How Establishment/Corporate Politics Are Played Today

Career of Evil

Bill Clinton was only allotted 5 minutes to speak last night-- and not in prime time. The NY Times called it a "blink-and-you’ll-miss-him moment before a party that once revered him" and noted that that "is testimony to how his influence has faded... [and] of the baggage he carries with the re-examination of allegations of sexual assault and harassment over his years in public life in the wake of the #MeToo movement."

Even in John Harris' Politico opus yesterday-- The Bill Clinton Comeback is Coming Soon-- he immediately made sure his readers understood that Clinton's Republican-lite "centrism" isn't what he's talking about, and that it's just his way of making an argument that deserves a revival." Whew. Clinton's "brand of centrism," wrote Harris, "is seen as too compromising, and his private life and disreputable personal associations too compromised." Harris, a New Dem type centrist like Clinton, tries excusing his fear-based-- he was kicked out as Arkansas governor for being a liberal-- conservativism to make the case that he deserves a revival. He doesn't.

This morning I found a 44 page document, a complaint in the New York State Supreme Court pitting Rimylan Enterprises, LLC, Project Applecart, LLC, Tormima, LLC and Minino Productions against Clinton administration scumbags Mark Penn and Nancy Jacobson, two of the worst characters-- a husband and wife team-- in American politics. I spent a lot of time and energy in 2018 and 2019 explaining how their malignant operations against progressives were especially detrimental to Marie Newman in Illinois, Dena and Alan Grayson in Florida and Matt Heinz in Arizona. The lawsuit is against their crooked front operations: "No Labels, Inc. , Forward Not Back, Inc, United For Progress, Inc. United Together, Inc., Citizens For A Strong America, Inc., Govern or Go Home, Inc., Americans Committed For Progress, Inc., Citizens for America, Inc., Progress Together, Inc., Patriotic Americans PAC, Inc., No Labels Action, Inc., and Progress Tomorrow, Inc., as well as Nancy Jacobson personally. The suit claims Rimylan is owed $3,708,214.26 by Jacobson and her nefarious entities. Rimylan wants the $3.7 they're owed plus about a million in damages plus another $3.7 million from Jacobson personally "for fraudulent inducement on the ground that she omitted to tell Rimylan that No Labels did not intend to be bound" by the contract.

Applecart is the trade name for Rimylan, Tormima, and Minino and it is a technology company that provides political data and analytic services. You know what Brad Pascale did for Trump-- the tsunamis of micro-targeted ads? That's what Matthew Kalmans and Sacha Samotin, co-founders of Applecart, do for candidates. Last year Applecart hired a new president, Democratic operative Joe Shafer, who was the head of the Democratic Governors Association’s (DGA) independent expenditure arm, and has begun an association with Rahm Emanuel's brother Ari. The Kalmans and Samotin big idea-- the "Social Graph"-- "uses a combination of human and artificial intelligence to mine publicly available data to identify online and offline social relationships between Americans. In the time since, Applecart has since mapped over 17 billion relationships between more than 250 million Americans and has been deployed as the analytics engine behind the highest stakes advertising campaigns of major politicians, corporations, and advocacy groups." One of their most successful campaigns was Conor Lamb's first congressional run.

Applecart, which had been working for John Kasich was introduced to Jacobson by former Utah Governor and former Applecart client John Huntsman, who was also one of No Label's "Honorary Co-Chairmen."

The suit says that "In October 2015, Kalmans and Samotin proposed to Jacobson that No Labels hire Applecart to demonstrate the impact of their strategy for supporting moderate [meaning conservative] candidates in congressional primaries in two such races, one Republican and one Democrat. In May 2016 Jacobson agreed to this proposal and selected two of several races proposed by Applecart. One, to support moderate Roger Marshall against three-term incumbent Freedom Caucus leader Tim Huelskamp in the Republican primary election in the First Congressional District of Kansas. The other, to support moderate Darren Soto to succeed far-left incumbent Alan Grayson in the Democratic primary in the Ninth Congressional District in Florida. No Labels formed two super PACs to support the elections of Marshall and Soto: Strong Leadership for America ('SLA') and Concerned Citizens for America’s Future ('CCAF'). No Labels established the super PACs because it, as a 501(c)(4) organization, is subject to limits on how much of its budget can be spent on political activities. No Labels also established the super PACs so that their work on behalf of Marshall and Soto would not be tied to No Labels, a bipartisan organization, because such an association was thought likely to be unhelpful in a partisan primary election. No Labels established separate super PACs for Marshall and Soto so that the work of one, on behalf of a Republican, would not be tied to the work of the other, on behalf of a Democrat."

The 44 pages are fascinating-- at least to me-- but what I really want to talk about how how a significant portion how U.S. politics has now come down to laundering money from vain billionaires-- Penn and Jacobson's specialty-- and laundering it into campaigns against progressives through an aggressive campaign of libel and slander while pocketing as much as the vain billionaires are unaware of. In this particular case, the vain billionaire/patsy was Nelson Peltz (chairman of Wendy's), who gives humongous amounts of money to conservative operations-- both the GOP's and Penn's and Jacobson's.

So basically it comes down to a small gaggle of manipulative vultures like Jacobson and Penn enriching themselves by sucking up to virulently anti-progressive billionaires like Peltz so that they can destroy the champions of the working class-- only and always-- in order to do well for themselves while... well, how else to say it: doing evil. This is the dark corruption that pervades American politics.

In 2018 Jacobson failed in her efforts to defeat now-Congresswoman Deb Haaland (D-NM) and this year all those millions she spent against Marie Newman went up in smoke as Newman beat reactionary Blue Dog Dan Lipinski. And, like I said... Bill Clinton was not allowed to address the Democratic convention in prime time.

A member of Congress who I asked about No Labels unethical and probably criminal activities turned me on to some Ryan Grim and Rachel Cohen work looking into No Labels funny business back in December, pointing out the built in conflicts of interest that should have long ago landed Penn, Jacobson and their board members in prison. For example, in late March of 2018, the reporters found an email in which "a representative for a No Labels donor expressed concern over the organization having 'perceived or potential' conflicts of interest. They urged Jacobson to disclose potential conflicts to the No Labels governing board. 'We believe that all Governing Board members need to be aware of the situation in order to prevent any misunderstanding and confusion going forward,' they wrote."

And all we need to do is elect reformers to change this-- not defenders of the status quo like Biden, who makes excuses for lobbyists and crooked operatives, every member of his family being one. Instead we wind up with a classic lesser of two evils "choice" between an outright fascist who is an undeniable existential threat to democracy and the integrity of our nation or a feeble, status quo nothing. Last night, AOC reminded us what could have been (if not for Obama's orchestration of the neoliberal forces against it):

The Seduction of Virginia Giuffre

Virginia Giuffre, an alleged victim of Jeffrey Epstein, center, pauses while speaking with members of the media outside of federal court in New York. That appears to be lawyer David Boies, one of her lawyers, looking on over her right shoulder. Photographer: Mark Kauzlarich/Bloomberg

by Thomas Neuburger

I've been reading through the Jeffrey Epstein–Ghislaine Maxwell–Virginia Giuffre documents released last week and have to say, they make fascinating if confusing (to non-lawyers) reading.

The document I want to feature below struck me particularly, though. It's an early phone interview (2011) between Brad Edwards, a lawyer who appears to have been involved in a lawsuit against Jeffrey Epstein (Edwards later appears to represent Ms. Giuffre), his own lawyer Jack Scarola, and Virginia Giuffre, one of Epstein and Maxwell's alleged victims.

A PDF of this document is here. It's both clear and mind-blowing in the stories it tells.

The purpose of this piece is to encourage you to read it in full. It's only 24 pages, and the lawyer who leads the interview, Mr. Scarola, walks Giuffre through the history of her relationship with Epstein in a straightforward way. He covers other matters as well, but in that respect, the document is simple storytelling, and the story that's told is stunning.

