Read the Transcript

It wasn't a transcript, it was a "memorandum of conversation" (aka MEMCON), as we all know, but Dear Leader has refused to admit, thanks to plenty of water-carrying from the complaisant corporate media.

(It seems like a small point, but it's not a small point at all -- in a responsible media ecosystem, every single time an article quoted him saying the word transcript, it should have been pointed out that that word means something, and that the document in question literally had a stamp on it saying NOT A VERBATIM TRANSCRIPT. Okay? For the millionth time, shit like that illustrates how we got here.)

But one of the key bits from the MEMCON was when Trump said to Ukrainian President Zelenskiy, in reference to US Ambassador Marie Yovanovitch, "She's going to go through some things." Now, thanks to the cooperation of one of Giuliani's -- and by extension, Trump's; don't think for a second that he wasn't greenlighting this thing -- goons, we know that all options were on the table, that Yovanovitch got the hell out of Kyiv just in time.

At minimum, they were plotting to rough her up physically; i.e., assault and battery. But they were clearly prepared to go to the wall on her. This is a goddamned United States Ambassador we're talking about here. No wonder the FSO corps cleared out so quickly. They knew best case scenario, they'd just be undermined in their stations, or rerouted to some shithole until they were too demoralized to continue.

And if they got too inconvenient, it turns out, these demented old boozehounds were ready to go full John Le Carré on them. All of it points to a scheme to influence or even take over the Ukraine energy sector, which serves as an intermediary for Russia supplying the rest of Europe, as well as a lucrative producer in its own right.

If the Democrats aren't already working on the next set of articles of impeachment, between this, the emoluments, and plenty of other things, they deserve to lose. This is a war, very much in the Clausewitzian "politics by other means" sense, and they need to be prepared to see it through, full measures.

At least now you have an idea of exactly why none of these treasonous scumbags wants to testify. Imagine what the rest of the iceberg looks like.

Teflon Don

I couldn't have picked a better couple days to stay home sick from work, than yesterday and today, with the impeachment hearings going on in the background. Hoarse Whisperer has been doing a great play-by-play job throughout, so check it out if you're interested in more granular detail, and throw him a few shekels for his effort.

European Union Ambassador Gordon Sondland is currently testifying, and as many live observers are noting, his demeanor is that of a man who is at peace with what he needs to do. He saw how lifelong ratfucker Roger Stone's time finally ran out last week. Stone is looking at fifty (50!) years in Club Fed, a life sentence. Paul Manafort is doing his stretch right now, and will be in his late seventies -- and broke like a muthafuckin' joke) by the time he's released.

Rudy Giuliani is in the midst of a very slow-motion process of being thrown under the proverbial bus. At 75 years of age and currently going through an expensive and messy divorce from Wife #3, Fruity Gee is surely aware that his best days are now and forever truly behind him. Even if he finds a way to weasel out of major trouble, he knows that he will only be accepted by people that he knows are scumbags. That's all he has left. That "America's Mayor" shit is long gone.

So Sondland sees all that and has adjusted his tack accordingly. He's just a standard doofus with way too much money who thought he'd buy his way into the in-crowd. Well, ya got in, Gordo. How's the weather?

Sondland is now dragging Giuliani and Mike Pompeo and Mick Mulvaney and Dear Leader himself into the ever-widening web of implications. Pompeo and Mulvaney have been trying to find a way to jump ship for months, and Gordo just shanked 'em both real good. They're balls-deep in this, and will be lucky if all they lose is their political careers.

I would only add a few "slightly larger picture" details that are being exposed more and more as this process works through:

• Ukraine is not a member of the European Union. So what exactly is Sondland's official role in all this? Why is he the mediator for these surreptitious transactions with a country not in his diplomatic portfolio? Not to mention the fact that Sondland is a certifiable dipshit -- he testifies that he took no notes of any of his conversations (but gee, he wishes he would have), and he literally held a discussion with POTUS out in the open at a restaurant in Ukraine, on an unsecured line, loud enough for everyone within earshot to overhear what Trump was saying. Again, if you wrote this into a spy novel or a James Bond script, you'd be laughed out of the pitch meeting. It's waaayyyyy too stupid to be remotely believable. And yet Gordo cheerfully attests to all that. Winning!
• Rudy Giuliani has no official role in the United States government at all. He is famously (infamously?) working "for free" on Trump's behalf. It should be clear by now why all that is extremely problematic. As cumbersome and tedious as the appointment-confirmation process might be -- especially to a STRAPPING MAN OF ACTION like Dear Leader -- all of this is why you have that process.
  
