahn, however, did and would have known.
Patricia Kayden
Majority support impeachment.
http://littlegreenfootballs.com/weblog/img/dangerman/2019/09/26/224fc07b717eb042e9c54cb77dc63fad72c4f7833f89896b0f81e18076e38cda.phone.jpg
Good to know.
Adam L Silverman
@JPL: The NY Times has all but outed the whistleblower by name in their reporting this afternoon.
Martin
Please make it happen!
Go Team Brain Slug!
Sister Rail Gun of Warm Humanitarianism
@Adam L Silverman: Thank you, was coming here to ask that.
Adam L Silverman
@Martin: And that’s what I’ve been concerned about, and writing about here and elsewhere, since last week.
moops
@Fair Economist: Can the Congress Intel committee just access the codeword database directly?
Jeffro
IC really firing for effect this week – nice!
Adam L Silverman
@Martin: Not sure if they understand that crisis management means minimizing the problem, not maximizing it.
Martin
@Adam L Silverman: Hey, Trump is all drama, all the time. Don’t diminish the brand.
Adam L Silverman
@Sister Rail Gun of Warm Humanitarianism: You’re welcome. I honestly don’t know what’s going to happen now. We are so far outside of even abnormal regarding handling of information that I have no reference points. And that’s not counting the Rudy insanity and bullshit or the attempt to shakedown Ukraine’s president.
Adam L Silverman
@moops: No.
C Stars
And also, excuse me if someone’s already mentioned this, but apparently Russia TV reported about Trump and Pence’s supposedly intentional snub of Ukraine’s presidential inauguration a long time ago, and now it’s coming out that this did in fact happen (i.e. it was intentional) and it was a part of Trump and Giuliani’s Biden shakedown.
https://www.inquisitr.com/5657961/russia-knew-donald-trump-banned-officials-ukraine-inaugural/
ETA: Dude is obsessed with inauguration attendance….
catclub
@chopper:
The settled opinion of the RWNJ’s is that the Steele dossier totally confirms that Trump is innocent, and it was made by Russians colluding with Hillary. RWNJ #1 – Rudy Giuliani
moops
Yeah, now all our foreign baddies that Trump has been shmoozing with know for a fact that their own transcripts of those conversations are something Trump has been hiding from his own people. That’s the sort of thing Wikileaks was supposed to accept and disseminate.
Sister Rail Gun of Warm Humanitarianism
@Adam L Silverman: Yah, but knowing that it would not normally require any extraordinary efforts for Congress to get the transcripts stored there will settle a lot of wild speculation.
Mousebumples
@Adam L Silverman: nothing substantial to add except a sincere thank you.
moops
@Adam L Silverman: so we have to subpoena the transcripts from the WH. Which means the incompetent WH can just fail to comply, over and over again, with no actual consequences.
Adam L Silverman
@Sister Rail Gun of Warm Humanitarianism: It isn’t routine for them to get access to it, but it shouldn’t be difficult given that they now clearly have a need to do so.
Adam L Silverman
@Mousebumples: You’re quite welcome.
Adam L Silverman
@moops: I expect the courts are going to have to be involved here and they don’t like to get in fights over clearance and access issues between branches of government.
Gin & Tonic
@C Stars: This was at exactly the same time as US Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovich left Kyiv, having been muscled out of her post by Rudy and Don Jr.
Alien Radio
@Adam L Silverman: Do you think McGhan Is an avenue to start turning the screws on the federalist society?
catclub
@Adam L Silverman:
It seems to me that the actual alleged crime is misclassification to protect
Trump, and hide any crimes by Trump on the phone.
The Executive OLC looks like they turned that into ( and Maguire let them) an executive privilege decision.
If the crime is misclassification, then there will be many people outside of Trump who should be prosecuted for it.
kindness
Or pick better Presidents than Boaty McBoatface. But that one is on those of us who voted for Boaty. I didn’t. I voted for Hillary.
Adam L Silverman
@Gin & Tonic: And that’s the other piece here that needs a light more sunlight and scrutiny. Don Jr. is tightly connected to the same to Russian oligarchs from Florida that have been funding Rudy’s adventures in Ukraine, Israel, as well as other places in Europe.
moops
@Adam L Silverman: Someone needs to be held in contempt and put in jail while these transcripts fail to show up in committee. Who would be the responsible individual to turn over these documents? WH Counsel?
