I’m posting lightly this week as I’ve mostly Gone Fishing.
When I get back I’ll write up accused pipe bomber Brian Cole’s effort to back into a January 6 pardon, Planet’s withholding of satellite photos that might explain whether Russia helped Iran kill Benjamin Pennington, and the President’s imaginary former President friend, which should trigger the 25th Amendment.
For now I want to say something about accountability.
Along with getting 3.5% of people in the streets, peeling off a handful of Republicans, legal challenges, and the midterms, I’ve always included rescuing Trump from a catastrophe, as Democrats had to rescue Republicans in 2008 and 2020, as one of the ways to rein in fascism.
While I argued that catastrophe itself — whether financial, health, or climatic — was predictable, I can’t say I predicted Trump would be stupid enough to start a war with Iran that will and is creating follow-on catastrophes, including financial.
The old geezer has the ability to surprise even those of us most critical of his abilities, I guess, even if he has few other abilities remaining.
But as part of the possibility that the Iran catastrophe could be a way to wrench power back from Trump, it has to come with accountability. Not least, because if Americans and its allies don’t hold Trump and those who enabled him accountable for this shitshow, he will blame Muslims for his own failures.
Many of his ridiculous lies (that he had no warning Iran would close Hormuz, that he had no warning Iran would attack its Arab neighbors) are an attempt–well-practiced by the narcissist–to avoid that accountability. But they are being exposed as lies.
More important, in the short term, though, is to hold others around Trump accountable. Democrats shouldn’t fund this war in any case, but any discussions of doing so should come with a demand that Pete Hegseth, whose enthusiasm for war crimes would rule out assistance from others, be fired. And those discussions must come with reminders to people like Joni Ernst and Roger Wicker that they allowed such a monster to become Secretary of Defense in the first place. Lindsey Graham, who has been cheerleading this war recklessly, deserves special accountability; while it is exceedingly unlikely any Democrat could replace him, Annie Andrews is an interesting challenger and deserves attention for the way she can call him out.
Mostly, though, this post is just a reminder that it’s not enough to describe how incompetent and reckless Trump’s war is, how much it will hurt every American, but also how many people enabled Trump to do this.
Happy St Patrick’s day
Hat tip to Grandma Twiss and all the Irish out there
Enjoy the fishing , you deserve it, he’ll have spit out more shit by the time you get back
This.
And in the long term, accountability for those around Trump is essential. We failed to do that with the CIA interrogations in the Iraq war, letting bygones be bygones and accepting the Nuremberg defense “I was just following orders” as valid.
Internationally, other nations will not buy a defense of the US that begins and ends with “Gosh, Trump was bad, but he’s gone and we’re all good, right?” We tried that in 2020, and by 2024 that was in tatters. Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice . . .
Sure, Trump is untrustworthy, but he has made the United States untrustworthy. Trust is built slowly, and doing so will require hold not just Trump but those around him accountable as well.
Maybe eliminating the Electoral College, Dark Money, and deploying ranked-choice voting, would help restore a modicum of sanity to our elections – and help repair our relations with Allies.
[Welcome back to emptywheel. SECOND REQUEST: Please use the SAME USERNAME and email address each time you comment so that community members get to know you. You attempted to publish this comment as “Klaus” triggering auto-moderation; it has been edited to reflect your established username. Please check your browser’s cache and autofill; future comments may not publish if username does not match. /~Rayne]
Trust. Hmmmm. That, as Peterr says above, is built slowly. Even if we weather the Trump storm and come out of this hellscape with a Democratic trifecta in January 2029, there will be much damage to undo. That trifecta can begin the hard work of addressing domestic damage, but the rest of the world knows that no matter how enlightened and benevolent our next President may be our electorate has shown twice that it is capable of putting a person like Trump in office again and enablers like the current majorities in congress to facilitate his/her sick objectives. How do you build trust with that knowledge hovering over everything you do? How do you repair alliances, reaffirm treaties, make new promises, enlist partners for new initiatives? Difficult to say the least.
Difficult is an understatement, but it starts with severe honesty. “Damn, but we screwed up royally (so to speak) as a nation when we not only elected but re-elected Trump.” No prevaricating, no minimizing, and no excusing.
It continues with, as Marcy posits, accountability, naming names and being quite specific in what was done. Hegseth’s “we don’t need JAGs or rules of engagement” nonsense has to be named as dangerous if not illegal, and folks need to be hauled before judges to account for their deeds.
Finally it requires reparations — or to borrow a word from my Catholic brothers and sisters, penance. “We screwed up, and we want to attempt to begin to make things right.” A good place to start would be to not just bring USAID back, but bring it back with triple the budget and triple the staffing. “Our actions caused the deaths of thousands (at least!), and while we can’t bring them back, we can make damn sure fewer folks will die going forward.”
