RussiaGate’s First Rat: Flynn Wants To Flip and Talk

Reports that Michael Flynn offered to sing for an immunity deal are not really surprising. It was clear during the questions and answers at FBI Director James Comey’s recent congressional testimony that Trump’s already-former NSC adviser is a target for his Russia ties and lies.

Cases like this often need a snitch to break it open. Flynn could be the John Dean of this one.

Or, as our own Xrepublican predicts, maybe this is a ruse to force a pardon. But unfortunately for Trump if that happened, pardons don’t come with gag orders.

Share
Avatar photo

Author: craigcrawford

Trail Mix Host. Lapsed journalist, author & retired pundit happily promoting nothing but the truth for Social Security checks.

149 thoughts on “RussiaGate’s First Rat: Flynn Wants To Flip and Talk”

  1. boss, must we continue using the “-gate”?    new times, new techniques involved.  burgles and break-ins are so passé

    how ’bout russia-to-judgement?  russianrats? putin-on-the-ritz?

  3. Keep an eye on the rumor mill.  Swirling around that Tillerson wants to quit.  Trump meeting with Condi.  All of this is NOT news and of absolutely no import, but it will keep the chattering masses busy for a bit.

     

  4. read somewhere that tillerson wasn’t in the best of health and didn’t exactly want the job to begin with…. he, state and allies might gladly welcome condi back.  she does have some expertise re Russia (let alone as a former sos) and speaks the language.   win-win for lil donnie
    according to wash. examiner:

    President Trump will meet with former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice at the White House at 10 a.m. Friday.

     

  5. Jamie, thanks for the vid.  good one.   another song lyric that begs for parody during the investigation is “fools rush in”.. ..  any number of ways to reword that one.

  6. as to immunizing mr Flynn, I see him less like a john dean who tells the truth and much much more like an ollie north ultimately getting himself and his boss white-washed and off scot-free.

  7. if the con artist of the deal thinks it’s a good deal, he believes it to be good for the twit himself than a good one for the country.

    cbs news:

    President Trump said Friday that his former national security adviser Michael Flynn should request immunity because he suggested the investigation into possible coordination between Trump associates and Russian officials is a “witch hunt.”

    Mr. Trump made the comment in an early-morning post on Twitter.

  8. patd – the Ollie North role sounds pretty good.  I think Flynn has a lot more dirt in his closet than North did.  But he has been carrying water for the floater for years.  And as deep as Flynn was in the scheme he also holds a lot on others in the clan.

  11. Pat – Agree. I’ve long since passed the point of being tired of hearing “-gate” attached to everything. It’s kind of silly. The Watergate scandal is referred to that way because it happened at the Watergate office complex. Pulling the third syllable off the word and appending it to any other scandal just seems dumb to me. We’ve been doing it for over 30 years now; might be time to stop.

  12. KGC – the times are bringing back memories of the Watergate era.  There was always something happening, except today we can follow minute by minute.  Time to put All The President’s Men on the DVD player – again.  It will follow Under the Yum Yum Tree.  I enjoy Jack Lemmon movies.  I think of the era as “too bad they had to be careful about adult themes” and “it is fun to catch all the double entendres made to get by the censors”.

  13. Grant Flynn nothing that would preclude the military from stripping him of his stars and membership at the O-club. He’s a slime ball

  15. looks like a few more folk need to ask for immunity according to this excerpt by Gellman at century foundation:

    Is the Trump White House Spying on the FBI?

    Three named officials—two Trump appointees and arguably his leading defender on the Hill—appear to have engaged in precisely the behavior that the president describes as the true national security threat posed by the Russia debate. Secrecy regulations, including SF312, the Classified Information Nondisclosure Agreement, do not permit Ellis and Cohen-Watnick to distribute sensitive compartmented information through a back channel to Nunes. This is true, and their conduct no less an offense, even though Nunes holds clearances sufficient to receive the information through proper channels. The offense, which in some cases can be prosecuted as a felony, would apply even if the White House officials showed Nunes only “tearsheet” summaries of the surveillance reports. Based on what Nunes has said in public, they appear to have showed him the more sensitive verbatim transcripts. Those are always classified as TS/SI (special intelligence) or TS/COMINT (communications intelligence), which means that they could reveal sources and methods if disclosed. That is the first apparent breach of secrecy rules. The second, of course, is the impromptu Nunes news conference. There is no unclassified way to speak in public about the identity of a target or an “incidentally collected” communicant in a surveillance operation.