I'll provide just a few excerpts here, and again, encourage you to read it for yourself. My main focus will be on the origin of Giuffre's relationship with Maxwell and Epstein — the initial seduction and its aftermath.

(Note: The original PDF is a series of images, not text. I've passed it though an OCR reader to make the text paste-able, but the process isn't perfect, so forgive any glitches in the "translation.")

The Initial Seduction

Here's how Giuffre (whose maiden name was Roberts) was introduced to Epstein by Maxwell. Maxwell basically "picked her up" while Giuffre was working at Mar-a-Lago as a women's bathroom attendant. (Except where noted, Giuffre is the speaker. I've added paragraphing to the original for readability. Underscores are in the original.)

I was introduced to Mr. Epstein by Ghislaine Maxwell. I was working at Donald Trump's spa in Mar-a-Lago and I was prompted by Ghislaine to come to Jeffrey's mansion in Palm Beach that afternoon after work to make some extra money and to learn about massage. She met me at the spa, and I was reading a book about anatomy, so I was already interested in massage therapy as it was and not having any of the education or you know anything behind me, I thought this was a great opportunity to work for her and go.

So, I went to Jeffrey's mansion about 5 or 6 in the afternoon. My dad drove me there. My dad worked at Mar-a-Lago with me, and he met Ghislaine and she seemed like a nice, proper English lady, and she knows, I mean, you know, one time then _once before I left to travel overseas, she just seemed really nice and like she would like to help me out. So my dad left, and I had no problem getting home that night, one of her drivers would take me back after my trial.

So she led me upstairs, and into Jeffrey's bedroom, and past that is Jeffrey's massage room, which has got his steam room and a shower and a massage table, and there is actually an extra room that has, that nobody knows about it, it's kinda like a secret room and it's got a whole bunch of decorative pictures of pornographic literature and sex toys and I can _ ?_ [sic] what happened in there.

After discussion of this private room (which is also brought up later in the interview), Giuffre continues:

So anyways, that was getting there, and I was introduced to Jeffrey, he was laying naked on top of the massage table, and obviously for one, I'm a 15 year old girl [in later interviews Giuffre is presented with documents that cause her to revise the year in which this occurred] and seeing him on the table was weird but, also learning about anatomy and massage, I thought this would be part of it. So obviously, I thought it was part of the massage program, so I said ok, this is fine.

And, he then instructed me on how to touch the body, Jeffrey's body, how to massage him, and for the first hour, it was actually a real massage, maybe not an hour, maybe like 40 minutes or something, but of something like that _and that's when he turned over on the other side and to expose himself fully.

So then Ghislaine told me that she wanted me to undress and began to take off my shirt and skirt, my white uniform from Mar-A-Lago, she also took off her shirt and got undressed, and so I was there with just my undies on, and she was completely bare, and made some kind of little flake [sic] about the underwear that I was wearing because it wasn't my normal sexy girl underwear and just like, I don't know, had red hearts on it or something like that; just your normal, you know, real cute underwear.

Anyways, so during all of this I'm kind of like what's going on, how do I act, what do I say, I was so afraid of, not afraid or fearful for my life but _unsure of how all this started and wanting to obtain a profession_ I was so afraid thinking about upsetting and disappointing them, I don't know, it's a weird situation by far and I was expected to _Lick his nipples, instructed on how to do so by J.E_ and give him oral sex while he wanted to fondle me, and then at the end, I was told by Ghislaine to get on top and straddle Jeffrey sexually, and when we were done, we went and had a shower in the room and Jeffrey told me to wash him up and down, you know with a bar of soap and make sure he was all cleaned up.

And then he took me downstairs and took me to two of the guards and told John to bring me home. John was the butler at the time.

[...]

Q: You've told us about the first visit. Was there any discussion on the occasion of that first visit about your returning?

Yes, they were very pleased with me and after the encounter was finished, the sexual encounter, he went and told me I did well and I have a lot of potential to become a massage therapist and if I'd like I could return tomorrow, you know, and do the same thing and get paid $200/hr, so Jeffrey insisted that I come after work, and over the next few days, I guess the relationship grew into more, and within a couple of weeks, not even a couple of weeks, maybe a week, I had quit Mar-a-Lago and I was working for Jeffrey full time.

When she's asked about whether they were aware of her age, she replies:

During the entire hour of what I call the legitimate massage I was giving him, it was cat and mouse games getting information from me to find out who I am, am I a willing participant in these kind of things, and how would I react if they were about to take the next step.

But they got information off of me, they got my age, they got my, a little bit of my history so they knew I was, you know, not very stable at home, and they knew that, you know, I was actually interested in making my life better by studying so what they were offering me was a chance to become a legitimate masseuse but it was getting trained.

They would have people show me how to work the body and be called a massage therapist and get me books on it, and you know, keep me interested, and every time, you know, I was with Jeffrey, literally was about massages, I don't mean just going in and have sex with him. I mean massage, because it would always start out with massage and then it would lead into sometimes other things.

Taken together, this is a straight-up, nearly clichéd pick-up and seduction — Maxwell, a wealthy posh-accented British woman ("nice, proper English lady") and member of an elite resort, spots a pretty, inexperienced, hoping-for-better-things girl working a menial job and uses the girl's interest in massage therapy as a hook to bring her to Epstein. The two of them proceed to walk her through from a massage to sex, then to a repeated pattern of massage-and-sex with promises of job training as a professional masseuse and (later) clients of her own from among Epstein wealthy friends.

It's short road from that initial seduction to a regular well recompensed life, as a member of Epstein and Maxwell's harem. Soon after she started with the pair, she was sent traveling regularly to service other of Epstein's friends, about eight in number, whom she declined to name. ("[S]ome of these people are really influential in power, and I don't want to start another shitstorm with a few of them.")

This tale could have been taken from a Victorian novel, but I don't think the non-rape method of wealthy men seducing girls — her poverty, their money and false promises — has changed at all since then. I don't think it has changed at all in millennia.

Note, by the way, that Maxwell is a semi-participant in the sex. From other documents it appears that Maxwell herself had sex with some of the girls, both in conjunction with Epstein and perhaps alone. In other words, Epstein is not the only pedophile in the relationship, though I don't think Maxwell herself has been charged as such.

About the Ages of Epstein's Underage Girls 

At one point Mr. Scarola starts to question Giuffre about the ages of some of the other girls. Here's one such exchange:

Q: Did Jeffrey ever brag to you about the age of any of the girls with whom he had relationships?

Yes, he did. He did all the time. The worst one that I heard from his own mouth was this [sic] pretty 12 year old girls he had flown in for his birthday. It was a surprise birthday gift from one of his friends and they were from France.

I did see them, I did meet them. Jeffrey bragged afterwards after he met them that they were 12 year olds and flown over from France because they're really poor over there, and their parents needed the money or whatever the case is and they were absolutely free to stay and flew out.

Those were the worst ones. He was constantly bragging about girls' ages or where he got them from or their past and how terrible their past was and good he is making it for them.

A "birthday gift" of poor 12-year-old girls.

Lives of the Rich and Famous

Bill Clinton is discussed on pages 22 and 23 of the transcript. Because that section has been so widely reported — yes, Clinton was on the island; yes, in the company of two of Epstein's girls, though no allegation is made of sexual conduct; and yes, "sexual orgies" did occur on the island — I'll skip that section.

Near the end of the interview, Scarola asks a fascinating and well-worded question. He knows Giuffre doesn't want to "name names" with respect to sexual conduct, so he phrases a question to her this way:

Q: If we were to take sworn testimony from the people I am going to name, and if those people were to tell the truth about what they knew, do you believe that any of the following people would have relevant information about Jeffrey's taking advantage of underage girls? 

So I'll just name a name, and you tell me yes if they told the truth, I think they'd have relevant information or no, I don' t think they would, or I don't know whether they would or not. Ok? You understand?

She does understand, and the following exchange takes place:

Q: Ok. Les Wexner.

I think he has relevant information, but I don't think he'll tell you the truth.

Q: Ok. Alan Dershowitz.

Yes.

Q: David Copperfield.

