Finland, We’re So Sorry

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Nothing short of embarrassing yesterday to watch the gentlemanly president of Finland endure our idiot president melt down in his presence. Maybe we could sacrifice an Olympic game or do something to make amends. We all owe him and his people a profound apology. Not the first, not the last. #ForgiveUSFinns

The crazy begins at 16:10
The crazy begins at 0:47

When someone shows you who they are, believe them.

Maya Angelou
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47 thoughts on “Finland, We’re So Sorry”

  5. Our apologies to the President of Finland ring hollow unless we eliminate the behavior necessitating said apologies. Impeach Mr Trump now.

  6. Unfit For Office 

    And so it is, or ought to be, with Donald Trump. You don’t need to be a weatherman to know which way the wind blows, and you don’t need to be a mental-health professional to see that something’s very seriously off with Trump—particularly after nearly three years of watching his erratic and abnormal behavior in the White House. Questions about Trump’s psychological stability have mounted throughout his presidency. But those questions have been coming even more frequently amid a recent escalation in Trump’s bizarre behavior, as the pressures of his upcoming reelection campaign, a possibly deteriorating economy, and now a full-blown impeachment inquiry have mounted. And the questioners have included those who have worked most closely with him.

  7. Flatus, what a capital idea.
     
    Apparently SFB doesn’t “watch” his words as carefully as he thinks – it’s so easy to mistake stable for stupid. 

  8. Here’s a piece from Harry Litman in today’s WaPo on why attorney-client privilege doesn’t apply to Rudy Giuliani and Trump.
     

    Rudolph W. Giuliani responded to the subpoena he received this week from the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence with characteristic bravado.
    As if the decision were his alone under the law, Giuliani tweeted that he would give “appropriate consideration” to the subpoena “signed only by Democrat Chairs who have prejudged this case.”
     

    Giuliani, President Trump’s personal lawyer, has been proffering quarter-baked legal claims for too long.
    His argument for resisting the subpoena is feeble. His real choice is whether to litigate — advancing the Democrats’ argument that Trump and his allies are obstructing their probe — or capitulate — and hand over important evidence that could help support an article of impeachment.
     
    Any executive privilege claim is off the table. No court ever has extended the doctrine to communications with private non-government actors such as Giuliani. Moreover, Giuliani undisputedly represents Trump in his personal capacity, not his official capacity, which further invalidates any claim of executive privilege.
     
    ***
     
    As frequently with Giuliani, it’s not clear if he is misinformed or is being mendacious. But what is clear is that he has no tenable claim to defend the subpoena on that basis.
     
    The attorney-client privilege exists, as the Supreme Court has made clear, to encourage clients to make full disclosures to their lawyers. Accordingly, the privilege covers confidential communications between lawyer and client and other privileged persons for the purpose of obtaining legal advice. (And it’s the client — here Trump — who must invoke it.)
     
    First problem for Giuliani: He has disclaimed even acting as Trump’s lawyer in his work in the Ukraine. He rather saw himself as a sort of free-wheeling private ambassador. As he put it, “I’m not acting as a lawyer. I’m acting as someone who has devoted most of his life to straightening out government.”
     
    But assuming the court were nevertheless to decide that he was acting as a lawyer, Giuliani next runs into an immediate buzzsaw. None of the communication between Team Giuliani and the Ukraine government was for the purpose of providing legal advice to Trump.
     
    Giuliani clearly had a political mission of getting Ukraine to provide dirt on former vice president Joe Biden and his son, Hunter; no amount of tortured reasoning could convert that effort into confidential communications made for the purpose of providing legal advice to Trump.
     
    Even the direct communications between Trump and Giuliani don’t appear to have been made for the purpose of providing legal advice. To the extent they consisted of Trump’s orders dispatching Giuliani to do his bidding in Ukraine, no privilege attaches.
     
    There’s more. The attorney-client privilege is subject to an exception — the “crime fraud exception” — for communications related to the commission of a crime. Here Giuliani’s conduct, as directed by Trump, arguably relates to a course of possible criminal conduct such as extortion or a campaign finance violation.
     
    [And yes, Virginia, there’s more]

    Harry’s a very knowledgeable guy – not some family lawyer from East Bumfuck, WV.  

  9. Jamie, thanks for linking that Atlantic piece by George Conway at 9:20.  quite an exhaustive review of founder history on impeachment, 25th amendment and psych science as it applies to the commander in chief of crazy.   for those who won’t read the whole article, here’re his concluding paragraphs:

     In short, now that the House of Representatives has embarked on an impeachment inquiry, one of the most important judgments it must make is whether any identified breaches of duty are likely to be repeated. And if a Senate trial comes to pass, that issue would become central as well to the decision to remove the president from office. That’s when Trump’s behavioral and psychological characteristics should—must—come into play. From the evidence, it appears that he simply can’t stop himself from putting his own interests above the nation’s. Any serious impeachment proceedings should consider not only the evidence and the substance of all impeachable offenses, but also the psychological factors that may be relevant to the motivations underlying those offenses. Congress should make extensive use of experts—psychologists and psychiatrists. Is Trump so narcissistic that he can’t help but use his office for his own personal ends? Is he so sociopathic that he can’t be trusted to follow, let alone faithfully execute, the law?

