*
Meanwhile, Trump’s boy, Russia expert and frequent-flier-to-Russia Carter Page, the second name Trump ever dropped as a foreign policy adviser, writes a letter to two senators claiming that his phones were also tapped. Doesn’t that mean that Trump is part of the investigation of his gang’s connections to Russia? No reason to believe there’s any investigation by the Justice Department! says Trump’s press secretary. He didn’t get that from us! says the Department of Justice—off the record. I didn’t say no, says Trump’s press secretary. I said we weren’t aware. Russia, Russia, Russia.
*
Trump Gang members Flynn, Sessions, and J. D. Gordon deny meeting with Russian ambassador Kislyak.
Turns out they all met with him.
Then they all fudged the truth about meeting with him. Then CNN turns up a video of Kislyak last October—and he’s fudging the truth about meeting with them. Russia, Russia, Russia.
*
Trump henchman Roger Stone boasts about trading admiring messages with the hacker Guccifer 2.0. Not only does the American intelligence community believe Guccifer is the front for the Russian spies who hacked the Democratic National Committee, but Stone himself believes Guccifer is the front for the Russian spies who hacked the Democratic National Committee. In fact, he wrote a piece stating this for Breitbart on August 5, nine days after the news conference in which Trump said, “Russia, if you’re listening, I hope you’re able to find the thirty thousand emails that are missing.”
Russia, Russia, Russia.
*
Of course, days before he boasted about contact with Guccifer, Stone had already boasted about having a back channel to Julian Assange, who posted the hacked DNC files at WikiLeaks.
And last August, Stone boasted that he knew the DNC materials were about John Podesta. The presumption is that there’s a middleman between the Russian spy hackers and Assange, and just about the only thing Roger Stone has yet to boast about would be if he were that middleman.
Russia, Russia, Russia.
*
Then there’s Trump’s pet Englishman, the Brexit conspirator Nigel Farage.
March 7, WikiLeaks releases documents purporting to reveal CIA hacking tools. March 9, Farage is photographed coming out of the London embassy of the nation of Ecuador—where, for the past five years, has lived Julian Assange! Asked if he had met with Assange presumably moments earlier, Farage says he can’t remember why he was in the building. Later, a source in Farage’s right-wing extremist political party confirms that Farage met with Assange. March 10, Assange holds a news conference pimping his supposed CIA documents and promising new revelations.
The same day, a British newspaper prints non-WikiLeaks correspondence showing five years of support for Assange by Farage’s political party. By the way, as late as October 10, Donald Trump gave a speech in which he bellowed, “I love WikiLeaks.” And Trump did not say a thing about the presumed purloined CIA docs as WikiLeaks released them. And as recently as February 28, Nigel Farage had dinner with . . . Trump.
Russia, Russia, Russia.
*
And there’s Trump and the Russian fertilizer billionaire. A Florida newspaper wondering why, nine years ago, Dmitry Rybolovlev bought a Palm Beach mansion from Trump, reportedly for about $50 million more than it was worth. And why, twice during the campaign and again as recently as last month, Rybolovlev’s private plane landed at a U.S. airport just before, or just after, Trump’s private plane landed at the same airport.
Russia, Russia, Russia.
*
And last of all, there was the former director of national intelligence James Clapper . . .
Who was so pissed off that Trump claimed he had been phone-tapped that Clapper went public with the news that in January, days after he briefed Trump about the existence of the Russian showers dossier compiled by the former British spy Christopher Steele, Trump called him and asked him to publicly say the dossier wasn’t true.
He wouldn’t.
Russia, Russia, Russia.
*
Everything Trump touches turns into a story about Trump and Russia.
*
Oops! I take that back. General Michael Flynn! The very briefly tenured national security adviser who was paid to appear on a Kremlin-controlled television propaganda outlet. The very briefly tenured national security adviser who was paid to go to Moscow to be part of a standing ovation for Putin. The very briefly tenured national security adviser who told the Russians not to worry about sanctions for allegedly meddling in our election. The very briefly tenured national security adviser who either lied to the vice president about Russia or got the vice president to lie for him about Russia.
While he was sitting in on the classified U.S. intelligence briefings Trump was getting as the Republican presidential candidate, Flynn was a paid lobbyist for the nation of Turkey.
Turkey, Turkey, Turkey.
*
Only partially obscuring the fact that Flynn, like Trump’s call to Clapper, like the sale of the Palm Beach mansion, like Farage’s visit to Assange, like Stone’s contact with Guccifer, like Kislyak’s denial, and Gordon’s denial, and Sessions’s denial, and Trump firing the United States attorney personally banned by Vladimir Putin . . .
All mainline back to Russia, Russia, Russia.
RUSSIA/WIRETAP/COMEY TESTIMONY
Post date • MONDAY, MARCH 20
We may have just heard the most carefully crafted sentence structure in American political history—and that sentence structure has condemned Donald John Trump.
According to its director, the FBI is “investigating the nature of any links between individuals associated with the Trump campaign and the Russian government . . .” Not “possible links.” Not “if there were links.” Links. Any links. Period.
