Category: Uncategorized

JP Morgan Chase on Tuesday agreed to pay a $75 million to the government of the US Virgin Islands to settle a lawsuit brought accusing them of complicity in Jeffrey Epstein’s pimping out teenage girls to his scumbag friends on his island within the territory’s borders, the Daily Beast reports.

The non-union Clinton Township, Michigan auto parts company hosting disgraced former President Trump’s Wednesday speech is hyping the event with some pretty dystopian shit, writing in a Tuesday Facebook post that they “are excited to announce that Drake Enterprises, Inc will be hosting former President Donald Trump tomorrow. In 2019, we rolled out an employee engagement program centered on patriotism and support for America. This program has sought to encourage our work force to embody the American Dream, whatever that may be for each employee.”

“With that said, we value this opportunity and are honored to provide a platform to one of America’s former leaders,” they continued and LOL at the explicit uses of “former” in the post. “Politics aside, this is a tremendous opportunity to expand name recognition for Drake Enterprises and help us to continue living our American Dream of growing our company and expanding our product lines. We want to recognize our ✨ staff ✨as they are a huge reason we were asked to host this event. We hope all of our followers are Living their American Dream!!” followed by an American flag meme.

So to recap, eight days ago the New York Times reported with the literal headline: “Trump to Woo Striking Union Members in Detroit, Skipping 2nd GOP Debate,” which ended up being accurate when you remove the words “Striking Union Members” and “Detroit” because Clinton Township is about 18 miles north and the workers in the audience will not be on strike nor will they be union members.

The whole situation has a very “Four Seasons” vibe to it, like the Orange Warlord demanded that his minions immediately find a “Blue Collar” setting for Trump to capitalize on the strike politically, and, without working the phones first to find a union shop or meeting hall or some place germane to the strike they went and told the Times’s Shane Goldmacher and Maggie Haberman that he was definitely going to “Woo Striking Union Members in Detroit.” Then came the “Oh fuck” moment when they realized they couldn’t actually get Trump in front of any real, genuine UAW members.

Dem Wisconsin Senator Tammy Baldwin joined the chorus of DINO Bob Menendez’s colleagues urging him to resign, writing “The indictment spells out deeply troubling allegations against Senator Menendez that breach the American people’s trust and compromise his ability to effectively represent his constituents. While Senator Menendez enjoys the presumption of innocence until proven guilty and will have his day in court to defend himself, I believe it’s best for his constituents, the American people, and our national security for the Senator to step down,” in a statement.

Baldwin follows Vermont Senator Pete Welch, Ohio’s Sherrod Brown, and Pennsylvania’s John Fetterman in calling for Menendez to get the fuck out. Noteworthy is that Brown and Baldwin are up for reelection next year. Former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has also said it’s time to go.

First son Hunter Biden on Tuesday filed a federal civil complaint against alcoholic shitbrain Rudy Giuliani for committing computer fraud and violating his privacy with the famous laptop the gropey former New York City mayor obtained under murky circumstances, CNBC reports. Also named as a defendant is Rudy’s (now former?) attorney Robert Costello, who is also suing Captain 9/11 over $1.36 million in unpaid fees accrued during multiple civil cases and federal investigations.

A CNN rundown of former Trump White House aide Cassidy Hutchinson’s book Enough contains some pretty dark and not all that unbelievable shit, including her boss, Mark Meadows admitting that the administration and campaign did kind of kill one-time GOP presidential primary candidate Herman Cain by exposing him to COVID-19 at the infamous failed Tulsa rally in June 2020.

The best part is that a spokesperson for Meadows doesn’t deny to CNN that the disgraced former Chief of Staff literally said “We killed Herman Cain” in the aftermath, but that it was out of some sort of twisted sarcasm. “In the days after he was expressing exasperation that the media would blame the President for Mr Cain’s death. Very different,” the Meadows spokesworm said. Other lowlights:

Trump complaining to Meadows after the Supreme Court rejected the Texas lawsuit to overturn the election in December 2020. “Why didn’t we make more calls? We needed to do more… We can’t let this stand,” and “I don’t want people to know we lost, Mark. This is embarrassing. Figure it out,” the Orange Tyrant told Meadows after days of being fed false promises that they would win the case.

The Meadows spokesperson denying to CNN that Meadows had burned documents in his fireplace with “Mrs Meadows was referencing how the wood fireplace made the office smell smoky – and we often started it using old newspaper. It had nothing to do with documents,” in response to Hutchinson writing that Meadows’s wife had complained his suits stank of smoke from burning incriminating documents during that last month or so as the White House collapsed into anarchy.

