Independence Day Open Thread

by

by wj

I’m going to spend most of the day helping set up, and shoot, one of the local (legal, with a licensed pyrotechnician and everything) fireworks shows. But here’s something to get the rest of you going.

During the last 6 years of the Obama administration, the Republican-led Congress was extremely careful to never actually go into recess. The motivation being to keep Obama from making recess appointments. But today, the Congress is in the midst of a 10 day recess for Independence Day.

President Trump has been complaining (with whatever accuracy or lack thereof) that the Democrats in Congress are holding up his appointments. So, will he seize this opportunity to put thru a bunch of recess appointments? Somehow, I doubt it. Maybe there aren’t actually that many appointments being held up. Or maybe it’s just that nobody in the White House these days is even aware of the possibility. So hard to get decent help these days…

348 thoughts on “Independence Day Open Thread”

  1. Let’s see… In addition to the Dems dragging things out, Trump has said he will not fill many (hundreds?) of the appointed positions because they are unnecessary (perhaps he is not so far behind as we think); nominated candidates seem to be taking a long time finishing the large amount of paperwork needed [1]; in at least a couple of cases, Republican committee chairs are sitting on a nomination because they would prefer to handle all three openings on that particular board in one meeting.
    [1] If Bush’s was the CEO administration, Trump’s is the LLC administration. Among other things, we are learning that our disclosure and conflict-of-interest filings are ill-suited to someone who operates in the LLC world. My perception is that to stay within the lines, such nominees are required to dismantle their businesses to the extent that there’s no business to go back to after their time in office.

  2. This week, the Economist offers A special report on Donald Trump’s America. I was particularly taken by this:

    The ANES [American National Election Study] also asks voters whether the Republicans or Democrats are more conservative, and found that some 15% of Trump voters thought the Democrats were the more conservative party (as did 6% of Clinton voters). Add in the don’t knows, and 16% of Clinton voters and 24% of Trump voters were not sure which party was more conservative.

    Read that again. 10% of voters think that Democrats are the more conservative party, and another 10% aren’t sure which is the more conservative party. The mind boggles.

  3. FWIW, the holiday leaves me with mixed feelings. It’s been a while since I’ve felt a sense of enthusiasm about being American.
    We’re not doing well, as a nation. And we’re not making any progress toward addressing the reasons for that.
    It’s not an occasion for celebration. Or, I don’t find it so. Regrettably.
    We always do a big fireworks thing in my town, but my wife and I will likely stay home. It’s too sad.

  4. 10% of voters think that Democrats are the more conservative party
    i would probably be among them, for a number of definitions of “conservative”.

  5. Russell, perhaps it would help to look at the fireworks, etc. as a celebration of what we aspire to be.

  6. not for me, this year. i’m not clear about what we aspire to be these days.
    enjoy the day everyone, and stay safe.

  7. There were days when fireworks were active pacifism (of the unintended kind). Some kings used up more gunpowder for a single fireworks display than Napoleon needed for a full-scale battle (or the army at peace time for a full year).
    These days it is just turning money into acrid smoke. Does it rival napalm in the morning?

  8. First, a little holiday humor:
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tflkVVJL-PA
    Second, I’ve been thinking about republican fuckwad’s CNN assault video:
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ci4QZ82n2i8
    I don’t have the expertise to do this, but it seems to me, given the stinking, lying conservative penchant for countering violent assaults with massive amounts of gunfire, someone should construct a video, using the Reddit original as its basis and which was made for the White House to release as a violent threat to the press and decent Americans, that depicts the assault, but in our funnier, truer version the CNN individual assaulted by trump manages while trump has him on the ground to remove a firearm from his WWF tux and shoot the aggressor, a gummint one no less, thru his black heart, you know, in self-defense as Wayne LaPierre advises.
    The video should be released by news outlets insisting that it is real news event, not fake news, which I think would stir filth conservatives into some netherworld paraoxsym of ultra-fake news, since it’s clear conservatives have no idea any longer of the difference between the fact and horseshit.
    In answer, the left should insist the new video depicting the violent demise of the thug filth, in an act of lawful, innocent delf-defense, is indeed fact and all denials by the filthy Right that the toupeed perp is fucking dead should be met with a hurricane of accusations that the White House is, as always, peddling fake news.
    Get them coming and going.
    Meanwhile, this guy:
    http://usnewz.com/2017/07/02/meet-racist-anti-semitic-reddit-troll-who-claims-credit-trumps-anti-cnn-body-slam-tweet
    He’s the leader of a sub-Reddit den (400,000 followers and counting) of pure Evil … racist, anti-Semitic, anti-gay, anti-woman, anti-Muslim projectile vomiting … and his video was chosen specifically and for all of those motives by the republican White House den of pure Evil …. racist, anti-Semitic, anti-gay, anti-woman, anti-Muslim .. in a word, what the right in every culture, in every epoch, has always thought of these fellow human beings: as vermin to be destroyed.
    trump is referred to on the sub-reddit site by his racist, murderous assmunchers as the God Emperor and trump appreciates this, believe me.
    He loves, he revels in it. Especially (as he sits on his commodious, solid-gold bathroom throne) coming from racist, anti-Semitic, anti-woman, anti-gay, Mulsim-hating, gummint-hating, tax-hating pieces of republican shit who frequent the threads.
    The People, as he calls them.
    redditt needs to be hacked. The identity and location of the individual who created the trump/CNN must be identified so he can be found (I volunteer) and physically hurt in such a way that his fellow conservative filth beg .. beg, for gummint protection from the God Emperor.
    Hurt physically in such a way that the Founders of this country and their hapless militias on this hallowed national holiday would approve of, considering all of the other fucking shit they approved of.
    No fireworks for me either.

  10. I watched fireworks last night. I went to the end of the street and sat in the local grocery parking lot with about 50 people.
    I was reminded this week, on 60 minutes?, that Adams and Jefferson didn’t speak for over a decade after their campaign, until someone reminded them of the things they so fervently mutually believed in. It brings to mind the the people I have respected for their ability to disagree with respect through my lifetime.
    This too shall pass. The courage and thoughtfulness of those people who created this country, stood their ground, fought and died for our freedom literally, and then spent the time and work to craft a vision that we still strive to live up today deserves our celebration.

  11. Human beings compartmentalize in odd ways.
    For example, I made a nice clam stew the other week (hard-shell, not the soft variety mentioned in this article):
    http://www.dailyjournal.net/2017/07/04/us-clam-trouble/
    Two sentences stick out:
    “Beal said the predators are the biggest threat faced by the clams.”
    “It’s not that there’s not clams,” he said. “It’s that they don’t survive.”
    Which predators are the biggest threat to the clams, they wonder?
    Me. Yum!
    But the spokespeople just don’t seem to be able to identify the predator who is eating all of the clams.
    “It’s that they don’t survive”. Yeah, no kidding. Scratching of heads all around.
    Lewis Carroll knew who was eating the missing mollusks:
    ‘The sun was shining on the sea,
    Shining with all his might:
    He did his very best to make
    The billows smooth and bright–
    And this was odd, because it was
    The middle of the night.
    The moon was shining sulkily,
    Because she thought the sun
    Had got no business to be there
    After the day was done–
    “It’s very rude of him,” she said,
    “To come and spoil the fun!”
    The sea was wet as wet could be,
    The sands were dry as dry.
    You could not see a cloud, because
    No cloud was in the sky:
    No birds were flying overhead–
    There were no birds to fly.
    The Walrus and the Carpenter
    Were walking close at hand;
    They wept like anything to see
    Such quantities of sand:
    “If this were only cleared away,”
    They said, “it would be grand!”
    “If seven maids with seven mops
    Swept it for half a year.
    Do you suppose,” the Walrus said,
    “That they could get it clear?”
    “I doubt it,” said the Carpenter,
    And shed a bitter tear.
    “O Oysters, come and walk with us!”
    The Walrus did beseech.
    “A pleasant walk, a pleasant talk,
    Along the briny beach:
    We cannot do with more than four,
    To give a hand to each.”
    The eldest Oyster looked at him,
    But never a word he said:
    The eldest Oyster winked his eye,
    And shook his heavy head–
    Meaning to say he did not choose
    To leave the oyster-bed.
    But four young Oysters hurried up,
    All eager for the treat:
    Their coats were brushed, their faces washed,
    Their shoes were clean and neat–
    And this was odd, because, you know,
    They hadn’t any feet.
    Four other Oysters followed them,
    And yet another four;
    And thick and fast they came at last,
    And more, and more, and more–
    All hopping through the frothy waves,
    And scrambling to the shore.
    The Walrus and the Carpenter
    Walked on a mile or so,
    And then they rested on a rock
    Conveniently low:
    And all the little Oysters stood
    And waited in a row.
    “The time has come,” the Walrus said,
    “To talk of many things:
    Of shoes–and ships–and sealing-wax–
    Of cabbages–and kings–
    And why the sea is boiling hot–
    And whether pigs have wings.”
    “But wait a bit,” the Oysters cried,
    “Before we have our chat;
    For some of us are out of breath,
    And all of us are fat!”
    “No hurry!” said the Carpenter.
    They thanked him much for that.
    “A loaf of bread,” the Walrus said,
    “Is what we chiefly need:
    Pepper and vinegar besides
    Are very good indeed–
    Now if you’re ready, Oysters dear,
    We can begin to feed.”
    “But not on us!” the Oysters cried,
    Turning a little blue.
    “After such kindness, that would be
    A dismal thing to do!”
    “The night is fine,” the Walrus said.
    “Do you admire the view?
    “It was so kind of you to come!
    And you are very nice!”
    The Carpenter said nothing but
    “Cut us another slice:
    I wish you were not quite so deaf–
    I’ve had to ask you twice!”
    “It seems a shame,” the Walrus said,
    “To play them such a trick,
    After we’ve brought them out so far,
    And made them trot so quick!”
    The Carpenter said nothing but
    “The butter’s spread too thick!”
    “I weep for you,” the Walrus said:
    “I deeply sympathize.”
    With sobs and tears he sorted out
    Those of the largest size,
    Holding his pocket-handkerchief
    Before his streaming eyes.
    “O Oysters,” said the Carpenter,
    “You’ve had a pleasant run!
    Shall we be trotting home again?’
    But answer came there none–
    And this was scarcely odd, because
    They’d eaten every one.’
    The Walrus and the Carpenter spokesperson pointed a fake news finger at the green crabs and the ribbon worms, to be sure.

  12. i’m not clear about what we aspire to be these days.
    Well, we’ve always aspired to a variety of, sometimes mutually incompatible, things. To take just the obvious example, for over a century there were folks in the Deep South who aspired to a world where the South (or at least its views on race relations) had won the Civil War.
    So I go with knowing what *I* aspire to for my country. And celebrating that it is possible to work peacefully (if not as rapidly as I would prefer) towards achieving it.

  15. The heightened predation from the crabs and worms has tracked in line with rising coastal water temperatures, which are predicted to keep rising, he said.
    Lobsters are moving north, too.
    This too shall pass. And it’s not likely to come back.
    Since I seem to be in a maudlin mood, I’ll note that it always kind of cracks me up when dudes like Cliven Bundy go on about their Traditional Way Of Life being jerked around by the dastardly feds.
    They’ve been ranching on that patch for, by god it must be 100 years!
    People around here have been making their living out of the north Atlantic for five or six hundred years.
    Kiss it good bye.

  16. Russell, you might also want to consider this, from Leonard Pitts a couple of days ago:

    [We have] reason to hope, but no guarantee. All we have is a fighting chance.
    But America has never needed more than that.

    To abandon hope is to guarantee that we will not succeed. IMHO

  17. There is a difference between having no hope, and being disinclined to celebrate.
    I’m not inclined to celebrate the United States of America today. I do not believe we are a nation that deserves celebration today. I’m not sure we are a nation at all, today, nor am I sure that I wish to be part of the same nation as many folks who live here, today.
    I appreciate that you’re trying to be encouraging, but I’m not encouraged, because I do not see reason for encouragement.
    We’re living through some truly rank bullshit. I won’t applaud it. Nor will I applaud what this nation has been in the past, because to the degree that we have a legacy worth celebrating, we are pissing on that legacy today.
    It offends me, profoundly, as an American, and frankly as a human being.
    So somebody else will have to go to the party today.
    I’m doing some chores. My wife and I will go to a good friend’s for a burger later on. Then we’ll come home. I have some work to do, I’ll probably play some vibes, and I’m reading Braudel’s “Memories of the Mediterranean”, which is more than interesting.
    And that’ll be my holiday.
    All y’all enjoy yours as best suits you. Don’t blow yourselves up!

  18. I don’t see government as the embodiment and soul of the country. So, I feel optimism for the country and disdain for government.

  19. People around here have been making their living out of the north Atlantic for five or six hundred years.
    Kiss it good bye
    The Canadian government, at the eleventh minute of the eleventh hour, closed its collapsed N. Atlantic cod fishery a quarter-century ago, in 1992.
    In the last two years, fisheries scientists have seen the beginnings of a comeback. The population of adult cod seems to be doubling roughly every three years.
    “Some elements of work
    Persist, with difficulty, here on Earth”

  20. joel, thanks. yes, cod are coming back, but the whole fishery is moving further north because of water temps.
    it’ll work out one way or the other.
    I’m gonna lay out for the rest of the day, enough harshing of mellows from me for now.
    Hope everyone has a great holiday. Don’t blow yourself up, and I’ll see you on the flip side.

  21. joel hanes, either it should have been elements of worth, or you misquoted on purpose. Either makes sense…. I had to look it up to find the poem, which rang only a very faint bell.
    Given it is a riposte of sorts to the Housman Epitaph on an Army of Mercenaries, it reminds me somehow of the wonderful Roger Woddis “parody” (which I often think of in these dark days) of Yeats’s Song of Wandering Aengus. Given that this is an open thread, and we have already had poetry –
    Yeats:
    The Song of Wandering Aengus
    I went out to the hazel wood,
    Because a fire was in my head,
    And cut and peeled a hazel wand,
    And hooked a berry to a thread;
    And when white moths were on the wing,
    And moth-like stars were flickering out,
    I dropped the berry in a stream
    And caught a little silver trout.
    When I had laid it on the floor
    I went to blow the fire a-flame,
    But something rustled on the floor,
    And someone called me by my name:
    It had become a glimmering girl
    With apple blossom in her hair
    Who called me by my name and ran
    And faded through the brightening air.
    Though I am old with wandering
    Through hollow lands and hilly lands,
    I will find out where she has gone,
    And kiss her lips and take her hands;
    And walk among long dappled grass,
    And pluck till time and times are done,
    The silver apples of the moon,
    The golden apples of the sun.
    Woddis:
    The Hero
    I went out to the city streets
    Because a fire was in my head
    And saw the people passing by
    And wished the smallest of them dead,
    And twisted by a bitter past,
    And poisoned by a cold despair,
    I found at last a resting place
    And left my hatred ticking there.
    When I was fleeing from the night
    And sweating in my room again,
    I heard the old futilities
    Exploding like a cry of pain;
    But horror, should it touch the heart,
    Would freeze my hand upon the fuse,
    And I must shed no tears for those
    Who merely have a life to lose.
    Though I am sick with murdering
    Though killing is my native land,
    I will find out where death has gone,
    And kiss his lips and take his hand;
    And hide among the withered grass,
    And pluck, till love and life are done,
    The shrivelled apples of the moon,
    The cankered apples of the sun.

