Apparently having caught a lot of shit from other customers about the obviously corrupt deal that led his company into footing the $91 million bond for fat former President Trump’s appeal of the defamation verdict brought by rape victim EJ Carroll, Chubb CEO (and former Trump appointee) Evan Greenberg on Wednesday tried to calm them down with an explanation about why he did it.

“I am writing to you because I have been made aware of your concerns about the appeal bond the company’s surety division provided in the E Jean Carroll defamation suit against Donald Trump. I want to provide you the facts including the purpose of appeal bonds and why our company provides these bonds so you understand our actions. An appeal bond is an important, neutral mechanism in our justice system ensuring the defendants have access to the appellate courts, ie right to appeal, while guaranteeing the plaintiffs will receive any damages that were awarded and affirmed on appeal. When Chubb provides an appeal bond it has nothing to do with the underlying merits or with favoring any of the parties in the case. As the surety, we don’t take sides, it would be wrong for us to do so and we are in no way supporting the defendant. We are supporting and are part of the justice system plumbing included in this case,” Greenberg wrote in an open letter to pissed off clients.

“When Chubb issues an appeal bond, it isn’t making judgments about the claims, even when the claims involve alleged reprehensible conduct. We, like you, leave judgments to the courts and our bond serves the important purpose of facilitating the legal process, providing the certainty that courts and plaintiffs require after an adverse trial court decision. Importantly, in the bonding process, Chubb protects its own assets by requiring that a bond be fully collateralized. If the bond is called, then Chubb takes the collateral which is intended to make us whole,” he continued, washing his hands of any simple moral discretion he could’ve exercised and then skipping any mention of who exactly collateralized the bond and if they might be a corrupt and/or hostile foreign entity.

Mentally ill Congresswomen Marjorie Taylor Greene and Nancy Mace denied their opposition to the bill forcing a sale of TikTok to an American company had nothing to do with disgraced former President Trump’s reversal on his hatred of the platform. This of course comes just a few months after Greene tweeted “Not only is TikTok brainwashing our kids with CCP propaganda but any conservative who wishes to share content gets immediately banned.” Real principled that one.

The Maine state Senate on Wednesday sent a bill adding the state to the National Popular Interstate Vote Compact to Gov Janey Mills’s desk, putting another four electoral votes to the compact’s total, now at 209, Daily Kos reports while claiming that another 82 are “possible” by 2028.

It’s not, but like we keep saying, don’t bet against it happening by 2040 as Pennsylvania (19), Nevada (6), Virginia (13), Arizona (11), and Wisconsin (10) may have Dem trifectas at varying points over the next decade. Daily Kos’s report says Michigan’s NPVIC bill advanced out of committee but remains stalled pending the outcome of two special state House elections next month.

Fat former President Trump on Wednesday posted he’s “asked Congressman Mark Walker to join my Campaign team to work with Faith Groups and Minority Communities, and he has agreed to immediately do so. During his tenure in the US House, Mark led on the FUTURE ACT, launched the HBCU paid internship program on Capitol Hill, and organized the largest ever fly-in for HBCU Chancellors for meetings with our Nation’s top leaders. Congressman Walker is also the only Republican in Congress to have won the prestigious UNCF President’s List Award, and delivered the Commencement Address at one of our Nation’s great HBCUs. He is very well suited for this important work” and some other shit that Donald is pretty unlikely to have written himself.

It’s possible this is some kind of bribe since Walker, the former North Carolina 6th District Congressman from 2015 to 2021, is about to face Trump’s endorsed candidate Addison McDowell in a runoff for the nomination, which is the general since there’s no Dem running in the 6th. McDowell, a lobbyist acolyte of NRCC Chair Richard Hudson, came in first at 26.1 percent, just ahead of Walker’s 24.1 percent in the first round five-way, so Walker may have the edge in the May 14th runoff given his name ID. Whether this means Walker’s actually going to step back from the race so Trump doesn’t have to take yet another L on his overrated endorsement record is not clear yet.

Either way there are some problems here. Well really just one in that Walker is white and it might come across as a little, uh, condescending to Black people of faith that Walker is Trump’s chosen ambassador to them. Like Tim Scott wasn’t available to do more or less the same shit he already does but have some kind of title attached to it? If not, there aren’t any other Black MAGAchurch pastors out there who want to step into the role? There has to be at least 12 of them.

Former “CNN This Morning” host Don Lemon is now also the former host of “The Don Lemon Show on Twitter X” after the platform’s ketamine-brained owner Elon Musk fired Lemon for asking him about… wait for it …reports of Musk’s heavy ketamine usage, freelancer Kara Swisher reports.

“Contract terminated” was the text Musk sent to Lemon after the interview Friday. Swisher writes that she had warned Lemon this was going to happen “despite promises by Musk and CEO Linda Yaccarino – who extravagantly touted this deal at CES to advertisers – that this time was different.”