PJ
@Adam L Silverman: And why shouldn’t Nixon have stuck around for the next three terms after that? https://watchmen.fandom.com/wiki/Richard_M._Nixon
ETA: Who needs Dr. Manhattan when you’ve got Murdoch and Koch?
jl
@Adam L Silverman: “Not sure if they understand that crisis management means minimizing the problem, not maximizing it.”
You don’t have any advanced training in discontinuous saddle point, with worm holes into unknown dimensions, crisis management
Yarrow
Tick tock, motherfuckers!
Adam L Silverman
@Alien Radio: One would hope. I think the bigger issue is going to be for the law firm that he went back to when he left the White House. They may tend to do legal work for Republicans and conservative interests and to have their people go into Republican administrations, but they aren’t going to want this mess on them. That may also provide some leverage.
JPL
UH OH The pool reporters were just called to the White House. What the hell is he going to do now.
Adam L Silverman
@catclub: I was referring to the White House Counsel’s Office, but other than that: yes.
??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??
@JPL:
Oh, probably order the executions of all of the Democrats in Congress for treason or something equally insane
sukabi
How long before we find out drumpfs calls with world leaders were marked “Code word: Crime“
Yutsano
@kindness:
OI! Boaty is a noble boat ‘e is! Don’t be comparin’ him to the orange trash in the White House!
Adam L Silverman
@moops: I don’t know.
C Stars
@Gin & Tonic: There are so many layers of corruption, I don’t see out they come out of this unscathed. But at the same time, I wouldn’t be surprised if they do….
Adam L Silverman
The Moar You Know
Which, Adam, you know damn well will never happen as the classifying authority will simply say “that’s not happening”. And he holds all the cards with regards to that.
Something else that should be addressed by legislation but probably won’t be.
Adam L Silverman
@PJ: I found that series unreadable. Darwyn Cooke’s similar concept, using actually DC characters and not amalgams, set during the Cold War was a far better story and was far better written.
Adam L Silverman
@JPL: @??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??: Maybe he’s going to formally fire Nancy Pelosi today by doing it in an executive order, rather than in off the cuff remarks like he did yesterday.
Adam L Silverman
OOOOOh!
rikyrah
Thanks for the post, and your comments in the replies, Silverman.
Honus
@Adam L Silverman: ti be fair, Nixon did have John Mitchell. Until he went to jail.
Alien Radio
@Adam L Silverman: that’s because you’re american. we have 2000AD. different cultural inheritance.
JPL
@Adam L Silverman: hah I thought that maybe he has ordered Barr to arrest Little Adam Schiff , Hunter and Joe Biden.
JPL
@JPL: Well this will change the subject..
White House press pool wild ride:
4:45 – Press asked to assemble … We have not been told what this is about.
4:49 – Pool has assembled on the front lawn for a photo of Sherrifs and law enforcement officials
4:52 – Trump talks with them, we can’t hear, lots of laughter.
Martin
@Adam L Silverman: I think he’ll tell Nancy Pelosi that since she is reluctant to provide him with the location of the DNC servers, he has chosen to test this station’s destructive power on her home planet of San Francisco.”
Adam L Silverman
The Independents are shifting!
Adam L Silverman
@Honus: That Mitchell guy was always soft!
Patricia Kayden
Republicans burying their heads in the sand.
https://twitter.com/mattyglesias/status/1177326803465187328
Not gonna work.
Adam L Silverman
@JPL: The President cannot order state or local officials to do anything. Someone decided he needed a photo op to settle him down.
Mnemosyne
@Adam L Silverman:
This is where Trump gets to see if his purchase of two Supreme Court justices pays off.
clay
@Adam L Silverman: Watchmen, unreadable? That’s a pretty hot take, Silverman.
debbie
I tried to listen to the hearings while at work. Did I miss the announcement that the GOP’s slogan had been changed to “Nothingburger”?
NPR just interviewed one of Tennessee’s finest, Tim Burchett, who stated several times that Schiff’s account of the phone call was a “parody.” I’d bet he doesn’t know what that word even means.
Adam L Silverman
@Mnemosyne: Perhaps.
cain
@Adam L Silverman:
Which is precisely why they all exist now because of that initial impeachment is my working theory. The lessons learned from Nixon is not “don’t do it”.
NotMax
@Honus
Remember Martha Mitchell’s midnight phone calls?
Roger Moore
@Adam L Silverman:
The shift among Republicans is almost as big. It’s not as obvious because the numbers are so much further from the center, but moving from 5/89 to 10/85 is noteworthy. The number of fence sitters is also interesting. It looks like Democratic fence sitters are coming down on the “Impeach” side, and independent anti-impeachment people are moving to the fence.
jl
@Patricia Kayden: That’s a good sign, I guess. Less insane pushback than in the House.