Don't know.

Q: Tommy Matola. [sic]

Don't know.

Q: Prince Andrew.

Yes, he would know a lot of the truth. Again, I don't know how much he would be able to help you with, but seeing he's in a lot of trouble himself these days, I think he might, so I think he may be valuable. I'm not too sure of him.

As I said, the interview is fascinating — straightforward, lacking in legalese, storylike in its simplicity, and stunning in its content.

Keep in mind, this interview took place in 2011, early in the game — after Giuffre had left Epstein (that part of the story is interesting in itself) to marry, live and raise a family in Australia and after Epstein began to have legal trouble — but not long after. It's from early interviews like these that the real wrangling begins.

All in all, if you read only one Epstein document, this is one you should turn your attention to.
 

From Juanita Broaddrick to Tara Reade: In Forty Years Has Nothing Changed at All?

Juanita Broaddrick, right, with residents of her Arkansas retirement home and Bill Clinton in April 1978, the same month she alleges that Clinton assaulted her (source)

by Thomas Neuburger

Hid among the grease and grime of the Tara Reade rape discussion — "Should we believe her? To what extent? Would Biden really do such a thing? But what if a public discussion leads to Trump's reelection?" — lies the shadow of another rape accusation.

Undiscussed, rarely brought up, as carefully hid or moreso by the Democratic Party–supporting media as the Tara Reade story was, stands the rape charge by Juanita Broaddrick against 32-year-old Arkansas Attorney General Bill Clinton, a rape said to have occurred in 1978.

The facts are these (source: a nicely researched 2017 piece by Dylan Mathews at Vox). First, this is what Broaddrick says happened:

In 1978, Broaddrick was volunteering for Clinton's gubernatorial campaign, and claims she met him when he visited his campaign office in her home town of Van Buren, Arkansas, that April. She says he then invited her to visit his office in Little Rock, which Broaddrick agreed to do a week later, when she was in the state Capitol anyway for a conference of nursing home administrators. Once she was at a hotel in Little Rock, she claims Clinton told her that he wasn't going to the campaign headquarters and offered to meet her in her hotel lobby coffee shop instead. Once he arrived, she says he called her room and suggested that they have coffee there, since the lobby had too many reporters. Broaddrick says she agreed.

Then according to a 1999 Washington Post story:

As she tells the story, they spent only a few minutes chatting by the window -- Clinton pointed to an old jail he wanted to renovate if he became governor -- before he began kissing her. She resisted his advances, she said, but soon he pulled her back onto the bed and forcibly had sex with her. She said she did not scream because everything happened so quickly. Her upper lip was bruised and swollen after the encounter because, she said, he had grabbed onto it with his mouth.

"The last thing he said to me was, 'You better get some ice for that.' And he put on his sunglasses and walked out the door," she recalled.

Broaddrick's story has no third-party witness, but quite a lot of contemporaneous corroboration:

• The director at the nursing home where Broaddrick worked told reporters "that she entered the hotel room shortly after the assault allegedly took place, and 'found Mrs. Broaddrick crying and in 'a state of shock.' Her upper lip was puffed out and blue, and appeared to have been hit.' Kelsey elaborated to the New York Times, "She told me he forced himself on her, forced her to have intercourse."

• In 1999, three of Broaddrick's friends told NBC News on camera that Broaddrick told them at the time that Bill Clinton had raped her.

• In addition, David Broaddrick "with whom Broaddrick was having an affair ... also NBC that Broaddrick's top lip was black after the alleged incident, and that she told him, 'that she had been raped by Bill Clinton.'"

The Other Side

Opposed to this evidence lie the usual adversarial questions about why Broaddrick delayed so long to say something, why she chose the time she did to come forward, and what her underlying motives might have been. Bill Clinton was being impeached for the Monica Lewinski affair — pilloried, really, by Ken Starr's special prosecutor's office — when Broaddrick's story was leaked to the public.

The response to this has been that Broaddrick, according to Vox, "had been courted to come forward about the allegations by Clinton enemies for years," and refused many pleas that she speak out.

"She only came forward after she was interviewed by Independent Counsel Kenneth Starr's office and her allegation leaked. Broaddrick told the [Wall Street] Journal [here] that NBC News reporter Lisa Myers pursued her for nearly a year before she agreed to an interview, and that she came forward because she wanted to rebut false rumors circulating after her statements to prosecutors (like that David Broaddrick had accepted hush money from the Clintons in exchange for silence)."

In short, if Vox's account is correct, Broaddrick was almost literally the most reluctant of reluctant witnesses at a time when Bill Clinton was beset on all sides with eager ones.

Did Hillary Clinton Weigh In?

It's an ugly story, both in the context in which it occurred — the dubiously moral, hypocritical Republican Party assaulting a presidency it never considered legitimate using charges they themselves were guilty of at the time — and in the Broaddrick story itself.

And the ugliness continued, according to Broaddrick, shortly after the event. In a 1999 interview she gave to the Drudge Report and quoted by Vox, Broaddrick said that "mere weeks after the alleged [1978] assault, Hillary Clinton had tried to thank her for her silence on the matter at a political rally." Broaddrick:

She came directly to me as soon as she hit the door. I had been there only a few minutes, I only wanted to make an appearance and leave. She caught me and took my hand and said 'I am so happy to meet you. I want you to know that we appreciate everything you do for Bill.'

Here her husband had just done this to me, and she was coming up to thank me? It was scary...I started to turn away and she held onto my hand and reiterated her phrase -- looking less friendly and repeated her statement----'Everything you do for Bill'. I said nothing. She wasn't letting me get away until she made her point. She talked low, the smile faded on the second thank you. I just released her hand from mine and left the gathering.

No one knows for sure what happened between Broaddrick and Bill Clinton in the hotel room save Broaddrick and Clinton himself, just as no one but Broaddrick and Hillary Clinton knows for sure what passed between them at the rally just a few weeks later — and only Clinton herself knows for sure what she meant to convey, regardless of how Broaddrick took it.

But if Christine Blasey Ford is credible (in my opinion, eminently so), then Tara Reade is credible at the very least — and so is Juanita Broaddrick.

The #MeToo Era: The Briefest of Lights in 40 Years of Darkness

Why bring this up? Because the alleged Broaddrick rape occurred in 1978 — and here we are, in 2020, with many of the same actors, all with the same loyalties, using much the same tactics to silence and sidestep the consequences of almost the same (alleged) crime, the forceable rape of a low-level female political associate by a high-level male with a history of intruding on women.

      Juanita Broaddrick, 1978
      Cover-up continuing, 2020

      Tara Reade, 1993
      Cover-up continuing, 2020

Has nothing changed for Democratic Party leaders in those 42 years?

It's almost as though the #MeToo era, two and a half years at most, the briefest of lights in two dark generations, never occurred at all.
 

Behind The Scenes And In Plain View: Mental Case, Criminal, Both?

Reporting for Vanity Fair this week, Emily Jane Fox, wrote that "Stephanie Winston Wolkoff was the mastermind event producer behind Trump’s inaugural celebration, which has since come under S.D.N.Y. investigation. Now, taped conversations reveal Wolkoff’s concerns with how money was being spent, the general chaos of the process, the involvement of the Trump family, and the people in charge, namely Rick Gates and Tom Barrack." If you haven't been watching Maddow with any kind of regularity over the past couple of years, you may be unaware that Trump's inaugural committee was a piggy bank for bribes from criminals-- both domestic and foreign-- to Trump and his contemptible spawn.

Last February, the New York Times published an article centered on WIS, headlined “Trump’s Inaugural Committee Paid $26 million to Firm of First Lady’s Adviser.” The inaugural committee had raised a stunning $107 million-- about twice what Barack Obama had hauled in 2009-- from donors such as Sheldon Adelson and corporations like AT&T. But as the Times reported, the tax form revealed profligate spending-- nearly $10 million on travel; $4.6 million on salaries and benefits; and $100,000 to Rick Gates, the former campaign aide and deputy chairman of the inauguration who, about a week later, became one of Robert Mueller’s first major cooperating witnesses. Some $40 million was publicly unaccounted for. Wolkoff, as the event planner in charge, became the face of the disarray. The Times story quoted an official from a government watchdog group accusing her of “fiscal mismanagement at its worst.” ... Sarah Huckabee Sanders would later say, “The president was focused on the transition during that time, and not on any of the planning for the inauguration.”

