Where's Melanie?

You know, I hadn't even considered that he might have actually hurt her.

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

Absolute truth

And it seems to work on a J curve.

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

Oldie but goodie explanation for Trump

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

Pardon power

President Donald Trump's announcement that he was pardoning far-right commentator Dinesh D'Souza, who pleaded guilty in 2014 to campaign finance fraud, caught many in Trump world by surprise Thursday morning, but they insisted it was not indicative of possible pardons for Trump allies ensnared in the Russia probe.

  Buzzfeed

Sure it's not. Who imagined it was?

D'Souza isn't that well-known of a figure among Trump's base of supporters, leaving many confused about the reasoning behind the pardon, especially since it came at the same time the White House announced major new tariffs.

Not everything is about his base. Everything IS about him, though. The pardon is not needed to assure his base - they're with him no matter what. The pardon is to assure his criminal colluding cohort who are going to need pardons. Of course, they're having to bet on him still being in office when they get sentenced. And what's even more risky: bet on him actually giving a shit when they get sentenced. For his purposes, the pardon is to encourage them to keep lying and to not give him up. (Although I think he's probably missed that boat on several people.) There's no risk to him tossing out winks and nods. The risk is assumed by those who rely on the clues.

The president told reporters Thursday on his way to Dallas he made the decision to pardon D’Souza on his own. “I don’t know him, I never met him, I called him last night, first time I’ve ever spoken to him,” Trump said, according to White House pool reports. “I said, ‘I’m pardoning you.’ Nobody asked me to do it.”

“I’ve always felt he was very unfairly treated,” the president explained.

[...]

D’Souza, Trump said, was shocked to hear from him. “He almost had a heart attack.”

D'Souza's wife on Twitter gave credit to Sen. Ted Cruz for the decision, saying he put a pardon on Trump's "radar." Cruz, retweeting D'Souza's wife, called the pardon "a terrific day for Justice."

[...]

There’s been some speculation that Trump’s pardon of D’Souza — like his earlier pardon of Scooter Libby — could be a signal to others that he’s willing to use his power to help people he deems “unfairly” treated, especially people who might be in the sights of special counsel Robert Mueller.

Well, that's just crazy talk.

[A] former official said he doesn't think Trump is playing "the sort of three-dimensional chess people ascribe to decisions like this. More often than not he's just eating the pieces."

Very likely. But sending constant reminders as to his pardoning powers, and particularly noting the types he pardons, isn't three dimensional chess. It's a typical Trump move. More like Uncle Wiggly.

D'Souza's account of the pardon:

My wife and I had dinner with Sen. Ted Cruz about a month ago and he told me he was going to press for a pardon. Then he called me a couple weeks later and said he spoke to the president and he was very receptive. There needed to be a legal review but he told me I should expect a call from the White House. I got that call midday yesterday and spoke to Trump for 10 minutes. He told me that it’s done and I’m tweeting it out in the morning.

He said I was a great voice for America, then he says: “You were screwed,” his word. He said these people went after you for a mere technicality, I’m going to set that right and clear your record so that you can be an even more visible voice for the country than you are now.

[...]

He was with (chief of staff) Gen. Kelly calling from the Oval Office and we just spoke about when the pardon would take effect and when it would be public.

He knows it was politically motivated. I don’t want to put words in his mouth because I don’t remember exactly what he said, but he said: “They went after you, and they shafted you.” Why would they do this? Obviously because I made a movie critical of Obama.

  Hollywood Reporter

Obviously.  It's the Kenyan's fault.

No American has been prosecuted, let alone locked up, for doing what I did. There’s a very clear record of this that my lawyer put into a legal brief a few years ago. Prosecutions occur under two conditions: When a donation is corrupt and the donor is seeking a quid pro quo from the candidate. Like a political appointment or tax break. The second time is for repeat offenders, like Rosie O’Donnell, who admits she did it five times. But for a single offense for a person with no prior record? To go after them for a felony and essentially try to destroy their life? That’s unprecedented. It’s like going 90 miles an hour on the freeway and being sentenced to five years in prison.

[...]

In the old days, a guy like Jimmy Carter would no more want to lock me up than George W. Bush would want to lock up Michael Moore. But there was a gangsterization of America under Obama where he’d punish dissidents. If they’re going to do it to us, then we should do it to them. That’s the only way this will stop. In a world where Dinesh is prosecuted for one violation, why isn’t Rosie prosecuted for five?

