If you wanted to bring down the governments of, at least, 3 of the 5 Five Eyes countries (US, UK, AUS) and several other western (Italy) and western oriented (Ukraine) governments, what has been reported on today would be a good way to do it. You’ve got at least five legitimacy crises being created by this that will at the very least weaken the stability of the governments in each state. I really do wonder what is on the transcripts of the calls between the President and Putin that have been stashed in the National Security Council’s Directorate of Intelligence’s code word access only computer system.
Open thread!
BruceFromOhio
NATO scared the shit out of them almost as badly as the Nazi’s. You don’t get over that easily.
Frank Wilhoit
Remember that the Israelis {probably?} have full audio of all of Trump’s calls.
geg6
Yup. Those have to be LIT.
Mnemosyne
Putin bet that Western elites were just as greedy and venal as he thought they were. And he was right.
Cheryl Rofer
OTOH, never attribute to Putin what can adequately be explained by Trump’s narcissism.
Adam L Silverman
@Frank Wilhoit: I seem to remember a front page post about it somewhere…
Adam L Silverman
@Cheryl Rofer: My guess is that Putin just strung him along by playing to that narcissism about the election and the investigation. He didn’t have to do anything but be a sympathetic ear and an encouraging voice.
Cheryl Rofer
@Adam L Silverman: It’s possible. My preference for parsimony in explanations minimizes Putin, although a nudge here and a suspicion there are certainly consistent with the way a KGB man would play it.
Fair Economist
It may have started as an attempt to destabilize several of the Western countries but it has moved on to an effort to gain control, if that wasn’t already a stretch goal from the start. We are seeing the same playbook of a combination of crooked investigations plus social media manipulation plus complicit MSM plus brownshirt-style violent irregulars to put neofascists in power from Hungary to Turkey to Brazil to the Philippines to the US to India to Italy. That is now the goal, and mere disruption the fallback goal.
TaMara (HFG)
Well, great. Now I’m not going to sleep well tonight.
Yarrow
So that leaves Canada and New Zealand.
Smedley Darlington Prunebanks (formerly Mumphrey, et al.)
I still have hope that we’re going to learn what they said to each other, especially now that it’s clear that he’s circling the bowl. I guess there are fucks dumb enough to go to jail for this clown, but there can’t be that many. Shit. With enough time, even Michael Cohen worked out whose side this guy is on. My guess is that a whole lot of people who know all kinds of shit are a lot less dumb than Cohen is.
Adam L Silverman
@Cheryl Rofer: No real disagreements between us on this.
Leto
If I knew how to link it I would, but Colbert’s Tonight Show FB page has a part of tonight’s interview with HRC and Chelsea up where they just learn about Pompeo being on the call with Ukraine and it’s glorious.
NotMax
Strictly entre nous, password is stablegenius1.
Either that or covfefe.
;)
JPL
Nothing to see here
Just in: Sebastian Gorka is traveling with @SecPompeo to Europe, @Abs_NBC reports. He was seen getting into a State Department van headed to Joint Base Andrews for departure
jl
in fairness, wasn’t the UK doing a good job on itself, starting a year or so before Trump was elected?
geg6
Since it’s an open thread, I have a recommendation for all the biography lovers out there. I got Chernow’s Grant biography about a year ago but have avoided picking it up until recently. This partly due to its massive size being a little intimidating and partly because I can’t seem to concentrate on anything this deep in the midst of this crazy timeline we are stuck in right now. But when I couldn’t take another minute of current events the other day, I picked it up. I thought I knew the broad outlines of his life but I really was ignorant of the full story. What a fascinating, contradictory man who has truly been inspirational to read about. I’ve read other Chernow works but this is a real masterpiece of the genre. Just got through the battle at Shiloh and the contrast with our current generals and president is just too apparent. He had his flaws and he wasn’t perfect or from an American aristocratic family but he was brave and humble and brilliant in many ways. He was the epitome of what Americans should strive for, a true patriot and hero. I can’t recommend it enough as an antidote to the current poison infecting this country.
clay
@Adam L Silverman: “Da, Mr. President, of course your election victory was one of the biggest victories in world history!…. What’s that?…. Nyet, of course we did not interfere with the election…. that is deepstate fakenews…. Well, I cannot say for certain, but our intelligence suggests that the Ukraine might know something about email severs…. da, da, MAGA.”
