@GottaLaff's Threads
BREAKING—Here’s the full story: AP sources: Trump allies pressed Ukraine over gas firm apnews.com/d7440cffba4940…
2/ Their aims were profit, not politics. This circle of businessmen & GOP donors touted connections to Giuliani & Trump while trying to install new mgment at top of Ukraine’s massive state gas co. Plan was to then steer lucrative contracts to companies controlled by Trump allies
3/ Their plan hit a snag after Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko lost his reelection bid to Volodymyr Zelenskiy...
"Reality Winner is frustrated...when she hears that Trump’s personal lawyer, Michael Cohen, gets sent to a cushy, minimum security prison camp in upstate NY while her pleas for similar treatment are met w silence." If @Will_Bunch wrote it, you should read it #FreeRealityWinner
2/ "Powers that be would love for you to forget Reality Winner ever existed. That’s why Trump’s DOJ took the hardest-line approach every step of the way in prosecuting her for leaking a key govt doc in 2017, ensuring that she would remain in federal custody well beyond election"
3/ " Clearer & clearer that what she blew the whistle on—govt covering up evidence that Russian hacking of US election boards had been more successful & posed greater threat than officials wanted public to know—is major scandal that threatens the very underpinnings of democracy"
“In May 2017..Rosenstein agreed to assist Trump in an effort to fire Comey as FBI director despite Rosenstein’s knowing beforehand that pres had devised false cover story to conceal that he was firing Comey for his oversight of FBI’s Russia investigation” nybooks.com/daily/2019/05/…
2/ “Trump gave Rosenstein a draft of a letter to then FBI Director Comey, in which the president justified his firing of Comey with a concocted story...”
3/ @murraywaas “was able to read full draft of that letter, & 2 earlier drafts, as well as notes made by Stephen Miller, sr policy adviser to Trump, who helped pres write various drafts. Trump admin has refused to provide these records to Congress citing claims of exec privilege”
"The reason why we have an anti-bullying movement in this country is not just because bullying tactics are cruel and morally abhorrent, but also because bullying is ruthlessly effective." If @Will_Bunch wrote it, you should read it.
2/ "A total narcissist in WH–who plays to win w no sense of embarrassment, let alone ethics–will not only plow through guardrails that have mostly kept America on bumpy path of democracy for 243 yrs, but run over anyone who insists on playing by the old rules like a 40-ton truck"
3/ "Trump has finally built his wall – a stonewalling approach of new obstruction to block the old obstruction."
💥 Ooo! Look what the NYT just broke: "Decade in the Red: Trump Tax Figures Show Over $1 Billion in Business Losses" "Newly obtained tax info reveals that from 1985-1994, Trump’s businesses were in far bleaker condition than was previously known."
nytimes.com/interactive/20…
nytimes.com/interactive/20…
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"With econ & Trump’s idiot-savant political skills getting Barr to roll out Mueller Report findings to deaden blows & portray himself as a victim, he's at 46%...highest of his presidency & equal to the number that got Trump elected." If @Will_Bunch wrote it, you should read it.
2/ Trump "has a plan for survival. It involves essentially shredding the Constitution, demolishing the govt of “checks and balances” that was envisioned by the Founders, and promoting a crisis that will leave Americans angry and, at least psychologically, poised for a civil war."
3/ " That sounds scary but the scariest part is: It just might work: Not for the nation, of course, but for Trump, which in Trumpland is the only outcome that matters."
At Trump golf course, undocumented employees said they were sometimes told to work extra hours w/out pay: "Juarez said he would stay sometimes past midnight...vacuumed, polished silver, got restaurant ready...
All off the clock. Without being paid" wapo.st/2PFjbOU?tid=ss…
All off the clock. Without being paid" wapo.st/2PFjbOU?tid=ss…
2/ "His bosses at the Trump country club called it “side work.”
3/ "Allegations that workers were routinely shortchanged on their pay at Trump’s suburban country club are now the subject of an inquiry by the New York attorney general..."
FFS, they're purging DHS, installing tons of extremist judges in record time, war on press, spreading lies, propaganda, allowing election interference, you name it. Between Trump & McConnell, they're weakening nearly every defense we (their opponents) have. This is happening NOW.
2/ News outlets should report all of this in that context, too: A power grab, a very alarming, very dangerous, very real long term power grab that would keep racist, bigoted, corporate GOP policies in place for decades & longer. This is urgent, this is a crisis.
3/ There are times when objective reporting has to be less objective, when "both sides" must be set aside in order to save democracy, to save the heart and soul of our country, when news outlets warn citizens. This is one of those times. This is the real national emergency.
"So this is how liberty dies -- with a rambling, incoherent monologue. Trump’s bizarre -- and, to be brutally honest, frightening -- Friday morning appearance in the Rose Garden..." If @Will_Bunch wrote it, you should read it.