  22. Pedantry here:
    “Country” is a geographic term. The part of North America that lies between Canada and Mexico is a country.
    “Nation” is an ethnographic term. The people who make up a nation don’t have to live in a single country (cf the Kurds), and the people living in a single country are not necessarily one nation (cf the Israelis).
    “State” is a political term. It implies a territory with a population and a government. A country with a nation living in it that has no government is not a state.
    In this terminology, it is a bit odd to be proud of one’s “country”; Nature made it, not patriots or any other sort of people. It is less odd, but still somewhat presumptuous, to be proud of one’s “nation”; perhaps an exception can be made for voluntary immigrants through a port of entry, but involuntary immigrants through the maternity ward can hardly claim credit or accept blame for the character of their “nation”.
    Now, when it comes to pride in one’s state, there’s little to cavil about. At least in a democratic state, where the government is of the people, by the people, and for the people, individual persons can rationally be proud of what they each had a small hand in building and sustaining.
    Of course, my pedantic distinctions between “country”, “nation”, and “state” mean nothing in the popular discourse. So I can hardly fault CharlesWT for writing “I feel optimism for the country and disdain for government”, because he’s surely less pedantic than I am.
    –TP

  23. GfnNC: Yes, a thinko. My mind knows perfectly well that it’s “elements of worth”, and I said “worth” in my head, but typed “work”.
    I can’t even blame autocorrect.

  24. “[a nation is] a group of people united by a mistaken view about the past and a hatred of their neighbours”. [8]
    –Political historian Karl Deutsch
    Nationalism and its Alternatives
    ISBN 0-394-43763-2

  26. Benedict Anderson’s definition of a nation, which I found very useful over decades of teaching about nationalism:
    it is an imagined political community-and imagined as both inherently limited and sovereign. It is imagined because the members of even the smallest nation will never know most of their fellow-members, meet them, or even hear of them, yet in the minds of each lives the image of their communion…. Communities are to be distinguished, not by their falsity/genuineness, but by the style in which they are imagined…. Finally, [the nation] is imagined as a community, because, regardless of the actual inequality and exploitation that may prevail in each, the nation is conceived as a deep, horizontal comradeship.

  28. https://twitter.com/jysexton/status/881619803080986626
    uday trump junior, the racist anti-semite republican, is spreading rumors that the racist, anti-Semite republican reddit author of the video his presidential sperm donor father-in-name-only commissioned is 15-years old.
    The cuck perp is a middle-aged man.
    The cuck perp who hired him is 70 years old and polluting the linen in the White House.
    Meanwhile, yet another white Christian male assholeamerican republican represents ugly abroad. Can’t bring himself to say “Jew” or “Jewish” as he stands where some of his right wing constituents want to reenact the Holocaust, but make it more inclusive next time.
    https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2017/7/5/1678018/-Republican-Congressman-Clay-Higgins-records-political-commercial-inside-Auschwitz-gas-chamber

  30. I can remember being really frustrated with the way email was being used a decade or so ago. That frustration has waned significantly since. I don’t know if people, generally, became more mature about email or if the stupidity was simply redirected elsewhere as newer forms of communication came about.
    Is there any hope that people will become more mature about using social media, and that the kind of crap described in the last couple of comments will become less common?

  32. HSH, I think you’re right. The insanity merely moves around as new forms of communication become available. The good news is, it leaves the newest-1 forms available for the rest of us.

  33. Is there any hope that people will become more mature about using social media, and that the kind of crap described in the last couple of comments will become less common?
    is this a rhetorical question?

  35. Facebook seems to have replaced the “chain letter” emails I use to get.
    Absolutely. But I’ve even found that the use of email in the workplace has improved. I used to see and participate in raging debates with long emails going back and forth (almost like comment threads here sometimes get) over stuff that would be better settled face-to-face. That doesn’t seem to happen much these days.
    I think the few people who still try to use email that way just get ignored or tersely rebuffed now, so the flames don’t spread.

  37. There’s a particularly despicable type of Facebook denizen that post stock images of people, usually babies and children, suffering from serious ailments or disabilities. They give them a name and backstory. Then they plead for likes, shares, supportive comments for the identity they’ve created.

  38. This just happened:
    http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/renaissance-technologies-time-inc
    In the financial hands of insane conservative filth now … Mercer(nary). Here’s why and what comes next (You’ll have to read the entire thing):
    http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2017/07/03/the-national-enquirers-fervor-for-trump
    Mr Pecker’s (yes, we’re deep into a Dickensian/Pynchonian naming of the lurid, scum villains destroying America) trump-worshiping National Enquirer is my go-to reading now to keep abreast (that, too) of the goings on in the cheap, tawdry, tiny-handed reality show travesty that is the God King’s and republican party’s gutting of the United States of America to sell the pieces of it on Ebay like so many sexually explicit tchotchkes.
    Pecker, yes, Pecker will make of Time and Sports Illustrated and the other publications what he has made of the Enquirer and what trump and his virulent legions have made of social media.
    The NPR posting of the Declaration of Independence on Twitter and the taking of it by brainless conservative pond dwellers, whom I expect carry a copy themselves in their camo pockets for apparently infrequent reference, except for the passages on wanking, as liberal Alinsky twaddle is a beautiful thing to behold.
    I’m recently in receipt of Gibbon’s six volume set of “The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire” and I looked up “butt stupid” in the index to no avail, so the soon to appear “Decline and Fall of America” will apparently break new ground in plumbing the reasons for … the Occam’s Razor by which we are slitting our own throats … and the origins of the end of empires.

  40. But I’ve even found that the use of email in the workplace has improved.
    The last couple of large employers I had tended to attract legal actions. Not through wrong-doing on their part, it was just the nature of the businesses. Training hammered the point that e-mail was subject to discovery, so think twice about what you’d just written before hitting send.
    Always an interesting day when you get to work and your cubicle entry is blocked with yellow tape, and there’s a typed notice that your space is off limits until legal is done with things.

  44. I did this myself just yesterday at the airport. Disembarked from the private jet and .. wait … where the fuck is my limo, again, you bozos place it right in front of me:
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JECAjrP39Ag
    And I didn’t have Vincent Vega from Pulp Fiction helping me out either.
    Must have been snowing a blizzard on Air Force One for the absolutely cranked God King.

  50. I’m patriotic, so I hung a flag out on the porch. Upside down. Then I spent the day posting articles about Republican actions on my FB page.
    There is nothing too evil for people in large groups to do. Yes, it can happen here. And we are a good ways down the road to authoritarian corporate control, which means decision making based on short term profit, the values of a drug dealer. Rape and pillage. The death of the natural world and everything beautiful. We are headed for a distopia based on Social Darwinism and greed, the values of the Republican party.
    I am glad that I am old and have no children. I feel a great deal of contempt for the political aspect of the lives of those who vote Republican. I mean I condemn their participation in politics, but not other aspects of their lives and decision-making, but their failure of citizenship is every bit as bad as the failure of Germans in the lead up to Hitler, and with less excuse.
    Humans in large groups nearly always behave badly and over time as “civilization” “developed” human power has increased with no increase either in empathy or wisdom.
    I will keep fighting because, like I said, I’m patriotic. But I dont have any expectation of winning in the long run. The Republican party, as an instrument of the worst in human nature, has already set in place those elements necessary for the end of our experiment in representative government.

  51. I’m not that old, and I have kids. Other than that, WWS.
    The one hope I do have is that the demographic wave that’s been predicted to change the political landscape in the US will actually do so. I thought it was already happening in ’08. Either it wasn’t, or it’s a fits-and-starts sort of thing.

  52. the values of a drug dealer
    This is the best summary of the values of this era, in this country, that I have seen.
    Depressing as hell, but apt.

  53. Wonkie, I don’t have an argument with the values of (especially the libertarian branch of) the Republican Party today. In short, what Janie said.
    But it may help to bear in mind that their base of support is based on fighting a losing rear-guard action against the modern world.
    That is, their electoral strategy is based on exploiting nostalgia for the 1950s. (As with most nostalgias, it omits inconvenient-to-them bits like the tax rates.) As those who remember the 1950s pass from the scene, their base will increasingly erode. Not to zero (see the numbers who still are nostalgic for their myth of the Confederacy), but to the point where it is necessary to politicians to have a different base.
    For an example of what will happen, see the difference in attitudes towards gay marriage between evangelicals under 30 and those above. It will take a while for those who are willing to leave past bigotry on that issue behind rise to leadership positions. But it will happen. And note that that’s a very recent worldview shift; on other issues the process is actually further along, albeit going a bit more slowly.

  54. WWS.
    the thing I worry about regarding change via demographic shift are the folks who appear to be happy to burn the place down before they’ll concede to that kind of normal, inevitable social change.
    there are a lot of them.

  55. Here’s a small amusement, if only because it’s hypocrisy working in a direction that many of you will favor:

    Even Kobach himself, pressed by the Kansas City Star, said he won’t turn over Social Security information to his own commission.

    Here’s the guy who, as the leader of Trump’s Voting Commission, driving the request for voter information. You gotta love it when he announces that he, in his capacity as Kansas’ Secretary of State, will be among those refusing to comply.

  56. I hope all the people who have expressed great fear and consternation over the potential for a federal gun registry are similarly perturbed over this actual voting commission.

  60. Where were we talking about immigrants, and their value to the US? russell I think it was said how important he felt that the back and forth exchange of culture etc between immigrants and the host country was, and how much he valued it.
    This is an interesting New Yorker piece on a woman called Zainab Ahmad, a prosecutor for the The Eastern District of New York, who has prosecuted 13 terrorists from abroad, and never lost a case. She is joining Mueller’s team, and sounds to me like she’ll be a real asset. The following quotation is what made me think about our previous discussion:

    But the Trump Administration seems less interested, so far, in parrying threats than in demonizing Muslims, particularly immigrants and refugees. Besides everything else, this is a strategic mistake. As Ahmad says, “America is the most successful country in the world at integrating immigrants, and that helps keep us safe. Immigrant communities in Europe are much more ghettoized, much less warmly accepted. We do have a problem with people trying to join isis, but the number of people going from Belgium dwarfs the number going from here, even in absolute terms, let alone relative to our populations.”

    http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2017/05/15/taking-down-terrorists-in-court

  61. Rightwing authoritarians need an external and an internal enemy. I dont think any Republican politician has seriously been committed to preventing terrorism. Too useful In fact, essential. IF there were no real terrorists, they’d have to make them up

  62. Immigrants are important to all countries, not just the US. Now if various countries, including the US, would just stop creating refugee crises.

  75. “This is an interesting New Yorker piece on a woman called Zainab Ahmad, a prosecutor for the The Eastern District of New York, who has prosecuted 13 terrorists from abroad, and never lost a case.”
    She was an ultra-competent, formidable prosecutor, which is why she lost that job under the anti-American rubes now destroying America.
    Wait until things hot up and watch trump and company malign her cultural and religious background and her gender via social media as he moves to fire the lot of Mueller’s team.
    I wouldn’t doubt that ICE and Homeland Security will be sniffing around her family’s immigration paperwork.
    We’re dealing with traitorous scum. Expect the worst and combat it with even worse.

  77. If Donald Johnson was here, I ‘d ask him what he thinks of this:
    http://www.theamericanconservative.com/articles/why-trumps-un-ambassador-nikki-haley-is-dangerous
    I find it highly peculiar that anyone believed that trump, first, knew anything abut foreign, diplomatic and military policy, and second, that he would get one look at the shiny armaments we over-fund and not get a stiffy just thinking about the megatonnage of the explosions he could order from the ala carte menu.
    Conservatives are full of shit.

  78. There are few things more mystifying than that some people take professional wrestling seriously.

  79. From that American Conservative article:

    Haley has been shooting from the lip since she assumed office and, it has become clear, much of what she says goes without any vetting by the Trump administration. It is never clear whether she is speaking for herself or for the White House.

    It’s not obvious, at least to me, how you can tell if anyone In this administration is “speaking for the White House”. Or even, was doing so, before the latest 180 from there.

  80. If Donald Johnson was here, I ‘d ask him what he thinks of this
    I started reading that article and saw that the author had voted for Trump. Donald voted for Clinton, although he campaigned for Trump throughout the election.
    I’m sure he’d be pious, whatever he might say.

  81. If Donald Trump really wants to drain the Washington swamp and reduce interference in other nations, he might well continue that program by firing Nikki Haley. He could then appoint someone as UN ambassador who actually believes that the United States has to deal with other countries respectfully, not by constant bullying and threats.

    that’s adorable. Mr Giraldi’s eyes are still full of sparkles and moonbeams; his man-crush rages on.
    one morning, soon hopefully, he’ll wake up and realize that Trump is simply an empty-headed con-man who doesn’t know or care enough about foreign policy to have actual principles. and then he’ll realize that he’s been conned. and that will sting a bit. but, be glad of it, for that sting will only be the remnants of ignorance leaving the mind.

  82. then he’ll realize that he’s been conned.
    he might realize it but he’ll never cop to it

  90. Meanwhile, here people are openly referring to Angela Merkel as the Leader of the Free World (anachronistic as that description may be) and to the G19. May have been happening for a few months, but it still brings you up with a start.

  92. I suspect that your idea of respectable media may be different than mine in that case. For it to be G19 it has to include Putin and May, maybe the G17? But then Saudi Arabia, oh, and China. Let’s see, China gets to start worrying about climate change in 2030. So G15?
    South Korea may still depend on the US a bit so G14?
    You mean fair trade deals should exclude us? Every President in the last 25 years has whined about China dumping steel, but now we are being problematic.
    F@ck the respectable press.

  94. Marty, I feel your pain. Did you see that Ivanka was sitting in for Trump at one of the working sessions? One of the Russians tweeted a picture, which was quickly taken down, but can still be seen….

  95. Did you see that Ivanka was sitting in for Trump at one of the working sessions?
    i’m sure that’s totally cool in a very specific way that would not apply at all if, say, Chelsea Clinton were to sit in while her mother was busy doing something else.

  96. In all fairness, the G19 was said only half-seriously after Paris Accords stuff, but the Leader of the Free World thing was said seriously, albeit with wonder and a sense of “unbelievably, this is where we are”.

  97. She sat in for a few minutes when he had to step out. She didnt attend the meeting for him. The Polish first lady didnt refuse to shake his hand. Blah, blah.
    Back to trying to find an actual report of what was accomplished. Not written by Merkel or Putin.

  98. Marty, the issue is not how long she sat in (between Xi, May, Merkel) for, the issue is why was she sitting in at all? What is her expertise? What does she know about this issue? As cleek says, what would you have said if this had been Chelsea Clinton (although I think we can guess)?

  99. The issue is she can tell the Presudent what was said while he was gone. As far as expertise, she at least as expert as he is, it’s a world bank/financial conference, she may be more qualified than many of the people there. However, she didn’t say anything, just listened until he returned.
    What does Chelsea have to do with It? She may have sat in for her mother in some meetings depending on the topic, who knows? Podesta didn’t like her level of participation in the Foundation.