It was an overnight confinement center in San Diego. It was eight months and I’ve already done that. What’s still ongoing is five years of community service and I’m on probation, so I have a officer visit me and I need permission from a judge to travel outside the country. The pardon brings all this to an end and, most importantly, clears my record. So I can vote, own a firearm, all my rights are restored.

[...]

People who plead guilty voluntarily are not doing so “voluntarily.” In my case they filed a charge that carried a maximum penalty of two years and another that carries five years and said they’d drop the second charge if I pled guilty to the first. So the whole thing is a sham. They positioned it like a show trial where I broke down and confessed when actually I was bludgeoned.

[...]

I have a somewhat providential view of life and look at things as if they serve a purpose. I’m a better man for it, so in that sense I don’t regret it. But it’s been an ordeal and emotionally painful and financially expensive.

He can own a firearm now!

So now he knows how the system works with pleas. Maybe he can work for prison reform with Kim Thong Un. But, poor baby, he's had an emotional hurt. Can we lock him back up for being a fucking idiot?



God, this asshole is disgusting.  No wonder Trump likes him.



 ...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

UPDATE:



Bingo.

Why doesn't Rosenstein recuse himself from the Russia probe?

Or at least the obstruction of justice part of it.

Rosenstein appointed Mueller and, under the relevant order and incorporated regulations, supervises him.

Rosenstein was also centrally involved in James Comey’s firing.

[...]

[J]ust before Trump fired Comey, Trump and an aide drafted an “angry, meandering” termination letter to Comey at the president’s golf club in Bedminster, N.J. The Bedminster letter was never sent. But in a meeting in the Oval Office soon after it was drafted, Rosenstein “was given a copy of the original letter and agreed to write a separate memo for Mr. Trump about why Mr. Comey should be fired,” according to the New York Times.

[...]

Rosenstein’s memo was used as a pretext to fire Comey; Rosenstein knew that the president wanted to fire Comey; and he read the Bedminster draft before he wrote his own memorandum.

[...]

The Washington Post reported unequivocally that Mueller’s investigation includes “whether President Trump attempted to obstruct justice,” including, as a central issue, in his firing of Comey. Rosenstein was in the middle of that firing. He possesses information about the president’s beliefs and motives in firing Comey, and quite possibly a personal interest in how those beliefs and motives are construed, since he appeared to many to have been used by the president (and was reportedly very angry about it). Rosenstein thus would very likely be a fact witness in any obstruction inquiry in connection with the Comey firing. It is hard to understand why he did not have a conflict of interest the moment Mueller’s investigation turned to obstruction in the firing of Comey.

[...]

[The Times] story Thursday added two details that make it even harder to see why Rosenstein does not have a conflict. First, Schmidt reports that, contrary to White House claims, Trump’s Bedminster letter mentioned the Russia investigation in its first sentence and described it as “fabricated and politically motivated.” Since Rosenstein saw that letter before he wrote his memorandum—and perhaps even discussed the contents with the president or attorney general prior to drafting his own second memo—he knew that the president had the Russia investigation on his mind in wanting to fire Comey. He wrote his memorandum about Comey in light of this knowledge.

Second, after reporting that Attorney General Sessions “wanted one negative article a day in the news media about Mr. Comey” and that a Sessions staffer approached a Hill staffer about whether he or she was in possession of any “derogatory information” about Comey, a claim denied by the attorney general’s spokesperson, Schmidt [the Times reporter] added:

Earlier that day, Rod J. Rosenstein, the deputy attorney general, had pulled one of Mr. McGahn’s deputies aside after a meeting at the Justice Department. Mr. Rosenstein told the aide that top White House and Justice Department lawyers needed to discuss Mr. Comey’s future. It is unclear whether this conversation was related to the effort to dig up dirt on Mr. Comey.

This suggests that Rosenstein had a more proactive role than has been previously believed in the firing of Comey. And it implies the possibility that he might have been involved in the effort to “dig up dirt” on Comey.

[...]

If the president abused his power in firing Comey due to the Russia investigation, Rosenstein appears to have knowingly contributed to it. I cannot fathom how, in this light, he remains the supervisor in charge of that investigation, since a reasonable person would question his impartiality in the matter.

One possibility is that Rosenstein has no conflict because Mueller is not actually investigating the president for obstruction.

[...]