    [….]

    If Nunes saw reports that named Trump or his associates, as he said, the initiative for naming names did not come from the originating intelligence agency. That is not how the process works. The names could only have been unmasked if the customers—who seem in this case to have been Trump’s White House appointees—made that request themselves. If anyone breached the president’s privacy, the perpetrators were working down the hall from him. (Okay, probably in the Eisenhower Executive Office Building next door.) It is of course hypocritical, even deceptive, for Nunes to lay that blame at the feet of intelligence officials, but that is not the central concern either.

    If events took place as just described, then what exactly were Trump’s appointees doing? I am not talking only about the political chore of ginning up (ostensible) support for the president’s baseless claims about illegal surveillance by President Obama. I mean this: why would a White House lawyer and the top White House intelligence adviser be requesting copies of these surveillance reports in the first place? Why would they go on to ask that the names be unmasked? There is no chance that the FBI would brief them about the substance or progress of its investigation into the Trump campaign’s connections to the Russian government. Were the president’s men using the surveillance assets of the U.S. government to track the FBI investigation from the outside?

  16. you gotta have a label that fits in a headline and late-might one liners if you want this story to get legs with the general public, which it doesn’t have yet. Gate is a cliche but recognizable. Alternatives that meet above criteria?

  17. Flatus, I’m with you. Screw immunity. Subpoena the sumbitch and ask him the damn questions. See if he takes the 5th.

  18. Get this.  We woke up this morning to find that we had no dialtone. So I came to work and contacted frontier communications on the computer through their website to try to see if they could test the light on or something like that. Well basically no can-do, and they were going to schedule a tech to come out and check it on April 11. Imagine that 11 days from today before they’re even planning to check it.  I’ve got the cell phone the works just fine at my house. I’m thinking frontier communications just may drop off my list of providers.

  19. Renee,  So sorry to check in and see that Ricks dad passed away, his vibrations will last forever, just reach out to feel them……special solar warming hugs to both of you.

    Too many of us miss someone only after they are gone…..i just know that he was one of the lucky ones…loved and taken-ed cared of while he was here.

  20. Senor Pescado…….great pix of the puppy with hat and glasses…. and you of course…..later

  21. craig, okay I see your point.  some have used “trumpsky” and “trumpovitch” as hashtags but not as widely understood as the -gate is.  some enterprising moneybag dogooder out there should  sponsor a contest for best title that incorporates his identity with Russia as well all the other misdeeds.  I favor “trumptrash” as a one-size-fits-all epithet.

  22. it needs to be more neutral than Trash for journalists to use it, which is the goal

  24. Fat-ass moron scandal –oh..I guess the media wouldn’t find that acceptable

  25. We could start by outlining the basic elements of this scandal and maybe arrive at a suitable moniker.  What are they? For starters, we have …

    1. Russia trying to hijack our election
    2. Trump cozies up to Putin
    3. Secret meetings with Russians by Trump associates
    4. Cover-ups and lies about all the above

    By the way, it seems the most commonly used media label so far is “Trump-Russia Scandal” — OK, I guess, but not very sexy.

  26. BB

    I just scored a DVD of Tribute.  For some reason this one film was never done professionally beyond VCR so I had to go to one of the knock off places.  It is the one film where he regularly plays piano and probably my favorite Lemmon film.

    Flatus, Thank you for the duet.  I had to go remind myself of the lyrics.  Beautifully expressive words of the tangled human relationships.

     

  31. That was Senate comm rejection of immunity request. The real kicker is whether FBI makes a deal, they usually ask the committees not to grant immunity, as it complicates their plans. I read in this that the FBI possibly has a plan, prefers congressional committees stay away from immunity deals.

    this is fun: Michael Flynn in 2016: Immunity ‘means you probably committed a crime’

  32. Jamie – last year the eagles in another nest got themselves a cat.  That became a learning tool for all the little children, and adults too, that eagles eat Sylvester the Cat along with fish.  That is also when the little informational text appeared under the video.  I have never let my cats out when the eagles, bald and brown, are circling around.

  33. Trump said that same thing…… It might register with Flynn but not with Trump as he’s said and shown many times that he regrets nothing…ever.

    That immunity equals guilt

  35. Trump-Put(in)-Dome?

    Eh, stick a “gate” on the end & the world understands.