Conceivable could get a conviction at trial in the Senate. GOP Senators will say they were too busy with appropriations, didn’t have time to follow it all, and weren’t sure what they were voting on.
Jeffro
@Patricia Kayden: I’ve already heard similar from my RWNJ brother – “oh, Dems MIGHT impeach but it’ll be laughed out of the Senate”…”complaint is somebody writing up what other people told him, allegedly”…”fun to watch the far left Dems going crazy and damaging their own prospects”
Seriously.
Out of all that the ‘far left Dems’ is the most concerning to me, because that’s how the Fox-addled talk (it’s never ‘Democrats’, it’s always ‘far left Democrats’ or ‘open borders Democrats’ or whatever) and he usually doesn’t watch a lot of Fox. I think he’s retreating into the bubble as things spiral downward…ugh
Adam L Silverman
@clay: Everyone has their preferences. I wasn’t thrilled with it on the first pass when it originally came out and I despised it so badly that when I bought an omnibus graphic novel version to read while on temporary duty before the movie came out to refresh my memory, I left it in a hotel room when I left for my next set of meetings at my next destination. I find some of Moore’s work genius. I find a lot of it doesn’t appeal to me. Some of it in the same series. V for Vendetta was a great concept, but there are parts of that series that are just meh and ugh.
Jeffro
@clay: I know, right? Third-most shocking news I’ve heard all day. =)
Gordon Hope-Murray
@clay: To be fair Dawyn Cooks work is sumptuous, and given the american superhero’s birth in the Jewish diaspora of new york it has certain sensibilities that darwyn cooke could tap into being american, but someone who’s just not got that cultural background – even if exposed to non uk work before working under a market that Pat Mills made and thus had an inherently anarchic streak.- would not be able to tap into. Superheros will resonate with Adam in a way they don’t for Alan Moore. Grant Morrison on the other hand loves them. Which is why his JLA run was so epic.
trollhattan
@clay:
We should presume Readmen are unwatchable.
JPL
@Adam L Silverman: I know.. I updated at 77
??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??
@Jeffro:
You should direct him to polling showing majority support for impeachment and increased support among Republicans. It’s not just “far left Democrats”.
NotMax
@Adam L. Silverman
Moore has since pooh-poohed it but I’ll stick with getting it from him directly at the time during a boozy conversation we had that the inspiration and template was Superfolks, published a decade prior to Watchmen.
MisterForkbeard
@Adam L Silverman: V for Vendetta is the rare work where I find the movie to be vastly superior to the written work.
Seriously, the comic has a fantastic premise but the whole thing is just weird and occasionally offputting in a… bad way.
Adam L Silverman
@cain: Pretty much my take as well.
Matt McIrvin
@PJ: It’s interesting that both Watchmen and Back to the Future 2 used repeated reelection of Richard Nixon as a sign of a messed-up, dystopian timeline… during the presidency of Ronald Reagan, who in many ways was basically Nixon with less raging paranoia.
(edit: I guess BTTF2 actually came out during the Bush I administration, but its “present day” scenes are set during the Reagan years.)
NotMax
@MisterForkbeard
Ah, you too have met Mr. Moore.
;)
Jeffro
@MisterForkbeard: Agreed on V For Vendetta working far better as a movie.
@Adam L Silverman: ‘genius’ = Tom Strong!
Adam L Silverman
@MisterForkbeard: I thought they did a great job with the movie including updating it to meet the political moment. And they removed some of the most bizarre bits that didn’t make much sense except to Moore. My only real complaint is if you want someone who looks like Natalie Portman, but has an English accent, then you cast Kiera Knightly.
Jeffro
@??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??: Oh I definitely will…I’m going to give it a few more days, when things will have shifted even further.
He has this problem where he never works off of actual ‘data’ – it’s always just a lighter version of GOP groupthink/wishthink that my dad has. Probably directly proportional to the amount of Fox viewing.
He also doesn’t seem to understand that this is not a static environment, nor that trumpov was an unpopular president* who has only gotten less popular (and less ‘strong support’ from his remaining base) across three years.
He’ll learn.
lgerard
Anybody want to be the next Senator from Georgia?
Apply right here
You might get to vote to impeach the Papaya Pinochet`
NotMax
@Jeffro
What he accomplished with Swamp Thing, a title at the time for which moribund is too optimistic a description, may not have been genius but was a reasonable facsimile thereof. Also too introducing John Constantine into the DC universe.
