Grifters Gonna Grift

Open Thread: Late Night Notes on Lev Parnas

by Anne Laurie| January 17, 20202:09 am| 26 Comments

This post is in: Foreign Affairs, Grifters Gonna Grift, Impeachment Inquiry, Open Threads, Republican Venality, Trump Crime Cartel

Here’s the “I don’t know him at all, don’t know what he’s about, don’t know where he comes from, know nothing about him” guy, w Lev Parnas & Roman Nasirov, former head of Ukrainian Fiscal Service, at Mar-a-Lago 12/16. @POTUS .@realDonaldTrump @Acosta #LevRemembers #LetLevSpeak pic.twitter.com/5B5QY2DJEg
— Joseph A. Bondy (@josephabondy) January 16, 2020

Per an unreliable narrator:

It is absolutely bonkers that this ex-Soviet dealer of stolen Oldsmobiles who knows a guy who can make your gas meter run backwards, hundred bucks, no problem, is MORE CREDIBLE THAN THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES.
Which he totally is!
— Slava Malamud (@SlavaMalamud) January 17, 2020

Parnas is from Odessa, the city with a very particular reputation. Basically, it's Ukraine's North Jersey, where every single resident is Tony Soprano dialed up to 11.
— Slava Malamud (@SlavaMalamud) January 17, 2020

I am kidding. My grandpa was a war hero and he eventually died of his wounds. He was a good citizen, as far as I know. But Odessa is totally the most notorious city in Europe.
— Slava Malamud (@SlavaMalamud) January 17, 2020

As to whether Lev is telling the truth, let me tell you something: Odessa men are much more believable and pleasant when they are lying. After 2 minutes with an Odessa swindler, you'll want to tell him your innermost secrets and ask to wash his mother's feet.
Lev looks miserable.
— Slava Malamud (@SlavaMalamud) January 17, 2020

Never stop marveling at the incredible power of American racism. There is no other force on Earth that could make this schlub, whose God-given talents are salt fish speculation and conning Jewish grandmas out of their pension, a confidant of the US president.
Thanks, Michigan!
— Slava Malamud (@SlavaMalamud) January 17, 2020

But look how happy he was, at Mar-A-Lago!:

pic.twitter.com/vZKvkYdXMv
— julie (@juliesCamp) January 16, 2020

#Immoralago is DONALD's spy central.
— OleHippieChick 🗽 BetteWolf 🇺🇸 (@BetteWo67187229) January 16, 2020

But how can we be sure Lev Parnas isn't lying? pic.twitter.com/EDiQwbAFAX
— Schooley (@Rschooley) January 17, 2020

How come no one asks Trump if he remembers when Parnas worked for her Fred? https://t.co/n0m4Ptbbs5
— Richter Scale (@Richter_Scale40) January 17, 2020

Open Thread: Late Night Notes on Lev ParnasPost + Comments (26)

Potential Book Club Material: “A Very Stable Genius”

by Anne Laurie| January 16, 202011:16 pm| 103 Comments

This post is in: Books, Excellent Links, Grifters Gonna Grift, Impeachment Inquiry, Republican Venality, Trumpery, All Too Normal, Bitter Despair is the New Black, Lock Him Up...Lock Them All Up

Trump wanted to get rid of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, ?@PhilipRucker? and ?@CarolLeonnig? report in their new book. “It’s just so unfair that American companies aren’t allowed to pay bribes to get business overseas,” Trump said. https://t.co/BzXfUyGZiA
— Jennifer Epstein (@jeneps) January 15, 2020

I’m kidding, of course — we know most of this crap already. But kudos to the authors on the timing of their release…

President Trump reveals himself as woefully uninformed about the basics of geography, incorrectly telling Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, “It’s not like you’ve got China on your border.” He toys with awarding himself the Medal of Freedom.
And, according to a new book by Washington Post reporters Philip Rucker and Carol D. Leonnig, Trump does not seem to grasp the fundamental history surrounding the attack on Pearl Harbor…
“A Very Stable Genius” — a 417-page book named after Trump’s own declaration of his superior knowledge — is full of similarly vivid details from Trump’s tumultuous first three years as president, from his chaotic transition before taking office to special counsel Robert S. Mueller III’s Russia investigation and final report…
The book by the two longtime Post reporters — who were part of the team that won a 2018 Pulitzer Prize for its reporting on Trump and Russia — was obtained ahead of its scheduled release Tuesday.
Many of the key moments reported in the book are rife with foreign policy implications, portraying a novice commander in chief plowing through normal protocols and alarming many both inside the administration and in other governments.
Early in his administration, for instance, Trump is eager to meet Russian President Vladimir Putin — so much so, the authors write, “that during the transition he interrupts an interview with one of his secretary of state candidates” to inquire about his pressing desire: “When can I meet Putin? Can I meet with him before the inaugural ceremony?” he asks…
In spring 2017, Trump also clashed with Tillerson when he told him he wanted his help getting rid of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, a 1977 law that prevents U.S. firms and individuals from bribing foreign officials for business deals.
“It’s just so unfair that American companies aren’t allowed to pay bribes to get business overseas,” Trump says, according to the book. “We’re going to change that.”
The president, they go on to explain, was frustrated with the law “ostensibly because it restricted his industry buddies or his own company’s executives from paying off foreign governments in faraway lands.”
The book, the duo writes in an author’s note, is based on hundreds of hours of interviews with more than 200 sources, corroborated, when possible, by calendars, diary entries, internal memos and even private video recordings. (Trump himself had initially committed to an interview for the book, the authors write, but ultimately declined, amid an escalating war with the media).
The White House did not immediately respond to requests for comment Wednesday…

show full post on front page

Anthony Scaramucci, who served as Trump’s communications director for just 11 days, recounts the president’s response when he asks him, “Are you an act?”
“I’m a total act and I don’t understand why people don’t get it,” Trump replies, according to Scaramucci.
Yet the people in Trump’s administration and orbit don’t behave as if the president is simply playing a part or acting a role. At the Justice Department, then-Deputy Attorney General Rod J. Rosenstein and other senior officials run through private fire drills in case Trump triggers a “Saturday night massacre” — an allusion to the series of resignations under President Richard M. Nixon following his order to his attorney general to fire the Watergate independent special prosecutor…
Trump was “verbally and emotionally abusive” toward then-Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen, the book reports, and routinely complained she was not doing enough about illegal immigration and the border…
When Nielsen — who had received threats against her life as the public face of the administration’s hard-line immigration policy — eventually left the government, she did so without any prearranged continuing security detail, which must be requested by the chief of staff and authorized by the president.
“When some of her international counterparts visited Washington, they offered to hire personal security for Nielsen to protect her, but she declined,” write the authors. “ ‘That would look horrible,’ Nielsen told them. ‘Can you imagine the story? Foreign governments provide security because the U.S. won’t?’ ”.…

Somewhere, former Ambassador Marie Voynovich shakes her head.