Good luck getting 40% of “Americans” to go along with the program, meaning the rest of the world is going to require a much deeper demonstration of commitment before they tentatively start to trust us again.
I’ve spent so many vacations actually fishing that I am compelled to ask if you meant “Gone Fishin'” literally or not. I grew up fishing so much, I cannot look at a body of water above 3 gallons without thinking about potential fishing.
Hopefully by the time you get back, some European leader has decided to imitate Trump and demand humiliating concessions from Trump personally for underwhelming and back-handed aid.
I think that might be what Trump needs: someone to speak to him in no uncertain terms. He is like a dog, always seeking dominance, but willing to be dominated in turn. He wants to be Top Dog, but what he wants most of all is to be in a hierarchy.
Like, if King Charles called him up and said sternly, “Now see here, this won’t do.”
King Charles III is only King because, after Queen Victoria or so, British monarchs became a symbol and nothing more. It’s been over 300 years since one withheld Royal Assent from a bill passed by Parliament.
But to your larger point, yes, he needs to be humiliated on a large stage. But less a dressing down (the famous photo of Angela Merkel lecturing him like a petulant schoolboy), and more treated like he treats others: transactionally, with low regard, and forced to surrender credibility and independence. Force him to offer things in exchange for a single French destroyer, for example, in a public display of begging.
Perhaps Macron or Merz will ship him some shoes.
Ms. Pelosi ripping up the SOTU is a favorite.
But, Trump is incapable of feeling humiliation and being humbled. After all, as MAGA points out, with God’s help, Trump fought off a sniper’s bullet.
How would he react if he got a cancer diagnosis? That might do it, might challenge his (teenager’s) sense of invincibility.
Trump is not self-aware. He has no idea that there exist objective viewpoints! So he acts as if he is the screenwriter/director/lead actor in one of the greatest stories history has ever told.
Everybody else is a loyalist bit player or an annoyance. imo
It was actually somewhat earlier. Charles I was a near-absolute monarch constrained by a Parliament mostly in his pocket, but Oliver Cromwell removed many of the royal prerogatives, principally the ability to prorogue Parliament without its consent. Charles I lost his head in 1649. However, his son Charles II still held many of the same cards (aside from the concessions given at Breda to regain his throne in 1660) but his brother James II lost most of that power in the Glorious Revolution that brought in William III and Mary II. Deals were made to smooth things along and henceforth these were constitutional monarchs with eroding prerogatives as crises and stupidity undercut the claims of moral superiority.
With the arrival of the Hanoverians (George I in 1714) more deals were cut to skip over the 50 or so Roman Catholic heirs with better claims to the throne. The Jacobites took issue with that until Culloden in 1745 settled the matter (see ‘Outlander’ for a dramatization). However, even George III had enough personal power to drive the Colonies up the wall into the Revolution, in part because Parliament was riddled with rotten and pocket boroughs essentially set aside for the royal entourage and the Lords still exerted veto power.
The last political prerogative lasted until Elizabeth II gave up her authority to name the leader of the Tories in the 50s / 60s as the Conservative Party went to party elections.
His claim to fame is assured by his hierarchic position as WBA champion (World’s Biggest A..hole). The concern is the bevy of contenders.
I perhaps should have said, “gone eating fish.”
Had some nice fish and chips myself to celebrate today with my mom, in our favorite local Irish pub, where we were greeted with a free tasting of Jameson’s Triple Triple.
Sláinte!
There’s always Guinness Extra Stout in my refrigerator, if nothing else.
replying to arleychino at 3:35pm
That’s what I ordered after finishing our “appetizer.”
Ha! Better!
Parental conditioning is a heckuva drug.
I’m not sure if it was the parent conditioning the child, the child conditioning the parent, or more of a mutual thing.
Parent conditioning me about fishing in any given body of water. Concrete swimming pools, I can resist. 200 gallon koi ponds, I’m already assessing rod type, line strength, and bait.
My first memories of fishing are with my great-grandfather in Minnesota, where the extended family took over a whole resort of a dozen or so cabins. Early morning fishing from a boat, fishing from the dock after lunch, and a last pre-dinner excursion on the boats again.
And then what grandma could do with those walleye and northern pike . . .
Yum.
Well, there goes my image of you and Rick Perlstein having a nice day on the river, fishing and chewing the political(ly) fat.
