US Politics, October 2019 — I guess statement you could say with thread. I made a thread. The thread was PERFECT.

Although I guess if 'getting other people to print out web pages for you' is the metric by which one is measuring internet mastery then he's basically achieved god-level status.

It would be like that episode of "Review" where Andy Daly has the secretary spell out, character by character, the full "google" address.

(Needless to say, I looked for a clip, but "review google show" is pretty much a dead end.)

Actually, he'd perform the task flawlessly but ingrained habit would have him navigate directly to RussianPissFiends.net

(there, that's satisfied my "one Trump piss tape joke per calendar year" rule)

Pssht, RussianPissFriends.net is not a real website. But I do $en$e an opportunity!

Oh, RussianPissFIENDS.net! Hold on ... no, not a website, either, but there are two sure-thing moneymaker sites sitting out there for the taking.

Rep. Jim Jordan told reporters this morning that testimony from Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman, the White House's top Ukraine expert and a decorated veteran, would not change the “fundamental facts” surrounding the phone call between President Trump and Ukraine President Zelensky.

He also pointed to Thursday’s scheduled vote in the House, saying that it shows Democrats “realize this process is completely unfair, partisan."

Oh u mean the vote you demanded?

To make it less partisan and more fair, all the Democrats should recuse and let the Republicans run it all again.

If someone were to snag his phone and click 'sign out' in his Twitter app, his capacity to navigate the internet would immediately turf out completely.

if you think Trump can't use the Internet, I have a monthly politics thread you ought to read

I'm surprised he hasn't tasked Barr with scouring the globe for AOL installation CDs.

WaPo headline: "‘Lock him up’ chant ignites a debate among Democrats: Give Trump his own medicine, or stick to the high road?"
Democrats quoted in response to the World Series chant: one.

As a protest against a man who has stated outright his belief that he shouldn't be subject to the due process which might result in his legal incarceration, I'd say that chanting 'lock him up' is a helluva lot higher road than many of the other ways people could register their displeasure.

i'm ready to see the take where trump is a crypto quant playing a moron and navigates the net the darknet and time and space with evil mastery whenever off camera.

when you've lost Liz Cheney, etc.

Rep. Liz Cheney (R-WY) called out conservatives who have been attacking Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman and other witnesses in the House impeachment investigation on Tuesday morning.

After complaining about Democrats’ handling of the investigation during a House Republican leadership presser, Cheney switched tracks.

“Now I also want to say a word about something else that’s been going on over the course of the last several hours and last night which I think is also shameful,” she said. “And that is questioning the patriotism, questioning the dedication to country, of people like Mr. Vindman, Lt. Col. Vindman, who will be coming today, and others who have testified.”

The Republican lawmaker urged for Vindman’s critics to “show that we are better than that as a nation.”

“We’re talking about decorated veterans who have served this nation, who’ve put their lives on the line, and it is shameful to question their patriotism, their love of this nation, and we should not be involved in that process,” she continued.

urged for Vindman’s critics to “show that we are better than that as a nation.”

NARRATOR: They did not

You know, they use the Internet better than almost anybody in the world, perhaps other than Donald Trump. And Donald Trump can also ride his bike real fast!"

It will be intersting to see how the GOP's eroding respect for the military (while still championing The Military in the abstract, natch) will play out in the long run.

Silly Liz, they're only heroes when they're on the battlefield; once they get into politics they're swamp-creatures.

As are you (I say to my high school classmate Rep. Cheney)

McCarthy says "I thank him for his service, but he is wrong".

Incredible piece of shit.

The fact that they would turn on military and FBI/intell services for Donald friggin Trump means they would turn on them for ANYBODY. Cult masquerading as a political party.

hmmm, maybe. but have you ever considered the possibility that everyone except trump and his small circle of advisors is lying? because that's what you'd have to believe, in order to think that trump is innocent. and that's what i believe #maga

Am I wrong in remembering that this tendency only really began with Trump responding in a Trumpian fashion to military-adjacent critics of Trump (eg the Khans, McCain)? And that prior to that the military (at least in terms of their public commentary) was pretty much sacrosanct among the GOP?

Well, sacrosanct as cudgels to use against Democrats. They don't give a shit about veterans.

Dead veterans they like.

yeah can't remember the GOP ever knocking John Kerry

xxpost Yeah, which is why I specified their public commentary. I mean, I don't think they actually give a fuck about farmers in the heartland, either, but they somehow refrain from voicing their true opinions about that gaggle of hayseeds.

it really is a tough judgment call to make: is this lifelong con artist self promoting sleazebag pathological liar lying, or is the whole of the leadership ranks of the military and intelligence agencies lying because they are jealous of said lying con artist. Lol jk it's not a tough judgement, haters gonna hate, we all know this.