@Alien Radio
Moore’s output for 2000 A.D. was, shall we say, uneven. But then so was 2000 A.D. itself.
;)
sublime33
Paul Ryan surprisingly moves back to Washington a month ago. Scaramucci suddenly goes on the anti-Trump train two or three weeks ago. Is it possible they knew this Ukraine thing was going to blow up so they got themselves back in the spotlight ahead of the tidal wave? I think Ryan is going to be their 2020 candidate and he was brought back by the party regulars. He is one of the few who isn’t totally soiled by his association with Trump.
dm
@Patricia Kayden: Note that the number of “all adults” who oppose impeachment is within the margin of error of the crazification factor.
JPL
hahahahhahaha
https://twitter.com/StevenTDennis
He actually might
narya
@Mnemosyne: Well and also too, they keep reminding us (or at least they did on the Clenis hunt) that it doesn’t have to be technically illegal to impeach.
MattF
Alexandra Petri visits a truck stop in Real America:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2019/09/26/trumps-getting-impeached-i-defy-you-convince-anyone-this-cursed-truck-stop/
Matt McIrvin
@Jeffro: It is remarkably static, really. I mean, Trump started out with less than 50% job approval (still lower disapproval, though: people tried to give him a chance), then dropped into the high 30s by the end of 2017, then gained some of it back to get to the low 40s. And since the spring of 2018, there’s been basically no movement. Little jinks up and down–the government shutdown shaved some off his popularity but he got it back quickly. I think he’s actually at something of a high right now according to the latest polls, but really nothing changes.
It’s the main reason why I’m skeptical that this will really amount to anything. But who knows, I’ve been wrong before.
??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??
@Jeffro:
Sorry your father has gone down the Fox hole : (
??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??
@Adam L Silverman:
Did you ever watch Hack Snyder’s adaptation of the Watchmen?
MisterForkbeard
@Adam L Silverman: Honestly, I would have watched the whole movie with Evie being played by the woman who played Rose instead. She was lovely, in both form and acting.
Though I do think that accent aside, Portman did a fantastic job. And certainly gave it some star power.
Mike in DC
So, I assume all of 45’s phone convos with Putin were also “upclassified”? Seems like the intel committees could subpoena some or all of those upclassified phone conversations with foreign leaders, so long as there was no valid support for said classification.
Connor Cochran
@Adam L Silverman: Comics nerd, here. Not amalgams — just alternate versions of the Charlton Comics superheros that DC had acquired. Moore had originally wanted to do WATCHMEN using them, but DC had other plans for the characters and Moore invented his own pastiches to use instead. Equivalence list here: https://watchmen.fandom.com/wiki/Charlton_Comics. (Getting really meta, Kieron Gillen just did a Peter Cannon, Thunderbolt miniseries for Boom! that takes the Cannon character, who was Moore’s inspiration for Ozymandias, and uses him (plus a set of further variant Watchmen) to simultaneously parody and honor/homage Watchmen itself (right down to the rigidly programmed panel layouts). I have no idea how it would read to someone who isn’t automatically getting all the references…
Tazj
@Patricia Kayden: “Raises more questions than answers”, that’s a great answer. What nonsense and others supposedly haven’t read it yet? They’re absolutely shameless. I guess the whistle-blower just risked his/her entire career because they hate Trump. Yes, everyone just hates Trump for the heck of it and the man who lies like he breathes should be defended.
PPCLI
@Martin: NOOOOO!!!
We want Rudy! We want Rudy!
PJ
@NotMax: I loved his runs on Swamp Thing, Watchmen, Miracleman, V for Vendetta, and From Hell (caveat – I read these all when they came out, some more than 30 yrs ago). He stole from everywhere but the confluence was usually interesting (ironic, since he objects vehemently to anyone adapting his works, despite the fact that he willingly sold the rights to them). But after From Hell, the hectoring for his views on sex and mysticism, and lack of interesting characters and story ground me down. The last few things I read were dreadful.
Yutsano
And BTW in the middle of all this we gots ourselves a CR people.
piratedan
@JPL: since he’s likely to be near the nadir himself, it should only involve a mirror, n’est pas?
dm
@Adam L Silverman: I’ve wondered about clearances on the Intel Committee — when I read the “code-word” description of this server the transcript was up-classified to, I assume they mean “compartmented”, in which case access to the material is more tightly controlled — not just anyone with a Top Secret clearance can look at it.