Come to the Chi, gurl, and I’ll fix that
[Moderator’s note: I can’t validate this is actually Mr. Perlstein; it could be a spoofed identity. I’m allowing it through for the lulz, though. /~Rayne]
Oh, I was hoping you were going to be featured on a new episode of Fishing With John (a quirky TV series from the early 90’s where musician John Lurie documents his fishing trips with the likes of Willem Dafoe, Tom Waits, and Dennis Hopper).
An interesting crew of fishing companions, to say the least. All favorites.
Merrick Garland’s sustained silence on the Trump administration’s desecration of DOJ and our rule of law has made me question Garland’s own commitment to those institutions.
For years, while he was AG, I cut him slack because of the counsel given here at EW by folks I considered better informed than myself. But all along I could never completely override my own suspicion that Garland might be a sort of narcissistic obverse to Trump: the sort who places his reputation for *not* rocking the boat above the pursuit of actual justice.
Would we be here today if Garland hadn’t dithered for two years before bringing Jack Smith on board? Yes, I get the part about accessing various phones, but there were other investigative steps that did not get initiated until Smith came in. I would argue that ‘cautiousness” can signal a sort of self-pride we don’t typically recognize as such. Pam Bondi’s self-promotion is brazen, naked, florid; we know what she’s doing. Garland also promoted himself but with the opposite, self-effacing style, and thus may have given us Trump Two.
@Ginerva:
Thank goodness we have titans of Justice like Eric Holder, who have a cot at the MSNOW studios so they go on air at an moment’s notice and thump their chests over the Trump not being held accountable…amirite?
/s
There’s a difference between refusing to use Trump’s methods and not honoring or respecting an institution. I think Garland erred, though, in being too concerned about the former, and ended up doing too little of the latter.
I contrast that with Obama, who entrenched CheneyBush’s excesses, giving them better legal foundations than they had. He did little to nothing to correct the hiring choices and the stay behinds, or to correct many of his predecessors’ policy excesses. All, apparently, in an effort to be the centrist he is, rather than the progressive he campaigned as being.
I rank that ahead of his and Rahm Emanuel’s throwing out the progressives in his campaign, the people who helped put him in the White House, immediately after the votes were counted. That’s what I call not respecting institutions.
This is not going to be popular, but I am giving Obama a pass for all of these things because I think he was playing the long game for future black Presidential candidates.
Had he come in and fulfilled everyone’s progressive dreams, I do not think he would have had a second term. And once in that term he was considering those who would stand on his shoulders in the future.
Harris could not benefit from his restraint because of the way she became the Dem. candidate (thank you Joe Biden) and because she is a woman. The misogyny knows no bounds.
Obama was still playing by the old political rules from before the Republicans had shown their hand and Project 2025, and before MAGA had congealed into the cult we see now.
I would love to know, in his heart of hearts, what Obama would do differently now in hindsight.
I agree, Molly. I think Obama was in a very precarious position, unrecognized by many. I already had had a serious encounter with white supremacist Christian nationalist militia members before he was elected. I was aware of their manipulative and dishonest methods, propaganda efforts and internet use long before many other people.
I believe people were distracted by new technology and corporate branding, among other things. My own peers were a devastating disappointment to me. And then there were the corrupt officials…
So, a lot is being left out of the picture. And that is a shame.
Obama: it was such a distinct break from his campaign and persona.
when he started naming people like summers and geithner, i had the distinct sense that he’d been “taken out to the woodshed” and threatened, very frighteningly and seriously.
#te
Doing everything progressives wanted him to do is not, I think, a benchmark that Obama considered one of his choices. He chose instead to do little that progressives wanted, beginning with making Rahm Emanuel his COS. That was a personal choice. As for his ability to market himself, it was superb. So, we’ll have to agree to disagree about what the range of acceptable choices were for him.
Its a bit like surfing really big waves. Obama did as good a job as he could, facing nature, and managed to stay on his board. We could use another intelligent leader.
While Rahm Emanuel’s manifest shortcomings are clearly visible now, that was not fully the case in 2009. Even for those of us from Chicago acquainted with Illinois politics generally and Obama’s rise in particular, Emanuel had not clearly stamped himself as the snake he would later appear to be; he seemed (if we squinted) a plausible choice for the role.
I did not fully appreciate until after Obama’s second term the horrifying dimensions and rapacity of the “heartland” groundswell of racism that arose against Obama after his election in 2008. It was only through my research into seemingly unconnected crimes throughout the country that I discovered the network of far-right, often ad hoc groups that sprang up in response to the simple fact of a Black man being elected president, as well as the close links members of such groups had to other violent crime.
I offer this observation as defense of Obama’s apparent unwillingness to advance a more progressive agenda. He knew at the time what was happening. Trump’s election must not have surprised him at all.