[Imagine if Obama…]https://t.co/hHi9EIdd4x pic.twitter.com/we0VCa2Qva
— Ryan D. Enos (@RyanDEnos) January 15, 2020

Re: a discussion of the new book by the WaPo authors on @NicolleDWallace’s show on the president*’s ignorance and incuriosity. Remember when Reagan was ignorant and incurious, but considered “charming.” Remember when W was ignorant and incurious, but deemed a “regular guy."
I do.
— Charles P. Pierce (@CharlesPPierce) January 15, 2020

God help the historians who have to explain this in 50 years.
"As news broke about his private agents plotting against an American ambassador, President Trump held a political rally in which he complained about a series household appliances. (No, seriously, check my footnotes!)" https://t.co/mRGeos11Xe
— Kevin M. Kruse (@KevinMKruse) January 15, 2020

Potential Book Club Material: “A Very Stable Genius”Post + Comments (103)

Grifters Gonna Grift Open Thread: Why Is the Sanders Campaign Suddenly In Need of A Big Distraction?

by Anne Laurie| January 13, 20205:04 pm| 268 Comments

This post is in: C.R.E.A.M., Election Year, Grifters Gonna Grift, I Can No Longer Rationally Discuss The Sanders Campaign, Open Threads

On the one hand, it's 2020, Trump is President and the Democratic Party is super focused on defeating him – candidates that have attacked others haven't fared well.
There is no other hand. https://t.co/7iLcr1xxnu
— Neera Tanden (@neeratanden) January 13, 2020

Warren is an unelectable whore! Biden is an elderly racist! Buttigieg is a larval robot! Sure, it’s crunch time in Iowa, but I had been expecting this kind of noisy media-friendly shite-flinging from the Sanders campaign ever since a certain AP article appeared last week — “Shadow group provides Sanders super PAC support he scorns”:

Bernie Sanders says he doesn’t want a super PAC. Instead, he has Our Revolution, a nonprofit political organization he founded that functions much the same as one.
Like a super PAC, which is shorthand for super political action committee, Our Revolution can raise unlimited sums from wealthy patrons that dwarf the limits faced by candidates and conventional PACs. Unlike a super PAC, however, the group doesn’t have to disclose its donors — a stream of revenue commonly referred to as “dark money.”
Now, with less than one month to go before the Iowa caucuses, Our Revolution appears to be skirting campaign finance law, which forbids groups founded by federal candidates and officeholders from using large donations to finance federal election activity, including Sanders’ 2020 bid.…
…[W]hile Warren has come under fire for courting wealthy financiers in her past Senate campaigns, Sanders and Our Revolution have largely avoided scrutiny during the primary, even as he has accelerated his criticism of others, among them Biden, for relying on super PACs founded by their allies.
In the case of Our Revolution, which aims to boost voter turnout for Sanders, the Vermont senator was the founder…
The campaign finance act says groups “directly or indirectly established” by federal officeholders or candidates can’t “solicit, receive, direct, transfer, or spend funds” for federal electoral activity that exceeds the “limitations, prohibitions, and reporting requirements” of the law. Those limits are currently set at $2,800 for candidates and $5,000 for political action committees.
Our Revolution has taken in nearly $1 million from donors who gave more than the limits and whose identities it hasn’t fully disclosed, according to tax filings for 2016, 2017 and 2018. Much of it came from those who contributed six-figure sums.
It won’t have to publicly reveal its 2019 fundraising until after this year’s presidential election. And money it raises between now and then won’t have to be disclosed until the following year…

Read the whole thing. I’d been waiting to see how much this story would be amplified outside sources like the Daily Caller, or whether the Sanders campaign would mount a defense. But that defense, as ever with St. Bernie, turns out to be “I HAVE NO FLAWS, unlike every other Democratic candidate!”

So, no, I don’t expect to hear Word One about this during tomorrow’s debate — the other candidates can’t afford to waste resources fighting a million bad-faith assaults on their staff and volunteers from the Bernie mob, and the media has no interest in damping down such an ‘exciting’ candidate. They’re saving their ammo until, in Chris Cillizza’s dreams, it’s a two-army battle between the Oval Office Occupant and his mirror-world doppelganger. And as long as he can keep squirreling away money for his ongoing, never-ending national campaign (and his fourth house), Sanders is perfectly happy to take advantage.

Grifters Gonna Grift Open Thread: Why Is the Sanders Campaign Suddenly In Need of A Big Distraction?Post + Comments (268)

Cold Grey Pre-Dawn Open Thread: Chris Cillizza Will NOT Be Out-Jingo’d

by Anne Laurie| January 7, 20204:01 am| 35 Comments

This post is in: Election Year, Foreign Affairs, Grifters Gonna Grift, Open Threads, Warren for President 2020, Assholes, Our Failed Media Experiment

WATCH: Sen. Elizabeth Warren says that "people are asking" why the Iran strike took place now. #MTP #IfItsSunday @ewarren: "We know Donald Trump is very upset about this upcoming impeachment trial. But look what he's doing now. He is taking us to the edge of war." pic.twitter.com/ChR29Usv6x
— Meet the Press (@MeetThePress) January 5, 2020

UpChuck Todd spends ten minutes of high-dollar Sunday tv time trying to gotcha Warren, but Chris ‘The Mad Bitcher’ Cillizza goes straight for ‘SHE SAID LONG WORDS WHICH IS ELITIST & PROBABLY UNAMERICAN’…

I rarely tweet about stuff like this but I can’t hold back here. Chris, this is embarrassing. Every statement is true & consistent. The reason you were able to cherry-pick her many comments is b/c she’s the only candidate who’s done multiple interviews & media avails about it.
— Kristen Orthman (@KristenOrthman) January 6, 2020

Also lol at Warren being tied with Sanders after all the "calling Soleimani a murderer is warmongering" posts
— veto players stan account (@Convolutedname) January 6, 2020

This is straight up slander from Chris Cillizza. We laugh at how dumb Cillizza is because he’s truly dumb. But we also forget that shit like this defines narratives. It’s Warren right now but this will be Biden if he’s the nominee in September. This brand of journalism is bad. https://t.co/eVvKy1QzjE
— David Gordon (@davidagordon9) January 6, 2020

Chris just wants there to be a nice noisy horse race until the election, when he dearly hopes we will elect whichever Repub daddy eventually gets shoved to the top of the ticket.

