Thursday, March 14, 2024

I Was About To Ask…

... if anyone had heard from Mike Lindell today.

I thought I was surprised, but then I thought: “No, I’m not.” It seems inevitable, doesn’t it?

And he’s back to claiming he’s going to get this before the Supreme Court. Wasn’t that too dangerous before? Or is that what the money is for? To start a lawsuit?

Or reimburse his business losses.

It’s all about the grift, isn’t it?
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🗡️

Funny, that’s not what Bragg said: In case the Klasfeld tweet embedded there isn’t clear: Which means this bears repeating: Besides, yes, ordinary people aren’t paying attention to this (the Lovely Wife struggles to keep all the cases straight). Not now. But come November, when these cases are still pending and being argued and being set on dockets for trial, Trump will find out delay is a two-edged sword.🗡️ 

Besides, losing is losing.
And as for the New York case: Don’t jump to conclusions; especially based on what you’re reading. It’s always more complicated. (Bragg is leaving the door open for this. The judge controls the docket. Being reasonable is always the best policy. The judge could well decide his docket won’t brook the delay, and Trump’s dilatory action will not be reviewed favorably on appeal. Wait and see.)
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😎

I think that’s the right analysis, except I don’t think a conviction is a silver bullet.

If Trump goes into November dragging the chains of three criminal cases and one conviction (New York goes to trial the first day of Holy Week), another conviction won’t be the one that put the dog down. I think most people will be reluctant to elect a president just dragging so much legal baggage.

Besides, the odds he gets the bond for the fraud case are nil. Donations to the RNC are going to dry up (those aren’t made by old people unwittingly donating $10 a month automatically). Laura Trump has no connections to the fat cats who write those checks. Trump is going to find that cupboard bare, and the legal bills mounting. Even as Letitia James starts taking buildings and Trump needs money for the campaign.

Trump is going to die the death of 1000 cuts. His business empire fails, his legal cases fail. He could be in trial in October or November. Even without a conviction, such cases would draw enormous attention. Delay is only going to make that more likely. And cost him money he doesn’t have, and that he needs for his only real hope of survival: winning the election.
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Lawyering On Twitter

ew is not a lawyer, and Bower is in the peanut gallery. Which does not exempt Willis from criticism, but the judge gave Georgia six months to correct this error:,I.e., to file a superseding indictment.

Everybody loves to say “You shoulda known better!” But in the end, the only opinion that counts is that of the judge of the case. When the judge decides against you, “you shoulda known better!” When the judge agrees with you: you’re just doing your job. Whaddya want, a cookie?

Overall, this is a hiccup. It’s also how complicated legal cases are tried before trial, and why such cases take so long to get to trial. This is not “delay,” it’s due process (analysis void in SDF because Loose Cannon is a biased idiot looking for a way to exonerate Trump. She’s going to spend days of court time on motions to dismiss that barely deserve hearing. (The argument that the Espionage Act is too vague should be tossed out on precedent alone. In 100 years, how many times do you think that issue has been adjudicated?) Trump is going to show up and fall asleep because he doesn’t hear his name mentioned enough.). If you’re still whinging about “delay,” you’re still expecting the courts to be the deus ex machina of democracy. And when have they ever done that?
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Of Lawfare And Lies

My daughter had a better command of English syntax when she was three years old. As the chyron says, he has a hearing in motions to dismiss in Florida coming up. He must imagine this helps him. "Let be be finale of seem/The only emperor is the emporor of ice cream.”🍦 Which is what I expect to see running soon out of Trump’s ears. It’s certainly what’s between them. I’m sure there are several octogenarian Senators nodding sagely when they hear this. 🤦🏻‍♂️ He at least shouldn’t be any closer to the White House than a federal jail cell. So, more and bigger lies? Dear Oliver Stone: Lawfare, you say?
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Nikki Haley Is Overperforming

All the talk of Dems “over performing “ is based on one simple fact: the polls are wrong.

But the polls cannot possibly be wrong (they never are!), so they can never be doubted. So: Dems are over performing. They are exceeding expectations. Expectations set by: polls. Which can never mean the polls are wrong. It can only mean that the Democrats are doing too well.
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Wednesday, March 13, 2024

In The Movies…

The innocent but convicted murderer is being strapped into the electric chair just as the incontrovertible evidence of his innocence: DNA, and a confession, and video of the crime, are presented to the court, which declares the convict innocent just as the switch is about to be thrown. And his girl throws her arms around his neck, in the chair, as the music swells and the credits roll.

Needless to say, real life is not like that. At some point, even in death penalty cases, the courts think enough is enough, and the appeals are done. It’s too late for any new appeals evidence (which is one of the problems with capital punishment). 