...Wolkoff had made a career in the events business, but she knew from the outset the inauguration would be a unique, and uniquely Trumpian, experience. First, she was a political novice who knew little about what an inauguration entailed. Then, there was Trump’s controversial reputation. Upon accepting the post on the Friday after his election, Wolkoff quickly reached out to her network of vendors. Most of them, according to people familiar with these conversations, resisted the opportunity to work with Trump. Even Burnett, who Trump enlisted to conjure up reality-show-like gimmicks (such as flying a gaggle of drones over the crowd), wanted to keep his involvement private.

Moreover, and perhaps not surprisingly, Trump’s family wanted to be involved in certain aspects of the coordination... [Wolkoff made] regular presentations to Trump, Melania, and the Trump family about various decisions, so that they could weigh in. (White House spokespeople have previously denied that the Trumps were involved in any planning, and said they knew little about the events.)

Trump was focused on the big-picture theatrics. He wanted to arrive on the Mall in a military plane with a military escort, much as he had arrived for tapings of The Apprentice on Trump Organization helicopters. He also wanted to have a full military parade, as well as tanks and helicopters on the ground...

In large part, Wolkoff worried about potential ethical issues surrounding the First Family-elect and their businesses. After all, Gates had been staying in a suite at the Trump Hotel for most of the inaugural planning. More than a dozen inaugural staffers had also been staying there. The Times reported last month that WIS alone had charged $31,000 for hotel rooms in the span of less than two months, including almost $18,000 at the Trump International Hotel. That did not include what was charged for room service, meals, and travel. In all, the Trump International Hotel was paid more than $1.5 million in inaugural funds, according to the Times. (Wolkoff’s contract states that the inaugural committee would reimburse WIS for travel, long-distance phone calls, mail-delivery services, and expenses connected to the performance of its work. WIS stands for “Who Is She,” Wolkoff’s play on her own anonymity.)

During the course of planning, Wolkoff had corresponded with Ivanka about the cost of using the Trump Hotel for events leading up to the swearing-in ceremony. On December 10, 2016, a Trump Organization employee sent an estimate for a ballroom rental and food and beverage minimum to use the Trump Hotel space for eight days. The price she quoted was $3.6 million, according to an e-mail. A week later, Gates e-mailed Ivanka about the cost. In this exchange, first published this past December by ProPublica and WNYC, Wolkoff flagged her concern. “These events are in PE’s [the president-elect’s] honor at his hotel and one of them is for family and close friends. Please take into consideration that when this is audited it will become public knowledge,” she wrote. (Peter Mirijanian, a spokesperson for Ivanka’s counsel Abbe Lowell, said in a statement: “When contacted by someone working on the inauguration, Ms. Trump passed the inquiry on to a hotel official and said only that any resulting discussions should be at a ‘fair market rate.’ Ms. Trump was not involved in any additional discussions.”)

For an event producer used to detailed lists and punctilious itemization, Wolkoff was often caught off guard by the ad-hoc nature of the committee. According to the two people familiar with the matter, Gates approached a couple individuals working on the inauguration and asked if they would be willing to be paid directly for their work by a donor, rather than by the inaugural committee. They had received more donations than they’d initially anticipated, Gates told these people. Skirting the usual payment route could allow the inaugural committee to avoid reporting the full amount raised from donors.

Wolkoff frequently told Melania about her concerns regarding Gates, these people said. She relayed her concern about the high access level of his security pass within Trump Tower and his closeness with the Trump family. In her view, these people said, he exacerbated a situation already fraught with potential conflicts of interest. Members of the inaugural committee talked about how he frequently worked out of Donald Trump Jr.’s office. He was in constant communication with the adult children in order to keep them in the loop about decisions surrounding the inauguration.

Wolkoff also questioned Gates and Barrack about pricing and budgets across the board, according to the people familiar with the conversations. She started to grow concerned about being left out of meetings, particularly as she raised more red flags. Because part of her responsibilities included reviewing all budgets from her vendors and presenting them to other members of the inaugural committee, she studied the line items in order to be able to explain them. At points, she could not justify the numbers coming in. After circulation of a quote from one of their largest event-production vendors, Hargrove LLC, Wolkoff was shocked that no one in the organization appeared willing to question the figures. She suggested that the quote seemed far beyond what the Obama inaugural committee would have been charged in 2009. She sent an e-mail to her team and Barrack on December 31, 2016. “I am DISGUSTED by [Hargrove’s] lack of transparency and entitlement to [the Presidential Inaugural Committee’s] funding,” she wrote. “I can not approve any budget line items because I do not have a clue what these numbers represent!!”

One of the most concerning aspects to Wolkoff’s team, according to the people familiar with the situation, was the amount of money and attention being spent on Barrack’s chairman dinner, which he hosted on an evening before the swearing-in. A draft guest list for the event from days before the dinner included the likes of retired Lieutenant General Mike Flynn, G.O.P. fund-raiser Elliott Broidy, Michael Cohen, and key officials in the incoming administration. Among the list marked as confirmed were seven people described as “foreign ministers” for Saudi Arabia, one foreign minister from Qatar, and one from the United Arab Emirates. They were the only people on the list who were unnamed. (On Tuesday, ProPublica published a memo that showed Barrack’s investment firm planned to profit from its connections to the Trump administration. A spokesperson called it “an outline of a proposed potential business plan which was never acted upon or implemented.”)

...Much has been made of the various problems with the inauguration, from the lackluster crowd size to the president’s own “American carnage” speech, which struck a tone so dark that George W. Bush was reportedly heard calling it “some weird shit.” But Wolkoff’s part, the event itself, went off without a hitch, and the family was pleased. The day after the swearing-in ceremony was Wolkoff’s birthday. The Trumps sent flowers to the Trump Hotel room where she had been staying. She flew back to New York on a military plane with Melania, her stylist, hairdresser, makeup artist, and the rest of the Trump family, apart from the president, Ivanka, and Jared Kushner, who remained in Washington.

Much is still unknown about how inaugural funds were managed, or if the unaccounted for $40-odd million will ever be publicly explained. It’s unclear whether there was foreign influence, or illicit attempts to profit off of proceedings. What Gates has offered investigators—about anything, really, but about the inauguration, in particular—is also unclear. How deep the Southern District’s investigation into all of this is yet unknown. But much like some of Cohen’s other taped conversations, the discussions with Wolkoff about the inauguration may have turned out to be consequential. On the witness stand during Paul Manafort’s trial in Virginia last summer, prosecutors asked Gates if he charged personal expenses to the committee. “It’s possible,” he responded.

As investigators continue to pursue the matter, they may find themselves in a familiar situation: seeking out former Trump allies-turned-adversaries who saw it all go down firsthand. One of the most inexplicable plot points in the whirling Trump drama has been the president’s public treatment of his former lawyer. Trump was aware that Cohen possessed all manner of damaging information about him, and yet he wasted few opportunities to disparage him publicly. Ultimately, Cohen implicated Trump in federal campaign-finance violations as he pleaded guilty. He spent more than 70 hours cooperating with federal investigators, opening his book to tell them what he knew about the president, his business, and the campaign. While Wolkoff’s treatment has been gentler, she’s been similarly isolated and publicly disparaged. And now, what she knows could be of interest to investigators, too.

Yesterday, ProPublica updated their reporting with an article by Justin Elliott about how the Trump family was able to enrich themselves illegally, over-charging massively for the use of Trump International Hotel and pocketing the extra cash without reporting it or paying taxes on it. A truly corrupt scumbag and his well-trained family were taking over the executive branch of government and turning it into a criminal enterprise-- an organized crime family... right from Day One. Trump's life long penchant for felony coexists with increasing mental illness, something that is almost always left out of news reporting, as author and journalist Amanda Ripley reported this week, asserting, correctly, that Trump Is a Mental Health Story.

