The Conversation -- August 9, 2025
Maureen Dowd of the New York Times: “Ever since he escaped what he considered a drab existence in Queens, Trump has bedazzled his life — everything from tweezers to seatbelts to TV remotes were gilt.... Now he has tarted up the Oval; it’s the modern version of worshiping the golden calf and just as profane. Trump’s tacky rococo gold adornments are growing exponentially. He’s piling on more and more garish features — from cherubs to mantelpiece swirls — and sycophants add to the gold rush by bringing offerings to truckle to King Midas. Trump is trying to turn the people’s house into a Saudi palace — 'dictator chic.' It is symbolic of this president: He’s refashioning our democracy as an autocracy.” Thanks to laura h. for this gift link. That “dictator chic” is a style that contributor Patrick once said U.S. staff at Middle East embassies called “Louis Farouk.” And this all reminds me of what Akhilleus wrote earlier this week:
Fatty ... loves him the gaudy, so there's plenty of Rococo flamboyance in his mish-mash concept of decoration. But Rococo, as a style was killed off almost in a flash in the late 18th C. Know what killed it? The French Revolution. So here's Louis de Fatso with his empty-headed, hard-hearted, tone deaf Let Them Eat Cake decorative sensibility, wired into a Neo-Classicism without the classics, the democracy, the humanism, and the enlightenment philosophy, but with plenty of Nazi-authoritarian, goose stepping, white supremacy flair. And we're picking up the tab to keep his gruesome grandiosity fed. All cult and no culture.
Konstantin Toropin of the AP: “The man who oversees the nation’s military reposted a video about a Christian nationalist church that included various pastors saying women should no longer be allowed to vote. The extraordinary repost on X from Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, made Thursday night, illustrates his deep and personal connection to a Christian nationalist pastor with extreme views on the role of religion and women. In the post, Hegseth commented on an almost seven-minute-long report by CNN examining Doug Wilson, cofounder of the Communion of Reformed Evangelical Churches.... The report featured a pastor from Wilson’s church advocating the repeal of women’s right to vote from the Constitution, and another pastor saying that in his ideal world, people would vote as households. It also featured a female congregant saying that she submits to her husband. 'All of Christ for All of Life,' Hegseth wrote in his post that accompanied the video.” ~~~
~~~ Marie: To any normal person aware of, for instance, the First Amendment, Hegseth's post is a firing offense. A real president would have Hegseth's "resignation" letter on his desk by now. But we don't have a real president, and we do have a crazy defense secretary nominated by a fake prez & confirmed by useless Senate kiss-ups. This morning laura h. linked to a Bluesky post by Sherrilyn Ifill about the woman-hating, Constitution-hating Heghog, warning, "You should be very concerned." Over on the Bulwark's YouTube channel, Tim Miller is equally aghast. AND this seems to be the CNN video Drunk Pete so enjoyed.
Maria Abi-Habib of the New York Times: “President Claudia Sheinbaum of Mexico rejected the use of U.S. military forces in her country on Friday, responding to news that ... [Donald] Trump had directed the Pentagon to target drug cartels that the United States considers terrorist organizations. 'The United States is not going to come to Mexico with the military. We cooperate, we collaborate, but there is not going to be an invasion. That is ruled out, absolutely ruled out,' she said, adding that she would read the order. 'It is not part of any agreement, far from it. When it has been brought up, we have always said no.'” Related story linked below.
Trump Unaware Data Collectors & Analysts Are Needed to Collect & AnalyzeData. Sarah Mervosh of the New York Times: Donald “Trump’s new requirement mandating that colleges share more data about their students could help conservatives who have argued that elite universities discriminate against white and Asian students. But ... since taking office in January, the administration has fired nearly everyone who worked at the National Center for Education Statistics, the statistics branch within the Department of Education that would be responsible for the new data collection effort. Of about 100 employees who worked at the National Center for Education Statistics, just four remain.... In his second term, [Mr.] Trump has often taken a paradoxical approach to education, pushing to diminish the federal government’s role, even as he tries to wield its power.”