Let’s all keep in mind how good it will feel when The Mad Bitcher has a public breakdown as the Democrats celebrate our new president, come November!

Cold Grey Pre-Dawn Open Thread: Chris Cillizza Will NOT Be Out-Jingo’dPost + Comments (35)

Election 2020 Open Thread: It’s Not A Campaign, It’s A Performance

by Anne Laurie| January 2, 20206:16 pm| 261 Comments

This post is in: C.R.E.A.M., Election Year, Grifters Gonna Grift, I Can No Longer Rationally Discuss The Sanders Campaign, Open Threads

So Sanders’ most online supporters have successfully gamed the system — and the media — into another BIG WIN FOR BERNIE!!! media cycle, this time concerning his fundraising:

For those who do not know the mechanics behind this:
Each time you donate = 1 individual contribution.
Bernie bros don’t donate $5. They donate $1, then another $1, then another $1, and so on.
This keeps their averages low + inflates individual contributions. Sad, huh? https://t.co/G92uWxcNSv
— The General (@generalunite) January 1, 2020

If Bernie was really as popular as they would have us believe — why the need to go through this ? pic.twitter.com/3CDn8zJ9Qa
— chris evans (@notcapnamerica) January 1, 2020

I’m curious mow much money the big banks have made by processing dozens of $1 donations from the same weird nerd who uses his rent money to feel the Bern ??
— Gay and Bad ???????? (@SJGrunewald) January 1, 2020

Hey, as long as it’s good for the credit-card companies, amirite? Play stupid games, win stupid prizes.

Meanwhile, out in the real(ish) world, where the actual work is done…

1) This is an un-serious issue to attack Bernie over
2) If this had come out about a different candidate, Bernie’s camp would have absolutely attacked them over it though https://t.co/hbKSftCKYa
— The Hoarse Whisperer (@HoarseWisperer) December 30, 2019

Part of the price of relying on volunteers and interns is that every campaign will be plagued with staffers who spend more time cultivating their personal issues than working on their candidate’s official program. But of course the Sanders campaign is the one whose staffers feel the need to contact the media about this eternal dynamic!

Also, it was reported as Excellent news for Bernie! when Jeff ‘Comic Book Guy’ Weaver lost his position as the official face of the Sanders campaign. Perhaps the political horse-race touts predicted this would give Weaver more opportunity to play to his real strength, nitpicking minor details and curating grudges…

Internal Sanders campaign staff concerns about using Amazon to buy office supplies reached high levels, prompting a response from senior adviser Jeff Weaver —>https://t.co/YxMqlOEskG pic.twitter.com/Q1YfXK3gty
— Sean Sullivan (@WaPoSean) December 30, 2019

Sen. Bernie Sanders frequently attacks Amazon on the campaign trail, vowing to break up the online retail giant if elected, denouncing its treatment of workers and decrying its ability to pay no federal taxes on billions in profits.
That’s why impassioned dissent erupted within the Sanders campaign earlier this year over its purchases of large amounts of supplies through Amazon, according to five people with knowledge of the situation…
The Sanders campaign continued using Amazon despite the concerns. Through September, it had spent more than $233,000 on Amazon purchases — much of it in office supplies, and often through Amazon’s Marketplace feature — a review of campaign finance records shows…
The campaign’s spending on Amazon is a small fraction of the more than $40 million it shelled out on operating expenditures during the same period. But it was more than other campaigns spent on the company, and more than enough to prompt surprise and complaints from staffers who felt it conflicted with the campaign’s principles…
show full post on front page

“I hear you on amazon but who is the paragon of virtue in . . . office supplies?” wrote senior Sanders adviser Jeff Weaver in an email over the summer, according to a person who saw the email and described it to The Washington Post. “I hear uline is terrible. Cant beleive staples is a great company but happy to shown I’m wrong.”…

The Amazon purchases are not the campaign’s only business practice to spark internal protest. In April, the campaign used Airbnb to arrange housing for state staff who traveled to Washington for a team meeting, triggering blowback from New Hampshire campaign staffers reluctant to use the company, according to three people with knowledge of the situation. Critics of Airbnb have argued it negatively impacts housing prices and hotel workers…

These internal disputes, which have not been previously reported, underline a basic tension in the Sanders campaign: Many employees see it as not just a bid for office but a social movement that stands for workers’ rights and reining in big corporations. Some have privately vented that the campaign doesn’t always live up to those ideals.

That tension was also evident over the summer during a standoff between management and unionized Sanders field staffers over pay, with some employees complaining that their salaries conflicted with the senator’s calls for a minimum wage of $15 an hour. After the dispute became public, the workers won a raise…

All of which, of course, reinforces my cynical conviction that Sanders isn’t running a campaign, where one wins or loses; he’s performing on the campaign stage, for the attention. Also — whether or not he’s consciously aware of the fact, I’ll grant him that loophole — because it’s become a permanent grift where St. Bernie the Pure collects ‘love offerings’ from people who think having the right political opinions is more important than actually being able to affect political outcomes.

Which would be just fine, if he weren’t doing his best to kneecap the actual Democrats in the race, and guarantee that the GOP will be allowed to loot our mutual commonwealth for another four years!

The blue line is Bernie. He’s basically in the same place he started the year pic.twitter.com/hHjV0fBG37
— Federico Chispas (@dfsparks) December 26, 2019

Election 2020 Open Thread: It’s Not A Campaign, It’s A PerformancePost + Comments (261)

Saturday Night Horrorshow Open Thread: YOUUUKRANE!!!!

by Anne Laurie| December 28, 201910:38 pm| 135 Comments

This post is in: Foreign Affairs, Grifters Gonna Grift, Impeachment Inquiry, Open Threads, Trump Crime Cartel, All Too Normal, All we want is life beyond the thunderdome

What Rudy Giuliani’s version of reality looks like from Ukraine https://t.co/brQUhHTSgY
— toomas hendrik ilves (@IlvesToomas) December 27, 2019

Not much joy in sercon dissection of the latest foreign policy revelations at this hour on a holiday weekend, but: This man is still, theoretically, the Oval Office Occupant’s personal lawyer.

