Sorry, Jennifer Rubin, Bill Barr can't play a vital role in helping Republicans accept that Trump is unfit for office

 

The words in Jennifer Rubin's opinion piece in The Washington Post (here, subscription) which I've highlighted below are why I say that Bill Barr can't play a vital role in helping Republicans accept that Trump is unfit for office:

 As Trump’s former attorney general, Barr’s willingness to speak out tells Republicans still capable of reason that the case is real, it’s serious, it cannot be brushed off and that the Justice Department didn’t engage in misconduct. Barr could break through the right-wing media bubble that shelters millions of Republicans from reality. They have convinced themselves that Trump is innocent and/or that this will all go away. Even after word of the indictment spread, Republican politicians continued to attack the Justice Department as if it, not Trump, were on trial. Barr is there to shake them by the lapels, effectively telling them, “No, he’s in big trouble because he did something very, very wrong.”

To be capable of reason one has to be willing to engage in critical thinking. People who aren't seriously mentally impaired are capable of reason, of rational thought, but before they exercise these "brain muscles" they have to be willing to accept they may have to alter beliefs they have not only held before, but shared with others, sometimes in very public ways.

Barr has said that if even half of what Trump has been accused of can be proved in court, he's toast.

You can listen to Barr here:

Consider that following these remarks by Barr, Trump called him  a "disgruntled former employee' & lazy Attorney General who was weak & totally ineffective" and wrote on Truth Social:

"He doesn't mean what he's saying, it's just MISINFORMATION.Barr's doing it because he hates 'TRUMP' for firing him. He was deathly afraid of the Radical Left when they said they would Impeach him. He knows the Indictment is Bull.... Turn off FoxNews when that 'Gutless Pig' is on!"

Jennifer Rubin wrote that "Trump’s former counsel Ty Cobb told CNN, 'I think Trump is in an enormous amount of trouble. This indictment is about as carefully structured and evidentially supported as any indictment in history.' Law professor Jonathan Turley, who frequently defended Trump’s behavior during his impeachments, wrote, 'For two years, I have said that the Mar-a-Lago charges — particularly obstruction — represent the greatest threat to Donald Trump. It remains baffling why Trump forced this issue over these documents rather than just give them all back.'" Nobody who isn't a political junkie really knows who they are (although they might recognize Cobb with his mustache and flowing locks). 

Consider that Daddy Trump even turned on his most favorite progeny, Ivanka after she supported Bill Barr:

Posting to Truth Social -- the social media network Trump launched after being kicked off Twitter -- Trump continued to repeat false claims about the 2020 election as he mocked the committee's work and lashed out at comments Ivanka Trump and former Attorney General Bill Barr made in videotaped depositions.

"Ivanka Trump was not involved in looking at, or studying, Election results," Trump wrote after she said she agreed with Barr's assessment that there was no amount of fraud sufficient enough to overturn his loss.

"It affected my perspective," Ivanka Trump told the committee about Barr's assessment. "I respect Attorney General Barr, so I accepted what he was saying."

Trump fired back Friday that Ivanka "had long since checked out, and was, in my opinion, only trying to be respectful to Bill Barr and his position as Attorney General (he sucked!)."  Reference

Even if there was a cat in the presumably petless Mar-a-Lago who had hidden away Melania's tongue and it was returned to her along with all the copies of the couple's prenuptial agreement, and she decided she could reign as a queen in the Manhattan social scene as a redeemed heroine, none of the dyed in the wool Trump supports would blink when Trump disavowed her. 

Trump after all could shoot someone on Fifth Avenue and they'd shrug it off, and he could call his dear Melania any horrific name in his book of insults and they'd figure she deserved it for her disloyalty. Remember Megyn Kelly?

There's a Trumptown cult and it's members would drink his Kool-Aide if he told them to.

So, so sorry Jennifer Rubin, even Bill Barr won't be able to get enough  members of Trump's cult to think rationally. 

