Trump, July 2017: Tweet more

next time reconciliation is possible will be the middle of mid-term elections, political calculus will be a bit different

i know it's cliche but i'm not saying never to anything ever at this point

This from @Scaramucci’s book explains why the Bannonites can’t stand him pic.twitter.com/pKf1N9uqVu

— Felix Salmon (@felixsalmon) July 21, 2017

lmao https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/sessions-discussed-trump-campaign-related-matters-with-russian-ambassador-us-intelligence-intercepts-show/2017/07/21/3e704692-6e44-11e7-9c15-177740635e83_story.html

Minor details, sir.

Russia’s ambassador to Washington told his superiors in Moscow that he discussed campaign-related matters, including policy issues important to Moscow, with Jeff Sessions during the 2016 presidential race, contrary to public assertions by the embattled attorney general, according to current and former U.S. officials.

Ambassador Sergey Kislyak’s accounts of two conversations with Sessions — then a top foreign policy adviser to Republican candidate Donald Trump — were intercepted by U.S. spy agencies, which monitor the communications of senior Russian officials both in the United States and in Russia. Sessions initially failed to disclose his contacts with Kislyak and then said that the meetings were not about the Trump campaign.

One U.S. official said that Sessions — who testified that he has no recollection of the April encounter — has provided “misleading” statements that are “contradicted by other evidence.” A former official said that the intelligence indicates that Sessions and Kislyak had “substantive” discussions on matters including Trump’s positions on Russia-related issues and prospects for U.S.-Russia relations in a Trump administration.

Already seeing speculation that this was done to try and finally force Sessions out. I have doubts.

by russia, for the lols, perhaps

There's no way anyone in Trump's circle is feeding the Russia story imo. However much they want rid of Sessions, makes no sense for them to fuel the collusion narrative.

Anthony Scaramucci looks like an extra in the Wolf of Wall Street that they had to fire because he kept trying to talk to Leo

— Ike Barinholtz (@ikebarinholtz) July 21, 2017

I weep for him

Spicer to Hannity on McCarthy/SNL: "There’s a lot of it that was over the line. It wasn’t funny. It was stupid, or silly, or malicious."

— Josh Dawsey (@jdawsey1) July 21, 2017

Hilarious if true:

Scaramucci is being primed to eventually take on the position of WH chief of staff, according 2sources w/ knowledge https://t.co/ZhlbsprsIw

— Tara Palmeri (@tarapalmeri) July 21, 2017

The latest in the seemingly endless series of "He can't really be that stupid, can he? ...Oh, wow..." moments.

Oh and

WSJ FLAG: Kushner releases revised financial filing, disclosing 77 assets "inadvertently omitted" from earlier rpt.https://t.co/QzzbyftESO

— Kyle Griffin (@kylegriffin1) July 21, 2017

Haha.

I understand the point Thomas Frank is making in that piece linked to a few posts up. It's basically an extension of Listen, Liberal--the venality of the cult of "professionalism," specifically within the Democratic Party--which I read and liked.

But no matter if the press's hatred for Trump is, in Frank's eyes, for all the wrong reasons, I do think its hatred, along with all the misery Trump inflicts upon himself, helps gum things up for him. I don't really buy the idea that, because the media are so hated in poll after poll, therefore Trump benefits from the mutual animosity. With the 30% or so of voters who are staying with him forever, no matter what, sure--they dig in. But as a practical matter, day-to-day, I really believe it hurts him badly. CNN seizes on everything. When Scaramucci gave his press conference today, every time he said something silly (e.g., hoping Spicer goes on to make lots of money), the words immediately showed up on the crawl at the bottom of the screen. I love that they do this; I think it takes a toll.

Is the press "winning" its war with Trump? I don't know what winning exactly means, but they are nurturing and adding to the chaos, and I can't believe that's a good thing for Trump.