Earlier this month, Rudolph W. Giuliani made an unexpected trip to Ukraine, accompanied by a TV crew from One America News Network (OAN), a little-known American channel to the right of Fox News. Giuliani’s mission was to exonerate his client, President Trump, of the charge in the articles of impeachment that he tried to bribe Ukrainian officials into investigating Joe Biden ahead of the 2020 election, and to dig up incriminating information on Biden and his son Hunter.
The documentary of that trip has now been released, and it tells a truly fantastic tale, as presented by OAN correspondent Chanel Rion. As she and Giuliani tried to uncover the truth, Rion claimed, 1,000 Ukrainian troops were deployed in Kyiv as part of an effort to find them. Once they were found, they raced to the airport, where Jewish Ukrainian oligarch Viktor Pinchuk and Jewish businessman and philanthropist George Soros were waiting for them with “human Dobermans in little black Mercedes.”
For journalists like me who have lived and worked in Ukraine for years, these claims were comical. Kyiv’s main international airport is about as much of a hub for intrigue as La Guardia. There is no evidence of a mobilization of Ukrainian troops in Kyiv while Giuliani and Co. were there. Soros does not live in Ukraine and hasn’t visited since 2016, and no one else has reported Pinchuk lurking at the airport. (Rion later tried to hedge her claim about Pinchuk and Soros, if only halfheartedly.)…
On cable news shows and Twitter, Giuliani has been echoing the same outlandish claims made by the documentary. He stated that one former Ukrainian prosecutor they spoke to who had proof of a Biden conspiracy had been poisoned with mercury, died twice and been revived. With Trump putting on pressure, the Senate Judiciary Committee has agreed to hear Giuliani and his evidence. In short, Giuliani’s claims about information coming from Ukraine look like they are going to become ammunition for Trump’s eventual impeachment trial in the Senate…

Man who wrote the tweet at the top is a former president of Estonia, where they don’t have our (literally) insular privilege to treat all this as a wacky TV serial.

perhaps just a bit senile in his dotage
— toomas hendrik ilves (@IlvesToomas) December 27, 2019

“Giuliani offered no proof of his allegations and he’s sought to blame on Soros in previous media appearances.” pic.twitter.com/057z1jbRBs
— Molly Jong-Fast (@MollyJongFast) December 23, 2019

Also, Rudy has a new “communications director”:

Here is Rudy's director of communications and traveling companion. Recalls Maria Butina.
Christianné Allen is the 20-year-old Director of Communications for Rudy Giuliani. She has not yet graduated from college. pic.twitter.com/BgqhLkSWXm
— GrassRootsGuy (@GrassRootsGuy) December 21, 2019

Additional nightmare fuel, via Politico: The mystery of Rudy Giuliani’s spokeswoman. Over the river and off the map!

Saturday Night Horrorshow Open Thread: YOUUUKRANE!!!!Post + Comments (135)

Late Night Open Thread: A Truly Professional Grifter Takes No Holidays

by Anne Laurie| December 27, 201911:08 pm| 86 Comments

This post is in: Grifters Gonna Grift, Open Threads, Post-racial America, Republican Venality

Domenich plagiarized at the Post, was forced to apologize after calling Kagan the "first openly gay justice" (she isn't gay), and he was paid to write articles praising Malaysia and did so w/o disclosing those payments to his outlets. But sure, his standards are really high!! pic.twitter.com/T3SspCnrZK
— Jessica Huseman (@JessicaHuseman) December 27, 2019

Give Ben Domenech due credit — he started grifting for the GOP while in high school, networked his way from the NRO online and RedState through the Heartland Institute into ‘publishing’ The Federalist (funder officially unidentified). And he’s married to John McCain’s daughter — since Meghan’s mommy is a billionaire beer heiress, neither she nor Ben would ever have to work for a living, if they didn’t take pride in their work ethic. (Or at least need a public outlet for their grievances & insecurities.)

Whining about the NYTimes’ 1619 Project has become the latest masturbatory group-grievance for the ‘intellectual’ branch of the Wingnut Wurlitzer, and by Prosperity Jesus, where there’s a grievance to be milked, Mr. Domenech is on it!

Chapter 2: Why The Native Americans Deserved To Be Murdered For Their Corn https://t.co/3p7iBdLSlz
— Social Democratic Party of Galar (@weedlewobble) December 27, 2019

Ben Shapiro's website literally did put out a video on Columbus day 2017 arguing that the Native Americans where backward savages who deserved it. He initially defended it as 'satire' before taking it down claiming it'd been put up without his knowledge.https://t.co/DZNLuid8Rr
— Social Democratic Party of Galar (@weedlewobble) December 27, 2019

Late Night Open Thread: A Truly *Professional* Grifter Takes No HolidaysPost + Comments (86)

Repub Stupidity Open Thread: Trump’s Press Campaign Proudly Declares Him A Comic-Book Villain

by Anne Laurie| December 11, 201910:29 pm| 65 Comments

This post is in: Election Year, Grifters Gonna Grift, Open Threads, Popular Culture, Republican Stupidity, Trumpery

… a comic-book villain who is mere seconds away from getting the beat-down of his life…

So you're arguing that Trump is Thanos ("The Mad Titan") who wants to kill half of all living things, but in the end winds up defeated and dying, taking all of his sycophantic followers down with him?
Great work, everyone. https://t.co/gFLPVch2An
— Kevin M. Kruse (@KevinMKruse) December 10, 2019

Nicely (in the original sense of the word) encapsulating the modern Republican Party: Parasitizing a smarter group’s work, failing to pay attention long enough to spot the problems with the stolen ideas, and not caring how much they get kicked around afterwards so long as the check clears. Per the Guardian:

… Shortly after the House brought two articles of impeachment against the president for his efforts seeking foreign interference to bolster his own political interests, the official Trump War Room re-election campaign Twitter account posted a video to social media that superimposed his face over that of the villainous Marvel comic book character Thanos.
In the scene from the movie Avengers: Endgame, Thanos snaps his fingers, attempting to destroy the diverse array of heroes from throughout the universe who’ve teamed up to defeat him. I am inevitable Trump/Thanos says…
The video then cuts to footage of Democratic leaders like Nancy Pelosi, Adam Schiff, and Jerry Nadler who magically vanish much like in the movie. Not the movie in question, mind you, the previous one, but these low-effort trolling operations from Trump’s social media team tend not to be heavy on consistency or logic.
Marvel Universe timeline discrepancies aside, the choice of this moment from the film was a strange one, as it’s seconds before Thanos realizes he’s about to be defeated.
Among the chorus of critics to point out the many other flaws at work in the analogy here was Jim Starlin, the artist who created the character of Thanos in the 1970s…