Well, so says the response by indicted melon Donald Trump’s attorneys to the Special Counsel’s motion for a proposed gag order that would block the disgraced real estate developer from issuing “disparaging and inflammatory or intimidating statements about any party, witness, attorney, court personnel, or potential jurors. The defendant is also prohibited from causing surrogates to make such statements on his behalf.”

But Trump argues “no witness has suggested that he or she will not testify because of anything President Trump has said. To the contrary, witnesses appear eager to share their expected testimony with the media and will undoubtedly testify at a potential trial, if called to do so.”  Nah, of course not!  That’s why Jack Smith has a security team in court and Trump supporters are sending death threats to a federal judge.

The arguments against the proposed terms are just a better-spelled and marginally more coherent version of the garbage Trump posts on Truth Social, bewailing that the gag order “lacks any semblance of narrow tailoring, sweeping in, for instance, all ‘disparaging’ statements about any ‘potential witness,’ regardless of subject, and including individuals who are actively waging political campaigns against President Trump” and would prevent “President Trump from defending himself in the political arena, while giving President Biden and his surrogates (including those in the corporate media) free reign to say whatever they want” as if any of that is somehow supposed to be the court and the prosecution’s problem. Maybe he should just drop out of the race if it’s all too burdensome.

Speaking to Rachel Maddow in her first live televised interview, former aide to Trump White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows Cassidy Hutchinson addressed a passage in her book where she alleges Congress’s Eddie Haskell, Florida Republican Congressman Matt Gaetz, attempted to slide his way into her cabin during a Republican retreat.  Asked by Maddow’s staff for a comment, the man credibly accused of child sex trafficking and current subject of a House Ethics Committee investigation responded, “I don’t remember either of those events and based on Cassidy’s prior false statements, I doubt they occurred. I did date Cassidy for a few weeks while we were both single a few years ago.”  Note, however, Gaetz did not deny the accusations.

Asked for her response, Hutchinson stated after offering some niceties, “Matt Gaetz, in my opinion, is somebody I personally do not hold in high regards in terms of trust, and I do not think Matt Gaetz has the best track record for relationships and condoning, condoning his relationships, how he thinks they might be defined.  I will say on behalf of myself, I never dated Matt Gaetz.  I have much higher standards in men and Matt, frankly, is a very unserious politician.”

A new Pew Research survey on Americans’ feelings toward the Electoral College finds a nearly two thirds of overall respondents, 65 percent, in favor of ditching the antiquated and flawed system of electing the president, while only 33 percent want to hang on to it. Even 47 percent of self-identified Republican respondents said they want to switch to a national popular vote system.

The part that you will not at all be surprised to learn is the Republican respondents describing themselves as “highly politically engaged” were the group most in favor of keeping the GOP’s presidential head start program in place, at 72 percent support. Which might just kind of indicate a whole lot of Republican voters don’t really know shit and what sounds good and fair to them on paper would actually be game over for their chances of ever winning the White House again.

Pew’s 2023 finding on the question is consistent with last year’s 63 percent against the Electoral College versus 35 percent in favor. Funny enough the last time a pollster saw support for switching to the popular vote at near parity with keeping the unpopular vote was in December 2016, when Gallup found 47 percent favoring the Electoral College and 49 percent against, a switch from their June 2013 finding of 63 percent against and 29 percent for, very consistent with Pew in 2023.

Weird how that was the month so many Americans suddenly remembered how awesome the Electoral College is and then that awareness ebbed over the next half-decade-plus, right?

“Here’s what I predict, and this is something I said last week on my podcast, Verdict with Ted Cruz,” shameless self-promoting podcaster Ted Cruz says, using his characteristic weasel words on the GOP cable propaganda network.  “I think the odds are very significant that next summer at the Democrat National Convention that the Democrat Party will jetison Joe Biden, they will throw him off the ticket and they will parachute in instead Michelle Obama to be their candidate.  I think they’re gonna look to Michelle Obama a-a-as the savior to come in a-and I think if that happens that would be very, very dangerous.”

First, any Obama, even Sunny, would be a better candidate than Trump.  But more realistically, Michelle Obama has stated repeatedly she will not pursue a political career and that she has no interest in entering the political arena.  And in reality, Ted is just jealous Marge is getting all the “craziest member of Congress” airtime.

At a time of the year when the ice should be at its thickest, the Antarctic sea ice levels are at record lows, possibly signalling an irrevocable point in the fight against climate change, the Washington Post reports.  Sea ice levels in the Antarctic hit their lowest point in February and their highest in September; this month, it hit its peak on September 10th, nearly two weeks earlier than normal.

At that point, there were 6.55 million square miles of ice, and it has been receding since thanks to warmer ocean temperatures.  Worse yet:  the amount of ice is nearly 400,000 square miles less than the previously recorded low in 1986.