Rosenstein’s non-recusal might, despite the many stories to the contrary, be evidence that Mueller is not in fact investigating whether Trump obstructed justice or otherwise violated the law in firing Comey.

  Lawfare blog

That would be hard to believe.

Moreover, Rosenstein has expressly stated that “if anything that I did winds up being relevant to his investigation then, as Director Mueller and I discussed, if there's a need from me to recuse I will.”

Perhaps Mr. Mueller has Mr. Rosenstein on the list as one of the last links to the obstruction case, and Mr. Rosenstein is either unaware of that or figures he'll hold out as long as he can, which would be until Mr. Mueller tells him he's "relevant".

A second possibility is that Mueller is investigating obstruction by the president and that, with respect to that issue, Rosenstein has in fact recused himself but not publicly announced it.

Odd, but more believable.

If so, then another Justice Department official, presumably Associate Attorney General Rachel Brand, would be supervising Mueller on the obstruction issue. I do not know if such a partial recusal is legally possible, since the appearance or reality of a conflict with respect to one element of the investigation might infect the appearance or reality of a conflict with respect to the entire investigation. Moreover, such a partial recusal, even if appropriate, would be politically controversial in the sense that many would make the “infection” charge to discredit the investigation. (It is also hard to see how news of the partial recusal would not have leaked.)

I'm with this right up until that parenthetical note. I don't believe the Mueller team leaks.

A third possibility is that Rosenstein is bending the rules a bit.

He bent the rules a bit already when he wrote an ass-covering memo for Trump's firing of Comey. And when he gave Congressional GOPers (and eventually one Democrat) information regarding the informant the FBI used early in the Trump campaign when they were trying to uncover whether the Russians were trying to interfere in the 2018 election.

With a president hostile to the investigation and the attorney general recused, Rosenstein (and Mueller) may feel that the situation is so fragile that everything possible must be done to avoid Rosenstein’s recusal, perhaps on the fear that a recusal would give the president ammunition to attack the entire investigation, or worse. If this is what is going on, then Rosenstein has surely obtained the appropriate authorizations from the appropriate Justice Department ethics unit. Such an authorization might satisfy any technical legal concern about a conflict of interest. But it would not satisfy the inevitable political concerns about such a conflict; indeed, it might fuel such attacks down the road in a way not helpful to the investigation.

Something here doesn’t make sense.

A lot of somethings about this administration don't make sense.

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

A petty tyrant

Since Mr. Sessions’s recusal in March 2017, the president has publicly and privately lashed out at him. In recent weeks, Mr. Trump has gone so far as to tell people not to raise Mr. Sessions’s name with him in conversation.

  NYT

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

Newsflash: the AG doesn't work for Trump

At least, he's not supposed to.






The latter in this instance, since the federal prosecutor is indeed "former".

ERA: We're still not there

Hard to believe this is the 21st century.

Illinois on Wednesday became the 37th state to ratify the Equal Rights Amendment, putting the country only one state away from a landmark change to the U.S. Constitution guaranteeing equal rights for women.

[...]

The ERA, first proposed in 1972, guarantees equal rights for all citizens regardless of sex. Ratification requires the assent of 38 states, but there’s some legal debate over whether it’s too late for additional states to join those that acted years earlier.

  TPM

Ferfuxsake.

Illinois was one of 15 states not to ratify before the 1982 deadline. The push to ratify took center stage once more after Nevada voted to ratify the amendment last year.

You want to know which states haven't ratified, I'm sure.  I don't think the list will surprise you much, other than the facts that this is the 21st century and that these same states will point to Muslim countries and denegrate them for their treatment of women.

Alabama
Arizona
Arkansas
Florida
Georgia
Louisiana
Mississippi
Missouri
Nevada
North Carolina
Oklahoma
South Carolina
Utah
Virginia

I'm guessing you can notice the pattern.

And, what may be a worse indicator of the times, five states voted to withdraw their ratification of the ERA, even though Congress has denied them the legality of it:

Nebraska
Tennessee
Idaho
Kentucky
South Dakota

Losing!

Bloomberg reports that Trump's current net worth is estimated at $2.8 billion, compared to $2.9 billion last June, and is the lowest his net worth has been since Bloomberg started tracking it in 2015.

The Bloomberg Billionaires Index used data from lenders, property records, annual reports, market data and Trump's financial disclosure to calculate Trump's net worth.