  100. “she at least as expert as he is.”
    Duly noted. She and my cat. I don’t have a cat at the moment, but it could be any cat.
    I good comeback to the Chelsea gambit, Marty, would have been to answer that SHE would have sat on/in Putin’s lap.
    I try to help.

  101. Yes, she can tell him what was said, and she may well be at least (or more) expert than he. But what makes you say she may be more qualified than many of the people there? You know, it is the practice of most leaders to take aides who are expert or at least very knowledgeable in the fields which are to be discussed – don’t you think that might be a better plan?
    And as for the Chelsea question, it is a thought experiment. If HRC were President, and Chelsea sat in for her, what do you think you, or other rightwingers might have said about it? Be honest.

  103. We wouldn’t have heard about Chelsea sitting in a few minutes for Hillary in a side meeting at the G20. Especially if Chelsea was, in fact, an advisor to the President as Ivanka is.
    The thought experiment might be valid if you ask if clearly biased right wing “news” orgs would try to make a big deal out of it. I would imagine that happening, just like the opposite here.

  104. We wouldn’t have heard about Chelsea sitting in a few minutes for Hillary in a side meeting at the G20. Especially if Chelsea was, in fact, an advisor to the President as Ivanka is.
    Aha, this seems to assume that the rest of the world (or the G20) would be prejudiced in HRC’s favour and wanting to protect her (apart from the fact that this was tweeted by a Russian). Why on earth do you think this might be (only a small amount of snark intended).

  107. I’m not sure what it has to do with the rest of the G20, people tweet stuff all the time. CBS news decides it’s the lead on coverage of the meeting.

  108. Marty, it’s in the UK press and the Australian press, and no doubt many other countries’ press. Nobody is really saying that Ivanka did anything wrong, what people are asking is how come nobody better (more qualified, informed etc) was available. It comes down to the same point as the fact that Trump had to scramble to get hotel accommodation: the whole administration is staffed by amateurs who, to use a British idiom, couldn’t organise a piss-up in a brewery. And, even more saliently, how come the US is valuing international affairs so little that this level of informed engagement is considered adequate? On top of the unbelievable mess in the State Department, it is a ghastly and vivid symbol of the decline of American power and influence.

  109. They are trying to catch up with trump’s house organs, the National Enquirer, FOX, and Brietbart.
    It’s just business.

  110. Besides, what’s the problem with fake news coming to us via Russia? The American people, enlightened as they are, had no problem with being fed fake news about Clinton by the russians/republicans/trump to steal an election.
    You mean, they might believe THIS, too?
    A tweet from Ann Navarro:
    “Telling that pic of Ivanka at G-20 table was posted by Russian staff. Russians knew would: 1. be deemed controversial; 2. get us going in US”

  112. Ghastly symbol of the decline of American influence? Potentially, but that didn’t happen in the last six months.
    First, I believe the decline of American influence has been greatly exaggerated. Second, the purpose of the EU was in large part to reduce US influence. Third, going along and supporting Paris so we would have agreed with everyone isn’t demonstrating influence anyway. Fourth, at home we have the hand wringing over the defense budget competing with the hand wringing over our diminishing influnce, by the same people.
    Aside from our military, US influence is entirely based on having a large consumer base that everyone in the world wants a piece of. As other countries consumer markets grow our influence shrinks, has been for a long time. The facade of influence has been granted because our military still is the main protection for the free west, including Japan. So, the EU and Japan cut a trade deal, how did that hurts the US? Were we against them cutting a bilateral trade deal? Sans Trump, did they care if we objected?
    Both China and Russia want to wield more influence, at the expense of freedom. Which military power do you want protecting you? The English are almost the only EU people who have actually acted like our friends for decades anyway.

  114. Ivanka sat in on and had nothing to say regarding the G-20 segment discussion on African development.
    trump apparently had to make an emergency transatlantic call to HUD’s Ben Carson to tell him (actually to first ask him what an “Africa” is) to get a move on shutting down public housing in Queens so the former’s son-in-law can and raze and re-develop the properties for non-African luxury apartments.

  115. “And I am not excited about CBS becoming Breitbart, or even CNN.”
    We are unexcited, but the market decides.
    “So, the EU and Japan cut a trade deal, how did that hurts the US? Were we against them cutting a bilateral trade deal? Sans Trump, did they care if we objected?”
    https://search.yahoo.com/yhs/search?p=what+does+the+trump+admin+think+of+the+EU-Japan+trade+deal&ei=UTF-8&hspart=mozilla&hsimp=yhs-001
    If we’re lucky, trump will tweet about it soon.

  116. “couldn’t organise a piss-up in a brewery.”
    To be fair, I’ve had a couple of highly disorganized piss-ups in breweries.

  117. Just to say that if the US needs my washing machine to sit in a meeting for them, I’d be happy to lend it, free of charge. In the spirit of internatinal co-operation.

  118. I’m going to go out on a limb, and assert that O would rather sit in on a meeting, any meeting, with either Ivanka or Pro Bono’s washing machine, rather than with trump.
    Comey and I have that in common.

  122. going along and supporting Paris so we would have agreed with everyone isn’t demonstrating influence anyway.
    That would not have been the point of going along with it, and you are right, it would not have demonstrated influence, but pulling out of it demonstrated catastrophically that your country is in the grip of corrupt, science-denying ignoramuses, who are in the pockets of commercial interests who put profit over the interests of safeguarding the global environment for the future of the world’s citizens, including their own. And this leads to a dramatic loss of influence.
    Both China and Russia want to wield more influence, at the expense of freedom.
    At whatever expense, this is true, and very upsettingly being enabled by the fact of the Trump presidency. You seem to have no concept of how much the election of this corrupt cretin has lowered opinions of America in the eyes of the rest of the world. I remember you saying when we were arguing before the election that you didn’t care what the rest of the world thought: this, if true, is a great piece of luck for you, since:

    According to a new Pew Research Center survey [June 26 2017] spanning 37 nations, a median of just 22% has confidence in Trump to do the right thing when it comes to international affairs. This stands in contrast to the final years of Barack Obama’s presidency, when a median of 64% expressed confidence in Trump’s predecessor to direct America’s role in the world.

    However, many Americans did seem to care when during the campaign Trump harped on how the rest of the world had lost respect for the US, and how he would bring it back.
    Of course America’s pre-eminence in the world was slowly shrinking for years anyway for several reasons, partly by virtue of the respective rise of eastern economies, and no doubt for many other complex reasons too. But I think you greatly underestimate what was the extent of America’s “soft power”, and how it is currently being decimated. From today’s Guardian, I was going to do excerpts, but really it’s not long, and the last 5 paragraphs in particular are germane:
    https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/jul/07/trump-putin-america-soft-power-g20-summit
    But really Marty, I think you oversimplify the feelings of most of Europe (and the UK if it comes to that) when you say The English are almost the only EU people who have actually acted like our friends for decades anyway. It’s all generalisation, of course, but I think the very complicated feelings about America of many Europeans, and in fact other world citizens, are composed of resentment, admiration, envy and affection. The wholesale consumption of American culture worldwide effortlessly indoctrinates world youth with at least some American attitudes, America has until very recently (even under the widely reviled Dubya) been able to muster reasonable coalitions for its military adventures, and the worlwide reaction after 9/11 should show you that anti-Americanism is just a small part of the very complicated picture.

  124. Just so, the only person disliked in Germany as much as Putin and slightly less than Trump is May. The complicated feelings of many Americans toward the EU is resentment and distrust.
    We spend billions on the common defense and Merkel and gang do nothing but talk us down in any point of disagreement.
    We ask NATO countries to abide by the NATO agreement and suddenly we aren’t dependable.
    You are right, I don’t care much what “they” think of us. They liked Obama because he promised everything to everybody all at our expense, that sounds familiar. That isn’t respect.
    Our soft power is an illusion, promulgated to continue taking advantage. In the throes of the financial crisis no one supported us, in fact they threatened to change the base currency away from the dollar. We want an equal playing field for steel, or a border tax, which every one in the world has, and suddenly we are starting a trade war. Just a note, that wars been going on for centuries and we’re losing.
    The Paris climate accords weren’t about climate, in fact they have almost no enforcement and little real impact, except to ensure our businessess were less competitive.
    The view from your side of the Atlantic matters, to me, only to the extent support is two way. So I do care what people in the UK think, but policy by policy they tend to agree with our Republicans. As do most of Europe when Trumps name is taken out.

  125. We wouldn’t have heard about Chelsea sitting in a few minutes for Hillary in a side meeting at the G20. Especially if Chelsea was, in fact, an advisor to the President as Ivanka is.
    Correct, we wouldn’t. Because it wouldn’t happen, and didn’t happen. Because she wasn’t.

  126. The complicated feelings of many Americans toward the EU is resentment and distrust.
    As it happens, I’m American, born and raised, and I have no feelings of resentment or mistrust toward the EU.
    As always, speak for yourself. You do not speak for me.
    Our soft power is an illusion
    What we present now is a farce.

  127. I doubt many Americans know what EU means. They might sat “Ewww!” when asked about it, but they don’t know what it is.
    Hillary Clinton may be so diabolical that she dressed and made up Chelsea to look precisely like Ivanka and smuggled her into the meeting with Merkel’s help.

  128. I’ve mentioned before that your defence spending is hardly altruistic, but partly a function of the stranglehold the military-industrial complex has on your pols. Trump’s predecessors also pressed on the 2% – your not being dependable was largely a result of Trump’s failure (until now) to endorse Article 5, and other appalling utterances (remember NATO being obsolete?). What else? Ah yes, Obama. I know this is very hard for you to believe, Marty, but he was widely perceived, all over the world, as an intelligent, decent man with reasonable, humane, democratic ideals, trying to do the right thing in the face of hugely complex international situations which he did not always handle perfectly (though better than his predecessor) and intractable and often racist hostility domestically which he tried as best he could to circumnavigate in pursuit of the common good. This may seem incredible to you, but I assure you it is true. As for May’s unpopularity in Germany and Europe generally, it is very understandable, she persists in touting the “hardest” form of Brexit, despite having been a Remainer, and despite not having won much of a mandate for it in an election she called after justifying it partly by scaremongering about Brussels. I’m on my phone, so cannot go on, but I promise you: without Trump all would not be sweetness and light, but with him, disaster looms closer, for you all as well as the world, and the world knows it.

  129. russell, you can quit correcting my generalizations, I stipulate none of them apply to you. It’s tiresome you think it’s necessary to make that clarification.

  130. it’s tiresome that you confuse your own opinions with what “Americans think”.
    if you want to “stipulate”, maybe stipulate that you speak for youself.
    you seem to know all about what folks in Europe think, too. They might be surprised to find themselves supporters of the American (R) agenda.
    Maybe ask them what they think.
    As far as the EU member states’ commitment to the common defense, I’m put in mind of the old joke about chickens, pigs, and a bacon and egg breakfast.
    chickens are involved, pigs are committed. har har!
    we’re involved. the EU member states are committed.

  131. Trying to get to sleep, but needed to grab the phone and add: if you think people, of almost any political persuasion in the UK, agree with most US R positions you are deluded. From health care, to regulations (environmental and otherwise), to guns (especially guns!), almost anybody in the UK, left or right (I canvass both) who cares to know about the US thinks the current Republican party (even pre-Trump) is nuts.

  133. Nobody is really saying that Ivanka did anything wrong, what people are asking is how come nobody better (more qualified, informed etc) was available
    what I personally am asking is why Ivanka has bugger-all to do with the foreign policy, economic policy, or governance of the United States at all.
    Maybe Trump’s cousin Eddie should be part of international agricultural policy. He’s got a great garden, you should see his tomatoes.

  134. Gotta  from our military, US influence is entirely based on having a large consumer base that everyone in the world wants a piece of.
    Gotta call bullsh*t on that. US influence is (was) based far more on the ideals we were supporting. Our military is great, but it can’t be everywhere. Our economy is big, but not so much that people will pay any price for part of it. And if our so-called economic nationalists have their way, it’s going to be a lot less attractive; the world can do without us far more easily than our economy can do without them.
    No, our influence is based in all those things that Trump is determined to pis away. If he succeeds (which I don’t think he will; at least not completely), we’ll start looking like the homes of his best buds: Putin, Erdogan, etc. Sad!

  138. http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/xi-trump-taiwan-china-g20
    Kelly Ann Whyconsomeofthepeoplewhenyoucanconallofthepeoplealltheway told trump afterwards: “It’s Chinatown, Jake. Forget it.”
    trump said “Don’t call me, Jake. And order out for the chop suey at Tokyo Bowl. Hold the chop and hold the suey, but bring me ketchup. And call that band, what is it, the Slopes, or is it the Karaoke Kamikazis? Tell em finally I can talk like I think.”
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nT6_JKtiSUY&list=PLB15rDNBS7WtwIqdAB25f1gjsARxeCZc3&index=5

  140. US influence is entirely based on having a large consumer base that everyone in the world wants a piece of.
    to the degree that this is true, we are on increasingly thin ice.
    the EU as a whole is a larger consumer market than the US. The BRIC countries are, individually, smaller, but China and India each have an emerging middle (and upper) class that present very large and attractive consumer markets to the rest of the world.
    we better be bringing more to the table than shopping carts. not least because a hell of a lot of people here don’t have much money.

  141. not least because a hell of a lot of people here don’t have much money.
    Maybe a cite would be worthwhile here. I actually think that people in the US are, for the most part (maybe not for long), doing okay compared to the rest of the world. In many ways they aren’t, of course. Health insurance is a big problem, but [thanks to Obama] we actually came out of 2008 in relatively good shape compared to most nations.
    I made a “churlish” comment regarding Donald Johnson earlier. He could visit, and refute it, but why would he? His beef has always been with “imperfect” Democrats, never with catastrophic, Nazi-style [is that okay with you GftNC, adding “style”?] R’s. Of course, he thinks they’re worse. But why should he join our chorus against them? He wants only to be a voice in the wilderness. Why be with the sell-outs?
    We could actually oppose Trump, but so many of us, including people like Donald Johnson, are turning a blind eye to Trump’s collusion with Russia, and the real problems of bots, voter suppression and other forms of organized disenfranchisement.
    Churlish, count? No, I’m pissed, and sad.

  142. Nazi-style? Not OK with me, in the unlikely event I am the arbiter. Malevolent keystone-cop-style more like. Don’t forget that one of the unfortunate hallmarks of the nazis was their efficiency. And as for Donald Johnson, when does the statute of limitation kick in?

  146. another
    hey, look at that… US seniors and children have the same poverty rate! equality!
    none of the other countries can say that. we’re exceptional.

