Attribution: DON’T DISTURB! by Marco De Angelis, PoliticalCartoons.com
72 thoughts on “Knock, Knock.”
couldn’t pass up this cartoon today. something about it says so many different things. it’s too serious for me to even try making a joke but, if you can, please supply the knock-knock punch line.
FYI about the cartoonist from his webpage:
Marco De Angelis was born in Rome, Italy, in 1955. He is professional journalist, cartoonist, illustrator and graphic designer.
He have been published from ’75 on over 200 dailies and magazines in Italy, Europe and USA: Il Popolo (redactor and official cartoonist from 1980 to 1997), Il Messaggero (cartoonist and illustrator from 1996 to 2003), La Repubblica (redactor from 2003 to 2015), Metropoli, Il Mattino, Grazia, Gialli Mondadori, Panorama, Lavorare, Shalom, L’Eco di San Gabriele, Buduàr, Help!, Comic Art, Comix, Travaso, Marc’Aurelio, Confronti, Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, Los Angeles Herald, Chicago Tribune, Vancouver Sun, Tampa Tribune, Herald Tribune, Institutional Investor Courrier International, Le Monde, Almanach Vermot, Nebelspalter, Eulenspiegel, Le Temps, Eine Welt, Jez, Feferon, Szpilki, Fire, Fenamizah, Supapo, NY TID, etc.
Rothco Cartoons, Cartoonists & Writers Syndicate and The New York Times Syndicate distributed in USA and worldwide many of his editorial cartoons. Now he distributes his works by CartoonArts International, Go Comics and Andrews McMeel Universal. He is part also in Cartoon Movement.
He was the editor from Italy for the international magazine and website WittyWorld (USA).
He is one of the creators and editor in chief of the monthly magazine online Buduàr, where he publishes cartoons and articles.
His works are also published on many international websites.
He is an illustrator of many children’s books for important publishers like Giunti, De Agostini, La Scuola, San Paolo, Salani, Lapis, European Language Institute (illustrations on 28 reviews in 30 Countries). Two books with his illustrations won two important prize in Italy.
As graphic designer and illustrator he had collaborations with RAI TV, Telemontecarlo, other televisions and many associations and companies.
He has won 150 awards: Golden Palm in Bordighera (1997), two Prizes Council of Europe (1978 and ’90), Prize S. Valentino (2005), Istanbul, (1987 and 2016), two Prizes Amnesty International in Olen (2013 and 2015), First Prize in Teheran, Krusevac, Belgrade, Sisak, Pistoia, Pescara, Chieti, Città di Castello, Lecce, Dolo, Trento, Fano, Le Piastre, Sestri Levante, Marostica, Velletri, Solin; awarded in Tokyo, Amsterdam, Belgrade, Skopje, Galati, Montreal, Ottawa, Paris, New York (United Nations), Porto, Genova, Tolentino, Ferrara, Cairo, Bistriţa, Caldas da Rainha, Stuttgart, Bejing, Bangalore, Tirana, etc.
In 2022 he was one of the three finalists in the Editorial Division of the prestigious Reuben Award NCS, USA, a very rare case for a non-American. Finalist also in the European Cartoon Award in 2020 and 2021 and in several competitions.
He held many solo exibithions (Rome, Stockholm, Nola, Vasto, Forte dei Marmi, Saint Just le Martel, Milan, Bangalore, etc.) and his works are exposed in museums of Tolentino, Skopje, Istanbul, Tehran, Stockholm, Boca Raton and others. He was selected by Cartoon Home Network International as one of the 10 best cartoonists of 2018 and 2020 in the world.
He was also member of over 50 juries in Italy and abroad (Bordighera, Rome, Fano, Le Piastre, Salsomaggiore, Legnica, Sisak, Kyrenia, Deva, Kragujevac, Caen, Skopje, etc.).
Donald Trump’s new global tariffs kicked in at midnight, the president made note of The Late Show’s ratings in an Oval Office presser, and JD Vance is a spoiled baby emperor.
A.I. iiiee…
From atop the White House Donald Trump distracts and denies, a song and dance all too familiar. But such is the job of the Diddler on the Roof. Mr. Newberger’s viral tweet brought to life in this showstopper of a tune.
That’s wonderful.
Aug 7, 2025 #southpark #recap #breakdown
South Park Season 27 Episode 2, titled “Got a Nut,” is one of the wildest and most politically charged episodes in recent memory. From Mr. Mackey leading ICE raids in Heaven to Cartman turning into a parody of Charlie Kirk, this episode spares no one—mocking J.D. Vance, Kristi Noem, and even the concept of institutional overreach. In this in-depth explanation, we break down all the absurd moments, hidden commentary, and why this episode proves South Park is more relevant than ever.
Whether you’re a longtime fan or just catching up, this episode recap uncovers the humor, horror, and satire behind every bizarre twist. Don’t forget to like, comment with your favorite moment, and subscribe for more weekly South Park breakdowns!
Holy Furballs! Pete Hegseth and the Church of Christian Nationalism
By Lotus the World’s Wisest (and Most Judgmental) Feline
You’re Gonna Want to Sit Down for This Hairball
So there I was, napping peacefully in a sunbeam, dreaming of clawing Louis Gohmert, when I caught wind of this steaming pile of theocratic nonsense: Pete Hegseth—the man Trump paw-picked as Secretary of Defense—just helped launch a new church in D.C. tied directly to one of the most extreme Christian nationalist figures in America.
Yes. The. Pentagon. Guy. Is starting churches now.
And not just any church—a Doug Wilson church.
As in Doug “Slavery Wasn’t So Bad and Women Should Submit” Wilson.
Hairball. Initiated.
🔗 Full article from The Independent
🙀 Meet the Cult Leader You Didn’t Ask For: Pastor Doug Wilson
Doug Wilson is what happens when you microwave Calvinism, mix in a dash of plantation nostalgia, and sprinkle it with holy testosterone. He runs a network of churches (CREC) dedicated to “reclaiming America for Christ”—which, in practical terms, means dismantling democracy, bulldozing civil rights, and shoving us all into a Puritan cosplay LARP.
This is the guy who:
Defended slavery as “not inherently sinful.”
Thinks feminism is a demonic plot.
Wants a society where women “obey” and men “lead”—with one hand on the Bible and the other on a belt.
And now his church has set up shop in Washington, D.C.
Like a fur-covered tick burrowing into the neck of the Republic.
🐾 So Why Was Hegseth There? Spoiler: Because He’s One of Them
Hegseth didn’t just stumble in looking for free communion wine. He’s been in bed—figuratively speaking—with Wilson’s theology for years. He’s a member of a CREC church himself and regularly promotes these views in his books, podcasts, and now, official Pentagon policy.
And before you ask—no, this is not just “traditional Christianity.”
This is weaponized religion with authoritarian aspirations.
Hegseth’s beliefs include:
Crusade nostalgia (nothing says “Jesus loves you” like a broadsword).
Anti-Muslim conspiracy theories.