The FBI’s investigation is about the nature of the links.
Director Comey used a caveat a minute at that hearing. He made no such disclaimers about links between individuals associated with the Trump campaign and the Russian government.
To him—under oath, before Congress—they exist.
*
Thus, the intelligence community is investigating links between the victorious presidential campaign and the Russians. Thus, the intelligence community has been investigating links between the victorious presidential campaign and the Russians since last July. Thus, the intelligence community will be investigating links between the victorious presidential campaign and the Russians—indefinitely. No time frame. No end date. What’s the normal length of such an investigation? “There is no normal,” says Comey.
I firmly believe that almost any other American politician hearing these words from the director of the FBI to the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence would have resigned the presidency before noon: “I have been authorized by the Department of Justice to confirm that the FBI, as part of our counterintelligence mission, is investigating the Russian government’s efforts to interfere in the 2016 presidential election.” I also firmly believe that almost any other American politician hearing Comey’s next words would have not just resigned the presidency before noon—but fled the country before nightfall:
“And that includes investigating the nature of any links between individuals associated with the Trump campaign and the Russian government, and whether there was any coordination between the campaign and Russia’s efforts.”
Again, note carefully the grammar.
To paraphrase the old insult: the links—we know what they are, now we’re just arguing about the price.
When Representative Jim Himes of Connecticut came back to the point of coordination and collusion and asked whether we should or shouldn’t dismiss it, Comey confirmed that this sentence structure—“any links”—was no accident. Comey answered, “All I can tell you is what we’re investigating. Which includes
whether there was any coordination between people associated with the Trump campaign and the Russians.” For Comey—keeping his cards not just close to his vest but sealed inside the deck—these comments were extraordinary.
And that was just the start of Donald Trump’s first day of reckoning. Comey dismissed Trump’s wiretap hoax. “I have no information that supports those tweets.” Comey said his bosses dismissed Trump’s wiretap hoax. “The Department of Justice has no information that supports those tweets.” Admiral Mike Rogers, the head of the NSA, dismissed the news gossip, cited by Press Secretary Spicer, that the British had surveilled Trump. Pressed by Congressman Pete King of New York to agree with former director of national intelligence Clapper that he had not seen proof of any collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia, King got nothing more from Rogers and Comey than “No comment.”
And Director Comey and Admiral Rogers repeatedly swatted away attempts by majority members like Chairman Nunes and Representative Trey Gowdy to elevate any procedural leaks, or their publication, to the level of an investigation of a foreign government’s efforts to alter the outcome of our elections, and the information they are investigating that a foreign government may have coordinated those efforts with the winning presidential campaign!
And in terms of the optics, all this took place the same morning as a series of panicked, hysterical tweets by Trump insisting, “The Democrats made up and pushed the Russian story as an excuse for running a terrible campaign.”
“This story is FAKE NEWS and everyone knows it!”
*
“The FBI, as part of our counterintelligence mission, is investigating the Russian government’s efforts to interfere in the 2016 presidential election, and that includes investigating the nature of any links between individuals associated with the Trump campaign and the Russian government, and whether there was any coordination between the campaign and Russia’s efforts.”
The story is not fake news. The story was not made up by the Democrats. It is not a “story.” It is an investigation by the FBI—and its targets are Donald Trump’s men.
In short, Trump got nothing from Comey or Rogers or even any of the Republican congressmen backfilling on his behalf who went so far as to imply that the Russians have always supported Republican presidential candidates. Sure—like Ronald Reagan.
Nothing. There was nothing to keep Trump from sinking. The best news he got was that there is an investigation—but that it hasn’t reached its conclusions yet. The best news is that the drip-drip-drip of Trump and Russia, and Russia and Trump, and what did Trump know and when did he know it—will continue indefinitely. That was the best news. The only way that hearing could have gone worse for Trump was if Vladimir Putin, Michael Flynn, Roger Stone, and Vladimir Ilyich Lenin had been sworn in and confessed.
*
In the past, Trump has claimed that his favorite motion picture of all time is the Orson Welles classic Citizen Kane. Might be true, might not; for all we know, he might never have seen it. But one piece of dialogue from that film kept playing in my head as I watched this hearing.
The corrupt politician whom Kane has promised to lock up has discovered Kane’s own corruption that will cost him the election. He offers Kane a way out—“you’re so sick that you’ve got to go away for a year or two”—but Kane can’t see the reality in front of his face, doesn’t know it’s over, doesn’t save himself and his supporters from humiliation and disaster. And the corrupt politician says to Kane: “If it was anybody else, I’d say what’s going to happen to you would be a lesson to you. Only you’re going to need more than one lesson. And you’re going to get more than one lesson.”
Were Trump smart, he would flee the country.
Now.
DONALD TRUMP, LOSER
Post date • TUESDAY, MARCH 21
Sixty days into his presidency and there is only one conclusion: Donald Trump is a loser.