  Instead, you have a doddering freelancer, working on the direct behalf of another doddering freelancer, rather than that of, you know, the fucking United States of America. So it's not just that POTUS is explicitly using tools of bribery and extortion on a foreign leader to extract concessions that benefit him personally, it's that his pro bono henchman is subverting national security and foreign policy to work his own side-hustle with whichever Ukrainian oligarch-owned gas company wants to come around and do business.
• This is a case study in how the ongoing undermining of the foreign service corps will have national security repercussions for decades. These shitheads chased out all the competent non-partisan personnel, whose expertise is quiet but essential to day-to-day operations and actionable intel, and replaced them with dipshit lackeys, whose only role is to receive and deliver thick envelopes. The lackeys will be gone at some point in the near- to short-term. It will be very difficult, and take years, to round up a new cadre of professionals, and get them trained and deployed. In the meantime, we will have no operational presence to speak of, in many volatile regions. Feel safer now?
• You hate to use tired clichés such as "scratches the surface" or "tip of the iceberg" with this. It will become clearer when (if) the tax returns are made public. Ukraine is just a small example of how American foreign policy has been monetized -- not for the country's benefit, but for Trump and his family. The Saudis are happy to to just funnel money through the failson-in-law, and get whatever they want -- including American military personnel, who now are apparently mercenaries working for a medieval shithole. Turkey certainly gave him some consideration, in return for his abject betrayal of the Kurds, who fought side-by-side with Americans, and are now being mercilessly slaughtered as you read this. The other side of that coin is the shakedown protection racket, which we just tried on the South Koreans yesterday, walking out of "negotiations" per Genius Q. Dealmaker's super-great how-to manual on MAKING THAT DEAL. Instead of having their protection fees quadrupled overnight, the South Koreans opted instead to sign a security agreement -- wait for it -- with China. And so the Asian century continues apace, without us.
  
  But the point is, Ukraine is just one part of the elephant here -- the trunk, the tail, an ear, whatever. There's a lot more to be uncovered, and the inquiry is probably going to have to be limited in time and scope, for various political considerations. I dunno, if only someone had proposed that this process be started MONTHS EARLIER.

Anyway, the real problem here is that the Republican party politicians, and their disgusting, increasingly anti-American base, won't budge for any of this. Again, you could have indisputably real video of Trump literally robbing a bank and shooting everyone in it -- guards, tellers, customers, his fellow robbers -- and they'd find an excuse for it.

All of the above is a problem for the nation, just as a going concern. But the stubborn obstructionism of Republican politicians, too terrified or stupid to simply observe what's in front of them and do what they know is the right thing, that is a clear and imminent danger. And you're never going to undo the brainwashing of the Fox cult, even if you found a way to pull the plug on the network tomorrow. That damage is done.

Nothing Beside Remains

Another day, another laundry list of transcribed LIES. As always, the whole mess richly deserves the FJM treatment, but to what end? More such lists erupt every week or so, or whenever some mewling scrivener feels it's their journamalistic duty to gain access to someone who has no intention of giving them a straight answer. So what's the fucking point?

Bonus points, though, for these gems:

1. Literally referring to the National Enquirer as "the newspaper." Jesus H. Christ, he really is the angry drunk sitcom dad of our collective cultural subconscious.
2. Seriously seems to believe that when he repeats unvetted bullshit that he heard on Fixed Noise or wherever, that when said bullshit is exposed it's not on him at all, but on the idiot who first pulled it out of their ass. Which begs the question:  if that's your standard for epistemic accountability, why not just recite claims from various late-night infomercials, or the scrawled claims on truck-stop bathroom stalls?
3. "I'm the president, and you're not." Not for much longer, motherfucker.

The whole thing is just a pathetic pile of nonsense. The man can barely put together two sentence fragments in a row without a running start. These pieces do at least demonstrate quite clearly what clusterfuck of a human being he is, that his head is full of snakes and mirrors and sulfurous smoke.

He thinks that because he drew crowds in safe states that "the country believes [him]". Fine, asshole. Come to a state where people actually live and see how that works out for you. He won't because he's a chickenshit, like his sucker-punching cult followers.