A hatred of secular democracy rivaled only by his hatred of basic literacy.
In other words: he’s not leading the Pentagon, he’s leading a theocracy with nukes.
🧠 “God’s Will” and Government Don’t Mix—Ask Literally Any Cat
Let me speak for the divine here: God didn’t elect Trump. God didn’t choose Hegseth. God doesn’t need your dumb little flag-draped church pretending to speak for Her.
Do you know how many gods I believe in? All of them—as long as they bring treats.
But one thing is clear: when you start fusing state power with religious dogma, you don’t get utopia. You get Inquisition 2.0: Patriot Edition.
The Founders—many of whom were deists who probably wouldn’t have made it past the greeter at Christ Church—built a wall between church and state.
Hegseth? He’s tunneling under that wall like a dog on bath day.
🐈 My Claws, His Face
Let’s not pretend this is “just about one church.”
This is part of a coordinated campaign by Christian nationalists to infiltrate:
The Department of Defense
Public schools
Local governments
And now, your Sunday brunch circuit
The goal is clear: remake America in the image of a patriarchal, white, theocratic fantasy where dissent is treason and democracy is blasphemy.
And if you think cats don’t care about politics, let me remind you:
I have personally knocked over more religious relics than Martin Luther.
🧹 So What Can You Do (Besides Screaming Into the Litterbox)?
Here’s how you can help de-flea this democracy:
✅ Support journalists exposing Christian nationalism
✅ Watch for CREC-affiliated groups in your community
✅ Donate to orgs fighting for secular government (like Americans United for Separation of Church and State)
✅ Demand Congress investigate religious influence in military leadership
✅ Share this article—because your aunt, who thinks Pete Hegseth is “handsome and brave,” needs an intervention
And for the love of tuna, VOTE.
Local elections. State elections. Judges. School boards. All of it.
🐾 Final Thought from the Throne
If Pete Hegseth wants to play high priest in D.C., fine.
But don’t let him do it with tanks and tactical nukes behind him.
This isn’t just a spiritual crisis—it’s a national one.
Now excuse me while I go cough up a symbolic hairball on a stack of unratified theocratic doctrine.
Breaking it down. Prison switch not normal.
We were warned
BLACKOUT THE SYSTEM
SEPTEMBER 16TH-20TH
5-DAYS
CONSTITUTION DAY
SEPTEMBER 17TH
(FOR THOSE WHO CAN ONLY
DO 1-DAY BLACKOUT)
Nationwide
• No Work
• No Purchases
• No Deliveries
• No Gas
• No Restaurants
• No Traveling
• No Projects
• No Events
• No Backing Out
•••
STAY READY, STAY CALM.
Preparedness is peace of mind.
*This from the 50501 Movement organizing nationwide protests. I would hope they would’ve added to patronize small businesses and pay in cash only (no fees to big banks).
ps – This should’ve happened months ago to get the attention of Congress.
WHO ORDERED MAXWELL’S PRISON SWITCH?
Sex offenders aren’t allowed in cushy prison camps — yet here she is.
The Bureau of Prisons says it wasn’t them… so who pulled the strings? 🕵️♂️
Them Who?
The Great Ignored
Who ordered Maxwell moved?
The buck stops at the top
Does it really matter which minion took it upon themselves to please the king?
It is not a sex scandal but just another “rich and powerful” doing things that get the rest of us thrown in prison for most of our lives.
Situation normal, there are rules for them and rules for the rest of us.
Jack
I suspect the there was at least a 5 person daisy chain in an attempt to obscure FF’s direction that culminated in Suzie Wiles calling the USBOP and ordering that transfer, pending her pardon.
I stay on this Epstein story because it is drawing blood. Maybe the only one. They didn’t shut down Congress early over complaints about ICE, but because Republicans demand release of the Epstein records. When Trump stops freaking out with a cover-up I’ll move on. Meanwhile I see this as the only story on the stove with the potential to singe his power grab.
Who ordered Maxwell moved?
“Who will rid me of this turbulent sex criminal?”
I like “ShakeStur”. Drop by again
They’ve added Adirondack chairs in my neighborhood park. Game changer!
today’s meme…
Don’t know if this is true… but it would be fun to see him trying to stay sober on the campaign trail…
The worms are everywhere, the lawn, the garden, the driveway, the garage (inside & out). The birds are hiding out until sunset, but they are well this morning.
Nice chairs. Cup holders?
Susie Wiles seems to be another Russian minder for Agent Orange.
Did you see what PM Medvedev said to Krasnov with the nuclear sub escalation?
“Trump should not think that the video archive of his past immoralities is only in the hands of Mossad.” (Although this is now being refuted.)
Now, there was a rumor that Epstein was working for Mossad, to compromise the powerful. It’s been denied, but Russia would know, if anything was said.
What I am finding is a lot of stuff I see once going missing. Scrub a dub dub.
Did former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev warn President Donald Trump that he should not think that “the Mossad alone has a video archive of his past depravities”? No, that’s not true: The quote was attributed to “Russia media” by a website that claims to be in Israel, but appears to be managed in Ukraine.
The claim appeared in a post (archived here) shared on X on August 2, 2025, that was a retweet of a Turkish-language post (archived here). The caption above the retweet read:
This is Medvedev’s response to Trump’s repositioning of 2 nuclear submarines towards Russia. I think the only people who don’t know Trump’s a child sex pervert are his cult.
“Trump should not think that the video archive of his past immoralities is only in the hands of Mossad.”
A search for online news reports that might include the Medvedev quote found an article (archived here) at CursorInfo.co.il, which uses the country code top-level domain for Israel. The website’s Facebook page, however, is administered in Ukraine, according to Meta transparency data (archived here). The article is in Russian, but we used Google Translate to see it in English. The article titled “Medvedev Threatens Trump: Know Your Place” opened:
Dmitry Medvedev told what “compromising information” the Russian Federation has on Donald Trump.
Deputy Chairman of the Russian Security Council Dmitry Medvedev continues his aggressive attacks against US President Donald Trump.
Russian media reported this.
This time he spoke out about the fact that in the Russian archives there is a compromising video featuring an American leader from the past.
“It is not only Mossad that keeps an archive of compromising videos (Epstein case – ed.) of Donald Trump from the past, so it is better that he (Trump – ed.) knows his place,” Medvedev said.
“How does a guy go from being a math teacher at the Dalton School in the late 70s with no college degree to having multiple airplanes, a private island, and the largest residential house in Manhattan?” Carlson said in his Turning Point speech on July 11.
“Where did all the money come from?”
*Math and physics. Based on that very long article Ivy and I posted from Mother Jones, Epstein was about as bright as Donald.
…old press clippings of Epstein’s purported relationship with Israeli officials, including a May 2023 story from The Wall Street Journal that was republished by The Times of Israel, which alleges that former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak met with Epstein dozens of times starting in 2013.
Barak also met with Epstein monthly for nearly a year, beginning in December 2015, according to the WSJ.
