The Commentariat -- August 13, 2018
Late Morning/Afternoon Update:
It's all a scam. Everything. -- Akhilleus, on the Trump presidency*
Adam Goldman & Michael Schmidt of the New York Times: "Peter Strzok, the F.B.I. senior counterintelligence agent who disparaged President Trump in inflammatory text messages and helped oversee the Hillary Clinton email and Russia investigations, has been fired for violating bureau policies, Mr. Strzok's lawyer said Monday. Mr. Trump and his allies seized on the text messages -- exchanged during the 2016 campaign with a former F.B.I. lawyer, Lisa Page -- in assailing the Russia investigation as an illegitimate 'witch hunt.' Mr. Strzok, who rose over 20 years at the F.B.I. to become one of its most experienced counterintelligence agents, was a key figure in the early months of the inquiry. Along with sending the text messages, Mr. Strzok was accused of sending a highly sensitive search warrant to his personal email account. It is not clear why Mr. Strzok, who was formally fired on Friday, was dismissed at this time.... Aitan Goelman, his lawyer, said that the deputy director of the F.B.I., David Bowdich, had overruled the bureau's Office of Professional Responsibility, which said Mr. Strzok should be suspended for 60 days and demoted." ...
Agent Peter Strzok was just fired from the FBI - finally. The list of bad players in the FBI & DOJ gets longer & longer. Based on the fact that Strzok was in charge of the Witch Hunt, will it be dropped? It is a total Hoax. No Collusion, No Obstruction - I just fight back! -- Donald Trump, in a tweet this morning
Felicia Sonmez of the Washington Post: "Omarosa Manigault Newman ... said Monday that she believes Trump was lying when he claimed in a phone call in December that he knew nothing about her dismissal by White House Chief of Staff John F. Kelly.... Trump fired back at Manigault Newman with a Monday morning tweet in which he attacked his former aide as 'vicious, but not smart' and claimed that 'people in the White House hated her.' 'Wacky Omarosa, who got fired 3 times on the Apprentice, now got fired for the last time,' Trump said. 'She never made it, never will. She begged me for a job, tears in her eyes, I said Ok.' Trump said he would 'rarely see' Manigault Newman in the White House, a claim that contradicts reports that she enjoyed a close relationship with the president. In two follow-up tweets, Trump continued to disparage his former aide, saying he had 'heard really bad things' about her and claiming that she 'would constantly miss meetings & work.'... He added that while it was 'not presidential' to attack her, he was doing so because he believes the media will be trying to make her 'look as legitimate as possible.'" ...
... Mrs. McCrabbie: Yeah, it's the media who force Trump to act "not presidential."
Cristian Farias of New York: "... for all the flashy testimony to come out of the [Manafort] trial..., jurors have already seen reams of documentary evidence -- emails, invoices, and business records that paint a picture of the scheme Manafort is accused of orchestrating. In significant ways, the oral testimony simply corroborates or adds to the foundation prosecutors have already laid with the documents entered into evidence. As for [Judge T.S.] Ellis, whose ornery treatment of prosecutors has gotten him undue attention for all the wrong reasons, it's best to not read too much into it.... Because the defense is likely to catch fire from him too, but also because benchslapping is something that trial lawyers have to live with -- and it's not a good barometer of how jurors will ultimately decide a case.... Ellis, more than just about anyone else in America, knows a wealth of extremely sensitive details about the Russia investigation, and his apparent drive to cut no slack for the prosecution also indicates that he wants their side to have a solid trial record in the event of an appeal."
Daniel Lippman of Politico: "Several times in the first year of his administration..., Donald Trump wanted to call Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe in the middle of the afternoon. But ... midafternoon in Washington is the middle of the night in Tokyo.... Trump's aides had to explain the issue, which one diplomatic source said came up on 'a constant basis,' but it wasn't easy.... Trump's desire to call world leaders at awkward hours is just one of many previously unreported diplomatic faux pas Trump has made since assuming the presidency, which go beyond telephone etiquette to include misconceptions, mispronunciations and awkward meetings." ...
... Jonathan Chait has a more amusing take on Lippman's reporting: "Running an effective foreign policy for a global hyperpower is always tricky when the president happens to be a personally corrupt authoritarian bigot who is concealing shady ties to a strategic adversary. The problem gets even harder when the president is unable to grasp some of the basic facts and principles of diplomacy.... It's like having Homer Simpson as president, but dumber:"
When Henry Met Jared. Caleb Melby, et al., of Bloomberg: Jared Kushner introduced himself to Henry Kissinger at a National Interest luncheon in March 2016, where Kissinger was the guest speaker. At the luncheon, Kushner "also met Dimitri Simes, the Russian-born president of the center.... Questions have recently been raised about the center for its ties to Russia, including its interactions with Maria Butina, a woman accused of conspiring to set up a back channel by infiltrating the National Rifle Organization and the National Prayer Breakfast.... In the weeks following [the luncheon, Kushner & Simes arranged] ... an event hosted by the center to give Trump a chance to lay out a cohesive foreign policy speech.... In his speech at the Mayflower, Trump called for easing tensions with Russia.... It was at [Trump's] Mayflower [event] that Kushner first met Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak, an encounter he left off disclosure forms when he initially joined the government." Via safari
Stephanie Murray of Politico: "A high-ranking Republican lawmaker's son donated the 'maximum amount' to a Democrat running to replace his father. Bobby Goodlatte, son of House Judiciary Committee Chairman Rep. Bob Goodlatte (R-Va.), made the surprise announcement on Twitter Sunday night. Goodlatte is retiring after 13 terms in Congress. 'I just gave the maximum allowed donation to Jennifer Lewis, a democrat running for my father's congressional seat. I've also gotten 5 other folks to commit to donate the max. 2018 is the year to flip districts -- let's do this!' Bobby Goodlatte wrote on Twitter.... Donald Trump carried the central Virginia district with nearly 60 percent of the vote in 2016, and Mitt Romney did the same in the 2012 presidential election. Goodlatte received two-thirds of the vote that year."