  38. Someone should reprise that “song”

    “They’re Coming to Take Me Away, Ha-Ha”

     

  40. Keep tryin, KGC, you’re getting there, counting on you as our Sloganeering Team Leader. (Connect the Rats is a hoot)

    Ha, BID, I came to the same conclusion when racking my brain for this morning’s headline..
    “Eh, stick a ‘gate’ on the end & the world understands.”

  41. I believe we are missing the Biggly Picture, just as the world missed the Grosse Bild in 1936. hitlerian aims were spelled out in the jumble we call Mein Kampf : to rule the world west of the Ob/Yenisey.

    trump’s/bannon’s/putin’s aims are laid out in bannon’s speeches : to destroy every American institution.

  45. xrep – So, then we just go with the name Apocalypse Now, and to hell with the -gate?   Or, maybe the  -gate(s) first?   The Gates of Hell?

  49. If you are looking for the trump/bannon/putin recipe for taking America down, check out this book, if you can find it :

    Sabotage ! The Secret War Against America, by Michael Sayers and Albert Kahn, 1942, Harper and Bros. NY and London

    The myriad of rightwing crazy groups congealed into the t (conveniently for trump) party, the t/trump party took over the repub party, and with massive help from the nkvd, trump/bannon became president, and chief looter.

  52. “You Think My Wall Is Yuuuge.  Wait’ll Ya See My Gate.” – Ms Dallas

    YuuuugeGate

    BigglyGate

    BiggestEverGate

  53. Biglygate (BID is on a roll)

    and I bet Cory has some good ideas

    Guiltygate

  60. Maybe we should hold a contest.

    Free Trail Hand Membership To Ever Lurker Who Submits An Entry By The End Of The World

  62. Sweetie and I have been awfully grim and ugly over the Biggly Gate Horrors. Our thanks to all of you word masters for lightening our day with good humor.

    Boss, hugs all around; they’re on me.

  63. A few thoughts.

    First, RR so sorry to hear of the loss of a family member. Condolences to you, your husband and family.

    Craig: I learned a new word today

    cozen [kuhz-uh n] verb (used with or without object)

    1. to cheat, deceive, or trick.

    So how about the trump/Russia cozening scandal? 😀

    trumplstiltskin, who is seen as incompetent to be President by anyone with half a brain, eyes to see and ears to hear, is meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping next week. Both of these men are more than capable of starting world war III. Anyone else concerned about this meeting?

    While you’re pondering the thought of that meeting, here is an interesting analysis on the possible cause of his incompetence:

  64. No first pitch for Pussy Grabber…I’m shocked I believe he told us he was the best baseball player ever

  65. oh to be in trumpascam now that april is in bloom…..

    trumpmess? or how about trumpro-mised as in compromised or  trumpromat  (a play on the Russian word kompromat that got us into this mess) 

  66. Thank you for all the condolences.  Rick and I both truly appreciate them.

    Solarman!…   so glad to see you resurface.  Don’t be a stranger…   ya hear.

  67. Greetings comrades…loving the ruskie scandal slogans.  A special gift for our flotus…grab a Lasko and relax this weekend, mel!!

  70. Official Kremlin naming of US investigation into US election meddling —

    охота на ведьм

     

     

  71. bw, what part of that is the Russian word for “stupid stooge”?

    was all for using “trump follies” but too late. he’s already set up an LLC under that name.  fitting.

  72. Obama Officials Made List of Secret Russia Probe Documents To Protect Them
     

    Obama administration officials were so concerned about what would happen to key classified documents related to the Russia probe once President Trump took office that they created a list of document serial numbers to give to senior members of the Senate Intelligence Committee, a former Obama official told NBC News.

    The official said that after the list of documents related to the probe into Russian interference in the U.S. election was created in early January, he hand-carried it to the committee members. The numbers themselves were not classified, said the official.

    The purpose, said the official, was to make it “harder to bury” the information, “to share it with those on the Hill who could lawfully see the documents,” and to make sure it could reside in an Intelligence committee safe, “not just at Langley [CIA hq].”

  74. sorry for the length, but afraid this part of story will get lost by other distractions

    raw story: Here’s why Comey may have stayed silent on the Russia probe before we voted — and it should terrify Trump

    According to a WhoWhatWhy exposé, published Thursday on AlterNet, the FBI declined to inform the U.S. public about ties between Trump and the Russian government for fear of exposing informants and “[jeopardizing] a long-running, ultra-sensitive operation targeting mobsters tied to Russian President Vladimir Putin — and to Trump.”