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The editing function for Reality Chex has not been working properly for about a month, and I often can't get in to edit a page for hours (or on one occasion, ever). To make a long story short, because of this, today's effort is somewhat truncated and future entries will be limited until Squarespace fixes the problem. So far, no luck.
Jess Bidgood of the New York Times: “... it’s not just that Trump wants more power over the federal government. He is also trying to give the federal government more power over society itself. Since Monday, the Trump administration has moved to assert new power over institutions like colleges and banks. He has ordered a surge of law enforcement in Washington, D.C., a city that ostensibly has home rule. He has dialed up pressure on state lawmakers across the country to further shore up his power through redistricting — a goal he is also pursuing with his efforts to redo the census in pursuit of a count that would be more favorable to Republicans. It’s presidential maximalism in action.... [In] a different kind of maximalism..., [the Oval Office] keeps getting shinier as Trump turns the people’s house into his own.” ~~~
~~~ Marie: Bidgood is missing half the point. Sure, Trump wants maximalist government, but only to the extent and in those areas that it increase his power & control. He's getting rid of the parts of the government that help ordinary Americans and/or might curb his whims & enthusiasms. He is rapidly working his way toward a purer form of despotism.
David Lynch & Hannah Natanson of the Washington Post: “... Donald Trump’s freewheeling use of tariffs as a tool of American power may have been more extensive than was publicly known, encompassing an array of national security goals as well as the interests of individual companies, according to internal government documents obtained by The Washington Post.... Administration officials saw trade talks as an opportunity to achieve objectives that went far beyond Trump’s oft-stated goal of reducing the chronic U.S. trade deficit.... National security considerations may help explain why most countries did not retaliate against the U.S. with their own tariffs on American goods, said Phil Luck ... [of] the Center for Strategic and International Studies.... The administration continues to leverage trade talks for broader gains. McCoy Pitt, the senior official in the State Department’s international organization affairs bureau, wrote the secretary of state this month about linking trade talks with hopes of killing a global climate change deal.”
Trump Secretly Advances Military Dictatorship. Helene Cooper, et al., of the New York Times: Donald “Trump has secretly signed a directive to the Pentagon to begin using military force against certain Latin American drug cartels that his administration has deemed terrorist organizations, according to people familiar with the matter. The decision to bring the American military into the fight is the most aggressive step so far in the administration’s escalating campaign against the cartels. It signals Mr. Trump’s continued willingness to use military forces to carry out what has primarily been considered a law enforcement responsibility to curb the flow of fentanyl and other illegal drugs. The order provides an official basis for the possibility of direct military operations at sea and on foreign soil against cartels. U.S. military officials have started drawing up options for how the military could go after the groups, the people familiar with the conversations said.... Directing the military to crack down on the illicit trade also raises legal issues, including whether it would count as 'murder' if U.S. forces acting outside of a congressionally authorized armed conflict were to kill civilians — even criminal suspects — who pose no imminent threat.” Thanks to Ken W. for the heads-up. (Also linked yesterday.)
Top U.S. Crime Org Demands U.C.L.A. Pay $1BB+ in Protection Money. Alan Blinder & Michael Bender of the New York Times: “The Trump administration is seeking more than $1 billion from the University of California, Los Angeles, to restore hundreds of millions of dollars in federal research funding that the government halted, according to a draft of a settlement agreement reviewed by The New York Times. The proposal calls for the university to make a $1 billion payment to the U.S. government and to contribute $172 million to a claims fund that would compensate victims of civil rights violations. If U.C.L.A. accedes to the demand, it would be the largest payout — by far — of any university that has so far reached a deal with the White House. Columbia University agreed to pay $221 million in connection with its settlement with the government, and Brown University pledged to spend $50 million with state work force programs.... The White House’s demands of U.C.L.A. fit into a broad pattern of how the Trump administration has targeted California.” The Guardian's story is here.
