Internal polling has to be ugly considering how hard they're ramping up the campaign.

I love the fact that the GOP has become so well known as the conspiracy party that they're opening most Obamagate talk by telling everyone that this isn't actually a conspiracy.

New: The State Dept. IG removed from his job Friday was looking into whether @secpompeo made a staffer walk his dog, pick up his dry cleaning and make dinner reservations for Pompeo and his wife, according to two congressional officials, per @JoshNBCNews and @mitchellreports

— Ken Dilanian (@KenDilanianNBC) May 17, 2020

She's been "vulnerable" since she won - Maine is purple & weird. But no part of what she's done or voted for in the Senate has ever mattered in that calculus.

QS you're much more in this world than me, and if you posted this I assume it's important, but I don't get this one. Is it weird a Cabinet level official would have staffers pick up dry cleaning and make dinner reservations? I just kind of assume that's what powerful people make interns and low level staff do.

I believe all of that would be an ethics violation for a Cabinet member.


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Cabinet members aren't allowed secretary's/personal assistant's?

They are not allowed to use government employees for personal errands or chores. Now, the end result likely would have been a small fine (basically paying back the hours of government time used for personal errands), so I wonder if there were other things about to be found out as well.

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The "whistleblower racket" is "causing great injustice". Topped off with a call out to Susan Collins...

The audacity and ignorance of this unfettered moron continues to shatter glass floors in the darkest basement of my expectations.

No, it was three years after Franken resigned with many democrats now regretting that decision. There were several prominent democratic leaders that did not want her to stay. I think she would have without the public shaming that the pictures brought.

A year after Franken resigned I should have said. Franken resigned in January 2018. And there are plenty who pushed Franken out that have expressed no regrets over it - Senator Gillibrand for one.

NEWS:

House Dems have learned that the State Department IG fired by Trump had mostly completed an investigation into the decision by @SecPompeo to fast track $8 billion in arms to the Saudis, I'm told.

Dems are looking at a possible link.

New piece:https://t.co/VoTMnyIPQ8

— Greg Sargent (@ThePlumLineGS) May 18, 2020

This is fine.

My point isn't in the specifics, but the generic. This IG is not being targeted for poor job performance, or something equivalent that a proper government would care about. This is undoubtedly personal/targeted because the IG is either looking into something, or has spoken about something that surely actually happen, which would if revealed prove unflattering to the asshole-in-chief and his minions. So, a person whose entire role in government is supposed to be about preserving accountability and transparency is going to get discarded in order to eliminate any such thing.


I don't care about dry cleaning and the like on a deep level, but, incidentally... I believe people who abuse their power and authority in such ways are piles of shit, in general, regardless of whether it's illegal.

A more tidy summary than I am capable of

Trump's Weekend of Scandal Was Hiding in Plain Sight - The Bulwark

Sounds like the IG was investigating if Pompeo green-lit arms sales to the Saudis that weren't allowed by Congress.

But hey, Ken Dilanian, be sure to run with the "he was having people pick up dry cleaning" story that you were fed. That'll help muddy the waters real good.

Journalism seems hard until you realize that it's really just verbatim copying of copy from GOP "sources."

The Malkin thing should have gotten more notice because she is a full on neo-Nazi at this point. Put out a book recommendation list that included Mein Kampf, Turner Diaries, Protocols of the Elders of Zion, and a bunch more like that in which she praised them.

Market is up 1000 points, everything is opening up again now or soon, the CBO says the economy will rebound in the 3rd and 4th quarters. Trump seems to be a heavy favorite and especially with as weak as Joe Biden and the D's are coming off as usual. Ugh not sure I can do another 4 years of this clown and whatever comes in 2024.

There's absolutely zero data that suggests Trump is the favorite, let alone a heavy favorite.

I think there is something to be said that "so goes the economy, so goes Trump"

Even with a good economy he hasn't built a path to being a heavy favorite in November. Trump's problem remains the fact that he's spent the last 3 and half years doing nothing to pull more voters in. He doesn't have the patience and fortitude to reach out and work with people that don't already worship him.

Unless something game changing happens Trump is trying thread the needle with the electoral college again. He may be able to pull it off, but saying he's the favorite because of a strong economy would be treating him like a traditional incumbent when he's anything but that.

I kind of hope some nation develops a vaccine but holds it til the 4th of November

Just keep selling that snake oil...

Trump says he’s taking hydroxychloroquine in case he gets coronavirus | KRON4

Countdown to Trump tweets about Cavuto...

Fox News's Neil Cavuto is stunned by Trump's announcement that he's taking hydroxychloroquine: "If you are in a risky population here, and you are taking this as a preventative treatment ... it will kill you. I cannot stress enough. This will kill you." pic.twitter.com/e6D5alfAgc

— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) May 18, 2020

There is no way he is taking it. Just a bullshit statement is my guess. Doctor should lose their license if that is true.

I do agree but think a possible wildcard is China. Blaming China and even possibly getting into some sort of confrontation (e.g. supporting Taiwan and like) can distract and increase support for a "war time" President.