The creator of Thanos responds to that Trump ad: "Seeing that pompous fool using my creation to stroke his infantile ego, it finally struck me that the leader of my country and the free world actually enjoys comparing himself to a mass murderer." https://t.co/hsQgvTmB8F
— philip lewis (@Phil_Lewis_) December 11, 2019

In the far future when historians look at this time period I’m convinced that they’ll call it the Era of Stupid. https://t.co/4ii8kWI9G5
— Gay and Bad ???????? (@SJGrunewald) December 10, 2019

Can't wait until the Trump campaign superimposes his head onto Hitler's body in the "Downfall" video.
— Daily Trix (@DailyTrix) December 11, 2019

Repub Stupidity Open Thread: Trump’s Press Campaign Proudly Declares Him A Comic-Book VillainPost + Comments (65)

Sunday Pharisees Open Thread: The New Failson Falkirk Center

by Anne Laurie| December 1, 20197:15 pm| 106 Comments

This post is in: Grifters Gonna Grift, Open Threads, Religion, Republican Stupidity, Republican Venality, Assholes, I Read These Morons So You Don't Have To

Jerry Falwell Jr. and Charlie Kirk had to come up with a name for their new think tank, so they just mashed up their two names and called it the Falkirk Center. https://t.co/dFVxfPaJ26
— Will Sommer (@willsommer) November 30, 2019

Jerry Jr. (last seen defending himself against charges of real estate fraud, self-dealing, misappropriation of funds from the university he inherited, and nightclubbing in Miami Beach) has gotten together with Charlie Kirk (founder of TP-USA, last seen bulk-buying failson Trump Jr’s ‘best seller’) have a new grift, per the Washington Examiner:

Growing concerns in conservative circles that liberals are trying to convert young Christians into socialists by distorting the Bible and U.S. Constitution have prompted Virginia’s Liberty University to form a new center to push back on the media, academics, and Democratic politicians.
The new think tank, announced Saturday in Lynchburg and previewed to Secrets, was co-founded by two key leaders in the Christian youth movement, Liberty President Jerry Falwell Jr. and Turning Point USA founder Charlie Kirk.
The Falkirk Center for Faith and Liberty, a combination of their names, will “play offense” against efforts by liberals to water down Judeo-Christian values in the Bible and Constitution in their bid to build support for big government, said Kirk.
“The fastest-growing religion in America is atheism and secularism and with that is the rise of leftism and statism and, as people veer away from the church and veer away from the Judeo Christian values that built our country, people are more likely to embrace statism,” he said in an interview…
It will operate under a 501(c)(3) charter and is owned by Liberty.
The plan to go on offense is similar to how President Trump operates, and it’s no coincidence that both Falwell and Kirk are leading defenders of the president.
Kirk, who stressed that it was an “honor” to work with Falwell in the bid to “organize an army of believers in faith and liberty,” said he expects to be attacked as he and Liberty’s president have for their support for Trump…
“If you want to be loved today as a political conservative, go against the president. You’ll get the best press you could ever possibly imagine. But if you want to stand for what’s right, if you want to stand for truth, defend our country, then you have to stand behind this president,” said Kirk, who has been accompanying Donald Trump Jr. during his book tour to colleges and universities to promote Triggered: How the Left Thrives on Hate and Wants to Silence Us.

All the failsons gotta hang together, it’s both natural affinity and a defense against their (many, legitimate) enemies.

The Falkirk Center's mission, according to Charlie Kirk, is to find out whether Jesus was a socialist. pic.twitter.com/xhHV1LWPC6
— Will Sommer (@willsommer) November 30, 2019

That Jesus dude notoriously condemned religious profiteering, promoted multiculturalism and sharing material goods across the community, and gave away free food and healthcare. (Also, He preferred hanging with his group of fellow believers to getting an honest job, and when one of the overworked women of the movement asked for a little help in the kitchen, slanged her off for not properly valuing the worth of intellectual labor.) So: Signs point to YES!

Falkirk “will operate under a 501(c)(3) charter and is owned by Liberty.” So Charlie Kirk will keep running fake charities to hide political activity. And Trump’s IRS ensures wealthy Evangelical donors take 100% tax write-offs. #nonprofits https://t.co/yvBiFMMNXP https://t.co/sBaytQrGWH
— Nancy Levine ?? (@nancylevine) November 30, 2019

@JerryFalwellJr and @charliekirk11 should do like Trump's buddies Lev and Igor and call it Fraud Guaranteed
— Birmingham Weekly (@BhamWeekly) December 1, 2019

Sunday Pharisees Open Thread: The New <del>Failson</del> Falkirk CenterPost + Comments (106)

Repub ‘Traditions’ Open Thread: Feelers… Nothing More Than Feelers…

by Anne Laurie| November 25, 20196:42 pm| 53 Comments

This post is in: C.R.E.A.M., Grifters Gonna Grift, Open Threads, Republican Venality

Warm profile in the Times. Get her on the Emmys. Maybe she can guest on Sesame Street. We cannot rest until all of the people who lied to us, daily, in the name of advancing the agenda of a lunatic racist bonehead have been fully rehabilitated! https://t.co/NawCZSXDzK
— Ken Tremendous (@KenTremendous) November 25, 2019

This is probably true. https://t.co/MCPr2azL32
— Dana Houle (@DanaHoule) November 25, 2019

Sarah Sanders must not know many people then https://t.co/g4fS2LS4VZ
— Catherine Rampell (@crampell) November 25, 2019

The people she knows best are Republicans. Even the ones who can read would rather not risk muddying their propaganda skillsets. Fox News and the Oval Office Occcupant’s twitter feed tell them all they need to know to succeed in grinding through their daily routines.