Marie: Looks like outright theft is not illegal if the president* (or the commerce secretary) does it: ~~~
~~~ Jennifer Jacobs & Joe Walsh of CBS News: "The federal government told Harvard University on Friday it could take control of the school's patents stemming from federally funded research — the latest in a months-long feud between the Trump administration and the Ivy League college. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick is launching an 'immediate comprehensive review' of whether Harvard has complied with federal laws around patents, he said in a letter to Harvard President Alan Garber. The patents in question could be worth hundreds of millions of dollars, a senior administration official said, and in his letter, Lutnick threatened to grant third-party licenses to Harvard's patents or take the titles to any patents where Harvard has failed to comply with government title and disclosure requirements. Lutnick ordered the Massachusetts-based school to provide information on all patents that it obtained through federally funded research."
Tyler Pager & David Sanger of the New York Times: Donald “Trump said he would meet with President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia next Friday in Alaska, as he tries to secure a deal to end the war between Russia and Ukraine. Mr. Trump announced the meeting Friday shortly after he suggested that a peace deal between the two countries could include 'some swapping of territories,' signaling that the United States may join Russia in trying to compel Ukraine to permanently cede some of its land. 'We’re going to get some back, and we’re going to get some switched,' Mr. Trump said while hosting the leaders of Armenia and Azerbaijan for a peace summit at the White House. 'There’ll be some swapping of territories to the betterment of both, but we’ll be talking about that either later, or tomorrow.'” ~~~
~~~ Siobhán O'Grady of the Washington Post: “Ukraine will reject any proposal that involves ceding territory to Russia, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky announced Saturday, hours after ... Donald Trump suggested 'some swapping of territories' to end Russia’s war on Ukraine.” The AP story is here.
Trump Fires IRS Chief. Andrew Duehren, et al., of the New York Times: “Billy Long, the former auctioneer and Republican congressman who was confirmed less than two months ago as head of the Internal Revenue Service, has been abruptly removed from the post by ... [Donald] Trump, the administration disclosed on Friday. Mr. Long, who had little background in tax policy beyond promoting a fraud-riddled tax credit, had clashed at times with Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent during his brief tenure.... He also made high-profile mistakes.... A gregarious and colorful personality, Mr. Long had tried to cultivate a connection with the depleted and demoralized I.R.S. work force. He visited I.R.S. locations around the country and repeatedly sent emails to all I.R.S. employees allowing them to leave work early on Friday afternoons.... Mr. Bessent will serve as the acting head of the I.R.S.... Mr. Long wrote on social media that he would be nominated to become the next U.S. ambassador to Iceland.” Read on. It's hard to pick the biggest goof-up here: Long, the humorless Bessent or Master-Fucker-Upper Trump. All the best people. ~~~
~~~ Fatima Hussein of the AP: Long's “quick exit makes him the shortest-tenured IRS commissioner confirmed by the Senate since the position was created in 1862.”
~~~ Steve Benen of MSNBC: "Between January and May, the [IRS] went through five different chiefs in five months." So that would make Long the sixth leader in six months.
DOJ, on the Trump Retribution Trail. Perry Stein, et al., of the Washington Post: “The Justice Department is intensifying its legal battle against New York Attorney General Letitia James, issuing at least two subpoenas to the state’s chief legal officer in recent days, according to three people.... The investigation into James — who Trump has long characterized as a political enemy — is being run out of the Northern District of New York, which covers Albany, the state capital, according to two of the people familiar with the probe. Attorney General Pam Bondi this week appointed Ed Martin, a former interim U.S. attorney in Washington, to serve as a special prosecutor in a separate mortgage fraud investigation of James. In the Northern District of New York investigations, one of the subpoenas focused on James’s successful civil fraud case against ... Donald Trump and his real estate empire.... A judge ordered in 2024 that Trump and his company pay more than $450 million in fines and interest. A second subpoena suggested that the Justice Department is looking into James’s high-profile litigation against the National Rifle Association....”