That is assuming he can build up support throughout the world, be seen as a leader and unify world "readiness to blame" someone/thing. But then we are talking about Trump ...

Uh ... no.

Trump can easily win because the Electoral College is a thing that allows unpopular candidate to win a national race. I'd still wager he wins but loses the popular vote by like 7-8 million.

No chance. Just another example of him paying no regard to how words spoken by the "President of the US" have a major impact on those who may not be wise enough to not understand he is full of BS.

Of all the vile enablers on Fox News I actually like Cavuto. He at least tries to be as unbias as he can. At least when I have heard him.

I'm guessing we'll get a "I was just being sarcastic" tweet later. Or something about how he was trying to trick the media. There is no chance he is taking that for preventative measures considering the nasty side effects, especially on the elderly.

If my Facebook feed is representative, Trumpers won't be taking any vaccines.

I have a lot of HS friends saying that.

Placebo.

Yeah, I was thinking people are telling him its hydroxychloroquine but it's really a placebo just so he'd stop asking for it.

Trump saying he fired an inspector due to the guy being investigated telling him to is a much bigger scandal and would be grounds for impeachment in any normal setting. But the focus of his press conference will be on his dumb lie about taking that drug.

I mean, it's Trump, so it could easily be just a bald-faced lie, but it could just as easily be a physician just trying to get Trump to stop bugging him/her about the drug.

The War on Reality is real:

Trump Campaign's New 'Investigative' Website Promotes 'Truth Over Facts'

Maybe we'll finally get to the bottom of the Bowling Green Massacre.

Remember the Pensacola shootings?


Somehow Al Queda was able to infiltrate a U.S. military program.

Too bad Dems aren't allowed to investigate anything.

Are you saying this is Trump's fault? or just incompetent vetting process?

The guy came here Aug 2017. Not sure when he was actually approved to take the program but early enough in Trump's tenure where it's plausible this fell under Obama's admin.

Don't know. Don't care.

It's clearly something that needs investigating.

Wait...what?

I'm surprised he hasn't said he had the virus and it was nothing. Just to say the virus isn't worth worrying about.

I think for a lot of people on the right it's going to be a badge of honor to not get any vaccine that's made available. I'm guessing most that say they aren't going to get the vaccine will go ahead and get it and then claim they didn't though.

Their cult leader gets away with lying all of the time. You know they're going to as well.

That's my guess, too. But the anti-vax movement does seem to be growing on the right.

After seeing the statement from his doctor that confirms that they discussed it and agreed it would be worth taking but seems to be very careful to not actually say that he gave it to him, this is 100% what happened.

As expected, Trump is going bananas about Cavuto.

I don't care what the President is or isn't taking. It's a distraction.

As Florida re-opens, COVID-19 data chief gets sidelined and researchers cry foul

I was part of the naive group that thought that MAGA would die out as it ran into Democracy and Reality.

What I didn't anticipate was how quickly, thoroughly, unabashedly, and unreservedly it would simply fight to eliminate Democracy and Reality instead.

I thought it was a political movement. That its adherents would be moved by the same cost-benefit calculus that has historically moved American citizens. Even the Confederacy--a literal treasonous slave empire whose entire existence was repugnant to the United States--was ultimately an economic cost-benefit decision. The Confederate States had an economic system based on slavery. The United States was refusing to let slavery expand into the new territories. Thus, it made sense to fight the United States to try and preserve slavery. If there would have been some invention that would have let the South prosper economically without slavery, it would have taken that instead of a Civil War. It would not have ignored reality just to keep on a self-destructive path.

But MAGA? It is about identity. It is not about politics. It is certainly not about economics. It is about identity.

And what do we do when reality steps on our identity? We fight reality. We ignore reality. We pretend reality does not exist. All those girls who didn't want to date me in high school and college? I wasn't going to let that get in the way of my identity as a non-loser. I simply would pretend that reality didn't exist. The guy who made the basketball team over me? That's because the coach was friends with his dad. Not because I'm not as good at basketball as I believe I am.*

So we are now facing a problem--COVID 19--that causes Pollyannas like myself to say "Surely this time will be different. They can't really hide dead bodies, can they? Fear of disease is some Limbic System shit. People just aren't wired to ignore contagious diseases. We are about to get a hard dose of reality. But that will be good b/c we need reality to help stop this horrible horrible virus."

I was, once again, naive and wrong. They are going to hide the bodies--literally.

Are enough of us paying attention? Will it matter in November? Will Barr/Putin make it all a laughable exercise in fake democracy? I have no idea. But that's what keeps me up at night.

I have MAGA friends. I have (a lot of) MAGA relatives. I wish them no ill will. I hope they continue to live the happy lives they have been living. I just will do everything in my power (which isn't much, granted) to keep them away from the levers of power. They cannot be reasoned with. They cannot be negotiated with. And their need to continue to deny reality is more harmful than any right/left political position can be.

*This second example is fake. I was so bad at sports that even I couldn't fool myself into thinking otherwise. There's reality, and then there's REALITY, you know?