With you on hoping this all comes to pass. Every other Mary and Joseph have had to pay up on taxes. Sans healthcare some women -- especially Black women -- might as well be delivering in a barn.
If DJT stays crowned as lord of all by tacit approval, consequences mean noting. But I cannot and won’t believe Garland will leave us with crickets by Christmas.
Once Herschel is safely tucked away, I believe we’ll hear something.
Trouble is that someone — anyone -- has that much power. That Murdoch has the ability to be a kingmaker —literally — is a major flaw of our system that has been way out of like since the Fairness Doctrine went bust in 1987 opening the sewer for Rush Limbaugh to spew venom and others to follow suit, unanswered. Anyone who doesn’t thing Ronald Reagan did as much to trash this country as TFG is nuts. And seeing the FCC stripped and that oversight gone bled the way for Murdoch to totally unhinge American media. I say media because that is not journalism. I wretched the day he claimed the WSJ. Anyway, I am deeply grateful for you, Heather Cox Richardson, Thom Hartmann, Rachel Maddow, John Oliver, John Stewart, Stephen Colbert, Seth Meyers, Bill Mahr, Judy Woodruff, Nikolas Kristoff, Charles Blow, Jane Stevens (who founded and is the publisher for the organization for which I work, PACESConnection.com, as she is bringing the truth of root cause for our social ills — toxic childhood stress, caused in large part by historical trauma: inequity, racism, genocide, systemic oppression. Please look up Jane Ellen Stevens and PACEs Connection. I would love to talk with you about the impact of childhood trauma on adult health, our nation’s health (preventing adverse childhood experiences could save, annually, what we spend on the defense budget!) and conversely, the protective effects of the 7 Positive Childhood Experiences as researched by friend Christina Bethell, PhD, MPH, MBA, of Johns Hopkins. It all ties together and makes sense of how we are where we are and how we heal our way out of it! csipp@pacesconnection.com. Peace! And thank you for sanity, clarity, depth, truth, elegance, and economy in your writing.
Having been a staunch supporter of AG Garland since his appointment, it pains me to high-five your today's newsletter, Greg. But here I am now high fiving.
Astonishing that Trump remains free to announce his presidential candidate fuckery!
Garland should have named a special counsel months ago, we’re both correct on that easily made decision. As for his merry band of complicit chodes that remain in indicted, in the words of my well known Attorney father”The law is no damn good anymore”! Great piece Greg!!
If he didn't want to do the job himself, the time to outsource it was 18 months ago. If he didn't have thoughts about whether he'd go after Trump, he never should have taken the job.
You nailed it. Good job. For some odd reason--possibly dementia--I am reminded of the the rebellion of the Duke of Monmouth against Charles II in 1685. Notwithstanding that Monmouth was Charles’s bastard son, he was beheaded at the Tower in one of the most gruesome executions ever: the drunken executioner failed to cut off his head having missed his mark with two previous blows of the axe, finally severing the beautiful head with his pocket knife. Frankly, this is how you depose traitors of large reputation: Carry them out into the courtyard and kill them. Otherwise: endless chaos, riots, rebellion, and all their attendant murder. It’s probably worth pointing out, however, that the rule of law in this country depends upon an unbiased jury, and no such jury can be found in this country at the moment. It will be, though, simply because Trump is SO LAST DECADE. To old farts like me, last decade was this morning, but to the kids who voted last week, it’s ancient history. They were in 7th-8th grade when Trump first ran for office. Justice may be slow, but as Longfellow reminds us, “though the mills of God grind slowly, they grind exceeding small.”
This is so frustrating! I try to have faith that the wheels of justice turn slowly. The thought that keeps coming to my mind is the fact that Nixon was never brought to justice. A direct line can be drawn between that lack of closure and the rise of the monstrous little boy that lives inside of the bloated Newt and now the obese Donald. Any parent knows that a lack of consequences for bad behavior only escalates and intensifies the recurrence of bad behavior. If he is not held accountable, an even worse version of the aforementioned little boys awaits us in the not-so-distant future.
You can go back further than that. The North moving troops out of the South in 1877, as a deal for the Hayes election. The last time we followed through on something was when the Lincoln collaborators were hanged.
Yes. Isn't it interesting how time keeps repeating itself? Slightly different people, slightly different scenarios but all with the same theme. Another chance to solve an age-old problem.