I tried an experiment the other day. To make sense of Trump’s behavior, I did not call foreign policy experts or pundits. That would be like calling an astrologer to explain a flu pandemic. Instead, I called Wendy Behary, who wrote the book Disarming the Narcissist and has treated hundreds of narcissistic clients, including surgeons, Wall Street executives, and other powerful people, in her private practice in New Jersey. It was one of the most useful conversations I’ve had about Trump in months.

Unlike the Washington Post or the New York Times, Behary has never once been surprised by Trump’s behavior. “His behavior is not remarkable. It’s predictable. It’s exactly what we’d expect,” she says. “He just continues to be a consistent version of who he appears to be.”



So far, most of the mainstream stories about Trump’s narcissism have been about whether mental health professionals should diagnose him from afar. That’s a worthy debate. But journalists are not psychiatrists. We are not bound by the rules of the American Psychiatric Association. We are bound by a duty to inform the public, without fear, drawing upon any source that may prove useful.

At this point, it’s not biased to acknowledge that Trump behaves in ways that most mental health professionals recognize as symptomatic of a larger problem. It’s not unreasonable to ask them to help explain and even predict his behavior. In fact, it may be more biased not to do so.

What if we got new sources to help us through this “remarkable” time? This doesn’t mean bashing Trump. To the contrary. In order to treat her narcissistic clients, Behary has learned to empathize with them. This isn’t easy to do, she admits, but it is essential--  so that she doesn’t mistake them for being strategic or simply evil. “Narcissists don’t set out to harm people,” she says. “They will harm you--  but it’s to protect themselves. It’s not personal.” Taking narcissists personally is a very common waste of time and energy.

Narcissists, for example, need admiration the way addicts need substances. They believe they are truly special and yet not appreciated for their gifts, which can lead them to act entitled, as if the rules do not apply to them. In their quest for recognition, they sometimes exploit others, contradict what they’ve said, and break their promises --  all the while arguing (and often truly believing) in their new, alternative facts. Once we know this, Trump’s tendency to revise history becomes unsurprising and explicable.

It’s a painful way to live, because no amount of adoration will ever be enough. After every victory, feelings of envy, anger, and frustration squirm back to the surface. Now, Behary says, Trump is “unraveling.” This, too, is predictable, which is why we need to talk about it, out in the open. As the bad news stacks up for Trump, including Republican losses in the midterms, a divided Congress, and continuing legal investigations, he is likely experiencing profound mental agony.

In this agitated state, narcissists are notoriously bad at negotiating, as it turns out. (They are good at bullying, which is not the same thing.) Catherine Conner, a family law attorney and mediator in Northern California, understands this better than political scientists, because she has helped hundreds of people craft child custody agreements and divorce settlements. A crisis, such as a divorce, may intensify narcissistic tendencies and make negotiation impossible, she says.

“The only way to create an agreement is to put yourself in the other person’s shoes and come up with a package that might appeal to both of you,” Conner says. “If they are incapable of seeing the world through anyone else’s eyes, they won’t be able to do this. They will just remain stuck on their vision of what should be, convinced that everyone will see it their way.”



This would explain why Trump was reportedly shocked that the Democrats did not agree to his border-wall terms. He was unable to see the situation from their point of view. When this kind of intransigence takes hold in Conner’s cases, the parties are sometimes forced to rely on judges to make the decision.

In Trump’s case, if he is unable to compromise before the government shuts down again in two weeks, the courts might have to get involved. Or Trump might just turn the government back on in order to be the hero. “Narcissists are so good at showing up as Messiahs,” Behary says. If he’s at risk of losing the support of his fan base, which he needs in order to stop the pain, he will swoop in to save the day. Because that’s what narcissists do.

Typically, when all else fails and narcissists are unable to get the attention and affirmation they need, they play the victim. If the investigations continue to intensify, and if Trump begins to lose the affection of his base, Fox News pundits, and Republican leaders, he may resign, Behary predicts, based on all the narcissists she has treated for decades. “He’ll point the finger and say, ‘I was making America great again, and the Democrats stopped me.’”

Trump may not behave this way. Human behavior is complicated. But isn’t it useful to know how other people like him tend to behave, generally speaking? So let’s stop living in the past, under the old rules of journalism and politics. Let’s start talking about mental health with the directness and care that our readers deserve. If journalists want to help the public understand the world in which we live, it is time to find new pundits--  the kind who have seen this all before, who can empathize with the president and his opponents, and who do not benefit from perpetuating the chaos.

And by the way, real presidents have real inaugurations with real entertainment and no one from the family or entourage pockets millions of dollars:

Trump's Penis Is Fair Game-- Albeit More Like A Squirrel Or Rabbit Than And Elephant Or Elk

-by Anonymous (Who the hell would want one’s name attached to this article?)

Since Trump takes the low road all of the time, Stormy is the perfect person to play his game. I say, “Go Stormy!” Stormy is coming out with a book, Full Disclosure, and some excerpts are showing up in the media. Stormy has provided a concise description of Trump’s penis and it isn’t pretty. (Although I would have to ask, would anyone actually use the word “pretty” to describe a penis?) [Obviously "Anonymous" is a straight male.]

As the age-old slogan in that old Wendy’s ad went, “Where’s the Beef?” Well, here’s the beef:

He knows he has an unusual penis. It has a huge mushroom head. Like a toadstool… I lay there, annoyed that I was getting fucked by a guy with Yeti pubes and a dick like the mushroom character in Mario Kart ... It may have been the least impressive sex I’d ever had, but clearly, he didn’t share that opinion.

In yesterday’s Hullabaloo, Digby writes:

There were many low points of the 2016 campaign but this was one of the lowest.



Stormy Daniels has written a new tell-all which explains why Trump felt the necessity to reassure the country that his equipment was adequate to the task of being the sexual assaulter in chief.

She (Stormy) describes Trump's penis as "smaller than average" but "not freakishly small."

"He knows he has an unusual penis," Daniels writes.

"It may have been the least impressive sex I'd ever had, but clearly, he didn't share that opinion."


I wouldn't normally discuss the presidential penis but he is the one who brought it up.

On national television.

There have been reactions that go with the “ewww factor” of Stormy’s revelations, such as in today’s Salon by Matthew Rozsa.

Stormy Daniels and Trump’s “endowment”: Why do we even care?

Let's talk for a moment about President Donald Trump's penis. Trust me, that's not a sentence I ever wanted to write. It is a sentence that I hope you never wanted to read. But considering that this is the same man who bragged about the size of his genitals during a Republican presidential debate way back in 2016, the topic was already in the political Zeitgeist even before anyone came forward to discuss having actually seen or otherwise experienced the member in question.

Rozsa then asks whether it is ok to be discussing Trump’s penis and concludes that it is should not be.

First of all, he resents her visuals.

For one thing, I happen to be a fan of Mario Kart, and now the character of Toad (i.e., "the mushroom character in Mario Kart") has been forever ruined for people who want to indulge in that innocent pastime. The same thing is true for Yetis; I never imagined them as having fur like pubic hair, but now that thought is burned into my brain.

Rozsa then offers reasons why such a discussion should not be taking place. To summarize, he doubts that the correct way to respond to bullying is by further bullying, and he suspects that the President will respond by exacerbating and elevating his machismo rather than by promoting a more enlightened discussion. Well, yeah!!

I am fed up with “let’s take the high road” when this has been getting us nowhere. I for one cheer that Stormy is exposing (ha ha) some extremely embarrassing details about the Orangeman. Whereas he generally has shown absolutely no shame about anything, this will undoubtedly embarrass him. Good, I say! He deserves it. He is the scum of the earth and Stormy is dishing out what he has been dishing out to the American people for almost two years.