Jordain Carney of the Hill: "The National Archives is doubling down on its refusal to respond to Democratic' requests for documents from Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh's White House tenure. Archivist David Ferriero wrote in a letter to Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), the top Democrat on the Senate Judiciary Committee, that it is the agency's policy to only respond to requests from a committee chairman, who are all Republicans." Mrs. McC: Sounds to me like an unamerican, um, "rigged" policy.
*****
Trump and his crew of misfits & miscreants are such clowns, I feel as if I should begin every page with an apology for the news that follows. It's so humiliating to be an American right now. -- Mrs. Bea McCrabbie
Liar-in-Chief. Hope Yen & Christopher Rugaber of the AP: "... President Donald Trump is pulling numbers out of thin air when it comes to the economy, jobs and the deficit. He refers to a current record-breaking gross domestic product for the U.S. where none exists and predicts a blockbuster 5 percent annual growth rate in the current quarter that hardly any economist sees. Hailing his trade policies in spite of fears of damage from the escalating trade disputes he's provoked, Trump also falsely declares that his tariffs on foreign goods will help erase $21 trillion in national debt. The numbers don't even come close." (Also linked yesterday.)
Julian Borger of the Guardian: "Donald Trump's anti-press rhetoric is 'very close to incitement to violence' that would lead to journalists censoring themselves or being attacked, the outgoing UN human rights commissioner has said. Zeid Ra'ad al-Hussein, a Jordanian prince and diplomat, is stepping down this month as UN high commissioner for human rights ... in the face of a waning commitment among world powers to fighting abuses. Zeid said the Trump administration's lack of concern about human rights marked a distinct break with previous administrations, and that Trump's own rhetoric aimed at minorities and at the press was redolent of two of the worst eras of the 20th century, the run-up to the two world wars."
Maggie Haberman of the New York Times: "When President Trump took to Twitter to complain about two women with connections to the Russia investigation, he affixed special descriptions to both. 'Beautiful,' he said of Nellie Ohr, the wife of a Justice Department official who worked for Fusion GPS, the research firm that commissioned a dossier that made salacious claims about Mr. Trump. In a separate tweet, Mr. Trump used the word 'lovely' to describe Lisa Page, the former F.B.I. lawyer who worked on both the Clinton email and Russia investigations and whose text exchanges with another bureau official, Peter Strzok, included repeated criticism of Mr. Trump during his candidacy. The descriptors Mr. Trump used for the two women reflected his intense interest in physical appearances and his clear disdain for both.... His commentary on their looks was in keeping with a long-running tendency by Mr. Trump."
Victoria Guida of Politico: "Rudy Giuliani on Sunday said ... Donald Trump and former FBI Director James Comey never discussed former national security adviser Mike Flynn, backtracking from July comments in which he indicated otherwise. 'There was no conversation about Michael Flynn,' Trump's personal attorney said on CNN's 'State of the Union.' 'That is what he will testify to if he's asked that question.' He also told CNN's Jake Tapper that he never said the president had asked Comey to give Flynn a break. 'I said that is what Comey is saying,' Giuliani said."(Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...
... Mrs. McCrabbie: Comey wrote in his opening statement before a Congressional hearing in June 2017 that "Trump said: "'I hope you can see your way clear to letting this go, to letting Flynn go. He is a good guy. I hope you can let this go.'" In oral testimony, under oath, Comey said "that he understood the President to be requesting that he drop the investigation into Flynn." It isn't foolish to question Comey's veracity, but it is hard to believe he made up out of whole cloth Trump's remarks about Flynn. Making up stuff is Trump's modus operandi. See AP report above. BTW, I heard the old clip Sunday; Giuliani did say that Trump asked Comey to give Flynn a break. Matt Shuham of TPM found the transcript: "What he [Trump] said to him [Comey] was 'Can you give him [Flynn] a break?'" This is yet another instance where Giuliani has changed the substance of his claims about Trump's obstruction attempts. ...
... Defining Obstruction Down. If the President Doesn't, Say, Pull a Gun, It's Not Obstruction. Megan Keller of the Hill: "President Trump's lawyer Rudy Giuliani said Sunday that it would take some sort of extreme action for the president to obstruct justice.... Giuliani said it would take some sort of extreme action for Trump to obstruct justice such as, if 'say the president put a gun to a person's head' in an investigation." Mrs. McC: But Rudy. Wouldn't putting a gun to Comey's head just be Trump's exercising his Second Amendment rights?
"The Rise & Fall of Paul Manafort." Sharon LaFraniere, et al., of the New York Times: "The whole trajectory of [Paul] Manafort's life -- from the son of a blue-collar, small-town mayor to a jet-setting international political consultant to Trump campaign chairman and now to prisoner in an Alexandria, Va., jail awaiting a jury verdict -- is a tale of greed, deception and ego. His trial on 18 charges of bank and tax fraud has ripped away the elaborate facade of a man who, the story went, had moved the swimming pool at one of his eight homes a few feet to catch the perfect combination of sun and shade, and who worked for the Trump campaign at no charge to intimate that for a man of his fabulous wealth, a salary was trivial [even though he was broke].... A subplot of the saga is the betrayal of Mr. Manafort by his longtime deputy Rick Gates.... Mr. Gates has testified that he helped execute Mr. Manafort's fraudulent schemes while simultaneously stealing hundreds of thousands of dollars from him, apparently because he felt that Mr. Manafort was not dividing the riches from Ukraine fairly."