Brianna Sacks & Maeve Reston of the Washington Post: “The Department of Homeland Security is holding up more than $100 million in preapproved funds intended to help hurricane-battered North Carolina clean up storm damage and fix infrastructure still in disrepair almost a year after Helene hit the region.... Communities across the region ... still need to be reimbursed for about a hundred projects ranging from debris removal, waste water treatment repairs, roads and bridges, damaged buildings and parks, as well as for emergency protective measures such as paying back volunteer fire departments.... Experts and former FEMA administrators, including W. Craig Fugate, say money for emergency and protective measures such as debris removal should have hit North Carolina by now.... This administration, however, has been taking longer to approve disaster declarations and hazard mitigation grants, according to researcher Sarah Labowitz, who has been tracking the data.
“During a visit to the ransacked town of Swannanoa last October [near the end of the presidential campaign], Trump lambasted FEMA for being too slow, bureaucratic, expensive and ineffective. He repeated similar sentiments during another visit in January, suggesting it might be best to eliminate the agency.... Much of the [current] holdup, however, has to do with the new red tape within DHS.... [DHS Secretary Kristi] Noem wants to review most of the contract requests herself, multiple officials familiar with the process have said. But her schedule is hectic and she travels often.”
Mattathias Schwartz of the New York Times: “A federal appeals panel delivered a major blow on Friday to a district judge’s plan to assess whether Trump administration officials were guilty of criminal contempt for sending flights of Venezuelan migrants to El Salvador, despite the judge’s verbal order that they turn around and return to the United States. The ruling by the three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia will make it more difficult for Judge James E. Boasberg to determine the details of who was made aware of his order in March, and why the planes continued on to El Salvador. Judge Boasberg had ruled in April that there was probable cause to believe the administration had committed criminal contempt by ignoring his order. But the administration appealed, and Friday’s ruling reversed Judge Boasberg’s finding of probable cause. The brief order was accompanied by 57 pages of concurrences by Judges Gregory G. Katsas and Neomi Rao, who were in the 2-to-1 majority. It represents a victory for Mr. Trump and a brushback of a judge who had sought to curb Mr. Trump’s second-term agenda, earning his ire.... There are still ways [Judge Boasberg's inquiry] could eventually move forward.” MB: Both Katsas & Rao are Trump appointees. Politico's story is here.
Graham Bowley of the New York Times: “The Smithsonian put up new text on Friday that changed its description of ... [Donald] Trump’s impeachment following the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol. The new text removed previous references to Mr. Trump’s incitement charge being based on 'repeated “false statements” challenging the 2020 election results' and giving a speech that 'encouraged — and foreseeably resulted in — imminent lawless action at the Capitol.' The new label reads: 'On Jan. 13, 2021, Donald Trump became the first president to be impeached twice. The charge was incitement of insurrection based on his challenge of the 2020 election results and on his speech on Jan. 6. Because Trump’s term ended on Jan. 20, he became the first former president tried by the Senate. He was acquitted on Feb. 13, 2021.'... The new labeling that went up on Friday also changed the description of [Mr.] Trump’s first impeachment, in 2019, adding the word 'alleged' to a line that now reads: 'The charges focused on the president’s alleged solicitation of foreign interference in the 2020 presidential election and defiance of Congressional subpoenas.'... The removal of the original text in July came after the Smithsonian’s Board of Regents, which governs the institution, had committed to reviewing its content after pressure from the Trump administration.”
Tim Weiner of the New York Times: “William H. Webster, the only person ever to lead both the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Central Intelligence Agency, switching from lawman to spymaster while the bureau was investigating high crimes at the White House and the C.I.A., died on Friday in Warrenton, Va. He was 101.... In Mr. Webster’s nine years in office, with a few notable exceptions, the F.B.I. stopped breaking the law in the name of the law.” MB: For those of you who weren't even born back then or who, like me, weren't paying close attention, this is an interesting, informative obituary.