Let’s take a look at a recent article in The Guardian, which differs from Rozsa’s point of view and is an excellent piece in support of Daniels’ expose. Is it acceptable to laugh at Donald Trump’s mushroom?

Any guilt over enjoying Stormy Daniels’s revelation should be weighed against how Trump’s policies hurt women. 
I see Stormy Daniels has a book out and everyone’s talking about a certain aesthetic judgment she makes. Is this really where we are now: judging how penises look? James, by email

Yes. So, for anyone who has been living under a rock for the past 36 hours, Daniels has indeed written a book in which she describes the president’s penis as “smaller than average … like the mushroom character in Mario Kart”. Try to enjoy your Nintendo Switch now, people.

Is it right that the world is now laughing at his penis? Well, given that Trump made a fortune from Miss America, which is all about reducing women to their various anatomical parts and judging them accordingly, this all feels like a rather pleasing O Henry story. No Mr. America crown for you, Mr. President. Only men with penises shaped like Luigi get that accolade. And there is some poetic justice in the world now laughing at Trump’s penis when he is currently trying to get Brett Kavanaugh on to the supreme court, primarily--as far as I can tell-- to overturn Roe v Wade. You want to control women’s vaginas, Donald? We’ll laugh at your penis. Men are afraid that women will laugh at them and women are afraid that men will kill them, as the Margaret Atwood quote goes. And given that banning abortion, as Trump wishes to do, will end up costing women’s lives, it seems fair enough that we get to laugh at him. It’s not exactly a quid pro quo, but it will do.


Shall I go further? I think I shall: when I hear men-- a gender that has spent the past, oh, several millennia, explicitly discussing the appearance of women’s breasts, butts, legs, etc-- suddenly affecting horror at the idea of a woman laughing at a man’s penis, well, I hear a certain music on the wind, and that music is a tune played by the world’s smallest violin. (Any man who wishes to write in with a #notallmen-type complaint is welcome to write it down on a piece of paper, roll it up tight and stick it in any aperture on his anatomy where the sun does not shine.)

Much has been written about Daniels’s refusal to be shamed. But what is really remarkable about her is how she’s turned the whole narrative around. Not only will she not be humiliated-- she will humiliate him. And why not, damn it? She wasn’t the married one. She is not the one with the power to ruin women’s lives by banning global abortion funding and defunding Planned Parenthood while having bragged in the past how, when you’re a star, you can grab women “by the pussy.” He is. While we may well live in a post-shame era, Daniels knows how to hurt Trump. And given how much Trump is hurting women, I think this is one instance in which we can indulge in some guiltless body-shaming. Go get him, Stormy.

Besides, let’s look at some relevant history here. The Republicans were FINE with dishing out all kinds of disgusting dirt about Bill Clinton, and descriptions of Bill’s penis were out there circulating at the time of his impeachment.

This is from the May 2016 right-wing Daily Caller: ALLEGED MISTRESS: BILL CLINTON IS HUNG LIKE A CHILD

Former Miss Arkansas Sally Miller-- allegedly once President Bill Clinton’s mistress-- wrote this week that the former president’s manhood “performed well but, it was a little-boy penis that just never quite–grew-up.”

This March 2016 article in the New Republic is an excellent summary of our country’s penis history (yikes!), with a description of Clinton’s own. I have included a take on Lyndon Johnson, which is rather disgusting, although the whole topic is disgusting: The Presidential Penis: A Short History

An obsession with the president's phallus is a feature of American history long pre-dating Donald Trump.

By Jeet Heer

Lyndon Johnson was always eager to let those around him know that he had an unusually large penis. Reviewing a biography of Johnson in the New York Review of Books, historian Marshall Frady noted:

He early became fabled for a Rabelaisian earthiness, urinating in the parking lot of the House Office Building as the urge took him; if a colleague came into a Capitol bathroom as he was finishing at the urinal there, he would sometimes swing around still holding his member, which he liked to call “Jumbo,” hooting once, “Have you ever seen anything as big as this?,” and shaking it in almost a brandishing manner as he began discoursing about some pending legislation. At the same time, he would oblige aides to take dictation standing in the door of his office bathroom while he went about emptying his bowels, as if in some alpha-male ritual assertion of his primacy. Even on the floors of the House and Senate, he would extravagantly rummage away at his groin, sometimes reaching his hand through a pocket and leaning with half-lifted leg for more thorough access.

Thanks to various sex scandals, we have detailed descriptions of Bill Clinton’s penis. According to Robert Bennet, Clinton’s lawyer in the Paula Jones case, “In terms of size, shape, direction, whatever the devious mind wants to concoct, the president is a normal man. There are no blemishes, there are no moles, there are no growths.” The Independent offered a more prosaic account: “His erect penis is about five inches long, has the circumference of a quarter ... and heads off at an angle, presumably rather like a finger bent at the joint.”

Has anyone heard of Peyronies disease? Bent dick disease is a real thing and there are even commercials about it.

…Powerful men like Bill Clinton apparently suffer from it, as we learned in the Paula Jones case, in which she was able to describe distinguishing characteristics of Clinton’s penis-- specifically, Peyronie’s disease-- which was backed up by former Clinton mistresses, as well as apparently his medical exams. 

And for the grand finale:

Here is the coup d’état of penis stories that relate to current politics: Brett Kavanaugh’s no holds barred deep dive into this low level, lurid, topic regarding Bill Clinton, when he was an assistant to Ken Starr. Another stunning example of why Brett should NOT UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES be given the honor of Supreme Court justice. His character, to put it simply, sucks.

In last month’s Washington Post:

Kavanaugh wrote a memo in 1998 that was a bit harsh even for many of his colleagues, because whereas some of them didn't want to know every single dirty detail about Bill Clinton's penis, Kavanaugh wanted to dive onto that dick head first. He was Hungry Hungry Hippos, for knowledge of Bill Clinton's dick! Clinton's dick was the all you can eat buffet at Ryan's Family Steakhouse, and Brett Kavanaugh was there for the Early Bird Special! If Brett Kavanaugh was stranded in the desert, sexxxy knowledge about Bill Clinton's dick was the oasis Kavanaugh would hallucinate about one million times, and he would exclaim, "I have found the Fountain Of Bill Clinton's Dick! Verily, we will no longer starve in the desert!" (And then he would die in the desert, we guess, because Clinton's dick was just a thirsty fantasy.)

Here are more details on Brett Kavanaugh’s role in Bill Clinton’s impeachment.

The National Archives has begun the release of documents pertaining to the previous government service of Brett Kavanaugh, Really Great Guy and nominee for the Supreme Court. As we have been told, over and over again, Kavanaugh doesn't much approve of the idea of independent counsels and their ability to make presidents uncomfortable. This, of course, despite the fact that Kavanaugh was intimately involved in the Great Penis Hunt of 1998 on behalf of special counsel Kenneth Starr.

  Boy howdy, was Kavanaugh intimately involved. One might even say he was intimately involved intimately. From the Washington Post:

The memo was written Aug. 15 to Starr and “All Attorneys,” with the subject line: “Slack for the President?” It was Kavanaugh advice for the type of questioning for Clinton that would occur by Starr’s associates, who were trying to determine whether the president had committed perjury in a civil suit. “After reflecting this evening, I am strongly opposed to giving the President any ‘break’ in the questioning regarding the details of the Lewinsky relationship” unless he “resigns” or “confesses perjury,” Kavanaugh wrote, continuing: “He has required the urgent attention of the courts and the Supreme Court for frivolous privilege claims — all to cover up his oral sex from an intern. He has lied to his aides. He has lied to the American people. He has tried to disgrace you and the Office with As should be obvious, Kavanaugh, as Really Nice Guys will, pushed very hard to include in the record certain details:

• If Monica Lewinsky said you masturbated into a trash can in your secretary's office, would she be lying?
• If Monica Lewinsky said you ejaculated into her mouth on two occasions in the Oval Office area, would she be lying?
• If Monica Lewinsky says that you inserted a cigar into her vagina while you were in the Oval Office area, would she be lying?
• If Monica Lewinsky says that on several occasions you had her give her oral sex, made her stop, and then ejaculated into the sink in the bathroom off the Oval Office, would she be lying?