Stephanie McCrummen of the Washington Post: "Omarosa Manigault Newman, the fired White House aide seeking publicity for her new memoir about her time in the Trump administration, said in an interview Sunday that the way Chief of Staff John F. Kelly dismissed her involved a 'threat' and played an audio recording of Kelly that she said she made in the Situation Room. The recording was played on NBC News's 'Meet the Press,' where Manigault Newman was interviewed by Chuck Todd. In the purported recording, which would constitute a serious breach of White House security, Kelly is heard complaining about her 'significant integrity issues' and saying that he wants to make her departure 'friendly and without 'any difficulty in the future relative to your reputation.'" (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...
... Here's the recording:
... Mrs. McCrabbie: If this conversation was recorded in the Situation Room, as Manigault Newman claims, why was that? The Situation Room is a secure site "to monitor and deal with crises at home and abroad and to conduct secure communications with outside (often overseas) persons." Why a "secure conversation" with Omarosa? This is just weird. ...
... Update: Patrick explained in yesterday's Comments why holding a termination interview in the Situation Room isn't so "weird": '... the conference room is an internal space in the WH intell center.... The whole thing is called the Situation Room, but it contains more than one room. So I imagine that Kelly just found that conference room to be the most convenient empty conference room at the time." Later, Patrick wrote, in response to another comment, "... individuals who enter [the SitRoom must] hav[e] the required clearance level. Which means that they have been briefed (when they got that clearance) not to bring any electronic devices into that area. And there are BIG signs at the entrances reminding people of the prohibitions.... They have little lockers outside for your cellphones, laptops, bluetooth devices, etc.... What OM did is a jailable offense. I'm not sure how the Secret Service can avoid charging her." ...
... Update 2: Sarah Sanders seems to confirm that General Kelly did it in the Situation Room. This is like Clue, White House Edition. Wrong answers: President Trump did it in the Oval Office with a gun. Mizz Sanders did it in the Briefing Room with a homemade pumpkin pie. Mister Pruitt did it in the White House Mess with a used Trump Hotel mattress.
... Javiar David of CNBC: "The fact that Manigault Newman recorded a conversation in a classified area could create considerable legal problems that add to her existing credibility issues. On social media, political watchers from the left and right ripped into Manigault Newman for having made the recordings in the first place." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...
... Mrs. McCrabbie: It appears Manigault Newman was truthful about that $15K/month "bribe" The White House offered her to keep her mouth shut. The Washington Post has reproduced a consulting agreement (between the Trump campaign & her) & a companion nondisclosure & nondisparagement agreement. The deal -- purportedly produced by Team Trump -- runs only till the end of this year, though. Kelly fired Omarosa in December, with an effective termination date of January 20, 2018. So that would make the "consulting" deal worth about $170K. Unless Omarosa mocked these up while she still had access to the White House watermark, like the GOP candidate in Florida who made her very own diploma (see yesterday's Beyond the Beltway), then these agreements were Omarosa's severance package. I expect she turned down the deal because it was so paltry. ...
... Jonathan Chait: "The $15,000-per-month retainer has been confirmed by the Washington Post, which reviewed a copy of the offer. This lends veracity to her other charges; after all, nobody is going to pay her $15,000 a month to keep quiet unless they know she possesses some damaging information.... The recordings might be damning, or they might not. In the meantime, she seems to have maneuvered her former colleagues into a highly uncomfortable spot." Mrs. McC: As the linked Post story (Aug. 10) notes, "Throughout his career as a businessman and politician, Trump has repeatedly used nondisclosure agreements to quiet critics and accusers, including adult-film star Stormy Daniels." Apparently Trump calculated that Omarosa had slightly more damaging info on him than Daniels -- who was paid $135K -- did. Or inflation. ...
Meridith McGraw & Tara Palmeri of ABC News: "Omarosa Manigault Newman's former White House colleagues are looking into legal options to stop her from releasing more tapes and to punish her for secretly recording her conversation with Chief of Staff Gen. John Kelly, White House officials tell ABC News." ...
... Oops, Too Late. Adam Edelman of NBC News: "Omarosa Manigault Newman ... has provided an audio recording that she says is from 2017 and on which ... Donald Trump expresses surprise that she'd been fired from his administration. The tape, which was played exclusively Monday on 'Today,' appears to show Trump having no idea that Newman had been dismissed by his Chief of Staff John Kelly. 'Omarosa? Omarosa what's going on? I just saw on the news that you're thinking about leaving? What happened?' Trump is heard saying on the tape, which Newman said was made one day after her termination in December 2017 when Trump called her. Newman responds, 'General Kelly -- General Kelly came to me and said that you guys wanted me to leave.' 'No...I, I, Nobody even told me about it,' Trump replies. Newman then says, 'Wow'... 'You know they run a big operation, but I didn't know it,' Trump is heard saying on the tape. 'I didn't know that. Goddamn it. I don't love you leaving at all.'" Includes video & audio.
Liz Robbins of the New York Times: "... a new rule in the works from the Trump administration would make it difficult, if not impossible, for immigrants who use [government programs for low-income residents] to obtain green cards. New York City officials estimated that at least a million people here could be hurt by this plan, warning that the children of immigrants seeking green cards would be most vulnerable." Mrs. McC: This is one of the anti-immigrant plans Stephen Miller has pushed. ...