A spokeswoman for the Trump Organization criticized Bloomberg's methodology for assessing real estate data to estimate Trump's net worth, saying in a statement to the outlet that it reduced "the value of our prime New York real estate assets," by not taking into account that Trump buildings are in desirable neighborhoods that affect property values.

  The Hill

My guess is that what Bloomberg doesn't do is use Trump's personal idea of what his property is worth, which seems to be how he evaluates it.

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

Another magazine cover for his golf club walls

Actually funny.  "Kim Thong Un."  "The other big ass summit."

Trump is a rump.




...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

UPDATE:



Indeed, we do. But this is still funny.  And why doesn't he publish any photos with serious people who have been hammering away without thanks for prison reform for decades?  Because he hasn't taken any.

Did I mention that Giuliani is an ass?

If I didn't, I meant to.

At Monday's baseball game between the Yankees and the Houston Astros, Giuliani was loudly booed when an announcer informed the crowd that the former mayor was in attendance and celebrating his 74th birthday.

[...]

Giuliani on Wednesday pushed back at speculation that booing from fans at a New York Yankees game earlier this week had upset him, saying fans boo public figures they actually support.

"No, no. I know Yankee fans. They boo you when they love you," Giuliani said near the southwest gate of the White House, according to Fox News Sunday producer Pat Ward.

  The Hill

Christ. Yeah, this sounds like love.

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

The world's biggest dickhead

Speaking to reporters on Thursday before boarding Air Force One for a trip to Texas, Trump said talks between U.S. and North Korean diplomats are going “very well.”

"They're going to be coming down to Washington on Friday. And a letter is going to be delivered to me from Kim Jong Un," he said.

  The Hill

If Kim really wants to own this asshat, and I assume he does, there won't be any letter.

Shhhh, don't tell the NRA

Shares of Dick's Sporting Goods soared on Wednesday after reports the company's first-quarter earnings exceeded expectations, assuaging investors' fears that its new restrictions on gun sales would hurt profits.

The sporting goods store's shares surged by 23 percent when markets opened on Wednesday as last quarter's $1.91 billion in sales exceeded estimates from last year, which had projected $1.88 billion, CNBC reports.

[...]

Dick's moved in February to pull the rifles from shelves just days after 17 people were killed in a South Florida high school by a shooter armed with a semi-automatic rifle.

The company also stopped selling high-capacity magazines and banned the sale of all guns to people under the age of 21.

  The Hill

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

What in God's name is he doing?

The Trump administration will levy hefty steel and aluminum tariffs on the European Union, Canada and Mexico starting on Friday, a move likely to lead to retaliation and risk the future of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA).

Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross on Thursday said President Trump has decided to end the temporary exemptions for the three key trading allies despite their two months of lobbying to avoid the tariffs.

“We look forward to continued negotiations with Canada and Mexico on one hand and with the European Commission on the other hand as there are other issues we need to get resolved,” Ross told reporters on a conference call.

Ross said the White House would need to see the reactions of Canada, Mexico and the 28-nation European bloc before determining what to do next.

  The Hill

I think we can assume the reactions won't be good. In fact, I think we already know exactly what their reactions will be.

The trading partners have all warned the U.S. that they will impose retaliatory tariffs on U.S. exports if the U.S. goes through with the steel and aluminum tariffs.

The EU is expected to quickly retaliate with promised tariffs of about $3.3 billion on iconic American products such as bourbon, jeans and motorcycles.

[...]

The decisions have prompted a pushback from Republicans in Congress, who are worried retaliation from trading partners could hurt farmers in particular.

[...]

The Section 232 law, which is rarely used, allows tariffs to be placed on imports in the name of national security. Trump is considering the same law to employ tariffs on automobiles.

[...]

Ross said that Trump can “do anything he wishes at any point subsequent from today” on whether to impose tariffs and quotes.

Can he get American steel and aluminum production up to levels that will cover the loss of imports in one day?  Can he find markets for the loss of exports in one day?

And, hey, if that's not enough...

Trump wants to impose a total ban on the imports of German luxury cars, according to a new report from CNBC and German magazine WirtschaftsWoche.

[...]

A number of German automakers have plants in the U.S., including Mercedes-Benz in Alabama and BMW in South Carolina.

[...]

Several U.S. and European diplomats told the news outlets that Trump told French President Emmanuel Macron about his plans last month during a state visit.