    A two month-long investigation by the publication revealed that FBI agents likely feared exposing an ongoing operation against “an organized crime network headquartered in the former Soviet Union.” This Russian mob “is one of the Bureau’s top priorities,” spans several decades, and is intricately linked with associates of Trump and businesses the president owns.

    As the report notes, federal officials were intent on protecting an FBI source—a convicted criminal with deep links to the organized crime network—upon whom the bureau came to rely for information. Some federal officials “were so involved in protecting this source” they later became a part of his personal defense counsel; upon his conviction government attorneys urged for “extreme leniency” toward this man.

    The article further reveals that among the many details Comey was unable to discuss during his Mar. 20 testimony to Congress was the fact that “for more than three decades the FBI has had Trump Tower in its sights,” monitoring its occupants’ deep ties to organized crime networks. According to the report, one former Trump Organization adviser, Felix Sater, fits the bill for the FBI’s source into the Russia-based crime ring.

    Sater, a Russian-born real estate developer, is a convicted felon; in 1998, he was charged in a massive $40 million stock fraud scheme involving members of the Genovese and Bonanno families. According to the Miami Herald, shortly thereafter, Sater “began spying for the CIA” and a “was able to track down a dozen Stinger missiles equipped with powerful tracking devices on the black market.” In return for buying the missiles, Sater avoided jail time. According to WhoWhatWhy, separate legal filings on Sater’s behalf indicate “he ‘reported daily’ to the FBI for many years.”

    Sater later altered his public name to Satter and became a senior adviser for Bayrock Group LLC, a real-estate development company based in New York. Through his work with Bayrock, Stater worked on Trump SoHo, and was a senior advisor to Donald Trump and The Trump Organization beginning in 2006.

    In 2009, Sater was formally sentenced in the racketeering case, and was asked to pay a $25,000 fine with no prison time. The Herald notes that Sater also avoided paying the victims of his scheme, which given the scope of his conviction, is “mandatory under federal law.”

    Much of Sater’s background was sealed, preventing fellow investors and clients from learning about his criminal past. Civil lawsuits brought against Bayrock charge the company with “concealing Sater’s 1998 $40 million federal racketeering conviction, and subsequent 2009 sentencing.” As investors sought to reveal Sater’s criminal background, federal agents argued that exposing it would undermine national security. As the Herald reports, at one hearing, the judge presiding the case said it had made it to the top levels “of a national law enforcement security agency. I should say agencies—plural.” The judge also dubbed Sater “John Doe” to “protect the life of the person.”

    Fred Oberlander, an attorney who represented a former Bayrock employee suing the company in civil court, was provided access to highly sensitive documents involving Sater’s work as a government informant. According to WhoWhatWhy, on Feb. 10, 2012, the US Court of Appeals instructed Oberlander he could not “inform the legislative branch of the United States government what he knew about” Sater.

    Oberlander’s attorney Richard Lerner, in a statement to WhoWhatWhy, said his client being forbidden from speaking with Congress “may well be the first and only hyper-injunction in American history.”

    “If there are others who have been scared silent by judges who wish to nullify Congressional and public oversight, we may never know,” Lerner added. “That is frightening.”

  77. I am waiting for “Deep Throat II” to show up.  Flynn is not Deep Throat.  But, there should be someone back in to closet who wants to feel clean after being in the sewer of the trumpf enterprise.

  78. Given Pussy Grabbers attempts at making the FBI his bitch –someone there ought to be willing to step up

  80. I’d recommend the novel SPIKE…….by two guys one of whom was Arnaud de Borchgrave (sp)

    a must read.