Adam L Silverman
@TaMara (HFG): You’re welcome.
Gin & Tonic
@Adam L Silverman: Did you find anything to that report I sent you this morning?
Timurid
At this point they have two choices:
1. Go full authoritarian. Refuse to give up the call records or any other information. Order government employees not to cooperate with Congress, even if subpoenaed. Threaten private citizens who are asked to cooperate. Manufacture more bogus investigations of enemies in government and the media (as with the ongoing Clinton email probe). Use the Justice Department as their bunker. Incite violence by non-state actors. Manufacture a war or other crisis.
2. Quit.
JPL
@Adam L Silverman: So what’s with Gorka traveling with Pompeo. Do they just not care anymore.
Maybe they never did
Mary G
Bet the Dutch, who were so good at hacking the Russians, aren’t sharing anything now.
Al Z.
Random stuff
Adam L Silverman
@clay: How were you able to get the transcript out of that classified system so fast. You better call Congressman Schiff ASAP!
Jim, Foolish Literalist
Bagdad Bobs
I wonder if Kellyanne is quietly negotiating her next move with Lachlan Murdoch
JPL
@Timurid: Well he’s not gonna pick two, so buckle up .
NotMax
@Mary G
FancyDeplorable Bear.;)
patrick II
@geg6:
Pompeo finishing first in his class at West Point has given me second thoughts about the abilities of our general officers as a whole.
Adam L Silverman
@Gin & Tonic: I haven’t had a chance to look around, but I haven’t seen anything in the normal places. Let me do some poking around and I’ll be back with you shortly.
For everyone else wondering what this is about, I have just three words for you: Need To Know.//
trollhattant
@geg6:
I’m at his reelection [whoops, spoiler alert!]. The political era portion doesn’t sizzle like his military period, but damn, has my opinion of the man risen. His main flaw seems to have been trusting folks who did not deserve it. His own scruples were beyond reproach.
It’s a great book of great size.
Gin & Tonic
@Adam L Silverman: Thanks. Not meaning to give you work if you’re otherwise busy (I can’t afford your standard rate), just thought it might intrigue you.
Leto
@geg6: I’ll definitely keep an eye out for it in the 2nd hand book store. Thanks!
Edit: @trollhattant: this right here, exactly why we need spoiler tags!!!
The Dangerman
Fond(le) memories of Pee Pee Tapes?
Leto
@Adam L Silverman: well here’s four letter for you: FOIA! :P
Yarrow
@Mary G: Ah, the Dutch.
You can see the picture in the tweet. Article is in next tweet if you click through.
chris
@JPL: IIRC Gorka never got a security clearance. Something very sketchy here.
NotMax
@The Dangerman
Oddly enough, 90 minutes of knock knock jokes.
Bex
@geg6: Do you think LMM might be interested?
Adam L Silverman
@Gin & Tonic: All I can find is the Kyiv Post summary that links to the Unian article, which links to the original Norwegian language paper article. And, of course, the Russian denials. But that’s it, no other reporting. Almost no one I’ve ever heard of has linked to any of the articles about it. Though this one journalist I’ve seen before basically says he’s heard or seen nothing from his sources:
Adam L Silverman
@JPL: I honestly have no idea. The Blue Footed Boobie of Budapest and I do not communicate.
JWR
For all the radio folks here, Ian Masters’ “Background Briefing” was pretty damn good today. (Link is to the homepage.) Here’s today’s lineup:
“Authoritarians Are Never More Dangerous Than When Vulnerable” with Ruth Ben Ghiat, then,
“As Trump’s Roy Cohn Barr Gets Him Out of Trouble, Giuliani Gets Him into More Trouble” with Casey Michel, and finally,
“The Contrast Between Whistleblowers like Reality Winner and the So-Called “Adults in the Room”” with Will Bunch
Archives are there for the plundering! Yesterday he had Alexander Butterfield, he of the Nixon taping system fame. One hour of fun!
zhena gogolia
@Adam L Silverman:
Shana tovah!