In the last few days, an interesting awareness has been dawning.
Pundits and prognosticators have been focused on a 2022 red wave, the expected historical backlash for a midterm election.
What if history no longer applies. What if we are entering a new normal.
What if the traditional seesaw between Democratic and Republican Presidents has been discontinued.
Donald Trump may have changed American elections for good. The legislative election tampering that racist America has been engaging in for over 100 years is now routinely headline news. America pays attention like never before to gerrymandering and Election Day monkeyshines and voter suppression.
The 2018 midterms and the 2020 election were a referendum on Trump. Now in 2022, instead of the expected referendum on Biden, we are getting another referendum on Trump, MAGA, election deniers, et al.
Politically, Trump kills everything he touches. That trend has been confirmed this month.
Trump’s involvement in 2024 is guaranteed to kill that election cycle for the Republican Party. And something tells me that, in 2028, they’re going to be in even more serious trouble.
We are moving into a new and unfamiliar political system. The political parties are going through some kind of change. Remember, we didn’t always have a two-party system. At the time of the election that Abraham Lincoln won, it was a multiple party system, much more of a free-for-all.
Greg, as we all are, is focusing on this moment. Lucian Truscott likewise. Trump is due to be locked up. Overdue.
And if we simultaneously step back, set aside the microscope, and take the long view, maybe the Trump phenomenon is part of a larger process. Maybe he is a symbol of what is happening to the racist and sexist remnants of our society.
That element of society is struggling for survival and, imo, dying. Like a hunted and injured animal, now cornered, it is thrashing about and screaming.
The Republican Party cannot survive in its current form. It’s impossible. Their platform is racism, sexism, anti-LGBTQ+. That’s what they stand for: the old society that is no longer tolerated.
Trump is still out of jail because the society he symbolizes, the 74 million voters + 88 million Twitter followers + + he speaks for, are still vehemently vocal and struggling for survival.
And that’s where the Republican Party finds itself: an existential battle for survival.
They are doomed in their current form. It’s a sinking ship, a ship in self-destruct mode.
Thanks, Roland. This is definitely an inflection point. Trump is not going to get the GOP nom and will run as a spoiler, assuming he's not in prison. If he DOES get the nom, Liz Cheney will run against him. They are fucked either way. We just need Joe to stay healthy for the next two years.
Fourth turning, whether you buy it or not. Authoritarians vs Not. Multiculturalism vs. Not. Going backwards vs Not.
I have to chuckle at Elon, going more Right with every passing year. Now he calls on the Twitter staff to go hardcore or go home in the midst of a migration away from workplace and careerism and corporate dominance.
They are flailing on every level. Hawley says the GOP is dead and must be reborn to aid the working man. Sorry Josh, Joe and Nancy are way ahead of you and your train has left the station, moving in the opposite direction.
All we need now is for Donald to put the coup de grace on the GOP. Do it, Orange Sunshine. Burn it down.
Actually, Greg, I think I'm done with Garland. I have defended his delay in indicting the Orange Menace for two years with the same thought processes you have, that a conviction was predicated on solid, air-tight evidence against him. Objectively speaking, January 6th was a thought crime, and the DOJ would be forced to try to prove intent on Trump's part, a heavy lift. But the classified documents? No, it IS an open-and-shut case, and there shouldn't be this delay after delay after delay. In my mind, I gave Garland until yesterday (Monday) to indict, knowing that the DOJ likes to make a big splash announcement like that on a Monday, and I thought it the last Monday there would be before Trump announced. But no, nothing, not even an update. When it happens, IF it happens, I'll be pleasantly surprised, but I'm no longer looking forward to it.
I encourage everyone to read, "Unchecked: The Untold Story Behind Congress's Botched Impeachments of Donald Trump" by Rachael Bade and Karoun Demirjian. This book seems to have flown under the radar, and contains MANY revelations, some of which were surprising and uncomfortable.
At present, it looks as though Donald J Trump is now getting away from ANY justice for a THIRD time within the US government. It seems like no matter who tries -- Democrats, Republicans, non-partisans -- they fail to bring Trump to justice. I think the only justice he'll see is in the mythical, but much spoken of, afterlife. It doesn't seem destined for here on Earth.