  81. The Spike (novel)

    The Spike is a 1980 spy thriller novel by Arnaud de Borchgrave and Robert Moss (New York: Crown Publishers, 1980). Drawing on de Borchgrave’s experience as a jet-settingNewsweek journalist and conservative Washington insider, it tells the story of a radical ’60s journalist, Bob Hockney, who stumbles upon a Soviet plot for global supremacy by 1985. When he tries to expose the web of blackmail, sex and espionage, he’s hamstrung by his editors’ liberal media bias.
    In the news world, to “spike” a story means to cancel its publication. De Borchgrave and Moss envision a scenario in which the KGB exploits the attitudes of the unsuspecting Western media, which was allegedly more interested in unmasking CIA agents than stopping the Soviets, threatening to thwart Hockney’s big scoop.
    The best-selling book was marketed not only as a spy thriller but an expose of real-life Washington. Time called the book a roman à clef for its fictionalized versions of real people and organizations, including Zbigniew Brzezinski and the radical left-wing magazineRamparts.
    In a 1980 interview with the New York Times, de Borchgrave mentions that he came up with the idea for a novel after he and his wife had to hide in the English countryside, after anonymous threats were made in response to a Newsweek article he wrote that named some of the terrorists behind the 1972 Munich massacre.[1]
    The authors’ 1983 follow-up, Monimbo, envisioned Miami race rioters as the pawns of Nicaraguan and Cuban communists.

  82. That dog’s name is Isabel……..it pleased me when they named her because of my love for Isabella Rossellini…….

  83. Barbarians at the Gate was also a very good spy novel.

    i went thru this thing……probably started with the Fleming books…..I Immediately got what they were really talking about……read about Intrepid, the finding of the Enigma and getting it out of Poland etc….Mata Hari……Col. House….then Burgess McLean, and I led three lives and all

    .but I went thru this thing where I read every even semi-spy novel I could find……there was a bunch of them………..That one, The Spike…….that was the top of the heap.

  84. KGC: “cozen collusion” nice one, short, sweet and rhymey 🙂

    Pat: Very interesting about the safeguarding of the Russia evidence by the Obama people. I think it’s pretty clear that they knew what they knew and wanted to make sure that eventually everyone would know what they knew.

    I just watched Southside With Me. It was cute and the two actors playing Barrack and Michelle looked very much like them. I didn’t know it was only about one damn day though. It was just about their first date, I would have liked more. 🙁

     

  86. Something to remember as these Russia hearings go forward: “the failure of the prosecution of Oliver North for his role in the Iran-Contra scandal after he testified at a congressional committee hearing about his conduct. The D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals held that much of the evidence being used in the prosecution was tainted by association with North’s compelled congressional testimony and could not be used at trial.” — Georgetown Law Journal

    In order to successfully prosecute RussiaGate characters, maybe Congress should make sure all testimony is voluntary. Writer of that article goes on to argue that congressional immunity grants and compelled testimony are unconstitutional violations of separation of powers.

  89. On the dementia front.  Today Trump had an Executive Order signing ceremony and forgot to sign the EO and walked out of the room.  Pence remembered and went back for the document which I assume eventually got signed as soon as they gave the putz a pen.

     

  90. It’s nice that trump has identified himself and his coven as witches. We should make sure that our ‘conservative’ pals understand what their messiah actually meant.

  91. The deadbeat witch forgot to sign the OE, cuz he was so engaged with himself. He had to russia away and see how he looked on tv.

    Biggly Hillary-ous !

  92. Thanks for the heads up on the EO Fiasco, Jamie. I thank G!D daily that the walleyed, deadbeat witch is so incompetent. Also, that his coven is so incompetent, and that the wreckuplican Congress is so incompetent.

    300 shitheaded punks.

  93. sturge, thanks on the “spike” recommendation.  am a very big fan of the americans series re  Russian sleeper agents/illegals program and also fascinated with what former spy turned u.s. citizen jack barsky has to say about recent turn of events.

    which leads me to suggest that “-gate” might be updated to “-door” or better yet “-swinging door”

  94. way to go, flatus!!!

    South Carolina women beat Stanford, earn 1st title game berth
    They will play Mississippi State in an all-SEC matchup for the national title after the Lady Bulldogs upset UConn 66-64 in overtime. That ended the four-time defending national champion Huskies’ 111-game winning streak.
    Down 29-20 at halftime, South Carolina went ahead to stay with 13 straight points in the third quarter.

  95. excerpt from  abc news: Hands raised, Trump aides rush to try to testify on Russia

    In case a formal letter wasn’t flashy enough, Russian billionaire Oleg Deripaska took out quarter-page ads in The Washington Post and The Wall Street Journal to publicize his willingness to “take part in any hearings conducted in the US Congress on this subject in order to defend my reputation and name.” That move followed an Associated Press report that Manafort in 2005 had written Deripaska, an aluminum magnate close to Russian President Vladimir Putin, proposing he do work for Deripaska that would “benefit the Putin Government.”

