By PatD, a Trail Mix Contributor
About that rather unusual campaign ad: from The Guardian:
Liberals might be unable to fathom how this could make voters more likely to vote for DeSantis, yet he clearly feels confident that he’s not the butt of the joke.
The ad serves as a reminder of Trump’s soaring approval ratings among Republican voters, and how difficult it will be for some Republican candidates to win races if they distance themselves from the White House.
DeSantis even seems well prepared for the backlash. He has come under some criticism for using his young children, but on Fox News he said such comments just show people have “no sense of humor” – a line that will surely further please a base that rails against political correctness.
More Posts by PatD
we might grudgingly chuckle at the chucklehead desantis and at other twit devotees, but for every halfway humor they may exhibit there’re too many stories like the one below that show their true colorlessness:
the guardian: ‘It’s heartbreaking’: military family shattered as wife of decorated US marine deported to Mexico
news from wapo: With Manafort’s trial pressing forward, a federal judge in D.C. on Thursday affirmed the legal legitimacy of Special Counsel Robert S. Mueller III’s appointment. In a 93-page opinion, Judge Beryl A. Howell wrote that Mueller’s power “falls well within the boundaries the Constitution permits,” because he was supervised by an official who was himself accountable to the president. She wrote that “multiple statutes” authorized Mueller’s appointment, and Deputy Attorney General Rod J. Rosenstein, who named him to the post, “had power to do so.” The opinion came in response to a legal challenge from a witness who was arguing he could not be compelled to testify before a grand jury. The witness argued that Mueller wielded too much power and was appointed unlawfully. In the witness’s view, Mueller should have been nominated by the president and confirmed by the Senate, and there was no statute giving Rosenstein the authority to appoint him. The witness was not named, though his attorney told The Post’s Manuel Roig-Franzia it was Andrew Miller, an associate of political operative and Trump adviser Roger Stone. The ruling from Howell won’t have any direct bearing on Manafort’s case. Manafort himself had sought to challenge Mueller’s authority in the case against him in D.C. — though he abandoned part of that, and a judge rejected his request to stop Mueller from bringing charges against him in the future. Judge T.S. Ellis III also earlier rejected an effort by Manafort to get the charges… Read more »
also at wapo: The Daily 202: Democrat makes gun control a central theme in key House race
[…]
Republicans note that Coffman’s Democratic challengers in 2012, 2014 and 2016 also endorsed stricter gun laws, though perhaps not as vocally as his current opponent. Crow, a former Army Ranger who now practices law, is betting his political future on 2018 being different.
“It’s something that I feel like we have reached a tipping point on,” he said. “You’ll find plenty of old salty politicos that would say, in a swing district like this, you shouldn’t take on gun violence. I don’t care about that political wisdom anymore.”
[….]
He looked like he might choke up when he discussed his two kids, who are in elementary school, participating in active-shooter drills. “I’ve used these weapons of war, and I’ve had similar weapons used against me,” he said. “But I’m also a parent, and way before my political career started and way after it ends, I’m going to be a father. Geez, I still get emotional when I talk about this: I had my 5-year-old daughter come home from school, telling me that she now has ‘bad guy drills’ and she has to hide in a dark closet.”
While five of the 10 deadliest mass shootings in American history have taken place in the past three years, Crow notes that he’s also chosen to focus on guns because of everyday violence that does not generate headlines or lead to the construction of memorials.
After many years our lime tree is finally bearing fruit!
Add jury tampering to Trump’s crimes.
Just imagine how quickly Manafort’s lawyers would be filing a motion for mistrial if he had called their case a “hoax”.