Thank you for calling out Rahm as the snake (a poisonous variety) that he is. He is a walking, talking demonstration of the fact that not only conservatives are toxic.
I’m wondering if it was Rahm’s idea to shut down the 50 State Project. It kept the Old Guard in power, yes, but also weakened the state parties to where some have never recovered.
The person who should answer that question is Tim Kaine, who became the DNC chair after Obama was inaugurated.
To EarlofH – Yes! Yes! Yes! We were led to thoughts and HOPE that ended up lacking any real and solid CHANGE.
Your point about the imaginary former President is a good one, following on Rayne’s excellent post. Wow, just wow. MSM walking about in the big Florsheims too.
I have read, and agree, that MSM is a misnomer. Corporate News is more accurate since that is the viewpoint they give.
I rather enjoyed the suggestion that the former President with whom he spoke was 45.
Re: imaginary former POTUS friends, NBCnews dot com has this headline:
“Trump said he spoke to a former president about bombing Iran. Four denials suggest otherwise.”
In fact, reporting says that official spokespeople/representatives of all 4 living former Presidents have denied speaking to Trump about Iran.
So WHY isn’t the headline: “Trump said he spoke to a former president about bombing Iran. He lied.”
…rhetorical question. But I’m disghausted (disgusted + exhausted) by the contortions major media will make to normalize/ give benefit of the doubt/ hell, in this case flat-out bend the narrative in Trump’s favor. *I* seek out lots of better & more reliable sources like EW, but millions of people get this schlock *at best* in lieu of real news.
I’m tired of everyone respecting the office of POTUS except the POTUS.
yeah, it’s very hard for me to imagine any of the three living Democratic presidents taking his call much less speaking with him and that goes for W too. What is true for our used to be allies is true for the last 4 presidents…you can’t insult them, lie about them, say incredibly ridiculous incendiary things about them and then expect them to take your call much less discuss something of upmost importance. Plus, he lies about every mutha effing thing.
It’s not a lie if it’s a delusion.
Media frequently struggles with the word “lie” because it can’t determine intent readily. Media also shies away from making statements about mental health, but in this case they could have made a stronger statement about how disordered and dysfunctional Trump’s claim is.
EDIT: There’s another possibility here, and I alluded to it in my last post about dementia. Did someone allow Trump to speak to/listen to an AI-generated construct claiming to be one of the former presidents?
Delusional thinking or manipulation — neither is good, should be investigated immediately, and Trump prevented from committing further abuses of power.
My sense is that is is a delusion.
I have also wondered about the manipulation angle. How easy would it be on some nights to ensure his phone is more readily available than on others, or that certain photos (since he can’t read) are laying in plain sight? At least when Reagan was “definitely not incapacitated” near the end, it seemed like pretty much everything that was being done was consistent with existing policy and practice. Here, it looks like it’s almost an active competition between agents of multiple bad actors domestic and foreign to see who can out-manipulate the others.
What do you mean Ronald Reagan is dead?! I just spoke to him!
The former president he talked to was himself!
Ding ding ding!!
You can take the prize of your choice!
Probably Maduro angling for a pardon.
Maybe he confuses Bibi with one of our former Presidents.
When you’ve lost Joe Kent, the cracks are showing:
Joe Kent resigns, says Iran posed ‘no imminent threat’ [Seattle Times]
“Joe Kent, who ran twice to represent Washington state in Congress, resigned from his role as director of the National Counterterrorism Center on Tuesday, saying that he cannot in “good conscience” support the Trump administration’s war in Iran.
“Iran posed no imminent threat to our nation, and it is clear that we started this war due to pressure from Israel and its powerful American lobby,” Kent said in a letter to the president.
“I support the values and the foreign policies that you campaigned on in 2016, 2020, 2024, which you enacted in your first term,” Kent added. “I pray that you will reflect upon what we are doing in Iran, and who we are doing it for.” … ”
https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/politics/joe-kent-resigns-says-iran-posed-no-imminent-threat/
This is also a big FU to Tulsi Gabbard — someone else who needs to be part of the push for accountability.
Also . . .
There’s a certain format to resignation letters, from which Kent rather significantly departs. I notice that Kent’s letter is undated and says his resignation is “effective today” without mentioning a date. Seems to me as if he’s had this written for a bit, and decided to send it today. Not sure what kind of gap there may have been, what made him decide to finally send it in, and what happened in between.
(I saw his letter at the NYT, but as it is behind their paywall, I linked to the Guardian’s reproduction of the full text of the letter. It’s on DNI/NCC letterhead, but there is no date on it.)