    Congress should consider all this because that’s what the question of impeachment demands. But there’s another reason as well. The people have a right to know, and a need to see. Many people have watched all of Trump’s behavior, and they’ve drawn the obvious conclusion. They know something’s wrong, just as football fans knew that the downed quarterback had shattered his leg. Others have changed the channel, or looked away, or chosen to deny what they’ve seen. But if Congress does its job and presents the evidence, those who are in denial won’t be able to ignore the problem any longer. Not only because of the evidence itself, but because Donald Trump will respond in pathological ways—and in doing so, he’ll prove the points against him in ways almost no one will be able to ignore.

  10. SFB needs to be told that the Finns beat the Soviets in WWII.  And, stupid is as close to being a Russian agent as anything in the Kremlin can be.  SFB embarrasses himself to Finland, again.  The Finns can tell the difference between a good American and a crummy scrambled brain Russian fool.

  11.  I guess Trump’s plan is to normalize his behavior, claim there’s nothing wrong with presidents making deals with foreign governments for their reelection campaigns. All the more reason for impeachment, lest we set that precedent.

  13. I think we need an impeachment cocktail —
    maybe( some take on the Bellini (champagne and peach juice)

  14. Niinisto should have known better than to meet with Trump.
     
    If we owe anyone apologies, it’s the kids we allow to be put in cages run by for-profit contractors because we’re too weak to shed the despot.

  15. I found one curtesy of Martha Stewart…  it’s called the Peachmopolitan:
    3 TBS vodka
    3 TBS peach schnapps
    2 TBS peach juice
    1 TBS freshly squeezed lemon juice
    peach slice for garnish
     
    We could call it the Impeahmopolitician for our purposes.

  16. sounds good except for the schnapps  – I wonder what would be  a substitue  – I guess youcould just use a good brandy

  20. Oh my GOD!!!  Alexandra Petri, who has been absolutely on fire the last week, has outdone herself.

    “There are different ways to bake the cake, depending on what sort of cake you want. Different flavoring, different temperatures, different ingredients yield different types of cake, and the president as the master baker is testing recipes and deciding what type of cake he wants.”
    — a senior official, explaining President Trump’s approach to impeachment to The Post on Monday.

    For the last time, this is all part of the plan. Getting himself impeached is actually a strategic triumph for President Trump, and anyone who thinks otherwise is just not playing chess in enough dimensions. Consider what is the greater mark of strategic genius: to mire yourself and your administration in an endless series of idiotic and pointless controversies, often rife with misspellings, damaging your standing at home and abroad, or to NOT do that? If you say the second, you are a fool. This is all part of the plan. Actually, this is good. Actually, this is great.

    He is like a master baker, preparing everything just exactly the way he would like it. You can’t make a cake without breaking eggs! That is why he has broken all the eggs and will not stop breaking eggs until there are no eggs anymore. He is baking the chess pieces into a cake, and it is brilliant, and that is why no one has thought to do it before. If it looks messy, if it looks like he is covered in batter and surrounded by trolls and incompetents and family members (but I repeat myself) — well, that is not correct. I’m embarrassed that you would think that maybe he did not know what he was doing, just because he looked and sounded and acted like he did not know what he was doing. Really, the fool here is you.

    Ah, the genius of this man! Moriarty wept, and also the Borgias, and also Jesus, although that may have been for unrelated reasons. His is the shrewdness of Alexander the Great, cutting through the Gordian knot. He has the vision to cut through things, even if the things he is cutting through say “THIS IS LOAD-BEARING, DON’T CUT.” He dares to push the buttons labeled “DO NOT PUSH: WON’T DO ANYTHING GOOD, AND WILL RELEASE OPOSSUM.” There is no puzzle, norm or rule of whatever degree of complexity he cannot immediately dismantle with a single movement.

    [Continues – and gets better]

     

  22. Someone left the cake out in the rain
    I don’t know if I can take it
    Cuz it took so long to bake it
    And I’ll never have the recipe again
    Oh, no

  23. It’s very nasty work afoot here, these fools think that they have god egging them on, and that this is their Last Chance to right the ship of state.
    A recipe from hell.

  25. pogo, more of ms petri at wapo

    President Sauli Niinisto! Thank you for visiting the United States and President Donald J. Trump on the 100th anniversary of U.S.-Finland diplomatic relations. Can you spare a minute of your time to tell us what you thought so we can improve the experience for future visitors?

    […]

    Do you have any feedback as to how your stay could be improved?