And by the way, Kimberly Guilfoyle, who the hell wears BLACK to a daytime wedding? I'm no fashion maven, basically wearing pajamas every day, coming up on three years, but even I know you don't wear black to a wedding. I would have cropped you out of the picture too! What a perfectly ticky-tacky little wife for Don Jr.
What else would someone named Tiffany have, but a crepe paper wedding? I see too that the groom is a billionaire, so she's set! Here's what I know: as a woman (sexist, yes!), you don't wear black, and you don't wear white, to anyone's wedding unless you're trying to make some kind of statement or just have NO fashion sense at all, or maybe it's all gone up your nose. My mom just told me tonight that her mother-in-law, my dear departed grandmother, wore black to my mom and dad's wedding, probably because NO ONE was ever going to be good enough for her son, so I'm guessing STATEMENT, there.
Kimberly, I'm sure, is mystified that people regularly refer to her as Kimberly Gargoyle. And I STILL can't wrap my head around her being married, at one time, to Gavin Newsome. AHHH!
With you on hoping this all comes to pass. Every other Mary and Joseph have had to pay up on taxes. Sans healthcare some women -- especially Black women -- might as well be delivering in a barn.
If DJT stays crowned as lord of all by tacit approval, consequences mean noting. But I cannot and won’t believe Garland will leave us with crickets by Christmas.
Once Herschel is safely tucked away, I believe we’ll hear something.
Thank you!
I hope so, I certainly hope so. DJT's reign is over, either way. Murdoch gave him the boot.
Trouble is that someone — anyone -- has that much power. That Murdoch has the ability to be a kingmaker —literally — is a major flaw of our system that has been way out of like since the Fairness Doctrine went bust in 1987 opening the sewer for Rush Limbaugh to spew venom and others to follow suit, unanswered. Anyone who doesn’t thing Ronald Reagan did as much to trash this country as TFG is nuts. And seeing the FCC stripped and that oversight gone bled the way for Murdoch to totally unhinge American media. I say media because that is not journalism. I wretched the day he claimed the WSJ. Anyway, I am deeply grateful for you, Heather Cox Richardson, Thom Hartmann, Rachel Maddow, John Oliver, John Stewart, Stephen Colbert, Seth Meyers, Bill Mahr, Judy Woodruff, Nikolas Kristoff, Charles Blow, Jane Stevens (who founded and is the publisher for the organization for which I work, PACESConnection.com, as she is bringing the truth of root cause for our social ills — toxic childhood stress, caused in large part by historical trauma: inequity, racism, genocide, systemic oppression. Please look up Jane Ellen Stevens and PACEs Connection. I would love to talk with you about the impact of childhood trauma on adult health, our nation’s health (preventing adverse childhood experiences could save, annually, what we spend on the defense budget!) and conversely, the protective effects of the 7 Positive Childhood Experiences as researched by friend Christina Bethell, PhD, MPH, MBA, of Johns Hopkins. It all ties together and makes sense of how we are where we are and how we heal our way out of it! csipp@pacesconnection.com. Peace! And thank you for sanity, clarity, depth, truth, elegance, and economy in your writing.
Having been a staunch supporter of AG Garland since his appointment, it pains me to high-five your today's newsletter, Greg. But here I am now high fiving.
Same. I want him to succeed, so so badly. I think he's a fine man. I'm just not sure he's the right guy for the moment.
Laying it all out, still frustrating as hell. Who could have pictured 1/2 of any of this actually happening? Still keeping the faith.
Every day I stop and look around and marvel at how fucking insane it all is!
Enough is enough. It's beyond high time to indict this traitor ~ I refuse to say his name!
FPOTUS is a clumsy, ugly series of letters that works...
Astonishing that Trump remains free to announce his presidential candidate fuckery!
Garland should have named a special counsel months ago, we’re both correct on that easily made decision. As for his merry band of complicit chodes that remain in indicted, in the words of my well known Attorney father”The law is no damn good anymore”! Great piece Greg!!
Thanks, Patrick.
If he didn't want to do the job himself, the time to outsource it was 18 months ago. If he didn't have thoughts about whether he'd go after Trump, he never should have taken the job.
Agreed, he’s been given a plethora of facts, testimonials to work with, do the damn job!!
Prosecute now with extreme prejudice. Donald Chernobyl is a super criminal. Always.
AGreed.