  148. I’ve been mulling Marty’s 08.25 p.m. ever since I read it, and want to go into it a little. But I want to stress that I am not in any way getting at Marty, who in my opinion has a hard row to hoe hereabouts, and does it, often, with great grace and, moreover, to our advantage. But my question to him, and to anybody else who has a better memory than I do is this.
    In his post, I noted the following phrases “We spend billions on the common defense and Merkel and gang do nothing but talk us down in any point of disagreement” and “They liked Obama because he promised everything to everybody all at our expense, that sounds familiar.” and “Our soft power is an illusion, promulgated to continue taking advantage” and “Just a note, that wars been going on for centuries and we’re losing.”
    These phrases depict a tremendously paranoid vision of the world’s relationship with America, and a certainty that world statemen’s positive feelings, statements etc about America are fake, and merely a front for a determination to take advantage of America and do it down. They convey a tremendous sense of insecurity, and victimhood really, about America’s place in the world and the supposed attitude of foreigners to America.
    In the spirit of full disclosure, I must admit that international attitudes towards America certainly took a dive during the Dubya presidency (Dubya, who now looks like a statesman compared to Trump). But it is my contention that he was seen as a complete aberration, and that the world breathed a sigh of relief and went back to business as usual as soon as he departed, with what I have already described as very mixed attitudes to the US, but with plenty of good stuff mixed in.
    Now, my point is this. These feelings of paranoia and insecurity as revealed in Marty’s post are very familiar to us now from Trump’s rhetoric, and the rhetoric of his friends and supporters in the media and elsewhere. But Marty did not vote for Trump, and in fact spoke vehemently against him in the lead-up to the election. He doesn’t watch Fox, he supports very different healthcare solutions from typical Trump supporters, and he seems to me in no way a typical Trumpy. So where did all this paranoia and sense of victimhood come from? Did Marty always talk this way, or is the Trump rhetoric getting to him? Can Marty elucidate, or does anybody else remember?

  149. Did Marty always talk this way, or is the Trump rhetoric getting to him?

    Hillary is another level of evil beyond Trump. He is crass, a blowhard, a racist and completely unlikeable for sixty percent of the population.
    She is a malevolent human being under the guise of an incredibly good politician. Her level of evil has no regard for the rules everyone else plays by. She,and many who support her, confuse her ability to hide a smoking gun with innocence. The outcome of investigations that say we can’t make charges stick in court but she is clearly implicated (every one of them) get transformed into statements completely exonerating her through magical thinking.

  150. No, no cleek, I remember his anti-HRC rhetoric very well: I took part in an extended back and forth with him about it once. What I was getting at (poorly, obviously) was whether this paranoid, victim-ish view of the world’s attitude towards the US is new, or whether he always thought this?

  151. Trump swallows Putin’s load (of crap).

    I strongly pressed President Putin twice about Russian meddling in our election. He vehemently denied it. I’ve already given my opinion…

  152. Did Marty always talk this way, or is the Trump rhetoric getting to him?
    In my experience, Marty has always talked this way, and about pretty much everything, not just how foreigners see America.
    From 2009, Marty quoting me and replying:

    “We have been all over this recently, at which time I offered a link that listed quite a few more than “several” benefits (the tally is roughly 1400 between federal and state) that unmarried couples don’t have,”

    So my point is completely accurate, the discrimination is equally applied to all non married people. So instead of solving that problem, we will declare another set of people as “married”, they will get theirs and screww the rest.

    That was an epic thread in which “the rest,” who were getting “screwwed,” were people like Marty’s unmarried son and his girlfriend, who did not have the rights of married people (by definition, since for reasons unknown to anyone in the thread but Marty, they were not married).
    When it was pointed out that what gay people were seeking was a right that Marty’s unmarried son and his girlfriend already had (to go down to the town hall and get married), Marty ignored the point.
    In Marty-world, Marty, or someone Marty approves of, always has a bigger grievance than you do, and if you’re paying attention to your own grievance and not the Marty-approved one, you’re a POS. This is a game I got tired of a very long time ago, which is why I generally ignore Marty.

  153. I hear you JanieM, but I am currently particularly interested in this “the whole world is taking us for a ride” stuff, which is obviously a large part of what appeals to Trump’s base. I don’t remember so much of this in general pre-Trump, but given that Marty was pretty much a never-Trumper, I am curious as to whether he has absorbed this specific shtick from the culture since Trump, or whether he always thought it. If the former, I find it particularly alarming (see Germany pre-1932 – sapient will be delighted). So I’m very much hoping Marty always thought this, no matter how misguided I think it, but so far no evidence either way.

  154. But it is my contention that he was seen as a complete aberration
    He was a fairly familiar figure – a familiar type – to folks living here. We just haven’t usually elected folks like that to the office of POTUS.
    Regarding the paranoid tone of Marty’s comments, they are dead normal for a very large number of Americans. As is true of you, not looking to jump ugly on Marty, just using his comments as typical of a lot of American thought.
    They’re taking advantage of us, why are we paying for this stuff that we don’t get anything out of. We do everything for everyone, all they do is run us down and hate us.
    Internationally, domestically, same/same.
    They’re taking my stuff and giving it to that guy over there.
    There are, in fact, situations where “they” are “taking our stuff” and “giving it to that guy over there”. So, if you want to see things that way, you can find whatever corroboration you need.
    But it seems, to me, a fairly limited way of seeing things.
    Americans are prone to it, and I don’t know why. Mostly I think we’re too used to thinking of ourselves as special, but I’m not a mind-reader, so that’s about as much as I can say about it.
    Whatever the reasons for it, it gets in the way. IMO.
    Imagine how somebody else might see things, then bring that back to your own thought process. Things look different. It’s not that big of a lift, IMO, but lots of folks don’t care to do it.

  155. I find it interesting that, outside the (for want of a better term) commentariate, the level of paranoia about foreigners seems to be inversely proportional to the amount of exposure.
    Once you get away from those who spout opinions for a living, people who have traveled and met real live people elsewhere are far less likely to believe the (paranoid) worst about them. Similarly, the level of hysteria about Hispanic immigrants (legal or otherwise) is inversely related to the number of such immigrants locally. (Ditto for the number of Muslims that an individual has personally met.)
    I suppose that, at its root, it’s the same phenomena that caused opposition to gay marriage to plummet: fear of the unknown and greater comfort with the familiar. There are individual exceptions, of course. But the general pattern is clear.

  156. Yes, a complete aberration as POTUS, that’s what I meant.
    So this sense of victimhood is common in the UK as well – it largely fuelled the anti-immigration wing of the Brexiteers. It’s regrettable, and IMHO usually incorrect (takes no account of e.g.the financial benefits to the state of immigration

  157. I think Marty is like the sparring partner who gets in the ring with boxers at the training gym.
    He certainly doesn’t have a glass jaw. And he doesn’t stay down for long.
    He keeps us in trim and our chops up.
    I wish McKT would put the pads back on and show up and go a few rounds for old times’ sake.

  158. I am currently particularly interested in this “the whole world is taking us for a ride” stuff, which is obviously a large part of what appeals to Trump’s base.
    This won’t really answer your question, certainly as regards Marty, but I honestly don’t think a lot of Trump’s “base” ever thinks about the rest of the world. It’s the domestic threats they’re obsessed with: “those” people, whether brown people, poor people sucking off the government teat etc., or us horrible liberals. The rest of the world comes into people’s thoughts mostly in relation to the question of whether we’re going to let terrorists (like bright female Afghan robot-builders) into the country to murder us all.
    This is all — totally admittedly — just my impression, and totally anecdotal. But I just think most Americans don’t pay a whole lot of mind to that lesser realm outside our borders. I could give example after example from conversations I’ve had over the past decades, but it would all be anecdata so I won’t bother.
    I just went to the doctor a couple of days ago — new guy, maybe temporary, and I won’t see him again in any case for reasons that will become clear in a moment; anyhow I’m waiting for the new doc to show up in this practice so I will again have someone who’s “mine” for a few years.
    When we were done with my minor medical complaint, I did something I now regret, which was to ask the guy — with apologies — where he was from (I’m much more careful about this with people who clearly aren’t native English speakers!!! silly me!), because he had the trace of an accent that could have come straight out of my home town. (Language is one of my obsessions. So is ethnicity, for that matter, but since so many people react to questions about ethnicity poorly, I mostly leave it alone until I know someone a bit. I’m still fascinated by where people came from, how they got here, etc. In my own mind, it’s in a good way. But not everyone sees it that way. Topic for another time.)
    Turns out he was indeed from that general area of the country. But his answer to my question quickly morphed into a rant about the (Democratic) governor of his home state, and how he (the “doc” — actually a PA) was never going back there, because they tax the whole state to support the cities, plus the governor pushed through a gun control bill after Newtown, and look out (a warning to me — totally assuming i was with him every step of the way) because this guy, the gov, was sure to run for president in 2020.
    I was stunned. I am still trying to decide whether to tell someone about this conversation, because it was — IMO — inappropriate (to understate the case a great deal) in any context between strangers given the political climate in this country, but how much more so in a medical context…?
    No. But he ranted about guns in such a way that honestly, I’m even afraid to “report” him — although all I would like to accomplish was to get someone to educate him a bit about how to conduct himself in a professional context.
    That encounter put me over another edge about what’s going on in this country. But my original point in bringing it up was that his rant was totally domestic. Not a word about furriners not respecting us enough.
    Could go on but probably shouldn’t.

  159. Sorry, posted too soon (fat finger syndrome on phone). Close brackets, then: but although these attitudes are common, when they are growing in the population it makes me very nervous, because a financially suffering population with growing feelings of this sort are easily manipulated by an authoritarian strongman. So I was trying to see if someone who may not have felt this way before feels it now. But clearly I am majorly failing to explain myself, so I am retiring embarrassed (not very embarrassed)!

  161. I feel like Bruce Willis in The Sixth Sense! I know it’s always been around, I want to know if it’s growing in the population because of Trump and his media coverage. I thought if Marty didn’t think it before but thinks it now it would prove something alarming. I’m now going to go and eat some worms….

  162. It’s good that Hofstadter said explicitly that this is not limited to the right wing. Because it is beautifully describes, for example, the anti-vaxers. Heated exaggeration – check. Suspiciousness – check. Conspiratorial fantasy – check.
    Actually I think that last is what makes the whole thing so toxic. You can calm down heated exaggeration. You can allay suspicions. But with a conspiracy fantasy there is, in my experience, simply no way to break thru.

  163. it’s only growing in the sense that the GOP base is committed to doing everything it can to defend and justify every dumb-ass statement Trump makes and action he takes.
    we have to kill all the radical Muslims, for the sake of Western Civilization™ but we can’t be the world’s policeman! we MUST be friends with Russia! so what if they hacked our election?
    not defending him would concede that liberals are right. and that will not do.
    but, yes, there’s always been a deep vein of isolationism and paranoia on the right. it was rarely represented in the WH or the media. but now it’s getting some air time.

  164. GftNC — spicy worms, worms with chocolate sauce…? 😉
    I doubt there’s a good way to know whether it’s growing in the population. And even if Marty didn’t think it before but thinks it now, that’s just one data point, and one relating to someone who obviously pays attention in what I think is a relatively sophisticated way.
    I have never in my life — including the fact that I have some fairly right-wing and *very* resentful people in my close circle of family and friends — heard anyone fussing about other countries taking advantage of us. It’s all about the welfare queen slapping her card on the pharmacist’s counter to get drugs that whoever-is-speaking has worked hard to earn the money to pay for. It’s all about you-know-who getting uppity and daring to have grievances 150+ years after the Civil War. It’s all about the vile “liberals” or the democrat party….
    Etc. etc.
    I think I get what you’re alarmed about, and I do agree that there’s the potential for Trump’s idiot xenophobia to take hold and become something very scary. But I also feel that
    1) there’s plenty of domestic stuff much higher on the list; and
    2) if it happens it’s most likely to have to do with North Korea.
    Now that’s a terrifying prospect.

  165. Thank you JanieM. I do know it would only be one data point, but as must have become apparent over the last few years, I am rather fond of anecdotes and maybe have a propensity to give anecdata more weight than I should – I guess it comes from a fatally unscientific education. However, to make up for it, I probably have way too much respect for scientists 🙂

  168. Similarly, the level of hysteria about Hispanic immigrants (legal or otherwise) is inversely related to the number of such immigrants locally.
    In my area, the level of animosity toward Hispanics seems most strongly correlated with (a) whether your folks were immigrants about two generations ago (French Canadian, Irish), and (b) whether the Hispanics are living in a neighborhood that was a former enclave of your forbear’s immigrant cohort.
    “It was nice when we lived there! We would never do X, Y, or Z!”
    I put it down to a lack of self-awareness, but I really don’t know what the issue is there. It’s a complicated dynamic.
    Oddly, some folks – Portuguese, for example – seem less prone to this attitude. Maybe because they’ve been here so long, English-speaking people are the newcomers from their point of view.
    There’s probably a master’s thesis in there somewhere for an interested party.
    As far as how Trump supporters regard the rest of the world, in the words of my Trump-voting niece, “I don’t care about other countries”.
    Most of the folks I know who voted for Trump basically see the US as the best country in the world, probably the best country that ever existed, and have little or no interest in any other place. Full stop.

  169. I am trying to think of how long some of these views have been a part of my world outlook at some level. Three time/dimensions.
    There is less talk about the U.N. these days, but having 149 countries regularly send someone to N.Y. to badmouth the US has happened most of my life. Without the UK ad an ally who knows what damage would have been done there. So there’s that.
    When I was in college there was a fairly large group of wealthy Iranian students, and othet foreign students, who spent most of there time in the student union talking about how the US sucks, right up until their student visas started to run out and they realized they had no country to go home to, they weren’t popular after the fall.
    When I started to compete on a regular basis with countries who could hire workers for $3-5 an hour and treat them like slave labor in countries that regularly subsidized every industry from textiles to steel to programming so they could trash our economy yet any economic defense for our workers was called starting a trade war.
    (France’s constant need to express it’s own insecurity by trashing the US is another topic.)
    Just some factual events that over the course of a lifetime shaped my views of how the world views us.
    On another note, Trump made the stupidest tweet I have ever seen today, making me wonder if he is trying to get impeached. Impregnable cybersecurity what?

  170. Janie M:
    Did your doctor at any point ask you what you wanted for Christmas?
    I wonder if that doctor offers rectal exams when he visits the gun range.

  171. Marty, you’re a champ, no matter how much our world views differ (always excepting our views on Dylan). Thank you for giving my question some thought. I will now go check out that Trump tweet…

  172. France’s constant need to express it’s own insecurity by trashing the US is another topic.
    And what does it say about our own level of insecurity that we (some of us) feel a constant need to trash other countries (whether just some, or all of them collectively, e.g. the UN) and their inhabitants? It’s hard to see that any of them are a real threat to the nation — however damaging they might be to some individuals.

  173. When I started to compete on a regular basis with countries who could hire workers for $3-5 an hour and treat them like slave labor in countries that regularly subsidized every industry from textiles to steel to programming so they could trash our economy yet any economic defense for our workers was called starting a trade war.
    My point of view is that countries wanting to sell us goods below cost are no worse than Walmart wanting to sell me a TV at half price.

  174. But with a conspiracy fantasy there is, in my experience, simply no way to break thru.
    …but, but, but CHEM TRAILS!!!!

  175. but having 149 countries regularly send someone to N.Y. to badmouth the US has happened most of my life.
    any chance any of those countries had valid complaints?