This is real. Americans love to laugh at idiots. They worship fame. And to elevate dumbasses because it makes them feel superior, or at least equal. This is a dangerous combination. Trump wasn't quite the first, but he's opened the floodgates.
— Mig Greengard (@chessninja) November 25, 2019

Every so often, the Republican Party reaches a new nadir, where they can’t even scrape up a conventionally good-looking figurehead to spin the propaganda on television. Now it’s Sarah Huckabee Sanders, who looks entirely too much like her old man (nepotism, of course, being her only qualification). Last time the GOP was about to get stomped, it was the Albino Amphibian who led the charge:

Also likely devastated: the dozens of creditors to whom @newtgingrich’s 2012 presidential campaign still owes a collective $4.63 million. pic.twitter.com/qGDJ6lYVQH
— Dave Levinthal (@davelevinthal) November 25, 2019

Gotta hand it to Newt: He’s an inspiration to every soulless grifter in American politics.

Repub ‘Traditions’ Open Thread: Feelers… Nothing More Than Feelers… Post + Comments (53)

The other obstruction and witness intimidation case tied to Russia and Ukraine

by David Anderson| November 15, 201912:16 pm| 75 Comments

This post is in: An Unexamined Scandal, Election 2016, Goddamned Traitors, Grifters Gonna Grift, Mueller Report, Open Threads, Republican Venality, Russia, Trump Crime Cartel, Trump-Russia

Just another day when a president's oldest political adviser is convicted on 7 criminal counts including lying to Congress and witness tampering during a break in an impeachment hearing in which the president's tweets from the morning are described as intimidating by the witness.
— Philip Bump (@pbump) November 15, 2019

Roger Stone was convicted on all counts of obstruction, false statements and witness intimidation.

Open Thread

UPDATE 1

1) Trump on his way to impeachment
2) His longtime political adviser convicted on 7 counts
3) His personal lawyer under investigation for ties to 2 indicted associates
All happening around the noon hour on a Friday.
— Aaron Blake (@AaronBlake) November 15, 2019

At least this Friday has the courtesy of news-dumping during normal business hours.

The other obstruction and witness intimidation case tied to Russia and UkrainePost + Comments (75)

Repub Venality Open Thread: Oh, Joy, Another 80s Reboot We Didn’t Need

by Anne Laurie| October 26, 20197:47 pm| 74 Comments

This post is in: C.R.E.A.M., Excellent Links, Grifters Gonna Grift, Hail to the Hairpiece, Open Threads, Republican Venality, All Too Normal

Look, this is what white working-class voters in Ohio and Iowa wanted. https://t.co/ej8aWokp37
— Daniel W. Drezner (@dandrezner) October 26, 2019

Turns out those ‘Opportunity Zones’ aren’t just a financial lifeline for Jared Kushner’s family of grifters — it’s a smorgasbord for allll the financial predators among Donny Dollhands’ associates…

In the 1980s, Michael Milken embodied Wall Street greed. A swashbuckling financier, he was charged with playing a central role in a vast insider-trading scheme and was sent to prison for violating federal securities and tax laws. He was an inspiration for the Gordon Gekko character in the film “Wall Street.”
Mr. Milken has spent the intervening decades trying to rehabilitate his reputation through an influential nonprofit think tank, the Milken Institute, devoted to initiatives “that advance prosperity.”
These days, the Milken Institute is a leading proponent of a new federal tax break that was intended to coax wealthy investors to plow money into distressed communities known as “opportunity zones.” The institute’s leaders have helped push senior officials in the Trump administration to make the tax incentive more generous, even though it is under fire for being slanted toward the wealthy.
Mr. Milken, it turns out, is in a position to personally gain from some of the changes that his institute has urged the Trump administration to enact. In one case, the Treasury secretary, Steven Mnuchin, directly intervened in a way that benefited Mr. Milken, his longtime friend.
It is a vivid illustration of the power that Mr. Milken, who was barred from the securities industry and fined $600 million as part of his 1990 felony conviction, has amassed in President Trump’s Washington. In addition to the favorable tax-policy changes, some of Mr. Trump’s closest advisers — including Mr. Mnuchin, Jared Kushner and Rudolph W. Giuliani — have lobbied the president to pardon Mr. Milken for his crimes, or supported that effort, according to people familiar with the effort…
The former “junk bond king” has investments in at least two major real estate projects inside federally designated opportunity zones in Nevada, near Mr. Milken’s Lake Tahoe vacation home, according to public records reviewed by The New York Times.
One of those developments, inside an industrial park, is a nearly 700-acre site in which Mr. Milken is a major investor. Last year, after pressure from Mr. Milken’s business partner and other landowners, the Treasury Department ignored its own guidelines on how to select opportunity zones and made the area eligible for the tax break, according to people involved in the discussions and records reviewed by The Times.
The unusual decision was made at the personal instruction of Mr. Mnuchin, according to internal Treasury Department emails. It came shortly after he had spent time with Mr. Milken at an event his institute hosted…
Mr. Milken — operating from an X-shaped trading desk in Beverly Hills, Calif. — was a Wall Street legend. He pioneered the junk bond, which enabled financially risky companies to borrow billions of dollars and ignited a wave of often-hostile corporate takeovers that came to define a go-go era. His firm, Drexel Burnham Lambert, hosted an annual event, which came to be known as the Predators’ Ball, where the era’s greatest financiers mingled. Mr. Milken became a billionaire.
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Then, in 1989, federal prosecutors charged him with violating securities and tax laws and with being part of a lucrative insider-trading ring. The next year, Drexel Burnham went bankrupt.

Mr. Milken pleaded guilty and was sentenced to 10 years in prison and paid $600 million in fines. After cooperating with the government, he ended up serving about two years behind bars…

Mr. Milken, however, has largely managed to restore his reputation — and his clout. His family gave tens of millions of dollars to his Milken Institute, which he founded in 1991 and whose board of directors he leads. After battling prostate cancer, he helped raise hundreds of millions of dollars to fund cancer research…

The most public display of his renewed stature comes each spring in Los Angeles when Mr. Milken presides over a glitzy gathering at the Beverly Hilton — the same venue where his famed Predators’ Balls took place three decades ago.

The Milken Institute’s annual conference attracts thousands of the world’s most powerful people — from government, finance, medicine, Hollywood and the like — for a frenzy of high-powered networking and conspicuous consumption… Mr. Milken is the power broker at the center of the action. Onstage, he interviews famous guests. In private, he organizes exclusive dinners. Some have called the event the Davos of North America.

In the Trump era, cabinet secretaries and White House advisers have been among the event’s marquee guests, more so than in other recent administrations. Coveted speaking roles have gone to Ivanka Trump and her husband, Mr. Kushner, giving them access to an elite audience.