... David Glosser, who is an uncle of Stephen Miller, in a Politico op-ed, recounts how their shared ancestors, who were the victims of violent Russian pogroms, immigrated to the U.S. in the early 1900s with no money &, in some cases, via "chain migration." "I have watched with dismay and increasing horror as my nephew, who is an educated man and well aware of his heritage, has become the architect of immigration policies that repudiate the very foundation of our family's life in this country." Thanks to unwashed for the link. Mrs. McC: Glosser is a neuropsychologist. He should know that a logical appeal can have no effect on his nephew. Glosser might know whether Miller's problems are the result of self-loathing (Hitler had Jewish & African roots), extreme selfishnish (I got mine), or simply bad wiring that bypasses normal empathy impulses & an ability to relate to others (see Trump). Whatever the cause, it has produced an evil person on whom appeals to reason are useless. In slightly different circumstances, Miller would be the "troubled loner" who took an AK-15 to Santa Monica Place & mowed down dozens of shoppers. ...
... Masha Gessen of the New Yorker: "The new rules appear to use the broadest possible definition of public assistance -- one that includes Obamacare and children's health insurance -- meaning that most potential new citizens will be ineligible for naturalization.... The key difference between a legal permanent resident and a citizen lies in the realm of political rights: the non-citizen doesn't have them. She can't vote. She can't run for office. She can't engage in civil disobedience -- any legal violation may make her deportable -- and, in effect, she can't protest. The new rules will mean that this category of disenfranchised immigrants will grow by millions in the next few years.... The new naturalization rules provide perhaps the clearest example yet that Trump's war on immigrants is a war on democracy." ...
... Mrs. McCrabbie: Congress, of course, could quash Stephen Miller's new rule by passing a veto-proof bill. But it won't. Republicans see every new citizen as a potential new Democratic voter. Most Republican legislators consistently place their own interests over those of expanding (or in this case, maintaining) democratic ideals. ...
... Today's American History Lesson. Diane Bernard of the Washington Post: "... at the height of the Great Depression..., President Herbert Hoover's [announced] a national program of 'American jobs for real Americans' -- code words for '"getting rid of Mexicans," who weren't considered "real" Americans,' said [Joseph] Dunn, whose staff spent three years delving into federal, state and local records ... to document this little-known tragedy of the Latino experience in the United States. The program, implemented by Hoover's secretary of labor, William Doak, included passing local laws forbidding government employment of anyone of Mexican descent, even legal permanent residents and U.S. citizens. Major companies, including Ford, U.S. Steel and the Southern Pacific Railroad, colluded with the government ... laying off thousands.... Hoover's approach is echoed in the Trump administration's immigration policies.'"
Sarah Ellison & Philip Rucker of the Washington Post: "The revolving door between Fox News and Republican political figures has turned steadily for years, with failed GOP candidates finding a home at the network. But since Donald Trump was elected president, the door has provided a number of former Fox personnel with entree into a government now infused with the cable channel's fiery sensibility. And with Bill Shine's appointment this summer to a top job in the White House, the door may finally come to rest. The two worlds have merged into one universe: the Fox News White House. If Donald Trump is running his own touch-and-go reality show from Pennsylvania Avenue, he has finally found in Shine his executive producer.... 'Bill Shine has made an entire career of subordinating himself to a big personality...,' a Shine confidante said. 'So when they're in the East Room, he wants the lighting to look the best it possibly can so that Trump can look the best he possibly can.'"
Chris Cillizza of CNN: "As a candidate, Donald Trump would famously boast that if elected, he'd 'surround myself only with the best and most serious people' -- adding: 'We want top-of-the-line professionals.' The first 18 months of his presidency have repeatedly revealed the fallacy of that pledge, as myriad members of Trump's Cabinet and senior staff have departed -- often under suspicious circumstances -- even as the President himself has railed against the ineptitude of people who still work for him.... The result, like so much of Trump's wildly unpredictable management style, is disorder, disarray and disorganization.... And because of Trump's tendency to openly discuss and deride both those who have left his side and those who continue to work within his administration, he launches a series of storylines that not only highlight the pandemonium within his ranks but also crowd out other, more positive stories for his White House." ...
... Mrs. McCrabbie: Trump's mismanagement style was obvious before November 8, 2016. Trump fired his first campaign manager Corey Lewandowski & his second campaign manager Paul Manafort. His third campaign manager, Steve Bannon, had no professional experience running a political campaign. The so-called "foreign policy advisors" he named mystified actual foreign policy pros, who -- for good reasons -- had never heard of them.
Noah Weiland & Andy Parsons of the New York Times: "A year after the race-fueled violence in Charlottesville, Va., a small group of white nationalists marched through downtown Washington on Sunday on their way to a rally in front of the White House. It was over almost as soon as it began. The white supremacists were met along their march route and at the rally site by thousands of counterdemonstrators denouncing racism and white supremacy. The white nationalists, who numbered about two dozen, stayed in Lafayette Square, a park just north of the White House, for a short time and left before 6 p.m.... Counterprotesters who had been shouting 'Go home, Nazis, go home!' suddenly started booing when the white nationalists did just that. A new song then broke out, 'Na na na na, na na na na! Hey, hey, goodbye!' With the white nationalists gone, the mood among the counterprotestors grew mildly celebratory, although rain led many to leave. Before they made their exit, the white nationalists were separated from the counterprotesters by metal fences and dozens of law enforcement officers guarding against any outbreaks of violence." ...
... Terrence McCoy of the Washington Post reports on the demonstrations in Charlottesville, Virginia: "There were more than 100 mostly young protesters, some who had come from other states, calling for an end to white supremacist groups. There was an overwhelming police presence that some demonstrators called symptomatic of an over-policing of minority communities in America.... There was less a feeling of reconciliation than anger, as protesters screamed at police officers, whom some demonstrators had all weekend tried to associate with racism and fascism." ...