  176. When I was in college there was a fairly large group of wealthy Iranian students
    when I was in college, there were two groups of Iranian students.
    one group were kids who came from wealthy families who supported the shah. they lived pretty well. i don’t remember them complaining about the US sucking, specifically. some of them would complain about stuff in a general rich-kid ennui way. or maybe just a college-kid ennui way. most of them seemed pretty happy wih their lot.
    the other group were kids who did not support the shah, and who would periodically protest US support for the shah while wearing masks, so that SAVAK could not identify them and either hunt them down and kill them in this country, or else persecute or imprison their family members back home.
    they did complain about the US bu it was pretty specifially directed toward our support of the shah.
    my landlord at one point worked in the administration of a local private prep school. one of the kids their was Iranian, his folks were plugged in with the shah’s government in some way. after the fall, his folks used to smuggle money to him by inserting cash in between the layers of polaroid snapshots.
    so, he had lots to complain about, too, but i think he was mostly just scared for his family who were still in iran.
    always multiple sides to a story.

  177. When I started to compete on a regular basis with countries who could hire workers for $3-5 an hour and treat them like slave labor
    sometimes when this kind of point comes up (not just from Marty) it makes me think about the history of the area i live and work in.
    industrialization in this country began aound here, i.e. new england. fast running water, access to shipping, cheap immigrant labor.
    then the cheap immigrant labor unionized and the factories moved… south, to right-to-work states that were hoastile to unionization and workplace safety regulations, and where they could pay cheap wages to people who’d rather do factory work than stay on the farm.
    over the years i’ve worked in a number of re-purposed mill buildings. i’ve lived in apatments that were originally built to house the immigrants who worked in those mills. when i first moved here, i worked as a waiter in a place that had a big afternoon rush of people coming in for their end-of-shift cocktail. it was the first time i saw guys salt their beer.
    it was a whole way of life, sustained whole communities, and then it went away. because of cheap labor in NC and SC and GA and AL and who knows where else.
    that was replaced around here with more technical manufacturing, until that moved… elsewhere, mostly overseas I guess, where labor was cheaper. nowadays i work in a space formerly occupied by the R&D and manufacturing groups of Sylvania lighting.
    i don’t know where that work went, probably China.
    you’re right, those kinds of “trade wars” have been going on for a long time. not just between countries.
    we could take steps to prevent stuff like that, but no without putting restrictions on corporations and the movement of capital in general. which we don’t seem to want to do.
    and to Charles’ point, we probably wouldn’t have cheap stuff anymore either.
    you can get a mobile phone for a couple of hundred bucks that you can run your whole life off of. if you want to keep manufacturing of that stuff in the US, and pay people $25/hour to do the work, you’ll probably pay a grand for the same phone.

  178. Sure russell, my side was if they didn’t like the US so much they should take their fancy cars and go home, or quit being a prick.
    Setting a lifetime view that you don’t come here and then f’ing complain about how we do things. That goes along with taking our money and our lives and then demeaning our second class Democracy(that’s a Europe complaint). Don’t bitch because you have to learn English. Don’t bitch because you have to carry id. I have to, every day. Don’t bitch because there is a legal way to get to be here. Just don’t bitch. Follow the rules or go home. Don’t get a bunch of illegal immigrants together and have a protest. You can do that the day you get a f’ng green card.
    Don’t ask us to free your country and then blame us because you kill each other in the tens of thousands and then when we try to help with that don’t bitch because we happen to kill a few innocent bystanders despite our best efforts not to.
    Come to think about, now that you have me thinking, there are a thousand insults I could come up with that have been levelled at the US. But mostly, everyone from everywhere seems like it is their right to criticize the US. Fix your own damn country, we’ll worry about ours. If you don’t like ours, stay home and don’t take our money or our soldiers lives.
    Our “influence” has killed way too many Americans for the treatment we got from the G19.
    If our influence is so weak that demanding fair trade deals and not signing a stupidly unfair economic treaty cloaked as a climate change deal puts it at risk, we didn’t have any in the first place.

  179. For clarification, none of that was an objection to GftNC or anyone on this blog having an opinion. There is a difference in discussing things in a forum meant for it and the specific offenses I am talking about.

  180. I’ve lived and traveled abroad and if you want to hear kvetching about the locals and their countries and customs and ways of doing things, get together with your fellow Americans, not the tourists much, but the expats and others in country for any length of time on foreign soil.
    Comes with the territory. It’s called culture shock.
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3SQGTufqOBQ
    Or, if you prefer a straighter version, played not for laughs with the tables turned and a Saudi doing the kvetching to an American host:
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wS4IExv3b1U
    And college students dissing everything? All universities should have a sign up over the entrance stating: “This is your chance to complain about everything under the sun and get if off your chests, kids, because no one is going to give shit what you say or think once you leave here! In some horrible places in the world they will kill you for your trouble. In the U.S., it’s even worse … you’ll be ignored.”
    i guess that would be more like a billboard.

  181. Sure russell, my side was if they didn’t like the US so much they should take their fancy cars and go home, or quit being a prick.
    Everybody’s got a side.
    Just don’t bitch.
    Everybody bitches, too.
    Not discounting your point, it’s reasonable. I guess I just don’t see that it makes sense to build a whole world view around it.
    Americans who go to other countries complain about those countries. All the time. Some people come here and love it, some people come here and bitch about everything.
    Because some people just bitch about everything.
    As far as the American lives spent thing, I’m pretty sure we’ve had interests of our own in view every time we’ve put American lives at risk. I’m hard pressed to think of an exception.
    If your argument here is harking back to WWII, talk to any Russian about what that war cost. Everybody’s got a story.
    As far as the G20 goes, Trump’s kind of an ass, and people respond to that, as that. We got some language in the trade deal stuff that we wanted. So your concerns on that point were addressed, at least to some degree. And “to some degree” is as much as any reasonable party should expect when you’re meeting with 19 other parties who also have a stake.
    Everybody else in the freaking world moved ahead with the Paris climate change stuff in spite of Trump’s lack of interest because everybody else in the freaking world except us finds the idea that some kind of action is needed to be utterly uncontroversial.
    We’re the odd man out there, because we choose to be.
    Who knows, maybe the whole climate change thing will turn out to be nothing but hot air (ha ha!). Trump will be seen by future generations as a visionary genius.
    What I’m getting at in all of this is that everyone has a point of view, that is formed by their own experience and history. You have yours, I have mine, people who live in other places have theirs.
    People who live in other countries don’t actually owe us their undying gratitude or loyalty. They have their own agendas, and should have their own agendas. In a fairly large shitload of cases, folks who live in other countries and other parts of the world have reason to complain about the US, both from their point of view and objectively.
    We can get all pissy and defensive about that, or we can try to understand what their concerns are. And we don’t have to piss away our own self-interest to do that.
    The advantage of trying to understand where they are coming from, and of treating their concerns with the respect that is due to another human being or nation of human beings, is that you might actually find a way to solve a problem.
    FWIW, I’m not really that patient with the whole idea of America being some super-special place, not because we aren’t a special place in any number of ways, but because it freaking blinds us to the context in which we exist. It blunts our self-awareness, and leads us to error.
    Everybody is special. We’re not the only catfish in the sea. We have our own interests, and we should advocate for them, but we should also recognize that other folks have their own interests as well.
    Even Spanish speaking illegal immigrants bring something to the table that almost no Americans do. If you like lettuce, you will agree.

  182. I’m sure all of the above seems like I’m delivering some kind of lecture. I hope I’m not. Apparently I like to hear my self talk.
    What I’m trying to get across is how things look to me. To me, that’s all.
    If you can see other people’s point of view, sometimes you can make some progress. That’s all.

  183. “Apparently I like to hear my self talk.”
    As long as you leave the “what Russell said”s to us and don’t start pointing it out yourself, keep up the good work.

  184. a stupidly unfair economic treaty cloaked as a climate change deal
    I’m confused. All of the targets in the Paris Accord were set by the country for itself. Voluntarily. What to do, and how much, were entirely voluntarily. The only thing binding, even remotely, was accepting the obvious. How is that unfair?
    Seriously, what am I missing? The only thing I can see isn’t economic, it’s cultural: we were agreeing that a) climate change is real, b) something can and should be done to slow or reverse it.

  185. russell, I didn’t take it as a lecture. I appreciate your view.
    I believe we should take other peoples concerns into account. I was just answering, for myself, the question of how my world view was formed and over what period of time.
    I don’t spend a lot of time worrying about what France thinks of us. I don’t care that we objected to a deal that was worse for us than anyone else, even if they don’t agree. But when France wanted us to help attack Libya we said yes. How involved were they in Iraq? Consideration works two ways.
    Luckily I can live without lettuce, so I would think just employing the migrant workers with legal work visas would cover the necessity if that’s a concern.

  186. Climate change is a concern and we will do our best to help.
    Took a hell of a long time to negotiate if that’s all it said, and wouldn’t be worth the ink to sign it.
    If we picked our own targets then the real issue is between the current administration and the last one. Oh, wait, its too bad all those other people had to get involved.

  187. But mostly, everyone from everywhere seems like it is their right to criticize the US.
    GftNC asks if Marty’s slide is recent or not. This shows that it’s rooted in a worldview. You can’t be the shining city on the hill if you aren’t prepared to be told when you aren’t living up to your ideals. Or didn’t live up to your ideals, cause there’s a lot of history that gets swept under the rug here. How dare you criticize us is the refrain, look at all we did for you. Never mind that we got a lot out of the deal too and maybe we should consider that. Never mind that, in an interconnected world, the country that falls apart is a threat to all the other countries. (that’s Afghanistan, giving us a wave) Or that the way behaved may influence behavior (hey, we didn’t mean it when we propped up the Shah!) In short, that world view can’t admit that we are responsible for everything because we are connected to everything, and that is what made for our influence. Somehow, we can keep that influence by building a wall around the country and watching the rest of the world go to shit.
    And of course, when people inside that wall who are not give their full measure of dignity complain, they are undermining that city on the hill and need to be dealt with.
    Just don’t bitch. Follow the rules or go home. Don’t get a bunch of illegal immigrants together and have a protest. You can do that the day you get a f’ng green card.
    Hey, I’m legal, that’s my mom and dad you are talking about…That’s why you then get people accusing them of being 5th columnists.
    Rules can be constructed in a way that is discriminatory. Anatole France’s comment here
    In its majestic equality, the law forbids rich and poor alike to sleep under bridges, beg in the streets and steal loaves of bread.
    Marty is incapable of seeing, or understanding, or admitting (take your choice) what the point of that quote is.
    Marty doesn’t like Trump’s “impenetrable Cyber Security unit” tweet and seems to understand that things don’t work like that. Why not admit that for trying to tell countries they need to
    Fix your own damn country, we’ll worry about ours.
    is precisely the same flavor.
    This is all pretty direct to Marty and for that, I apologize for that, I appreciate your participation here, but if you unpack what you are saying, there is an authoritarian bent to it. Which is why Trump’s support will never go below that 20% and that’s why I think of you as a trump supporter, no matter how many of his tweets you complain about.

  188. lj, that was a pretty straightforward comment, some of which I agree with. I appreciate the point of view.
    I suppose there is a bent to my world view that is, by some definition, “authoritarian”. I believe people should follow the rules and work to change them. I believe the rules can be abused, as can the right to challenge them.
    I believe in civil disobedience, I don’t believe in violent civil disobedience, and I believe citizens have standing to protest.
    I believe we have been a shining city on the hill not because we are so advanced in our thinking but because we have been a loyal friend in times of peril, a concerned member of a western world order dedicated to the basic rights of human beings and an experiment in various ways of government and cultural compacts.
    But mostly, a good friend. Friends disagree, sometimes strongly. But most of this hasn’t changed.

  189. Thank you for the gracious reply and I want to reiterate, it’s not personal. I’m sure that if we got together for beers, we’d have no problem, as long as you didn’t root for the Cowboys…

  191. Note I said ‘didn’t’, not ‘don’t’, so if you can just hold it in, it’d be cool.
    Though having Prescott from MSU really makes it difficult to wear my t-shirt that says ‘I’ll root for the Cowboys when they play the Russians…’

  193. So, the conversation has moved on, but just to answer some things:
    And as for Donald Johnson, when does the statute of limitation kick in?
    Not sure what you’re talking about here. Donald Johnson chose to leave, because he didn’t think that it was productive to talk about how bad Republicans are. What would he say now that Democrats have no power, except to reexamine Wikileaks revelations of comments (not authenticated, and taken out of context) by various Democrats whose foreign policy choices he takes issue with. He prefers Putin’s propaganda that Russian, and Assad’s, behavior in Syria was perfectly by the book, and totally forgivable. People are welcome to say those kinds of things forever, as far as I’m concerned, but shouldn’t be surprised when people call them out for it, or even dislike them for it.
    Russell, your cites are interesting and, at first glance, disturbing, but as to savings accounts, about 20% of the population is under 18. As to the OECD stats, they are based on median income, and the US ranks higher than most European nations. So, the actual wealth and living standards of people in poverty under that measure isn’t comparable.
    Obviously, wealth inequality, and poverty itself, are urgent issues in the US, and those problems shouldn’t be ignored or minimized. I wish we were
    Number One and “Americannally exceptional” in upward mobility, standard of living, health outcomes, etc. I vote for that, and work for that. But when we compare our state of need with other countries, we’re doing not so badly.

  194. You’re a Cowboys fan, Marty? And here I thought your political opinions were the problem. Yikes!

  195. hsh, It’s Ok as long as you’re not a Giants or Eagles fan, but then you might be. I would bet Eagles though.

  196. about 20% of the population is under 18
    so that leaves 80% of the population who aren’t.
    it’s lovely that our median income is high, but that has to be considered in the context of the cost of living and the general level of public spending on stuff people use.
    in any case, you wanted cites, i gave you cites. make of them what you will.

  197. in any case, you wanted cites, i gave you cites. make of them what you will.
    I have. I am in favor of diminishing wealth inequality, and I understand that a lot of people have financial insecurity, sometimes in the extreme. No argument on that. I support safety nets, more than what we have.
    On the other hand, when we’re talking about international trade, and our relative standing with regard to the rest of the world, we’re pretty freaking rich. Even our less wealthy.
    Minimizing the plight of our own citizens is wrong. Exaggerating it is also not a great idea.

  198. Also, russell, thanks for the cites. My comments are in good faith. For whatever reason, I always have to testify to that.

  199. Much as I dislike the Patriots, you gotta’ give chops to Belichick for playing the system.
    Go ‘Hawks.

  201. when we’re talking about international trade, and our relative standing with regard to the rest of the world, we’re pretty freaking rich
    yes, we’re 2, right after the EU.

  203. It’s one of the things that unifies the country, across all political persuasions: We would naturally prefer that our (generally, but not always, local) team win. But as long as the Cowboys lose, it is a good week.
    Thus the reward for unilaterally proclaiming yourselves “America’s Team.”

  205. Exaggerating it is also not a great idea.
    That was a pretty cheap trick showing that 18 year olds don’t have a lot of savings.
    Who coulda’ known?
    So let’s look at the numbers from a bit of a different perspective.
    As a society, yes, we are in absolute terms, incredibly rich….so rich in fact that it shames me to see how we spread all the wealth around.

  206. And we’re imperiled, and so is the EU.
    But the EU at least has the mother wit to try to improve their situation. While our government seems determined to make ours worse. (Maybe in aid of Bannon’s avowed goal of the “deconstruction of the administrative state”…?)