Trump reportedly told Macron that he would maintain the ban until no Mercedes-Benz cars are seen on Fifth Avenue in New York.

  The Hill

Who is he punishing?

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

UPDATE:

And did I say Giuliani is a bag of shit?

If I didn't, I meant to.

Rudy Giuliani on Wednesday dared Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Calif.) to continue calling for Trump’s impeachment.

“I challenge Maxine Waters to say impeachment,” Giuliani said. “Say it. Say ‘impeachment’, sweetheart. Just say it.”

Giuliani appeared on Fox News with host Sean Hannity to blast the Democrat who has continually called for Trump to be removed from office.

  The Hill

"Sweetheart"?  I hope Maxine puts a boot up his misogynistic ass.

“The people who will decide this are the people of the United States in the 2018 election,” Giuliani said. “And, boy, they are switching fast and Democrats are running for cover.”

“You don’t hear them say the words impeachment anymore,” he added.

Trump said last month that if Republicans lose the House majority in the midterms, he’ll face impeachment from Democrats.

[...]

Waters called for Trump’s impeachment earlier this month after he decided to pull the U.S. out of the Iran nuclear deal.

“Trump, further isolating the United States, thinks he knows better than our negotiators and all of our global allies who agreed to the Iran deal," Waters tweeted. "How long do we have to suffer his gigantic ego and narcissistic behavior? Impeachment is the only answer."

[...]

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and other Democratic leaders have tried to quell the impeachment push, arguing that they need more firm evidence of wrongdoing to press for Trump's removal.

Pelosi said just “being a jerk” doesn’t rise to the level of impeachment.

Jesus Christ, Nancy. Is that all you think is problematic here?

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

What prompted his "not that it matters" tweet?

Here's the tweet:



And here's what must have prompted it:

A memo has been turned over to special counsel Robert Mueller detailing a claim that Donald Trump asked for the Russia investigation to be officially cited in the firing of FBI director James Comey last year.

  The Guardian

What a fucking idiot.

The former acting F.B.I. director, Andrew G. McCabe, wrote a confidential memo last spring recounting a conversation that offered significant behind-the-scenes details on the firing of Mr. McCabe’s predecessor, James B. Comey, according to several people familiar with the discussion.

[...]

In the document, whose contents have not been previously reported, Mr. McCabe described a conversation at the Justice Department with the deputy attorney general, Rod J. Rosenstein, in the chaotic days last May after Mr. Comey’s abrupt firing. Mr. Rosenstein played a key role in the dismissal, writing a memo that rebuked Mr. Comey over his handling of an investigation into Hillary Clinton.

But in the meeting at the Justice Department, Mr. Rosenstein added a new detail: He said the president had originally asked him to reference Russia in his memo, the people familiar with the conversation said. Mr. Rosenstein did not elaborate on what Mr. Trump had wanted him to say.

  NYT

So that's what Rosenstein edited out. I recall at the time that it was reported he edited Trump's memo, but no one said what he changed. I figured he edited out some nasty comments about Comey.

This is rich.

To Mr. McCabe, that seemed like possible evidence that Mr. Comey’s firing was actually related to the F.B.I.’s investigation into the Trump campaign’s ties to Russia, and that Mr. Rosenstein helped provide a cover story by writing about the Clinton investigation.

"Seemed like possible evidence." Yeah, I guess it does. Mr. Mueller thinks so, too.

Mr. Rosenstein gave Mr. McCabe a copy of a draft firing letter that Mr. Trump had written, according to two people familiar with the conversation. Mr. McCabe later gave that letter, and his memos, to Mr. Mueller.

[...]

One person who was briefed on Mr. Rosenstein’s conversation with the president said Mr. Trump had simply wanted Mr. Rosenstein to mention that he was not personally under investigation in the Russia inquiry.

Another nice try for cover. Alas, you can't protect him from himself.

Mr. Rosenstein said it was unnecessary and did not include such a reference. Mr. Trump ultimately said it himself when announcing the firing.

[...]

“And in fact, when I decided to just do it, I said to myself, I said, ‘You know, this Russia thing with Trump and Russia is a made-up story,’” Mr. Trump said. “It’s an excuse by the Democrats for having lost an election that they should have won.”

Mr. Trump also told Russian diplomats in the Oval Office that firing Mr. Comey had relieved “great pressure” that he had faced because of Russia.