Huh. Interesting. Wonder if the date has significance in its absence — like something particular may have been a trigger inside the last 24 hours.
See if this NYT gift link works?
(I hope this is kosher, nope unintended.)
The NYTimes will not put that reason in their headline. The group that claims they do not control the American Media or Government doesn’t seem to match what folks on the ground are seeing with their own two eyes. This particular topic came up frequently when I was tabling at the University of Wyoming with the College Democrats last week. It is certainly the elephant in the room but no one seems to want to take a bite out of the issue, so the problem grows larger.
For my part, I was pleasantly surprised at the nuanced discussions that were had on this subject; however, I think the issue should be addressed in a more direct fashion, but we will see if that happens. During the discussions with some of Muslim students, I am learning a great deal about how the Islamic world views the stories in Genesis.
It is spring break this week and while the students are mostly gone, the Turkey Vultures are due to return and the red finches are setting up their nest in the Ristras hanging on our front porch. I am off to enjoy St. Patrick’s Day, the anniversary of my parents wedding and the start of March Madness. Enjoy the time off and the fishing.
I’ve been thinking about accountability because I’ve been thinking about The Problem. What is The Problem? Its not Trump, suprisingly. Trump is the big explosion in The Kremlin so the Mission Impossible team can go in and steal the McGuffin. Hes ultimately a distraction.
The Problem is the Republican party. More specifically, our governance is owned and managed by 2 political parties and one of them has given up on the idea of representative democracy and indeed, governance itself, in the name of simply holding on to power. Accountability needs to be more than firing individuals or even putting a few in jail. At a minimum it needs to start with ungaming the systems the party has gamed, starting with representation in the House and the Supreme Court. Throwing several people in jail would help drive the point home that breaking the law is bad and has consequences. The party needs accountability to reduce the incentive to try all this again.
Absolutely this. Trump could only emerge and prosper from a collective of individuals who had largely lost their individual and group moral compasses in desperate greed for power at all costs – and go hang the will of the people.
Once Trump is gone and the fallout from their abject failure of governance becomes fully manifest, it’s hard to see how the party can recover without a comprehensive clean sweep – and most especially excluding all those Nazi-admiring “young” Repubs.
Jeff Sharlet wrote the book The Family back in 2008 about the Highly organized and covert ‘Christian’ political group. I remember listening to an NPR interview of him at the time. He talked about what this group had planned and how they were playing the long game and they were perfectly poised to carry it all out. He sounded truly scared of what he saw coming from this group and how he saw no way to stop it.. I think we are living his fear right now. I think we are living The Family’s plan. I think Trump’s rise may have pushed up the speed of their plan which may have caused them to not be carrying it out as perfectly as they were doing. I hope this eventually thwarts their plan.
So Trump and enablers will always have friends and opportunities in this Christianist world. finding a way to hold these groups accountable too would be ideal.
My perspective of the Netflix series and then observing the world that network and ideas was embraced by a wider group than just in the US, but maybe you are aware? The Family message generated out of DC worked for countries that had larger christian communities while less so in places like Europe and most of the provinces of Canada. That message really resonates in Russia, Bulgaria, Romania and really any formerly repressed christian based faith. Putin and the GOP Family know this.
Why now? Just like striking down Roe, those that understand the plan are passing away. Putin, Trump, Bibi are in place, just like Alitio, Thomas, Barrett, Kavanaugh, Gorsuch and Roberts. The time was now. Assume that in the end; Israel, US and Russia have aligned interests from the Family’s perspective.
The Netflix series profiles the two and only two Congressman to serve the Dayton, Ohio community for most of my adult life – Tony Hall and Mike Turner. I ran for US House against Mike as a Republican in 2002, Tony Hall, the Democrat, was gerrymandered out after 2000, as the one issue Roe voters took over Southern Ohio.
Russia, US and Israel are aligned – The Family plan.
The Family is one of several books on the subject of ultra-right, dark-money Christianist influence on elections and, significantly, the judiciary. Others are Shadow Network and Money Lies and God. I recommend all of them.
Without understanding the Christianist and deeply funded GOP long game, you cannot understand why Trump’s eventual passage from this earthly plane will not free us. We have to be in it for the very long haul. They sure are.
Unconstitutional number of representatives congress in congress
Article 1 Section 2 “the number shall not exceed one for every thirty thousand “never amended.
Us population +/- 341/347 million average 344 million/30,000 =11,466 +/-representatives. Our
Representation is 1/20 of the constitutional requirement multiplying the power of the president and supreme court by a factor of 20
That doesn’t mean it can’t be less than “one for every thirty thousand”. It just says that that’s the minimum number of people that a district can have.
