Happy Saturday, Everyone! Enjoy your weekend with family &
Friends.
Recommended viewwing on Netflix
Happy Saturday, Everyone! Enjoy your weekend with family &
Friends.
Recommended viewwing on Netflix
Even though 3Chics Politico is written and curated by three women: Ametia, Rikyrah, and SouthernGirl2, I must nominate this as one of the most engaging blogs I've found. Devoted to politics and culture, these three shine a light on contemporary life with humor and spirit.
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Quick Takes: Grassley and Graham Are On Board With a Cover-Up
A roundup of news that caught my eye today.
by Nancy LeTourneau
January 5, 2018
* In case you were wondering whether Senate Republicans would do anything to hold this president accountable, you got an answer today.
Two Republican senators have called for the investigation of Christopher Steele, the former British intelligence officer who compiled a dossier on alleged collusion between the Trump campaign and the Kremlin.
In a letter to the US justice department, Charles Grassley and Lindsey Graham claimed there was reason to believe that Steele had misled US authorities over his contacts with journalists and called for him to be investigated.
The letter, the first criminal referral from Congress since it started investigations into Russian interference in the 2016 elections, comes at a time when Republicans are seeking to divert those investigations from scrutinising Donald Trump’s links to Russia to focus instead on whistleblowers, the FBI, and the special counsel investigating the issue, Robert Mueller.
The FBI is Cracking Under Pressure, and Time is Running Out
by David Atkins January 6, 2018
In the year since Donald Trump moved into the White House, one of the key questions was how long the institutions of American democracy would hold up if he tried to create an authoritarian state centered around himself. For a long time things seemed to be largely OK: the institutions of state were mostly able to resist Trump’s incursions into their necessary roles and perform their duties more or less as intended. Sure, Trump’s appointees were hyperpartisan in their deregulatory and corporate-friendly fervor, which often put them at odds with the purposes of the agencies they were in charge of. Yes, talented employees are leaving in droves and some key functions are going unfilled, and yes, agencies with authoritarian powers like ICE have been behaving cruelly and abominably with horrible consequences for those affected. But overall, American democracy itself has not been on the verge of unraveling. The president has found himself at least partially constrained by the courts in his racist immigration decrees; the Justice Department and FBI have been doing their duty in pursuing investigations into the President’s malfeasance; the states effectively scuttled Kris Kobach’s voter suppression commission; and the other agencies aren’t fully dysfunctional even if they are perverted in serving the interests of the rich and powerful rather than regular Americans.
But all of that started to change this week. The seams are beginning to come apart, and the danger of autocracy is far nearer than it was just a few days ago. This, even as the publication of Michael Wolff’s new book shows just how dangerously unfit this president is even under normal circumstances.
Republican Senators who began last year by pretending to want investigations into Russia’s interference in the election are now actively scuttling those investigations. Two Republican Senators, Charles Grassley of Iowa and Lindsey Graham, have now made a criminal referral to the FBI against Michael Steele, the longtime intelligence officer who provided information designed to expose Russia’s crimes and accomplices. This is nothing less than a coverup designed to muddy the waters, protect those truly guilty of collusion with Russia to undermine our democracy, and intimidate anyone else who might come forward in the future under similar circumstances. It’s particularly galling coming from Lindsey Graham who at one time was one of the president’s harshest critics, but is now serving as his political hit man even as Trump’s unfitness for office has never been clearer.
Meanwhile, reports surfaced the FBI wilted some months ago after ongoing public pressure from Donald Trump to prosecute his political opponents for nonexistent crimes by reopening investigations into the Clinton Foundation and the Uranium One nothingburger. The investigations were halted due to lack of evidence of wrongdoing, but the mere fact that the FBI could be pressured into harassing the charity for purely political reasons is troubling.
On the real collusion front, the integrity of the FBI’s investigation in Trump and his associates is being hampered by Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes’ blatant attempts to acquire sensitive documents held close by the FBI, and to subpoena FBI officials whose public testimony would harm the investigation itself. Nunes is already widely suspected of having passed sensitive information to the White House and having lied about it, but he is being backed up in this coverup by Paul Ryan himself.
If (like our illustrious president) video is more your thing than text, Rachel Maddow provided a good rundown of these and other disturbing developments on her show last night. It makes for disturbing viewing.
It’s clear that the country has reached a dangerous inflection point. Republicans have decided en masse that their best chance at political survival is to hew closely to President Trump. But the president is so clearly unfit for office and in such obvious legal and ethical peril that they cannot protect him without violating basic principles of accountability and democracy.
I am the very model of a Very Stable Genius.
I have a mighty button and no problems with my penius.