I don't know why Trump didn't take the opportunity to badmouth McCabe and the Times in his tweet. At least I'm surprised he didn't remind us McCabe was fired for not being forthright about some things, so, you know, why should we believe anything he wrote in a memo? I'm guessing he's still in shock about this memo getting leaked and, being guilty, didn't wait to settle down with a plan before firing off a tweet. Not that it matters.

I know another narcissist liar who uses that phrase when lying while also feeling guilty. I wonder if that's common.

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

UPDATE:

Where's Melania?

This is exactly the kind of thing that Melania would/should be seen at.  She's been missing from public view for three weeks.

This was on her Twitter account that same day:

So why wasn't she at this children's sports event on the lawn?  And why is Ivanka standing in?

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

Him or your lying eyes? (And ears.)

Except he told Lester Holt on national TV that he DID fire Comey to get the Russia probe off his back.

Not that it matters much.



...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

UPDATE:

The prompt for the Comey tweet.

Memo to Co-colluders & Crooks

Kiss his ass, get a pardon.



...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

UPDATE:

Make America irrelevant again

So....that didn't go quite the way he planned

First, Giuliani trips him up by revealing that Trump repaid Cohen's hush money, prompting Sean to stutter, "I didn't know that." 

And now these two Trump campaign cronies throw him hooks.

To be fair, though, all three interviewees are buffoons.  Hannity was a fool to have them on.


...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

Ah, Jesus, I thought we might have lost Rudy

President Donald Trump’s lawyer Rudy Giuliani said that he can fully understand why Attorney General Jeff Sessions recused himself from investigations related to Russia and the presidential election and that he might have done the same, had he accepted that job, as Trump wanted.

Giuliani said he would have had the same conflict of interest as Sessions because they were both major players in Trump’s campaign, although, unlike Sessions, he never met with the Russian ambassador.

“I would have considered it, sure,” Giuliani told HuffPost on Wednesday, adding that he told Trump this when Sessions removed himself from oversight of any related Justice Department probe in March 2017. “I told the president at the time that I just didn’t know what I would have done.”

[...]

He added, however, that he does not believe Trump should fire Sessions.

“He could, but he shouldn’t,” Giuliani said, pointing to what he called improving poll numbers for Trump. “Things are moving in his direction ... If you fire somebody, even though it’s legitimate, you’re just going to raise a lot of questions.”

  

We don't want any questions.

Giuliani had hoped to be in Trump’s Cabinet but not as attorney general, he said. “He offered it to me,” Giuliani said. “I didn’t take it because I wanted to be secretary of state. I recommended Jeff [Sessions] as the perfect guy to do it.”

So, really, then, it's Rudy's fault.

Giuliani said that if he were Sessions, he would demand to know from special counsel Robert Mueller the status of the probe and whether there is any reason Sessions should not oversee it. “I think he should do it confidentially first, to give Mueller a chance to explain himself,” Giuliani said.

Tap, tap, tap. Rudy? Maybe he did that.

Giuliani said Mueller’s investigation has failed to find anything of importance and should be ended quickly. “I believe it’s going to be over by, I hope, September,” he said.

Still trying to placate Trump with these predictions of the end of the investigation, or do they just keep doing that to keep his base agitated when it goes longer? Maybe both.

As he previously told HuffPost, he thinks Trump would agree to an interview with Mueller — but only if the DOJ turns over its report on the use of a confidential informant to acquire information from Trump campaign officials about Russian involvement.

Maybe Mueller should take him up on that. Then if he didn't agree to the interview, that could be used against him politically, and if he did agree, there's plenty of other areas where he's going to incriminate himself.

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

Check out the audience

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

The danger in White Fear

I have a sort of knee-jerk negative response to anything advertised as "must read" or "must see" - and all of Jeremy Scahill's podcasts are worth listening to - but I'm confident in claiming this interview with Professor Eddie Glaude Jr is a "must" for every American. (Starts at about mark 42:00)

Aaaaaand, there it is

Apparently, he's made it to a TV.



Now why didn't I guess that it would be about HIM?

Avenatti denied right to practice in Cohen trial

The Cohen/Avenatti hearing was held this morning.

Avenatti was denied the right to practice in the New York court:


Not smart on Avenatti's part.

Also...



UPDATE:



Without benefit of tone or expression, this sounds like a statement that Avenatti is freer on the outside than he would be if allowed to be a part of the case and could be taken to mean that the judge would like him to coninue on the outside.