Maybe Trump has succeeded in resurrecting Jimmy Carter as his erstwhile imaginary friend/former president after secretly reading (or having read to him) your 3/6 post here?
It could be one of those “sir” stories: “Sir, don’t make the mistakes I did – finish the job in Iran”, said imaginary Jimmy in between Trump cranking out sleep-deprived shitposts railing at this-and-that around 3 a.m. one recent morning.
As many people noted from personal experience (and I can add my confirmation to this) in comments to Rayne’s recent dementia post, many dementia sufferers report encounters like this as real, when they get past the MCI stage of early dementia.
Which leads to my baseless conspiracy theory: Susie Wiles doesn’t really have breast cancer at all. She needed to move into the WH because she’s the only one who can effectively cover up Trump’s increasingly-obvious and advancing dementia but she now needs to be there 24/7 to accomplish that. Yikes, I better be wrong.
Surrogate mommy?
That occurred to me. We know Trump had daddy issues but does he also have mommy issues?
Does something about Wiles trigger memories of Trump’s mother?
He once referred to her as Susie Trump
In certain photos from the 1950s, Trump’s mother sports a lacquered upswept hairdo that could be the template for Susie Wiles’s out-of-date coif.
Trump’s origin story lies in his mommy issues. When he was a toddler his mother spent most of her time sick and unavailable to him, at that critical time when young children learn to bond with other humans. The source of her illness has remained somewhat vague, but what has not is that even after she recovered she remained fairly distant–most often described as vain and self-centered.
Fred, Trump’s father, was notoriously demanding and stingy with his approval. Neither parent seems to have been generous with affection. That Donald became a bully in elementary school seems unsurprising; how else could he get their attention?
Back in 2016 I tried to find out everything I could about his relationship with his mother. Back then precious little was out there; most journalists were (and still are) focused on Big Bad Daddy Fred. Now that niece Mary Trump has lifted the veil we know more about Mother Mary Trump, but I think there’s still lots we don’t know that’s at least as important as the better-documented story of Donny and his dad.
You have no idea how many times I have wished somebody had picked gossip columnist Liz Smith’s brain about the Trumps before she died. She knew a lot about them she took to her grave, including Fred and wife Mary Anne.
Wiles is his touchstone to the NY he knows and loves. Wiles and Trump were marinated in the same sauce. She was Pat Sumerral’s kid and as such traveled in the same space as Donald so she knows all generational things that appeal to him from a WASP NYC state of mind.
However, since she is Pat’s kid (Daddy issues), she is a christian nationalist that believes she is working toward god’s plan and she is the “perfect” person to manage the modern day King David.
When I listened to the recent Fresh Air interview of Rhae Lynn Barnes about the history minstrel shows in America and their impact on America, I could not help but think of Susie and Donnie being taken in by this history when they were in NYC.
https://www.npr.org/transcripts/nx-s1-5738478
She provides the generational camaraderie for the heydays of NYC that Melania cannot.
Doozy
I have got a chief-y
let’s call Doozy,
In the words of Shakespeare:
she kerpows,
Though all of you
may know her, too
I’d like to spout right now:
If you knew Doozy
like I know Doozy,
Oh! Oh! What she’ll ensnarl,
Ask Thomas Massey,
And then Chuck Grassley,
Oh! Oh! Even canvas Tallahassee
Stephen’s reigning…
she doesn’t balk,
In this country
Stephen Miller cleans my clock,
If you knew Doozy
like I know Doozy,
Oh! What she’ll ensnarl.
Doozy has a rightwing adoration,
No one ever said she’d cop a plea
Nobody knows
what she’d disclose,
Nobody knows, why me?
If you knew Doozy
like I know Doozy,
Oh! Oh! What she’ll ensnarl,
My mother’s tresses
as Freud distresses,
Oh! Oh!
Will she build her own successes
Out in public
She’s a walk-on,
Water-cooler: ICE-y link
and war talk’s on,
If you knew Doozy
like I know Doozy,
Oh! What she’ll ensnarl.
She’ll spend Sunday
praising the Lord,
But on Monday
It’s all Nixon and his Ford,
If you knew Doozy
like I know Doozy,
Oh! What she’ll ensnarl.
I had some backlash
On someone and her pup,
Doozy’s got those lips,
She parsed me once
And churned it up.
If you knew Doozy
like I know Doozy,
Oh! Oh! Oh! What she’ll ensnarl.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I0zKqiClt1k
“If You Knew Susie (Like I know Susie!)” Eddie Cantor, 1925
1/9/26
I dreamed I saw Joe Kent last night,
I think on NBC.
He’d quit the War but still had thoughts
Of rank Conspiracy.