This jury is not sequestered and judge’s instructions only tell them to “resist” media exposure, so it’s feasible they could be influenced by a president trashing prosecution’s case. …
ny times; The Russian Threat ‘Is Real,’ Trump Officials Say, Vowing to Protect U.S. Elections WASHINGTON — Trump administration officials on Thursday vowed to defend the United States’ elections against threats from Russia and other countries, describing influence campaigns by America’s adversaries in blunt terms rarely used by President Trump. The heads of the nation’s national security agencies said Russia was still trying to influence and disrupt the midterm elections, and they pledged to help local and state governments counter those efforts in the weeks ahead. “Russia attempted to interfere with the last election,” Christopher A. Wray, the F.B.I. director, said, adding that Russian operatives were continuing to operate against the election system in “malign” ways. He said the United States government must face the threat with “fierce determination and focus.” Mr. Wray and other top national security officials, who spoke at a White House news briefing, did not describe specific threats to the coming elections, and they were vague in saying how the government was responding to what they called Russia’s interference campaign. Despite Mr. Trump’s public comments playing down the threat from Russia, the officials did not hesitate in directly blaming the Russian government as the primary culprit behind the interference campaign. “We acknowledge the threat. It is real. It is continuing,” said Dan Coats, the director of national intelligence. “We are doing everything we can to have a legitimate election that everyone can have trust in.” That message — delivered at a rare briefing for reporters… Read more »
however, as reported in usa today: Republicans block $250 million to beef up election security
WASHINGTON — Senate Republicans blocked a Democratic push Wednesday that would have provided $250 million to beef up election security.
The money would have been doled out in grants through the Federal Election Assistance Commission and helped, among other things, replace outdated voting equipment and increase cybersecurity efforts.
But the amendment failed Wednesday on a 50-49 vote, 10 votes shy of the 60 needed for it to pass. The votes fell almost entirely on party lines as only one Republican — Sen. Bob Corker (Tenn.) — voted for the grant.
“The integrity of our elections, which are the foundation of our democracy, should not be a partisan issue,” Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.), who proposed the amendment, said in a statement. “It is unfortunate that the Senate has followed the same path as House Republicans in blocking the funding our states need to help upgrade their infrastructure and secure our elections.”
Last month House Republicans similarly blocked an effort for $380 million to bolster election security efforts.
[….continues…]
the guardian: Trump’s attacks on media raise threat of violence against reporters, UN experts warn Donald Trump’s attacks on the media have been condemned by experts at the United Nations, who warned that the US president’s vitriolic rhetoric could result in violence against journalists. In a joint statement, two experts on freedom of expression – David Kaye, who was appointed by the UN Human Rights Council, and Edison Lanza, who holds the corresponding position at the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, said: “These attacks run counter to the country’s obligations to respect press freedom and international human rights law.” Trump’s attacks “are strategic, designed to undermine confidence in reporting and raise doubts about verifiable facts”, they added, while noting the president “has failed to show even once that specific reporting has been driven by any untoward motivations”. “We are especially concerned that these attacks increase the risk of journalists being targeted with violence.” […] The president has also labeled the media the “enemy of the American people” – a characterization his daughter, Ivanka Trump, rejected on Thursday. “I’ve certainly received my fair share of reporting on me personally that I know not to be fully accurate, so I have some sensitivity around why people have concerns and gripe, especially when they’re sort of targeted,” she said at an event hosted by Axios. “But no, I do not feel that the media is the enemy of the people.” The issue also arose during a fraught… Read more »
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Jee don, do you mean the republican surrogate campaigner, al capone ?
hmmm gin and tonics
For goodness sake, Craig, that’s what Golden Delicious look like when they bear fruit very late in the season in Florida
Mojitos.
1 1/2 oz White rum, 6 leaves of Mint, Soda Water, 1 oz Fresh lime juice, 2 teaspoons Sugar
Wapo features the nightly kremlin annex party.
Nightly protests outside the White House began the evening that its resident made headlines in Helsinki. Now in its third week, it has morphed into equal parts demonstration, roast and dance party.
Unlike the Women’s March or March for Our Lives — single-day events attended by thousands — the modest, day-to-day rally dubbed the “Kremlin Annex” has a different flavor. Organizers welcome those who want to confront President Trump daily, at high volume.