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Texas. Eleanor Klibanoff of the Texas Tribune: Texas “Attorney General Ken Paxton on Friday asked the Texas Supreme Court to expel 13 Democrats from the state House, the latest in a flurry of unprecedented actions aiming to resume business at the Capitol and pass new congressional maps to benefit Republicans. Gov. Greg Abbott previously asked the court to expel Houston Rep. Gene Wu, the chair of the Texas House Democrats.... [Paxton] said these 13 [who include Wu], among the dozens who have left the state, 'made incriminating public statements regarding their refusal to return, essentially confirming in their own words the very grounds for this legal action.'... Legal experts say it does not amount to abandoning office if a member intentionally does not show up for work in an effort to stymie the passage of a bill that their constituents oppose. Texas lawmakers have engaged in these “quorum breaks” since the 1870s and none have ever been expelled as a direct result of leaving the chamber.”
~~~ Eleanor Klibanoff of the Texas Tribune: “Former U.S. Rep. Beto O’Rourke cannot financially support Texas Democrats who left the state to delay passage of a new congressional map, a Tarrant County judge ruled Friday evening. O’Rourke and his political group, Powered by People, were sued by Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton Friday afternoon. Paxton argued that the group was deceptively fundraising for and illegally helping support Texas Democrats as they fanned out to Illinois, Massachusetts and New York to deny the House the headcount needed to pass legislation. Tarrant County District Judge Megan Fahey granted Paxton’s request for a temporary injunction, barring O’Rourke and Powered by People from fundraising for the Democrats or spending money to cover their expenses.... Fahey, a Republican, was appointed by Gov. Greg Abbott in 2019 and has twice been reelected to the bench.”
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Played again
Desperate to look like the Great Dealmaker and a cagey master of realpolitik, Fat Hitler once more gets played by an actual master of international manipulation.
Ever the hapless Charlie Brown to Putin’s Lucy. C’mon, Charlie, kick this football!
At first, Fatty sez Putin and Zelensky must meet face to face and stop the fighting. Putin tells him to fuck himself. So no Zelensky AND Putin says he wants Eastern Ukraine handed over to Russia.
“Just when Ukraine and its European allies thought President Donald Trump was coming round to their view of the war, he appeared to give a huge win to his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin.
For Kyiv, this was Trump’s deadline to Putin: stop the fighting by Friday or face tough new economic sanctions. Instead, Trump has handed Moscow a diplomatic coup by agreeing to meet Putin face-to-face in a matter of days, their first encounter since the invasion of Ukraine.
Trump had initially suggested that such a summit would only go ahead if Putin agreed to meet with Volodymyr Zelenskyy, something the Ukrainian president’s administration has long called for but has been resisted by Russia. On Thursday, Trump dispelled the idea that they would have to get together — raising the specter of a bilateral negotiation that freezes out Kyiv.
‘The danger for Ukraine is actually quite grave,’ said Jonathan Eyal, international director at the Royal United Services Institute, a London-based think tank. ‘There will be a sense of alarm in European capitals.’
For Eyal and others, Ukraine’s nightmare is now one step closer to reality: ‘Trump will be so pleased by what he perceives as the great achievement of getting Putin to the negotiating table, that he grabs any kind of offer that is made,’, Eyal said. ‘The danger of half-baked compromise, which Trump can claim as his main achievement, is very high.’
That compromise could be a temporary ceasefire that would allow Russia to restock its army and give its economy a break from international sanctions, according to Hope for Ukraine, a nonprofit organization based in New Jersey.
Even if there is no truce agreement, ‘a meeting with Trump — no matter the outcome — would be a big diplomatic victory for Putin,’ Yuriy Boyechko, Hope for Ukraine’s CEO, said in an email. ‘Putin wants to break his diplomatic isolation” and such a meeting “will stroke his ego.’
The ‘meeting with Putin is a trap; President Trump must not fall for it’ Boyechko added.
But Fatty the Clown always falls for it. He will undoubtedly agree that Ukraine must hand over half its country while Putin regroups and plans to take the rest of it.
Благодарю! Comrade Donaldovich Trumpinsky!
It's probably not a good idea for El Stupido to be meeting in Alaska.
He'll unwittingly be trading Alaska for something, maybe a billion
dollar donation to the Trump fund.
As seen on Bluesky -
Be very concerned
"The extraordinary repost on X from Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, made Thursday night, illustrates his deep and personal connection to a Christian nationalist pastor with extreme views on the role of religion and women.
