Credit where credit is due

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

It will only get worse

Revenge, retaliation, intimidation are Trump's first order of business after his "acquittal".

Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman — a National Security Council aide who testified during House Democrats’ impeachment hearings — will be informed in the coming days, likely on Friday, by administration officials that he is being reassigned to a position at the Defense Department, taking a key figure from the investigation out of the White House.

[...]

Vindman had already informed senior officials at the NSC that he intended to take an early exit from his assignment and leave his post by the end of the month, according to people familiar with his decision, but Trump is eager to make a symbol of the Army officer soon after the Senate acquitted him of the impeachment charges approved by House Democrats.

[...]

Trump and his allies are considering doing more than just launching verbal fusillades at his perceived enemies over impeachment as the decision regarding Vindman shows. Some of the president’s aides are discussing whether to remove or reassign several administration officials who testified during the impeachment inquiry, according to aides and advisers who like others spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss the plans. Meanwhile, Senate committee chairmen are ramping up their investigation into Hunter Biden’s work in Ukraine while his father, Joe, was vice president.

[...]

Trump has complained about Vindman in private, mocking the way he spoke, wore his uniform and conducted himself during the impeachment inquiry, according to people familiar with his remarks. He has discussed with aides removing other national security officials who testified or cooperated with House Democrats, with Trump calling them disloyal and asking whether he should further cull his national security staff after impeachment.

  WaPo

Abuse of power.

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

UPDATE 2/8:

Vindman's twin brother, who also worked for the NSC, was also removed from his post.

[...]

He was working as a senior lawyer and ethics official for the NSC and did not testify in the impeachment inquiry. The New York Times first reported that Vindman's brother, who's also an Army lieutenant colonel, was fired and removed at the same time.

  NBC

Unfuckingbelievable.  Well, no, believable.

Abuse of power, Republicans?

UPDATE:

Sorry, Susan, there's no way to clean it up

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

UPDATE:

The victory lap is long and positively insane

Trump's ongoing victory lap winded through a National Prayer Breakfast (which shouldn't even be a thing), and it was anything but appropriate in such a setting.

And then he went into another venue.

Trump: "Had I not fired James Comey, who was a disaster by the way, it's possible I wouldn't even be standing here right now."

Trump: "This is not a news conference. It's not a speech. It's not anything...it's a celebration." He says we "went through hell" even though he did nothing wrong. He says he's done some things wrong, "not purposely," in the past, but not here. 

Trump holds up the Washington Post with the Trump Acquitted headline. He says to the First Lady: "You can take that home, honey, maybe we'll frame it." 

Trump: "We first went through Russia Russia Russia. It was all bullshit." Scattered quiet laughter.  "Evil people." "Fake dossiers." "Horrible, dirty cops." "The FISA courts should be ashamed of themselves. Uh, it's a very tough thing."

Trump is falsely claiming that the things Vindman wanted added to the rough transcript were indeed added. They weren't, though Vindman said it wasn't that big a deal and didn't see anything nefarious. 

Trump is mocking Democratic lawmakers who dropped out of the presidential primary, such as Gillibrand. 

Trump says of his performance at the Prayer Breakfast this morning: "That was so good it might wipe this out." He says that Pelosi was sitting nearby, and he said things a lot of people wouldn't have said about her, but "I meant every word." 

Trump says Chuck Grassley has a voice that can scare people.  Trump falsely claims James Comey admitted to being a leaker in a committee exchange with Chuck Grassley. Comey *flatly denied* being a leaker in that exchange.

Trump is doing the thing in which, as he gives shout-outs to Republican legislators, he muses at great length about their personalities and behavior. 

Trump says he doesn't think Pelosi prays for him. In fact, he says, "I doubt she prays at all." 

Trump falsely claims he "won 197 to nothing" in House impeachment votes. He *lost* all those votes. He had unanimous support from Republicans at levels around 197 votes. So he's just writing the Democratic votes out of history. 

Trump says there were lots of people on his Zelensky call, including "apprentii." That is how the former host of The Apprentice refers to apprentices. 

"Boy, my kids could make a fortune" if they behaved like Hunter Biden, Trump says, omitting the fact that his kids are currently involved in international business dealings. 

