ChiCom dictator Xi Jinping on Monday arrived in Moscow for a high-stakes meeting with Russian dictator Vladimir Putin as the Ukraine was tests their “no-limits friendship,” the AP reports.

While House Speaker pro tem Kevin McCarthy is sucking up to Donald Trump by doing little things like putting a logo for Truth Social on the Speaker’s official website–trying to make it look like a legitimate social media site–Kevs apparently doesn’t actually read what Trump has posted there.

McCarthy told NBC News he doesn’t think people should protest the expected upcoming indictment of Trump, rumored to be scheduled for this week as New York City prepares for potential unrest.  “I don’t think people should protest this, no. And I think President Trump, if you talk to him, he doesn’t believe that, either,” McCarthy said, responding to a question from NBC during House Republicans’ retreat in Orlando.

Apparently, McCarthy doesn’t follow Trump’s posts over the last 36 hours as he has repeatedly entreated his cadre of cult followers to “protest” and stand up for him, claiming that his indictment on financial impropriety charges amounts to a undermining the Constitution because he has some God-given right to commit crimes.

“A lotta people are saying, oh, anybody who picks on George Soros is an anti-Semite,” corrupt Trump supporter Alan Dershowitz says, as though he has the authority over everything.  “Well, let me tell you, I’m a proud, deeply-committed Jew and Zionist.  Please, everybody, feel free to tell the truth about George Soros.  Don’t worry about false charges that it’s anti-Semitic.”

In National Zero sportsball news, the Liberty University Flames on Sunday fell, 75 to 71, to the Wisconsin Badgers in the second round of the National Invitational Tournament, ESPN reports.

The details of the game were unimportant and there’s no real real for us to cover this besides an opportunity to note that the Liberty Flames now have to watch the rest of the NIT from the corner.

Like we mentioned earlier, shooting and murders are actually down in New York City (and probably in his actual district in Manhattan) since Alvin Bragg took over. The city overall is a considerably safer place to live than virtually everywhere in MAGAmerica in terms of risk of “external forces” like homicide and car accidents according to a 2022 study by Bloomberg’s Justin Fox.

Disgraced former President Trump has called on lawyer Robert Costello to serve as a “rebuttal witness” to try to dissuade the grand jury from voting to indict his fat ass this week as is allowed under New York State law when a person is targeted by a grand jury, the New York Times reports.

The decision to hear out Costello lies with the grand jury and it’s unclear yet if they’ll accept his offer to testify. Cohen will then testify some more to re-rebut Costello if necessary.

Sources in the New York City Police Department tell the Daily Beast the brass are readying to activate a 700-member “disorder control” unit to kick some MAGA ass if things get out of hand as fat former President Trump faces indictment in Manhattan this week.

The Beast’s report also mentions fanboys readying a “Patriot moat” around Mar-a-Lago to prevent any marshals from coming to detain the Orange God Emperor and bring him north to face justice.

In MAGA world nothing is ever a coincidence. Bad news for fanboys can never happen in a vacuum, it has to be some sort of Soros plot to distract from the bottomless corruption and malevolence of the libs. Maria Bartiromo herself is a pro at this: Claiming Dems were dragging out the pandemic to justify continued use of mail-in ballots in the midterms, that Vladimir Putin invaded Ukraine to distract from the “explosive” allegation of spying by Hillary Clinton, so on and so forth.

This time however it was her guest, House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer, doing that legwork, saying it’s “very odd” that Trump said he would be arrested the day after his investigation found some bullshit “evidence” of the Biden family taking money from the ChiComs or whatever that will collapse under a light application of scrutiny soon enough. What’s interesting is that Comer doesn’t even bother to go through the motions to say he’s going to investigate this alleged coordination between Hunter Biden and Manhattan DA Alvin Bragg to undermine Comer’s “devastating” allegations of whatever the fuck he thinks he found. He just casually tosses it out there and makes it clear he’ll continue to let himself be victimized by these evil machinations. Sad!

One of the backbencher weekend Fox and Friends hosts on Sunday moaned that the Manhattan DA Alvin Bragg’s pursuit of charges against disgraced former President Trump is somehow “sacrificing” the lives of Black civilians. “How many Black lives have you sacrificed under a higher crime city with increased murder rates to devote a limited number of resources to the priority of pursuing a weak case against Donald Trump?” asked the shitweasel, whatever his name is. Another said it was Bragg’s way of paying back his master, George Soros for supporting his campaign in 2021.

“NYC expected to record double-digit dip in murders for 2022,” Fox News’s sister publication the New York Post reported on December 29, 2022, adding “New York City is on pace for a double-digit percentage dip in murders this year as police records show a small improvement in closing homicide cases.” It’s hard to nail down what the murder rate was in just Bragg’s bailiwick in Manhattan in 2022 – his first year in office – but the borough’s annual homicide number is typically in the mid-double digits – 47 in 2020, 35 in 2019, 39 in 2018 – so there’s no reason to believe it changed significantly last year. But don’t let any of that stop these fuckers from making the borough of Manhattan sound like an apocalyptic nightmare while they’re sitting in their ground-floor studio in the middle of it.