You nailed it. Good job. For some odd reason--possibly dementia--I am reminded of the the rebellion of the Duke of Monmouth against Charles II in 1685. Notwithstanding that Monmouth was Charles’s bastard son, he was beheaded at the Tower in one of the most gruesome executions ever: the drunken executioner failed to cut off his head having missed his mark with two previous blows of the axe, finally severing the beautiful head with his pocket knife. Frankly, this is how you depose traitors of large reputation: Carry them out into the courtyard and kill them. Otherwise: endless chaos, riots, rebellion, and all their attendant murder. It’s probably worth pointing out, however, that the rule of law in this country depends upon an unbiased jury, and no such jury can be found in this country at the moment. It will be, though, simply because Trump is SO LAST DECADE. To old farts like me, last decade was this morning, but to the kids who voted last week, it’s ancient history. They were in 7th-8th grade when Trump first ran for office. Justice may be slow, but as Longfellow reminds us, “though the mills of God grind slowly, they grind exceeding small.”
Thanks, John, for that colorful bit of history.
One of the reasons they always executed traitors for treason is so the treasoning would stop. The pardoned traitors are still treasoning.
This is so frustrating! I try to have faith that the wheels of justice turn slowly. The thought that keeps coming to my mind is the fact that Nixon was never brought to justice. A direct line can be drawn between that lack of closure and the rise of the monstrous little boy that lives inside of the bloated Newt and now the obese Donald. Any parent knows that a lack of consequences for bad behavior only escalates and intensifies the recurrence of bad behavior. If he is not held accountable, an even worse version of the aforementioned little boys awaits us in the not-so-distant future.
You can go back further than that. The North moving troops out of the South in 1877, as a deal for the Hayes election. The last time we followed through on something was when the Lincoln collaborators were hanged.
Yes. Isn't it interesting how time keeps repeating itself? Slightly different people, slightly different scenarios but all with the same theme. Another chance to solve an age-old problem.
Great column.
Trump takes the award for historys most corrupt US President.
However
Unlikely that Trump will wear the Orange suit.
History notes that we dont prosecute, "Presidents."
Easily charges could have been brought against Nixon and how about George W and his gang of liars? Cheney, Rice, Powell and Wolfowitz.
Or Reagan for what he did to Jimmy Carter and his Contra Affair?
And as the WASP holidays approach, don't forget Thanksgiving and the murderous affairs against US indeginous.
Yep as ee cummings said. "Manunkind. "
Thanks, Cal. He may not go to prison. He may be acquitted. But we have to at least TRY.
In the last few days, an interesting awareness has been dawning.
Pundits and prognosticators have been focused on a 2022 red wave, the expected historical backlash for a midterm election.
What if history no longer applies. What if we are entering a new normal.
What if the traditional seesaw between Democratic and Republican Presidents has been discontinued.
Donald Trump may have changed American elections for good. The legislative election tampering that racist America has been engaging in for over 100 years is now routinely headline news. America pays attention like never before to gerrymandering and Election Day monkeyshines and voter suppression.
The 2018 midterms and the 2020 election were a referendum on Trump. Now in 2022, instead of the expected referendum on Biden, we are getting another referendum on Trump, MAGA, election deniers, et al.
Politically, Trump kills everything he touches. That trend has been confirmed this month.
Trump’s involvement in 2024 is guaranteed to kill that election cycle for the Republican Party. And something tells me that, in 2028, they’re going to be in even more serious trouble.
We are moving into a new and unfamiliar political system. The political parties are going through some kind of change. Remember, we didn’t always have a two-party system. At the time of the election that Abraham Lincoln won, it was a multiple party system, much more of a free-for-all.
[this post is duplicated on Lucian Truscott]
Greg, as we all are, is focusing on this moment. Lucian Truscott likewise. Trump is due to be locked up. Overdue.
And if we simultaneously step back, set aside the microscope, and take the long view, maybe the Trump phenomenon is part of a larger process. Maybe he is a symbol of what is happening to the racist and sexist remnants of our society.
That element of society is struggling for survival and, imo, dying. Like a hunted and injured animal, now cornered, it is thrashing about and screaming.
The Republican Party cannot survive in its current form. It’s impossible. Their platform is racism, sexism, anti-LGBTQ+. That’s what they stand for: the old society that is no longer tolerated.
Trump is still out of jail because the society he symbolizes, the 74 million voters + 88 million Twitter followers + + he speaks for, are still vehemently vocal and struggling for survival.