... AP: "Officers kept the peace at this weekend's protests and counter-protests a year after a deadly far-right rally. Authorities made several arrests in Charlottesville and in northern Virginia, where a small group of right-wing demonstrators took the Metro to their rally outside the White House. Authorities said a man heading to the 'Unite the Right 2' rally in Washington was arrested Sunday for assaulting two Virginia police officers ... outside the Vienna/Fairfax/George Mason University Metro station.... Meanwhile, in Charlottesville, police made several arrests as hundreds marched Saturday in a demonstration against the far-right "Unite the Right" rally that left one dead and others injured a year ago. That march was overwhelmingly peaceful as well, but Charlottesville Police say they're investigating an alleged assault of an officer who approached a man whose face was covered. Police say the officer and the man fell to the ground. Others pulled them apart, enabling the masked man to get away. No one was injured, and the march continued."
Capitalism Is Awesome, Ctd. Cathy O'Neil in Bloomberg: "Jack Dorsey from Twitter, Mark Zuckerberg from Facebook, all those Google nerds: They're monumentally screwed, because they have no idea how to tame the monsters they have created. The way I see it, these guys -- and they are mostly guys -- were arbitrarily chosen. They started with some good ideas, some luck, great timing, got lots of people to believe in their rosy vision, and they won the unicorn lottery. Little did they know or care what problems they were creating. And now, they're being asked to solve -- or acknowledge, or something --- some really big issues, such as what to do about people who use their platforms to meddle in elections or spread lies, paranoia, bigotry and straight-up hate. The world expects great things of them, because they're supposed to be geniuses. Problem is, they're not.... They're manufacturing baloney explanations about how they'll use more technology, or maybe more people, to handle the civic duties they had hoped to avoid.... I'd like to offer some advice.... Ask someone smarter and more educated, thoughtful, and civic-minded to decide on the future of your companies."
How Dollar General Creates New "Food Deserts." Capitalism Is Awesome, Ctd. Chris McGreal of the Guardian: "Dollar General is opening stores at the rate of three a day across the US. It moves into places not even Walmart will go, targeting rural towns and damaged inner-city neighbourhoods with basic goods at basic prices.... The chain now has more outlets across the country than McDonald's has restaurants, and its profits have surged past some of the grand old names of American retail. The company estimates that three-quarters of the population lives within five miles of one of its stores, which stock everything from groceries and household cleaners to clothes and tools.... But there is a cost. Dollar General's aggressive pricing drives locally-owned grocery stores out of business, replacing shelves stocked with fresh fruit, vegetables and meat with the kinds of processed foods underpinning the country's obesity and diabetes crisis."
Beyond the Beltway
Minnesota Attorney General Race. Briana Bierschbach of Minnesota Public Radio: "Keith Ellison, one of the leading candidates to be Minnesota's next attorney general, confronted allegations Sunday of domestic abuse of a former girlfriend that surfaced days before the election that will decide the party's nominee. The allegation that the physical abuse was caught on video was posted to Facebook late Saturday night by the woman's son, four days before Minnesota's primary election, where Ellison is facing off against four other Democrats for the open attorney general's seat. Ellison is a six-term 5th District congressman and the perceived front-runner in the race. In a written statement Sunday, Ellison denied the incident.... State Rep. Debra Hilstrom, who also is running for the Democratic nomination for attorney general, recirculated the Facebook post and called on Ellison to answer the allegation.... Hilstrom was later joined by Democratic candidates Matt Pelikan Tom Foley, who separately called for Ellison to address the allegation." ...
... Kyle Potter of the AP: "Minnesota Rep. Keith Ellison on Sunday denied an allegation from an ex-girlfriend that he had once dragged her off a bed while screaming obscenities at her -- an allegation that came just days before a Tuesday primary in which the congressman is among several Democrats running for state attorney general.... Karen Monahan['s] ... son alleged in a Facebook post that he had seen hundreds of angry text messages from Ellison, some threatening his mother. He also wrote he had viewed a video in which Ellison dragged Monahan off the bed by her feet. Monahan, a Minneapolis political organizer, said via Twitter that what her son posted was 'true.'... Monahan had sent Twitter messages for several months referencing an unidentified, powerful man who had abused her."
... Mrs. McCrabbie: Bierschbach said she reviewed "more than 100 text and Twitter messages between Ellison and Karen Monahan," which Monahan had given her. "There is no evidence in the messages reviewed by MPR News of the alleged physical abuse." Ellison is also deputy chair of the Democratic National Committee.
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Reader Comments (24)
Here's an interesting op-ed in Politico about immigration by someone who has benefited from chain migration. The author, David S. Glosser, just so happens to be the uncle of Stephen Miller, architect of the current fiasco.
That Omarosa–-what a gal! Her "don't mess with me" stance might just wind up getting her arrested––-secretly recording Kelly's firing, which by the way was interesting to listen to–-he seemed comfortable in those shoes––- while in the situation room (thanks Patrick for the rundown on this) where all electronic devices are verboten. But none of this is surprising since this White House has been run like a Marx Brother's comedy without the humor, from the get-go. With Shine now in charge of the entertainment we can be sure he'll put that extra polish on the sleazy machinations.
"Ready for your closeup, Mr. President?"
Last night MSNBC had a special where an Ex-White Supremacist who turned himself around and now is operating like a sane human being trying to help others do the same, hooked on with a young man who was having doubts about his affiliation with the W.S. The Ex takes this guy to meet Heather Heyer's mother–-in a church, wouldn't you know––and they had what one could call a wee bonding. The next thing we see is this young man is having his Nazi tattoo's removed. Praise be that the Ex- guy here has as much luck with his next recruit.