Compare this to the protest inside the nixon WH…back in 1972 when Carol Feraci protested with back-up from her group, the Ray Conniff singers.
Our house limes are gorgeous, can’t wait for time to make our guacamole recipe (we do measurements by taste):
Don’t let it sit with lime juice mix
Craig,
If you are in the mood for a good long wait, plant an avocado. A generation from now will thank you for a great climbing tree and a wonderful fruit. This is in line with Chinese wisdom.
When is the best time to plant a tree? Twenty years ago. When is the second best time to plant a tree? Today.
BW, don’t forget – muddle the mint leaves…
And Poobah, nothing goes with a Mojito quite as well as fresh guacamole – and that recipe sounds righteous. My mouth is beginning to water.
the guardian: Suspected Russian spy found working at US embassy in Moscow Exclusive: Russian is understood to have had full access to secret data during decade at embassy US counter-intelligence investigators discovered a suspected Russian spy had been working undetected in the heart of the American embassy in Moscow for more than a decade, the Guardian has learned. The Russian national had been hired by the US Secret Service and is understood to have had access to the agency’s intranet and email systems, which gave her a potential window into highly confidential material including the schedules of the president and vice-president. The woman had been working for the Secret Service for years before she came under suspicion in 2016 during a routine security sweep conducted by two investigators from the US Department of State’s Regional Security Office (RSO). They established she was having regular and unauthorised meetings with members of the FSB, Russia’s principal security agency. The Guardian has been told the RSO sounded the alarm in January 2017, but the Secret Service did not launch a full-scale inquiry of its own. Instead it decided to let her go quietly months later, possibly to contain any potential embarrassment. An intelligence source told the Guardian the woman was dismissed last summer after the state department revoked her security clearance. The dismissal came shortly before a round of expulsions of US personnel demanded by the Kremlin after Washington imposed more sanctions on the country. The order… Read more »
Patd, does ANYONE believe the SFB administration gives a flying phuch about Russians in our embassies? Still? Schitte no. No one believes that.
If you missed this Senate Intelligence Committee hearing on C-Span, you might want to check out the recording. Foreign Influence on Social Media
Avocados are very helpful by providing their own ripeness scale. In addition to the soft, but not squishy, pop the little bit where it was connected to the tree. It changes color and when ripe it will be dark yellow to brown to indicate ready to use. If in a hurry, my local Safeway makes fresh pico de gallo to substitute for all the chopping. Add minced garlic and season to taste. I prefer the “from scratch” a la Craig, but needs must sometimes.
https://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow/watch/us-embassy-worker-in-moscow-was-suspected-spy-for-russia-report-1291359811528?playlist=associatedspyS
embassy worker in Moscow was suspected spy for Russia: report
Michael McFaul, former U.S. ambassador to Russia, shares his reaction to a report in The Guardian that a woman who worked at the U.S. embassy in Moscow for a decade was suspected of being a mole with the FSB, Russian intelligence.
ny magazine: Back when Michael Cohen was still the president’s personal lawyer – and, arguably, Washington’s sketchiest unregistered lobbyist – a major Trump donor promised to pay him $10 million if he successfully persuaded the White House to give said donor a $5 billion loan. Specifically, Franklin L. Haney, a real-estate mogul and Donald Trump campaign patron, was looking for Uncle Sam to chip in on the construction of a couple nuclear reactors that he’d recently purchased in Alabama. To further that end, he offered the president’s personal attorney a monthly retainer to lobby the White House on his behalf, along with a $10 million “success fee” if the $5 billion loan came through – or so, the Wall Street Journal reports. In a statement to the paper, Haney’s attorney denied that the mogul ever entered into such a contract. On the other hand, the Journal’s previous reporting on Cohen’s sordid, secret lobbying contracts with well-heeled business interests has all held up. Remarkably, it’s unclear whether it is actually illegal for the president’s personal attorney to try and score a client a $5 billion loan in exchange for a $10 million kickback. ….. [….] Alas, Cohen did not bother to register as a federal lobbyist. And for this, and other reasons, the FBI won a warrant to search his home, hotel and office. Those raids put an end to Cohen’s career as a lobbyist – and, by all appearances, put him on the path to an exciting new… Read more »
trump toward the end of his speech last night asked
“Whatever happened to fair press?” “Whatever happened to honest reporting?”