Mike Lindell’s fundamental problem is that he confuses the movies with real life. Presenting “evidence” on the steps of the Supreme Court building, or on-line tomorrow, the effect is the same: because unless it’s presented in a court of competent jurisdiction under applicable rules of evidence in a properly brought proceeding, it’s not evidence. And the Supreme Court can’t vote to overturn the 2020 election for the simplest reason that the law doesn’t work that way. There’s no case before it, and no case can be brought. It’s too late for any new evidence.

Besides, what happened to the lawyers who told Lindell this was “too dangerous”? Are the steps of the Supreme Court building inherently dangerous on Fridays?
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“And Mexico Is Going To Pay For It!”

I know Ron is right about US energy production. But sometimes I like reducing the issue to a bumper sticker.
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So, Officeholders Should Be Above The Law?

He said he has been thinking a lot about "lawfare" as he has recently completed a film about Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva.
Lula, as he is widely known, was imprisoned in 2018 on corruption and money-laundering charges after several years in power.
The charges were overthrown after an investigation found the judge was biased, and Lula was re-elected president last year.
So…the system worked. And the problem is?

If Stone was a random guy on the street, nobody would give a shit what he said.
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🚀

Without resorting to Google, NASA stopped blowing up rockets very early in. I say that, but their first two manned programs (Mercury and Gemini) used missile boosters (Redstone and Titan.  IIRC, Mercury used two different boosters. Can’t remember the name of the other one. I used to know this stuff.🫤). Saturn 1 and then 5 were the first built specifically to lift the heavy payloads for travel to the moon and back. (It was it 1-B? I used to know these things…)

Don’t remember any rockets blowing up at Canaveral/Kennedy. I do remember a lot of sci-fi in my childhood about free enterprise taking over space travel (Kubrick’s Pan Am shuttle to the space station was not . outlier). Turns out it’s too complicated and expensive for capitalism. Governments can wait until they have it right. Capitalism wants an ROI that R & D can’t always provide quickly enough. Could be some things are too hard for private industry to handle.

Certainly space travel is dangerous, from launch to return, and everything in between. Space is inimical to human life, no matter what “Star Trek” told you. Even government blew up rockets until they figured it out. What’s interesting to me is that private interests seem to be reinventing the wheel. And struggling with the concept.


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When Everything Is Authoritarianism…

Is anything authoritarianism?
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Leadership Begins At Home

Is she volunteering her services? C’mon, lead by example!
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Tuesday, March 12, 2024

Why This Is Bad News For Joe Biden

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Trump’s TeeVee Lawyers Suck, Too

This is also an object lesson in opining on a lawsuit you aren’t involved in. How long until she urges Trump to sue because she’s been law shamed?
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So Hungry

 She really wants that VP slot. It’s obvious even to me.

“But when I got there, the first thing he does is confront me about my own rape that happened at the age of 16, 30 years ago," Mace explained. "And we coined it rape-shaming, right? He raped-shamed me this Sunday on This Week." 
Mace claimed Stephanopoulos had falsely stated Trump was found to have raped Carroll. 
"Donald Trump has not been convicted of rape, not in a criminal court, not in a civil case," she said. "And so that's not what that judgment was about either." 
"And I think that he opened himself and ABC News and ABC This Week up to huge liabilities," Mace added. "And if I were Donald Trump, I'd be suing him." 
Carroll had claimed she was raped by Trump, but a jury in her civil trial found him liable of sexual abuse. However, a judge in the second defamation trial brought by Carroll said, "Mr. Trump in fact did ‘rape’ Ms Carroll as that term commonly is used and understood in contexts outside of the New York penal law.”
Free legal advice is worth what you pay for it. And “let’s you and him fight” is always curious advice, especially when you keep claiming you were the one who was shamed.

I can’t tell if this was always her endgame, or if she discovered it when crying “rape shame!” became too much like crying “Wolf!” for the fourth time.

I knew she was hungry. I didn’t know she was this hungry.
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Best Evidence Rule

Will it happen is one question. Procedure rules, as I’ve said. What will happen, is another question. So, lawyers will have to testify. That voids attorney-client privilege. The defense alone won’t be allowed without evidence, and I don’t see how that evidence doesn’t include Trump’s testimony. You can’t claim reliance without evidence you actually relied. “Trust him” and “Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, does my client look like he knows the law?” are not enough.

Yes, they can try to assert the defense without putting Trump on the stand. First, whether they can at all depends on NY rules. If they can, it’s hard to see how they can do it without Trump in the stand.

And if that happens, it’s likely the jury will ask if they can bury Trump under the jail.