In July 2019, The New York Times reported that Barak, then 77, received approximately $2.3 million in payments between 2004 and 2006 from a foundation associated with Epstein. Epstein also invested a reported $1 million in a limited partnership established by Barak in 2015.
Former National Security Agency counterspy John Schindler wrote on his Top Secret Umbra blog in January 2024 that Epstein appeared to have been part of a shadowy Israeli influence operation characterized as MEGA.
“There’s a venerable spook joke that you need to move on from counterintelligence work when, at least once a week, you stare at yourself in the mirror while shaving and think: ‘I wonder who he’s really working for?'” Schindler wrote.
He continued: “That’s not a one-pedophile job and, given the industrial scale of Epstein’s abuse over decades, with at least hundreds of victims, it would take a considerable retinue if not a small army to keep that sordid operation going and out of public view for any extended period.”
A 2021 Rolling Stone story involving inmate Steven Hoffenberg, imprisoned for 18 years for committing a $450 million Ponzi scheme, detailed how Hoffenberg worked with Epstein in the financial sector.
Hoffenberg claimed at the time that Epstein moved in intelligence circles. When the author of the piece, Vicky Ward, brought up Hoffenberg’s relationship to Epstein himself, the former financier reportedly legally threatened her.
Eric Weinstein, mathematician and a former managing director of Thiel Capital, said during an appearance on the Diary of a CEO podcast, hosted by Steven Bartlett: “I don’t know who Jeffrey Epstein was, but I would certainly bet money that he was a product of at least one or more elements of the intelligence community. I don’t know who he was. I don’t know who ran him. He certainly was not a financier in any standard sense. That was a cover story.”
British entrepreneur Bartlett asks about Weinstein having met Epstein, and Weinstein says, “He wasn’t a financier the day I met him.” Weinstein went on to describe Epstein as a “weird guy” who “didn’t seem to know a lot about currency trading.”
A BBC documentary, House of Maxwell, released in 2022, alleged that Robert Maxwell, father of former socialite and convicted sex offender Ghislaine Maxwell, had claimed that Epstein helped Maxwell hide hundreds of millions he had stolen from his company’s pension funds. Robert Maxwell fell off his yacht to his death in 1991.
Journalist Glenn Greenwald, on X: “1) One of Epstein’s closest friends was former Israeli PM Ehud Barak; 2) A key source of Epstein’s vast wealth, though mysterious, was from Les Wexner, whose primary life cause is Israel; 3) Ghislaine Maxwell’s father – the billionaire Robert Maxwell — was a Mossad agent who mysteriously died after that was reported.
“Though Maxwell was British, Israel gave him a state funeral when he died; 4) Epstein got the red carpet treatment when visiting Israel; 5) Epstein bankrolled major investments in Israeli tech. … But fine, if Epstein had no ties to Israeli intelligence or any other intel service – which is theoretically possible – why can’t Pam Bondi, CIA and FBI say that?”
But Craig, It is time to take all that anger in maga land and redirect it. What makes it powerful isn’t the sex, it is the “rich fuckers” getting away with it. *Again* Epstein wasn’t the only one screwing underage girls and the powers that be, know it. It may not be Trump but he has “rich and powerful” backers. Some of them are on the list. That is why there was a sweetheart deal in the first place and that is why the prison move. It doesn’t matter if it was Trump or his backers they are trying to protect. They are all just a bunch of “rich fuckers” and that is the way to frame it.
Jack
BiD
Your Epstein musings today remind me, I’ve been watching a lot of bad spy movies lately. It is always the CIA,
Jack
A compromised leader is important.
The crime is important.
The money trail is important.
The cover-up is important.
There is now more of a cover-up than MAGAts originally thought, and it’s continuing to happen in real time.
Agree with your framing ideas Jack. Meanwhile I’m keen on pulling threads to keep their cover up unraveled.
Susie Wiles, families ties to Russia. Taking orders from Putin? That’s what Steven Hassan said.
Trump’s newly appointed Chief of Staff, Susie Wiles, brings a complex political profile, with ties to Russian oligarchs and Chinese surveillance firms.
Before joining Trump’s 2024 campaign, Wiles was a co-chair at a firm that lobbied for sanctioned individuals and companies. A lobbyist who recommended Wiles to lead US President-Elect Donald Trump’s campaign represented a Russian-born oligarch connected to the Russian President Vladimir Putin and a state-owned oil corporation Rosneft.
Wiles’ ex-husband has ties to a Kremlin-linked lobbyist known for attending the 2016 Trump Tower meeting, where “dirt” on Clinton was offered on the Russian Government’s behalf.
Wiles’ daughter failed the White House background check.
Examining her lobbying work and personal connections reveals the scale and reach of foreign affiliations, raising concerns over potential foreign influence within Trump’s incoming administration.
Reportedly, the internet had been “scrubbed” of all articles that tied her to Russia when she was first appointed.
Today’s New Yorker
“Any plans for the weekend, or for escaping the incoming totalitarian regime?”
When Trump stops freaking out with a cover-up I’ll move
I personally have limited bandwidth and don’t feel like tying red string around my room to get to the bottom of Epstein, but I can only speak for myself.
The only point I was making about liberal obsession of the topic isnthat conservative cooks are going to perpetuate the story anyway, giving liberals an opportunity to appeal to the electorate on more substantive matters, like that we’re all going broke
Lib/progs are rudderless though, so those were all thoughts in an idealized scenario. Trump-stein away, good Sir 🫡
Just saw an SNL cold open from 1999 (Seinfeld/Bowie), and it was Reform Party HQ: Ross Perot vetting Pat Buchanan and Donald tRUMP for VP. Donald had a plan to turn the WH into a tRUMP tower. Wild.
It was on over-the-air TV, and I can’t find it in YouTube, or I’d link it. Cheri O’Teri made a great Ross Perot. Guess Carvey had left the cast.
I was probably the first person here and one of the first person in the entire political national discourse to talk about Trump‘s Russia connections, so I don’t wanna dismiss that issue but eight years of hammering away at it and libs have achieved no political gain from it
There’s a quote I’m thinking of I can’t quite remember what it is, though I would put here hmmmmmm, it was misattributed to a really smart guy hmmmm…
do support “guy in the park” youtubes 🫡
now that trumpco lifted the prohibition on tax-exempt churches endorsing political candidates, libs will never win outside of their bastions again, so throwing shit at the wall is as good a pastime as any!
apparently season 25 episode 1 of Saturday Night Live is available on Peacock, here is a rundown of the episode with screen caps describing the scene BiD mentioned:
Friday’s subpoenas come as the department convenes a grand jury to investigate whether James, a Democrat, violated the civil rights of President Donald Trump and other Republican-affiliated entities.
According to the media reports, the grand jury will not only probe whether Trump’s rights were violated by the fraud lawsuit, but the subpoenas will also seek information about a second lawsuit James launched against the National Rifle Association (NRA), an influential gun lobby group
“Any weaponisation of the justice system should disturb every American,” the statement said. “We stand strongly behind our successful litigation against the Trump Organization and the National Rifle Association, and we will continue to stand up for New Yorkers’ rights.”