The Keith Ellison story is tough to read. Once again we have men behaving badly–-enough to ruin their climb up that slippery ladder. Strangely I had been thinking of a poem I wrote ––about an experience a man has in an airport bar in Minnesota–- upon awakening this morning because of lightening and troubled looking skies and then coming upon this––in Minnesota, no less, was eerie. I'll post the poem, just for fun.
I cannot wait for the Manifort trial to end–-it is sucking the life out of other important stories that need to be front and center.
MARGARITA IN MINNESOTA
A flight delay due to lightning––scary skies;
Black clouds accumulating minute
By minute in Minnesota.
And there you were––
In the airport bar famous for their perfect margaritas
Sipping slowly, looking my way.
Brief encounters like erratic weather
Have purchase––change patterns, a speck
In the eye removed lovingly by Leslie Howard,
Perhaps.
Nothing monumental, mind you
But the stepped-up beat of a heart,
A slight tremor in the hand holding
The frosted glass with its limey-salt taste
Circling the rim.
How was I to know
That many drinks later
And many years after
I’d hold that memory so close
To my chest.
Even now I can see how you
Kept tucking your hair behind your ears,
The way you leaned toward me listening
To my lying
And you saying as clearly as you did then––
Yes––I’d love another.
April–-2013
@PD Pepe: I'm not sure about Ellison. The son says he has a videotape of Ellison abusing his mother. I don't need to see it, but if it's real, let him show it to disinterested "authorities" -- reporters would be good enough for me -- and let them tell us what they saw or think they saw on the tape. As MPR reported, the text messages the girlfriend produced don't rise to the level of "threats" the son claimed; maybe the video, assuming it exists, doesn't either.
Breaking up is hard to do. People say things. I'm sure I said things to my husband -- with whom I didn't break up -- and I know he said things to me that neither of us would want on the 6 o'clock news.
The accusers should have come out with their allegations -- about which the girlfriend apparently has been hinting for some time -- way before the eve of an election. The public does have a right to know, but not after many already have voted & not in the form of, so far, unsubstantiated election-eve allegations.
The Ellison situation (regardless of the actual events that might have occurred) remind me of consideration I have not seen much discussed.
Has anyone established a proper line between what should be public and what private in interpersonal disputes?
It would seem good arguments can be made for taking the personal public in cases of physical abuse when charges are filed, and I can even see the line moving more in the public direction when the perpetrator presents him or herself as a defender of public virtue as a member of the clergy or public official does.
Nonetheless, could be my age, but sometimes these public airings of interpersonal troubles strike me as unseemly, even wrong, because they imply either a degree of nastiness on the accuser's part that I don't countenance or an indication of an inability to deal effectively with the kind of personal difficulties that, as Bea says, we all face.
Sometimes this old man just wants to say, "Oh, grow up!"
Or is that too unfeeling or dismissive?
It appears that one of the many Russian entry-points into the Trump campaign to destabilize and undermine American democracy comes with Henry Kissinger front and center. Who would've known? Interesting how Mr. Coup d'état keeps popping up in this sordid tale of treachery. Kushner got invited to one of his speeches held by Pro-Russia "think tank" by a Time Warner exec and quickly achieved "Useful Idiot" status after rubbing shoulders with some Russians, later being introduced to ex-Ambassador Sergey Kisliak, and the rest is history. Jarod's such a weak target, all they had to say was "bank loan" and he'd start humping legs for free.
I wonder how dryly arrogant and obtuse Kissinger feels to have serviced so many Russian connections to Washington power-brokers, knowing now their true intentions of undermining the West that Kissinger himself helped build. Do you think he'd ever admit that he got played by Putin, trying to extend an olive branch to Russia in exchange for squeezing China? Egg heads like his can do no wrong, even after facilitating tyrannical dictators near and far.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-08-13/kushner-s-ties-to-russia-linked-group-began-with-kissinger-lunch
@Ken: "Has anyone established a proper line between what should be public and what private in interpersonal disputes?" you ask. I think you've answered that question for yourself quite well and I agree: Disputes other than physical or/and serious psychological abuse need not concern the public. Looking over the tsunami of harassment cases we've been bombarded with these past few years I can only recall one that smelled fishy and that was the case of the woman who first accused Al Franken of sexual harassment––she of the Playboy and Hooters's affiliation and was somehow connected with Roger Stone. I still think it was a set-up.
So–-this old woman says to you, old man, no, you are not being unfeeling or dismissive––we, including Marie, have lived in a time when airing certain stained laundry was unseemly at best. There were lots of things that stayed behind closed doors, and there were also things that should have come out of the closet but remained hidden for much too long. Always the balance––and how to weigh it.
@safari: Your reminder of Kissinger's sordid machinations is why I disagree with PD Pepe's conclusion that the Manafort trial "is sucking the life out of other important stories that need to be front and center." The Manafort trial is a microcosm of what is wrong with American politics: crooked "players" who make (and in Manafort's case, lose) millions by doing the bidding of bad actors, both foreign & domestic. None of us is naive, but to make such a mockery of our own government is appalling. I'm happy to see Manafort & his crony Roger Stone making the front pages in the worst of ways.
@PD Pepe: Off-topic. But. I'm no pro-fessional literary critic, but I will say your poem is one fine piece of work. Jimmy Buffett, eat your heart out.
Design for Scamming
Before the Trumpy Space Force gets consigned to the historical Bin of Stupid Trump Ideas, there's yet one more index of this amateurish, ill-conceived concept:
Logo design
.