2/ "The import of what Trump was actually doing--triggering 1 of most signif constit crises in Amer history--as buried in alarming incoherence of delivery. Instead of case for his bogus “national emergency," short-fingered-vulgarian-in-chief presented urgent argument for 25th A"
3/ "It’s wrong not to recog there’s a history of POTUS power grabs, but this kicks it up several notches. Never b4 has a pres claimed authority to spend $ on a project that had been so clearly rebuffed by Congress, the branch of govt that is supposed to control gov purse strings"
"Chaos of 2020 election has meant no honeymoon for Beto O’Rourke, 47th pres, whose narrow win over Nikki Haley (GOP convention in Charlotte having rejected Pres Pence) had only enraged both the right & increasingly angry left..." If @Will_Bunch wrote it, you should read it.
2/ "You’d think the rapid decline of Western civilization would get more news coverage in America ... but the latest chess moves in the Trump-Russia scandal and the embattled White House continue to trump most other headlines."
3/ "I imagine one reason the mayhem in Paris hasn’t been viewed with much alarm here in the United States is the notion of French Exceptionalism, that those crazy Gauls have always gone off the deep end with their protests -- remember 1789? -- and this is just one more."
"Nat. Park Service threatens to hit political protesters on Natl Mall w lg gatherings, and it wants to make it easier to reject a spontaneous protest of the type that might occur, say, if Trump fires Mueller." If @Will_Bunch wrote it, you should read it!
2/ "The @ACLU would likely mount a similar challenge if the new Trump-era restrictions are imposed — but past success is no guarantee of future results."
3/ ... Trump and his allies — Republicans candidates, the Fox News Channel, talk radio — instead have amplified divisiveness and, in some cases, unleashed hate."
"It's nighttime in Donald Trump's America." If @Will_Bunch wrote it, you should read it.
@Will_Bunch 2/ "Worst part. In its unyielding effort to bend environmental rules to the will of its corporate patrons, Trump decided to stop arguing #ClimateChange is a hoax, instead acknowledge catastrophic climate change is so locked in for there is nothing humankind can do about it."
3/ "Team Trump has found a way to turn climate denial into something even worse — climate nihilism, the belief that the party's almost over so tonight Big Pollution might as well party like it's 2099."
Ruh roh! "According to an anonymous complaint sent to Republican Sen. Cory Gardner of Colorado, Kavanaugh physically assaulted a woman he socialized with in the Washington, D.C., area in 1998 while he was inebriated."
2/ “When they left the bar (under the influence of alcohol) they were all shocked when Brett Kavanaugh, shoved her friend up against the wall very aggressively and sexually.”
“There were at least four witnesses including my daughter.”
“There were at least four witnesses including my daughter.”
3/ Ooof!!
Our system is too broken to assess the sexual assault claim against Brett #Kavanaugh: slate.com/news-and-polit… via via @DahliaLithwick "Kavanaugh defenders were quick to say that the woman, still unnamed, was a drunk and a liar." <<Trolls are doing this as we speak.
@Dahlialithwick 2/ #Kavanaugh "called the abuser, because he was worried about the abuser’s mental health. Worrying more about the accused judge than the accusers one claims to believe is the system protecting the system. This is why women don’t come forward."
3/ "The problem is that demanding that any one woman bear the full professional and social and emotional cost of dismantling the machinery of men in power propping up other men in power is expecting entirely too much." #MeToo
>>>California professor, writer of confidential Brett #Kavanaugh letter, speaks out about her allegation of sexual assault wapo.st/2QAADV4?tid=ss…
2/ "I thought he might inadvertently kill me,” said Ford, now a 51-year-old research psychologist in northern California. “He was trying to attack me and remove my clothing.”
3/ 💥💥💥 Read this thread. "Ford said she told no one of the incident in any detail until 2012, when she was in couples therapy with her husband. "
"...All of those euphemisms for “lies” still mean lies, and if, as Haberman asserts, he really believes them, then she should report that it is also possible that the president is out touch with reality."
2/ "Journalists must work to help the public make sense of this great American dumpster fire, and a part of doing that is centering the conversation around the White House’s conflicting versions of reality."
3/ "Much of Trump’s war on the truth appears to be based in exploiting widespread media illiteracy among the citizenry. Journalism is not about striving to appear fair, but maintaining a rigorous objectivity for the purpose of serving the public."
Whaaaaa?👉🏼👉🏼NEW: Sources tell us that Mueller has evidence Cohen was in Prague in 2016, confirming part of the dossier mcclatchydc.com/news/politics-…
Boing!💥 
3/ “Cohen has vehemently denied for months that he ever has been in Prague or colluded with Russia during the campaign.”
Nunberg is on with @KatyTurNBC right now.
"Roger Stone is like family to me. I'm not gonna do it!" Nunberg to @KatyTurNBC. "I'm not a fan of Trump... He's right. It's a witch hunt."
"Why should I spend 80 hours going over my emails?" Nunberg to @KatyTurNBC. "Had he not won the primary, Trump would probably have endorsed Hillary Clinton."
👉🏼👉🏼Trump’s Lawyers Want Him to Refuse an Interview in Russia Inquiry via @NYTimes nyti.ms/2EmTm3e
2/ “His lawyers are concerned that the president, who has a history of making false statements and contradicting himself, could be charged with lying to investigators.” FOR GOOD REASON.
3/ “Refusing to sit for an interview opens the possibility that Mr. Mueller will subpoena the president to testify before a grand jury, setting up a court fight that would dramatically escalate the investigation and could be decided by the Supreme Court.”