his own tweet yesterday afternoon was his answer “It is the FAKE NEWS, ….that is the enemy of the people!”
misspelling, as he usually does, the word FOX… [which does sound like “fake” in more ways than one]
ahhhhh… poor, poor trump supporters…
daily telegraph:
Pippa, a British pedigree pug who splits her time between Brussels and Britain, is taking Belgian ‘citizenship’ amid fears of a looming no deal Brexit.
The four-year-old pooch is one of the quarter of a million British pets that cross from the UK to the EU every year and regularly visits friends and family in Britain and Ireland.
Thanks to the EU’s pet passport scheme, which covers cats, dogs and ferrets, she is spared the six month quarantine that used to be common practice when crossing Britain’s borders.
[….continues…]
Cilantro is one of those herbs that makes me want to take cover; wish I didn’t have that reaction.
I use raw sugar for virtually all table and cooking needs. Why not cocktails, too?
Why not indeed!
http://www.dulanotes.com/raw-sugar-simple-syrup/
Sorry to hear that Flatus. Cilantro is my all-time favorite for so many dishes.
With health care uppermost on my mind these days — and appreciating the wonders of free care at the VA — and watching Trump repeatedly bragging lately about gutting and “finishing off” Obamacare, touting the “wonderful” care Republicans have replaced it with:
This means he and GOP must own the huge premium spikes/loss of coverage coming soon because of what they’ve done, just in time for the Midterms.
Dems only need Trump’s rally quotes to hang the blame on them.
Craig, you might be interested in this article from Vox.
President trump admits he’s trying to kill Obamacare. That’s illegal.
craig, how’s the dad doing? any chance that last skin surgery weakened his system or opened the door to some resident virus/bacteria?
am sure Orlando facility topnotch but there was this about problems at VA in d.c. in usatoday: VA staff plea: End ‘incompetence’ and fix worsening conditions at DC hospital
[…]
Infection rates went up instead of down. In veterans’ blood streams. In their urinary tracts. Patient satisfaction went down instead of up. Employee satisfaction tanked.
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/msn/va-staff-plea-end-incompetence-and-fix-worsening-conditions-at-dc-hospital/ar-BBLoKWw
newsweek: Appearing on ABC’s The View as a fill-in for regular co-host Whoopi Goldberg, Avenatti commented on the recent controversy involving the president’s increased attacks against the media and Sanders’s refusal on Thursday to explicitly renounce Trump’s vitriol. “She’s a mouthpiece for the president and she doesn’t make the statement that Jim [Acosta] asked her to make because she doesn’t want to face the wrath of Donald Trump,” Avenatti said when it was asked why Sanders has not quit. Avenatti explained why he believed Trump and the administration frequently harped on the press’s coverage. “There’s a message the administration wants to continue to deliver and that is that you can’t trust the news,” he said. “And the reason why they want to deliver that message is because they are worried about the facts that are reported relating to what’s gone on with Donald Trump and the administration and they want to undercut that in the minds of the American people.” […] Sanders was called out by CNN’s Jim Acosta Thursday during a press briefing, and specifically asked if she would denounce Trump’s labeling of the media as “the enemy of the people.” She noted perceived personal attacks from the press against herself, including jokes made at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner earlier this year. “I appreciate your passion. I share it. I’ve addressed this question. I’ve addressed my personal feelings,” Sanders said. “I’m here to speak on behalf of the president. He’s made his comments clear.” Similar claims about Sanders’s alleged… Read more »
from the hill:
The Newseum is now selling “Make America Great Again” hats — as well as t-shirts proclaiming “You are very fake news” on its website.
