Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Screw the Judean People’s Front. Splitters.

Militantly superior in their own minds…

… down to kool-aid drinkers and next of kin at the trump White House

Let me eat cake. The rest of you could stand to lose some weight, frankly.

A snarling mass of vitriolic jackals

The willow is too close to the house.

Too inconsequential to be sued

Consistently wrong since 2002

Mission Accomplished!

Tick tock motherfuckers! Tick fucking tock!

The revolution will be supervised.

This really is a full service blog.

What fresh hell is this?

If you tweet it in all caps, that makes it true!

Han shot first.

I’d try pessimism, but it probably wouldn’t work.

All your base are belong to Tunch.

Is it irresponsible to speculate? It is irresponsible not to.

We have all the best words.

False Scribes! False Scribes!

How has Obama failed you today?

The math demands it!

Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Shallow, uninformed, and lacking identity

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Grifters Gonna Grift

Friday Evening Open Thread: The NRA Tries A Strategic Retreat

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Per the AP:

The National Rifle Association announced Friday it has filed for bankruptcy protection and will seek to incorporate the nation’s most politically influential gun-rights group in Texas instead of New York.

The announcement made on the NRA’s website comes months after New York’s attorney general sued the organization over claims that top executives illegally diverted tens of millions of dollars for lavish personal trips, no-show contracts for associates and other questionable expenditures.

The coronavirus pandemic has also upended the NRA, which last year laid off dozens of employees, canceled its national convention and scuttled fundraising. The NRA’s bankruptcy filing listed between $100 million and $500 million in assets and between $100 million and $500 million in liabilities. Still, the NRA claimed in announcing the move that the organization was “in its strongest financial condition in years.”

The NRA filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in federal court in Dallas and said it planned to incorporate in Texas, where records show it formed a limited liability corporation, Sea Girt LLC, in November 2020. Sea Girt LLC made a separate bankruptcy filing Friday, listing fewer than $100,000 in liabilities.

“The move will enable long-term, sustainable growth and ensure the NRA’s continued success as the nation’s leading advocate for constitutional freedom – free from the toxic political environment of New York,” the NRA said in a statement…

MAH FREEDUMBS!!1!! He’s not even bothering to pretend it’s about gunsports any more…

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Late Night Insurrection Open Thread: GOP Scaff, Raff & Bob-Tail

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The Beergut Putsch had me recalling that useful phrase of opprobrium, which a lazy google informs me originally meant professional beggars, streetcorner loiters, and sex workers of all genders. As the linking implies, those three groups tend to interlock quite a bit, depending on the individual Repub in question…

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I think they got your number

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This video is remarkable.

(I’ll be back in the not-too-distant with more fundraising. I decided not to push too hard for money for Ossoff and Warnock since they were both swimming in it and after a certain point, it makes no difference. WaterGirl and I are looking at organizations around the country focused on ballot access and registration. I think we’ve found some to raise lots for this year.)

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Trump Crime Cartel Open Thread: The Son-In-Law & His Cronies

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My old man used to say, “Those guys get their suits tailored with rubber pockets, so they can steal soup.”

… Federal Election Commission records show that the Trump campaign has made no salary payments to chief strategist Jason Miller, who came on board in June, or to campaign manager Bill Stepien, who joined the campaign in late 2018 and took over the top job from Brad Parscale in July. Kushner agreed to both arrangements, and personally directed the payments to Miller, the person involved said…

Instead, the campaign has paid these top-tier advisers through intermediaries — some of which are still unknown.

For instance, according to the source, after salary negotiations with Miller, Kushner directed the campaign to route the top strategist’s $35,000 monthly payment through Jamestown Associates, a media and production firm where Miller once worked, and which the campaign contracts for video production. Miller, who is currently contesting child-support payments in court, requested the anonymous arrangement for the $420,000 annual rate, for unclear reasons. Communications, court documents and FEC filings reviewed by Salon make clear that the money was paid to by way of Jamestown. President Trump himself was aware of the deal, a person involved said.

To this point, the campaign has not told government that it has paid Miller anything. Instead, it has stated that all payments to Jamestown are for “video production,” without mentioning Miller’s name or strategy work. Furthermore, Miller’s official role means that he has often directed how and when the campaign uses Jamestown Associates, the company that technically pays him…

Getting paid off the books to screw over your baby mamas will no doubt resonate with a certain portion of Trump’s (Very) Base, but it remains legally… dubious.