FURTHER UPDATE:

Marcy Wheeler seems to think that's what happened:



UPDATE 5/31:

Ambien responds

Daniel Dale was at the Nashville rally so we don't have to read about it or listen to it

Here are some of his observations...

Trump says "people are saying" that he's the only politician that "produced more than I said I was going to produce." He started saying this at rallies and then eventually started attributing it to "people."

Trump is talking about how people said he couldn't get 270 electoral votes but then he really did.

Trump wrongly claims nobody would have believed him if he'd promised there'd be 3.3 million jobs added between now and Election Day. Over the previous 18-month period, under Obama, there were 3.9 million jobs added. Trump falsely claims that wages are "finally going up" for "the first time in many, many years." Wages have been rising since 2014. The current pace, 2.6% in April, is lower than the pace in Obama's last full month in office, 2.7%.

Trump says "Crooked Hillary." Very loud "lock her up" chant.

Trump accuses unnamed people of "infilitrating" his campaign. He then asks anyone in the arena who is infiltrating his campaign to raise their hand.

Trump is telling his usual lengthy ramble-lie about how "San Diego" came and begged him for The Wall. None of this happened. San Diego's Republican mayor opposes the wall, and its city council held a formal vote to express disapproval.

For the 15th time in office, Trump lies that countries are intentionally sending their bad apples into the visa lottery. Individuals enter the lottery on their own because they want to immigrate.

Trump falsely claims that illegal immigration is "down." Judging by border apprehensions, Trump's favourite metric, it has spiked this year - apprehensions are up 4% from the first four months of 2016, up 77% from the first four months of 2017.

"You won't have a Second Amendment" if the Democrats win, Trump says, which is, imagine this, not literally true.

Trump has returned to the subject of MS-13: "They want to cut people up into little pieces." Scoffing at Pelosi, he says, "They're not human beings." "What was the name?" he asks the crowd. "ANIMALLLS," the crowd shouts as one.

Trump is retelling his story about MS-13 as enemy occupying army and Trump as liberator of Long Island: "It's like they've been liberated, like from a war...the people are dancing and they're waving and they're looking out their windows and they're waving at the ICE people."

Trump on Democratic candidate Phil Bredesen: "Phil whateverthehellhisname is, this guy, will 100% vote against us every single time."

Trump is now telling a version of the usual fictional story in which he, sir, is told no president since Reagan could pass a tax cut, and he realized it was because they all called it "tax reform," and he, master brander, decided to call it "tax cuts."

Trump is telling the story about how he wasn't concerned about opening up ANWR to oil drilling - "who cares" - until a friend in the oil business called him up and told him Bush and other presidents couldn't do it, so then he wanted to do it.

For the 14th time, Trump falsely claims the U.S. has spent $7 trillion on Middle East wars. No basis for this claim. Trump is wildly exaggerating a Brown U study that estimates current costs at $4.3 trillion, total including estimated future costs at $5.6 trillion.

Trump is now retelling the almost-certainly-completely-fictional story about how he signed the name "Donald" on an order spending $1 billion on a new Israel embassy, and then had a fiscal epiphany and didn't sign the "Trump."

Trump has told three elaborate stories tonight in which he has talked to someone who called him "sir." I don't think any one of the stories has any basis in reality.

Trump reminds people of how he said in 2016, of African-Americans, "Highest crime rate. Bad education...bad this, bad that."

"We are so respected again. I can't even tell you the degree to which people respect our country again," Trump says. "It's amazing. It's amazing."

Talking about rebuilding America, Trump...goes out of his way to say he has big hands: "We'll do it all with these big beautiful hands. Look at these hands."

Trump has concluded. That was an extremely dishonest speech.

One thing I still haven't figured out well, and I don't think anyone really has, is how to capture Trump's level of rally unhingedness in a regular article. The only good way is to list like 30 things he said.

Oh yeah, this was supposed to be a rally for a Tennessee Congressman.



 ...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

Bolton's new chief of staff: another racist

National Security Adviser John Bolton’s new pick to be the National Security Council chief of staff has served for the last five years as the Senior Vice President for Policy and Programs at the Frank Gaffney-founded Center for Security Policy, a Southern Poverty Law Center-designated hate group that espouses anti-Muslim conspiracy theories.

Gaffney and the group have for years promoted anti-Muslim beliefs, including accusing government officials of being aligned with the Muslim Brotherhood.