StringOnAStick
This is seriously petty of me, but my 87 year old father is a complete and utter RW nutjob, a Bircher from way back; we only get along now (after nearly 50 years of his screaming at me about my liberal politics) because we’ve agreed not to talk about politics. It took his wife/my mom dying last year to get to this state of affairs, yet I’m like beaten dog constantly waiting for the yelling to start again. Here’s the petty part: I really, really want to see this entire administration go down HARD in flames just because he won’t be able to avoid seeing it happen. That might help make up for a lifetime of abusive behavior regarding his precious Rethuglican party.
You can call me petty about this. I’m OK with it!
zhena gogolia
Kyle Griffin
Verified account
dm
@sublime33: When I heard Romney and Sasse distancing themselves, I thought: “Right — these are the people who will be lining up to replace Trump on the ticket if a Trump candidacy becomes untenable in the next few months.”
zhena gogolia
@StringOnAStick:
You are not petty.
Anotherlurker
@kindness: The correct spelling is : Bloaty McBloatface.
Patricia Kayden
Chinchilla is always wrong.
https://twitter.com/eclecticbrotha/status/1177339944358031362
Imagine getting paid for spewing nonsense.
Adam L Silverman
@??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??: I have. I thought that visually he did a great job replicating the visuals of the comic on the screen. Which is, to be honest, his real talent. And given that the tenor of the story is actually pretty in line with his understanding of the world, I think he did a decent overall job with the adaptation. But other than his ability to translate visuals from the comic book page to the screen, he was the wrong person to be given Superman or any other DC property.
Adam L Silverman
@MisterForkbeard: The problem with the actress that plays Rose is that she doesn’t look like the Evie character from the comic. And I’m not knocking Portman’s performance, or even her accent for the movie, just that it seemed like an odd choice given that they could’ve just gotten Kiera Knightly and the accent would’ve come naturally.
zhena gogolia
I have gotten no work done today.
Adam L Silverman
@Connor Cochran: I’m very aware of the backstory of what Moore wanted to do with the Charleton characters and was actually allowed to do. But some of those characters were still amalgams, and not just alternate versions. For instance, Owlman was clearly supposed to be the Ted Kord Blue Beetle, but there was also some Batman worked into the visuals of the contemporary Owlman in the story.
Brachiator
Once again, it appears that Trump doesn’t trust the government or understands how to use the resources available to him effectively. So he tries to wing it with a tiny group of his family and most trusted advisors, instead of the full resources of the intelligence community and State Department.
Or, Trump is an agent of the Russian government trying to hide his tracks.
Adam L Silverman
@Yutsano: And we don’t even have the CR yet. Only four more shopping day till the government shuts down!
Amir Khalid
@Adam L Silverman:
Her name is spelled Keira Knightley. By the way, surely learning an appropriate English accent would not have been beyond Portman’s acting skill set?
Mnemosyne
@NotMax:
As I was saying to G yesterday, that worked because Martha Mitchell was calling Helen Thomas, an actual reporter.
Anyone who calls Maggie Haberman with similar information about Trump is never going to see their information see the light of day.
Quinerly
@sublime33: might be of interest to you. Vanity Fair piece about chaos at Fox and Paul Ryan is on the Board. https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2019/09/madness-at-fox-news-as-trump-faces-impeachment-lachlan-murdoch
SFAW
Although this Doonesbury is slightly dated, I’m hoping it can be applied to all of them, including Shill Barr. who could probably teach John Mitchell a thing or two about being a dishonest, corrupt motherfucker.
ETA: I see Honus @ 74 more-or-less beat me to it.
Adam L Silverman
@dm: You are technically correct, which we all know is the best type of correct. However, members of Congress get their clearances on the basis of simply being elected constitutional officers of the United States. Access/need to know is based on their committee assignments and their oversight roles as a result of those assignments. At the very least this would be something that the Gang of 8, the caucus leaders and the intel committee chairs and ranking members would need to know.
Adam L Silverman
@Brachiator:
trollhattan
@StringOnAStick:
Heh. Family.
Prepare yourself for Trumpdenburg to be blamed on Hillary’s Crime Syndicate.
I’m cool with that, so long as I get my Trumpdenburg. “Oh, the humanity?”
Alien Radio
@NotMax: 2000AD is punk. what is more punk than uneven quality? I have to say I prefer Morrison over Moore but that’s ‘cos I like techno and grew up in Hong Kong. Neon and steel is more my thing. Plus I can appreciate superheros.