     

    Well, I have to say, I would perhaps have done certain things slightly differently. For instance, it was clear that President Trump had many things he wanted to get off his chest, primarily about someone named Adam Schiff, but also about the governor of California? I found this unseemly emotional outburst off-putting. I would not have asked him to stand there while I had an emotional outburst. To me, a more seemly way of showing disapproval would be to purchase and then quietly hand them a Marimekko design that is in an unpleasing color — although, such a Marimekko design does not exist?
    I do not understand why it was necessary for me to sit there silently like an Artek daybed (although even when they are silent, Artek daybeds make statements). He kept yelling about a perfect conversation, but if it was anything like the conversation we had, I would say it was not perfect. A perfect conversation, to us in Finland, is one in which the freedom of the press is respected and people do not shout, say inaccurate things about the European Union and give the press mean nicknames. We reserve this kind of saltiness for our licorice.
    Also, I would say, it is embarrassing for a leader to hector his press and call them fake. It makes him look bad, and it is uncomfortable. It seemed as though this was the kind of thing you would want to save for later, when you were alone, after you were not trying to impress people anymore. Indeed, I started to wonder: Does he know that I am here? I am just sitting here like the “J” in “fjord” or the many treasures of Helsinki: I am there, but nobody thinks about me. I began to feel that I had blended into the chair, but then he placed his hand on my knee, so I knew I had not been forgotten.
    In Finland, we are proud of our free press. The United States, too, should be proud. They should not let this man insult one of the things that should be a source of national pride. Does he do this to Tiffany lamps and the Grand Canyon?
    I kept thinking, should I say something? Then the president yelled at a reporter for not directing his question to me, but when he did direct the question to me, the president interrupted and made it difficult for me to answer. On the whole, it was confusing.
    I would say in the future, if the purpose of the visit is that you will be unexpectedly called upon to defend the European Union as an institution and then sit very still while the president does some personal yelling, you should specify this more clearly on the invitation so that a leader can decide for themself whether it is worth it to visit.

     

    How likely are you to recommend the United States to a friend or colleague?

     

    Not very.

     

    Is there any other feedback you would like to leave?

     

    I would like to tell Donald Trump to go to Helsinki.

  27. REnee,  The passage you cited was among the comments below Petri’s piece.  But how could it not be?

  28. Sturg,
    Love John Hiatt (even with – maybe because of – that distinctly idiosyncratic voice) and love the song.  And Sonny Landreth – Jesus Christ can he play. Saw Hiatt in a joint down in the Flats in Cleveland about 20 years ago – what a great writer and performer.  I have to admit  like the BB King/Clapton version of that song although the rewrite is never quite as good as the original.  Oh, and maybe Leo was onto something with those guitars.

  31. An impeachmint
    Shot of Russian vodka
    Shot of peach flavored vodka, or schnapps  needs to be sweet.
    1/2 shot of tequila
    juice 1/2 lime
    A bit of orange juice  cause you got to have the orange color
    Shake with ice , pour into a martini glass garnish with, what else, mint.
     Taking a sip, Hmmm,  not bad. just make sure it is good tequila it adds just a touch of flavor.
    Jack

  33. Jacques Stroppe could eat no slop,
    His wife could eat no good,
    And so betwixt the two of them,
    They divvied up the food.

  34. LOL, Republican wannabe bad boy, Jacob Wohl held a press conference. He claims Elizabeth Warren was having kinky BDSM sex with a 24 yr old marine. 
    All I can say…….
    Go Liz!!!
    LOL
    Jack

  35. Ya know ya got to get your jollys where you can find them these days. BTW, I wouldn’t drink 2 of those  Impeachmints. One is kicking my ass.  Just sayin’
    Jack

  36. Looks like Trump really is scared of Biden. He is putting out over  million dollars worth of ads in the first 4 primary states. Those are all small market states so a million dollars goes a long way.
    Jack

  38. mike pence, mike pompeo, mike scuse, mike huerta, mike mulvaney. There are mikes everywhere.
    No wonder the old gasbag is paranoid.

  43. Russia, Ukraine, China and the rest of the freakin’ world should look into Trump’s kids doings!!! 

  44. Kim was meticulously trained for his role as successor to his father and grandfather.  His mastery of the art of the purge is superb and has allowed him an uncontested, totally supportive environment in which to wreak hell on whomever on a whim.

  45. jack, how ’bout a simple creme de peche with sprig of mint on the rocks?

    or as one maker of said fruity liquer suggests, this delight of an impeach drink:

    The best use of Crème de Pêche is with champagne in a classic Kir Pêche. Just a teaspoon in the bottom of the glass and topped up with fizz, the exotic hint of peach lightens the champagne to create this delicious and refreshing summer cocktail.

  47. What a difference a day makes. From 93 yesterday to a high of 70 today. And even cooler with some much needed showers Sunday and Monday. Whew,  

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