Every GOP figure I've spoken to at #AspenSecurity assumes Trump leaked this to force Sessions out. "Certainly not a Mueller leak," one said. https://t.co/5WjsCLkQks

— Garrett M. Graff (@vermontgmg) July 21, 2017

OMG more NEWS: House Intelligence Committee will interview Jared Kushner next Tuesday, per release

— Seung Min Kim (@seungminkim) July 21, 2017

Meantime

https://www.wsj.com/articles/sean-spicer-faced-myriad-obstacles-during-dramaticwhite-houserise-and-fall-1500678379

Less than a month into his new job, White House press secretary Sean Spicer needed to keep his food and drink cold. He wanted a mini-fridge.

He dispatched a top aide to a nearby executive office building where junior research employees are crammed into a room, surviving on Lean Cuisine frozen lunches. Mr. Spicer wants your icebox, the aide said, according to people familiar with the incident. They refused to give it up.

So Mr. Spicer waited until sundown—after his young staffers had left—to take matters into his own hands. He was spotted by a fellow White House official lugging the icebox down the White House driveway after 8 p.m.

The Fridgegate Burglary

Real "who throws a shoe?" territory there

I don't really buy the idea that, because the media are so hated in poll after poll, therefore Trump benefits from the mutual animosity. With the 30% or so of voters who are staying with him forever, no matter what, sure--they dig in. But as a practical matter, day-to-day, I really believe it hurts him badly.

― clemenza, Friday, July 21, 2017 7:24 PM (seven minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

OTM and the tendency to believe otherwise is more of the fearful, apologetic, and ultimately self-sabotaging shit that got us into the mess in the first place. Dems should not be waiting until 2018 or 2020 wondering if taking no prisoners is NAGL. Three-foot putts be damned, these creeps are increasingly cornered and there is never going to be "the right moment" to take the boot off their throats

^conceding so-called liberal media bias here

I'm depressed to hear that Schumer et al who I would like to see as good guys in this have picked now to illegalise boycotting Israel.

That stink is going to stick to Gillibrand when she eventually announces her presidential candidacy.

A little extra detail

http://www.cnn.com/2017/07/21/politics/trump-junior-manafort-agree-to-negotiate/index.html

The leaders of the Senate Judiciary Committee have cut a deal with President Donald Trump's eldest son, Donald Trump Jr., and former campaign chairman Paul Manafort to avoid a high-profile public hearing next week, with the two men agreeing to provide records to the panel and to be privately interviewed ahead of any public session.

In a joint statement, panel Chairman Chuck Grassley and ranking member Dianne Feinstein said, "(W)e will not issue subpoenas for them tonight requiring their presence at Wednesday's hearing but reserve the right to do so in the future."
The committee has issued a subpoena for Glenn Simpson, the co-founder of Fusion GPS, the political firm that compiled a dossier at the center of the federal Russia probe.
Attorneys for Simpson say he will not accept the committee's invitation to testify Wednesday.

So Sessions - or any of them, for that matter - just outright liars who did not think they would be caught?

Fun times!

http://www.politico.com/story/2017/07/21/inside-24-hours-that-broke-press-secretary-sean-spicer-240822

Bannon, people who spoke to the chief strategist said, was still unhappy after the official announcement of Scaramucci's hiring. Priebus spent the day trying to convince others that he and Scaramucci are close friends and that Spicer's departure wasn't bad for his own embattled position in the White House. Scaramucci was heading back to New York for the weekend.

i am not aware of any US pol who has suffered for being maniacally pro-Israel

Grassley planning to subpoena Fusion GPS and not manafort and Jr.! Fuck this

Yeah but that's because they agreed to come in and testify, so.

Well they aren't coming in next week now

Interior Sec. Ryan Zinke, the first speaker at the Western Conservative Summit, wastes no time getting heckled by environmentalists.

— Tim Alberta (@TimAlberta) July 22, 2017

Protesters just chanted for a solid 5 minutes of Cory Gardner's speech -- #WCS17 staff struggling to remove them from the ballroom. Brutal.

— Tim Alberta (@TimAlberta) July 22, 2017

http://www.thedailybeast.com/president-trumps-interview-bashing-jeff-sessions-meant-legal-spokesman-mark-corallo-had-to-quit

“Anyone with Mark’s professional capabilities would have seen the New York Times interview was a debilitating P.R. calamity,” the friend added. “To direct broadsides on Mueller and the A.G. is going to be impossible from which to recover, and Corallo certainly would have known that. It makes total sense that he got out of dodge. He’s always had tremendous political instincts.”