James’s personal lawyer, Abbe Lowell, also said in a statement that her legal team was “ready and waiting with the facts and the law”.
people like seeing what’s going in the city, even if it’s nothing
Jamie’s back — and she’s flipping over the rocks to see what’s really crawling underneath the president’s latest scheme. This time, it’s a brazen attempt to change the Census..
Today’s conversation has me harking back to the beginning of the Trump family. Remember Don, Jr comment. “We can get all the money money we need from Russia!”
Wasn’t today Putin’s deadline to stop the genocide? Instead, they’re meeting Friday in Alaska.
I thought the new census was to redraw districts before 2028.
I don’t know why Trump doesn’t just refuse to administer the census and make up the numbers, just like his bank loan applications
State Rep. Michael Johnson, a Kansas City Democrat who chairs the Legislative Black Caucus, said any effort to remake maps is a pure power grab by Republicans seeking to shield President Donald Trump from congressional scrutiny.
“This move by the Missouri Republicans is a clear intent to shield their national counterparts from impending and inevitable loss that would be suffered in 2026 by an electorate demanding accountability for a hostile administration.”
Missouri has eight seats in the U.S. House of Representatives, with six held by Republicans and two held by Democrats. The seat being targeted in an effort to draw a seventh district where the GOP was certain to prevail is the 5th District in Jackson and Clay counties currently held by U.S. Rep. Emanuel Cleaver of Kansas City.
Gov. Mike Kehoe, who would issue the call for lawmakers to meet, told reporters Tuesday that he’s generally supportive of the push but didn’t give a date for lawmakers to convene. “We want to keep the House in Republican control, so what we look at, what we’re going to do here in Missouri, we’ll work with our leadership group and see if there’s a path or something that makes sense for Missourians,” Kehoe said, according to KYTV in Springfield.
*Califotnua and other blue states need to get busy.
I don’t know why Trump doesn’t just refuse to administer the census and make up the numbers, just like his bank loan applications
same reason putin holds ‘elections’- appearance of legitimacy
the pod save guys agree with me today on Dem impotence but Dan Phieffer is adamant that the Trump-stein scandal is worth the effort to keep it prominent, on both moral and political grounds
they see the forest for the trees and recognize how dire everything is
if Olbermann is hyperbolic (and he is), the pod save guys aren’t, and the implications of their analyses are no less frightening
The problem is you had to follow these right-wing nuts all these years like I have to really understand why Epstein matters so much to them. Normal people never believed the conspiracy theories, so they don’t really get it now.
Reps. Mike Flood (R-Neb.) and Eric Sorensen (D-Ill.) said that the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration received permission to fill 450 positions at the National Weather Service including meteorologists, hydrologists and radar technicians.
The rehires come after a summer where extreme weather incidents put the cuts to the National Weather Service under increased scrutiny. Specifically, one government official told NBC that staff at the service believe floods in Texas and the aftermath sparked the rehiring spree.
After the deadly Independence Day floods, the administration declined to provide Texas with access to a tranche of FEMA funds aimed at heading off the next disaster — money intended to pay for things such as warning systems, tornado shelters and anti-flood measures.
It’s not alone.
In May, children in a Missouri elementary school sheltered from a tornado that shattered windows and ripped gutters off the building inside a safe room purchased with hazard mitigation money issued after the deadly 2011 Joplin tornado.
Though the Trump administration approved Missouri’s disaster declaration, it refused the hazard mitigation funds the state requested to buy generators and more outdoor warning sirens, state officials told The Hill. Missouri is appealing that decision.
In neighboring Oklahoma, the Biden administration had in November approved hazard mitigation funding for wildfires and straight-line winds.
But even as those funds went out, more wildfires, driven by straight-line winds, were raging across the Sooner State. President Trump issued a disaster declaration on the last day of the weeklong emergency — but denied hazard mitigation funding.
*Benjamin Franklin would hate Adolf. “A stitch in time saved mine.” Ben also might’ve been in the Epstein files.
Craig,
The one area where the census effects political desire is apportionment.
“Apportionment” is the process of dividing the 435 memberships, or seats, in the House of Representatives among the 50 states. The Census Bureau conducts the census at 10-year intervals. At the conclusion of each census, the results are used to calculate the number of House memberships to which each state is entitled.
Of course, apportionment hasn’t been accurate since it was frozen at 435 members. If people were being accurately represented as originally intended, and the U.S. House of Representatives was not capped at 435 members, it would likely be significantly larger, possibly around 692 members, according to the “cube root law”. This law suggests that the number of seats in a legislature should roughly equal the cube root of the population. Of course, this would mean even greater numbers for the states with large city enclaves which would favor the Democrats, and each representative could better serve their constituents.
While the idea of a secret “Epstein client list” became a fixation for far-right influencers and members of Trump’s base, the candidate himself rarely brought up Epstein unprompted in campaign speeches or rallies. Instead, it was Trump’s official and unofficial surrogates—many of whom now occupy top posts in his Administration—who repeatedly stoked expectations that explosive revelations were imminent, often suggesting prosecutions were coming and that thousands of pages of damning material would soon be released.
Now many in Trump’s base are accusing him of falling far short of what they expected him to do with the Epstein case, partly because of years of rhetoric from his allies that neither Trump nor his campaign did much to refute. After the Justice Department and FBI announced this month that there is no incriminating “client list” and no further disclosures would be made, Trump lashed out at his own supporters who were calling on him to release the files. “My PAST supporters have bought into this ‘bull—t,’ hook, line, and sinker,” he wrote on Truth Social. “I don’t want their support anymore!”
But some of his supporters pointed out that it was Trump himself who had deployed Epstein’s alleged client list as political ammunition a decade ago, as he was laying groundwork for his first presidential run. At the conservative conference known as CPAC in February 2015, when Trump was asked for his thoughts on former President Bill Clinton, he responded: “Nice guy. Got a lot of problems coming up in my opinion with the famous island with Jeffrey Epstein. A lot of problems.”
*He knows he’s in the files & he couldn’t poo-poo it too much or his base might’ve realized that.
Stur, the roots of why this matters so much to them go deep into early Q-Anon craziness.
They believe in a worldwide elite pedophile ring, led in part by Epstein, that has been covered up, and they believed in Trump’s many promises to release the DOJ “proof”, echoed by Patel, Bannon, Bongino and many others.
Pam Bondi launched this mini-series by announcing the records were on her desk for release, then releasing only stuff that was already public, and then saying they don’t exist, there’s “no list”.
Jamie, hopefully this census gambit was just a distraction or the courts will be tied up with another crazed power grab.
Keep pushing, keep talking, survivors and families. Your voices are the ones that really matter. People can hear you.
We just got back from a rare fine-dining splurge. I got Duck Breast with gnocchi in a cherry sauce. Full video in next episode of Date Night DC.
