This scandal was spread worldwide, and though its dismantling will sound as a whimper in comparison to the fevered reporting of the big lie, the truth is nonetheless prevailing in the end. — NOS4A2

Uh, that actually could be seen that the Mueller Report didn't find similar things...

(AP/The Washington Times, April 22 2019) The Democratic Party-financed dossier, once celebrated by liberal Washington politicians and journalists, is officially debunked, according to a review of special counsel Robert Mueller’s 448-page investigative report.

Dossier creator Christopher Steele, who was paid with money from the Hillary Clinton campaign and the Democratic National Committee, leveled at least a dozen Russian election conspiracy charges against President Trump and associates.

Virtually all his information came from Kremlin intelligence, according to the dossier. Mrs. Clinton’s operatives spread the document to the Justice Department, the FBI and news outlets.

A Washington Times review shows that not one of his conspiracy charges 0-for-12 was proved true and most were outright rejected by Mr. Mueller. The Mueller report also puts to rest four other non-dossier conspiracy charges tied to Mr. Trump.

However, the Mueller report did not clear Trump totally, as we know.

Anyway, I watched Trump meet Putin here. Strange that the US President was a total toadie for the Russian President. It simply is bizarre.

End of story.

watched Trump meet Putin here. Strange that the US President was a total toadie for the Russian President. It simply is bizarre. — ssu

It's evidence that there is someone who can outsmarten Trump. It's a consolation.

Anyway, I watched Trump meet Putin here. Strange that the US President was a total toadie for the Russian President. It simply is bizarre. — ssu

I didn't think it was strange. Putin is precisely the kind of charismatic, unconstrained 'strong man' Trump would see himself as aspiring to be. Since Trump scorned most conventional Western democratic politics, where else would he go for models?

I didn't think it was strange. Putin is precisely the kind of charismatic, unconstrained 'strong man' Trump would see himself as aspiring to be. Since Trump scorned most conventional Western democratic politics, where else would he go for models? — Tom Storm

I also wondered about that guy from Brazil. Was he emulating Trump, Putin, or was he just his own version of them? I think there were some others. We had our own little Adolf/Benito/Tojo thing starting up.

That asshole, Bolsonaro, is a monster. When he cast his vote against the illegal coup ousting Dilma Rousseff (the previous president) he said he did so in honor of her rapist during the Brazilian military dictatorship.

And much, much more. He's considerably worse than Trump as a person.

He's considerably worse than Trump as a person. — Manuel

So you are saying the bar can indeed go lower? Don't tempt Trump. It may be a pissing contest and he might feel he has to up his game. Of course they are both bitches compared to Putin.

Don't tempt Trump. — James Riley

He tempts himself.

Of course they are both bitches compared to Putin. — James Riley

You should add Erdogan and Netanyahu to that list. Though this latter one is gone for now.

They're all disgusting. Putin may be worse, but beyond a point, it's just degeneracy.

:100: :up:

I didn't think it was strange. Putin is precisely the kind of charismatic, unconstrained 'strong man' Trump would see himself as aspiring to be. Since Trump scorned most conventional Western democratic politics, where else would he go for models? — Tom Storm

The most logical reason I can think of is simply appeasing to the populist crowd, but it simply doesn't make sense. To be tough on the allies and then to "make an openings" to those that see the US as a threat. Not actually a great way to go. You will have estranged allies and rivals that take advantage of you. But what else can such an inept politician do?

It simply wasn't normal. Yet what is noteworthy is the speed that the pro-Russia people were whisked away from the Trump administration.

Wonder what it's going to be like in the second Trump administration. That really would be the thing...

Wonder what it's going to be like in the second Trump administration. — ssu

It would be much like the current adminstration, except it will make liberals uncomfortable enough to say something because it will be honest about its depravity.

The most logical reason I can think of is simply appeasing to the populist crowd, but it simply doesn't make sense. — ssu

Perhaps you are over-thinking this. I don't think Trump's fascination for Putin is anything more than one inflated roid-ridden bodybuilder admiring an even more inflated roid-ridden bodybuilder standing nearby in the gym. What Trump's people themselves thought is a separate matter as is whatever populist considerations there might be in this. Remember too the saying 'the enemy of my enemy is my friend' - that fits Putin in relation to the liberal elites who also disparaged Trump.

