Daily Check-In 9/21/2017

Not too bad for a Thursday…

At least relatively speaking, that is.  In TrumpWorld, today felt like a slow news day.  Health care, North Korea, Spicer, Facebook, Twitter, Lewandowski, Pence.  Today it felt a little slow.

Compared to W or Obama, stuff is happening at breakneck speed.

Calling today a slow news day is like saying a 747 is moving slow.  It’s moving at several hundred miles per hour.  Might not be as fast as an F-35, but it sure is faster than a Ford Explorer.

LEWANDOWSKI SAYS MANAFORT SHOULD BE IN PRISON FOR LIFE

From The Hill, former Trump Campaign Manager, and Paul Manafort’s predecessor Corey Lewandowski, called out his successor in some harsh language, going as far as to say that he should spend the rest of his life in jail.

Corey is a blustery asshole whom I hate for completely irrational reasons that I’ll explain later, but so far he’s the only person associated with the Trump Campaign to show any level of outrage at what happened.  Everyone else either shrugged it off, acted like they never heard of Paul Manafort (like Vice President Mike Pence did this morning on Fox & Friends), or tried to change the subject.  To Corey’s credit, he’s calling Paul out.  Not that there was any love lost between the two, and Corey is still denying that Trump ever had anything to do with Russia, at least while he was around.

SOCIAL MEDIA, CONGRESS, AND THE SPECIAL COUNSELOR ALL GETTING ON THE SAME PAGE

Earlier today, reports came out that both Facebook and Twitter have agreed to work with the Senate committees, and that they are both fully cooperating with Special Counselor Mueller.  Twitter is handing over the information they’ve collected on Russian bots, while Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg announced several sweeping changes with Facebook, including policing ads more for political content, forcing advertisers to disclose themselves in the ad, and sharing the suspected Russian ads with Congress.

These aren’t some magnanimous or altruistic move on their part, this is straight-up CYA.  Cover. Your. Ass.

If they don’t cooperate with the investigations, they’re screwed, and could possibly go down as accomplices.  If they don’t take proactive actions, they could piss off Congress enough to get classified as utilities.  That might still happen, but at least if they start taking swift action, they’re less likely to be completely screwed.

‘THE NOTEBOOK 2″ TO STAR SEAN SPICER, ROBERT MUELLER, DONALD TRUMP

SHOUTY SPICE IS BACK, BITCHES! After rage quitting the White House when he was passed over for his dream job, Sean Spicer is back in the news, and not for being affable on late night television.

According to GQ Magazine , the Special Counselor is very interested Sean Spicer.  He’s interested in hearing his side of the story of the Comey firing press statement.  He’s interested in hearing his side of the story of the press statements he made before Comey was fired.  He’s interested in hearing his side of the story about all of the times he addressed the nation and spouted obvious lies to the American people.

Unlike everyone else in this organization, Sean won’t have a problem remembering details.

Why?

He took notes.  Lots of notes.  Of EVERYTHING.

Spicer has many reputations, but one of them is being an studious note taker.  He took notes in meetings, about meetings, notes about what he was doing each day, whom he was meeting with, what they discussed, wha the other person discussed, and who was where.  One of the stories about him was that staffers would tease him, saying he was taking notes so he could write a tell-all book.

Well, he’s gonna tell all…to Bobby Three Sticks.

I called Spicer flipping like a gymnast months ago.  He’s a lying, hypocritical jerk, and a toadie, but he wouldn’t take the fall for Trump.  Sean Spicer struck me as being the guy that gets close to his dream job, one step away from it, and knows that he’s got to eat a shit sandwich every now and then, but he didn’t think it would be as bad as it was.  Being ridiculed, humiliated, abused, treated like dirt, and that was just his boss.  That doesn’t include being a laughing stock for America.

But when Trump decided to bring his Jewish children to meet the Pope instead of Sean Spicer, a devout Catholic.  Meeting the Pope was a lifelong dream of his.  When Trump did that, he lost Spicer.  Doing this for him would have cost Trump very little, but would have kept Spicer’s loyalty for life.  To quote Frank Underwood “It requires very little of me, and it means the world to him.”