    The rush to volunteer to testify even extended to a convicted Ponzi schemer whose name had not previously been associated with the Russia investigations. Steven Hoffenberg, a Trump supporter and onetime New York Post owner, phoned the AP unsolicited to announce he’d volunteered to testify to offer “evidence that is very serious.”

    “I decided on my own after watching the circus of false stories,” Hoffenberg said, adding that given his criminal history the FBI likely tapped his communications, including those with people in Trump Tower during the summer of 2016. “There’s no privacy for me as a citizen.”

  97. Craig, Abbe Lowell was on MSNBC yesterday explaining how a prosecutor can’t use the immunized testimony or any facts “tainted”, i. e.  uncovered as a result, by that testimony. It’s why Ollie North’s conviction was overturned.

  98. pogo, along those same lines from above abc news link:

    Rob Walker, a Washington lawyer at the Wiley Rein law firm who represents clients in congressional investigations, said the willingness to testify struck him as “contrary to the norm of what one would expect” in such a probe. He said he was not sure a witness had anything to gain from appearing before Congress during an FBI investigation.

    “As a general matter,” he added, “I would advise a client to follow a different path.”

    Though witnesses may look like they have something to hide if they refuse to testify before Congress, it’s also clear they open themselves to criminal prosecution in the event government officials believe they’re lying. The Justice Department, for instance, prosecuted retired baseball star Roger Clemens for perjury after he denied steroid use to Congress, though he was later acquitted of all charges.

    It’s unlikely the FBI is as enthusiastic as those volunteering to talk.

    Testifying before Congress can complicate a criminal investigation if a witness is granted immunity, given restrictions on the Justice Department’s ability to use those statements in any subsequent prosecution.

    “It’s not just that you’re not allowed to use the testimony, said Josh Chafetz, a Cornell University law professor and expert in congressional investigations. “You’re not allowed to use any leads you got from the testimony.”

  99. Great comment on the issue at the Post.

    “This is just getting started. Before long, the White House is going to have its own immunization clinic.”

    LOL

  100. from   carl Hiaasen: Cut Ivanka Trump some slack — at least she’s sane

    It’s far-fetched to hope that one person, even a favorite child, could magically transform an erratic 70-year-old lout into a thoughtful statesman. But anybody who can exert even a slightly calming influence on the Big Orange Trumpster deserves office space in the West Wing — and the closer to the president, the better.

    Ivanka is also receiving a controversial security clearance, which means she’ll have access to some classified information. So does Steve Bannon, who is much scarier.

  101. Colbert King has an hilarious article at Wapo about Nunes.

    Nunes revealed himself to be a sleuth of the Inspector Clouseau variety: klutzy, incompetent and prone to produce chaos wherever he turns up.

     

    Sorry but can’t get the link function to work on my phone. Go to Wapo and read it.

  102. If people aren’t concerned about the  crazy chaotic and incestuous WH staff picks they either aren’t paying attention or support the pumpkin.

  105.  

    ST. THOMAS, U.S. VIRGIN ISLANDS—Speaking Wednesday from the grounds of the lavish tropical estate where he plans to spend much of his downtime while in office, Donald Trump unveiled a new presidential retreat he hopes will allow him to escape from the grueling pace of life at Mar-a-Lago.
    With its sunny climate, secluded setting, and luxurious accommodations, the 45-acre Caribbean hideaway known as Isola Vista—which sits on a pristine white-sand beach along the island of St. Thomas’ southern coast—will reportedly serve as a haven where the president can find respite from his five-star Palm Beach, FL resort and its many day-to-day pressures.
    “After a while, all that time spent at Mar-a-Lago starts to take a toll,” Trump said of the relentless routine of recreation and extravagance he experiences at his oceanfront Florida club. “I’m there so much that sometimes I just need to get away and clear my head. Here in St. Thomas I’ll have a place where I can simply relax and, for a little while at least, forget about all those headaches I left behind in Palm Beach.”


  109. Published on Mar 31, 2017

    They said it couldn’t be done, but Stephen and the Late Show squad found a way to make a cartoon even creepier than the viral hit ‘Hi Stranger.’

  110. Happy 46th President’s Day/April Fool’s Day.

    Maybe we just call it Gate 46.