At the outset, we emphasize that there is a marked difference between the commonly referred to 'advice-of-counsel' defense; and the defense that President Trump expects to raise at trial," the attorneys write. 
"While President Trump intends to elicit evidence concerning the presence, involvement and advice of lawyers in relevant events giving rise to the charges in the Indictment, he does not intend to assert a formal advice-of-counsel defense." 
Such a defense would require Trump to prove he told his lawyers everything, sought and received advice that his actions were legal, and relied on their advice "in good faith," the lawyers write. 
Because this will not be a formal defense, the attorneys argue they are allowed to skip the requirement that they give prosecutors the basic details. 
"Accordingly, there is no privilege waiver requiring production of communications protected by the attorney-client privilege," the lawyers write, "and there is no basis for the People to demand a preview of our defenses at trial."
Sounds like they want to be “a little bit pregnant” to me, and raise the defense without raising it or putting Trump on the stand. Squid ink, in other words. I’m all for defendants forcing the prosecution to prove their case beyond a reasonable doubt, but this sounds like a “nudge nudge, wink wink, know what I mean?” defense.

I’m not sure the court should even allow it.
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“Nothing Is Revealed”—Bob Dylan

Every time I tuned in, it was people spouting talking points. All around. If they got to the transcripts, it was still so inside baseball it won’t leave even a ripple.

The SOTU was much more consequential. And it will be forgotten if something comes along to erase it 

The next big story is still the criminal trial in Manhattan at the beginning of Holy Week.
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Monday, March 11, 2024

Is That Your Final Answer?

Fair enough; here’s the rest of Trump’s answer, per the transcript:
"There’s tremendous amounts of things and numbers of things you can do. So I don’t necessarily agree with the statement. I know that they’re going to end up weakening social security because the country is weak. And let’s take a look at outside of the stock market, are, we’re going through hell. People are going through hell. If they have and I believe the number is 50%. They say 32 and 33%. I believe we have a cumulative inflation of over 50%, that means people are, you know, they have to make more than 50% more over a fairly short period of time to stay up. They’ve gotten routed. The middle class in our country has been routed and the middle class largely built our country and they have been treated very, very badly with policy.”
So, something about “tremendous amounts and numbers of things” Can he name three? Even one? Can he feign coherence? Was he finished? No:
TRUMP: “So first of all, there is a lot you can do in terms of entitlements in terms of cutting and in terms of also the theft and the bad management of entitlements, tremendous bad management of entitlements.” "There’s tremendous amounts of things and numbers of things you can do. So I don’t necessarily agree with the statement. I know that they’re going to end up weakening social security because the country is weak. And let’s take a look at outside of the stock market, are, we’re going through hell. People are going through hell. If they have and I believe the number is 50%. They say 32 and 33%. I believe we have a cumulative inflation of over 50%, that means people are, you know, they have to make more than 50% more over a fairly short period of time to stay up. They’ve gotten routed. The middle class in our country has been routed and the middle class largely built our country and they have been treated very, very badly with policy.”
Yes, that’s the complete answer you asked for. Happy now? And the “incomplete” answer to the question was here: I think you should quit while you’re ahead.
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Those Appeals Won’t Pay For Themselves

WWJoeBidenDo? Or should JBD? Like this? Sunday was yesterday, right? So, what was the question again? And how many people are on Twitter following this, anyway?

In other news, Trump’s lawyers suck.
  There are procedural reasons why this is way too little, way too late.
In his letter, dated March 8, Merchan notes the deadline for motions in limine — or those seeking to ban specific evidence or arguments from being presented in court — had passed on Feb. 22. 
"Defendant does not explain the reason for the late filing," Merchan writes, "a mere two and a half weeks before jury selection is set to begin." 
He gives Bragg's office until March 13 to respond. 
Merchan then demands both sides ask permission before filing any more pretrial motions and those requests be no longer than a single page.
Again, this is how trials are conducted . Not by throwing shit at the wall. I still don’t think Trump’s lawyers are any good, or are going to reverse Trump’s losing streak.

And in other legal news:
You have to assume Trump’s lawyers are at least that competent. Well, so long as Habba isn’t cross-examining this witness. One can understand why Trump doesn’t want this case tried before the election, and it’s not just so he can pardon himself. Yeah, this is not going to end the way Trump thinks it will. Again: Trump can’t fund a Presidential campaign and four criminal cases/trials (there’s nothing says he can’t be in criminal court on the first Tuesday in November) and three appeals and a half-billion dollar appeal bond, making it four appeals. All while his company goes out of business waiting for that appeal to be heard and resolved. Not the flex he thinks it is. ETTReallyDoesD. 😎
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🦂 🧠