You may be right. Trump is a simple man. Really, really simple. One has to remind oneself about that.

It would be much like the current adminstration, except it will make liberals uncomfortable enough to say something because it will be honest about its depravity. — StreetlightX

Comes to mind the best reasoning given by Trump supporter why Trump should be elected in 2016. He said the following: "If Trump is elected, the media will do it's job and watch every move Trump makes. With Hillary they will be her lapdogs."

Some truth to that.

It's the one redeeming feature of a Trump administration - it is practically a left radicalization factory. But even when not in power, liberals find a way to fuck it up by channelling that energy into conspiracy theories about Putin, or to pretend that Trump is sui generis and make it a matter of personality politics. Literally anything to avoid substantial political questions in which Trump is a product of American politics as a whole - because this would make liberals complicit. Which of course, they are.

Americans don't need Putin as a scapegoat to blame for their utterly shit domestic politics. They can and are and ruining their country perfectly fine by themselves.

I don't think Trump's fascination for Putin is anything more than one inflated roid-ridden bodybuilder admiring an even more inflated roid-ridden bodybuilder standing nearby in the gym. — Tom Storm

No. Putin cares about ruling a country. Very few high politicians nowadays care about ruling. Most are just intoxicated with holding a position of power, or with getting the benefits that being so high up gets them and their cronies. In some countries, to begin with, the political system is set up in such a way that prevents the accumulating of much power in the hands of one person or one party, so politicians in those countries can't focus on ruling even if they wanted to.

But Putin is an old-school ruler. As a personality, he thus simply can't be very pleasing. But he rules.



(I suspect part of the problem with Putin are his face and his demeanor -- Slavic-Mongolian. Westerners generally aren't used to those races and can't read those faces properly.)

Well, I was talking about how Trump may see this, not really any reference to Putin's actual work (whatever this may really be). T likely just sees P as an ideal version of who he would like to be - able to easily kill and jail opponents and censor the press and say a fulsome fuck you to Western Liberal elites.

Bannon charged with contempt of congress.

About bloody time. Deserves jail.

About bloody time. Deserves jail. — Wayfarer

I'll believe it when I see it. And if it's a country club, forget that. I'd like to see the distinction lost to the history books. He needs a big (if you know what I mean) cell mate. All of them do.

smaller cell the better, I'd say.

Don't get all excited yet. The trial is far from over.

Of course but it is a small win.

"Tr45h Restoration" Coup" in 2022? 2024? ...

:chin:

I don't think so; but nonetheless an excellent analysis of the current "radicalized" State of the Ruin.

I agree.

Yet the problem is this. In 2016 Trump was already totally ready and in fact expecting to play the "stolen election" card. Now in 2020 that became the reality. Now with 2024, both sides seem to think that the election will be stolen. The article is sure about that and is a good example of this.

Perhaps this part shows this most clearly:

One year later, Douthat looked back. In scores of lawsuits, “a variety of conservative lawyers delivered laughable arguments to skeptical judges and were ultimately swatted down,” he wrote, and state election officials warded off Trump’s corrupt demands. My own article, Douthat wrote, had anticipated what Trump tried to do. “But at every level he was rebuffed, often embarrassingly, and by the end his plotting consisted of listening to charlatans and cranks proposing last-ditch ideas” that could never succeed.

Douthat also looked ahead, with guarded optimism, to the coming presidential election. There are risks of foul play, he wrote, but “Trump in 2024 will have none of the presidential powers, legal and practical, that he enjoyed in 2020 but failed to use effectively in any shape or form.” And “you can’t assess Trump’s potential to overturn an election from outside the Oval Office unless you acknowledge his inability to effectively employ the powers of that office when he had them.”

That, I submit respectfully, is a profound misunderstanding of what mattered in the coup attempt a year ago. It is also a dangerous underestimate of the threat in 2024—which is larger, not smaller, than it was in 2020.