Why does Epstein matter so much to them?
in addition to what Mr. C said, the kooks and con-schemers also wanted to damage Bill Clinton and by extension HRC (because they hate women that much)
My thinking was that the extra census would be to fix 2028.
The census wouldn’t be ready to do anything for the 2026 midterms, which is why he’s directing red states to redraw districts, and also why the DOJ is trying to access voter rolls.
If he doesn’t get his census, he can say the midterms were rigged. As always, every accusation is a confession.
Republicans aren’t even hiding what they’re trying to do, and I wonder if they will just eventually do away with them. I mean, if Dems retake both houses in 2026, is Adolf going to invalidate them somehow?
Yep. Remember Pizzagate?
MAGAts so want to “own the libs.” Even if they turn away from Adolf for not releasing the Epstein files, or taking away their farm subsidies or Medicaid keeping Meemaw in a care home, they will never let go of their hatred of what they think liberals are, because they think every liberal is looking down on them for everything that they are. Disagreement isn’t necessarily condescension. These are the most lost folks. It really is a cult and they will never be fully deprogrammed, even if they realize that Orange Adolf is just a fascist, gtifting turd.
About that SNL cold open from 1999, I didn’t recall Donald being involved with the Reform Party, or politics in any way. I thought he went from saying he was a Democrat to saying he was a Republican.
Trump has destroyed the GOP: Former Georgia Republican switches parties
Geoff Duncan, former Republican lt. governor of Georgia, talks with Jen Psaki about how the Republican Party is unrecognizable to him now, having become a cult for Donald Trump, and explains why he has not only left the GOP but has switched to the Democratic Party.
God
TheGodPodcast.com
“Gerrymandering is fascism’s polite way of knocking before it kicks down the door.”
For right-wing Catholics, politicized evangelicals, and socially frightened Pentecostal-Charismatics, MAGA is the new American religion. The experience believers have in their relationship to it is anything but rational.
The fusion is inseparable once the transition from God and church to Trump and MAGA is complete—and the 2024 election sanctioned that completeness. For these Christians, MAGA is their new denominational home. Like baptized Catholics, cradle Methodists, and multi-generational Pentecostals, what I now call MAGA-anity (as distinct from Christi-anity) forms a follower’s deepest, most meaningful, and resilient identity. And because it’s transcendent, the bond cannot be loosened by outside forces—not by reports of a souring economy, not by videos of shrieking moms being separated from their children by masked ICE agents, not even by the call of Christianity Today magazine to release the full Epstein files. About the possibility that Trump may be implicated in Epstein’s crimes, the Reverend Kenneth Johnson, a long-time friend of mine and widely-admired conservative evangelical leader in deep-red Adams County, Ohio, along the Kentucky border, said of the Trump voters he ministers to, “If Trump is accused, most of his followers still would not believe it.” Of course, for the few outside Adams County who might believe it, there is always the Bible’s King David, who committed both adultery and murder, but was forgiven and was called “a man after God’s own heart.”
*This was written by a woke evangelical pastor. It’s a long piece, but with the read.
pretty sure this tariff bullshit is just a simple market-manipulation insider-trading scheme
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couldn’t pass up this cartoon today. something about it says so many different things. it’s too serious for me to even try making a joke but, if you can, please supply the knock-knock punch line.
FYI about the cartoonist from his webpage:
Donald Trump’s new global tariffs kicked in at midnight, the president made note of The Late Show’s ratings in an Oval Office presser, and JD Vance is a spoiled baby emperor.
A.I. iiiee…
From atop the White House Donald Trump distracts and denies, a song and dance all too familiar. But such is the job of the Diddler on the Roof. Mr. Newberger’s viral tweet brought to life in this showstopper of a tune.
That’s wonderful.
Aug 7, 2025 #southpark #recap #breakdown
South Park Season 27 Episode 2, titled “Got a Nut,” is one of the wildest and most politically charged episodes in recent memory. From Mr. Mackey leading ICE raids in Heaven to Cartman turning into a parody of Charlie Kirk, this episode spares no one—mocking J.D. Vance, Kristi Noem, and even the concept of institutional overreach. In this in-depth explanation, we break down all the absurd moments, hidden commentary, and why this episode proves South Park is more relevant than ever.
Whether you’re a longtime fan or just catching up, this episode recap uncovers the humor, horror, and satire behind every bizarre twist. Don’t forget to like, comment with your favorite moment, and subscribe for more weekly South Park breakdowns!
Holy Furballs! Pete Hegseth and the Church of Christian Nationalism
By Lotus the World’s Wisest (and Most Judgmental) Feline
Breaking it down. Prison switch not normal.
We were warned
BLACKOUT THE SYSTEM
SEPTEMBER 16TH-20TH
5-DAYS
CONSTITUTION DAY
SEPTEMBER 17TH
(FOR THOSE WHO CAN ONLY
DO 1-DAY BLACKOUT)
Nationwide
• No Work
• No Purchases
• No Deliveries
• No Gas
• No Restaurants
• No Traveling
• No Projects
• No Events
• No Backing Out
•••
STAY READY, STAY CALM.
Preparedness is peace of mind.
*This from the 50501 Movement organizing nationwide protests. I would hope they would’ve added to patronize small businesses and pay in cash only (no fees to big banks).
ps – This should’ve happened months ago to get the attention of Congress.
WHO ORDERED MAXWELL’S PRISON SWITCH?
Sex offenders aren’t allowed in cushy prison camps — yet here she is.
The Bureau of Prisons says it wasn’t them… so who pulled the strings? 🕵️♂️
Them Who?
The Great Ignored
Who ordered Maxwell moved?
The buck stops at the top
Does it really matter which minion took it upon themselves to please the king?
It is not a sex scandal but just another “rich and powerful” doing things that get the rest of us thrown in prison for most of our lives.
Situation normal, there are rules for them and rules for the rest of us.
Jack
I suspect the there was at least a 5 person daisy chain in an attempt to obscure FF’s direction that culminated in Suzie Wiles calling the USBOP and ordering that transfer, pending her pardon.
I stay on this Epstein story because it is drawing blood. Maybe the only one. They didn’t shut down Congress early over complaints about ICE, but because Republicans demand release of the Epstein records. When Trump stops freaking out with a cover-up I’ll move on. Meanwhile I see this as the only story on the stove with the potential to singe his power grab.
Who ordered Maxwell moved?
“Who will rid me of this turbulent sex criminal?”
I like “ShakeStur”. Drop by again
They’ve added Adirondack chairs in my neighborhood park. Game changer!
today’s meme…
Don’t know if this is true… but it would be fun to see him trying to stay sober on the campaign trail…
The worms are everywhere, the lawn, the garden, the driveway, the garage (inside & out). The birds are hiding out until sunset, but they are well this morning.
Nice chairs. Cup holders?
Susie Wiles seems to be another Russian minder for Agent Orange.
Did you see what PM Medvedev said to Krasnov with the nuclear sub escalation?