“There is some concern that this may be the beginning of a long-term trend of decline for Antarctic sea ice, since oceans are warming globally, and warm water mixing in the Southern Ocean polar layer could continue,” read the National Snow and Ice Data Center, a service from the Univeristy of Colorado, said in an announcement released Monday.

So, I was just swatted during my podcast.

The caller pretended to be me and told the cops – "I've stabbed someone, had a gun, and was going to kill myself."

This is the result of being doxxed over and over by leftist outlets. You can imagine how dangerous this is.

I'm okay,…

— Catturd ™ (@catturd2) September 25, 2023

Widely non-respected and regularly ridiculed dipshit “legal expert” Jonathan Turley is listed as House Oversight Chairbilly James Comer’s star witness at the first hearing of this stupid Biden Impeachment “inquiry” coming up on Thursday, lol. Seriously, it’s in Comer’s announcement.

“This hearing will establish the basis for the impeachment inquiry and present the evidence House Republicans have uncovered to date regarding President Joe Biden’s knowledge of and role in his family’s domestic and international business practices,” meaning Turley’s going to tell them how to write the articles of impeachment or something who the fuck knows. The other witnesses are listed as “Bruce Dubinsky, Founder, Dubinsky Consulting,” who – Surprise! – is a longtime Fox News contributor and supposedly an accountant, and “Eileen O’Connor, Former Assistant Attorney General, Department of Justice Tax Division,” a Federalist Society member and a George W Bush appointee who hasn’t served in the public sector since 2007 aside from a brief stint on “then-President-elect Trump’s Treasury Department Transition Team” per her Federalist bio.

This is going to be such a complete shitshow. Cannot wait to carry it here live on National Zero.

Trump spokesman Steven Cheung, whose head could seriously win a watermelon contest at a county fair, on Monday tweeted and then hours later deleted a video of his boss “buying” a Glock pistol from a gun store in South Carolina before his rally after quite a few folks pointed out that it’s a federal crime to purchase a firearm while being under felony indictment, Meidas Touch reports.

It’d been possible, maybe even likely, that Trump was bullshitting to the store owner when presented with the pistol. We actually would’ve been quicker to believe that than if someone had told us he had handed them his American Express and paid for it on the spot, given his history of over-promising and under-purchasing for his fans. But now that Bucephalus deleted the tweet and went into damage control mode we’re not so sure. Someone’s going to have to go full Zapruder film here and also check to see if there’s any ambiguity to the statues against purchase and possession and what would constitute a clear violation. Like would it necessarily matter if the Trump campaign paid for it rather than he himself personally? How hard would it be to definitively establish whom the purchaser is if not? A lot could hinge on these questions if this incredibly stupid fuckup starts snowballing.

Far right local radio host Steve Gill confirmed to the Tennessee Holler on Monday that a European watchdog’s report naming him as one of “34 non-Russian foreign persons involved in the ‘international observation’ of Russian ‘elections’ in occupied Ukrainian territories” to help falsely legitimize this month’s phony contests was indeed accurate and he was detailed by his handlers to the Donetsk region to “observe” the polling. “I was there,” Gill wrote in an email to the Holler.

Even better was Gill’s confirmation that a lawyer tied to Tennessee Republican Senator Marsha Blackburn’s campaigns was present with him in the Donetsk region. “Unlike here in the states, the votes are transported somewhere else for the count, which would, as we see here, allow for all sorts of mischief. I watched and thought through how I might cheat if I was there, and I could not find a way,” Gill wrote in a follow-up, clearly trying to say elections in Russian-occupied eastern Ukraine in the middle of a bloody war are legitimate while the ones conducted in the United States aren’t.

Yeah, he went there. Again. A little more definitively this time, without the insincere qualifiers. Same solipsism as always, like nobody else got sick or lost their job because of the pandemic – or died.

Other lowlights from this cult fest include Trump asking fans not to boo Lindsey Graham because he “helps him on the left,” which really sounded like he meant “with the gays,” “joking” that he wanted to give himself the Congressional Medal of Honor after he was brave enough to fly into Iraq, then blaming President Jeb [sic] Bush for invading the country, and he’s still talking so there will probably be a few more. Oh, and during the pre-show RSBN coverage white nationalist Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene interfered in the GOP primary by calling on all the other candidates to drop out immediately and apologize to Trump. They also visited a gun store together and Trump refused to answer the owner’s question on whether he would unban pistol braces before buying a Glock with an image of his face etched on the handle …which might have kind of been a federal crime considering he’s currently under felony indictment if he really did buy it (he probably didn’t).

Really hard to decide what’s more pathetic about this public demonstration of her obedience training after Trump called out the RNC – and Ronna by name – in Truth Social post a ordering them to “start suing now” and “get the right lawyers this time” to find some way to halt Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro’s plan to institute automatic voter registration at all state DMVs.