I have no time for television, golf, or social media
Since my brain is way way better than the best encyclopedia.— bob (@huntthesnark) January 6, 2018
I like to tweet the lies of racist grievances historical
When Russian ties are mentioned I deny them categorical
I do not feel the sting of words because I am avenious
I am the very model of a Very Stable Genius!— C. B. Wright (A Madman Unhing’d) (@ubersoft) January 6, 2018
The wheels are coming off the bus, day 4 – Never go full Fredo
This is a combination self-care thread and “OH MY GOD WHAT DID TRUMP DO NOW??”
As we all know by now, Donald Trump went full Fredo this morning, tweeting out that not only was he smart, but a “stable genius”. Of course, as of this writing, “Fredo” is trending on Twitter.
The Michael Wolff tome has savaged Trump and his self-image. Say what you want about Wolff, but what he did was brilliant. He told regime members, including Trump, what they wanted to hear in order to gain access, and then destroyed them. He turned their ridiculous self-regard back on themselves. And he has reduced Trump to doing a pathetic Fredo Corleone impersonation on Twitter do defend his nous. As we all know, his claim to fame was his alpha-male image. Nothing punctures that more than pathetic whining.
THE RACHEL MADDOW SHOW 1/5/18
New Trump US attorney appointments raise questions
Matt Alexrod, former senior Justice Department official, talks with Rachel Maddow about the peculiarities in the way the Trump administration has appointed some replacement U.S. attorneys.
@tobie: Matthew YglesiasVerified account @ mattyglesias
Doing a retreat with your party’s congressional leadership makes sense.
Doing a retreat with your national security cabinet also makes sense.
Doing a retreat with your party’s congressional leadership AND your national security cabinet is very odd.
he is so funny
“I am a very stable genius” is the way people talk on the way to the funny farm, not the Situation Room. Or so it was a year ago. https://t.co/hoh8arOrNU
— Richard W. Painter (@RWPUSA) January 6, 2018
It appear, per pooler @Jordanfabian, Trump and GOP leaders watched “The Greatest Showman” at Camp David last night. Per, IMDB, the movie “celebrates the birth of show business, and tells of a visionary who rose from nothing to create a spectacle that became a worldwide sensation”— David Nakamura (@DavidNakamura) January 6, 2018
JUST IN: Twitter statement on world leaders’ use of Twitter:
“Blocking a world leader from Twitter or removing their controversial Tweets, would hide important information people should be able to see and debate.” pic.twitter.com/j4gC33BUL3— MSNBC (@MSNBC) January 5, 2018
From March 2017 through July 2017, Ivanka Trump made between $1 million and $5 million from her business, per her federal filing, VF reports. https://t.co/NWUrYm8FAc
— Kyle Griffin (@kylegriffin1) January 6, 2018
NEW: America can now make sure low income kids have insurance for less than $18 per kid.
That’s 9 million kids for $160 million per year according to the new CBO report.
That’s less than the tax cut for a single multinational company.
— Andy Slavitt (@ASlavitt) January 5, 2018
More than 200,000 Puerto Ricans arrived in Florida since Trump and his regime botched hurricane relief.
These are American citizens.
In Florida.
Which means they can vote.
IN FLORIDA.
But only if they’re registered.
306 Days until the mid-terms. pic.twitter.com/na4axvyBKG
— Steve Marmel (@Marmel) January 4, 2018
Since the moment Dolt45 was ‘elected’
They were desperate to make it about anything other than race.
Economic Anxiety, remember?
Well, Archie Bunker voted for Hillary Clinton.
It was Archie’s BOSS and his WHITE WIFE that voted for Dolt45.
As I’ve said for awhile..
What burns them is that their vessel for White Supremacy is not just a national, but INTERNATIONAL embarrassment.
What burns them is that non-Whites REFUSE to take any responsibility for this.
AND…that we have ‘ the audacity’, at every turn, to purse our lips and remind THEM that WE didn’t do this.
They were so desperate to prove that the Black Man in the White House wasn’t all that good, that they turned around and voted in this imbecile, whose every step only accentuates just how fabulous 44 was.
The MSM was desperate because they wanted to paper over their professional malpractice in 2016..but, a) we keep on coming with receipts, b) we have no intention of ‘ turning the page’, and c) their desperation for the ‘pivot’, which would prove that their malpractice wasn’t all that bad.
I’ve said for awhile..
This isn’t 2000.
This isn’t even 2004, after Shrub lied us into two wars.
This is on a whole other level, and our side isn’t interested in forgiveness or understanding.
The TREASON is what makes this different.
Well said, Rikyrah.
I keep thinking about where we were one year ago, dreading Trump’s inauguration, dreading the inevitable, while MSM and other Trump supporters peddled that “give him a chance” and “maybe he will step up and become presidential” fantasy.
I’m grinding my teeth just thinking about it.