  112. A real emperor/czar doesn’t need no damned gate. A stile is erected at any point where the wire needs crossing.

  113. Ok……..your candidate for World’s Most Annoying Song.

    mine is “Feelings” tied with “K-A-R-S, Cars for Kids”

  115. Just finished watching the MissSt UConn game; that finish was really exciting. I’m sure our USC women are eager to meet MissSt again, this time for the NCAA Championship. During 2016-17 we beat them twice; when we met them during the regular season in January then again when we won the SEC Championship in March. I believe it’s likely that we will beat them once again tomorrow night.

  117. Yes…..there are quite too many annoying songs to easily narrow it down to one…..still, it’s amusing to try sometimes……..

    I mean the future of American Song is at stake and we here are the only mighty Bulwark, never failing.

  118. Most annoying Christmas song:     That horrid little drummer brat, with his rump a bump bum…….

  119. I’ll second Feelings. Dammit, Mr Sturgeone, reminding me has spoiled my lunch.

  120. Well……it’s so annoying, it will probably disturb your supper as well….

    i suppose I should more carefully react to the voices in my head….

  121. “I’m a conservative on most issues but a liberal on this one. We should not hear so many stories of families ruined by healthcare expenses. . . . We must have universal healthcare. . . . The Canadian plan . . . helps Canadians live longer and healthier than Americans. There are fewer medical lawsuits, less loss of labor to sickness, and lower costs to companies paying for the medical care of their employees. . . . We need, as a nation, to reexamine the single-payer plan, as many individual states are doing.”  – Trump, 2000, in his book, The America We Deserve

    I wonder if the deadbeat witch knew what went into ‘his’ book.

  123. xr & sturge, now that we know your feelings about “feelings” can it be assumed same feelings for “people”… ‘specially people who need people, the luckiest people in the world???

  125. Craig – I’m sure you’re right. I just get a little tired of what I feel is silliness in this kind of thing. If I think about it, that might be a reason I didn’t pursue journalism beyond my high school newspaper editorial days. I was too interested in prose than headlines and ledes.
    Gang – Maybe it’s just my mood this week. I’ve been struggling a little after my last chemo infusion. I’m just finding quick one word clever names for what is happening in this country to be terribly irksome. And the most irksome to me is “-gate”. It may be instantly recognizable, but I just find it ridiculous and overused.
     
    Flatus – I was rooting for Stanford, but am so impressed by South Carolina. Even without Mississippi State’s upset of Connecticut, the Gamecocks were my pick for NCAA Champion. Best of luck in the final!

  126. Annoying Christmas songs…so many

    I saw Mommy kissing Santa Claus

  127. travis, not so bad if you think of it in terms of investi-gate …. just wish there were more invested in the investigation than all the swinging on the squeaky gate.

  128. time:

    A viral Trump tweet-burning robot joined Twitter Tuesday with one goal: roast President Donald Trump, by literally burning his official tweets to a crisp.
    Amsterdam-based engineer David Neevel, who is from Portland, Ore., created the account to share videos of a Rube Goldberg-style contraption with a blazing mission: it prints, burns and trashes Trump’s tweets.
    For every Trump tweet, the machine responds swiftly with robotic disaffection and a video. The short clips show the automatic machine spitting the president’s update out word for word on paper, lighting it aflame with a standard cigarette lighter, and finally, dropping it in an ashtray.
    “The goal with this robot was the same as with a lot of my robots: finding small, but not necessarily simple, ways of making life better,” Neevel told NBC New York.
    Neevel, feels that the stone cold robot performs a vital function for people who find the president’s updates stressful. “Burning each tweet allows people to acknowledge the tweet’s existence and perform a small ritual of dismissal of it,” he said.
    A day after its debut, the account has racked up roughly 15,700 followers with the stunt.

  129. One of these days these boots are going to walk all over all the annoying songs.

  130. Two things have popped up due to the failure of ACA.    Buying a membership to a local clinic & a catastrophic illness policy to avoid the penalty.   I found a membership  (in another state) for $55/month for an adult. No co-payments and it covers simple labs.

    What happened to the inexpensive, one-drop blood test that folks were supposed be able to go into a pharmacy and do extensive labs to take to their doc?   The powers-that-be went after the inventor to shut her down, that’s what.   Innovation is not rewarded if it hurts the wallets of the 1%.

    However, a membership does not take care of meds. Of course, neither does the ACA which has denied an arthritis MED on their approved list; they will only allow it if it’s prescribed for an off-label use.  So…that way they can use it as a sales tool (look at our giant list of covered meds) but they never have to kick in for it.

