Are there enough pillows to assure Trump a soft landing

 

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Are there enough pillows to assure Trump a soft landing?

Can Mr. Pillow provide Trump with enough pillows to assure he has a soft landing what with all the news going out about the legal peril he's in growing exponentially?

As we read articles like this...

'Most worried Trumpworld has ever been' -- and they're waiting for 'another shoe to drop': MSNBC's Lemire

... even trying to avoid the trap of wishful thinking and setting myself up for heartbreaking disappointment it does't appear that Trump is in more jeopardy of losing a major chunk of his support. I wondered if even the deepest pile of pillows suppled by Mr. Pillows, whose cell-phone was just confiscated by FBI agents while he was in the drive-through line at a Hardee's restaurant in Mankato, Minnesota, will give him his usual cushy landing.

We read articles by attorneys like this

There Is More Than Enough Evidence to Indict Trump

and this:

'Charge Trump now': Legal expert says DOJ shouldn't wait for midterms to indict former president

The malignant narcissist who fancies himself as invulnerable probably is in deep denial that he could end up like his pal Steve The Aggrieved Bannon doing what would be the most famous  perp walk in history.

The last time Trump was figurative and literally on his back was in the Vince McMahan and Stone Cold Steve Austin wrestling nonsense. Who could forget this?

 

Donald Trump, Stone Cold Steve Austin and Vince McMahon spent months promoting The Battle of the Billionaires.

If you can stand it, watch the videos in this article and ask yourself how in Holy Hell did this man become president.

The article actually provided me with the only photo I could find of Trump on his back to put together this illustration for the headline.

By Hal Brown

Quotable Quote for Today is From Salon and is related to President Biden's better poll ratings. The better the Biden and the Democrats do the worse it is for Trump and his prospects of staying both relevant and holding sway over a significant percentage of the GOP leadership and Republicans who are tiring of his ever more unhinged schtick. The Revelations in the news coming from the new Peter Baker and Susan Glaser book, The Divider, may also hurt him. 

While the story about how the Cabinet considered invoking the 25th Amendment not long after Trump was elected and how John Kelly referred to the book "The Dangerous Case of Donald Trump" to better understand how to deal with him won't make headline news but they continue to the drip-drip-drip of bad news coming out about him

From Brian Karen in Salon

It is hard to understand a political party that cheers against American success, but that, in a nutshell, is today's Republican Party. "God, we need Trump back," I heard from a Trump minion Tuesday. I hear that every day, of course, from the handful of Trumplicans who still exist outside mental institutions and the Deep South.

We don't need Trump anywhere — except behind bars. And there is a world of difference between Biden and Trump on the stump. Biden is a politician with a wealth of experience in serving the country. He is adept at public speaking and knows how to reach people empathically.  When Biden says, as he did on Tuesday, that he really believes the best is yet to come for the United States — stressing each word as he says it — it's easy to see why his supporters are so optimistic. You believe he means it.

The news gets even worse for Trump.

From The Washington Post about the charges Trump and Co. face in Georgia.:

No decision will be made for months on whether there will be indictments — and, most notably, if Trump himself will face charges. At least 17 people have been notified they are targets of the criminal investigation, meaning they could eventually face charges. And more targets will be added to the list soon, Willis said in an interview Tuesday in her Atlanta office.

For those who don't subscribe here's a summary:

Previously, Willis suggested that the elector's scandal, the pressuring of officials and threats against election officials could be prosecuted using Georgia's conspiracy and anti-racketeering or RICO laws. 

“The RICO statute allows you to tell jurors the full story” of a complex conspiracy, Willis explained. “It’s a great statute for prosecutors."

The question Trump ought to be asking himself is whether any of his cohorts in crime want to do time in a place like this to prove their unwavering loyalty to him.

Georgia State Prison, located in unincorporated Tattnall County outside of Reidsville, is the main maximum security facility in Georgia. 

Phillips State Prison

 Gwinnett County

It keeps getting better and better:

My comment to above article:

It has not been a good news day for Trump and it could get worse:

Excerpt:

Washington Post reporter Carol Leonnig and former acting Solicitor General Neal Katyal explained that it was almost certain based on the information that was included in the Justice Department court filings that they most likely had an inside source. 

Speaking to MSNBC's Nicolle Wallace on Thursday, Leonnig said it might be the reason that folks reportedly said Trump was "unhappy and displeased" while he was at his Virginia golf course this week. 

"While there are a lot of conspiracy theories floating around about why he was there, his mood is pretty obvious," Leonnig explained. "He is on multiple fronts under investigation. And he knows, based on all the subpoenas flying around, and some were returned, including Mark Meadows, the request by DOJ for texts, all these things flying around have given the Department of Justice a lot of information. He must know by now as well, Nicole, that somebody in his inner circle, somebody close to him, close to him at Mar-a-Lago, close to him in his White House has been cooperating with the Department of Justice to make clear that there was a high degree of certainty that they would find classified records. Still at Mar-a-Lago after Donald Trump's lawyers insisted they had done a diligent search and none were to be found."