“Trump should not think that the video archive of his past immoralities is only in the hands of Mossad.” (Although this is now being refuted.)
Now, there was a rumor that Epstein was working for Mossad, to compromise the powerful. It’s been denied, but Russia would know, if anything was said.
What I am finding is a lot of stuff I see once going missing. Scrub a dub dub.
https://leadstories.com/hoax-alert/2025/08/fact-check-no-evidence-medvedev-warned-trump-russia-has-video-of-past-depravities.html
Did former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev warn President Donald Trump that he should not think that “the Mossad alone has a video archive of his past depravities”? No, that’s not true: The quote was attributed to “Russia media” by a website that claims to be in Israel, but appears to be managed in Ukraine.
The claim appeared in a post (archived here) shared on X on August 2, 2025, that was a retweet of a Turkish-language post (archived here). The caption above the retweet read:
This is Medvedev’s response to Trump’s repositioning of 2 nuclear submarines towards Russia. I think the only people who don’t know Trump’s a child sex pervert are his cult.
“Trump should not think that the video archive of his past immoralities is only in the hands of Mossad.”
A search for online news reports that might include the Medvedev quote found an article (archived here) at CursorInfo.co.il, which uses the country code top-level domain for Israel. The website’s Facebook page, however, is administered in Ukraine, according to Meta transparency data (archived here). The article is in Russian, but we used Google Translate to see it in English. The article titled “Medvedev Threatens Trump: Know Your Place” opened:
Dmitry Medvedev told what “compromising information” the Russian Federation has on Donald Trump.
Deputy Chairman of the Russian Security Council Dmitry Medvedev continues his aggressive attacks against US President Donald Trump.
Russian media reported this.
This time he spoke out about the fact that in the Russian archives there is a compromising video featuring an American leader from the past.
“It is not only Mossad that keeps an archive of compromising videos (Epstein case – ed.) of Donald Trump from the past, so it is better that he (Trump – ed.) knows his place,” Medvedev said.
https://www.newsweek.com/jeffrey-epstein-mossad-tucker-carlson-israel-naftali-2098880
“How does a guy go from being a math teacher at the Dalton School in the late 70s with no college degree to having multiple airplanes, a private island, and the largest residential house in Manhattan?” Carlson said in his Turning Point speech on July 11.
“Where did all the money come from?”
*Math and physics. Based on that very long article Ivy and I posted from Mother Jones, Epstein was about as bright as Donald.
…old press clippings of Epstein’s purported relationship with Israeli officials, including a May 2023 story from The Wall Street Journal that was republished by The Times of Israel, which alleges that former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak met with Epstein dozens of times starting in 2013.
Barak also met with Epstein monthly for nearly a year, beginning in December 2015, according to the WSJ.
In July 2019, The New York Times reported that Barak, then 77, received approximately $2.3 million in payments between 2004 and 2006 from a foundation associated with Epstein. Epstein also invested a reported $1 million in a limited partnership established by Barak in 2015.
Former National Security Agency counterspy John Schindler wrote on his Top Secret Umbra blog in January 2024 that Epstein appeared to have been part of a shadowy Israeli influence operation characterized as MEGA.
“There’s a venerable spook joke that you need to move on from counterintelligence work when, at least once a week, you stare at yourself in the mirror while shaving and think: ‘I wonder who he’s really working for?'” Schindler wrote.
He continued: “That’s not a one-pedophile job and, given the industrial scale of Epstein’s abuse over decades, with at least hundreds of victims, it would take a considerable retinue if not a small army to keep that sordid operation going and out of public view for any extended period.”
A 2021 Rolling Stone story involving inmate Steven Hoffenberg, imprisoned for 18 years for committing a $450 million Ponzi scheme, detailed how Hoffenberg worked with Epstein in the financial sector.
Hoffenberg claimed at the time that Epstein moved in intelligence circles. When the author of the piece, Vicky Ward, brought up Hoffenberg’s relationship to Epstein himself, the former financier reportedly legally threatened her.
Eric Weinstein, mathematician and a former managing director of Thiel Capital, said during an appearance on the Diary of a CEO podcast, hosted by Steven Bartlett: “I don’t know who Jeffrey Epstein was, but I would certainly bet money that he was a product of at least one or more elements of the intelligence community. I don’t know who he was. I don’t know who ran him. He certainly was not a financier in any standard sense. That was a cover story.”
British entrepreneur Bartlett asks about Weinstein having met Epstein, and Weinstein says, “He wasn’t a financier the day I met him.” Weinstein went on to describe Epstein as a “weird guy” who “didn’t seem to know a lot about currency trading.”
A BBC documentary, House of Maxwell, released in 2022, alleged that Robert Maxwell, father of former socialite and convicted sex offender Ghislaine Maxwell, had claimed that Epstein helped Maxwell hide hundreds of millions he had stolen from his company’s pension funds. Robert Maxwell fell off his yacht to his death in 1991.
Journalist Glenn Greenwald, on X: “1) One of Epstein’s closest friends was former Israeli PM Ehud Barak; 2) A key source of Epstein’s vast wealth, though mysterious, was from Les Wexner, whose primary life cause is Israel; 3) Ghislaine Maxwell’s father – the billionaire Robert Maxwell — was a Mossad agent who mysteriously died after that was reported.
“Though Maxwell was British, Israel gave him a state funeral when he died; 4) Epstein got the red carpet treatment when visiting Israel; 5) Epstein bankrolled major investments in Israeli tech. … But fine, if Epstein had no ties to Israeli intelligence or any other intel service – which is theoretically possible – why can’t Pam Bondi, CIA and FBI say that?”
But Craig, It is time to take all that anger in maga land and redirect it. What makes it powerful isn’t the sex, it is the “rich fuckers” getting away with it. *Again* Epstein wasn’t the only one screwing underage girls and the powers that be, know it. It may not be Trump but he has “rich and powerful” backers. Some of them are on the list. That is why there was a sweetheart deal in the first place and that is why the prison move. It doesn’t matter if it was Trump or his backers they are trying to protect. They are all just a bunch of “rich fuckers” and that is the way to frame it.
Jack
BiD
Your Epstein musings today remind me, I’ve been watching a lot of bad spy movies lately. It is always the CIA,
Jack
A compromised leader is important.
The crime is important.
The money trail is important.
The cover-up is important.
There is now more of a cover-up than MAGAts originally thought, and it’s continuing to happen in real time.
Agree with your framing ideas Jack. Meanwhile I’m keen on pulling threads to keep their cover up unraveled.
https://www.democraticunderground.com/100220282555
Susie Wiles, families ties to Russia. Taking orders from Putin? That’s what Steven Hassan said.
Trump’s newly appointed Chief of Staff, Susie Wiles, brings a complex political profile, with ties to Russian oligarchs and Chinese surveillance firms.
Before joining Trump’s 2024 campaign, Wiles was a co-chair at a firm that lobbied for sanctioned individuals and companies. A lobbyist who recommended Wiles to lead US President-Elect Donald Trump’s campaign represented a Russian-born oligarch connected to the Russian President Vladimir Putin and a state-owned oil corporation Rosneft.