Adam L Silverman
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Rebekah Mercer. She works for Rebekah Mercer.
Jeffro
If your goal is to cause chaos in the Western democracies, with everything else potentially as a bonus, bribing a few public officials and newspaper editors isn’t the hardest thing in the world. A helluva a lot cheaper than a tank division too.
Jeffro
@Fair Economist: I’m certain that Putin, Xi, and MBS have been astonished to see how easily and how well their efforts have worked.
“All this time, we thought we had to build up armies and air forces! LOLOL”
NotMax
@Adam L. Silverman
Some one (or somebot) sending out cherry-picked clips from Occupied?
Gravenstone
@Adam L Silverman: Some of us read G&T’s comments about it in prior threads. Unless he’s speaking of other potential skullduggery afoot.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Adam L Silverman: I forgot, but what is life if you’re not on TeeVee at least three times a week?
I wonder if Maher will start having her back on, or if he’s beneath her now.
Yarrow
@Jeffro: You don’t bribe them. You find things they’ve done, or set up conditions where they do things, then you own them.
Adam L Silverman
@Gin & Tonic: It definitely did. It worries me very much. I do know that the submarine part of the story may be recycling of reporting from October 2015 when a Russian sub was lurking around.
Adam L Silverman
@Leto: Do I look like the Federal government?
Jeffro
@Yarrow: Why not both? And a bribe, once accepted, is a way to own someone.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
JPL
@Adam L Silverman: The Federal Government doesn’t look like the Federal Government.
just sayin
Yarrow
@Jeffro: My framing is the end goal. The bribe is not the goal. The owning is the goal.
Gin & Tonic
@Adam L Silverman: Thanks, Adam.
Another Scott
@Al Z.: Well that was unexpected.
Thanks.
Cheers,
Scott.
Gin & Tonic
@Gravenstone: This is the same thing. I mentioned it in one comment in the morning thread, I think.
Adam L Silverman
@zhena gogolia: Thanks. This special Jewish New Year Infrastructure Week is off to an exciting start!
Adam L Silverman
@NotMax: I don’t know.
Adam L Silverman
@JPL: True.
Keith P.
I’m trying not to get my hopes up, but Trump is staring at impending impeachment (and Lord-knows-what-else-awaits-if-he-isn’t-pardoned), Boris Johnson is looking at getting sacked or jailed or investigated for an affair or all of the above, *and* Netanyahu looks close to failing to put together a government and is a few days from being indicted.
Adam L Silverman
@Gin & Tonic: You’re quite welcome.
Adam L Silverman
This is Balloon Juice Actual to All Hands! General Quarters! I repeat we are going to General Quarters! All hands to stations. Brace for impact!!!!
Ken
@NotMax:
If you’ve ever been around a four-year-old who’s just learned their first knock-knock joke, this is completely believable. Well, you have to assume Trump has declined to that mental level…
Dorothy A. Winsor
@geg6: @trollhattant: I just looked it up on Amazon because we’re traveling in November and I need stuff to read. The ppb is cheaper than the e-book but for travel, the e-book is better. I read Chernow’s Hamilton. He’s a good writer. He knows how to bring historical material to life.
Gravenstone
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Once again, the inherent vulnerability of Democrats having actual consciences rears its ugly head.
hells littlest angel
How every conversation starts:
Trump: Hello, boss.
Putin: Why don’t you pass the time by playing a little solitaire?
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Adam L Silverman: is that 10:00 Eastern? Rudi should be on his fourth manhattan, maybe some wine with dinner?
Yarrow
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHA!
chris
Fake news whack-a-mole. Thread on a statement from the ICIG.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
Yarrow
No surprise here:
Ken
@Adam L Silverman:
It turns out the classified system stores everything on the cloud, and Clay keeps the cloud in his living room.
MomSense
@Adam L Silverman:
Should I reach out to the strikkere? It’s quite a network – they know all!
Adam L Silverman
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: I would think.
Jeffro
@Yarrow: Um okay. I think we’re agreeing here, seeing most of the same parts of the elephant.