If you met this man at a bar, you’d move to the other end:
TRUMP: “When I was president, I was doing a job, we’re going to start to pay off debt. We were drill baby drill. We were producing oil but we were going at a much higher level oil and gas. We were doing, you know, we were third when I started and when they ended we were one by a longshot and we were very close, we’re energy independence, we’re very close to becoming energy dominant Joe, we’re gonna be dominant so dominant, like double what Saudi Arabia and Russia were doing. And we were on that path. We were gonna be paying down debt. We were doing, we were doing a lot of things and then we got hit with Covid. We did a fantastic job with Covid. But nobody, nobody wins with Covid. I guess China found that out because they also really got hit very hard also, but nobody wins with Covid. And so we had to get to we had to do other things. We had to help." 
"You know, if I didn’t do the expenditures that we didn’t do the kinds of things we did for the economy, we would add in 1929 type depression. And I had to say out in front of it, and we did we did a great job on that and we did with all of the things we’re coming up with Regeneron doing so much else, getting all because you know we had empty when I came in, we had empty, I call them empty cupboards. We had empty shelves, we didn’t have equipment, we didn’t have the gowns, we didn’t have the ventilators. We didn’t have anything." 
"This country wasn’t prepared for a thing like that. And I’m not even blaming anybody in that. Because, you know, when when it came, nobody thought the pandemic would ever happen again. It sounds like an ancient’s problem, not a problem that you’d have you know at that time, you know, in modern, very modern age. It was like an ancient thing. We you know, who, who would ever show I’m not blaming anybody, but we had empty cupboards, and I got them stocked and I got them stocked fast. And we did a great job with it. Never got credit. I got credit for the greatest economy. I got credit for foreign policy. I got credit for knocking out ISIS and not going into wars. But we beat ISIS, but I never got the credit for having done a great job with that.”
You don’t have to fact check every sentence or remember the days of Covid in the US or even know that Trump shut down the very agency that would have warned us of Covid before it reached us, to know this is sheer gibberish and gobbledygook. You’d expect an x-ray of this man’s head would show a rat’s nest sooner than show the shadow of grey matter.

And this is the man trying to answer a question in an interview. Imagine what he’s going to do in a debate, especially after sundown. 

In the same interview, responding to a question about how he’s changed positions on Social Security and Medicare:
TRUMP: “So first of all, there is a lot you can do in terms of entitlements in terms of cutting and in terms of also the theft and the bad management of entitlements, tremendous bad management of entitlements.” 
"There’s tremendous amounts of things and numbers of things you can do. So I don’t necessarily agree with the statement. I know that they’re going to end up weakening social security because the country is weak. And let’s take a look at outside of the stock market, are, we’re going through hell. People are going through hell. If they have and I believe the number is 50%. They say 32 and 33%. I believe we have a cumulative inflation of over 50%, that means people are, you know, they have to make more than 50% more over a fairly short period of time to stay up. They’ve gotten routed. The middle class in our country has been routed and the middle class largely built our country and they have been treated very, very badly with policy.”
Ideas are scorpions 🦂 in his brain, fighting for supremacy. Again, you don’t have to rebut every sentence he speaks, because I defy you to make sense of them, separately or cumulatively.

The good news is, even the Grey Lady is beginning to pay attention:
The CNBC interview is the one these quotes are from.

May you live in interesting times.
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“Originalism” RIP 🪦

I don’t always agree with MJS, though I think I agree with him more than Luttig. Although I don’t agree with him as often as I do rusty pickup. 🛻  Which is only to say, this is an interesting conversation: Especially when he uses the example of Shelby County (when CJ Roberts started gutting the VRA). Minds alike, and all that.

George Conway thinks the entire bench was afraid of handing down Son of Bush v Gore.

But that is all just prelude to this, which is much more interesting:

At the core, all important supreme court decisions are political. If the language or application of the law was clear the case would never make it to the court. Even something that appears simple, like "Congress shall make no law... abridging the freedom of speech" is immediately unclear when it intersects with the reality of the limits thereof. Does it include threatening speech? Are the arts speech? And so on. There are no balls and strikes here, it is ultimately a political decision on the breadth and limits. Traditionally the court tried to limit the consequences by only ruling on the facts in front of them, since there could be unintended consequences and no one could fully foresee how a ruling would impact similar but not identical situations. The court took other steps to limit the political decision making by limiting it's review to actual controversies for example.

The current court is in contrast to earlier courts, even the courts it despises like the Warren court, a cascade of failures. Putting aside the political content of its decisions (which I find generally abhorrent), it continues to find new depths of failure. I've commented before that the very low review of cases is an abdication of a basic function of any supreme court, providing guidance and clarity to the law that can then be applied by the legal community to guide and counsel clients. The court has added to that failure a number of others. I was struck while listening to the oral arguments for the EPA case on reducing ozone across states how much the current court has degraded the entire legal process. The case was lifted straight from the district court to the supreme court. The justification was the urgency of the case. When the solicitor general of Ohio was presenting, one of the liberal judges was asking about the justification for the case even being at the court. When the urgency was mentioned, the justice asked if the plaintiff had requested expedited review from the lower court. The answer was no. Stunning. As the justice then pointed out, the supreme court was acting as the court of first instance. There had been no fact finding, no hearing of witnesses, no entry of exhibits. There were literally no facts on which to decide the case. The solicitors arguments were completely conclusionary. The EPA decision was bad because it was bad, and it would cause harm. How much harm? When would the harm occur? (The supposed harm was at some unspecified future date). There hadn't been any hearing to create a basis for these statements. As it turned out, it didn't matter. The conservative majority immediately started referring to these harmful decisions of the EPA. The plaintiffs didn't need to present a reasonable argument or recitation of facts because they knew the conservative majority didn't need one. They already agreed on the outcome, the only need was to get the case in front of the court in any manner. The conclusion of court observers is the plaintiffs will win over the EPA.