Wiles’ ex-husband has ties to a Kremlin-linked lobbyist known for attending the 2016 Trump Tower meeting, where “dirt” on Clinton was offered on the Russian Government’s behalf.
Wiles’ daughter failed the White House background check.
Examining her lobbying work and personal connections reveals the scale and reach of foreign affiliations, raising concerns over potential foreign influence within Trump’s incoming administration.
https://bylinetimes.com/2024/11/12/lobbyists-oligarchs-and-power-the-pro-putin-network-raising-fears-of-foreign-influence-in-trumps-team/
Reportedly, the internet had been “scrubbed” of all articles that tied her to Russia when she was first appointed.
Today’s New Yorker
“Any plans for the weekend, or for escaping the incoming totalitarian regime?”
I personally have limited bandwidth and don’t feel like tying red string around my room to get to the bottom of Epstein, but I can only speak for myself.
The only point I was making about liberal obsession of the topic isnthat conservative cooks are going to perpetuate the story anyway, giving liberals an opportunity to appeal to the electorate on more substantive matters, like that we’re all going broke
Lib/progs are rudderless though, so those were all thoughts in an idealized scenario. Trump-stein away, good Sir 🫡
Just saw an SNL cold open from 1999 (Seinfeld/Bowie), and it was Reform Party HQ: Ross Perot vetting Pat Buchanan and Donald tRUMP for VP. Donald had a plan to turn the WH into a tRUMP tower. Wild.
It was on over-the-air TV, and I can’t find it in YouTube, or I’d link it. Cheri O’Teri made a great Ross Perot. Guess Carvey had left the cast.
I was probably the first person here and one of the first person in the entire political national discourse to talk about Trump‘s Russia connections, so I don’t wanna dismiss that issue but eight years of hammering away at it and libs have achieved no political gain from it
There’s a quote I’m thinking of I can’t quite remember what it is, though I would put here hmmmmmm, it was misattributed to a really smart guy hmmmm…
do support “guy in the park” youtubes 🫡
now that trumpco lifted the prohibition on tax-exempt churches endorsing political candidates, libs will never win outside of their bastions again, so throwing shit at the wall is as good a pastime as any!
apparently season 25 episode 1 of Saturday Night Live is available on Peacock, here is a rundown of the episode with screen caps describing the scene BiD mentioned:
https://www.onesnladay.com/2020/01/24/october-2-1999-jerry-seinfeld-david-bowie-s25-e1/?amp
https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2025/08/08/sydney-sweeney-republicans-win-media-ecosystem-00497761
Rob Flaherty making the same points
perfect cartoon, today, patd. You’ve made me a fan of Marco De Angelis
Of all of the idjits portrayed in that cold open, only Ross Perot has had the decency to die.
Craig – Agree with Anon; guy in a park videos. It harkens back to your CQ man-on-the street. What’s Andrew doing these days?
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2025/8/8/trump-administration-subpoenas-new-york-attorney-general-letitia-james
Friday’s subpoenas come as the department convenes a grand jury to investigate whether James, a Democrat, violated the civil rights of President Donald Trump and other Republican-affiliated entities.
According to the media reports, the grand jury will not only probe whether Trump’s rights were violated by the fraud lawsuit, but the subpoenas will also seek information about a second lawsuit James launched against the National Rifle Association (NRA), an influential gun lobby group
“Any weaponisation of the justice system should disturb every American,” the statement said. “We stand strongly behind our successful litigation against the Trump Organization and the National Rifle Association, and we will continue to stand up for New Yorkers’ rights.”
James’s personal lawyer, Abbe Lowell, also said in a statement that her legal team was “ready and waiting with the facts and the law”.
people like seeing what’s going in the city, even if it’s nothing
Jamie’s back — and she’s flipping over the rocks to see what’s really crawling underneath the president’s latest scheme. This time, it’s a brazen attempt to change the Census..
Today’s conversation has me harking back to the beginning of the Trump family. Remember Don, Jr comment. “We can get all the money money we need from Russia!”
Wasn’t today Putin’s deadline to stop the genocide? Instead, they’re meeting Friday in Alaska.
I thought the new census was to redraw districts before 2028.
I don’t know why Trump doesn’t just refuse to administer the census and make up the numbers, just like his bank loan applications
The White House MAGA Ballroom fully imagined..
https://www.ky3.com/2025/08/08/ky3-digital-extra-redistricting-talks-heat-up-missouri/
SPRINGFIELD, Mo. (KY3) – The redistricting talks in Texas have moved to other states, including Missouri.
Democrats in the Show-Me-State could lose one of the only two Congressional seats they hold if the governor calls a special session.
State Rep. Michael Johnson, a Kansas City Democrat who chairs the Legislative Black Caucus, said any effort to remake maps is a pure power grab by Republicans seeking to shield President Donald Trump from congressional scrutiny.
“This move by the Missouri Republicans is a clear intent to shield their national counterparts from impending and inevitable loss that would be suffered in 2026 by an electorate demanding accountability for a hostile administration.”
Missouri has eight seats in the U.S. House of Representatives, with six held by Republicans and two held by Democrats. The seat being targeted in an effort to draw a seventh district where the GOP was certain to prevail is the 5th District in Jackson and Clay counties currently held by U.S. Rep. Emanuel Cleaver of Kansas City.
Gov. Mike Kehoe, who would issue the call for lawmakers to meet, told reporters Tuesday that he’s generally supportive of the push but didn’t give a date for lawmakers to convene. “We want to keep the House in Republican control, so what we look at, what we’re going to do here in Missouri, we’ll work with our leadership group and see if there’s a path or something that makes sense for Missourians,” Kehoe said, according to KYTV in Springfield.
*Califotnua and other blue states need to get busy.
same reason putin holds ‘elections’- appearance of legitimacy
the pod save guys agree with me today on Dem impotence but Dan Phieffer is adamant that the Trump-stein scandal is worth the effort to keep it prominent, on both moral and political grounds
they see the forest for the trees and recognize how dire everything is
if Olbermann is hyperbolic (and he is), the pod save guys aren’t, and the implications of their analyses are no less frightening
The problem is you had to follow these right-wing nuts all these years like I have to really understand why Epstein matters so much to them. Normal people never believed the conspiracy theories, so they don’t really get it now.
Why does Epstein matter so much to them?
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/doge-national-weather-service-rehire-b2804436.html
Reps. Mike Flood (R-Neb.) and Eric Sorensen (D-Ill.) said that the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration received permission to fill 450 positions at the National Weather Service including meteorologists, hydrologists and radar technicians.
The rehires come after a summer where extreme weather incidents put the cuts to the National Weather Service under increased scrutiny. Specifically, one government official told NBC that staff at the service believe floods in Texas and the aftermath sparked the rehiring spree.
https://thehill.com/policy/energy-environment/5421362-fema-denying-some-funding-after-floods/
After the deadly Independence Day floods, the administration declined to provide Texas with access to a tranche of FEMA funds aimed at heading off the next disaster — money intended to pay for things such as warning systems, tornado shelters and anti-flood measures.