Betting Pool

So the betting markets fucked up royally in predicting the election outcome, obviously, but so did the "professional" pollsters. With that caveat in mind, and acknowledging that we are barely sixty days into this amateur clusterfuck of an administration, it bears mentioning that there are at least existing bets one can place that these motherless fucks will be down the road before the end of the first term, and even by the end of this year.

It's a hair too soon to be overly optimistic, but something is brewing and gathering momentum. Paul Manafort, Roger Stone, Carter Page, Michael Flynn, and now Devin Nunes all appear to be up to their asses in alligators over the pattern of collusion between the Clownstick campaign and Russian intel. The only one of these assholes that's even a bit hard is maybe Flynn, and that's only because whatever his faults, he's still a general.

The rest of them? Pfft. Manafort just wants to go back to his dismal existence of serving as a bagman and PR flack for murderers and tyrants. Stone is a perv who literally likes to watch other guys fuck his wife; even more damning, he's a lifelong professional ratfucker. Page appears to be a broker between the Clownstick regime and the Russian oligarchs, and Nunes simply backed the wrong horse because he has way more ambition than brains or ethics.

The Investiture of Fuckface Von Clownstick

Was there anyone who seriously thought that Tweety would change from blustery campaign asshole to someone more presimadentiamable? Probably, but that's why they're called suckers.

Clownstick's inaugural benediction was indeed a piece of dark, Lovecraftian doggerel for the depths of R'lyeh, a tone poem for the Elder Gods, painting a lurid story of a flaming hellscape in the middle of a Thunderdome, and only Batman can save us from ourselves. Seriously, what kind of thumb-sucking dipshit believes this nonsense?

Of course, we've all heard exactly what kind of dipshit, the same kind that lives in these wiped-out shithole counties that have been busted out by opioids and heroin. We'll see how long it takes before these rubes come out of their comas and realize that Batman doesn't really give a fuck about them. Nor does he really exist, because life is not a fucking played-out comic-book movie franchise.

And really, what is Batman's deal, anyway? Consider:  Bruce Wayne is a single billionaire who is expertly trained in martial arts and wants to fight the bad guys in his crime-riddled city. So does he join the police force? Does he buy them some new equipment? Does he maybe create a fund for them to finance more staff on the force? No, he dresses up like a bat and goes vigilante. Probably hasn't paid his fucking taxes for twenty years either.

It is interesting and heartening so far to see some form of resistance to this idiot nutcase, but we'll see if it holds. The Democrats and the corporate media each seem to be finally getting the message that these people are not fucking around, that the animosity is real, it's not schtick, and they either fight back like they mean it or find new jobs.

Or learn to speak Russian.

Urine Big Trouble

You knew this was going to be fun, you just had no clue how much fun, right? It's wishful thinking that this might already be the beginning of the end, since Prince Tweety McTinyhands has no sense of shame or decorum to begin with, and his legions of mouth-breathers have even less. Nothing else that's come out about him over the last eighteen months did him in, why would some shady allegations of water sports in a Moscow hotel suite?

But I think Ed has it right, that when his already tepid political support bails on him, it will happen quickly. In the meantime, we can probably safely guess that about half of the allegations published in Buzzfeed are verifiable, and we can all make a game out of guessing which half.

Three (at least) salient observations leap immediately to mind on this:

1. It says a lot about what's left of our society that Tweety's dealings with Russian oligarch and bratva interests have been floating around for some time, and now that some small weight is being added to them, we mainly fixate on the pee story, which is actually the least plausible (if only for its spot-on weirdness) of the main threads.
2. I have no idea how anyone who considers themselves a serious person -- as in, a person who would claim o be knowledgeable and thoughtful about world events, history, politics, etc. -- could possibly take this fucking clown seriously. Anyone who believed Tweety when he implied that he would govern differently than he campaigned can suck it. As always, it's all props and schtick, stacks of fucking manila envelopes and browbeating reporters. A petulant seventy-year-old child, whose every utterance must be fact-checked, because he lies the way most people draw breath.
3. Every time this cocksucker or one of his scumbag surrogates whines about "fake news," someone needs to remind them that he rode the fucking birther train for five fucking years, and rolls hard with conspiracy mongers such as Alex Jones. Payback's a bitch, asshole.

One positive aspect of the whole fake news wave is that it comes down being compelling, to making a convincing pitch, precisely because Tweety has such an extensive history of utilizing bullshit and conspiracy theories to his own benefit. He's entering office with historically low approval ratings, barely a third. That means two out of every three 'murkins have momentarily set down there cheez doodles and dumbphones, looked away from Chrisley Knows Best and Judge Judy, and wondered what the fuck is up with this fucking guy. That takes some doing.

