US Politics, November 2019: These people are truly sick.

Is it? I thought the opposite

Like noon-ez

nooner

FAKE NUNES

Omg

There was a girl I went to high school with whose last name was Nunes, and she pronounced it noons.

I like Betsy Woodruff Swan's reporting on this

President hiding in his bedroom

The Oval Office is the traditional epicenter of power for American presidents, but a new one is emerging that’s more exclusive, more secluded and more convenient.

President Donald Trump is increasingly morphing the White House residence into a second Oval. It’s become the place where Trump feels most productive, where he avoids meddling by his staff and where he speed-dials his network of confidantes, GOP lawmakers and TV pundits.

The residence was where Trump made the infamous July 25 phone call to the Ukrainian president that’s now at the center of impeachment proceedings. It’s where Trump often meets his personal attorneys to plot legal strategy or campaign advisers to shape 2020 campaign moves. And last week it became the location for a Trump meeting that’s as official as any, hosting Federal Reserve chair Jerome Powell — the target of countless Trump twitter attacks — along with Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin for a Monday morning discussion of monetary policy.

Maintaining a sanctuary to work and think has taken on greater importance for the president as he increasingly feels under siege by the Democratic impeachment inquiry. Frustrated by the whistleblower complaint and a parade of administration officials testifying on Capitol Hill, Trump is as wary as ever of the staffers around him and distrustful of the traditional White House infrastructure. Working from his private quarters gives him space away from what he perceives as prying eyes and guards against his omnipresent fear of leaks to the media.

sounds like he's.... increasingly isolated

Someone leaked a photo:
https://media.gettyimages.com/photos/long-white-hair-outgrown-fingernails-pills-dark-rooms-and-tissues-to-picture-id515543846?s=2048x2048

Really just a matter of time until he's refusing to do business from anywhere but his couch cushion fortress.

“the Democratic impeachment inquiry.”

Seeing this everywhere now, it’s the HOUSE impeachment inquiry ugh

OK, Nunes is roughly my age. Plenty of dudes in my high school had that look.

Me too and I wouldn't have voted for any of them for anything except maybe picking up the keg.

process stuff:

CHUCK TODD: And one last thing, on the Senate trial, is one of the reasons you’re not going to fight to try to — in the courts right now for Bolton is that you believe – -there’s this theory that’s been on, I think, Talking Points Memo, a liberal news organization, Josh Marshall. There’s a legal theory running around that it’s a lot easier to get the Chief Justice to compel John Bolton to testify at a Senate trial than it would be waiting around to get him to Congress. Do you buy into that theory?

REP. ADAM SCHIFF: I think that may very well be true. Now, people like John Bolton, whose deputies had the courage to come in and testify, are going to have to answer one day why they saved what they knew for a book rather than tell the country when the country needed to know. But I do think that when it comes to documents and witnesses, that if it comes to a trial, and again we’re getting far down the road here, that the Chief Justice will have to make a decision on requests for witnesses and documents.

followed by this:

Some readers have said this is wishful thinking: why would John Roberts of all people help out here. This is the wrong way to look at this. I don’t know how Roberts will balance his partisan leanings with institutional or ethical considerations. The point is more one of speed. Given his role of Chief Justice, the composition of the Court and more, all these question will ultimately fall to him, whether through the conventional appellate process or at a Senate trial. The key in a Senate trial is that the decision comes quickly and in the open.

https://talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/adam-schiff-seems-to-agree

Maintaining a sanctuary to work and think

The plot sickens

The big picture is that when you have a crooked pres who makes it clear he wants foreigners to take out his political rivals lots of shady folks come out of woodwork https://t.co/VwFIrnRNG5 via @TPM

— Josh Marshall (@joshtpm) November 24, 2019

why would that ledger be a forgery? the manafort became phenomenally wealthy working for the ukranian president who threw his opponent in jail is well documented. he is in prison for not disclosing all the money he made here.

Can you believe people lie and create propaganda like this to keep you confused?

it's just these deflections are so fucking stupid. i won't belabor the point.

Forgery has been practiced since the Sumerians used cylindrical personal seals to make impressions on mud.

It's just endless muddying, and honestly, when I read stories like that, I feel my mind slipping into this state of semi-credulity where I start to wonder if somehow it's true even though I know it isn't. Just being exposed to it feels corrupting.

Bud Cummins

Nickname: Turbo Diesel

I encounter some kind of cognitive block when I try to picture this

right, how could a face get any more constipated-looking

The House Intelligence Committee is in possession of audio and video recordings and photographs provided to the committee by indicted Giuliani associate Lev Parnas, multiple sources familiar with the matter tell ABC News. https://t.co/o0Up5JoKIj

— Kyle Griffin (@kylegriffin1) November 24, 2019

Giuliani-Trump pee sex tape?

With tax returns?

...and nudes?

Generally sex involves nudity

I hope it's a real game changer like audio of president bragging about sexual assault, or video of him saying he fired Jim Comey because of the Russia investigation

imagine if it's the transcript of a phone call where he gets caught bribing Yelensky!

wow fucked up

Generally sex involves nudity

Trump keeps his jacket and buttoned shirt on during coitus, carefully folding the base of his tie up and resting it upon the rump & small of the back of his unfortunate partner

oh look my lunch just came up

xp relatable tbrr

Over a week, still no golf.

according to 538 support for impeaching Trump has gone down a couple % points since the Ukraine thing started

whatever the GOP is doing it's working

I don't know if it's The Muddle so much as the bloom being off the rose.

people are so dumb they probably think he's been impeached already and don't support impeaching him again.

Also, Americans are so annoyingly stubborn and contrarian it's possible that support has dropped because they know it's going to happen, so now they're more against it.

They talked about this on the podcast, some of it is an artefact of methodology. They used to group together polls asking 'should be removed' 'should be impeached' and 'investigations should begin'. Not surprisingly, support was largest for the mildest option. But not that hearings have begun, nobody asks the last question, and support looks like it's going down.

Not surprising, the Times told me yesterday that congress has played to a draw on impeachment.

Impeachment is a really serious thing. Playing to a draw is a big achievement, and a gigantic embarrassment for Trump!

Yeah, just like the conclusion of the Mueller report. Maybe he did it, maybe he didn't, who are we to say? It's a draw!

The GOP noise machine can force a draw In the unlikeliest of situations just by taking a position opposite of reality. And the GOP automatically wins all draws. See Kavanaugh, Brett.

it plays into the victim narrative that strengthens their base

but who cares.

removing trump is the right thing to do. he has no business being president.

I mean, he is not going to removed, that's why it's never going to be more than a draw :) But the hearings shed light on an attempt to cheat in the elections next year, and it's pretty clear that if Trump thought he'd gotten away with it, he'd cheat again. And again. And again. It should also be pretty clear that it did actually take quite a bit of time, and quite a bit of work, to concoct this attempt to cheat, so shooting it down, making sure it amounts to nothing, getting rid of all the low-level people who helped make it happen, will mean he will start again from scratch, when he inevitably tries to cheat again.

The best part of this clip, which you can barely see, is Bret Stephens engaging in an epic eye roll when I say, “I’m from America.“ You can just glimpse it at the 32-second mark.pic.twitter.com/lfkNt0tTjK

— Anand Giridharadas (@AnandWrites) November 25, 2019

Impeachment also makes it much harder for Trump to get anything done