Yarrow
@sublime33:
Nope. Ryan was chair of the Republican convention when they approved the change in wording to the platform. Also, Kislyak was there. And remember Ryan was the one who shut up McCarthy when McCarthy said he thought Putin paid Trump.
I just had a look at that transcript of the Republican meeting. Good Lord, they were talking about Ukraine. Seriously.
Link.
Mnemosyne
@Adam L Silverman:
You and the other comic book fans may enjoy this scathing review of Snyder’s “Batman v Superman” from Gizmodo:
https://io9.gizmodo.com/batman-v-superman-spoiler-faq-of-justice-1767720335
Mary G
Top of my trending on Twitter list:
Adam L Silverman
@Mnemosyne: I’ve read it. There were four real problems with that movie. The first is that it occurred too soon in the attempt to build a shared universe, so for it to come out between Man of Steel, which had its own problems, and Wonder Woman, made the larger world building feel rushed. The second is that the extended cut is what should have been released in theaters as the extra fifteen minutes or so actually made for a much better and coherent story and movie. The third relates to the first, but is really tied into Snyder’s larger problem with being handed the DC properties: he doesn’t understand the characters or the shared universe. This, combined with rushing the world building, was a serious issue. The fourth and final problem was some of the casting. Specifically Jesse Eisenberg. He was terrible as Luthor. Frankly, I think he’s just terrible, but giving him the benefit of the doubt, he was terrible as Luthor. It was like watching Luthor who’d been possessed by the Joker. And not even one of the better interpretations of the Joker. There is a final issue, which relates to and effects all of Snyder’s superhero movies except Watchmen, where it made sense, which is his lighting and color palette.
I have long believed that if you wanted to do a Superman-Batman conflict story, that included Wonder Woman as she’s the third part of DC’s trinity, then you adapt Kingdom Come. It is set far enough in the future where there’s not going to be a problem for trying to establish a current shared continuity and the world building necessary for it. The story is much, much tighter than trying to pull one of the multiple plot lines from The Dark Knight Returns and make it its own standalone plot. The basis for the conflict and crisis between Superman and Batman is far more real and makes far more sense. And the resolution of their conflict, and the reason for it, make far more sense.
And yes, I know I’ve threatened/promised to write a post on this for over two years and almost did last Saturday for Batman day.
Gin & Tonic
@zhena gogolia: That’s at least two of us.
??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??
@Adam L Silverman:
Agreed about Snyder not understanding the universe or the characters. Plus, “Batman vs Superman” sounds fucking stupid and cheapens the idea. Don’t forget the “Martha” nonsense
Adam L Silverman
@??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??: That’s why the Kingdom Come point of conflict and resolution and reconciliation between the two characters makes much more sense.
Jeffro
@SFAW: 70s and 80s Doonesbury was the BEST – funny and sharp as hell, and practically a historical record in its own right.
Jeffro
@MattF: Petri is so spot-on with how the NYT and other ‘mainstream’ outlets do their “Cletus Safaris” (LOVE that phrase) it’s amazing.
I have only a few negative bucket-list goals in life, and one is to get Gary Abernathy OFF of the WaPo op-ed pages. He puts out “yuhwellItalkedtodinerfolksinmypodunktownandtheyalllovetrumpov!” crap like this all. The. Time.
Miss Bianca
@rikyrah: Maybe they used the money they were spending on Ken Vogel to hire a real reporter.//
Jeffro
@Matt McIrvin: What I think is amazing is his ‘strong support’ is right around the crazification factor, while the ‘strong disapprove’ has recently come into 50% territory. And that’s of likely voters.
Just like 2018, all of the energy and enthusiasm will be on our side. He riles his base, but his base is shrinking, and he riles up our base even more than his own.
Dan B
@Adam L Silverman: Why does the government have to shut down on my birthday!?!
And China’s big party the same day?! Hope Hong Kong is not burned down as part of the celebrations. That might tank my savings…
Sebastian
@Adam L Silverman:
And that’s why he had to go over a burglary whereas this gang had to push it to Grand Treason before the whole thing went Kaboom.
Sebastian
@Mary G:
Finally. Let’s throw them an anvil.
Miss Bianca
@Yarrow:
Ahhh… : )
Miss Bianca
@clay: It – the movie, anyway – is certainly unwatchable. IMHO
Chris T.
@trollhattan:
“Oh, the inanity”?
Sebastian
@sublime33:
You sure about that?