Hopefully Putin’s spreadsheets end up seeing the light of day. Names, bribes/kompromat, ROI, the whole thing. Shoot, we could probably crowd-source 90% of that right here on BJ. The short version would just be “chump change > GOP ‘principles’ “
Or maybe more like “a smattering of rubles >>> GOP ‘principles’ “
Ladyraxterinok
@Yarrow: Trudeau and brown face made public now?
Adam L Silverman
@MomSense: Sure. Also, please get me this week’s powerball #s.
MomSense
@Adam L Silverman:
Ha!
Steve in the ATL
@Jeffro:
Easier to allow a PAC-12 team into the college football playoff. No one could get his head around that!
trollhattan
@Dorothy A. Winsor:
I got the Kindle edition with no clue as to the length, and was puzzled because the progress bar never budged past, say, Baltic Avenue. Eventually I saw it in the store and went “Oooh.” Definitely more than halfway through by now. There could be a hundred pages of footnotes but I’ve not peeked.
Mike in NC
@geg6: Reading that book right now. Grant was a decent and modest man in every way, so basically the anti-Trump. A very great American hero.
Yarrow
@Jeffro: Yeah, I think we’re pretty much in agreement.
@Ladyraxterinok: Was thinking the same thing. The PM of NZ is great but I’m thinking a vulnerability for them is all the foreign billionaires who have bought property there to create bunkers. I think NZ has changed their laws about foreigners owning property in recent years but I don’t think they do much about property they already own.
Adam L Silverman
@trollhattan: I picked up the Kindle edition a few week’s ago when it was on the $2.99 special. It’s in the queue.
Gin & Tonic
@Adam L Silverman: Not enough liquor here at Casa G&T to subject myself to that.
Dorothy A. Winsor
@trollhattan: I read Hamilton on my kindle and, now that you mention it, I had the same experience with the progress bar.
trollhattan
Reminder: While the head whale flops on the shoals, the real damage continues.
I’m out of can’t-evens.
Gin & Tonic
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Has Mifsud’s body turned up anywhere?
Mrs. D. Ranged in AZ
@Adam L Silverman: Pardon my nerdiness but when I read your comment I thought of Sauron and Saruman in LOTR. Although Commander Cheesypoofs in Chief has nowhere near the powers of Saruman, they certainly have/had hubris enough to think they could play with the big dogs.
Alternative Fax, a hip hop artist from Idaho
Late to wish Shana Tovah to people.
Adam L Silverman
@Gin & Tonic: I just had some rum cake, so I’m either good to go or I’m going to wake up on a frigate somewhere in the south Atlantic having been impressed into the British Navy.
mrmoshpotato
@Yarrow: Oh that’s good. Now I want NBC to get ahold of some transcripts.
“Oops! Published! Cry in each other’s arms Dump and Putin.”
(Yes, I know they’d try to blame the Democrats for Dump sucking Putin’s ass.)
Geoduck
Re: Gorka, I read third-hand comment elsewhere that his official designation on the trip is “press”.
Elizabelle
@Mike in NC:
Think about how US Grant’s reputation was trashed for the better part of a century. Alcoholic. Corrupt.
It was letting the fucking confederate sympathizers do the whispering campaign and write the history books.
How we have the cult of St. Ronald Reagan, while Jimmy Carter (who turns 95 this week!) gets credit for nothing.
This is why it is going to be so important to hold Trump’s enablers accountable. All of them. As OhioMom said, we don’t want to hear the enablers saying “look, systems worked.” Uh no.
We need to follow Germany’s example WRT being honest about Nazis.
And we need to stop allowing constant broadcasting by Fox News and Rush, etc. without some form of a fairness doctrine. We could never have Trump without fucking Murdoch and blowhard Rush salting the fields for decades. Don’t let their ugliness and brainwashing hide behind the First Amendment.
mrmoshpotato
@Adam L Silverman: Ew. No.
Adam L Silverman
@Mrs. D. Ranged in AZ: I have read LoTR a lot, so no worries, I’m tracking.
Adam L Silverman
@Alternative Fax, a hip hop artist from Idaho: I always thought Shana Tovah would be a great name for either a Jewish stripper, adult actress, or both.