At last year’s event in Beverly Hills, attendees included Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross and Mr. Mnuchin. The Treasury secretary was accompanied by several senior aides, including Daniel Kowalski, who is overseeing the department’s drafting of the opportunity zone rules…

To quote a famous predators’ motto from the first Gilded Age: Anything not nailed down is mine. Anything I can pry loose is not nailed down.

Repub Venality Open Thread: Oh, Joy, Another 80s Reboot We Didn’t NeedPost + Comments (74)

Friday Morning Open Thread: Scorpion Season

by Anne Laurie| October 25, 20194:32 am| 129 Comments

This post is in: Election Year, Grifters Gonna Grift, Open Threads, Sports, #notintendedtobeafactualstatement, All we want is life beyond the thunderdome

New Scorpio moon Sunday, Selket protect us. Pluto and Mars will be in opposition, which means all the nastiest skeletons are due to fall out of closets, but since it’s a new moon it will take up to six months to resolve the ensuing crises. Then Mercury goes retrograde between Halloween and November 20th, which portends mechanical failures, missed opportunities, and gremlin activity on all fronts…

(In my defense, sports fans are notoriously superstitious.)

I have never wanted a sweep so bad in my life. https://t.co/28scvLFa4v
— Craig Calcaterra (@craigcalcaterra) October 24, 2019

Per the Washington Post:

President Trump said Thursday that he plans to attend Game 5 of the World Series at Nationals Park on Sunday if the Washington Nationals and Houston Astros are still playing, though he will not throw the ceremonial first pitch.
“They’ve got to dress me up in a lot of heavy armor — I’ll look too heavy,” he responded when a reporter asked him about whether he would take the mound. Trump appeared to be making a reference to a bulletproof vest that presidents sometimes are required to wear by Secret Service when they are amid large crowds. A team official confirmed later that he will not take part in that on-field tradition.
Trump’s attendance at the 41,000-seat stadium in Southeast would mark a rare time he has ventured into the District’s entertainment and nightlife scene, other than his occasional visits to the Trump hotel a few blocks from the White House. It could also mean increased security restrictions at the ballpark for what is expected to be a capacity crowd.
The Nationals lead the Astros 2-0 in the best-of-seven series, with Game 3 scheduled for Friday night and Game 4 on Saturday, both in Washington. The Nationals would have to lose at least one of those games for there to be a Game 5 on Sunday…

Wow it’s only Thursday and I can already hear the booing https://t.co/poTeWPmpTO
— andy lassner (@andylassner) October 24, 2019

For the same reason he scheduled a rally in the middle of Chicago when Ted Cruz was gaining momentum during the 2016 primary? https://t.co/u4zSVq1Oxh
— Ben Jacobs (@Bencjacobs) October 24, 2019

Elsewhere:

1. Clinton says Republicans are grooming Gabbard as a 3rd party spoiler
2. NYT bungles quote as her saying Russians are grooming Gabbard
3. Everybody craps on Hillary
4: https://t.co/eCJuej54hO
— Jonathan Chait (@jonathanchait) October 24, 2019

Good news for Kai Kahele, at least: Gabbard just announced that she’s dropping her ~~Senate~~ House reelection campaign. So, once her new third-party grift fails to install her in the Oval Office, she and Nikki Haley will be able to devote all their attention to competing for gigs on the Wingnut Welfare circuit.

Friday Morning Open Thread: Scorpion SeasonPost + Comments (129)

Late Night Open Thread Reminder: There ARE No ‘Better’ Republicans Than Trump

by Anne Laurie| October 22, 20192:07 am| 17 Comments

This post is in: Grifters Gonna Grift, Open Threads, Republican Venality, All Too Normal, Decline and Fall, Ever Get The Feeling You've Been Cheated?

Just some who are slightly more professional in their kleptocracy:

It's largely forgotten, but a reminder that Halliburton, the company of which then VP Dick Cheney had been CEO for 5 years, and which he left only to join the 2000 ticket, was awarded the lucrative contract to provide food, housing, fuel & other support for the wars he launched. https://t.co/DgdARlP2U9
— Peter Lettre (@plettre) October 18, 2019

There seems to be a shift among the Permanent GOPers to act as though the Oval Office Squatter is some kind of aberrancy that slipped past their time-tested barriers to such vulgar criminality.

Good for them, if they’re finally moving away from protecting their deplorables’ god-emperor. But the truth is, the only difference between this maladministration and the ‘usual’ Repub stint in the WH is that Trump insists, gleefully, on saying the quiet parts out loud.

Late Night Open Thread Reminder: There ARE No ‘Better’ Republicans Than TrumpPost + Comments (17)

The Doral Debacle Open Thread: “He’s in the Hospitality Business!”

by Anne Laurie| October 21, 20194:19 pm| 64 Comments

This post is in: C.R.E.A.M., Grifters Gonna Grift, Open Threads, Repubs in Disarray!, Trumpery, #notintendedtobeafactualstatement, All Too Normal, Decline and Fall, Let A Thousand Watergates Bloom

So Mick Mulvaney told us. And Trump certainly set out a rich buffet for his detractors…

New: Trump canceled plans for a Doral-based G7 after hearing from Republican lawmakers that they were unable to defend the move, especially after having fielding questions about Ukraine dealings and Syria decision. w/ ?@vmsalama?: https://t.co/KOdR7KXHYN
— Michael C. Bender (@MichaelCBender) October 20, 2019

Trump was also told by White House officials that the controversy over the G7 location would overshadow any agenda he hoped to highlight at the international summit next year. https://t.co/KOdR7KXHYN
— Michael C. Bender (@MichaelCBender) October 20, 2019

MORE from me & ?@EricLiptonNYT?: Local officials in Doral weren’t notified of the cancelation — or the original choice, for that matter. And a former G7 sherpa for Bush says the choice of Doral would’ve posed ethical problems for visiting leaders. https://t.co/Yiww8pKXVB
— Katie Rogers (@katierogers) October 20, 2019