We have deep concerns about how this could affect the security of the ballot. The @GOP has a long history of fighting, and winning, in PA courts for election integrity.

Stay tuned. (2/2)

— Ronna McDaniel (@RonnaMcDaniel) September 25, 2023

It could be just the emptily “demanding answers” over their “deep concerns” coming obviously very short of filing a lawsuit as she plainly hopes that the fat bastard will just forget it and find something else to complain about. Or the “@GOP has a long history of fighting, and winning, in PA courts for election integrity,” which lol no they don’t. They’ve gotten their asses kicked in every major case of the last few years. Maybe they did better before that and it’s like if she said former Fox News chief Roger Ailes had a long history of sexually harassing and abusing women until he stopped in 2017.

Could be that this is very incongruous with – if not in letter, then the spirit of – Ronna’s lame new “Bank Your Vote” campaign, which seemed to signal that national Republicans were going to try stop constantly bitching and crying about early voting and try to get their base to embrace it after beginning so many election days already in the hole against Dems, which was especially painful from them in Pennsylvania last year. Getting people to vote, be it early or same-day, requires getting them to register. What better than the state doing that job for you? Which is probably why she stayed quiet on Shapiro’s plan until Trump found out and threw a tantrum. Or that she knew this isn’t going to be a winnable fight so why bother. “Stay tuned” for a whole lot of nothing either way.

Pennsylvania Senator John Fetterman’s office tells the Messenger he’s going to return the $5,000 his scumbag DINO colleague Bob Menendez donated to Fetterman’s successful 2022 campaign.

“We are in process of returning the money in envelopes stuffed with $100 bills,” said Fetterman spokesman Joe Calvello of the unsubtle dig at the evidence of bribery in Menendez’s indictment. Our guess is they briefly considered gold bars but that might not have been a lawful reimbursement.

“President Biden swore an oath to uphold our Constitution and protect American Democracy. Freedom of the press is a fundamental Constitutional right. To abuse presidential power and violate the Constitutional rights of reporters would be an outrageous attack on our democracy and the rule of law. Presidents must always defend Americans’ freedoms – never trample on them for selfish, small, and dangerous political purposes,” says the White House in a statement responding directly to disgraced former President Trump’s insane vow to punish NBC for their coverage.

More of this please. Trump’s hateful bullshit need not be amplified nor does he need to even be named in a simple restatement of principle to point out how fundamentally bent and debased he is.

Far right Montana Congressman Matt Rosendale kind of lost control for just a little bit while speaking with some Newsmax host on Monday, getting plainly annoyed over being asked why he’s going to let the government shut down if his plan to leave 30 percent of it unfunded doesn’t pass. Rosendale was also keen to insist most Americans won’t actually notice it if the federal government shuts down, raising the question of why everyone else in politics thinks it’s important to prevent from happening since this Freedom Caucasian and a few of his buddies say it’s no big deal.

Complete tool MAGA lawyer Stefan Passantino, credibly accused in the courts of public opinion and of the DC Bar Association (but not yet criminally) of tampering with former Trump White House aide Cassidy Hutchinson’s damning testimony to the House January 6th Select Committee, last week sued former Mueller Investigation prosecutor Andrew Weissman for defamation, seeking $75,000 in damages for reputational harm caused by Weissman’s September 15th tweet in which Weismann wrote that Passantino had coached Hutchinson to lie. Passantino’s complaint on the first page cites Hutchinson telling investigators “I want to make this clear to you: Stefan [Passantino] never told me to lie… He told me not to lie” but not the part where she quoted Passantino as having told her “No, no, no. We don’t want to go there. We don’t want to talk about” the legendary “Steering Wheel grab” incident when Trump allegedly assaulted at least one Secret Service agent on January 6th.

So while maybe in a narrow technical sense saying that Passantino had “coached [Hutchinson] to lie” isn’t the most accurate description, the “coached” part – with the heavy implication of getting her to omit certain parts that were unambiguously embarrassing to the ketchup-flinging maniac – definitely is. A defamation claim needs to meet a burden of proof that we’re not quite sure is within reach here, especially considering the Bar complaint and that the dipshit appeared to have been pushed out of his law firm the day after the transcript of Hutchinson’s testimony to the committee dropped. It might also have helped if the former Trump White House “ethics” lawyer’s suit against Weissman had landed before a politically sympathetic judge, maybe one his former boss appointed.

It didn’t. Politico’s Kyle Cheney reports that Passantino’s case has been assigned to none other than DC Circuit Court Judge Tanya Chutkan. We’re not attorneys and don’t have any specific take on the merits, it’s just something tells us that if Passantino doesn’t already regret filing it then he will when the jurist, so deeply feared and loathed in MAGA circles, starts banging her gavel.