I can’t CO-SIGN this Commentary enough, Rikyrah.💁🏽👍🏾👍🏾👍🏾👍🏾👍🏾👍🏾👍🏾👍🏾👍🏾👍🏾👍🏾👍🏾👍🏾
I’m hoping many of those good folks displaced from #PuertoRico move to Georgia and #RegisterToVote and/or #RunforSomething 🌊 https://t.co/sczkvCwbtR
— Dudette (@Dudette9t9) January 6, 2018
307,000 Puerto Rican’s newly in Florida since Hurricane Maria. That’s a 1.5% increase in the state’s population (!)
— Will Jordan (@williamjordann) January 6, 2018
THE RACHEL MADDOW SHOW 1/5/18
Republicans, compliant FBI make progress undermining Russia probe
Rachel Maddow looks at how Republican interest in investigating Russia’s intrusion in the 2016 election has turned over the course of the past year to an interest in undermining that investigation, and how the FBI has become more compliant as Trump and Republicans have stepped up attacks.
https://twitter.com/monolithic87/status/949670985233518592
https://twitter.com/NBCNews/status/949700358057660417
https://twitter.com/oregonvt/status/949696808917307394
https://twitter.com/Philip_Elliott/status/949690910270459905
https://twitter.com/hodgman/status/949410141962727432
https://twitter.com/kylegriffin1/status/949676968227885057
James Fallows, in the Atlantic, “It’s Been An Open Secret”:
https://twitter.com/AmericanIndian8/status/949683227429453824
https://twitter.com/justinhendrix/status/949629474823393280
He needs hair products.
LOL
https://twitter.com/netflix/status/949449196536393728
I liked this article on Wolff:
Michael Wolff Did What Every Other White House Reporter Is Too Cowardly to Do
I’m gonna begin this post with the same disclaimer that needs to come with every post about Michael Wolff, which is that Wolff is a fart-sniffer whose credibility is often suspect and who represents the absolute worst of New York media-cocktail-circuit inbreeding. But in a way, it’s fitting that our least reliable president could finally find himself undone at the hands of one of our least reliable journalists.
All of Wolff’s excerpts from Fire & Fury so far (the book was rushed into stores today) read like jayvee fan fiction. They read like a pilot that Steve Bannon himself wrote, pitched to Hollywood, and had rejected 17 times over. They read, in short, like bullshit. And yet…Wolff has audio. He’s got hours upon hours of audio. Not only that, but the book has already caused legitimate upheaval in the administration, opened a permanent rift between President Trump and Bannon, AND it confirms what we have all always known to be true: that the president severely lacks the cognitive ability to do this job, and that he is surrounded at all times by a cadre of enablers, dunces, and outright thieves. As much as I wanna discredit Wolff, he got receipts and, more important, he used them. Wolff got it all. Wolff nailed them.
And look how he did it. He did it by sleazily ingratiating himself with the White House, gaining access, hosting weird private dinners, and then taking full advantage of the administration’s basic lack of knowledge about how reporting works. Some of the officials Wolff got on tape claim to be unaware that they were on the record. Wolff denies this, but he’s very much up front in the book’s intro about the fact that he was able to exploit the incredible “lack of experience” on display here. In other words, Wolff got his book by playing a bunch of naive dopes.
Thank God for that. Wolff has spent this week thoroughly exploiting Trump and his minions the same way they’ve exploited the cluelessness of others. And he pulled it off because, at long last, there was a reporter out there willing to toss decorum aside and burn bridges the same way Trump does.
Yes, and as Eliihaas pointed out the beltway Hoo haws crowd who mngle & jingle with he clown behind closed doors are no in it to serve American citizens.
Congratulations Jordan Greenway on making the U.S.A. ice hockey Olympic Team!!!
https://www.twincities.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/11/ap_17269512134852.jpg?w=884
https://www.twincities.com/2018/01/02/wild-prospect-jordan-greenway-first-african-american-player-on-u-s-olympic-hockey-roster/
https://www.twincities.com/2018/01/02/wild-prospect-jordan-greenway-first-african-american-player-on-u-s-olympic-hockey-roster/
I think you can remove the video above that I posted, please.
Good Morning Everyone 😄😄😄
Good Morning Rikyrah and Everyone :)
Wishing all of you a great weekend!
http://www.lovethispic.com/uploaded_images/209527-Happy-Saturday-Good-Morning-Quote-With-Coffee.jpg
Good Morning, 3 Chics Family & Friends! Thanks for the cup of coffee, yahtzee.
You are very welcome, Ametia, my pleasure :)
(Good afternoon, SG2) Hope you are feeling better today.
Good morning, everyone.
45’s a complete mockery of a supposed highly reputable USA government leader- of the free world! SMGDH