The final straw for Spicer was when Trump hired Anthony Scarmucci to be the next White House Communications Director instead of him.  I heard rumors that when he found out, Spicer legitimately rage quit.

This also shows how bad Donald Trump is at what he does.  He demands loyalty of everyone, but does not return it to his subordinates.  In crime organizations, loyalty can be kept with threats of violence.  With wealth, loyalty can be bought, as long as the cash flows.  But in Washington, D.C., loyalty is temporary, and power can shift on a dime.  By treating Sean Spicer so bad for so long, he created an enemy.  An enemy who kept notes, and shared them with the Special Counselor.

IN OTHER NEWS

NORTH KOREA’S KIM JONG UN CALLS TRUMP DERANGED, WORLD SADLY AGREES

Yep, this story again.  It’s almost like every time Trump needs a distraction, North Korea does something.  And, yes, North Korea and Russia have some interesting ties. Earlier this year, two North Korean spies suffered Russian Heart Attacks, when they were found dead in their luggage after being shot.

It won’t be too long before it comes out that Putin is pulling North Korea’s strings as well, and that they’re the reason why North Korea can put a nuke on a missile.

SENATE REPUBLICANS CONTINUE PUSH ON OBAMACARE REPEAL BEFORE END OF FISCAL YEAR ON SEPTEMBER 30

This doesn’t deal much with the Russian Investigation, but this could cost at least 25 million Americans their health care, and is a terrible idea.

I put blame on Citizens United.  As long as unlimited money from corporations is allowed in campaigns, elected officials are beholden to the will of large money donors like the Mercers and Koch’s.  The Koch Brothers even said that they will only donate $400 Million in next year’s midterm elections if, and only if, Obamacare is repealed and tax cuts are passed.

But why the sudden push?  September 30th is the end of the fiscal year for the Federal Government.  The parliamentary trick that Mitch McConnell used on health care, called Reconciliation, can be used on one bill or package per year, has to meet certain financial requirements, and can bypass cloture.

That last part, cloture, is part of how filibusters work.  While a simple majority is all that is technically required to pass any bill in the Senate, a filibuster can be called by any senator, for any reason.  Cloture is the number of votes required to break a filibuster.  That number, 60, is part of why it’s so hard to get things done in the Senate, but is also what protects this country from rampant partisanship.

So, Mitch has one last shot to pass a health care repeal before September 30th.  After that, we’re back to the sixty vote threshold.

FROM THE RUMOR MILL….

Nothing too new has come from the Rumor Mill on Twitter recently, except for confirming stories hitting the press and giving details that fill in the gaps.

One thing I found interesting was something Louise said in a tweet about Mike Pence showing up on Fox and Friends.  Earlier this summer, she wrote an article detailing how Fox News as a corporation, and a few individuals in particular, were under investigation by the FBI for their role in spreading Russian propaganda during the election, and after.  One name she dropped was Sean Hannity.

Earlier today, she mentioned that the cast and crew of Fox & Friends was included in that investigation.  I’ve mentioned before in Fox & Friends – 10 Minutes Is Enough how that program hit all of the checkboxes of a state run propaganda operation.  It wouldn’t surprise me at all that they were under investigation by the USIC, FVEY, and every other agency at this point.

Once again, this is just a rumor, take it with a grain of salt.

That’s about it for tonight.  I’m working on an idea for a new section on the home page, focusing on crimes.  If I’m right about what’s coming on the horizon, there’s gonna be a lot of talk about FISA, Money Laundering, Obstruction of Justice, and lots of fraud and tax evasion.  I’m going to add a new section devoted just to the crimes, and how the actors in this macabre play line up with each crime.  Criminal definitions don’t necessarily fall under “Get To Know Your Government”, and I plan to right enough of these to justify their own section.

“Without Journalists, it’s just propaganda”

– Katy Tur

Thank you, and have a good one.