Trump, being a malignant narcissist and having the judgment of a gnat can't help but making it worse for himself. I am sure that if his new $3 million lawyer was advising him, and he was heeding this advice he wouldn't be saying things like this from "Trump threatens DOJ against indictments: 'You'd have problems the likes of which you have ever seen before'"

On Thursday, in an interview with right-wing talk radio host Hugh Hewitt, former President Donald Trump appeared to issue a vague threat to the Justice Department against indicting him.

Trump said that "I would have no prohibition against running," when he asked whether he would still run for office with an indictment.

"I think, if it happened, you'd have problems in this country the likes of which, perhaps, you have ever seen before," said Trump. "I don't think the people of the United States would stand for it."

When Hewitt asked Trump to elaborate, he said, "Big problems."

The stories have been breaking fast, furious, and fabulous all day. As you can see I find RawStory the best place to follow such news since they are the progressive website that keeps up with all the other media which publishes such articles. Check this one out:

Excerpt:

The whole situation, argued Brennan, is similar to the behavior Trump exhibited during the Russia investigation — and in that case, as well, seasoned prosecutors who investigated the matter concluded that the former president and his allies had likely committed obstruction.

"You are talking about the investigation into Russian interference in the election and Bill Barr's blatant mischaracterization what the Mueller Report found, the Mueller Report found although there was collusion, there wasn't the evidence that he was able to uncover for criminal conspiracy," said Brenna. "I would think criminal conspiracy here in terms of trying to avoid any type of understanding that these documents were in Mar-a-Lago is something that I think Donald Trump and others are vulnerable to potential future indictment."

Today's saga continues

 

Fetal personhood and how to get away with murder

 Reductio ad absurdum 

Reading this article... 

Does a fetus count in the carpool lane? Abortion laws create new questions about legal personhood

... it occurred to me that taken to the extreme if a pregnant woman murders someone and is apprehended the prosecutors have some serious considerations in moving forward. In fact, they may have to let her stay home, perhaps under house arrest, until she gives birth. There are even problems with that which I address below.

On the very most basic level if the fetus is a legally consider to be a person from the moment of conception or on any legally defined post-conception time it cannot be incarcerated.

The woman of course could, and would, even prior to trial if the charge was murder, if she wasn't carrying the fetus inside of her. This would be no different from jailing a single-parent mother along with her toddler because nobody else had custody. The state would take custody of the child and determine where he or she went.

If a collection of cells inside of a woman's uterus is a person, whether an embryo in the earliest post-fertilization stage of development or at anytime later in pregnancy, is a person that just happens not to have been born yet forget the question about the legality of a woman driving in a carpool lane. 

There's no case that can be made that it is legal, let alone constitutional, to deprive that pre-born person of its freedom by incarcerating them. 

Taking this logic to an extreme, even an arrest is a deprivation of freedom so it would be unconstitutional to arrest a woman who was carrying an unborn person. If a police officer did this it would be a false arrest and I could see lawsuits as a result. It would could make an even more compelling case if the unborn person was locked in the back of a police car or even worse taken to a holding cell in a police station.

Again consider what would happen to a woman suspected of a crime who was arrested while she was with her actually born, living, breathing, thinking, and feeling child. I think in most jurisdictions that child would go with a relative or social services would take temporary custody if the woman was to be deprived of her freedom.

Consider the question about ankle bracelet monitored house arrest to prevent a woman from fleeing to avoid prosecution and whether it would be an infringement of the constitutional right of the unborn child. Who speaks for the fetus who can't talk? Whose to say that the fetus doesn't want to take a walk, or for that matter, go to a country which we don't have an extradition treaty with.

Of course once the child is born unless the woman managed to get pregnant soon after giving birth  she could be arrested, go to trail, and if convicted go to prison.

Ban this , you gormless stinking discharge of MAGA effluent

This explains why I believe Daily Kos banned me for life. This is a review of Daily Kos which I posted today on the site review website sitejabber. Since I was banned for my Sept. 7th story which they took off line before I could copy and republish it here I am devoting my blog just to politics. Perviously I could just put links to my Kos stories here and only put photo essays on about road trips to various beautiful and interesting places around Portland. You can find these essays in the Archive column on the right. If I go someplace new I will put a photo essay of that trip here.

-------------------

I thought of writing this after hearing about a teacher who faces suspension in some backwater school district apparently inhabited by some people who would make Neanderthals look like geniuses.

The teacher got in trouble for posting a link to the Brooklyn public library banned book list. There’s another article or series of articles about places where it will be made illegal to even communicate in any way shape or form anything about getting an abortion. 

Then there's this: a newly elected district attorney in Tennessee spoke openly about jailing teachers and librarians for spreading information he deems inappropriate. She now denies this a what she'd actually do. I wonder if they will be able to continue in their roles once they're in prison. After all it would be a benefit to the other inmates to have teacher and librarians, even though it would be a loss to the students who actually want to learn the truth about everything from American history to science.

Here are just a few unTrumpified truthy tidbits for the banning buttwipes to use to justify going after me. Maybe they can put me on a banned blogger list.