Update:

Trump continued by calling Barr "weak" and taking a shot at his weight.

"And now he goes and he sits down — if they can find a chair for him, because it's not that easy — and he sits down and he just bloviates and it's disgraceful," Trump said. "It's actually unpatriotic. It's so bad for our country, just so bad. But, you know, he's got a lot of hatred." From:

Trump rages at Bill Barr on Truth Social for admitting Mar-a-Lago indictment is "very, very damning"

Real mature, Donald...

If you don't see the Disquis comment section below, click here.

Trump's secret plan for easily ending the war in Ukraine, Santos, and other schadenfreude tidbits

 Trump's secret plan for easily ending the war in Ukraine, Santos, and other schadenfreude tidbits

By Hal Brown

A link to this was in my email this morning:

Click above to read article

The article leads with these points:

• Donald Trump appeared to criticize a decision by the US and Germany to provide tanks to Ukraine.
• "FIRST COME THE TANKS, THEN COME THE NUKES," Trump said on his social media platform.
• Trump also suggested ending the war in Ukraine would be "easy," without elaborating.

At first blush on reading this I wondered what easy plan the man with the biggest brain had for ending the war which he was withholding, perhaps figuring he could sell it to President Zelensky or his pal Putin or even the fake president, Joe Biden.

Then it occurred to me. What a dummy I was. Of course the easy way to end the war would be for Ukraine to unconditionally surrender.

This would no doubt make Marjorie Taylor Greene happy:

Her tweet led to these replies:

In case you read my blog about Greene's aspirations before I tweaked my original illustration which just depicted her inside of the presidential seal, here's the new improved photoshop.

Back to Trump:

I wrote a few days ago that Trump's having Truth Social is a gift to prosecutors. I wrote that Trump behaves like a child who has problems with impulse control who is having a temper tantrum when he doesn't get his way. Once a tantrum starts there's a point of no return where the child, or adult in people like Trump, is no longer considering the negative consequences. 

Trump can't restrain himself and perhaps with no-one around to vent to or make ridiculous self-aggrandizing claims to he takes to Truth Social where what he expresses can't be erased. From journalists tasked to monitor Truth Social to ordinary citizens there are many people making screen grabs of whatever he posts there.

Here's an example. He posted this on Truth Social:

 “Does Coco Chow have anything to do with Joe Biden’s Classified Documents being sent and stored in Chinatown?” Trump wrote. “Her husband, the Old Broken Crow, is VERY close to Biden, the Democrats, and, of course, China.”

This led to articles like this in the Murdoch owned NY Post: Mitch McConnell’s wife, Elaine Chao, breaks silence on Trump’s racist ‘chow chow’ nickname for her.

Excerpt:

Former Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao fired back at former President Donald Trump for his racist remarks about her — insisting his attacks reveal “a whole lot more about him than it will ever say about Asian Americans.” 

Chao, 69 — who has frequently been referred to by the former president as “Coco Chow” — issued the rare rebuke on Tuesday.

Yesterday's National Review article referencing Truth Social was just reported on again on Morning Joe:

And then there's George, or whatever his name is:

This offers a lot of schadenfreude: 

Kevin McCarthy "stands by" George Santos: Now the MAGA caucus owns his lies

The Republican Party's illicit affair with a con man has already gone south. But Kevin McCarthy can't let go

It is unusual, if not unprecedented, for a freshman member of Congress to make the top of the Washington Post website the way Santos has.

The illustration in one of the articles is even animated with moving blackout lines over lies he told:

Here's another story from the Post:

This is breaking news Friday evening - I did add something to the photo:

I thought it was interesting that website of The New York Times (see image) didn't have a single article about Santos.

I blogged about George Santos yesterday and by this morning couldn't keep up with the new revelations about him to add to that story.

George Santos made 'offensive' past joke about Hitler and 'The Jews': report

View - Screenshots from over a decade reviewed by Patch show Rep. George Santos has what the ADL called a "deeply offensive" social media history.