… “He had no choice,” Chris Christie, the former New Jersey governor and longtime friend of the president’s, said Sunday on ABC’s “This Week.” “It shouldn’t have been done in the first place. And it’s a good move to get out of it and get that out of the papers and off the news.”
[And you know it just broke Christie’s heart to be called on to explain this for his old frenemy…]
The president first heard the criticism of his choice of the Doral watching TV, where even some Fox News personalities were disapproving. By Saturday afternoon, his concerns had deepened when he put in a call to Camp David, where Mr. Mulvaney was hosting moderate congressional Republicans for a discussion of issues facing them, including impeachment, and was told the consensus was he should reverse himself. Those moderates are among the votes Mr. Trump would need to stick with him during an impeachment.
“I didn’t see it being a big negative, but it certainly wasn’t a positive,” said Representative Peter T. King of New York, one of those at Camp David. He said the group told Mr. Trump’s aides that sticking with the decision “would be a distraction.”…
“I think there was a lot of concern,” said Representative Tom Cole of Oklahoma, a member of the Republicans’ leadership team. “I’m not sure people questioned the legality of it, but it clearly was an unforced political error.”
Mr. Cole said he did not speak to the president directly about it, but expressed relief that Mr. Trump had changed his mind, and was certain that other Republicans felt the same way. “We just didn’t need this,” he said.
By late Saturday afternoon, Mr. Trump had made his decision, but he waited to announce the reversal until that night in two tweets that were separated by a break he took to watch the opening of Jeanine Pirro’s Fox News program…
[Because a guy needs a little ego balm when he’s facing such a hurtful choice.]
“At the end of the day,” Mr. Mulvaney said Sunday, “he still considers himself to be in the hospitality business, and he saw an opportunity to take the biggest leaders from around the world, and he wanted to put the absolute best show, the best visit that he possibly could.”
[A show, he most certainly put on, regardless.]
show full post on front page

…[T]he selection, as the president had anticipated, touched off a wave of censure from Democrats and ethics experts.

But it was also criticized by conservative legal scholars, who were already uncomfortable with a number of recent actions by the White House, including pressuring Ukrainian officials to investigate former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr., and his son Hunter Biden.

“It is really just about him ordering the country to pay him money,” said Paul Rosenzweig, a Department of Homeland Security official in the George W. Bush administration who is now a senior fellow at the conservative R Street Institute. “It is just indefensible.”

Pushing the Doral site also threatened to hurt the United States’ standing globally, legal experts said, in light of its decades’ worth of efforts to combat corruption by other foreign governments, according to Jessica Tillipman, a lawyer who specializes in an American law known as the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act.

“This is no different than any other corrupt leader of an oil-rich African country who is taking money from the government and taxpayers,” she said….

Scholars who have studied the history of Group of 7 gatherings — dating to their start in the 1970s — said they could cite no other time when a president effectively tried to force global political leaders to pay his or her family money at a resort owned by the head of state.

“This was unprecedented,” said John Kirton, a professor of political science at the University of Toronto and the director of the G7 Research Group, which studies these gatherings. “This was astounding and embarrassing to the United States.” …

LOL cave. But he still got a free f***ing tax-paid infomercial for his chain of Florida bribery mills from the White House podium.
— Zeddy (@Zeddary) October 20, 2019

Imagine his face when Bill Barr told him, “Actually this might be a problem for us.”
— Schooley (@Rschooley) October 20, 2019

The phrase "Media & Democrat Crazed and Irrational Hostility" is indicative of a measured, eminently sane and presidential man. (I will call you later!) https://t.co/cBKVgnOmeB
— Elizabeth de la Vega (@Delavegalaw) October 20, 2019

Tfw people make a big hassle over your crimes and stuff https://t.co/qfnDjcGNEh
— IrrationalHostilityHat (@Popehat) October 20, 2019

Thoughts and prayers to all the bedbugs at Doral that will be going hungry. ????
— Gabe Ortíz (@TUSK81) October 20, 2019

He's the whiniest, unmanliest grifter who ever grifted. But he whines! He whines for you, forgotten America! pic.twitter.com/TOMzvCc822
— Dan Murphy (@bungdan) October 20, 2019

Trump’s G7 Doral move was like shooting on the wagons that are circling him.
— Schooley (@Rschooley) October 19, 2019

Thinking tonight of all the Republican officials who defended Trump's decision to hold the G7 at his own hotel… what do they say now?
— Susan Glasser (@sbg1) October 20, 2019

Sen. Ken Cramer (R-ND) on Trump’s decision to award G7 summit to his own Miami property: “It may seem careless politically, but on the other hand there's tremendous integrity in his boldness and his transparency”https://t.co/50KObtK7q9
— Catherine Rampell (@crampell) October 18, 2019

I'm almost sorry Trump didn't double down on the also-impeachable G7 thing, but at least he waited long enough for enough Republicans to get out on a limb defending it before he sawed it off behind them.
— Tom Nichols (@RadioFreeTom) October 20, 2019

Let’s recap: Congressional GOP spent an entire week defending the president for something that was clearly unethical & very probably unconstitutional all for no reason b/c Trump realized he had to fold.
Don’t forget most Rs were totally fine with it. Lesson: don’t defend Trump! https://t.co/Z1OwmXzOYV
— Heath Mayo (@HeathMayo) October 20, 2019

It is #ExtremelyFunny that Mick Mulvaney confessed, in detail, to high crimes and misdemeanors while lavishly announcing a WHOLE OTHER premeditated act of thievery that has now been called off less than 60 hours later.
— Zeddy (@Zeddary) October 20, 2019

When do they announce that the G7 is going to Turnberry?
— Charles P. Pierce (@CharlesPPierce) October 20, 2019

Look on the bright side!

Given that Trump caved on Doral within two days, I really don't think he'll refuse to concede and then maintain that position for the 11 weeks between election day and inauguration.
— Boo-risma Executive Board Member (@agraybee) October 20, 2019

The Doral Debacle Open Thread: “He’s in the Hospitality Business!”Post + Comments (64)

I personally stopped the public option…

Where tasty lettuce and good mustard aren’t elitist.

Hot Air and Ill Informed Banter

And we’re all out of bubblegum.

This is a big f—–g deal.

Also, too.

Shallow, uninformed, and lacking identity.

Han shot first.

I can see Russia from this blog!

Naturally gregarious and alpha

We still have time to mess this up!

I showered with Rahm and all I got was this shitty blog.

What fresh hell is this?

Women: They Get Shit Done

Screw the Judean People’s Front. Splitters.

Usually wrong but never in doubt.

Consistently wrong since 2002

We are aware of all internet traditions.

Yes we did.

Not all heroes wear capes.

Shock troops for the Unitarian Jihad.

An almost top 10,000 blog!

Today in our ongoing national embarrassment…

Technically true, but collectively nonsense.