Another person who has known Corallo professionally for years said he couldn’t keep working on the president’s defense team after that interview.

“It’s the most unprofessional thing Trump has done to date, getting in Sessions’ ass and getting in Mueller’s ass,” the long-time colleague said. “You can’t do that. There’s no attorney in the world that’s going to want a client that’s doing that. First of all, it’s impetuous. But in addition to that, it makes the legal defense team, including Corallo, look really bad, because a lawyer would never advise their client to do that. And if you don’t make a stand on that, then tacitly, you agree with it.”

Grab 'em by the ass!

was that in series or in parallel

This is all so bewildering for him, I'm sure. People have always given him cookies and told him what a smart and handsome boy he is whenever he spitefully pissed himself in the past. He must be pissing himself wrong.

Has anybody explained to him the connection between not divesting and interest in his personal finances? Would think that was a beginners introduction. & still he's whining about interest in that area.
quite apart from the extensive nepotism, extreme ineptness, and other vast amount of corruption.

But if nobody with any power is going to do anything about anything because they're chasing their own quixotic white whales how are things going to develop.
Would agree that the norms have been stretched to a point where it is going to be difficult to prevent things repeating with some minor variati8on at some point in the future. Even if only because the next sociopathic chancer will be able to look back and see what has been got away with.
& politics seems to be an area inherently open to sociopathic chancers dunnit? Fake charisma etc etc.

I'm reminded of the idea of putting a positive slant on the idea of psychopathia in the late 90s. Which was supposed to be promoting a tribe of go-getters like Gordon Gekko. I thought it was referred to as the Purple people. I heard it was being pout forth as a positive at the time but the end result seems to be things like the mess in the white house now seems inevitable really.

I guess Trump learned something at the G20 summit after all - he's planning to take August off. He'll be at his NJ golf course from August 3-20.

This from @Scaramucci’s book explains why the Bannonites can’t stand him pic.twitter.com/pKf1N9uqVu
— Felix Salmon (@felixsalmon) July 21, 2017
― Ned Raggett, Friday, 21 July 2017 22:56 (yesterday) Permalink

Could've sworn that was taken from the Robert Evans autobiography.

one of the things vlad and don discussed at the G20?

http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2017/07/scaramucci-may-have-a-russia-problem-of-his-own/

lotta tweets out of the president this saturday morning, hard to pick a favorite

While all agree the U. S. President has the complete power to pardon, why think of that when only crime so far is LEAKS against us.FAKE NEWS

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 22, 2017

if meeting with representatives of an adversarial nation who interfered in an election that i ended up winning is a crime, then i don't want to be innocent!

No surprise that Manafort and DJTJ no longer testifying publicly. Slightly more of a surprise that that Russian lawyer has reportedly agreed to testify, but only if her safety is guaranteed (!).

you've gotta love the classic GOP bait and switch, from 'jr and manafort are testifying wednesday!' to 'got you're attention? good! we're going to pin russian collusion suspicion on fusion GPS and hillary!'

http://www.politico.com/story/2017/07/21/donald-trump-jr-paul-manafort-chuck-grassley-testify-russia-240815

i am not aware of any US pol who has suffered for being maniacally pro-Israel

― Supercreditor (Dr Morbius)

i wondered why that old guy was waving around that anti-israel sign when i was on the train yesterday. god bless him for being able to keep up with this shit.

You know, the President decides what to say and who to say it in front of.

If it appears in the TimesPost the next day, that's on him.

He's once again claiming "illegal leaks" and "fake news" in the same breath.

It's still hilarious how little he understands about email (thinking it's difficult to delete 33,000 of them, continuing to use phrase 'acid washed')

It's still terrifying how little he understands about pretty much everything but winning.

I'm not sure he knows much about that, either, except that it's better than losing. Which I suppose is pretty primal.

Worth a read; dude worked as a lawyer in Congress. Positive read of the situation.

A few thoughts on Senate Judiciary's agreement to interview Paul Manafort & Don Trump Jr. next week instead of public hearing testimony 1/

— Andy Wright (@AndyMcCanse) July 22, 2017