Christamighty, it's a good thing he's a Really Nice Guy, or else I'd think he was a bed-sniffing hypocrite and a sanctimonious yahoo who's spent his entire career as a Republican hack.

Go Stormy!

Notes on Seymour Hersh's book "Reporter"

An American soldier stoking a fire of burning houses during the My Lai massacre on March 16th, 1968 (Ronald S. Haeberle/The LIFE Images Collection/Getty)

by Gaius Publius

Seymour Hersh recently released a book on his life as a reporter, called appropriately, Reporter. It's gotten praise from many quarters, including from novelist and former intelligence officer John Le Carré: "This book is essential reading for every journalist and aspiring journalist the world over."

Journalist Matt Taibbi has apparently taken le Carré's words to heart, read it (no surprise) and written an interesting commentary on it for Rolling Stone. I'm drawing the observations below from Taibbi's observations.

On Intelligence Agencies "Going Rogue"

Taibbi recounts a story from Reporter about a time when Hersh, who makes his living discovering information that intelligence agencies don't want people to know, was handed a "treasure trove" of secret information the CIA did want him to know.

Taibbi writes:

Late in his new memoir, Reporter, muckraking legend Seymour Hersh recounts an episode from a story he wrote for the New Yorker in 1999, about the Israeli spy Jonathan Pollard.

Bill Clinton was believed to be preparing a pardon for Pollard. This infuriated the rank and file of the intelligence community, who now wanted the press to know just what Pollard had stolen and why letting him free would be, in their eyes, an outrage.

"Soon after I began asking questions," Hersh writes, "I was invited by a senior intelligence official to come have a chat at CIA headquarters. I had done interviews there before, but always at my insistence."

He went to the CIA meeting. There, officials dumped a treasure trove of intelligence on his desk and explained that this material – much of which had to do with how we collected information about the Soviets – had been sold by Pollard to Israel.

On its face, the story was sensational. But Hersh was uncomfortable. "I was very ambivalent about being in the unfamiliar position of carrying water for the American intelligence community," he wrote. "I, who had worked so hard in my career to learn the secrets, had been handed the secrets."

From this Taibbi takes this lesson: "This offhand line explains a lot about what has made Hersh completely embody what it means to be a reporter. The great test is being able to get information powerful people don't want you to have. A journalist who is handed something, even a very sensational something, should feel nervous, sick, ambivalent."

From the same story I take an additional lesson: The CIA, through an active, serving, "senior official," attempted to use an unauthorized intelligence leak of massive proportions to undermine and potentially sabotage the decision of an elected, sitting president, nominally the official's boss via the chain of command, all this in 1999, decades before Donald Trump.

Should Pollard have been pardoned by Clinton? Likely not. Pressure on Clinton from Israel and the Jewish-American community was intense, but he eventually decided against a pardon, and a look at the facts shows he made the right decision. Pollard had done quite a lot of damage, was unrepentant, and acted for gain as well as in the interests of Israel. So justice was done.

Yet the method attempted by the CIA to influence this decision included not just normal chain-of-command influence (going into the president's office and arguing the case), but backdoor leaks to the press (Hersh) calculated to make a pardon politically impossible. In other words, to box in a presidential decision, the agency decided to "go rogue" — use its access to classified intelligence material to force the president it serves to make a decision it preferred.

This is first cousin to blackmail by the keeper of the nation's secrets via a third party (Hersh), and it would actually have been blackmail had someone from the agency gone to Clinton ahead of time and told him of the plan. Which they may well have done.

Keep this intelligence community behavior in mind as you consider (a) how that community operates with respect to U.S. politics; and (b) how it may be helping to get rid of another elected, sitting president, one that few in the Beltway political establishment want to see continue in office.

To be clear: Should Trump be removed as president? I'm a strong yes on that, though you may disagree. How should he be removed? The answer to that sets precedent, doesn't it?

We've had presidents murdered out of office, most recently in 1963, in suspicious circumstances as a matter of fact. To my knowledge we haven't yet had one blackmailed out of office, though that clock has obviously not run out.

On CIA Assassination

Taibbi also brings up the history of political assassination carried out by the CIA: "Hersh was also among the first to describe a burgeoning American assassination program that to this day is poorly understood."

Within weeks of 9/11, for instance, Hersh quoted a "C.I.A. man" claiming the U.S. needed to "defy the American rule of law… We need to do this – knock them down one by one." He later reported on the existence of a "target list" and cited an order comparing the new tactics to El Salvadoran execution squads, reporting that much of this was going on without Congress being told.

That quote, about defying American rule of law, can be found in this New Yorker analysis of Hersh's writing about the executive assassination program in the post 9/11 years, "Close Read: What Did Seymour Hersh Say About Assassination?" published in 2009. It's quite revealing.

For even more about executive assassination, I strongly recommend reading this Hersh account of what really happened to Osama bin Laden — "The Killing of Osama bin Laden" — published in the London Review of Books.

A taste:

'They knew where the target was – third floor, second door on the right,' the retired official [one of Hersh's sources] said. Go straight there. Osama [by now an invalid] was cowering and retreated into the bedroom. Two shooters followed him and opened up. Very simple, very straightforward, very professional hit.' Some of the Seals were appalled later at the White House’s initial insistence that they had shot bin Laden in self-defence, the retired official said. 'Six of the Seals’ finest, most experienced NCOs, faced with an unarmed elderly civilian, had to kill him in self-defence?'

The whole thing, including Obama's shameful, self-serving sabotage of the agreed-upon plan, will fascinate you.

How to Be a Reporter

Taibbi ultimately reflects on the journalism business:

The job in many quarters has devolved into feeding captive audiences a steady stream of revelations framed to fit their preconceived ideas about the world, in order to keep them coming back. From Fox to MSNBC, the slant of programming has become more predictable, because audiences hate surprises and dislike being challenged. ...

Hersh's career is a tribute to the pursuit of the "unpredictable result." We used to value reporters who were willing to alienate editors and readers alike, if that's the way the truth cut. Now, as often as not, we just change the channel. This has been bad for both reporters and readers, who are losing the will to seek out and face the unpredictable truth.

I found myself speculating a little as I read those paragraphs. Matt Taibbi is already one of our most valuable journalists. Still, could this signal a change in his own career, or is this just an comment about someone else's career from his own desk at Rolling Stone? Taibbi's admiration is certainly obvious, as is his criticism of his peers.

Either way, Seymour Hersh has committed journalism of the most dangerous kind, putting him several steps ahead of what is now delivered to us as reporting. It would be nice to find a few more like him among the current crop.

GP
  

Setting a Perjury Trap for Trump

by Gaius Publius

A "perjury trap" is a prosecutorial maneuver and a form of entrapment in which "a prosecutor calls a witness to testify with the intent to base a perjury charge on their statements, not to indict them for a previous crime." If a prosecutor calls a witness for only that purpose, rather than to get information to further an investigation, the law is clear — it's forbidden.

Perjury traps are most easily executed when the prosecutor has prior knowledge of the matter about which the witness is questioned but doesn't reveal having that knowledge. In practice perjury traps can be executed while furthering an investigation and still be traps. A prosecutor can ask investigatory questions and set a perjury trap at the same time. Thus, since perjury traps are forbidden in law only in restricted circumstances, they are difficult to avoid.

If the questions leaked to the New York Times and presented as what Robert Mueller would ask Donald Trump in an official interview, are indeed Mueller's questions (regardless of who leaked them), Mueller may be setting a perjury trap for Trump.

Michael Flynn's Perjury Trap

Witness the situation of Michael Flynn, about which investigative reporter Robert Parry wrote just weeks before his death:

Russia-gate enthusiasts are thrilled over the guilty plea of President Trump’s former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn for lying to the FBI about pre-inauguration conversations with the Russian ambassador, but the case should alarm true civil libertarians.