It’s not alone.
In May, children in a Missouri elementary school sheltered from a tornado that shattered windows and ripped gutters off the building inside a safe room purchased with hazard mitigation money issued after the deadly 2011 Joplin tornado.
Though the Trump administration approved Missouri’s disaster declaration, it refused the hazard mitigation funds the state requested to buy generators and more outdoor warning sirens, state officials told The Hill. Missouri is appealing that decision.
In neighboring Oklahoma, the Biden administration had in November approved hazard mitigation funding for wildfires and straight-line winds.
But even as those funds went out, more wildfires, driven by straight-line winds, were raging across the Sooner State. President Trump issued a disaster declaration on the last day of the weeklong emergency — but denied hazard mitigation funding.
*Benjamin Franklin would hate Adolf. “A stitch in time saved mine.” Ben also might’ve been in the Epstein files.
Craig,
The one area where the census effects political desire is apportionment.
Of course, apportionment hasn’t been accurate since it was frozen at 435 members. If people were being accurately represented as originally intended, and the U.S. House of Representatives was not capped at 435 members, it would likely be significantly larger, possibly around 692 members, according to the “cube root law”. This law suggests that the number of seats in a legislature should roughly equal the cube root of the population. Of course, this would mean even greater numbers for the states with large city enclaves which would favor the Democrats, and each representative could better serve their constituents.
https://time.com/7302995/donald-trump-jeffrey-epstein-jd-vance/
While the idea of a secret “Epstein client list” became a fixation for far-right influencers and members of Trump’s base, the candidate himself rarely brought up Epstein unprompted in campaign speeches or rallies. Instead, it was Trump’s official and unofficial surrogates—many of whom now occupy top posts in his Administration—who repeatedly stoked expectations that explosive revelations were imminent, often suggesting prosecutions were coming and that thousands of pages of damning material would soon be released.
Now many in Trump’s base are accusing him of falling far short of what they expected him to do with the Epstein case, partly because of years of rhetoric from his allies that neither Trump nor his campaign did much to refute. After the Justice Department and FBI announced this month that there is no incriminating “client list” and no further disclosures would be made, Trump lashed out at his own supporters who were calling on him to release the files. “My PAST supporters have bought into this ‘bull—t,’ hook, line, and sinker,” he wrote on Truth Social. “I don’t want their support anymore!”
But some of his supporters pointed out that it was Trump himself who had deployed Epstein’s alleged client list as political ammunition a decade ago, as he was laying groundwork for his first presidential run. At the conservative conference known as CPAC in February 2015, when Trump was asked for his thoughts on former President Bill Clinton, he responded: “Nice guy. Got a lot of problems coming up in my opinion with the famous island with Jeffrey Epstein. A lot of problems.”
*He knows he’s in the files & he couldn’t poo-poo it too much or his base might’ve realized that.
Stur, the roots of why this matters so much to them go deep into early Q-Anon craziness.
They believe in a worldwide elite pedophile ring, led in part by Epstein, that has been covered up, and they believed in Trump’s many promises to release the DOJ “proof”, echoed by Patel, Bannon, Bongino and many others.
Pam Bondi launched this mini-series by announcing the records were on her desk for release, then releasing only stuff that was already public, and then saying they don’t exist, there’s “no list”.
Jamie, hopefully this census gambit was just a distraction or the courts will be tied up with another crazed power grab.
Keep pushing, keep talking, survivors and families. Your voices are the ones that really matter. People can hear you.
We just got back from a rare fine-dining splurge. I got Duck Breast with gnocchi in a cherry sauce. Full video in next episode of Date Night DC.
in addition to what Mr. C said, the kooks and con-schemers also wanted to damage Bill Clinton and by extension HRC (because they hate women that much)
My thinking was that the extra census would be to fix 2028.
The census wouldn’t be ready to do anything for the 2026 midterms, which is why he’s directing red states to redraw districts, and also why the DOJ is trying to access voter rolls.
If he doesn’t get his census, he can say the midterms were rigged. As always, every accusation is a confession.
Republicans aren’t even hiding what they’re trying to do, and I wonder if they will just eventually do away with them. I mean, if Dems retake both houses in 2026, is Adolf going to invalidate them somehow?
Yep. Remember Pizzagate?
MAGAts so want to “own the libs.” Even if they turn away from Adolf for not releasing the Epstein files, or taking away their farm subsidies or Medicaid keeping Meemaw in a care home, they will never let go of their hatred of what they think liberals are, because they think every liberal is looking down on them for everything that they are. Disagreement isn’t necessarily condescension. These are the most lost folks. It really is a cult and they will never be fully deprogrammed, even if they realize that Orange Adolf is just a fascist, gtifting turd.
About that SNL cold open from 1999, I didn’t recall Donald being involved with the Reform Party, or politics in any way. I thought he went from saying he was a Democrat to saying he was a Republican.
https://www.msnbc.com/the-briefing-with-jen-psaki/watch/trump-has-destroyed-the-gop-former-georgia-republican-switches-parties-244558917663
Trump has destroyed the GOP: Former Georgia Republican switches parties
Geoff Duncan, former Republican lt. governor of Georgia, talks with Jen Psaki about how the Republican Party is unrecognizable to him now, having become a cult for Donald Trump, and explains why he has not only left the GOP but has switched to the Democratic Party.
God
TheGodPodcast.com
“Gerrymandering is fascism’s polite way of knocking before it kicks down the door.”
For right-wing Catholics, politicized evangelicals, and socially frightened Pentecostal-Charismatics, MAGA is the new American religion. The experience believers have in their relationship to it is anything but rational.
The fusion is inseparable once the transition from God and church to Trump and MAGA is complete—and the 2024 election sanctioned that completeness. For these Christians, MAGA is their new denominational home. Like baptized Catholics, cradle Methodists, and multi-generational Pentecostals, what I now call MAGA-anity (as distinct from Christi-anity) forms a follower’s deepest, most meaningful, and resilient identity. And because it’s transcendent, the bond cannot be loosened by outside forces—not by reports of a souring economy, not by videos of shrieking moms being separated from their children by masked ICE agents, not even by the call of Christianity Today magazine to release the full Epstein files. About the possibility that Trump may be implicated in Epstein’s crimes, the Reverend Kenneth Johnson, a long-time friend of mine and widely-admired conservative evangelical leader in deep-red Adams County, Ohio, along the Kentucky border, said of the Trump voters he ministers to, “If Trump is accused, most of his followers still would not believe it.” Of course, for the few outside Adams County who might believe it, there is always the Bible’s King David, who committed both adultery and murder, but was forgiven and was called “a man after God’s own heart.”
*This was written by a woke evangelical pastor. It’s a long piece, but with the read.
pretty sure this tariff bullshit is just a simple market-manipulation insider-trading scheme
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