For all I know, to do a self-coup with the powers of the US president is far more easier than not being the President. So really to argue that the threat is bigger in 2024 than it was in 2020, nah. There's no strategic surprise anymore, Trump isn't getting the political establishment caught like deer in the headlights.

Where does that lead the US? Both sides already making the charge that the other one is up to no good. It's like both sides are saying: "Let's not even wait for the actual election years from now, it will be stolen." Seems like elections will get to be only bigger dumpster fires than the last one.

Although I think this is a view that still can change:

Unless biology intercedes, Donald Trump will seek and win the Republican nomination for president in 2024. The party is in his thrall. No opponent can break it and few will try. Neither will a setback outside politics—indictment, say, or a disastrous turn in business—prevent Trump from running. If anything, it will redouble his will to power.

There still are the midterms before this, and things have changed in US politics quite quickly.

And one thing, I don't think that a guy like Patterson in the article represents all the 74 million that voted Trump. I'm sure that you can find the most woke, most stereotypical liberal that perfectly annoys everything in Republicans, just as the racist Patterson does.

Let's not forget that the vast majority of American voters don't believe the steal.

The Atlantic is publishing some truly great stuff on all this. I subscribed and am not regretting it. Helps I guess that it's owned by Laurene Powell Jobs, but it has a great pedigree and really good writers.

I think spectacularly malfeasant, insolvent & gaslighting "Individual 1's" political future is in the same clumsy heavy hands it was in during 2016 and 2020: the damn Democratic Party – particularly the DNC, (Biden's this time, not Obama's) Department of Justice, and the 2021-2022 Democratic majority in the US Senate. These Dems have all the cards, if only they'd play their collective hand to win:

A. Federal indictments (re: Mueller's Investigation (a dozen "sealed" indictments pending), January 6th Insurrection, Campaign Finance Fraud, etc) of many-to-most key players in "Individual 1's" WH, including his three eldest children, and culpable GOP members of Congress by 2Q 2023.

B. End the (pro-lynching obstructionist!) "Filibuster Rule" in the US Senate by 1Q 2022

C. By Presidential executive order forgive all student loans in addition to passing the current social welfare and infrastructure legistlation by 2Q 2022

D. By Presidential executive order declare organizers & fundraisers of the January 6th Insurrection – excluding "Individual 1" himself – "enemy combatants" under the provisions of the post 9-11 "Patriot Acts" and sequester them in detention facilities in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba by 2Q 2022

E. Abolish the Debt Ceiling? Expand SCOTUS by 3-5 seats for Biden to appoint more center-left Justices? – both by 1/2Q 2023?

F. ???

Will the Dems-controlled Congress, WH & DOJ play any one or more of these cards? TBD. :mask:

Also: The rightwing SCOTUS will overturn Roe vs Wade in 2Q 2022 which will set-off a center-left firestorm through the summer and fall that will help the Dems (barely) hold on to control of both houses of the US Congress in next year's midterm elections.

There will be bloodshed in 2022-2024 ( ... ) just as the Atlantic Magazine article suggests. I suspect the massive George Floyd protests of 2020 will seem like carnival parades in hindsight compared to what's coming. And I expect Xi & Putin to take advantage of this pandemic-propelled US civil crisis / explosion by invading (occupying) Taiwan and Ukraine, respectively, by 1/2Q 2022 (or 1/2Q 2023).

In the old days, when the opponent appeared to be gaining too much power, someone would execute.

Well, that seems like a nice future there.

I can always remember how nice the US was actually in 2019, the last time I was there.

Trust a native, sir, my country was a "shithole" in 2019 (in 1989) too. Nothing new except some (heavily armed, pandemic-denying, racist) natives openly rebelling against their government for its half-hearted attempts at treating "other" natives equitably. :mask:

Trust a native, sir, my country was a "shithole" in 2019 (in 1989) too. — 180 Proof

Well, things can always get even worse. Just look at Mexico. It's surprisingly like the US, but just worse. Worse corruption, worse police, worse crime. Of course, what is lacking is the hyper-partisan political tribalism as Mexicans know all their politicians are thieves. (You might think the election of Lopez Obrador would cause a divide and an Mexican "culture war", but actually...no.)

True. But remember the Mexican shitshow was more or less "Made in America".