Not important? Well, perhaps not, until you consider how much logo design impacts branding efforts and how much time and effort is put in to thinking about how it all connects the public/consumers with the product/service.
Think of IBM, Coke, Apple, FedEx, Nike, Amazon. GE has kept the same basic logo with simple upgrades since the century before last. That's consistency and a belief in your design. Really, you can have a very cool, extremely well done logo design and a crappy company, so the logo does not in itself guarantee success. But it does establish an identity with the public that is immediately identifiable and doesn't require you to put on the thinking cap to figure out what in the holy hell this outfit is all about.
Case in point, the Trumpy Space Force logos.
There are six that look like final projects for a 12th grade design class. One is a rip-off of past NASA logo elements, another is a Peter Max pop art knock off, without the wit. One of them looks like it came off something you'd see at Toys R Us. One (my "favorite") sez "MARS AWAITS!" with a rocket ship blasting off from what looks like a Rocky Mountain forest. So, um, what? Are we going to invade Mars? What the hell does Mars have to do with the Trump-Pence Flash Gordon fakey Star Wars bullshit?
Who knows?
Who cares?
It's typical Trump. Fly by night scam idea, poorly thought through and poorly executed. Just enough to fool a few idiots, pick their pockets, and move on to the next marks. The only thing that's missing is for little mikey pence to don a Yoda costume and say "Like to join Space Force, yes? Help you, I will".
In a nutshell, it's how Trumpy is "running" the goverment. Big, gaudy, sophomoric branding designed to appeal to juveniles and the semi-literate with nothing behind it. It's all a scam. Everything.
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@Akhilleus:
You passed. safari is having the same trouble I am, but the fix the Geek Guys gave me hasn't worked for him. Let me know if you want me to send it to you so you can log in. It's cumbersome, but not that complicated.
Update: Oh, I see you were spammed. I've despammed you, but who knows what will happen next?
@Ak: You are so right. Those space force logos defy all elements of good graphic design. All of them are overly fussy. There's not a Saul Bass (think "Man with the Golden Arm") or Milton Glazer (I 'heart' NY) among them.
You folks are too kind on your opinions of the space force logos. I'd call it one blatant rip off of NASA and five third grade art class efforts. I'd vote for one of a cow jumping over a crescent moon with Trump riding like Major Kong.
Dollar General is one of three such chains down here, Dollar Tree and Family Dollar being the other two. Last time I checked my little semi rural county had five combined. They seem to be the new minute markets without the gas pumps.
MAG,
My book of Saul Bass film title sequences is a treasured object. I had a copy of his Vertigo poster on my bedroom door for years.
And in college, I had this Milton Glaser poster of J.S. Bach above my bed all four years.
His I heart NY graphic is brilliant in its simplicity, clever choice of imagery and typeface and the directness of its message. I don't know if it was included on the 1977 Voyager spacecraft's collection of images and music, but if it was I'm betting some alien race will find it at some point and think "Gee, this NY place sounds pretty cool. We should check it out."
Bass and Glaser represent a high level of creativity, craft, and professionalism. These guys would never make it in Trump World.
What is the point of having the National Archives if our own elected leaders can't even have access? I understand any Joe Sixpack walking in and getting the slow walk filling out papers, getting credentials, whatever. But elected members of the Congress of the United States, supposedly endowed with special powers, are barred from accessing information held they're entitled to by the same government they're leading? Do they still keep telling themselves on the Hill that the Senate is the greatest deliberative body in the world?
What a giant crock of bull shit.
This fuck job is quintessentially modern day America. Keep the wrong info away from the wrong people at the wrong time. Keep 'em stupid, folks. Blindfolds for everyone until we finish the hack job, then unplug the leak and go silent amid the post-mortem bitching and moaning. Emerge later triumphant. Rinse and repeat.
We're talking about a Supreme Court nomination that will affect the direction of the country for the next 30-some years, and our country's Senators have their fucking hands tied due to some bullshit obtuse red tape. Incredible. And the Archives, sitting on the information, can just throw up its hands. Talk about fucking scams. Here's one!
Sure sounds like these GOP hypocritical lowlifes are doing their darnedest to hide something. Surely once Democrats hold power again, they'll get their hands on some pretty scandalous information and the GOP will all cracks their shitty grins, butt dart each other giggling, then cross their arms and declare, "Go fuck yourselves. We win." Meanwhile, for the next 30 fucking years, Kavanaugh will wake up each day, try to shower off that lingering stench of illegitimacy and political corruption at the foundation of his place of the world, don his black robe and stumble awkwardly to his seat at the court, slightly off-kilter due to the kilos of fools gold holding down the right side of the "equal" balance of justice.
Shams built on shams built on shams.
Bobby Lee,
I think Trump would make a great Major Kong. Put him on a nuke and send him to Russia. (Not particularly germane bit of trivia: You may recall Major Kong reading the contents of the emergency kit his men had on board their plane " Pep pills, morphine, hundred dollars in gold, two pairs of nylon stockings, lipstick, pack of prophylactics; shoot, a fella could have a pretty good weekend in Vegas with all this stuff." If you watch the clip, he doesn't say "Vegas". The script read "Dallas" but after the events of November, '63, the producers had Slim Pickens come back and dub in a different city.)
As to your point about the sprouting of Dollar stores, it all has to do with what a great job Republicans have done with the economy. The little king has been bragging to anyone who will listen that the economy has never been better in the history of the world than under his auspices. Naturally giving everyone a one time boost of a tax break makes people go out and spend, which jumpstarts the economy, but things had already been turned around by the horrible nee-groe. What Trumpy does not mention is that despite unemployment being low, wages have not gone up. In fact, they are lagging behind the rise in the cost of living which is a net loss.