This court has made the entire process political. What used to be reasonably objective is now political. Standing is political. In the student load case the state was given standing to represent a separate corporate entity that didn't want to bring the case, and that entity would only be impacted under a very strange set of circumstances that the entity itself would have to invoke. For this court that was sufficient whereas in previous courts the case wouldn't have been heard even at the district court. Currently there is the abortion pill case, where doctors have standing because they might suffer "psychic harm" by treating patients that took the pills and have regrets. Prior courts would have found this laughable. Case and controversy is political. The prayer at the football game case was fabricated, the coach was never at risk for job loss for praying. In 603 Creative, the website designer (who never created a website) was never asked to host a gay wedding. (Which conveniently meant that there wasn't a party on the other side to argue they had suffered discrimination by the web designer. The court only wanted one side to be sympathetic.) Even facts are political, the court making up factual strawmen to which they then respond with the decisions they desire to issue (603 Creative, the prayer case and many more).

The consequence of playing so fast and loose with all the previous requirements to bring a case to the court has resulted in the court playing equally loose with the opinions. The most recent 14th amendment case has been rightly savaged for inconsistencies, lack of any academic rigor, and conflict with other decisions. It's not the only case. The broad second amendment case knocking down the NY gun permit system was based on reasoning that historically there were no restrictions on guns at the time of the second amendment. That rational probably sounded great in a some Federalist Society presentation, but it started to look ridiculous this term when the same reasoning would clearly allow domestic violence perpetrators to keep their weapons. Since even the idea of domestic violence didn't exist at that time, there is certainly no basis to take away firearms from those people. It's going to be hard to sell the public on the importance of arming domestic abusers to kill their families and spouses, while systematically stripping rights from women, minorities and the LGBTQ community. I can't decide if the ever increasing use of the shadow docket is better or worse. Worse, because we get precedential decisions that have no justification at all, leaving conservative lower courts to push the limits of these cases unbounded by a written opinion. Better perhaps because you can at least those cases are limited to their facts, where as the opinions being generated are so poor they lead to even worse decisions down the road, like arming domestic abusers.

The court further makes everything political by blatantly engaging in bias. Accepting lavish gifts (Thomas and Alito), hob-knobbing with the ultra-wealthy and powerful (all of the conservatives), family members reaping large rewards based on connections to the justices (Roberts' wife earning $10M placing lawyers at firms that appear before the court, Ginny Thomas, etc.). Roberts touted his ethics rules, and then promptly violated them along with the other conservative justices by failing to explain why they were recusing themselves from cases. The same has happened with travel.

I fault the three liberal justices here too. They have placed maintaining the institution of the court over real ethical reform. It would hurt the court in the short term to point out these failings, but it would save the court in the long term to rid it of these harms. Perhaps there is starting to be a glimmer of the awareness from the three. Last term in the dissent to the student loan case, one of the justices (I don't have time to look up which one), stated that in light of actual language that allowed the secretary of education to modify loans, the court itself was acting in an unconstitutional manner with the decision. The comment was ignored, but a constitutional scholar at the time said it was astonishing, they couldn't recall any other case where a justice said the court was acting unconstitutionally. In this case we have the three justices semi-aggressively attacking the majority opinion. Not just disagreeing, but attacking the foundation of the decision. It will be interesting to see if this portends a more aggressive approach to the majority, or if the three will return to defending the institution of the court. Even if they are more outspoken, I have a hard time seeing that it will effect the behavior of the conservative majority. (Although Justice Barret clearly took umbrage with her scolding remarks to the majority).
And then there’s the analysis that “originalism” has been proven, again, to be a fraud. Then again, Scalia, the father of that jurisprudence, always trotted it out to justify his opposition, and never to consistently @call balls and strikes.” This is Scalia’s court. That is the institution now. That’s what the justices, all nine of them, are defending.

And yes, it is a fraud. Giants once walked among us. Great legal minds capable of profound legal analysis. I’ve read their works. Scalia and the justices who follow in his footsteps can’t carry the robe bags of those giants. Their legal reasoning is all reducible to simple expressions of power: they are the Supreme Court. They have declared themselves the final arbiter. They are beyond review and outside of investigation, and serve for life because they say so. The dead hand of tradition is their right. Their assertion of their power is their authority. It isn’t what they rule that matters, or ever has; it’s how. But they don’t even bother with “how” anymore. “Because” is their right.