At any rate, it'll be fun if the GOP manages to well and truly alienate any of the agencies/institutions they've traditionally aligned themselves with, all for the sake of shielding the fragile ego of a ochre-hued rascal who only switched over to their side so he could let his racism find its full flourish.

Oops.

Source familiar with Vindman’s closed doors deposition says he has testified that he took notes during the July 25th phone call, and made two or so recommended edits to the summarized call transcript that weren’t used in the end (ie using company in place of Burisma)

— Olivia Beavers (@Olivia_Beavers) October 29, 2019

jeez - so he was trying to help trump cover his tracks, and they ignored his advice?

These people are so smart.

What is wrong with these mush-brained wastes of space that the lock-him-up WS chanting was anything other than an OBVIOUSLY ironic repurposing of the original

Fucking idiots

I think the tweeter worded this poorly

I was going to make a crack about it being a mistake to challenge the great and unmatched wisdom of Donald Trump even when it's in the service of obfuscating his hamfisted malfeasance but then I remembered that he's a septuagenarian life-long criminal who managed to scam his way into becoming POTUS and is likely to never face any substantive punishment for his many misdeeds and, well, that sure shut my mouth.

you are sadly correct

He honestly might as well have made a public statement that he was preparing to do crimes just before all of the times he did crimes. It's perfectly within the remit of the president to do so AFAICT.

kinda hope that troop worship (obv in the abstract, not in any material sense) may go the way of the zomg deficit and fambly values as an increasingly weak cudgel for the Right, but it probably won't

lol wtf am i saying the other two will be back front and center the minute a democrat dares take the oath of office

I’m also ok with troop worship In the material sense going the way of those things tbh

Most veterans don't give a fuck about veterans being shat on by Trump

yeah i'd be interested to see what support for trump is among (white) veterans and active duty. i'm guessing just shy of cop territory?

a fair number of the vietnam era vets i work with have expressed, shall we say, extreme dislike for trump but they're also more likely to be in more tenuous social situations (lots of medical and psychiatric problems, no money, POC, etc). the only maga hats i tend to see around the hospital are being worn by white boomers that appear to be doing pretty well, financially etc

obv all completely anecdotal

my fave patient (RIP) was this grumpy old retired criminal defense lawyer who refused to speak his name and would spit when i'd ask him who the president was (a standard orientation question)

Someone I know went to an Army-Navy game recently and reported that support was at a fever pitch among military families. /shrug emoji

(Non-rich) GOP voters have typically put more stock in the utterances of those who claim they have the utmost respect for their constituents' homes and belongings than in the actions of those same people as they torch their constituents' homes and belongings, but maybe even a disingenuous gesture of respect is becoming optional.

'Fuck you, dipshit, vote for me' (dipshit hurtles to the polls)

McConnell smells things

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said Tuesday he has not decided whether to hold a floor vote on a resolution condemning the House impeachment process, adding that he is waiting to see the Democrats' plan for proceeding with their inquiry.

Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) on Tuesday is slated to outline her plan for proceeding on impeachment, which is expected to include a vote to formally launch the process and give Republicans and President Trump's legal team more power to participate.
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“We’ll have to take a look at what the House produces later today and see if it passes the smell test of providing the kind of due-process protections that the president and his team are certainly entitled to, just like President Nixon was and President Clinton was.”

The Senate GOP resolution condemning the House impeachment process has 50 Republican cosponsors. Three GOP senators — Sens. Susan Collins (Maine), Lisa Murkowski (Alaska) and Mitt Romney (Utah) — have not signed on, meaning Vice President Pence might have to cast the tie-breaking vote if the resolution comes to the floor.

“We haven’t made a decision on that yet,” McConnell told reporters, adding “the next step” will be “to take a look and see whether the House is now going” to “try to handle this in a more transparent way that meet basic standards of due process that every American would be entitled to.”

Asked if he viewed the House impeachment inquiry as illegitimate, McConnell responded: “Impeachment, as a practical matter, is whatever a majority of the House decides it is at any given moment.”

last line gives the game away dunnit

IMPORTANT: Dems putting House Intel in charge of public hearings means most of Trump's best defenders are sidelined when the inquiry goes public -- Jordan, Meadows, Zeldin.

Intel also has the fewest # of GOP members of all committees: 9.https://t.co/PHFNsnXfQU

— Kyle Cheney (@kyledcheney) October 29, 2019