What is arguably most disturbing about this case is that then-National Security Adviser Flynn was pushed into a perjury trap by Obama administration holdovers at the Justice Department who concocted an unorthodox legal rationale for subjecting Flynn to an FBI interrogation four days after he took office, testing Flynn’s recollection of the conversations while the FBI agents had transcripts of the calls intercepted by the National Security Agency.

In other words, the Justice Department wasn’t seeking information about what Flynn said to Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak – the intelligence agencies already had that information. Instead, Flynn was being quizzed on his precise recollection of the conversations and nailed for lying when his recollections deviated from the transcripts.

Seems like entrapment to me, regardless of what you think of Michael Flynn.

Bill Clinton's Perjury Trap

If you're not fond of Michael Flynn, consider Bill Clinton, of whom many have kinder thoughts. In 1998 Jeffrey Rosen wrote this in The New Yorker about Ken Starr's attempt to prove Bill Clinton perjured himself by denying his affair with Monica Lewinsky (emphasis added):

Independent Counsel Kenneth Starr has claimed that his 7-month investigation of President Clinton's relationship with Monica Lewinsky, which seeks to prove that Clinton and Lewinsky lied under oath in the Paula Jones sexual harrassment case against Clinton, is about lies, not sex. But the public appears to recognize instinctively what the law has long acknowledged: that lies vary in degree and in kind, and that they should be treated accordingly. The President's aides fear that Starr will try to set a so-called perjury trap in order to catch the President in lies told directly to the grand jury. Perjury traps have become a popular tactic among independent counsels: if they can't prove the alleged crime they were appointed to investigate, they indict suspects for lying to investigators. But the traps are effective only because independent counsels have succeeded over the past few decades in expanding the lying laws far beyond their historical roots.

The U.S. is a prosecutorial nation, and has been for some time. How else do we explain the popularity of shows like Judge Judy, Jerry Springer and the many like them, shows in which the "unworthy" are subjected to public humiliation? How else do we explain our acceptance of having the largest prison population in the world?

How Will the Next "Rogue" President Be Taken Down?

Perhaps you're fine with this use of prosecutorial power. Perhaps, even though you'd hate it if these tactics were used against you, and hated it when they were used against Bill Clinton, you now love them when used against Trump and his team.

But whatever your view of either man, Donald Trump or Bill Clinton, keep this in mind:

     1. This is the way prosecutors regularly do business in our "in love with prosecution" state. 

     2. This is one way Mueller is trying to get rid of Donald Trump — this and the blackmail opportunity his investigation of Trump's finances will inevitably offer.

And thanks to Democrats, who opposed these tactics when used against Clinton's presidency, and now cheer their use against Trump's, we see that:

     3. These techniques have now been "blessed" (legitimized) by both parties and the mainstream press, and

     4. They can and will be used freely against any sitting president who falls seriously out of favor with our ruling Establishment.

Do you think a President Sanders would be any more loved, or any less hated, by the DC and press Establishment than Donald Trump is? Imagine a Sanders-like presidency. Remember MSNBC's behavior to Sanders during the 2016 primary. Remember the Party's behavior during that time. What do you think would be done to "delegitimize" him, or anyone like him, by both parties and the press, with both parties' consent?

What if he adopted a federal jobs guarantee proposal? Such a program, properly executed, would force wages to rise through the entire private sector and affect the bottom line of every corporation with employees in the U.S. What if he starts such a program under current executive power? Now imagine that the program has huge popular support, which means it represents a real legislative threat to our decades-old, comfortable, bipartisan neoliberal Establishment.

Would such a program be allowed by that Establishment to go forward? What if it could not be stopped in any other way than by bringing down ("delegitimizing") the Sanders presidency itself?

Anyone who attempts to overturn four decades of Establishment neoliberal rule would not be treated kindly by anyone in DC. The bipartisan takedown of a President Sanders would look different than the takedown of Trump, but all of the same actors would participate and all the same tools would be in play.

Please, as you cheer the takedown of President Trump (if you do), keep a president like Sanders in mind.

The NSA Already Knows the Answers to Mueller's Collusion Questions

Back to Mueller's questions for Donald Trump. The dirty little secret — which is only "secret" because everyone in the country is pretending it isn't so — is that the NSA already knows all or most of what Mueller reportedly wants to find out in his questions for Donald Trump.

Ex-intelligence officers Ray McGovern and William Binney wrote about this at Robert Parry's Consortium News (h/t email correspondent Kevin Fathi for the link; emphasis added):

Mueller does not need to send his team off on a “broad quest” with “open-ended” queries on an “exhaustive array of subjects.” If there were any tangible evidence of Trump campaign-Russia collusion, Mueller would almost certainly have known where to look and, in today’s world of blanket surveillance, would have found it by now. It beggars belief that he would have failed, in the course of his year-old investigation, to use all the levers at his disposal — the levers Edward Snowden called “turnkey tyranny” — to “get the goods” on Trump.

Here’s what the “mainstream” media keeps from most Americans: The National Security Agency (NSA) collects everything: all email, telephone calls, texts, faxes — everything, and stores it in giant databases. OK; we know that boggles the mind, but the technical capability is available, and the policy is to “collect it all.” All is collected and stored in vast warehouses.  (The tools to properly analyze/evaluate this flood of information do not match the miraculous state of the art of collection, so the haystack keeps growing and the needles get harder and harder to find.  But that is another story.)

How did collection go on steroids? You’ve heard it a thousand times — “After 9/11 everything changed.”  In short, when Vice President Dick Cheney told NSA Director and Air Force Gen. Michael Hayden to disregard the Fourth Amendment, Hayden saluted sharply. [James Comey, hero of the #Resistance, saluted sharply too, except for that one little time when he asked for changed first.]

And so, after 9/11, NSA’s erstwhile super-strict First Commandment, “Thou Shalt Not Collect Information on Americans Without a Court Warrant,” went the way of the Fourth Amendment. (When this became public, former NSA Director Adm. Bobby Ray Inman stated openly that Hayden violated the law, and former NSA Director Army Gen. William Odom said Hayden ought to be courtmartialed.  The timorous “mainstream” media suppressed what Inman and Odom said.)

And yes, the NSA does indeed spy on everyone, with the help and connivance of Barack Obama:

On January 17, 2014, when President Barack Obama directed the intelligence community to limit their warrantless data searches for analysis/evaluation to two “hops,” either he did not understand what he was authorizing or he was bowing, as was his custom, to what the intelligence community claimed was needed (lest anyone call him soft on terrorism).

Intelligence directors were quite happy with his decision because, basically, it authorized them to spy on anyone on the planet.

"Collect it all," NSA chief Keith Alexander famously said. And if whistle-blower Russell Tice is to be believed, the NSA's been doing just that since 2001, including getting wiretaps of Barack Obama in 2004, just as he was emerging onto the national political scene. Tice once claimed in an interview to have held those orders in his hand. He also claimed that similar orders applied to all important judges, including FISA judges, and all Pentagon officers of three-star rank and above. (For conspiracy fans, note that this would have included General Patraeus.)

Setting a Perjury Trap for Trump

To end where we began, here's what I think we're about to see next in the Mueller-Trump story. Mueller is attempting to bait Trump into giving an interview. Trump's former lawyer John Dowd quit recently, reportedly over Trump's interest in granting Mueller an interview, which Dowd strongly (and wisely) opposed. Trump recently hired Rudy Guilani, reportedly to negotiate a Trump-Mueller interview with clear boundaries and with it an end to the investigation.

It looks like Trump favors doing the interview. So what will happen if Trump sits down with Mueller? Will he stay on the script his lawyers prepared for him, or will he freelance?

If he freelances, will he lie?

It's impossible to imagine an undisciplined Trump not freelancing and not lying. If he lies, he will be charged with perjury and Mueller will have succeeded.

Whether that brings him down, however, is anyone's guess. (Mine is, it won't.) After all, the House would still have to impeach him, and even Nancy Pelosi has said impeachment is off the table (again).

Maybe it's all just one club after all.

GP