  207. Go brain damage!
    Is this going to degenerate into one of those “don’t let the perfect be the enemy of the good” so-called discussions? Because if it is, count-me-out.

  209. hey, we didn’t mean it when we propped up the Shah…
    Not to mention overthrowing a democratically elected government and putting him in power in the first place.
    It’s not entirely surprising that the Iranians should have a beef against the US – and the British.
    For all that history, and for all their own faults, they are still,probably a more natural ally in the Middle East than is, for example, Saudi Arabia.

  210. So let’s look at the numbers from a bit of a different perspective.
    No argument with the hope for more comfort and happiness. Also safety nets, let’s all agree.
    As to football, I hate it. Sue me.

  211. Also, since “open thread”:
    Who’s still “skeptical” about Russia? [Mike Pence style? Sorry to offend, GftNC].

  212. For all that history, and for all their own faults, they [Iran] are still,probably a more natural ally in the Middle East than is, for example, Saudi Arabia.
    Too true. Their theocracy, noxious as it is, is far less so than the Saudi Wahabis. And it’s placed on a foundation of a long-civilized nation, rather than a tribal culture barely removed, except for its oil-funded affluence, from its medieval base. The sooner we figure that out and adjust accordingly, the better.

  213. I lurk here sometimes. I left because I disagree with most here on some things and have come to the conclusion that getting into heated discussions with people online is rarely a good use of time. I now try to avoid the heated back and forth situations. That’s best done here by me not posting as there is no possible way I could post here without getting into such arguments.
    However, someone here has an obsessive need to tell falsehoods about my positions, and since this someone uses a pseudonym and I use my real name, I don’t like it much. For instance, this–
    “He prefers Putin’s propaganda that Russian, and Assad’s, behavior in Syria was perfectly by the book, and totally forgivable. ”
    In fact I think that Assad is guilty of massive war crimes, and Putin is too though on a lesser scale and I delurked specifically to spell that out because the obsessive one wrote that falsehood. I would have ignored the rest of the crap, including the ludicrous statement about campaigning for Trump, but not that. I think we were wrong to support the rebels, that it dragged the war out, increased the death toll, and in general everything we touch in the Middle East turns to shit even we we ostensibly have “noble” motives, never mind what happens when we clearly don’t, and no, that doesn’t mean we are responsible for every bad thing in the Mideast or even half the bad things (well, maybe half) or whatever other contemptible shitty argument we use to avoid taking blame for our murderous screwups. under both parties. (If that is what they are.) There was a good article about Syria in the NYT Sunday Magazine some weeks back–among other things, the article mentioned the worry of a “catastrophic success”. In short, if the rebels won there would likely be a genocide of religious minorities. The pseudonymous one (why bother criticizing by name someone who uses a fake one?) takes the position that if I think our intervention was stupid and immoral this means I applaud Assad’s war crimes.
    Countme–I think Giraldi is smart about foreign policy and was seriously delusional to take Trump’s antiwar campaign noises seriously. Trump criticized our interventions and then would turn around and call for war crimes and stealing oil from Iraq, so Giraldi was self-deceived. He seems to have woken up for the most part. Larison was never fooled. American Conservative is a mixed bag–lots of really stupid posts mixed in with some smart ones, sometimes smart and stupid posts coming from the same people. Larison is consistently good. Same for Bacevich. The rest, well, caveat emptor.

  216. sapient, I don’t know what your 11.25 means. Was I sceptical about Russia? I seem to remember going into a lot of detail about how Putin was a KGB thug who sent assassins to London to kill Litvinenko. Or is this an incomprehensible sally in your campaign to make me out to be some kind of stickler for “etiquette”?

  218. I recall, GftNC, that you were skeptical about Russian interference in our election, and that you would not believe Barack Obama, or the findings of our intelligence agencies on the subject, without further proof. I don’t doubt at all that you dislike Putin.
    Donald, thank you for delurking. Your comments about Syria at the time seemed to indicate that you thought the reporting about Russia’s actions was overblown, especially as compared to our various misdeeds.

  220. I would bet Eagles though.
    If we ever meet in person, I’ll do a rousing rendition of the fight song for you, Marty. I focus almost entirely on sheer volume, so it’s very special.
    I miss Donald’s comments, myself.

  221. whew. this latest from Trump Jr is something else.
    ok, so the meeting wasn’t just about adoption like i said a couple of days ago. see, i was expecting to collude with Russia to get info that would damage HRC’s campaign! so i invited two of the key campaign players to a meeting with some Russian person whom i’d never met. but it turns out this person didn’t have any useful info, so we cut the meeting short. see, i’m totally innocent!

  222. One photo of Trump, Jr. accompanying the story about meeting is appropriately reminiscent of Martin Short’s Nathan Thurm on SNL.

  223. and who brokered that meeting?
    this guy – the guy wearing the “RUSSIA” t-shirt in his Twitter selfie on Nov 10th, 2016.

  224. I recall, GftNC, that you were skeptical about Russian interference in our election, and that you would not believe Barack Obama, or the findings of our intelligence agencies on the subject, without further proof.
    Ah yes, sapient, thank you. I had a faint memory it might have been something like that, but wasn’t sure. I believe at the time the info was much less “full” than it is now (numbers of intelligence agencies reporting etc), and rather than distrusting Barack Obama particularly (or much at all) I just decided that rather than automatically believing what I was told, when it fitted in with my wishes and basic beliefs, I was going to be more questioning and wait for more info. I had been caught before accepting “official versions”, and was trying to be a more critical consumer of news. Ditto with the chemical attack in Syria, when we were reading links throwing doubt on whether it was really Assad, I decided to wait it out and see what came out. Just a couple of days ago I read that some international agency had confirmed Sarin residue, so that made it pretty watertight. This is my attempt, such as it is, to avoid confirmation bias.

  226. But Nigel, you have to admit that he definitely has the family talent for saying things that directly contradict the things that the administration has been saying (vehemently) for months.
    And can there be any lamer excuse than “We met with her because she said she had damaging information on Clinton. But it was a bust.”?
    I mean, come on! What he is saying is that, at least in this case (and one has to wonder now if there were others) the candidates son, son-in-law, and campaign chairman were meeting with Russians about the campaign and the election. So this was attempted collusion, even though it didn’t work out.
    Sad!

  228. First, collusion doesn’t mean what you seem to think it means. If they met to plan getting into the DNC’s email that would be collusion.
    There is not a single campaign manager for any campaign ever that would not have attended a meeting with someone who said they had “damaging information about your opponent”. They hire whole staffs to go try to find that information.
    But it seems unlikely that the three of them just forget she was a Russian for the last 7 or 8 months.

  229. But it seems unlikely that the three of them just forget she was a Russian for the last 7 or 8 months.
    Of course, that she was Russian is the very source of the problem. It is the thing that makes attending a meeting with someone who said they had “damaging information about your opponent” potentially criminal, when it might not otherwise be.

  232. The current (watch for on-going developments) official White House position seems to be that it didn’t end up being collusion. So it was just attempted collusion. And therefore not a problem.
    Even assuming (IANAL) that is true in the absolute legal sense. It still adds a big boost to the “What are they hiding???” issue.

  233. But it seems unlikely that the three of them just forget she was a Russian for the last 7 or 8 months.
    And not just any Russian.
    My thought about all of this is that, if anything actually sinks Trump, it’ll be either of:
    a) the money trail, possibly having nothing to do with the campaign at all
    b) somebody will perjure themselves or otherwise incur criminal liability by lying about something they didn’t even need to lie about in the first place
    Money, or stupid. Take your pick.

  235. Of course, that she was Russian is the very source of the problem.
    Of all the things I think this is wrong. If she were German, or Polish or English should they have declined the meeting? The problem for me isn’t that the Russians tried to influence our election, it is that any one outside the US did.
    People keep leaning heavily on the fact it was Russia, the bear, traditional bad guy with a really bad guy in charge. But if Merkel(not in any way implying she did) tried to influence our election it should be considered just as bad.
    So, honestly, if she was a lawyer with ties to the Macron campaign offering information on Trump, would you care?

  236. Of all the things I think this is wrong. If she were German, or Polish or English should they have declined the meeting?
    Yes.
    So, honestly, if she was a lawyer with ties to the Macron campaign offering information on Trump, would you care?
    It’s not a question of whether or not I care. It’s a question of law.

  237. So it is against the law to collect damaging information about your political opponent?
    My understanding, not sure, is that the information has to be gained by illegal means for it to be against the law.
    They could not have known that one way or the other without a discussion.

  238. well, it matters a little because Trump, and all of his team, apparently, have a history of rubbing up against the Russian underworld. there’s some context here that we wouldn’t get with just any country.

  239. They could not have known that one way or the other without a discussion.
    IANAL, but it seems to me that the appropriate response to a foreign agent offering you some info about a US election is to call the FBI, first.

  240. There is also the matter of security clearances, in particular Jared Kushner’s. My understanding is that contact with foreign nationals is supposed to be disclosed when applying.
    Oh well, he meets with so many people, it’s hard to keep track. </snark>

  241. If she were German, or Polish or English should they have declined the meeting?
    In a word, yes. Any foreign national, from any country, who offers assistance in a campaign should be rejected. Money, information, anything.
    And in fact that has happened in the past. I seem to recall Gore getting offered a copy of Bush’s debate briefing book by some non-American. He called the FBI.

  242. So it is against the law to collect damaging information about your political opponent?
    C’mon, Marty. You’re not that daft. What wj wrote above.
    Cleek, too. Russia isn’t just another country like all the rest, not that it affects the legality. But it does, or should, matter to anyone with a few brain cells to rub together.

  243. Gore was offered the briefing book by an American who mailed it anonymously. They did call the FBI. She pled guilty.
    “U.S. District Judge Sam Sparks told Lozano she faced a maximum of 10 years in prison, six years of supervised release and up to $500,000 in fines. She is scheduled to be sentenced Aug. 17. ”
    Those were the days. But she pled guilty to stealing and mailing, so mail fraud, the information. So, as I said, she gained it illegally. I did not see the Obama team returning the tape of Romney.
    Information can be gained in perfectly or imperfectly legal ways.

  244. I am not daft, but the guys that returned the briefing book, “leafed through it enough to know they shouldn’t have it” and then called the FBI.
    http://www.weeklystandard.com/to-catch-a-mole/article/12918
    These guys were asked to take a meeting, finding that nothing, legal or illegal, was offered they left. And no, I don’t think it should matter. China hacks us all the time, so does Israel, I don’t like it even more if Russia or China or Iran do it. But I don’t like it when Israel does it either.

  245. I don’t think it should matter. China hacks us all the time, so does Israel, I don’t like it even more if Russia or China or Iran do it. But I don’t like it when Israel does it either.
    Which is pretty much what we are all saying. It doesn’t matter which nation she was from, it’s still a problem.

  246. I’m sure that, in terms of political campaigns/elections, not all information obtained from American sources is legal. I would guess that not all information obtained from non-American sources is illegal, maybe. But you aren’t supposed to seek help from other nations.
    That American-sourced campaign info/assistance can be illegal has no bearing on the legality of foreign-sourced info. Sometimes (or very often, or almost always) foreign-sourced info/assistance is illegal simply for being foreign-sourced.

  247. I am happy to believe that’s true, so, if they received information from a foreign source and didn’t turn it over to the FBI that would be criminal.
    I don’t hear that happened. If it did they should be charged and jailed.

  248. Another question is whether accepting a meeting with a foreign national, on the pretense that she will provide campaign assitance, amounts to solicitation of foreign campaign assistance, which would also be illegal, AFAIK. (IANAL.)

  249. Hillary Clinton would have done the same thing and been hanged for it if she hadn’t died of pneumonia, or bone cancer, or syphilis, or whatever it was a couple of people right here reportaspeculated (based on Russian-sourced reporting from Drudge and company) she suffered from last fall weeks before the election.
    Apparently she’s buried in Vince Foster’s grave, along with dozens of co-conspirators from Arkansas.

  250. I can only the persistence of Marty’s excuse-making on behalf of Clinton had her campaign done anything like this.

  252. “I don’t hear that happened.”
    That was precisely what McConnell said to Obama when the latter begged the former to cooperate in a bipartisan manner during the campaign to investigate and counter the Russian* incursions.
    McConnell said “Nyet!”, which in Kentuckian dialect means “Fuck you, boy!”
    “I don’t think it should matter. China hacks us all the time, so does Israel, I don’t like it even more if Russia or China or Iran do it. But I don’t like it when Israel does it either.”
    This is exactly what rump said on the subject in Europe. Lots of people do it.
    I’m going shopping for melons.

  254. >Before arranging a meeting with a Kremlin-connected Russian lawyer he believed would offer him compromising information about Hillary Clinton, Donald Trump Jr. was informed in an email that the material was part of a Russian government effort to aid his father’s candidacy, according to three people with knowledge of the email.

    string. that. fucker. up.

  256. See, on the other hand, this
    https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/the-latest-russia-revelations-lay-the-groundwork-for-a-conspiracy-case/2017/07/10/15b81256-65a8-11e7-a1d7-9a32c91c6f40_story.html?utm_term=.8017b20ea091
    from an expert in white collar law.
    Cases can be, and often are, built from an accumulation of bricks. No smoking gun. No single brick is conclusive . . . but the collection of bricks makes a persuasive wall.
    Even the limited items we have out in public so far suggests that that sort of case is a very real possibility. It would be totally unsurprising if the larger collection of information that the Special Counsel has turns out to be even more persuasive.

  257. Well I’ll take the NBC majority of opinions from veterans of the DOJ. To have a conspiracy there has to be conspiracy to do something illegal. It is a hard prosecutorial row to hoe.
    If money actually exchanged hands it will be easier.
    Aside from that, I have to admit to being tired of “three unidentified people said” being the basis for a news story that talks about that in the headline and first paragraph and offers no more proof. In fact, every named source quoted said the opposite.

  258. Here is another one to call me batsh*t over.
    I bet the three people WaPo refers to were all Russian or Russian stooges. Putin meddling still. Trump didn’t come out and say Putin didn’t do meddle, or whatever stick is up his butt today, so he stirs the pot.
    And everybody jumps to.
    And, for hsh, I wouldn’t expend a finger touch defending Clinton, but I wouldn’t be posting stupid daily headlines that are clearly designed to try and cripple her administration either. I might quoetly revel in her circumstance, but i might not. There is a line. Loretta Lynch probanly crossed it, if they crossed it dumping on her everyday with useless big headlines and no facts behind them, i would already be tired of that. I was never on here posting the latest right wing out let garbage on her, I have my own opinion, when pressed I have fully expressed it a few times.
    Bit I didn’t come back every day the next week posting a plethora of pontifications positing her potential demise.
    So there’s that.

  259. cleek, two paragraphs down the article contradicts that quote.
    not seeing it. which text contradicts which other text?
    I bet the three people WaPo refers to were all Russian or Russian stooges.
    odds are good they are unsavory characters. who else would know what goes on in Trumptown ?