Amid the kaleidoscope of the past two months of prejudice, hatred, revenge, gluttony, dishonesty, corruption, protofascism, and corporate statism this is, perhaps, the only unexpected development—the only true surprise: these people are idiots.
What have they thus far accomplished?
They have left such a bad taste in the mouths of their own supporters that the Gallup tracking poll—showing as late as the 25th of January that Trump approval was at 46 percent and disapproval at 45—has now collapsed to approval at 39, with disapproval at 55 percent.
With control of the White House and the Senate and the House, they got an intelligence hearing Monday that confirmed that the FBI “is investigating the nature of any links between individuals associated with the Trump campaign and the Russian government.” They have a Republican member of that committee and the Republican deputy majority whip both insisting that Trump owes Barack Obama an apology for Trump’s wiretapping hoax story. They have Trump still propagating this hoax, even as it roots back through an uninformed Fox talking head to an anti–Michelle Obama conspiracy theorist and back further to the Russian propaganda network RT, and they not only still can’t get him to let it die, but he tried to draw the German chancellor into supporting his paranoid delusion at a news conference and she looked at him like he was a dick.
They have let Trump attack the free press, the intelligence community, the judiciary, the right to protest, the opposition party, and the vote totals in an election in which he prevailed. They have let Trump go out in public day after day, in setting after setting, acting as if he is not a governmental executive working for this nation, but the owner of a company, and we are all his employees, and if he doesn’t like what we do, he will fire us.
They have produced a budget that is cruel, draconian, stupid—and yet have somehow managed to lose the narrative on it so badly that it is actually perceived as worse than it is. They have sent out a profoundly and exhaustingly stupid man named Mick Mulvaney, the budget director, to publicly explain cuts by saying, “Can we really continue to ask a coal miner in West Virginia or a single mom in Detroit to pay for these programs?” without ever thinking that people would respond by wondering why it’s okay to ask the coal miner and the single mom to pay the half a million dollars a day it costs to keep Melania Trump living in New York, or to pay the three million a trip it costs to let her husband go play golf. Every weekend. Every goddamned weekend. They have so little idea even how to manipulate public opinion that they have let stand the conclusion that this budget eliminates Meals on Wheels for the elderly and veterans, when it does not—but the damage has left Trump looking like Scrooge in A Christmas Carol, asking “Are there no prisons? Are there no workhouses?”
They have tied themselves to gutting health care, changing their own promises about insurance for everybody, then access to insurance for everybody, then, finally, no—nothing for anybody.
They have sent an amateur dressed up as a secretary of state into the middle of a hornet’s nest in North Korea and China, and when the story gets out that he canceled a dinner because he was fatigued, they can’t refute that story, because they themselves banned the press from accompanying him on the trip.
They have had a national security adviser resign, and prove to have been a paid representative of the governments of Russia and Turkey while receiving classified American intelligence. They have had an attorney general misrepresent the truth at his confirmation hearing and thus be forced to recuse himself from key investigations. They have had a senior adviser come under investigation for allegedly wearing a pro-Nazi, anti-Semitic Hungarian medal and tunic to an inaugural ball.
They have tried and failed twice to impose a Muslim ban, with Trump’s own words and the words of his minions being quoted back to him by the courts that stopped him. They have insisted that the ban could not wait a day, let alone a week, for implementation—and then they waited weeks to introduce a revised version.
They have been so amateurish using those entry law
s that already do exist that their operatives have twice detained the son of the legendary boxer Muhammad Ali, and have kept for questioning the former police chief of Greenville, North Carolina, whose first name is Hassan. They have been so ham-handed at the border that they publicly advertised that they would separate toddlers from their parents at detention centers. They have threatened to deport a man with a Hispanic name who was born in Puerto Rico. They have staggered from insisting that the border wall would be paid for by Mexico to insisting that it would be paid for by us, with reimbursements from Mexico, to explaining that it would be paid for with available funds to having to acknowledge that they only have enough money to build a wall four miles long.
Under their inspiration, the Secret Service has become so dispirited or incompetent that it had a laptop full of Trump Tower floor plans stolen, was found to have had agents who took selfies with Trump’s sleeping grandson, and needed seventeen minutes to find a fence jumper at the White House.
They have been so slovenly about security that passersby at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort were able to photograph him studying data about North Korea, and last weekend one gawker boasted of eluding the Secret Service there in order to take a selfie with one of Trump’s endless portraits of himself.
They have done all this . . . in just sixty days.
These people are idiots.
*
This is no longer merely about Trump’s substandard and dysfunctional mental, psychiatric, or intellectual status. This is now—most urgently—about his unadulterated and unceasing incompetence, and the unadulterated and unceasing incompetence of those he has brought with him into government. This is about the realization by his opponents and supporters—a realization seemingly growing geometrically every single day—that the worst-case Trump scenario is going to be the standard operating procedure—until we remove this incompetent and unstable individual from office and rush to save this nation while there is still a chance to do so.
Trump Is F*cking Crazy (This Is Not a Joke) Page 31