We know that happened on January 6th. We saw it with our own eyes, heard the testimony of his own staff and read the reports. The facts cannot be disputed. Trump lied about the election of 2020, called people to Washington, incited an insurrection in which they stormed the Capitol and hunted for the Vice President chanting “Hang Mike Pence!” And we know that Trump took no action and let it unfold until late in the day he finally told the rioters that he loved them and asked them to go home. According to the once and future president, Donald Trump, none of that is what happened: None of this is the story Trump tells. Instead, he inverts both the culpability and the morality: The rioters are victims, and those seeking justice are guilty of injustices. It’s deeply and transparently self-serving. It’s also the position of the incoming president of the United States, someone empowered to enforce his vision of justice on the rest of the country. Trump sat down for a lengthy interview with NBC News’s Kristen Welker last week during which he outlined his upside-down view of the events of Jan. 6.
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The anger of the crowd and the pettiness of plutocrats Princeton economist Paul Krugman just published his final New York Times column in a body of work begun in January 2000. He considers how the world has changed over 25 years. It’s a grimmer place: What strikes me, looking back, is how optimistic many people, both here and in much of the Western world, were back then and the extent to which that optimism has been replaced by anger and resentment. And I’m not just talking about members of the working class who feel betrayed by elites; some of the angriest, most resentful people in America right now — people who seem very likely to have a lot of influence with the incoming Trump administration — are billionaires who don’t feel sufficiently admired. Krugman doesn’t mention Trump again, but he’s the most prominent of those resentful billionaires. In early 2000, Krugman writes, “Polls showed a level of satisfaction with the direction of the country that looks surreal by today’s standards.” One could point to many reasons for the public mood, but the collapse of public faith in elites features prominently.
Ben Wikler on “The Daily Show” Ben Wikler, Democratic Party of Wisconsin chair, appeared Monday night on “The Daily Show” and made an impression on host Jon Stewart. That’s not easy to do for a political operative. Wikler, 43, a founding producer for Al Franken’s Air America radio show and former national adviser to MoveOn, is running for Democratic National Committee chair. “The passion that you’re bringing, that feels like what it needs in this moment,” Stewart said, remarking that DNC chairs he’s interviewed before felt much more corporate. “You are approaching [politics] from a much more populist, bottom-up standpoint than I’ve heard in the past. Other than Howard Dean’s 50-state strategy.” At that Dean reference, the audience applauded. I’ve mentioned Wikler in the context of the DNC chair’s race twice already. The two front runners for the position are Wikler and Minnesota’s DFL chair Ken Martin. I met Martin in passing this year at a North Carolina party meeting. He’s known, experienced, impressive, and connected. But indulge me.
Today Cliff Schecter and Hal Sparks talked about Kash Patel & how he could be the first possible leather daddy to head the FBI. The Steve Bannon plan is to overwhelm the media with Trump’s horrible nominees. What gets to the MSM, that makes them disqualified, isn’t the same as what makes it to late night comedy shows, or to Fox News, or RW social media. Part of what we can do with our audiences is to show how weird these people are. There are serious reasons these people are horrible, that would disqualify them to normal people like us. But we need to also point out stuff that the MAGAs have a hard time with, but we can’t reach their channels. If we tried they’d say, “I thought you were COOL WITH DEI, gays, and leather daddies!” So we put stuff out saying, “We’re cool them being gay or leather daddies, but we are not cool with their policies to destroy our national security, are you?” Frankly I don’t know which weird, corrupt, sick, incompetent or illegal activity of Trump’s nominees will knock them out of the process. But we need to find them and share them.
This story is breaking … elsewhere Al Jazeera: Seems the Islamist rebels already have their solution. The autocrat is gone. What comes next is the question. ISIS? A Taliban? Al-Qaeda? More from Al Jazeera: Cars flooding into Syria after al-Assad’s ouster Nour Qormosh, reporting near Idlib, Syria We are here, by the N-5 Highway. Cars are moving on the highway with people returning to their homes in Syria for the first time in 14 years. The joy of the people is insurmountable. We’ve talked to the civilians here as they transport their belongings back into the country. Their joy is shared across the Syrian geography – from Idlib to Hama, Homs, Damascus, and Deraa. This is the most significant moment in the history of the Syrian revolution. The Guardian: Two senior Syrian officers told Reuters that Assad had fled Damascus, his destination unknown. The report could not be independently verified. The senior Emirati diplomat Anwar Gargash declined to say whether Assad was fleeing to the United Arab Emirates.
Celebrating a murder This story sent chills (TMZ): Internet sleuths believe they have found the jacket worn by the gunman who killed UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson … and now it is morbidly flying off the shelves. On Reddit, a user speculated the suspect’s jacket was a Sherpa Lined Two Picket Hooded Trucker Jacket by Levi’s … sold at Macy’s for the retail price of $225. The jacket’s popularity has since spread like wildfire on the company’s website … where more than 6,000 people were viewing the jacket at the same time — and nearly 700 were sold in the past 48 hours, according to an item popularity tool on Macy’s site. The New York Times follows up (Gift link): A grainy image of his face drew comparisons to Hollywood heartthrobs. A jacket similar to the one he’s wearing on wanted posters is reportedly flying off the shelves. And the words written on the bullets he used to kill a man in cold blood on a sidewalk on Wednesday have become, for some people, a rallying cry.
WTF is he talking about? Huh??? He’s right that Assad has been deposed and that Russia and Iran basically said “we’re out” and let it happen. Other than that, this is the usual contradictory, puerile nonsense he spews when he doesn’t know what he’s talking about. He’s over in Paris acting like the president so he’s putting out statements like they are official US policy. They are not, at least not yet. He should just keep his mouth shut but he is incapable of that. BTW, the US has almost a thousand troops in Syria but whatever…
He appeared on Meet The Press this morning. I’m sure it’s the last thing many of you want to see. But here are a few highlights you should probably watch. I don’t know about you but I felt my energy and anger return at seeing that miscreant say that he’s going to deport American citizens and well … everything else. He’s feeling his oats and he clearly wants revenge. And he’s obviously is counting on his henchman and hencwoman Patel and Bondi to help him get it. There is simply no doubt about it. (By the way, I still have to use twitter for these because Blue Sky videos don’t render properly on this platform. Yet.)
I sill leave it to others to analyze what’s happening in Syria and the ramifications for the region and the rest of the world. I’ll link to good ones I run across later. But one thing does seem clear. The Russian government is on a losing streak and for good reason. Charlie Sykes offered this concise take: Let’s start with V. Putin’s crappy weekend, shall we? The fall of Vlad’s Syrian bitch extends a remarkable run of reverses for the Russian czar-manque. Phillips P. OBrien notes that since his invasion of Ukraine, Putin’s actions have “caused Sweden and Finland to join NATO and it looks like Russia [is going] to lose its base in Syria because it can’t keep enough forces in the area.” And since we’re toting up the butcher’s bill, Putin has managed to seize only “a relatively small part of Ukraine,” while Russia has “suffered more than 750k casualties and seen millions of young, educated people flee the country.
And a true leader What an excellent choice to lead the military.