And that’s where the Republican Party finds itself: an existential battle for survival.
They are doomed in their current form. It’s a sinking ship, a ship in self-destruct mode.
Did you see TC's column sharing the scientific analysis of who has been dying of Covid and where? They are doomed, in more ways than one, it seems.
No, where is it?
He posted it yesterday I think: Making America Great Again. I think.
The death throes of the patriarchy.
Thanks, Roland. This is definitely an inflection point. Trump is not going to get the GOP nom and will run as a spoiler, assuming he's not in prison. If he DOES get the nom, Liz Cheney will run against him. They are fucked either way. We just need Joe to stay healthy for the next two years.
Inflection point. Precisely.
Fourth turning, whether you buy it or not. Authoritarians vs Not. Multiculturalism vs. Not. Going backwards vs Not.
I have to chuckle at Elon, going more Right with every passing year. Now he calls on the Twitter staff to go hardcore or go home in the midst of a migration away from workplace and careerism and corporate dominance.
They are flailing on every level. Hawley says the GOP is dead and must be reborn to aid the working man. Sorry Josh, Joe and Nancy are way ahead of you and your train has left the station, moving in the opposite direction.
All we need now is for Donald to put the coup de grace on the GOP. Do it, Orange Sunshine. Burn it down.
Actually, Greg, I think I'm done with Garland. I have defended his delay in indicting the Orange Menace for two years with the same thought processes you have, that a conviction was predicated on solid, air-tight evidence against him. Objectively speaking, January 6th was a thought crime, and the DOJ would be forced to try to prove intent on Trump's part, a heavy lift. But the classified documents? No, it IS an open-and-shut case, and there shouldn't be this delay after delay after delay. In my mind, I gave Garland until yesterday (Monday) to indict, knowing that the DOJ likes to make a big splash announcement like that on a Monday, and I thought it the last Monday there would be before Trump announced. But no, nothing, not even an update. When it happens, IF it happens, I'll be pleasantly surprised, but I'm no longer looking forward to it.
I encourage everyone to read, "Unchecked: The Untold Story Behind Congress's Botched Impeachments of Donald Trump" by Rachael Bade and Karoun Demirjian. This book seems to have flown under the radar, and contains MANY revelations, some of which were surprising and uncomfortable.
At present, it looks as though Donald J Trump is now getting away from ANY justice for a THIRD time within the US government. It seems like no matter who tries -- Democrats, Republicans, non-partisans -- they fail to bring Trump to justice. I think the only justice he'll see is in the mythical, but much spoken of, afterlife. It doesn't seem destined for here on Earth.
And by the way, Kimberly Guilfoyle, who the hell wears BLACK to a daytime wedding? I'm no fashion maven, basically wearing pajamas every day, coming up on three years, but even I know you don't wear black to a wedding. I would have cropped you out of the picture too! What a perfectly ticky-tacky little wife for Don Jr.
Thanks for this. I mean, the rationale to wait might also be BS. Do they really NEED the docs to nail him? Really? Please.
I will check out the book.
I don't know, I kind of dug the Goth look at a crepe paper wedding...
What else would someone named Tiffany have, but a crepe paper wedding? I see too that the groom is a billionaire, so she's set! Here's what I know: as a woman (sexist, yes!), you don't wear black, and you don't wear white, to anyone's wedding unless you're trying to make some kind of statement or just have NO fashion sense at all, or maybe it's all gone up your nose. My mom just told me tonight that her mother-in-law, my dear departed grandmother, wore black to my mom and dad's wedding, probably because NO ONE was ever going to be good enough for her son, so I'm guessing STATEMENT, there.
Kimberly, I'm sure, is mystified that people regularly refer to her as Kimberly Gargoyle. And I STILL can't wrap my head around her being married, at one time, to Gavin Newsome. AHHH!
What about Mrs.-Too-Long-Sleeves? What a Goon!
To NOT prosecute Trump would be criminal.
Great piece, lead of Zombies tune as well Greg!
The planets second largest White Collar Criminal announced he is running "agin."
Thanks Kate
It seems that years of outrageous behavior by Trump should be punished, but I'm not feeling confident it will. C'mon Garland!
And lo, JAck Smith has entered the chat...in fact, that will be the title for Tuesday's piece...