Trump spawn international business ties.

Trump repeats his usual false claim about European countries including Germany not paying money to Ukraine. European countries have spent billions since Russia's invasion in 2014. The EU has been the largest contributor, though the US has provided more military-specific aid. 

Trump complimented Georgia Sen. Kelly Loeffler for being "downright nasty and mean" in defending him. 

The cruelty is the point, as is so often said about Trump and his cabal.

Trump is still on the portion of the speech where he reads out people's names.

Trump notes that he overwhelmingly won the Republican race in Iowa. He then notes that there are people running against him, one a former governor, Bill Weld. He adds: "I guess they consider them non-people." 

Trump touts Jim Jordan as an NCAA wrestling champion. He explains that the NCAA is "the big deal," as it means "in ALL of college."  Trump muses about Rep. Jim Jordan never wearing a jacket. He says Jordan is "obviously very proud of his body." He then talks about Jordan's ears.

Trump says Mark Meadows is someone who became very friendly with, he doesn't know why, although he likes Meadows' wife better than him, since she always supported Trump, including by going on a women-for-Trump tour after the Access Hollywood tape release, while Meadows didn't. 

Trump said he liked Rep. Debbie Lesko's name, and her face, and that's why he picked her to be on his impeachment team. 

I know.

Trump calls Rep. Devin Nunes "the most legitimate human being." Trump calls another person, Rep. John Ratcliffe, "central casting." He says "if we're doing a remake of Perry Mason," he would pick Ratcliffe to play the role.

Trump of Rep. Steve Scalise: "He got whacked." He then vividly recounts Scalife's wife's devastation after Scalise was shot. He says she was "a total mess." He says other wives wouldn't have been that upset.

I know.

Trump is recounting the shooting of Steve Scalise in great detail. He says the shooter was a "whack job." He says Scalise was shot with "a bullet that rips you apart." He does a "boom, boom, boom" with a gun-shooting hand gesture as he describes the response from armed security.

I know.

Trump is now talking about former Yankee Bobby Richardson, and his great range at second base, compared to the limited range Steve Scalise had after he was shot. Trump describes the hard-hit ground ball Steve Scalise managed to field after he was shot as...a "shot."

As was perhaps predictable, this is one of the wildest speeches of Trump's presidency -- and we haven't gotten past the part where he reads people's names and talks about them. 

Lisa Page and Peter Strzok. "Two lowlives."  Trump says Strzok and Page "are the crookedest" people. Trump says Bob Mueller looked like a good G-man but didn't have things other than looks. He calls FBI leaders, I think, "the top scum." He says 99% of the FBI supports him, the issue was just "top scum."

Trump has invited supporters in the crowd to stand up and say something supportive of him. 

I know.

Trump says the only Republican who voted against him was "a guy that can't stand the fact that he ran one of the worst campaigns in the history of the presidency." 

Trump: "I want to apologize to my family for having them have to go through a phony, rotten deal by some very evil and sick people."  "And that includes Barron. That includes Barron. Who's up there as a young boy."

Trump says America is respected again. He has finished.

And, I'll wager, even the Republicans are glad.

What's this with naming all these people and saying something about them?   Reminds me of Molly Ivins saying even when she wrote unflattering or negative things about the bubbas in Texas politics, when she'd see them, they'd say, "Baby, you put my name in your paper!"

Is that the extent of the threat he made?  "So many people have been hurt, and we can't let that go on."  Or is there more?  Perhaps he was referring to the Grassley/Graham investigation into Hunter Biden that was announced as soon as the impeachment trial was over?  Other investigations?

Aaron Rupar's video clips make me think Daniel Dale cleaned it up quite a bit.

For instance...

And, what is going on here....

UPDATE:

UPDATE:

Perhaps it's the "can't look away" syndrome.  On the other hand, it's perhaps important that people see for themselves just how batshit crazy this man is.

UPDATE:

The main event came [...] , in the East Room of the White House, where the president* put on a performance that should have had copies of the 25th Amendment inscribed on tablets of gold falling from the sky around him.

His trolley went around the bend and off the tracks. His sanity had expired and met its maker. [...] But, alas, this is not yet an ex-administration*, and it still derives its only energy from the incredibly toxic stew of vengeful rage and inflamed victimhood that is the only sign of sentient life in the brain of its president*

[...]