The hat with the Trump slogan, also known as “MAGA,” sells for $14.99, or $10 less than the official one on President Trump’s campaign website, and is also a slightly different design.
The “fake news” t-shirt is currently on sale for $19.95.
“As a nonpartisan organization people with differing viewpoints feel comfortable visiting the Newseum, and one of our greatest strengths is that we’re champions not only of a free press, but also of free speech,” a Newseum spokesperson said in a statement to The Hill.
[…]
ensions between the Trump White House and the press erupted again this week when press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders refused multiple requests from CNN reporter Jim Acosta to state definitively that the media is not an “enemy of the people.”
The Newseum, which is located in Washington, D.C., says its mission is to “increase public understanding of the importance of a free press and the First Amendment.”
[….continues…]
@Scaramucci
Follow Follow @Scaramucci
This isn’t our best. It’s not who we are. I don’t always agree and am often upset with journalists but we are flashing warning lights now that we shouldn’t be flashing. The free press needs to be protected as well as their opinions. That’s why that Amendment was First.
Anthony Scaramucci added,
Anthony Scaramucci Retweeted Jim Acosta
0:45
Jim AcostaVerified account @Acosta
Just a sample of the sad scene we faced at the Trump rally in Tampa. I’m very worried that the hostility whipped up by Trump and some in conservative media will result in somebody getting hurt. We should not treat our fellow Americans this way. The press is not the enemy.
8:10 PM – 31 Jul 2018
new from the guardian:
Revelations of suspected spy at US embassy in Moscow could be tip of the iceberg
Intelligence analysts warn that Russian worker believed to have had full access to secret data is unlikely to be an isolated case
[…]
Valerie Plame, a former undercover CIA operations officer, said: “This woman would have had access to the schedules of principals coming to Russia. You’re just handing information to the FSB on a silver platter. It makes their jobs so much easier.
“The secret service were going through all sorts of real problems of discipline and training under President Obama. There was a series of real muck-ups. This appears to fall into the same bucket, that same period of time, and show clearly from the top down there were organisational, morale, bureaucratic, security problems.
Plame added: “We’ve been dependent on foreign nationals around the world for decades. It’s just part of the accepted risk. It seems to me that, given she was hired under the auspices of the secret service, which has had its own deep problems, that means elsewhere in the world there are potentially foreign intelligence services that have exploited that weakness as well.”
[…continues…]
From VF’s The Hive.
Mueller’s indictment may not name the five Americans, but he drops clues as to their identities. More intriguing are his hints of unknown unknowns.
The fifth and murkiest American, “a candidate for U.S. Congress,” sought and obtained damaging information on his or her opponent, according to Mueller. Speculation has centered on four Florida Republicans: Carlos Curbelo, Brian Mast, Matt Gaetz, and Ron DeSantis. Democrat opponents of each had to contend with the public release of hacked internal campaign information; all four won their races, and all four have denied any link to Guccifer. (DeSantis has called for an end to Mueller’s investigation, and Gaetz introduced a resolution calling for the impeachment of Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein.)
Well, today I sort of watched catching catfish and carp on Youtube while working. The man has a passion for fishing, in particular catfish and carp. It is fun, he takes along his toddler children where he fishes too. I learned how to fish in Iowa farm ponds and sloughs of the small streams which are dammed up to provide water ponds and flood control. My takings were almost always pan fish and catfish, primarily bullheads. To this day I do enjoy a dinner of hush puppies and catfish.
I am learning that we need to take a step back from the reflex of immediate response to SFB spews. He does stuff like I have seen with ill men who might have been suffering from things they did in their earlier days or had the bad luck of suffering from something which made them throw feces at their loved ones.
Stepping back you learn to not be in the front row. You leave the three ring circus and go outside to the sunshine and fresh air. You wait for the fool to stumble out the door and you realize he is nothing more than a very fat, old, low intelligence man.