How many Feds/Fed assets are in place to turn protest against the political arrest of Pres Trump into violence?

— Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene🇺🇸 (@RepMTG) March 19, 2023

BREAKING NOOSE: Former Vice President Mike Pence told ABC’s Jonathan Karl he’ll swing some cooperation with the subpoena from Justice Department special prosecutor Jack Smith.

“We’re not asserting executive privilege, which may encompass other discussions,” Pence said in an interview set to air Sunday, adding that he’s still hanging on to the Speech and Debate clause for certain aspects of the questions. “I just believe that the work that I did preparing for and conducting on my role as President of the Senate is covered… I believe we have the law on our side.”

Russian President Vladimir Putin on Sunday made an unannounced visit to the Ukrainian city of Mariupol, a city in the Donetsk region that had more than 400,000 residents prior to the war but now has fewer than 100,000 people in it, the New York Times reports.

An early target of the Russian military following the February invasion, Mariupol held out for more than three months before the remaining Ukrainian defenders, holed up in a massive steel mill, surrendered at the end of May.  Putin’s visit to the city came days after he was indicted on war crimes charges by the International Criminal Court for ordering Ukrainian children kidnapped to Russia.

Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg on Saturday told his office to stay frosty amid the threats of violence from the supporters of maniacal former President Trump in the days before the all-but-certain indictment of the fat orange fuck on charges related to his illegal hush money payoff to pornstar Stormy Daniels in the days prior to the 2016 election, Politico reports.

“Our law enforcement partners will ensure that any specific or credible threats against the office will be fully investigated and that the proper safeguards are in place so all 1,600 of us have a secure work environment,” Bragg told his staff amid the Orange Terrorist’s threats to their safety.

“Folks, this is one of the darkest days in our history if this turns out to be true.  And a political opponent of a man in the White House, Joseph Biden, whose son is on tape committing sexual acts that you’re accusing Donald Trump of.”

First:  Trump’s not under investigation for having sex with Stormy Daniels.  Trump’s under investigation for covering up a payment to her to keep her quiet about having sex with him to protect his political prospects. Second:  Who can find Bongino chanting, “Lock her up!”? And finally:  Hunter’s laptop?  Really?  Bongino’s asking for more lawsuits.

Former Texas Lt Governor Ben Barnes tells the New York Times in an interview that in 1980 he was dispatched to meet with the Iranian regime to tell the Ayatollah’s goons they could get a better deal with then-candidate Ronald Reagan in the White House if they held out on releasing the American hostages from the embassy seized during the revolution, something Barnes had kept secret for 43 years and is only now coming forward with for whatever reason.

A source inside the Manhattan District Attorney’s office tells Yahoo News that prosecutors are in “delicate negotiations” with the Secret Service on how to bring Trump into court to turn himself in and that the indictment probably won’t come until the end of the week or so. It’s also unlikely to feature a “perp walk” out on the street in front of the courthouse given the obviously high level of attention and security concerns from MAGA terrorists, but the situation is still very “fluid.”

Here we go again — an outrageous abuse of power by a radical DA who lets violent criminals walk as he pursues political vengeance against President Trump.

I’m directing relevant committees to immediately investigate if federal funds are being used to subvert our democracy by…

— Kevin McCarthy (@SpeakerMcCarthy) March 18, 2023

Reacting to their Orange God Emperor’s (likely inaccurate) warning that he’ll have to turn himself in on Tuesday in Manhattan on his all-but-certain indictment, MAGA Land did what they do best, writing comments on the internet squealing with outrage and butthurt over the unfairness of it all:

“Anything to divert attention away from the Biden cartel” – Top comment on Breitbart article.

“The one good thing the right has going for it is, the left usually over plays its hand. Unintended consequences are the Achillies heal of the left” – Fox News top comment.

“I seem to recall a certain laptop story that got buried because it would hurt some candidate and his presidential run… pretty sure what got covered up there is far more detrimental and problematic for the country than this. Oh yea, I forgot, rules for thee, but not for me – Daily Wire top comment.

“Meanwhile Biden gets away with crimes 10 times worse than this” – Gateway Pundit top comment.

“I am fascinated by people on the hard left. Not that there are many of them reading on this site, but would love to ask, isn’t even the least bit suspicious to you that all forces are in desperate alignment to get rid of this one single guy (all of us by extension I guess). This nonsense is magnitudes different than Bush (both), Romney, et al. Is it not possible to see that the uniparty deepstate is so threatened by this one person trying to save this country? He definitely has faults for all to see, but wow, try to get a sense of perspective … and I wholeheartedly agree; be very careful when you protest. The Stasi is looking for reasons to put you in jail” – RedState.com top comment.

They seem almost resigned at this point, as if the window had been moved to where it needed to be rather than a gut punch shock like the FBI raid or the underwhelming midterms for the GOP.

A Trump spokesworm on Saturday walked back on the fat former President’s deranged all-caps claim that he faces arrest in Manhattan on Tuesday, saying “There has been no notification other than the illegal leaks from the” DA’s office and blah blah blah, according to New York Times reporter Maggie Haberman. It’s still not clear why Donald said Tuesday specifically, but it’s apparent that the DA’s office has not given him any sort of formal notification yet at this point.