In the post, Hegseth commented on an almost seven-minute-long report by CNN examining Doug Wilson, cofounder of the Communion of Reformed Evangelical Churches, or CREC. The report featured a pastor from Wilson’s church advocating the repeal of women’s right to vote from the Constitution, and another pastor saying that in his ideal world, people would vote as households. It also featured a female congregant saying that she submits to her husband."
From NPR,
Why a NASA satellite that scientists and farmers rely on may be destroyed on purpose
"The Trump administration has asked NASA employees to draw up plans to end at least two major satellite missions, according to current and former NASA staffers. If the plans are carried out, one of the missions would be permanently terminated, because the satellite would burn up in the atmosphere.
The data the two missions collect is widely used, including by scientists, oil and gas companies and farmers who need detailed information about carbon dioxide and crop health. They are the only two federal satellite missions that were designed and built specifically to monitor planet-warming greenhouse gases."
Zoë Schlanger, in The Atlantic, On climate, the U.S. and the rest of the planet are now in “completely separate worlds.”
"Last month, the world’s highest court issued a long-awaited opinion on how international law should regard climate harm. The International Court of Justice concluded, unanimously, that states have binding legal obligations to act to protect the climate system, and failure to do so—by continuing to produce, consume, and subsidize fossil fuels—may “constitute an internationally wrongful act.” In other words, curbing greenhouse-gas emissions is not merely voluntary in the eyes of the court; failure to do so is illegal.
A week later, the U.S. government proffered an entirely opposite picture of legal responsibility. It announced a plan to rescind one of the most important legal underpinnings of the federal effort to combat climate change. The Environmental Protection Agency’s endangerment finding for greenhouse gases, from 2009, says quite simply that these emissions endanger the public and qualify as harmful pollution; they can therefore be regulated under the Clean Air Act. This finding is the legal basis for power-plant rules, tailpipe-emissions regulations, and almost every other action the executive branch has taken to curb the release of carbon dioxide and methane. And the U.S. EPA would now like to throw it out."
Putin will probably tell Fat Hitler to think about his Nobel Peace Prize and just announce the "peace deal" that hands over much of Ukraine to Russia. Putin will probably already have filled out his nomination form and tell FH that he can send it in that day if makes the right choice. It'll probably be framed and embossed in gold because FH is so easy to manipulate. Tim Apple did the same thing with a plaque when he was announcing his "investment" of Trump America.
Today's Heather Cox..
https://heathercoxrichardson.substack.com/p/august-8-2025-friday
depressed the hell out of me, reminding me as it did of all the steps we've willingly taken on the road to Ukraine's demise.
Today's Maureen Dowd. in The New York Times, on Dictator Chic
also includes a couple of links to previous stories in the Times. Gift link:
"Now he has tarted up the Oval; it’s the modern version of worshiping the golden calf and just as profane.
Trump’s tacky rococo gold adornments are growing exponentially. He’s piling on more and more garish features — from cherubs to mantelpiece swirls — and sycophants add to the gold rush by bringing offerings to truckle to King Midas.
A groveling Tim Cook came to the Oval on Wednesday with a gift for the president: a glass plaque with a 24-karat gold base.
Trump is trying to turn the people’s house into a Saudi palace — “dictator chic.” It is symbolic of this president: He’s refashioning our democracy as an autocracy."
Party of Trump
"Rep Drunken [Derrick] Van Orden reveals serious personality disorder by retweeting graphic, sexual photos and trying to bully people online.
But DVO has a special hatred for Rep Mark Pocan because Pocan keeps showing DVO up, holding town hall meetings in DVO's territory while DVO is too afraid to meet his constituents. This hatred, and DVO's stunted social skills, boiled over again on Xitter.
On Wednesday, the NY Post showed a photo on Xitter of a European man who was running around naked except for a hood and crocs, carrying a stick with a sex toy tied to it, and terrifying tourists. Van Orden retweeted it and falsely claimed that it was Pocan:"
McSweeny's
"Texas Democrats Are Subverting Democracy by Preventing Us from Subverting Democracy"
Hostility Towards Legal Reasoning
"Net neutrality advocates won’t appeal loss, say they don’t trust Supreme Court
Advocates say Supreme Court shows "hostility toward sound legal reasoning.""