And the Republicans, all of them, sitting there like brain-dead fish all schooled in one spot, applauding on cue, accepting the president*’s sourball compliments as though they were being blessed from Above.

[...]

I have resisted using the word “cult” to describe where the Republican party is at right now because I think it absolves too many of the people that made something like Trumpism inevitable. But, Lord above, we’re looking at a battalion of drill-thralls now, with no minds of their own and no souls to speak of.

  Charles P Pierce

The tallest blade of grass gets cut by the scythe*

Former Republican Rick Wilson explained that [...] Trump has become a parasite that [...] “ate the Republican Party from the inside out. And the shell that still remains, everything has to be years here, it has to be reset because it’s all about Donald now.”

He explained that there are now two groups of Republican senators: the “coward caucus” who privately rails against Trump and hate him. Then there are the “Trumpers” who think they can parlay Trump’s support into their own presidency someday.

[MSNBC interviewer Lawrence] O’Donnell noted that if the GOP collapses after Trump, it could mean Romney rises from the ashes.

“Well, if it collapses after Trump — they’ve lost 650 seats across the country since Donald Trump took office at various levels of government,” said Wilson. “So the collapse is underway, and you know, I think there will be principled Republicans at the end of the day, there won’t be a lot. I joke sometimes you could sit us around a Waffle House table. But people today watched Mitt Romney display political courage.”

Wilson said that Romney and Sen. Doug Jones (D-AL) displayed huge political courage. Jones is up for reelection after winning Jeff Sessions’ Senate seat when Trump appointed him to the Justice Department. Trump then fired Sessions and spent the better part of a year attacking him. Now Sessions is trying to get his seat back.

“It’s so dangerous to the Trump people that instead of taking their victory lap today, what have they done? The line-up on that other network tonight was basically about ‘they hate Mitt Romney,'” Wilson continued. “It was the screaming fest about ‘Romney, the traitor,’ and all this. It really tells you what happens when these Republicans hear a message like [Romney's speech]. They feel pain. It’s their souls trying to re-enter their bodies."

  Raw Story

*Old Russian proverb (of late used by Senator Sherrod Brown).

Deconstructing America

Wednesday’s vote—anticipated with near-perfect precision since the opening hours of the Ukraine scandal in September—has yielded a new indictment: The partisan divisions that saved Trump are an expression of deeper and malignant trends that are a threat to constitutional democracy.

[...]

[Mitt[] Romney in his floor speech said his fellow Republicans were casting different votes in good faith. That’s a generous appraisal. It is impossible to believe that Senate Republicans would think it would be fine if President Hillary Clinton had linked military aid to her domestic political needs, or even that they would be disturbed by this but think impeachment is excessive.

[...]

But one paradox of the past 30 years is that the various legal and political instruments to investigate, expose, and try to punish misbehavior of people in power have not made it harder to get away with questionable behavior. They have made it easier.

Bill Clinton was investigated for years over obscure business dealings in the Whitewater affair that took place a decade before he came to power. His decision to replace the White House travel office was a controversy that echoed for his first term.

[...]

Twenty years later, it is worth recalling the matters that have only briefly dented headlines during the Trump years, or in some cases barely dented them at all.

Recall that Trump is the first president in the modern era to not release his taxes; he is facing inquiries over his Inaugural Committee’s overseas contributions and its contracts at his hotels and his personal foundation’s unfulfilled pledges of donations to worthy causes. He has seen the criminal convictions of his campaign manager, his first national security adviser and his personal lawyer. He has confronted allegations of self-dealing or misuse of taxpayer funds among officials at his health department, EPA, and Transportation Department, among others.

These and other matters briefly cause an uproar, or not, then fade from consciousness of the opposition party, of the news media, of the public.

This inability to give sustained focus on ethical matters that an earlier generation would have commanded national attention for months or years is not a structural challenge of the Constitution. Nor it is a thwarting of democracy. It is the expression of a democracy that has allowed its muscles of accountability to atrophy.

[...]

[The] fundamental problem of modern political culture is the erosion of accountability. Politicians have shown repeatedly the ability to escape consequences by reframing almost any controversy away from the particulars of misbehavior to the familiar question: Which side are you on, mine or my enemies?