Loser

Does it need to be pointed out that (especially three months out) only people who know they're going to lose talk about the contest being rigged? At least he's consistent in his fucking incompetence. I sincerely hope that after this shitshow is finally, blessedly done, the only thing keeping him from living on the sidewalk is the allowance he gets from Putin.

Chickenhawk Takes Bait

So George Snuffleupagus' entry in the Sunday follies tomorrow will be a pre-taped interview with Donald Fredovich Drumpfski, in which the latter takes his usual scattershot aim at the DNC speech of Khizr Khan, a Muslim lawyer who emigrated from Afghanistan decades ago and raised a family, including three sons -- one of whom, Army Captain Hamayun Khan, was killed in Iraq by a suicide car bomber at a guard post.

During his DNC speech, Mr. Khan spoke about the very real sacrifices he and his family had given in service to this country, comparing it with Drumpfski. So of course Drumpfski, as is his wont, responds with his usual tone-deafness:

"Who wrote that? Did Hillary's script writers write it?" Trump said in an interview with with ABC News' George Stephanopoulos that will air Sunday. "I think I've made a lot of sacrifices. I work very, very hard."

Khizr Khan, whose son Army Capt. Humayun Khan died in Baghdad in 2004, delivered one of the most powerful speeches of the Democratic National Convention. With his wife Ghazala at his side, Khan repeatedly blasted Trump's immigration proposals -- specifically those aimed at barring Muslims -- and said the billionaire businessman has "sacrificed nothing and no one."

Trump, in the ABC interview, said in response, "I've created thousands and thousands of jobs, tens of thousands of jobs, built great structures. I've had tremendous success. I think I've done a lot."

This is both the tragedy and beauty of this vile man -- he listens to nothing and no one. Mr. Khan's comments go whizzing right past him for the same reason that Hillary Clinton's comments do. Drumpfski understands nothing unless it pertains directly to him and his lifelong branding efforts. Working "very, very hard" is not a "sacrifice" the same way that losing your son in combat is. This should not even have to be explained to anyone, but clearly Drumpfski does not understand this obvious distinction.

But while Drumpfski is on the subject of how his "sacrifices" of supposed 80-hour weeks and such like created "tens of thousands" of jobs, let's also take a moment and consider the many jobs and small businesses that were sacrificed on the altar of Drumpfski's preening avarice, how they went broke while he made millions declaring bankruptcy.

He's a thief, a fraud, a soulless prick, without even the minimum amount of introspection it would take to see the gulf of difference between the extra hours he put in ripping off people and slapping his name on other people's buildings, and a family who came from elsewhere to give the ultimate sacrifice for this country.

Pussy

Looks like Drumpfski is combing through his excuse rolodex to rationalize his unwillingness to debate HFC. Maybe he needs to get Putin's permission. Looks like another bullshit veterans' fundraiser is in the offing.

Temperamental Fool

Well, it's good to see that borderline personality Drumpfski has been playing nice all this time, holding back out of decorum I guess. No more Mister Nice Guy, you crooked bitch, I'm comin' for ya!

If anyone ever wanted a real-life mashup of A Face in the Crowd and The Night of the Hunter, looks like you got your wish.

No Release

Hey, if we're keeping Leslie Van Houten behind bars for the rest of her life, the least we can do is keep this old bastard locked up until he's a moldering corpse no one would take the time to piss on, right? Blanton escaped justice for nearly forty years, remorseless for his actions, for murdering four little girls for some demented lie. He needs to know that he will never breathe air as a free man again.

And yet, if he lives long enough, it's entirely possible that Thomas Blanton might conceivably be released. Prisons have been undergoing drastic demographic shifts, with larger numbers of elderly inmates, that the prisons obviously are not equipped to care for. So "compassionate release" has become more and more commonplace, understandably so in some cases.

Generally speaking, symbolism is one of the more useless things in our benighted material plane, the idea that something is rendered somehow more important or meaningful simply by what it supposedly "means" to certain people or groups. But it must be noted that while there has always been a consistent undercurrent of racist, insurrectionist, and "white power" movements (ably chronicled by my old sparring buddy from the forum days long ago, Dave Neiwert), these groups and individuals have found themselves "empowered" by the rise of Herr Drumpfski.