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Trump Crime Cartel Open Thread: The Son-In-Law & His CroniesPost + Comments (150)

Late Night Grifter-on-Grifter Violence Open Thread: Reverend Robertson Clotheslines Golden Donny Dumpster Fire

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It is one of the foundational documents of America that all men are endowed with the right to expend their lives, their treasure, and their sacred honor in support of whatever cult best satisfies their needs and their insecurities. Donald Trump has had an amazing four years working the kafaybe to vacuum up the rubes’ money and attention, but he’s never made much effort to spread the wealth among the more established performers. Now he’s just embarrassing, not to mention a threat to all of them — once the Outsiders start taking apart the Trump fantasies in broad daylight and on national media, what certified non-profit is safe from the backsplash?

Not least among Trump’s woes, as he is turfed unwillingly out of the Oval Office, will be discovering how much support he does not have among all those ‘very fine people’, Talibangelical and otherwise, who have publicly slavered over his ‘Man of God’ stature for the cameras. Let. Us. SAVOR!

Late Night Grifter-on-Grifter Violence Open Thread: Reverend Robertson Clotheslines Golden Donny Dumpster FirePost + Comments (47)

Late Night Superspreaders Open Thread: ‘Right-Wing Coachella’ Not Off To the Best Start

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What they said before the event, per Vanity Fair:

… After covering Turning Point’s West Palm Beach bash in past years, I’ve concluded that “right-wing Coachella” is the most accurate way I’ve heard the conference described, encompassing the big-name lineups; the huge crowds of young people, many of whom travel hundreds of miles to be there, documenting every moment and every celebrity sighting on Instagram; the meticulously planned outfits, including Lilly Pulitzer elephant-pattern dresses and skirts paired with pearls, or tucked-in Trump campaign T-shirts; and the drunken, after-hours debauchery that goes on until the bars close, at which point students often go to pools or file into packed hotel rooms to continue drinking.

With COVID-19 case numbers in the U.S. reaching record highs, this week recording more than 247,000 cases and over 114,000 hospitalizations, Turning Point spokesman Andrew Kolvet assured the Palm Beach Post earlier this month that organizers are “reacting and adjusting our plans on the fly as information becomes available” and said that the group has made a “sizeable investment” in personal protective equipment, adding that students will be encouraged to only eat with and spend time around their respective pods, i.e. the group of attendees they are rooming with. In other words, Turning Point is employing a similar mitigation strategy that universities relied on, only to learn that telling thousands of young people to stay away from each other doesn’t work out well. (The New York Times reported last week that more than 397,000 coronavirus cases have occurred on college campuses since the pandemic began, an explosion that sometimes led to students bringing the virus back home.) Kolvet described the situation as “fluid,” and emphasized that “the national conversation was different” when the event was planned. Still, he argued that so many students are still eager to attend despite the ongoing pandemic because “kids want to get out—they know they’re not a super vulnerable cohort so there is probably a little more willingness to go out.” …

What they found when they got there, per the local CBS-12 news team:

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Saturday Night Trump Crime Cartel Open Thread: It Went to Jared

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American Made Media Consultants, for extra risibility. Bess Levin is always a good read:

Donald Trump and his family have spent the last four years making the airtight case that they view the presidency as simply a means to enrich themselves and their associates. They probably don’t particularly like that reputation and, yet, it hasn’t stopped them from funneling taxpayer money to their private business, gouging the Secret Service, and raising legal defense funds that the fine print says could go directly to their pockets. Oh, and, according to a new report, setting up a shell company that spent hundreds of millions of campaign dollars to pay Trump family members along with other expenditures it seemingly wanted to keep under wraps.

According to Business Insider, first son-in-law Jared Kushner personally approved the creation of the company, incorporated as American Made Media Consultants Corp. and American Made Media Consultants LLC, in April 2018. From there, Eric Trump’s wife, Lara Trump, was named president, with Mike Pence’s nephew John Pence serving as vice president. If you’re wondering why the shell company, described as Business Insider as acting “almost like a campaign within a campaign” was necessary, well, it’s not entirely clear, but it sure sounds like the express purpose was the ability to shield “financial and operational details from public scrutiny,” as it allowed the campaign to avoid federally mandated disclosures concerning what it was spending considerable amounts of money on. And by considerable we mean nearly half of the $1.26 billion raised for Trump’s reelection. Which seems like a lot!…

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Saturday Night Trump Crime Cartel Open Thread: It Went to JaredPost + Comments (190)