  260. Just what Trump was doubtless hoping for. Not! Today Ukraine said it would begin discussions to join NATO. President Petro Poroshenko promised a program of reforms to meet NATO-membership standards by 2020.
    I’m guessing Russia will go ape. And Putin will discover whether his best buddy will step up and veto any consideration.
    (And, if this goes anywhere, will Georgia see this as an opportunity its bid for membership as well?)

  261. Just to add to my 11.47 (I think) to sapient:
    I hope it goes without saying, but just in case: I have been convinced about the Russian interference for so long now that I had semi-forgotten that I ever waited to be sure. I can’t even remember what finally swung it.

  262. the collection of bricks makes a persuasive wall.
    yup.
    the meeting is not an isolated case.
    To have a conspiracy there has to be conspiracy to do something illegal
    criminal conspiracy yes, impeachment no.
    and lying about legal activities to the wrong party in the wrong context can be illegal.
    see my comment above about “stupid”.
    So there’s that.
    trump ain’t clinton

  263. “if this goes anywhere, will Georgia see this as an opportunity its bid for membership as well?”
    I hope that Trump gives Georgia to his best-bud Vladimir. And throws in Alabama also, too.

  266. Why would Trump be against Ukraine joining NATO? I really don’t understand that comment.
    Putin would be against it. And that dust-up would put a strain on our relations with Russia. Which are already being the subject of acrimonious exchanges.

  267. Actually, “against it” might be way too mild a description for Putin’s reacction. Considering a) how he flipped out when Georgia previously asked NATO about membership, and b) that Russia’s current incursion in Ukraine could arguably be a casus belli under Article 5.

  268. “Why would rump be against Ukraine joining NATO?”
    Who knows? Maybe he believes it to be obsolete? Or not?
    Might as well ask the Magic 8-Ball.
    I thought this was an odd article:
    http://www.independent.co.uk/News/world/asia/japan-sex-problem-demographic-time-bomb-birth-rates-sex-robots-fertility-crisis-virgins-romance-porn-a7831041.html
    This caption under a picture of a sex bot in the article: “Sex robots are a serious concern that isn’t being thought about enough.”
    Methinks the problem would be more squarely addressed if that read: “Sex robots are a serious concern that is being thought about too much.”
    A blue-ribbon panel of experts, sexperts needs to be convened at a spa to look into the matter. Everyone retire to their rooms for the week and we’ll gather the robots for a plenary session and see what’s what. Off you go.

  273. First things first, from lj’s link:
    “Not to put too fine a point on it, but both Hillary Clinton and Trump’s Republican opponents hired an investigative firm to talk to Russians (both here in the United States and in the motherland) in an effort to find dirt on him. That’s how the now infamous Steele Dossier was produced. If all Donald Trump Jr. did was take a meeting with some Russian lawyer, that would only be newsworthy because the Trump campaign has been denying that any meetings with Russians took place.”
    That kind of kills all of the swooning about talking to a “Russian”, omg. And mostly calls bs on the idea that there was anything unusual about getting info on your opponent from foreign sources.
    The rest is interesting history, none of which would necessarily be self evident to Trump Jr. when he took the meeting.
    A lawyer for the Russian mob is an interesting tale of how the Russians work, but doesn’t really support all the conclusions he draws from it.
    And, once again, I find myself defending a group of people I have no respect for because the other side is so obviously partisan, slanted and irrational.
    It was ok for Clinton to hire a firm to specifically root around with Russians of questionable repute to create a dossier on Trump of questionable, probably variable, veracity, and then USE IT.
    We’ll just skip over that to condemn a meeting held in NY that lasted 20 minutes.
    I’m embarrassed for you.

  274. For a refreshing change of topic:

    President Trump’s advisers recruited two businessmen who profited from military contracting to devise alternatives to the Pentagon’s plan to send thousands of additional troops to Afghanistan, reflecting the Trump administration’s struggle to define its strategy for dealing with a war now 16 years old.
    Erik D. Prince, a founder of the private security firm Blackwater Worldwide, and Stephen A. Feinberg, a billionaire financier who owns the giant military contractor DynCorp International, have developed proposals to rely on contractors instead of American troops in Afghanistan at the behest of Stephen K. Bannon, Mr. Trump’s chief strategist, and Jared Kushner, his senior adviser and son-in-law, according to people briefed on the conversations.

    Erik Prince. You know, because this worked so well in Iraq.

  276. Erik D. Prince, a founder of the private security firm Blackwater Worldwide, and Stephen A. Feinberg, a billionaire financier who owns the giant military contractor DynCorp International, have developed proposals to rely on contractors instead of American troops in Afghanistan at the behest of Stephen K. Bannon, Mr. Trump’s chief strategist, and Jared Kushner, his senior adviser and son-in-law
    These folks used to be called condottieri. The history of this kind of arrangement is… checkered.
    I’m embarrassed for you.
    Son, son-in-law, and campaign manager meeting with a Russian mafia lawyer.
    Campaign manager on the payroll of pro-Russian Ukrainian interests.
    National security adviser on the payroll of Turkey and maybe other folks.
    Son-in-law wants to set up a back-channel to Russia using secure comms at the Russian embassy.
    A sudden shift in the platform of the (R) party away from sanctioning Russia for Ukrainian exploits after Trump wins the nomination.
    A possible heads-up to Putin about US plans to seize Russian diplomatic property in DE and Long Island.
    Trump’s personal and professional history of entanglement with Russian mafiosi and all-around thugs.
    The general overlap of the Russian government, oligarch class, and mafia, and all of their connections to Trump, his family, and his businesses.
    So, what wj said.

  277. It was ok for Clinton to hire a firm to specifically root around with Russians of questionable repute to create a dossier on Trump of questionable, probably variable, veracity, and then USE IT.
    right. and it was OK for Trump to do the same.
    but that’s not what we’re talking about here.
    the issue is that the Trump gang were ready to accept info (indirectly) from a Russian government source that was being provided to them because the Russian government wanted to help Trump win.
    that is literally what the email Jr just posted says.
    that is light years from hiring an investigator to dig around for dirt.

  278. also, these emails make it pretty hard to believe that Trump Sr didn’t know Russia was actively trying to help him.

  279. “that is light years from hiring an investigator to dig around for dirt.”
    I am not sure light years are as short as you think they are. I think it is great that he just published the emails. So now we can find out what is and isn’t illegal. But drawing a bright line between this meeting and Hillary’s oppo research is just partisan. Period.
    How long is the list of people that the Clintons have documented relationships with that are in charge of other countries, who could have provided information that did or did not help Clinton, did they? Didn’t they? Lets start another Clinton investigation into her deep ties with the Ukraine presidential candidate. Give me a week and control of the NYT front page and we’ll have her convicted.
    Back to my point, if the Russian lawyer had incriminating evidence on Clinton that was gained illegally and the Trump campaign obtained and used it then they conspired to break the law.
    None of that happened here. I find that it reinforces that the Russians were on Trumps side, which we already knew. We have lots of documentation of that I presume although it is nice to see some public confirmation.
    We should do something about that, this probably helps that as it makes Trump have to be defensive so he is likely to throw a tantrum at Putin.

  280. Why would rump be against Ukraine joining NATO?
    It occurs to me that I didn’t really address the substance of the question. Sorry.
    In Putin’s view, the countries bordering Russia are properly part of its sphere of influence. Any effort to incorporate one of them into NATO, or any other alliance for that matter, constitutes an attack on Russia.
    He’s pretty unhappy about the Baltics being in NATO, for that matter. That was a fiat accompli before he took power, so he hasn’t, so far, tried to pull the same kind of stunt there that he did in Georgia and Ukraine. But they are well aware that he’d like to, if he thinks Article 5 is a dead letter.

  281. But cleek, if you distrust expertise, and knowledge generally, why wouldn’t you think colleges are bad for the country? It seems like an entirely consistent position.

  282. wj, So the assumption you are making is Trump will veto this on Putins behalf? Not that Trump himself would see this as a bad thing?

  283. did they? Didn’t they?
    Who knows? It’s hard to say.
    God knows we spent enough time and money trying to find it.
    Lets start another Clinton investigation
    No, please, let’s not. We’ve had 25 years of them. We’ve had, not a week, but 25 years of the corrupt Clinton narrative.
    25 years and millions upon millions of dollars, and the only thing they could make stick was Bill lying under oath about a blow job. You only get so many bites of the apple, dude.
    This isn’t about Clinton. Whatever Clinton did or did not do, and whatever we know or do not know about it, has nothing to do with what Trump’s circle were up to.
    Back to your point, there are about 1,000 ways these jokers have crossed the line. Some of them may have been illegal. We’ll find out. Some of them may be sufficient to justify impeachment. We’ll find out.
    Either Donald Jr is the stupidest guy ever to walk the face of the earth, or there’s worse stuff that we don’t know yet. Or, there are other folks involved that are less disposable than Jr.
    Who knows, maybe the whole thing really is an eleven-dimensional triple-bank-shot plot by Obama and Clinton to impugn and undermine the Trump presidency.
    Anything’s possible, just ask Alex Jones.
    We’ll find out.

  284. if the Russian lawyer had incriminating evidence on Clinton that was gained illegally and the Trump campaign obtained and used it then they conspired to break the law.
    None of that happened here.
    IANAL, but it seems to me that you can have a conspiracy to break the law, even if you don’t actually succeed in doing so. Which (whether my understanding of the law is correct or not) is what we seem to have had here: an meeting to attempt to break the law.
    By the way, the information doesn’t even have to have been obtained illegally. It is illegal under US law to have a foreign national involved in trying to influence the outcome of a US election.

  285. “It is illegal under US law to have a foreign national involved in trying to influence the outcome of a US election”
    Then in this election every one should go to jail.

  286. wj, So the assumption you are making is Trump will veto this on Putins behalf? Not that Trump himself would see this as a bad thing?
    No, I’m saying that Putin would be likely to ask/lobby Trump to do so. What Trump’s personal opinions are, I have no idea. (My nasty suspicion is that, unless he has plans for a hotel or golf course there, he knows nothing about Ukraine and cares less. But that might be doing him an injustice.)

  287. Marty, do you have evidence that foreign nationals worked with the Clinton campaign? Not just had a business relationship with Clinton at some point (if they did), but worked with the campaign. And during the campaign, not something that might have happened years earlier.
    Unless that happened, then the actions of those foreign nationals in support of Clinton would be illegal, but the campaign itself would not have broken the law.

  290. “This isn’t about Clinton. Whatever Clinton did or did not do, and whatever we know or do not know about it, has nothing to do with what Trump’s circle were up to.”
    Of course it isn’t about Clinton, nothing to see there.
    But really, I don’t think its about Clinton, I don’t think its about Trump, I think its about Democrats and liberals trying to find some reason that isn’t them that he won. Period. Must be the Russians.

  291. The bar at this point is:
    The manager of Bandar al Saud’s nephew’s crappy rock band emails Chelsea and says, the leadership of Saudi Arabia wants to help your mom out, they have damning information on Trump.
    They want to set up a meeting between you and the attorney who represented all of the Saudis who got caught in the BCCI thing, back in the day. Not the one who unfortunately fell out of the window, the other one. She’s got the goods.
    Chelsea says, Hell yeah, I’ll take that meeting, and she does. And she brings Robby Mook and Huma Abedin along.
    That’s the scenario.
    Did that happen? Could be. Probably not.

  293. I think its about Democrats and liberals trying to find some reason that isn’t them that he won. Period. Must be the Russians.
    Bullshit.
    We all know why he won. Americans are stupid. That’s why he won.
    Speaking for myself, my interest in this is that nobody’s above the law.
    Trump’s a crook, and his family are crooks, and most of his associates are crooks. That’s neither here nor there, as long as (a) they keep it inside the boundaries of the law, and (b) it doesn’t influence how he executes his office.
    Bending US policy to benefit his crooked buddies crosses the line. Pimping the office of POTUS to make himself and his crooked kids rich crosses the line.
    I don’t read the NYT or the Post, I don’t watch cable news. I don’t give a shit what the latest media meltdown is all about.
    I want this issue run to ground. I trust Mueller to do a good job of it, and I pretty much don’t trust anybody else involved.
    It’ll land where it lands. If that means people go to jail, people go to jail.
    If that means Trump goes, he goes.
    If he goes, it’ll be on his own head. Not mine, not the media’s, not some liberal lynch mob.
    His.

  294. For those keeping track, here is the link, provided by Donald Trump Jr wherein he posts the e-mail chain.
    https://twitter.com/DonaldJTrumpJr/status/884789418455953413
    Including the statement, prior to the meeting telling him that he would be meeting with a “Russian government attorney”. And that this was part of ““Russia and its government’s support” for his father’s presidential campaign.
    I’m kind of amazed that he would post something like this. Even if he realizes that it would doubtless be subpoenaed at some point. But then, the Trump’s seem willing to make public any number of incriminating bit of evidence.
    It’s like they just cannot imagine the law applies to them. Although, to be fair, Jr may figure that his father will issue him (and Kushner; although perhaps not Manafort) a full pardon if push comes to shove. And he might be right.

  295. Of course it isn’t about Clinton, nothing to see there.
    What about Clinton is there that you think needs to be investigated (again)? What planet have you been on?

  296. “I’m kind of amazed that he would post something like this. Even if he realizes that it would doubtless be subpoenaed at some point. ”
    Its pretty smart. Here it is, the Times was leaking a line at a time so they could publish a new headline out of it every 6 hours or so. Now everyone has it.

  298. There’s something to be said for taking the “get it all out at once” approach. But it isn’t clear why they would go to it now, after having resisted it for months.

  299. also, these emails make it pretty hard to believe that Trump Sr didn’t know Russia was actively trying to help him.

    to wit…

    Philip Bump at the Post just flagged this Trump speech from June 7th, four days after Don Goldstone’s first contact with Don Jr and two days before the meeting at Trump Tower on June 9th.
    Trump promises big news about Hillary Clinton’s crimes in a speech on “probably” June 13th.”

  301. Trump promises big news about Hillary Clinton’s crimes in a speech on “probably” June 13th.”
    the 12th was the Orlando shooting. but on the 13th Trump did start a speech saying it was supposed to be about Hillary’s big evil deeds, but that he’d have to get back to it because Orlando.
    he never got back to it.
    he knew. he’s been lying to the country for a year. just like everybody else in his crime family.
    but yes, Hillary Clinton exists.

  302. Both rightwing nutjobs and purist lefties derided Hillary Clinton for her “baggage”.
    He, Trump’s baggage could fill a boxcar at this point.
    But He is at least a 6-to-5 favorite to get re-elected in 2020 because Americans are exceptionally stupid. Churchill was right: Americans have to do every wrong thing they can think of before they can get around to doing the right thing.
    ITMFA.
    –TP

  304. The evidence can’t be considered a “slam dunk” until there’s a conviction, and it all depends on what crimes we’re looking for. “Collusion” is a general term indicating conspiracy. All crimes have specific elements that need to be proved.
    There were obvious misstatements and failures to disclose things on federal forms with a penalty of perjury. Those themselves are crimes if intent can be found, and it sure looks like there was intent. So there’s that.
    I’m sure that if I were prosecuting the case, I’d be looking for more, because there obviously is more. Marcy Wheeler is good at ferreting out information, but these people are lawyers, and they see fire.
    That doesn’t mean anything will be done about it (just as nothing has been done about the lying under oath), and until it is, people will be saying “Well, we need to wait and see ….” I expect to be dead by then.