I said, How are you, Joe, old boy,
How are you, Joe old chum?
He answered, AIPAC just don’t quit,
They get right up your bum.
Their influence is everywhere,
They call the shots up here.
They goose the ass of Lindsey Graham
Who gets inside Trump’s ear.
And Bibi says, War’s pretty good,
It keeps you on the throne.
So come along with me, dear boy,
It’s hell to burn alone.
We’ll blow the Imam clean away,
As I have urged before.
Tehran is full of Shiites, pal,
They won’t miss three or four.
But Joe, I said, you still believe
Those bums were tourists, all?
Manhandling papers, waving sticks
And shitting in the hall?
Just reg’lar guys they were, said he,
And not to be ignored.
Their only thought was for to see
Democracy Restored.
But what of Pence’s gibbet, man,
And what of Mike Fanone?
Tarrio’s thugs, the flagpole guy,
And what of Roger Stone?
An inside job, said he, I’m sure,
Most likely CIA.
The vote was rigged by dirty Dems
Who stole it clean away,
Who stole it clean away.
A séance with Jefferson Davis is a real possibility
I think it was CNN anchor Kasie Hunt who speculated that Trump was talking to himself. He was clearly a former president. Maybe he looks in the mirror and has conversations with himself. He is a narcissist, after all. Or he could have had a visual projection of any former president: Jackson, Nixon, Reagan…
In her declining years, my mother often spoke with people who were not there. One time it was a cute, little red-haired boy. Other times it was someone speaking to her through the vents in her room.
I was a caregiver for many years, which included all during the time that I was also a whistleblower. As I mentioned back when I was a newbie, it was very difficult dealing with corrupt government officials; but it was even more difficult taking care of someone with dementia. Both experiences caused a great deal of grief.
I have no doubt that Trump has some form of dementia. His cabinet members and family are willfully negligent: Totally irresponsible in their obligations to Trump as a human being and citizen. And totally irresponsible in their obligations to the nation and the Constitution. The GOP establishment is equally culpable.
Didn’t they say Nixon in his days leading up to his forced resignation used to talk to the portraits of former presidents in the White House?
from the dedication Jimmy Carter wrote for his book of poems, Always a Reckoning, which is actually pretty good:
“to punishment or remorse for those who claim to speak for God, but only in his role as judge; for human rights oppressors in our own and other lands; for those who cause, condone, or disregard the suffering of the poor and weak…”
No, I don’t believe the shade of President Carter would approve of Trmp’s war(s).
W MI note: I missed the Conklin St. Patty’s Day parade again for the 13th strait year. It was 17 degrees.
I’m thinking this war could be Bibi’s Dien Bien Phu.
Between this, the recent Cuba comments, and his “girls of age at six” slip-up that is at best problematic and at worst horrifying, it’s becoming obvious that Trump is either getting worse quickly or is getting so belligerent quickly that they can’t stop him from saying in public what he’s been saying in private for a while.
And that leads to an interesting situation. JD Vance desperately needs Trump to just hold on until next February so he can live out his fantasized ten-year reign. Vance’s many rivals have every incentive to keep Trump coherent and controllable as long as possible but to not let that happen. Add in the likelihood of a lame-duck Congress, and things may get messy starting right around the Christmas break.
Speaking of accountability:
Happy St. Patrick’s Day, the day when everyone is Irish. If you’re not convinced, think about this charming, delightful song. It was written in 1912 and has been popular since then. But, guess what, neither the composer nor the lyricists were Irish.
Another interesting fact about the composer, Ernest Roland Ball: He was born in Cleveland, OH and when he died he was interred at Lake View Cemetery in East Cleveland. Here are some other spirited people who keep him company there:
James A. Garfield – President of the United States
John Hay – U.S. Secretary of State and aide to Abe Lincoln
Eliot Ness – One of the Untouchables who played a role in helping to bring down Al Capone
John D. Rockefeller – Founder of the Standard Oil Company
Carl B. Stokes – Mayor of Cleveland
Louis Stokes – Member, U.S. House of Representatives
And as you can see below, even the Irish love this song:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2WxNAH5Z-Ek
“When Irish Eyes Are Smiling, by Emma Sophia (age 5)”
Trump had no warning Iran would close the Strait of Hormuz………If he actually believes that he needs to resign. When the news reported Trump had Iran bombed, the first thing which went through my mind was, Iran is going to block the water ways in the area. Now if one senior citizen with no military back ground can figure that out, …… He is most likely so ignorant and full of himself he doesn’t think people will check with former Presidents or he can spin another lie.