Except it isn’t. It never has been. It never can be. Originalism was always just “because.” Scalia sold it as more than that, but it was a shell game, and he knew it. He hid the ball repeatedly, and you were the one who didn’t follow. But he knew it was a dalliance, and he never relied on it when he might be responsible for the outcome. That’s why he used it in opposition. But his disciples and students on the Court now missed that lesson. They don’t understand the she’ll fame depends on the patter; and on nothing really being at stake.

They abandon originalism just as Scalia did, but not as artfully. They aren’t in on the con, and so they con themselves. Another stain Donald Trump has left on our nation. Or maybe we let all this happen, and it’s up to us to set things right.

Got to understand the con first, regardless.
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Incoming Salvo Of New Excuses

Fellow CNN panelist Margaret Hoover defended Britt by saying that, behind the scenes, she's far more thoughtful and knowledgeable than what she showed during her primetime speech. Rather, said Hoover, Britt's performance showed the malign influence that former President Donald Trump has had on the party.
The attempt to save Katie Britt from herself is also the leading edge of the attempt to salvage the GOP from the smoking ruins it has become.

But ETTD. It’s an iron law of the universe.
"I don't think that exonerates Katie Britt or any of the others who endorsed Donald Trump and repeat his lines, knowing full well how misleading, how often horrific he is," he emphasized. "It doesn't exonerate them."
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“…Than You Were Five Years Ago?”

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Closing That Loop

So that 60 day provision was unusual, or at least negotiable. And the court’s permission for plaintiff to object did give her leverage to renegotiate that provision.

And, as George Conway pointed out, this bond guarantees Carroll gets paid.

Win-win.
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Finally Getting Around To That

It’s not the misrepresentations. It’s the grotesque exploitation. Katie Britt still hasn’t addressed that.

Mostly because nobody, still, has asked her to.
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Sunday, March 10, 2024

“Isn’t It Past Your Jail Time?”

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The Whole Country Is A Nail…?

Cruelty is also as American as apple pie. Seriously. Cultivating cruelty is pretty much what we do.

I mean, it’s not like something we knew nothing about 8 years ago.
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Asking For Byron York

Is sexual torture: 

A) sexual abuse;

B) sexual assault; or 

C) “civil rape “?
Extra points: unless one happens to be a statutory term and you are responsible for drafting the charging document, what the hell difference does it make?

Extra extra credit: what is imaginably “civil” about rape?

My only excuse is: slow news day.
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Fools Rush In…

...where angels fear to tread.  But...is “civil rape” something that occurs politely between friends? Because that’s not a term I learned in law school.

No, I’m not going to see how she does it (or actually fails to), because this is pretty much where she started:
 And I doubt her syntax got much better.

There’s only so much I can take on a Sunday.
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Coming Around Again

I think we’re coming back around to why Trump lost in 2020.

And why he’s only gotten worse since then.
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Very Interesting

I’ve been wondering what possible grounds Carroll could have to object to the bond Trump is posting to appeal the second verdict.  This might be one.

I have no experience with appeals bonds. For all I know, this is a standard provision. I certainly don’t trust apparent expertise on Twitter. But I’m also curious what grounds, legal or factual, Carroll could use to object to this bond. I’m not sure the judge has one in mind, so much as he’s giving her every opportunity.

I just wonder if this might be one. I guess we’ll find out by tomorrow, 11:00 AM EDT. 🕚 
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Boy Cries “Wolf!” For 100th Time

But now, Mike Lindell says he has recently uncovered new evidence that he intends to personally deliver to the Supreme Court. Evidence that is so compelling, he says that the world will never be the same: 
"This is big everybody! This is what we've been waiting for. It's a Petition for Writ of Certiorari ... Our case was dismissed on standing, they said the claims were speculative ... The lawyers were sanctioned, including Alan Dershowitz, which I had hired for this case. This isn't just some tinfoil hat case, this is huge ... This new evidence is the most explosive evidence ever! Just in the last two months we got this. The lawyers are excited, the whole world is gonna watch us. This coming Friday on the steps of the Supreme Court, 3:00 PM. We're gonna hand-deliver this to the world. It's going to be the biggest thing ever, and we are going to save this country!"
Did his lawyers explain to him that the Supreme Court doesn’t take evidence this way? Or take evidence at all (Alito notwithstanding)? That it only (should) review questions of law, not questions of fact?

Oh, who am I kidding? All the lawyers on this case got sanctioned. Does he even have lawyers anymore?

And yeah, we’ve heard this before. Funny how he always announces it, and it’s always a week in the future; and that future never comes.

But seriously; somebody put this man in receivership for his own protection. He clearly shouldn’t be allowed anything sharper than a rubber ball.
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In Related News..:

Former President and current reverse mortgage applicant Donald Trump spent $10 million in 24 hours on lawyers.
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Sarah Palin Has Her Fingers Crossed

I won’t join the criticism of Romney on this one. I, for one, would welcome Katie Britt as Trump’s running mate. Sure, that’s a great way to “own the libs.”