Mika has provided cover for many of us to be able to quote her about she knows him and is stating he is off his rocker.
bbronc, thanks for that mediaite link. to your point mika’s quote:
“We were told repeatedly that it was somehow out-of-balance to comment on the candidate’s declining mental state and, yes, I’m not a doctor, but I know what I see, and we know Donald Trump. We also know what campaign staffers told us two years ago and I know the dangerous, blustering bigot on the stage last night is more boorish and less connected to reality than he was ten years ago. Donald Trump is not well, and everyone close to him says it.”
they also quoted from another story Omarosa Insists She Saw Signs of Trump’s Mental Decline: ‘Something Serious was Going on in Donald’s Brain’
While watching the interview I realized that something real and serious was going on in Donald’s brain. His mental decline could not be denied,’ she writes in Unhinged: An Insider’s Account of the Trump White House.
‘Many didn’t notice it as keenly as I did because I knew him way back when. They thought Trump was being Trump, off the cuff.
‘But I knew something wasn’t right.’
Bloomberg: The Trump administration failed again to convince a federal judge that there’s a legitimate reason to rescind legal protections for hundreds of thousands of young undocumented immigrants who were brought to the U.S. as children and seek to avoid deportation. U.S. District Judge John Bates in Washington said Friday that a second attempt by the Department of Homeland Security to offer a “rational explanation” for the agency’s decision had fallen short. Bates had given Nielsen another shot after blocking the plan in April. “The court has already once given DHS the opportunity to remedy these deficiencies — either by providing a coherent explanation of its legal opinion or by re-issuing its decision for bona fide policy reasons that would preclude judicial review — so it will not do so again,” Bates said. The plan to rescind the Obama-era Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, known as DACA, has also been put on hold by courts in California and New York. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit in San Francisco is reviewing one such ruling after having heard oral arguments in May. Bates gave the administration 20 days to decide whether it would appeal before he blocks the DACA rescission. The judge called the plan “virtually unexplained,” but said he wasn’t asserting that DHS Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen didn’t have authority to rescind it. “The court simply holds that if DHS wishes to rescind the program — or to take any other action, for that matter… Read more »
butina updates wapo: Trump associate socialized with alleged Russian agent Maria Butina in final weeks of 2016 campaign Maria Butina, the Russian gun-rights activist who was charged last month with working as an unregistered agent of the Kremlin, socialized in the weeks before the 2016 election with a former Trump campaign aide who anticipated joining the presidential transition team, emails show, putting her in closer contact with President Trump’s orbit than was previously known. Butina sought out interactions with J.D. Gordon, who served for six months as the Trump campaign’s director of national security before leaving in August 2016 and being offered a role in the nascent Trump transition effort, according to documents and testimony provided to the Senate Intelligence Committee and described to The Washington Post. [….continues…] mother jones: Did Alleged Russian Spy Maria Butina Cause a Leadership Shake-up at the NRA? Weeks after the feds raided Butina’s apartment, the gun group’s president made a hasty exit. On May 7, the National Rifle Association released a curious press release declaring that Oliver North, the key player in the Iran-contra scandal and an NRA board member, was “poised to become” the group’s president. Earlier that day, Peter Brownell, then finishing his first term as NRA president, had announced that he would not seek a second annual term in order to devote more time to his family business, a firearms retail company. This changing of the guard—and how it happened—was odd. For fifteen years, the NRA leadership had followed a… Read more »
Are all these repubs going to pay when butina claims to be pregnant ?
What if she’s is pregnant like Octomom, with 8 foeti, but from 8 different fathers ? That’s a horribly cruel thing to think, but also a hoot for those of us who suffer from darkside humor. Maybe butina will publish her memoirs, complete with all the pervy things that these pious ripoffs wanted to do – backed by video recordings and dna samples, of course. Such a memoir would make zillion$.