[...]

In the Trump-Ukraine matter, both the partisan House vote to impeach and the partisan Senate vote to acquit were, in broad terms, a faithful reflection of popular will.

It is the nature of popular will—bitterly cleaved, indifferent to facts except as they can be employed as weapon or shield—that is the challenge.

[...]

The 48 senators who voted to convict (lone Republican Mitt Romney, plus all Democrats and socialist Bernie Sanders and independent Angus King) represent states with 171.4 million Americans.

The 52 Republicans who voted to acquit represent states with 156 million Americans.

[...]

Liberal frustration is understandable. The last two Republican presidents won first terms after losing the popular vote. The intentional dilution of pure democracy in the Senate—Wyoming’s 600,000 people get two senators; so do California’s 40 million—is growing starker each year.

[...]

David Birdsell, dean of the school of public and international affairs at Baruch College in New York, has done research projecting that in 20 years, 70 percent of Americans will live in the 15 largest states, meaning that 30 percent of Americans will be represented by 70 senators.

[...]

These structural distortions may well be a long-term problem for constitutional democracy.

[...]

A POLITICO/Morning Consult poll last week found 50 percent approval for removing Trump from office, and 43 percent disapproval. A composite of polls by the FiveThirtyEight website found that 84 percent of Democrats, 42 percent of independents, and nine percent of Republicans wanted Trump removed from office. This averaged out just under 48 percent of all Americans—by coincidence the very number of senators voting to remove.

  Politico

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

It will only get worse

President Donald Trump immediately attacked his political rivals at the National Prayer Breakfast, just hours after his acquittal in the Senate impeachment trial — charging that they had inappropriately invoked "their faith as justification" for calls to remove him from office.

  Politico

Irony is still dead.

"As everybody knows, my family, our great country and your president have been put through a terrible ordeal by some very dishonest and corrupt people," Trump said at the outset of his speech.

The politics of grievance.

"They have done everything possible to destroy us, and by so doing, very badly hurt our nation. They know what they are doing is wrong, but they put themselves far ahead of our great country."

[...]

"I don't like people who use their faith as justification for doing what they know is wrong," Trump added. "Nor do I like people who say, 'I pray for you' when they know that that's not so. So many people have been hurt, and we can't let that go on. And I'll be discussing that a little bit later at the White House."

That sounds like a threat.

UPDATE:

Who wore it better?

Trump's choice of papers was intended to go with that smirk.

UPDATE:  Looks like he held up two papers.

At the National Prayer Breakfast.  (Which souldn't even be a thing.)

There's no holding him back now

FFS, he's going after Mitt Romney, the one Republican who had the cojones to do the right thing and vote to remove Trump from office, because of course he is.

During an interview with Fox News Channel host Chris Wallace that aired shortly after his Senate floor speech, Romney referred to his 2012 White House defeat, describing it as the worst thing that’s happened to him politically.

“I’ve got broad-enough shoulders to weather personal changes in my career, political or otherwise,” he told Wallace. “But what I don’t have is the capacity to ignore my conscience.”

[...]

“I am sure to hear abuse from the President and his supporters,” Romney said in his floor speech announcing his vote. “Does anyone seriously believe I would consent to these consequences other than from an inescapable conviction that my oath before God demanded it of me?”

[...]

“It’s the hardest thing to do in the world — to stand up to your party, your donors, your friends — to do what is right,” [Democrat Chris] Murphy said. “We all wonder if we would do the same thing. … There is still honor in this place.”

But not much.

House Intelligence Committee Chairman and lead House impeachment manager Rep. Adam B. Schiff (D-Calif.) called Sen. Mitt Romney (R-Utah) an “inspiration” Wednesday for breaking with his party to vote to convict President Trump on the charge of abuse of power, saying his speech explaining that vote will “change history.”

“I mentioned on the floor that even a single vote can change history and I think his vote just did,” Schiff said in a brief interview Wednesday. “For a lot of us, when we face difficult votes in the future, we’ll think back to the courage that he displayed, how he put country over party.”

  WaPo

Kudos to Mitt Romney.