George Santos was 'sweet and caring' — until he started stealing from everyone: ex-boyfriend

Posted Fri. Jan. 27:

George Santos appears to admit drag queen past in Wiki post

A user with the name Anthony Devolder wrote in 2011 that they won several drag pageants. Anthony Devolder is a Santos alias.

The last story above demonstrates how a dogged investigator with nothing more than internet access and determination can dig deeply into information available online about someone and come up with information that a person like Santos very likely forgot he posted.

Click above to read article

Excerpt:

The Wiki entry, last edited in 2011, appears to match up with biographical information currently provided by Santos, including his birth date and being born to a Brazilian family with a European background, Politico reported Friday.

It also claims “Devolder” acted in a movie starring Uma Thurman and appeared in the TV series “Hanna Montana,” an apparent misspelled reference to a Disney show that starred Miley Cyrus, noted The New York Post.

Any appearances as a drag queen by Santos could cause a meltdown within the Republican Party, whose members have very specifically attacked drag performances as part of their anti-LGBTQ hate campaign.

On Jan. 11th I wrote Santos leads the GOP in eliciting Schadenfreude, no doubt more to come. No doubt, indeed, here it is Jan. 27th and he has been a gift that keeps on giving me pleasure, or schadenfreude if you prefer: 

Schadenfreude is the experience of pleasure, joy, or self-satisfaction that comes from learning of or witnessing the troubles, failures, or humiliation of another. It is a borrowed word from German, with no direct translation, that originated in the 18th century. . Wikipedia

There's more schadenfreude eliciting news. 

While the report that John Eastman seems likely to get disbarred, and that Marjorie Taylor Greene had an amendment about releasing oil from the reserves defeated in the House 418 to 14. 

The most promising pleasure I am hesitant to let reach the level of schadenfreude is the news reported here:

Click above to read article

Also read: 

Bill Barr asked Italian officials to discredit Russia probe — they responded with evidence linking Trump to crimes

I am hesitant to let myself feel too optimistic about this. It could lead once and for all to proving that the dots are clearly connected proving Putin attempted to get Trump reelected. Ideally we may learn that the attempt to prove that the there was no effort by Putin to influence the election could prove the very opposite.

I just don't want to get my hopes up since Trump seems to have the most tenacious Teflon in the world. Not only that, whenever I indulge in schadenfreude in excess I come across articles like this: 

The quiet takeover of the Tea Party: GOP establishment is now full MAGA

Click above to read

Excerpt:

Meanwhile, the MAGA movement, under Trump, took up what was once the undercurrent of the Tea Party movement, the culture war, and brought it to center stage. No longer did anyone have to pretend that all they cared about was spending cuts. They could hate on immigrants and Black people and gays and liberals right out in the open and could do it in the crudest terms possible. Conspiracy theories were encouraged to flourish and loyalty to Trump was the only "issue" they needed to care about.

This new Congress finally brings it all to the fore. It's all come together. The anti-tax, government-slashing extremists are one with the revolutionary MAGA culture warriors. Today Speaker Kevin McCarthy embraces Freedom Caucus member and MAGA heroine Marjorie Taylor Greene while Freedom Caucus founder and MAGA leader Jim Jordan leads a crusade to "take down the deep state" and Freedom Caucus member and MAGA superstar Matt Gaetz plots ways to destroy the economy if they don't get their way. They are all one. These former gadflies and bomb throwers are the establishment now. They are the Republican Party. The metamorphosis is finally complete.

File these under semi-schadenfreude:

Trump slapped down by judge in bid to avoid Jan. 6 Capitol cop trial

'Trump has run his course': Top NH GOPer's have moved on as he prepares for Saturday speech to party

McCarthy allies scrambling after leadership fight eroded his power: report

CNN's Manu Raju turns tables on George Santos when he accuses network of 'lying to the American people'