Unknown to us until we saw Lemon’s tweet announcing the breakup on Wednesday was that this was actually the first and now obviously the only episode of “The Don Lemon Show on X” to be produced under the partnership. “There were no restrictions on the interview that he willingly agreed to, and my questions were respectful and wide ranging, covering everything from SpaceX to the presidential election. We had a good conversation. Clearly he felt differently. His commitment to a global town square where all questions can be asked and all ideas can be shared seems not to include questions of him from people like me,” Lemon wrote, not mentioning the ketamine thing.

The presumptive 2024 Republican nominee for president pic.twitter.com/7O1QXWSCc6

— Biden-Harris HQ (@BidenHQ) March 13, 2024

QAnon fan Congressidiot Lauren Boebert on Wednesday hinted to CNN’s Manu Raju she’s won’t be putting her name in the Colorado 4th District primary to serve the rest of Ken Buck’s term after he resigns next week, but will press forward with her original plan to switch districts for the regular primary and general only. Oh and that this shitshow is somehow a conspiracy against her.

“I think this is a play by the uniparty, and I’m not resigning and giving up on my constituents in the third,” Boebert said. “And I will win the primary.” A committee of Colorado GOP officials will decide the nominee for the 4th District partial term, a process that if Boebert angled for and ended up winning would require her to switch seats and create another vacancy. What makes this maybe a little less risky for both her and the House GOP’s majority is that the Buck replacement special and the primary for the regular election will be on the same day. That said the state party could fuck her by picking a candidate who’s already on the primary ballot and give them the edge over Boebert.

Fulton County, Georgia Judge Scott McAfee on Wednesday tossed three of the counts against fat former President Trump and his minions, former White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows, bail bondsman Ray Smith, and alcoholic shitbrain Rudy Giuliani, in the sprawling RICO indictment brought by District Attorney Fani Willis over their failed post-2020 election coup attempt in the Peach State.

“These six challenged counts charge various Defendants with Solicitation of Violation of Oath by Public Officer in violation of OCGA §§ 16-4-7 and 16-10-1. The crime of Violation of Oath by Public Officer, OCGA § 16-10-1, prohibits any public officer from willfully and intentionally violating the terms of his or her oath as prescribed by law. The term of the oath alleged to have been violated must be ‘expressly prescribed,’ meaning it is explicitly contained in the applicable statutory provisions… The Court’s concern is less that the State has failed to allege sufficient conduct of the Defendants – in fact it has alleged an abundance. However, the lack of detail concerning an essential legal element is, in the undersigned’s opinion, fatal. As written, these six counts contain all the essential elements of the crimes but fail to allege sufficient detail regarding the nature of their commission. They do not give the Defendants enough information to prepare their defenses intelligently, as the Defendants could have violated the Constitutions and thus the statute in dozens, if not hundreds, of distinct ways,” McAfee wrote while spiking other motions to dismiss.

The bad news is that Trump’s felony counts have dropped from 91 to 88. The good news is that, barring the disqualification of Fani Willis which McAfee is set to rule yes or no on this week, this obviously streamlines the case and makes it possible to bring it to trial sooner.

In a move one insider tells the Daily Beast is a short-sighted plan to “Make the RNC White Again,” the newly extra-Trumpfied Republican National Committee will not be restarting their already largely shuttered “minority community outreach” center strategy in 2024, a result of the party’s piss-poor financial situation but also not really something Trump gives a fuck about given his demands for unconditional loyalty and goal to use the RNC as an ATM for his massive legal defense bills.

The move comes amid a purge of personnel for the Committee which, per the Beast, could have serious consequences stretching far beyond whether or not they can use rented storefronts to rope in a few ten thousand Black and Latino voters in key states by giving out free pizza and t-shirts. The loss of institutional knowledge and experience while Biden and the DNC are comparatively well-oiled and flush with cash may one day be high on a “post-mortem” article of the 2024 election.

Opinion | Democrats went to town in Hur hearing but Republicans missed a major moment https://t.co/kBfbe4BZ9d

— Fox News (@FoxNews) March 13, 2024

The Wisconsin state Senate adjourned for the year on Tuesday and left on its floor an Assembly-passed bill to unfuck the “Red Mirage” by allowing county clerks to start processing mail-in ballots a day prior to Election Day rather than the current morning of, thereby leaving in place the gap that in 2020 allowed the Orange God Emperor to claim the election was rigged simply because the in-person day-of vote totals showed him in the lead before Biden overtook him when the Dem-heavy mail-in ballots were added to the state’s vote totals, the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel reports.

“There’s been a concerted effort by folks in the Assembly and senators to try to get this calendar to the Senate, so we can put to rest complaints from conspiracy theorists,” Dem Mark Spreitzer, told reporters on Tuesday. “But just like in Washington, DC, former President Donald Trump has told Republicans not to fix anything so he can continue to spread his lies and complain when he loses.”

It’s not clear if Spreitzer was talking about actual conversations between Trump and state Senate Republicans or if it was more of an implied thing, as in they know the fat fuck doesn’t want it so they didn’t do it. Complete twat State Senate President Chris Kapenga, whose past prostrations before Trump managed to stick out even in a party of total worms said “It makes sense to sort absentee ballots and verify envelope data on Monday before Election Day, but there aren’t enough controls in place to protect the privacy of votes if opened early. As the rest of the world has figured out, the best way to eliminate irregularities and potential fraud is to just vote and count on the same day.”