Adam L Silverman
@Geoduck: That may be. Either from Sinclair or OANN or whichever station his radio show is on.
Doug R
@Ladyraxterinok:
Yeah, as a Canadian voter the Trudeau coloured face pictures make me feel bad, just like they were intended to.
The question is: Where was that picture in 2015? Why was it released now?
It proves that Trudeau is/was an entitled douche, but the Conservatives want to RACE us towards climate change, all for the almighty $.
We had a saying in the last election that I hope holds true this time: ABC Anybody But Conservative.
Mary G
Jeffro
@Mary G: First person to photoshop Lindsey’s face onto Princess Leia’s Episode IV hologram asking for help wins…wait…never mind, the Internet already took care of that.
“Help the trumpov kkkrime kkkartel, Western powers who still can’t believe we’re getting away with this shit. You’re our only hope!”
Butter Emails
It looks like the current Republican strategy is to gather all the lying, dishonest, corrupt shitheads they can find internationally to spread disinformation. Essentially, they are going to get all the criminals to point the finger at Obama, Hillary, Biden and the deep state.
Ladyraxterinok
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Mifsud from Malta. Mayor Pete of Maltese heritage. Opportunity for conspiracy theories
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Adam L Silverman:
@Mary G: Meanwhile, and not at all coincidentally
Sebastian
@Fair Economist:
The media is more than complicit. They resurrected the 60ies and 70ies playbook of infiltrating and compromising Western media.
Jeffro
@Butter Emails: Totally. They have to go all-in on their weird all-encompassing, “these idiot liberals are also the world’s greatest criminal masterminds evar!!!1!” Theory of the world, since, well, all the facts are against them.
It’s like the facts AND the law AND even the table are against them, so they are left to publicly pound their…er…never mind…
Fair Economist
@Sebastian: I could believe that.
Another example of the shared playbook is Boris trying to incite unorganized violence by followers, copying Duterte, Modi, and Trump.
mad citizen
@Elizabelle: This is a great comment and I second it. I was thinking the other day about all of Carter’s work around the world helping democracies to run free and fair elections. I wonder if he’s available for U.S.?
Ladyraxterinok
@Mike in NC: Got impression in school (50s as nd 60s) he was a plodder.
Now I consider it, my college prof of Freshman American History and his departmental colleague were experts on Confederate military history. Still remember his colleague’s 1 hr lecture on Stonewall Jackson. Was riveting!
Ladyraxterinok
@Elizabelle: Thanks for reminding how Grant was so denigrated.
Sab
@trollhattant: @geg6: I always thought Grant got smeared by his own enemies in his day, and by their descendants on the Texas School Board book purchasing committees.
I read his own biography about five years ago. Beautifully written. As an Ohioan I was deeply embarrassed not to have read it sooner.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
Ladyraxterinok
@Doug R: Spent 76-77 at Memorial U in St John’s Nfld where my ex had a sabbatical . Loved it and what we saw of Canada both ways between IA and Nfld. Visited Lewisburg. Some yrs later visited the Hudson Bay fort at Thunder Bay. Canada does an incredible job with those types of living history museums.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
The Second Most Seriousest Person in the Village on foreign policy for almost twenty years
mad citizen
A few years ago, someone stuck an “infowars” sticker on the face of a traffic sign along a road I drive to work every morning. It’s in a place with wild bushes growing right up to the road for a good piece, so hard for anyone to walk up to it. Anyhoo, it’s still there, I checked it this morning. All this Rudy stuff makes me wonder why Alex Jones isn’t part of their crew, this is right up his alley.
Leto
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: I got a speeding ticket, but my lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, pleaded it down to first degree murder! Thanks, Rudy!
(Shamelessly stolen from the internet)
cain
DougJ has been killing it with sarcastic NYT opinions/editorial “pitches”.
cain
@Adam L Silverman:
Luckily you’re Jewish and you can crack that joke ;) But then “Shana Tovah to tell you she’s not in the business, no more!” OK, bad joke. But alternatives would make John Cole blush.
NotMax
@Jim, Foolish Literalist
“We dissemble, you decide.”