Abortion

A fetus doesn't experience feelings of pain until about 24 weeks of pregnancy:

Even when a developing fetus can sense a light touch, he doesn’t feel pain the way you do. That requires not only touch receptors, but also the necessary molecules and pathways in the brain to process a pain signal. The neural connections and the brain structures necessary to sense pain don’t develop until at least week 24 of pregnancy.

Simply having the physical structures in place still doesn’t mean a fetus can experience pain. The complex neural circuitry necessary to tell the difference between regular touch and painful touch doesn’t develop until the end of the third trimester.  Reference 

All of the arguments about life beginning at conception, let alone potential conception, are based on some religious beliefs and have nothing to do with physiology.

This is from Jewish law:

An unborn fetus in Jewish law is not considered a person (Heb. nefesh, lit. “soul”) until it has been born. The fetus is regarded as a part of the mother’s body and not a separate being until it begins to egress from the womb during parturition (childbirth). In fact, until forty days after conception, the fertilized egg is considered as “mere fluid.” These facts form the basis for the Jewish legal view on abortion. Biblical,  ic, and rabbinic support for these statements will now be presented. Reference.

 

History (part of which is called Critical Race Theory or CRT which in fact is hardly theoretical).

Loath that students learn the truth about the history of racism in the United States! All the MAGA's railing against it being taught known damn well that if America had as many arms as the Hindu god Shiva at least one would have blood on its hand.

American history if honestly taught is fraught with not only bigotry but outright cruelty from the slavery days in the Old South to KKK lynchings. 

What about modern times? While some politicians may make sure certain supporter wear t-shirts that say, oh for example this...

... we don't really know whether in their heart of, uh, hearts they really believe Whites are superior to Blacks.

And then we have ordinary people making the news in articles like 

Texas teacher quits over racist rant about white history month and the N-word: ‘I can’t say that?’

and

Vice principal transferred to different school after calling Black student the N-word.

Does any objective person believe that some police officers have an implicit bias against Blacks (this Michigan State Trooper believes it) and may engage in racial profiling and on some occasions have cost innocent Black people their lives?

Add to how Black people were and are treated what was done to Native Americans and any group the majority White population whose ancestors came from certain countries, with the exception of, well, Jews, Irish, Italians, the list goes on, who they wanted to demonize or steal from and we don't have to do a deep dive into our history to document that our history has a decidedly dark side.

Leaving race aside, modern history gives us both the Vietnam War  which was escalated because of the Gulf of Tonkin incident (the second proved false) . The rationale for invading Iraq was that Saddam Hussein was still stockpiling weapons of mass destruction when in fact he wasn't.

Science

We can divided this into two truthy categories: Covid and climate change. The Trump lies about the former cost the country thousands of deaths according to this:

Top medical journal blames Trump's policies for tens of thousands of deaths

 As for the later, the deaths will come in both the near and distant future. Already as recently as August 31st we have this news:

China’s Drought Threatens Nation’s Energy, Food and Economic Security

Politics

One can debate whether the philosophies and policies of normal conversative Republicans like Liz Cheney and perhaps Mitt Romney  are better for democracy than those of moderate and progressive Democrats. What can't honestly be argued is that the current crop of Trump cultists especially promoters of the big lie, those who want to have the country turn hard-core fascist, those who want to destroy free and fair elections though gerrymandering and voter restrictions are benefiting democracy in the United States. Add to this, judges from the Supreme Court down to the lowest courts, who bend their decisions to fit the political goal they want to achieve. I am talking about the five judges who voted to overturn Roe v. Wade and about you, Judge Cannon.

If these achieve their ultimate goals the democracy the Founders envisioned will cease to exist and we become no better, and in someways worse, than counties run by the strongmen Trump so admires. 

Psychology

As someone who worked as a psychotherapist for 40 years and ran a community mental health center where I supervised dozens of other therapists and student interns I can address the subject of psychology with some expertise.

Starting with the easiest and by far the most prominent example of psychopathology in the country, Donald Trump meets every criteria for two disorders in the diagnostic manual (the DSM-5). These are narcissistic personality disorder and anti-social personalty. In addition to these disorders he has every trait describing people with malignant narcissism (my article on this) and being a member of The Dark Triad (another article by me). 

Moving to notable politicians we have a group of people who are either incredibly gullible or have a delusional disorder. Marjorie Taylor  Greene seems to fit into this category. Some people think she's delusional, others think she's putting on an act.

As for ordinary people, we have an hitherto underestimated number of people who believe things, often called conspiracy theories, that fit on a continuum between highly unlikely to outlandishly ridiculous. Some proudly wave a QAnon flag and buy into all of that group's mishegas while others are are more selective in which things they believe.

Have I left anything out to dare the godless stinking discharge of MAGA effluent to try to ban this?

I suppose I'd be remiss if I didn't note that there is good evidence that the most ardent of Trump supporters can be consider to be members of a cult. This is discussed in this Lawrence O'Donnell interview with psychiatrist Lance Dodes:

Trump's cult isn't born from stupidity — it comes from lack of morality

Note that he points out that while low intelligence may make some people more susceptible to joining a cult, there are always members who have a fairly high IQ. The above nine minute interview is well worth watching. In it Dodes also calls Trump a dangerous criminal psychopath.

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