Processing ballots means simply taking them out of the mailing envelope and arranging them for tabulators, so Kapenga is – surprise! – full of shit. He also knows what he’s doing with giving Trump space to claim fraud just as Republicans in Michigan and Pennsylvania did in 2020. As for those other two states, Michigan in 2022 killed the Red Mirage and a bill to do the same awaits the Republican-majority Pennsylvania state Senate, its prospects unclear at best.

Less than half of the House GOP are planning on going to the caucus’s “policy retreat” in West Virginia on Wednesday as relations between different factions steadily deteriorates, Axios reports while writing that a Republican “argued that moving their conference discussions from the Capitol to a resort with alcohol could exacerbate infighting between members,” and directly quoting that member as saying “I’d rather sit down with Hannibal Lecter and eat my own liver.”

Not as funny as the alcohol part. Worse yet there might be a shortage of cocaine too as keynote speaker Larry Kudlow backed out at the last minute. The rest of the slate sucks as those who are still going will be stuck listening to Susan B Anthony Pro-Life America president Marjorie Dannenfelser, March for Life president Jeanne Mancini, and Israeli Ambassador Michael Herzog.

You’d think she’d be flattered to have Academy Award nominee and wife of the head writer Scarlett Johansson portray her, but no, Katie Britt. Is. Not. Happy.  The Republican Senator, who performed the Republican revue to Joe Biden’s powerful State of the Union, is using the utter indignity of being pilloried by the far-left elites in the media.  [Weep.]

“Following my speech, the far-left media didn’t waste a second flooding the airwaves with despicable, disgusting messages about me,” the email from the community theatre Norma Desmond read according to the Daily Beast. “They attacked my character. They attacked my faith. They attacked my identity as a mother and a wife.”  Well, no, Senator.  They attacked your delivery, your message and your lack of any proposed policy.

Apparently not understanding that losing the popular vote in seven out of the last eight elections is a pattern they should note, the Republican base–a monster of far-right, science-denying, quasi-Christian Trump zealots–have backed a man responsible for two of those losses to be the GOP candidate again in 2024.  Donald Trump won the Washington state primary, according to Decision Desk and the New York Times, sending him over the 1,215 delegate threshold needed to secure the Republican nomination.  This sets Trump up to face the presumptive Democratic nominee and incumbent President Joe Biden in the November election.

“The Hur Report was revealed today! A disaster for Biden, a two tiered standard of justice. Artificial Intelligence was used by them against me in their videos of me. Can’t do that Joe!” posted fat former President Trump on Truth Social after Democrats played a vast multitude of video clips of his addled batshittery during the Hur hearing on Tuesday. They were not AI generated.

Former special counsel Robert Hur’s hearing before the House Judiciary Committee–where Republicans gave him a positive performance review while Democrats underlined his conclusion that Joe Biden didn’t do any wrong while Donald Trump did–brought out the debunked GOP talking point that Biden is a doddering old man with a bad memory, a description helped along by Hur’s editorializing.

But that characterization doesn’t make sense when you look at the transcripts of Hur’s interview with the President, who sat for sessions with the Special Counsel in the days after the Hamas attack on Israel.  In the transcript of the five-hour interview done over two days, Biden responded “I don’t remember” or “I don’t recall” a total of 51 times in the 251 pages.  About ten of those “memory lapses” were when Biden was asked to identify specific people who may have moved boxes that contained documents in the previous four decades, or when asked the last time he may have been in proximity to the documents prior to their discovery.

But is that a lot?  Are Biden’s memory gaps–on average, once every five pages of transcript–excessive?  Here’s where we can look at similar evidence to see how well Biden worked.  Because federal interview transcripts are fairly well standardized–25 lines per page in the same font size–we can see how well others performed in similar circumstances.

“Hillary had top secret classified information, 33,000 deleted emails, bleach-bit, hammers devices, everything we learned.” It’s March 2024, but Fox propagandist Sean Hannity rants like he’s still in 2016 as he tries to make Oversight Committee Chair Jamie Comer feel okay about himself for not being able to do anything effective in his pursuit of an impeachment hearing for someone.

The chief of staff for the recently-murdered opposition leader Alexei Navalny was attacked with tear gas and a hammer as he was getting into his car in Vilnius, Lithuania, Politico reports, signaling another wave of violent retribution for people who oppose Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Leonid Volkov reportedly just got seated in his car outside his home when someone approached the car and smashed out the window with a hammer.  The attacker sprayed the tear gas into the vehicle and started attacking Volkov with the hammer.  Volkov was taken to a hospital by ambulance and is being treated for non-life-threatening injuries.

“You need to understand that these gains were won primarily by Democrats who are willing to vote for them,” John Palmer, a Teamsters Vice President, says.  “I know we get accused of supporting only Democrats, honestly the reason is, the Republicans haven’t supported us.  I mean, they’ve– they’re pushin’ ‘right to work.’  Right to work doesn’t benefit anybody.  It benefits corporations.”  Though the Teamsters have not yet made an endorsement, Palmer strongly hinted to supporting Biden.