    This is the USA and we can do better than this, dang it!

    If anyone is interested in universal coverage, there is book written by Michael Booth called, The Almost Nearly Perfect People. He compares the Scandinavian countries, including healthcare.

    The US does not have health care.  We have an insurance industry that feeds off of humans like a bunch of vampires.

    It’s all witches and vampires today, folks.

     

     

     

  131. They shut her down because her lab work turned out to be inaccurate and WRONG

    they didn’t shut her because sh was a innovator they shut her down because she was a fraud

  132. Then, right before the IPO, the balloon popped. In October, a series of reports emerged ranging from FDA allegations of uncleared medical devices to employee allegations that Theranos isn’t using the technology they claim to have. What happened?
    The list of board members at Theranos is impressive, albeit one comprised mostly of DC insiders and people completely disconnected with the medical technology industry. What interested them? A strong likelihood is the desire to corner the market on less expensive lab tests, especially since both LabCorp and Quest have both been prosecuted for diagnostic testing fraud before.
    Moreover, Theranos technology ostensibly replaces visits to primary care doctors, a welcome relief to existing federal programs as well as the imminent costs of Obamacare. Hence, the ability to get on board was probably too big a temptation for the early adopters to ignore. Throw in a blond female Stanford dropout in silicon valley as the face of the company, and it looks like nobody even bothered with basic due diligence – it was just too good to be true.
    http://www.returnofkings.com/76246/is-theranos-a-girl-powered-scam

  133. On the subject of previous patient tests, a number of which have been found to be inaccurate, Taylor said: “Theranos has been responding to the deficiencies raised by CMS and will continue the process of revising or voiding test results as appropriate until we are satisfied that we have taken all necessary remedial action.”

    Theranos closed its last remaining blood-testing lab after it reportedly failed an inspection

    wow sometimes there is no conspiracy – just fraud and incompetence

  134. Fine.  Thanks for the update.

    The insurance industry & Big Pharma are still vampires, sucking the life blood out of our country.

  136. BiD – the Veep exit credits is great.  Just watching the senile old man talk then instead of going to the desk to sign the orders, turns and exits, closing the door behind him.  That left everyone standing around looking as stupid as they are for showing up in his lordships presence.  A couple articles say he left when a reporter asked him about Flynn.  The audio has that question after he is walking to the door.

  137. here’s a full vid by global news of what happened the few minutes prior to the walkout

    https://youtu.be/rE0RavPjErc
    Published on Apr 1, 2017

    President Donald Trump gets mad and leaves/walked out of an executive order signing ceremony without signing the orders. Trump leaves the Oval Office without signing his executive order.

  138. daily beast:
    Michael Flynn Failed to Disclose Payments From Russian Propaganda Network
    The former National Security Advisor’s financial disclosure forms made no mention of payments from a Russian state-run media network.

  140. Well, there’s one thing…….Sunday morning shows have become watchable again……sort of……..

  141. Flatus, your SC guys have come back from what looked like a fatal 1st half. They’re making this a really good game. Up by 2 after being down by 14. Very nice play.

  142. I didn’t buy the 14 point lead. That made me even more nervous because South Carolina just keeps on coming no matter what. That’s a great basketball team.

    But Go Go Gonzaga!

  143. Jamie: He forgot to sign his own EO-LOL Amazing find!

    Pat: I love that robot! I’m now a follower of @burnedyourtweet I think everyone should follow and RT as many as possible! Also that full vid of trumplstiltskin leaving w/o signing includes his remarks. I can’t see how anyone with half a brain can listen to that man speak and NOT see how demented he is. He never actually says anything! He had a few crib notes that helped him, otherwise he would sound like a blithering idiot…instead of just sounding like an idiot!

    Pogo: So the brainless wonder needs a vacation palace retreat from his vacation palace retreat because he works so hard. I may gag!

    Basketball Hall of Fame news: Local gal Rebecca Lobo will be inducted into the HoF this year. Former UConn star, Olympic gold medal winner and one of the pioneers of the WNBA.

  147. as rudy k said:

    0h, East is East, and West is West, and never the twain shall meet,
    Till Earth and Sky stand presently at God’s great Judgment Seat;
    But there is neither East nor West, Border, nor Breed, nor Birth,
    When two strong men stand face to face, though they come from the ends of the earth!

    but make that 10 men face to face

    go zag!

Comments are closed.