//
Zelma
Grant’s unfavorable reputation is a good example of why we can’t trust “history” to get it right. I say that as a historian. When I hear comments about how “history” will judge the current Trump enablers, I cringe. History is often written by the “winners,” but just as often it is written by the “losers.” The historiography of the American Civil War and its greatest general is one example of this. I “learned” my American history in the late 50s and early 60s, at the tail end of the glorification of the “lost cause.” Why it was all about “states’ rights,” you know. And maybe the tariff. Slavery? Why that was just another labor system. Nothing to see there. Move along. And Reconstruction? Oh those nasty “Carpetbaggers” and Scalawags who were picking on those nice Southern folks.
OK, that’s a bit of an exaggeration, but not much. It’s taken decades to set the record straight and obviously, it hasn’t sunk in for many people, especially among my generation.
Trump and the people around him don’t care what “history” will say about them. They figure they’ll be dead. But, in my opinion, not soon enough.
mrmoshpotato
@Zelma:
Seconded.
jl
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Get Smart Would You Believe 3
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bCKzuh1-pbQ
mrmoshpotato
@mad citizen:
Ghouliani doesn’t scream about gay lizard people enough?
ETA – Has Jones had the life sued out of him yet?
jl
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Secret Agent Man Lyrics
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nGZ0ntpSx2Y
jl
@mrmoshpotato: Giuliani doesn’t have a line of man pills and super duper vitality protein muscle shakes ready to go?
Jim, Foolish Literalist
just saw this clip on MSNBC, he brought up his secret tapes in reference to evidence he would like to present to Congress, then seemed to say it’s all protected by attorney/client privilege.
Nora
@Zelma: Interestingly, I’m currently reading The Impeachers about the impeachment of Andrew Johnson, and I’m startled at how little I knew about this period of American history before, say, the last couple of years. Reconstruction was one of those things we sped through in US History, on our way past the Civil War and onto the Gilded Age and then the two exciting World Wars! A lot of pro-southern propaganda, even in JFK’s Profiles in Courage, which lionized the Senator who voted against convicting Johnson, when really Johnson had betrayed his oath of office and Lincoln’s legacy with his eagerness to make sure this was a nation for white people and only for white people (reading about the arguments against black suffrage in the immediate aftermath of the Civil War made me deeply ashamed to be white). Really good book which I recommend highly.
mrmoshpotato
@jl: LOL Look at Rudy. Need I say more?
Mike in DC
Adam, assuming someday we get through all this with our country(mostly) intact, I’d love to hear your thoughts on what, vis a vis Russia, “Containment 2.0” might look like.
Chris Johnson
@Timurid:
I don’t believe they can actually do 1 because they don’t have Putin’s support now. The Russians needed this to be covert since it was always a stretch: high drama doesn’t work for them. My guess is that the next move is to blame Trump and his people entirely, say THEY were the ones taking all the initiative, pull back and consolidate around a second wave of compromised Republican operatives such as McConnell if they can, or others. I’m very suspicious of Paul Ryan, who’s moving back to Washington and was always the press darling (and it’s become obvious how Russian-controlled some of the press is). He could be getting groomed to take on a second wave of control, one that’s less batshit outrageous and will give Putin what he wants. I would vote NAY on that one.
But support for Trump stupidly trying to pull off an open coup and crush our system of government? No. Which is not to say he wouldn’t try it or isn’t trying it, but even compromised Republicans aren’t going to help him because doing so doesn’t serve Russia’s real interests. Again, Russia needs all this to be covert. Trump is… not good at ‘covert’ or ‘subtle’.
prufrock
@patrick II: My grandfather was a West Point grad, class of 1939. I looked at his yearbooks, and the leader of the corps of cadets when my grandfather was a plebe was William Westmoreland.
It’s always been a shady institution.
Jinchi
@clay:
Needs a *wink, wink* in there I think.
Let’s not encourage the stupidity defense. Trump knows Putin interfered, because they collaborated on it. That’s why feels he can snark “Don’t meddle in the election, please” in front of a pool of reporters and tells George Stephanopoulos, while the cameras are rolling, that he would happily take dirt on an opponent from “Norway” .