The Center for Security Policy’s website features a congratulatory post published Tuesday, confirming Fred Fleitz’s tenure.

  TPM

I'm guessing no one is surprised.

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

UPDATE:  From the Anti-Defamation League:

Trey Gowdy won't be invited onto Fox News any more

Rep. Trey Gowdy (R-SC), told Fox News on Tuesday that after attending the President Trump-mandated classified Justice Department briefing last week, he’s “convinced” the FBI acted correctly in deploying an informant to meet with Trump campaign officials.

“I am even more convinced that the FBI did exactly what my fellow citizens would want them to do when they got the information they got and that it has nothing to do with Trump,” he said Tuesday evening.

[...]

“President Trump himself in the Comey memos said, ‘If anyone connected with my campaign was working with Russia, I want you to investigate it.’ Sounds to me like that was exactly what the FBI did.”

  TPM

He may have said it, but he didn't mean it.

Haven't heard anything out of Rudy for a couple of days. Maybe this will bring him out again.

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

UPDATE:

This didn't bring him out, but Trump's tweeting he wished he hadn't picked Jeff Sessions for AG did.  BTW: Rudy is the one who suggested Sessions for the job.  At least he claims he did.

Courts slowing the forward motion of the Trump Regime

A fourth federal judge has ruled against the Trump administration's decision to prematurely end grants aimed at cutting teen pregnancy rates.

Judge John Coughenour in Washington state ruled Tuesday afternoon that the administration unlawfully ended grants two years early for the King County Health Department in Seattle, which participated in the Teen Pregnancy Prevention (TPP) Program.

[...]

Federal judges have now ruled in four different cases involving nine TPP grantees that the administration's actions were unlawful.

The rulings mean the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) will have to process applications for the final two years of funding.

The HHS last year sent notices to grantees informing them that their grants would end two years earlier than originally planned, arguing that the program was ineffective.

Trump appointees at HHS are pushing to give the TPP program a greater emphasis on abstinence education.

  The Hill

Abstinence education? Gee, I wonder if that's ever been tried.

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

2020 is a reprise of Trump's 2016 campaign

President Trump said at a campaign rally Tuesday night that Mexico will pay for his long-promised border wall “in the end.”

“In the end, Mexico is going to pay for the wall,” Trump said at the rally in Nashville, Tenn.

“They make all of this money, and they do absolutely nothing to stop people from going through Mexico, from Honduras and all these other countries, the caravan, all of this stuff,” the president said. “They do nothing to help us, nothing.”

“They’re going to pay for the wall, and they’re going to enjoy it,” Trump added.

  The Hill

The pills made me do it

Roseanne Barr is a disgrace.

Barr has since defended herself, writing: “It was 2 in the morning and I was Ambien tweeting,” Barr tweeted. “It was Memorial Day too. I went too far and do not want it defended. It was egregious [and] indefensible.”

“I think Joe Rogan is right about Ambien,” she added, referencing the comedian and UFC host who described the drug as “scary stuff”. “Not giving excuses for what I did (tweeted) but I’ve done weird stuff while on Ambien: cracked eggs on the wall at 2am etc.”

  The Guardian

I don't want to defend it, but it's not my fault.

I'm pretty sure Ambien didn't make Roseanne a racist.  And maybe if you're doing "weird stuff while on Ambien," perhaps you should get off Ambien.

Barr will appear on Rogan’s podcast, The Joe Rogan Experience, this Friday. On Wednesday, Rogan tweeted a link to a Huffington Post story titled The Disturbing Side Effect of Ambien, the No 1 Prescription Sleep Aid.

As far as I know, even through all her apologies, Barr has never admitted to being racist or needing to do anything about that other than not show it publicly.

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

UPDATE:

Somebody really needs to take away his TV time

Yeah, well, you didn't.  You have zero impulse control.  If you'd spend a little time making decisions and let other, capable people guide you, you wouldn't be in the messes you're in.

Too bad you can't seem to fire your way out of this one.

You create these situations for yourself.  Stop whining like a spoiled brat, ferfuxsake.  You're the president of the United States of America.  Act like it.

And, Trey Gowdy, et al., stop excusing this asshole like this is simply normal behavior for a president.  It's not, and we're going down the gutter in a rush along with him because the GOP and the media paper over his insanity and talk about him like he's not an insane, narcissistic, big baby son-of-a-bitch who puts the entire world at risk.

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.