  305. we now have five Trump associates who lied about meeting with Russians during the campaign. after a while, a pattern emerges, and we have to wonder if there’s an underlying cause.
    as even Wheeler notes, there is more to this than the strict legality: there’s also the politics.
    everyone knows the GOP Congress isn’t going to do anything about Trump because they’re (cover your eyes, Marty) partisans who only want to hold onto their party’s power. but, the public is going to get a chance to vote, eventually. this will be on their minds, and it doesn’t look good to anyone who isn’t deeply committed to lying to themselves.

  306. everyone knows the GOP Congress isn’t going to do anything about Trump because they’re (cover your eyes, Marty) partisans who only want to hold onto their party’s power.
    Well, Marty is right that the Democrats are partisan and out to get Trump. (Shocking revelation, I know.) That’s why you don’t elect someone who is so easy to be out to get.
    I mean that in a couple of ways. Trump is so generally bad as president that it’s very easy to be motivated to be out to get him, even if you don’t care that much about party loyalty. He’s bad for the country, so why wouldn’t you want to remove him or at least discredit him to hobble him politically?
    Trump is also ignorantly arrogant enough, as are many of his associates, that it’s going to be easy to get him, which makes being out to get him a high-morale endeavor.
    I honestly don’t know that the Democrats would have had the doggedness that the Republicans had with either of the Clintons if faced with a similar challenge, but it’s moot. They have Trump. He’s going to do most of the work for them.
    They’re walking downhill with the wind at their backs.

  307. Well, Marty is right that the Democrats are partisan and out to get Trump.
    There are quite a few political pundits and conservative public intellectuals who are also out to get Trump. It’s bipartisan. Yes, I’m a partisan, and am horrified by many Republican policies. But this Russia issue goes beyond my partisan sensibilities by miles.

  308. They’re walking downhill with the wind at their backs.
    I’m not convinced.
    First of all, it doesn’t seem like the Democrats have their act together very well, but I’m not a voracious consumer of inside politics news, so I could be wrong about that.
    Second, Trump still seems to have a fanatical … what should I say … fan base, amplified and manipulated by the internet. Trump Jr. met with a Russian mob lawyer? Well of course, Obama let her into the country on purpose to entrap him. And so on.
    That second point is making me wish I remembered more of what was going on in the time period leading up to Nixon’s resignation. I paid even less attention to politics then, and in fact that summer I was backpacking and getting very little news of any kind. (I think we were playing chess with shells and stones on the Olympic coast at the moment he resigned.)
    So here’s a question for those of my generation who *were* paying more attention: did Nixon still have any kind of base of political support in the months leading up to his ouster? It’s hard for me to imagine, because he was such an unlikable character from start to finish that I feel like he never did have the kind of fanatical base of support, even when he was winning an election, that Trump did and does now.
    Or maybe I am still too heavily influenced by having read “The Making of the President 1960” as an eleven-year-old, and in a context where all of *my* people had adored John Kennedy and disliked Nixon intensely.
    All of this — plus, I just don’t think the atmosphere in the country was as overtly, viciously divided then, my doctor story from a few days ago being Exhibit X.

  309. There are quite a few political pundits and conservative public intellectuals who are also out to get Trump. It’s bipartisan
    That’s part of why it may be easier to get Trump out than some of you expect.
    Trump definitely has a voter fan base. But his actual fans (as opposed to tactical allies) in the Congress are pretty thin on the ground. And the actual conservatives, reactionaries, and libertarians in Congress are well aware that, if they get rid of Trump, Pence will not only not oppose them, he will likely be much better at implementing what they want. And executing it.

  310. here’s a question for those of my generation who *were* paying more attention: did Nixon still have any kind of base of political support in the months leading up to his ouster?
    In a word, yes.
    Even when he resigned, Nixon still had at least a quarter of the country supporting him. (Compare Trump’s “strongly support” numbers, which also run around 20%-25%.) The Internet wasn’t available then, to provide instant feedback for them. But they still managed to communicate and reinforce each other.

  311. I shouldn’t have brought my IPad with me and I’m about to backpack into the back country, but should rump be impeached — he won’t be — the party he infiltrated is a lying, thieving pack of sociopaths — but should he be impeached, he and his hyenas will not leave. They will hole up in one of the rump lairs and surround themselves with armed cultists, many of them republican politicians in state and local governments and hunker down for the duration.
    Every filthy fascist militia worm cultivated these many years by the Republican Party, and much of the NRA, will begin terrorist actions against government, media, and liberal democratic institutions.
    Expect elements of the American military to mutiny in favor of rump and his crime syndicate. Expect to see aggressive military movements and even incursions by Russia at strategic flashpoints as Putin shows his muscle in defending his co-puppets in the White House.
    But before we get there, expect rump to order martial law in blue segments of the country, as he simultaneously orders the arrests of Barack Obama, the Clintons, Meuller and his team, and key federal government officials from the mythical deep state.
    I have some friends and acquaintances who are avid rump supporters. Otherwise nice people, but I haven’t seen blind devotion to a political movement like theirs and absolute hatred of the opposition in my life. Not since maybe some fringe Christian cultists in the 1980s, or maybe off-the-cliff radical imposters in the early 1970s who thought the Symbionese Liberation Army was a legitimate force for a way forward.
    Nixon had Haldeman, Buchanan, and a few other of those characters until the demise.
    Rump has millions. There will no sobbing at a press conference as he relents. He’s a thug. His limited imagination, and those of his acolytes, cannot conceive of defeat without fucking up the scenery and taking all of it down with them.
    They will kill. And too many of the right wing in this country, even among the so-called elite, believe it’s about time.

  312. Expect elements of the American military to mutiny in favor of rump and his crime syndicate.
    If by “elements” you mean a “few handfuls of people here and there”, then quite possibly.
    But if you mean any significant sized groups, then No, no way. Members of the military are often quite conservative in their views. But they also take their oaths, to “protect and defend the Constitution” extremely seriously. And if Trump is duly impeached and removed, they won’t desert to defend him.

  315. Not every one! 😉
    But you do provide me lots of opportunities. Some of which are merely amusing; but others deserve to be taken at least a bit seriously.

  316. To make my own position clear, I have no doubt that people in Trump’s campaign colluded with the Russian government to swing the election in Trump’s favor.
    IMO the outstanding personal quality about Trump, and his kids, is that they are crooks. They are not honest people. At all. They value money, and their own inflated opinions of themselves. And little if anything else. They’re our very own House of Borgia.
    All of that said, I think it’s extremely important that whatever investigations are done of Trump or his circle, and whatever legal or political actions are brought against them, be painstakingly and scrupulously transparent and fair. Because if Trump goes, a quarter of the country is going to assume that it’s just a political hit.
    Marty, who is not palpably insane, thinks it’s all just a bunch of (D) cry-babies who can’t get over the fact that Clinton lost. Marty is just the tip of the iceberg, and he is by far at the sane and reasonable end of it.
    People who support Trump are all in. They don’t trust anybody else in government, and they don’t trust people who don’t support Trump. All of the events and disclosures of the last six months have, if anything, cemented their loyalty to Trump.
    If whatever legal or political action is taken against Trump or anyone in his circle is not absolutely righteous and above reproach, the country is going to melt down. I’m not talking about civil war, just about things descending into a chaotic ungovernable mess. Which is to say, an even worse chaotic ungovernable mess than what we have now.
    I actually think it might be preferable to just let Trump be POTUS for his four years and just work around him. Let the (R) agenda advance, and let Trump’s supporters imbibe the consequences of their choices to the freaking lees. Trump is an incredibly incompetent and toxic POTUS, but no-one who supports him is going to question that support based on anything anyone like me says. They’re going to have to see what life under the conditions they voted for are actually like, and figure out for themselves exactly how shitty that can be.
    I don’t see any other way.
    Removing Trump is only going to deepen his supporter’s feeling that “the system” is rigged against them.
    That isn’t an argument for not pursuing all of the various investigations, into all of the various forms and manifestations of venal bullshit, that are already underway.
    Those should continue and should be pursued until the last i is dotted and the last t crossed.
    But if, as is likely, that results in people going to jail, and/or Trump being removed from office, a lot of shit is going to hit the fan.
    So it all has to be above board.
    I actually trust Mueller, and I hope that he is allowed to pursue his investigations wherever they lead. I’m sure he will turn up a freaking rat’s nest, because a lot of rats are involved. But the process has to be allowed to proceed in as transparent and clean way as is possible.
    So, IMO, it’s sensible to not rush to accusations of legally actionable collusion, or treason, or whatever. Let it play out and it will land where it lands.
    We don’t need to hand 50 or 100 million resentful people a martyr. Give them a chance to figure it out for themselves.
    Some will, some won’t. But some will.

  317. I actually think it might be preferable to just let Trump be POTUS for his four years and just work around him. Let the (R) agenda advance, and let Trump’s supporters imbibe the consequences of their choices to the freaking lees.
    Russell, as a matter of domestic politics, I would agree.
    But the problem(s) with Trump aren’t just about domestic politics. They also impact, substantially, the situation in the rest of the world. And, whether Trump’s supporters believe it or not, the rest of the world matters to us. A lot. Which may not overturn the calculus, but does move the needle on what ought to be done.

  318. We don’t need to hand 50 or 100 million resentful people a martyr. Give them a chance to figure it out for themselves.
    If “figure it out for themselves” means that the United States is irreparably trashed, I don’t think we can sit back and wait for the arc of history to bend. The Dark Ages lasted quite awhile. We need to hope that at least some of our institutions can be made to save us. (My own hope is just a sliver, but I’m trying.)

  320. i felt a lot better about Mueller before i learned that his team learned about this email/meeting stuff from the NYT.
    now i’m wondering if maybe they should hire some reporters to do the legwork for them.

  321. Ok then, ITMFA. Jr and Kushner go to jail, along with Flynn and Manafort.
    That would actually be OK with me.
    It’s gonna be a mess, no matter what. What that tells me is that the country is a mess, Trump or no Trump. So, work to do.

  322. let Trump’s supporters imbibe the consequences of their choices to the freaking lees. Trump is an incredibly incompetent and toxic POTUS, but no-one who supports him is going to question that support based on anything anyone like me says. They’re going to have to see what life under the conditions they voted for are actually like, and figure out for themselves exactly how shitty that can be.
    Pessimist that I am, I agree with what you said below that, which is that some people will come around and some won’t. But my sense is that millions of people are never going to make the connection that the conditions of their lives have anything to do with Trump or the Republicans. Like I pointed out earlier: DJTJR’s troubles are all Obama’s fault, and that became the story almost before the story broke. Now that everyone on all sides admits that there’s such a thing as “fake news,” no one has to believe anything they don’t want to.

  325. Even by his normal standards, russell’s 12.30 is the gold standard of sane and sensible, but wj’s follow up also makes a lot of sense. And one can only hope that the Count’s dystopian vision remains in the realm of alternative history…..

  328. I don’t want to put this on any place people are actually talking. I turned on MSNBC today to watch the press conference with Trump and Macron. Good enough press conference, everyone being nice. But I left the tv on afterward for a few minutes and I just don’t know how people watch that crap, and I am sure that Fox News is worse, or maybe the same.
    Andrea Mitchell, who sometimes tries to pretend to be a non partisan news anchor, and the “panel” just rehashed every left wing talking point over and over. They added nothing of value, it sounded like me and sapient going at it without me ever having to respond. Reminds me why I don’t watch any of that stuff.

  329. little Donny’s a traitor; as is everyone on team Trump.
    that’s my talking point.

  331. Yep that’s what they said in 20 ways in 5 minutes while congratulating each other on how clever they were.
    That’s what passes for news coverage of Trump meeting with the French President.

  332. That’s what passes for news coverage of Trump meeting with the French President.
    oh, i’m sure they spent some time talking about the fact that Trump was ogling the French President’s wife.
    the guy’s a fncking clown. his every action is at best a national embarrassment, at worst a danger to the country.

  333. oh, i’m sure they spent some time talking about the fact that Trump was ogling the French President’s wife.
    Don’t be ridiculous, cleek, surely you know that Brigitte Macron is 64, and that Trump is on record as saying that 35 is checkout time for women? I think it was in the interview in which he agreed that his daughter was “a piece of ass”:
    http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/donald-trump-howard-stern-tapes-women-35_uk_57fa46e1e4b01fa2b904368b
    Also, and connected in a particularly unsavoury way, this immortal comment:
    “You know, it doesn’t really matter what [the media] write as long as you’ve got a young and beautiful piece of ass.” — from an interview with Esquire, 1991

  334. Don’t be ridiculous, cleek, surely you know that Brigitte Macron is 64, and that Trump is on record as saying that 35 is checkout time for women?
    it really would be nice if age would limit the number of women he slobber on. even if the rule was based in ugly sexism, reducing the number of national embarrassments he causes would be a win. alas.

  335. I hadn’t seen that cleek, so thanks for showing me the most recent seminar from the Donald Trump International Statemanship and Charm School.
    Of course, he thought he was being chivalrous and gallant. Somehow, after all this time, the extent of his boorishness can still stun…

  339. alas
    At least he didn’t go with “I’d hit that”.
    Trump’s lawyer appears to be a lovely man.
    Thugs.

  342. MSNBC (Chris Hayes) is currently discussing the timeline of what happened around the time, and after, the Trump, Jr. meeting. I have no idea that the particular meeting was dispositive, but what transpired is really ugly.
    Also, I realize that my “traitor” comment with regard to Trump’s disgusting lawyer may have been confusing. Apparently the email from the anonymous citizen was inspired by Rachel Maddow’s highlight of ProPublica’s reporting that Kasowitz (Trump’s lawyer) has some issues which would preclude most people from getting a security clearance to see the information that he needs to see in order to represent Trump in the Russia matter.
    But he’s not going to get a security clearance. Because he will see all of that without anybody caring or seeing to it.
    We’re screwed.

  343. Just saw on Rachel Maddow that Jimmy Carter was doing some construction for habitat for Humanity. He’s 93 (I think). He apparently said from his hospital bed: “Stay hydrated, and keep building.”
    People have accused me of being a Democratic apparatchik. I accept.
    Except, please don’t blame the Democratic party for my absolute disgust and hatred for the traitor Republicans. Hatred, for them and for those who put them in office, Am I a “partisan”? You bet.

  344. Guess I forgot to mention, about Jimmy Carter, that he became dehydrated.
    So we have Jimmy Carter becoming dehydrated working for the poor, and Donald Trump …. what is he doing for us, again, Marty? Was it the tax cut?

  345. That’s what passes for news coverage of Trump meeting with the French President.
    Marty, don’t want to pile on, but I’d like to know what you know about Macron and his party La République En Marche!. you mentioned earlier something to the effect that he was just an Obama clone or something similar, so I start off with a fair dose of skepticism, but I’d love to be surprised. Have at it.

  346. I know what I have read in the news lately about him, a little from whatever is in Wikipedia about the party. I know his party has an absolute majority in the French government, but I don’t know how consistent from a a policy standpoint that majority is.

Comments are closed.