Sarah Palin wants to retire the title of “Worst VP Pick In The 21st Century” anyway. Mike Pence couldn’t take it away, and she’s ready to get rid of her only claim to fame.
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I’m Pretty Sure…

... the women who don’t want to speak about their rape (or prosecute the crime against them) are more shamed by defenders of Donald Trump than by interviewers of politicians.
And it's a shame that you will never feel, George," Mace charged. "And I'm not going to sit here on your show and be asked a question meant to shame me about another potential rape victim. I'm not going to do that." 
"It's actually not about shaming you," Stephanopoulos noted. "It's a question about Donald Trump." 
"No, you are shaming me," Mace insisted. "You've endorsed Donald Trump for president," the ABC host observed. "Donald Trump has been found liable for rape by a jury. Donald Trump has been found liable for defaming the victim of that rape by a jury. It's been affirmed by a judge." 
"It was not a criminal court case, number one," Mace fired back. "Number two, I live with shame. And you're asking me a question about my political choices, trying to shame me as a rape victim. And I find it disgusting." 
Stephanopoulos pressed Mace several times, and she accused him of shaming her each time. 
"And this is why women won't come forward," Mace complained at one point. 
"Women won't come forward because they're defamed by those who perpetrate rape," Stephanopoulos remarked.
But thanks, Rep. Mace, for playing a game no one asked you to play. Except maybe your constituents, and shame on them.
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Except For The Mothers Of His Children?

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“Homegrown Is The Way It Should Be”

Or in America in the GOP you can take it back to Ronald Reagan’s “welfare queens” driving “welfare Cadillacs.”

The Nazis got eugenics laws from us. Who’s to say Orban didn’t get “Gypsy crime” from us, too? Finding groups to blame for crime in America is as old as America itself. Closer to Trump’s home, it was the KKK’s raison d’etre. Fred Trump was a fan, if not a member, of the KKK. Emmet Till died for the idea that all black men lusted after white women.

Orban is despicable, but Trump is an entirely homegrown product.
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“The Craziest Bitch In The Target Parking Lot”

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Saturday, March 09, 2024

Does He Understand What That Bond Is For?

And what it’s not for?
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Count The Clock That Tells The Wrong Time


After decades of putting up with it, the less said about DST, the better. It’s become like the weather: everyone complains about it, but nobody does anything about it.
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What Percentage Of A Scaramucci Was This?

Back to Raw Story:
"Sean Ross, Britt’s communications director, confirmed that she was talking about Karla Jacinto Romero — who has testified before Congress about being forced to work in Mexican brothels from 2004 to 2008," the outlet reported Saturday. "(A viral TikTok by journalist Jonathan Katz first revealed that Britt was speaking about Romero.) In a phone conversation and a statement, Ross disputed that Britt’s language was misleading." 
The Post, however, vehemently disagreed. 
"Britt’s account of Romero’s experience was a centerpiece of her rebuttal to Biden’s address. The way Britt sets up the story, there is no indication that she is talking about a woman who was working in brothels in Mexico during the George W. Bush administration," according to the Post's fact check. "But Biden has nothing to do with Romero’s story." 
The article continues by suggesting Romero was "never trafficked in the United States." 
"In a high-profile speech like this, a politician should not mislead voters with emotionally charged language," the article states. "Romero’s story is tragic and may be evocative of other Mexican girls trapped in the sex trade in that country. But she was not trafficked across the border — and her story has nothing to do with Biden. Britt’s failure to make that clear earns her Four Pinocchios."
Not to mention an unconscionable exploitation of a woman whose story is about the horror of her exploitation.
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Friday, March 08, 2024

Klass Act

She hasn’t changed one jot. She cares not a bean for the dead nor their families. She just wants to hoot like a howler monkey. Which is unfair; they have a better reason for behaving as they do.

Her competition now is Katie Britt.
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Xenophobia And Racism: The Twin Peaks Of The GOP

The short version (the video is worth watching): the events did occur, but in 2004-2008, in the state of Guadalajara, Mexico (did you know it’s the United States of Mexico? I find that kinda cool.) The victim of that horror is now an anti-human trafficking activist, who tells her story regularly in her efforts to oppose human trafficking (and praise to her for her courage and strength).

She told the story to Britt when the newly elected Senator went to Del Rio, Texas (and it’s not a “district,” it’s a border town) on a fact-finding mission. That’s what this woman does: tell her story to people who might do something about human trafficking.

So this terrible four-year ordeal didn’t happen near or on the border, and the POTUS when it did was Shrub. Not that he had any responsibility for it, either.

This story is just pure xenophobic, racist fear mongering about the border and non-white people in the world. The tale is nightmarish, human trafficking is a crime that should be eradicated, but it has bugger all to do with Joe Biden’s border policy or the SOTU.