There need to be repercussions on what Trump has done. He threatened Greenland and Canada, invaded Venezuela, kidnapped their President,sent troops into American cities, they in turned shot and killed American citizens, jailed people–didn’t care if they were children, sick, American citizens and started to buy up and build huge concentration camps, cut off oil to Cuba causing massive problems and now wants to take over that country also. Trump bombed Iran because as he was running around doing whatever he wanted no one stopped him.
Then he wants other countries to clean up his mess in the Strait of Hormuz. He has some nerve or he is bat shit crazy and then he threatens countries who turn him down. He has insulted a number of countries, imposed nasty tariffs and insulted Canada and G.B. As a Canadian, I wouldn’t piss on him if he were on fire.
Both Benni and Donni need to be hauled in front of an international tribunal for their crimes or before the American Congress. The Republicans who permitted this to all happen are complicit in all of this. What were they thinking?
I am now waiting to see which comedian or commentator he has arrested for treason and arranges a large show trial.
Why some people are in Cabinet is beyond me but then it maybe they are there because they are so stupid and incompetent.
The U.S.A. has accomplished many great things in its history but these days its starting to remind me of a fascist state complete with restrictions on freedom of speech. When you shut down comedians you are in deep trouble.
Lest anyone be tempted to think Joe Kent is one of the good guys, Josh Marshall takes him to the woodshed:
Thank you for this. The enemy of my enemy is merely my enemy’s enemy, nothing more. I read somewhere that Americans rank near the bottom of being able to hold multiple truths simultaneously, but I’m glad we do better here. Kent’s comments were a dog whistle to other extremists to start setting up the scapegoat now.
Note the use of the word “pressure” meant to imply Trump was a passive unwilling actor. Like MGT quitting the House, Kent can’t blame Trump and alienate his base. He was forced into it, trick by the tricksy Jooz.
And paywalled Charles P. Pierce:
I don’t think Netanyahu can exert pressure on Trump, but knows Trump well enough to influence him via flattery and other verbal tics. If it is pressure you’re after, I think it’d something I don’t see mentioned as much – Saudi Arabia and MBS. They are a direct funnel of money to Trump and MBS wants Iran pummeled. Trump is simple – he wants glory and to be paid for his brilliance – and paid for his favors.
The harder they hit Iran, the more $$ goes into Jared’s investment fund, Trump unstablecoins and the production of Melania II.
Peterr, where did your grampa catch the walleyes and northerns? As a Minnesotan in ND exile I’m curious.
Lake Nisswa, just north-northwest of Brainerd.
Perhaps seems OT, but indulge me a minute.
Gareth Gore is the author of the book OPUS, the subject matter of which is Opus Dei and the dark money, human trafficking and right wing conspiracy within the Catholic church. He was invited by the Pope to the Vatican. They had a 40 minute long private interview.
The Opus Dei sect, founded by the fascist priest Josemaría Escrivá under Franco’s dictatorship, is highly secretive, and known for abuse of young girls, who are groomed to work as housekeepers for priests with the promise to their families that they will have a secure future and a religious upbringing. It operates outside the usual hierarchy, reporting directly to the pope.
Given the figures connected to the Trump administrations who are Opus Dei, such as Mike Pompeo, Bill Barr, and Leonard Leo, as well as rumored members of SCOTUS Alito, Kavanaugh and perhaps Barrett, it leads me to wonder whether Opus Dei has a nexus with the Epstein trafficking network. They are in the same line of work, after all.
Seems like a Chicago Pope might pull back the veil.
Here’s an interview with Gore, from April 2025:
https: //www.youtube.com/watch?v=TiZJ2TwS7y8
El Pais from October 2024:
https: //english.elpais.com/international/2024-10-06/manipulation-greed-and-power-the-untold-story-of-opus-dei.html
And his Substack post on his chat with the Pope:
https: //garethgore.substack.com/p/my-audience-with-pope-leo
“He was invited by the Pope to the Vatican.”
Which Pope? This is not a small detail.
Just a hat tip to ernesto1581 on March 17, 2026 at 11:24 pm. Brilliant.
i am going against the grain with the majority of the comments here to say that it seems (to me) like a facile trap — to dismiss what trump is up to as dumb, stupid, or unplanned.
there is some sort of plan here, a desired outcome, and it is one that is very bad for our country.
donald trump may be demented but he is nonetheless very devious.
P S when someone, like donald trump, harps on stolen elections, fake news, hoax this & hoax that, or amazing landslide mandates — that is where the conspiracy sniffers should be looking, not dumping on their fellow americans for having elected that person.
Trump would be in jail without the 2024 election’s seven swing states. he had to win that election, one way or another.
the next must-win is coming up, really soon.