@Akhilleus: Thanks. I was going to write a fake headline along the lines of "Trump announces Putin will roll him in Alaska." But I thought, gosh, what if it turns out Trump gets some kind of positive result from his Alaska "summit"? If so, my fake headline will be inaccurate.
But your reminder of what-all led up to Trump's announcement convinces me my fake headline would have been right-on. Giving Trump the slightest benefit of the doubt is always a mistake. I should have thrown misplaced caution to the wind and gone with the one true thing: Trump screws up everything.
Marie,
Got that right. As RAS suggests, all Putin needs to do is dangle “Nobel Peace Prize” in front of Fatty, and like a cartoon character being hypnotized by a swinging watch, he’d probably hand over half of Europe.
And…into the bargain, as Forrest suggests, if Putin promised to pay him a billion dollars (seems to be the going rate for a Fat Hitler bribe—see UCLA), he might give him Alaska as a thank you for the Peace Prize nomination. Except Putin, if he decided to pay him at all, would send him a check for one billion rubles (about $12.5k).
Hey, then Palin really could see Russia from her back porch! Winners all around.
Oh, except for Ukraine.
And we thought Dubya was a moron. Bush looks like Mensa material next to the current idiot.
Everyone has the FH playbook.
TRIPP — the Trump Route for International Peace and Prosperity.
"Armenia Names Region For Trump In Peace Deal
President Donald Trump hosted the leaders of Armenia and Azerbaijan at the White House on Friday, where they finalized a peace agreement that would grant the United States exclusive development access to a critical transit corridor in the South Caucasus, which will be named after Trump.
The deal is aimed at quelling long-simmering tensions between the two nations, while opening up the region for greater economic development — including through granting the US long-term, exclusive rights to carve a new transportation route through Armenian territory."
"You are invited to the grand opening of the Beautiful Ballroom"
How narcissism truly warps the brain…
You want something from Fat Hitler? Bring him a gold gewgaw or name something after him.
Would this work with any normal person?
Let’s say you and your neighbor have a dispute. He wants to build a giant garage on part of your property to store his collection of gigantic pickup trucks, each of which, when started, sounds like an Atlas rocket, just before liftoff. Your initial instinct is “Nope. Never. Not in this lifetime. See ya later”
But he brings you a present, maybe a fancy gold door knocker, and he says he’ll name the garage after you and put a big sign on it with your name in big gold letters.
Does this bullshit sway you? Even a little?
Absolutely not. In fact, it convinces you that the guy either thinks you’re an idiot, or he himself isn’t operating on all cylinders.
But not Fatty. My dog is a tougher customer than Trump.
Our president!
That Trump Transit Corridor from Nakhchivan to Armenia, passing through Azerbaijian, appears to be the same deal that was part of the "peace" between Armenia and Azerbaihian in 2020. Only then the route was "guaranteed" by the Russians. The peace was not peaceful.
So DiJiT is dusting off the failed 2020 peace agreement, adding the U.S. to the interlocutors (not, I hope, God forbid, as a guarantor of any kind ... the A's have been shooting at one another since rocks were invented), adding his name to the rest stops, and hoping to sell development licenses to energy companies. Iran and Russia both oppose this transit corridor.
This deal is about as shaky and obscure as they come .... but, sure, Nobel, why not? DiJiT probably thinks he's optioned the first link in a US version of China's Belt and Road project. 3,000 years of history say, probably not.
As a disabled veteran, I have been reading Marie Burns's and other contributors' postings here, almost from its inception. I cannot thank you all enough for the voice(s) of sanity and reason, and shared reportage that clarifies so much from our news media. You are a most trusted source of truth and seekers of justice, for me and I'm certain for many others. Many thanks for your great service to our country in fighting against the GOP-fully-sponsored Fascist dictatorship-in-progress. We sane combat veterans stand together with you.