Dollar stores are propagating because Republicans have effectively outlawed the middle class. You either shop in the malls with Neiman Marcus or you shop at the Dollar Tree.
Unions have been gutted and corporate bosses have been handed power like they haven't had since the days of J.P. Morgan and Jay Gould. And no, they are not going to give you a raise even if their own profit margin is now through the roof.
So, if you want a cheap, Made in China, piece of crap toy for your kid's birthday, that will fall apart in hours, it's off to the Dollar Store you go.
If you can afford it.
James Ball of The Daily Beast has a long story on some leaked emails of a little known Russian oligarch, linking in a host of corrupt groups/people from Russia, Ukraine, the UK and Kazhakstan.
And naturally, all corrupt roads lead to Trump Org: "Working out where businesses, alleged criminals, governments, and state agencies end and begin is all but impossible, and often comes with considerable moral ambiguity—especially as so many Russian stories, from alleged assassinations, to frauds, to business deals, to lobbying, intertwine and interconnect.
These interconnections have now taken center stage in American politics, thanks to the U.S. president’s years-long dealings with Russia: Trump and his family have their own connections with almost every entity involved in this story."
https://www.thedailybeast.com/exclusive-hacked-e-mails-take-us-inside-the-billionaires-club-around-vladimir-putin?ref=home
Safari,
With every passing day, new stories emerge about some bit of ratfucking done by Trump's latest future Nuremberg Trials defendant. It's no wonder Confederates are racing to get him on the Court. They don't know when something really horrific will pop out.
If it turns out, after he's on the Court, that Kavanaugh used to visit Gitmo on his off days so he could personally water board a few guys, it'll be too late, and that's McConnell's plan. Ram that confirmation process through in a couple of hours and get him in the robes before any of these stories about his fealty and submission to power and his indifference to the Constitution and the rule of law gain traction.
At this point it's not even a question of scamming the public. That would at least require some kind of Potemkin government, a sham of a governing body. What McConnell and Ryan and Trump have on offer doesn't even rise to the level of Potemkin.
It gets as far as Pot...and stays there. And that's where the country's going.
Doncha love how Trump is now calling his former White House staff member "Wacky Omarosa" and tweeting about what a nut she is and how he hardly ever saw her?
Like someone else hired her. Like he's just now finding out that she was even working there. Like Manafort. "Who? That guy? I hardly ever saw him. He only worked for me for about fifteen minutes. We never even spoke." "Omarosa? Who's that? Oh, that crazy black chick. Well, I couldn't have hired her. I don't hire black people. And I only speak to those who bow down to me."
In fact, Trump has never spoken to anyone who could make him look bad or rat him out.
Just ask Rudy.
Let's see now: would I like health care for all, or would I like to support space cadets? It does look to me that even the republican legislators have no intention of supporting this ridiculous (distraction functioning as a) program. I bet Pence was the only one Trump could get to talk it up; and I bet Pence is the kind of guy who really believes the stuff he said.
In terms of Dollar General: it does not offer food in my area. It has moved into the space which had previously been Family Dollar, which didn't make it in this area. It seems that even poor people won't take the crap they offer for sale.
The firing of Peter Strzok is a very bad sign. Very bad.
It signals that bullying, braggadocio, threats, and lies are winning. There is no way a civil servant should be fired for expressing his opinions privately, in a text, for criticizing an eminently criticizable and guilty crook (I'm disregarding any concept of "alleged". Trump is a fucking criminal and a traitor.)
The fact that the FBI felt compelled to fire, not to suspend and demote (neither of which were appropriate either) an employee who criticized the Glorious Leader.
Trump is winning. I hate to say that, but I believe it's true. It won't matter what Mueller finds. Republicans will do nothing. He will live to scam another day. And he will demand the immediate defenestration of anyone who dared or dares to challenge his treason.
If Americans are no longer able to express their personal opinions without fear of reprisal, we are no longer in America.
Akhilleus,
Another take?
I might have it wrong but I think Strzok expressed his opinions on a work phone. No matter how correct he turned out to be (except for the he'll never elected part) about the Pretender himself, in his position using a work phone to express an opinion about one of the Presidential candidates was stupid.
I have no doubt other FBI employees did the same thing, many expressing negative opinions about HRC, but with the Pretender's election and the Republican lickspittles who have gleefully tossed democracy in the dustheap, Strzok was caught in a vise.
Was his punishment too severe? Surely it was. But just possibly the DOJ is doing all it can to insulate itself from certain future claims they have been corrupted, so that when the Mueller report comes out, Strzok will not be a distraction.
They can point to his carcass and say, "See, that's how incorruptible we are. We even sacrificed one of our own on the altar of neutrality."
....He suggests, preferring the bright side.
Ken,
I'm not supporting the idea that he say something controversial on a work phone, but I have no doubt that, as you say, there were likely agents on the other side saying things about Hillary or Obama who were never (and never will be) penalized.
@safari: I concur with your outrage re: the inaccessibility to Kavenaugh's complete papers for the Democrats. Who the heck is responsible for this at the National Archives? Aren't they supposed to be non-partisan? I find this very curious.
@Marie: I am recanting my " Manifort sucking the air out of other news" after reading your retort. It just seemed to me that so much awful other stuff is going on that gets lost in the coverage of this trial, but I concur that this trial is a "microcosm of what is wrong with American politics"–––I just worry that those who need to see this, don't.
Thank you for the compliment re: the poem. It was based on my son's experience, sans the seduction–– who told me about those tasty Margarita's in that Minnesota airport bar. Brief encounters.
Tomorrow is voting day here in Ct. We have a slew of democratic women candidates on the ballot.