That response wasn’t bizarre and erratic. It was disgusting and reprehensible. At least Jindal and Rubio just made fools of themselves. This woman has lowered herself beneath Trump’s low standards, just to get him to like her as a possible VP pick. That’s not me; a lot of people think she’s been on the shortlist, which means she probably thinks she is.

Britt apparently uses this story whenever she can. I’ve been told today how admired Britt is (was, before last night) in DC. I’m beginning to realize that kind of “honor” is damning with very faint praise (at best) outside the Beltway. Especially since none of those reporters seem to have noticed Britt has a record of relying on this horrific tale every chance she gets.

I also wonder how long it was going to take (if ever) for some editor to assign this to some reporter to find out where this tale of atrocity came from. My guess is: half-past never.

Human trafficking is a horrible crime we should all wish to see eradicated. It should not be used for cheap shock value to promote xenophobia for purely partisan political purposes. Sen. Britt didn’t just give an awkward SOTU response. She revealed to us who she is. And who she is, is beneath contempt.
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Katie Britt Twitter

I can quit anytime I want to. Yes, I grew up among girls like this. That’s my story and I’m sticking to it.
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The People Who Welcome You To Hell

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“But Biden Is Old!”

And mean!

Or really, really qualified for this job.
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“A Dutiful And Obedient Woman”

Find the most offensive statement of Sen. Britt by Sen. Tuberville in the quote. Justify your decision.

Bonus points: identify all the other offensive descriptions of Sen. Britt in the quote. Explain your decisions.

Extra bonus points: write proposed talking points to persuade Republicans to call Sen. Britt “America’s Housewife.” Limit yourself to 1000 words.

This is an open book quiz. The proctor will notify you of the time left.

Extra double bonus points:
Compare and contrast.
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Popehat Is Alive And Well On Threads 🧵

Hi I’m Ken welcome to this week’s episode of “Make My Kitchen Less Fucking Horrifying” we have a great show for you let’s meet our guest Katie hi Katie show us your kitchen how bad can it OH JESUS OH WHAT THE FUCK OH WHAT IS THIS H.P. LOVECRAFT SHIT OH THERE IS NO GOD I DID NOT SIGN UP FOR THIS
Who else?

Threads seems to want to work like Twitter, but I’m not signed up for Threads and maybe I will, but until then…

Take my word for it. (Because that link is to his site, not the post.)

(I will get tired of the SOTU and Britt. But that’s the funniest thing I’ve read all day!)
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Was She At A Diner?

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It’s A Cult

God could not be reached for comment.
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🔇

Post columnist Monica Hesse noted, "If you were watching with the volume down, you would have assumed you had stumbled upon a commercial for either stain remover or Il Makiage," referring to the makeup company. 
Hesse said it's hard to say if she was effective in conveying the message she was trying to get over. 
Britt began by "saying that her proudest role was being a 'wife and mother,' before segueing into describing a violent gang rape, before calling Biden 'dithering and diminished,' and explaining that we were all “steeped in the blood of patriots,” wrote Hesse. "Which, ladies — if that’s a menstruation euphemism, I hadn’t heard it before. Somehow, she wrapped up by talking about how America put a man on the moon."
As I said, I watched Britt with the sound off.🔇 And I’ve never heard of “Il Makiage”; but I recognized the “Southern Belle/bless your heart” type just from facial expressions.

The Lovely Wife watched and listened, and was telling me this morning about the gang-rape story. Which is horrible, but it’s also a matter for law enforcement. Houston has the shameful reputation of being a hub for human trafficking; but this is a literally international city and we recognize this as a law enforcement issue. (Houston’s police force is undersized and underfunded because the Lege won’t allow cities and counties to raise the money they need to function, because “low taxes good!” Oh, don’t get me started.) Houston doesn’t get national attention for this blight on civilized order because…Houston’s not on the border.

Anyway…

“Steeped in the blood of patriots”? Holy crap! Good ol’ fashioned Southern Baptist “washed in the blood o’ Jesus” stuff, that. Creepy and bizarre when I was young; anachronistic and grotesquely out of context now.

Interesting summary of what Britt was told to say. But the best part is what Britt didn’t say, but did ask for:
...the talking points Britt sent around to Republicans encouraged them to call her “America’s mom.”
You'd think after “America’s Mayor” got slammed with a libel suit, put himself on film with his hand down his pants alone with a young woman, and filed bankruptcy, the GOP would want to stay away from “America’s” anything.

When will they ever learn?
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😎

Future’s so bright…
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Pictures 🥪

This kitchen looks more like a real kitchen… … than this one does. This looks like they found an empty house in a subdivision and said: “We’ll shoot it here.”

Besides, a kitchen? The charitable explanation is somebody too “kitchen table issues” too literally. The uncharitable one: “You may be a U.S. Senator, but where’s mah sandwich?!”🥪 
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