Romney voted to acquit Trump on the obstruction of Congress charge.

Now THAT I don't understand.

But moderate Democrats all voted to convict Trump on both counts, and Schiff congratulated them for “courage” in taking that vote too.

Good. There was some question about that happening.

Several Trump administration officials, including Vice President Pence and White House counselor Kellyanne Conway, had predicted earlier Wednesday that Trump would be acquitted on a bipartisan vote.

But that prediction did not come true: Republicans did not succeed in persuading any Democrats to cross the aisle in voting for acquittal on either charge.

[...]

In a brief break before the trial formally began, Manchin’s Democratic colleagues came over to him in the back of the chamber, hugging him, patting him on the back — finally aware that he would join them in a united caucus vote to remove Trump from office.

[...]

“I take no pleasure in these votes, and am saddened this is the legacy we leave our children and grandchildren,” Manchin said. “I have always wanted this president, and every president to succeed, but I deeply love our country and must do what I think is best for the nation.”

[...]

“There are a number or Democratic senators that showed very similar courage, and that shouldn’t be overlooked either,” Schiff said. “There were some real profiles in courage here, which give me a lot of optimism. So I leave this optimistic about the future.”

Schiff would not, however, say if the future includes a subpoena for former national security adviser John Bolton. “We’ve made no decisions about Bolton or other things,” he insisted.

They better not drop it. They better keep digging and exposing, because the rest of this year is going to be pure hell with Trump unleashed and once again calling himself completely exonerated.

Pelosi gave a scathing assessment of the Senate’s vote to acquit Trump, who she called a “rogue president.”

The Founders, she said, “never imagined that they would at the same time have a rogue leader in the Senate who would cowardly abandon his duty to uphold the Constitution.” — ripping Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.)

She maintained, as she has previously, that the acquittal is illegitmate because the trial did not have “the most basic elements of a fair judicial process.”

Pelosi accused the GOP of “betrayal of the Constitution” and said because of that Trump “remains an ongoing threat to American democracy.”

He'll be absolutely unbearable now.

And what the fuck is THIS?....

He'll be getting a cease and desist from Nazareth.

And, WTF, Bob Dole?!

Jesus, I thought the man was dead.  He's obviously senile.

Shortly after the Senate voted to acquit Trump, GOP Sens. Charles E. Grassley (Iowa) and Ron Johnson (Wis.) announced they would be probing Hunter Biden — just as Trump had wanted Ukraine to do.

[...]

They are seeking from the Secret Service any time Hunter Biden traveled with protective security detail during the time his father was vice president and whether he flew on government planes.

  WaPo

While the Trump spawn go everywhere with secret service details.

A number of influential GOP figures, including Donald Trump Jr., have pressed Senate Republicans to remove Romney from their party’s ranks in the chamber.

But McConnell was notably restrained in his criticism of his Utah colleague and declined to say whether he thinks Romney should be expelled.

Unbelievable. You're not allowed to have your own convictions and your own vote if you're a Repubican?

Actually, I don't think Mitch would dare. That would surely cost the party votes in November. Republican voters (aside from Trumpalos) are not such cowards and sycophants as the Republican Congressfolk.

[Justice] Roberts spoke briefly at the conclusion of the trial, offering senators his “sincere good wishes as we carry out our common commitment to the Constitution.”

It's obviously not common at all.

For what it's worth...

He'll pay for it.  But he'll always have his self-respect and, like Barbara Lee, who was the lone vote against invading Iraq, he'll eventually be the one with the laudits.

And Old Mitch is taking his shots.

And this one thinks he can be president in 2024 (if Daddy agrees to leave after two terms):

Do justice: Convict

Duog Jones was considered a possible defection from the Democrats' position

Susan Collins gets her turn

It was a stupid remark for her to make in the first place.

UPDATE:

UPDATE:

Susan Collins is full of shit

Again?  They're still doing it.  The only thing that will make them stop is when Biden is no longer in the running.  And then they'll be well into investigating whoever gets the Democratic nomination.

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

UPDATE:

He'll be more cautious about it?!?

UPDATE:  Annnnnd....like clockwork....



UPDATE:

But who cares?

Another Republican whos says Trump abused the power of his office but who won't do anything to hold him accountable for it.

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