Trump 53: Orange Florida Man Awaiting Indictment

[AmazonGrace]

He's probably stashed millions and millions of bribery money somewhere they'll never find it.

[GreyhoundFan]

I guess the Orange hotel in DC is no longer the place to be seen.

[Alisamer]

22 hours ago, fraurosena said:

He deserves to be broke, yes. And he's going to be.

I think, sadly, the only way he'll truly be broke is if he's imprisoned. 

The rich stay rich. Even when they're not rich anymore. He has declared bankruptcy multiple times, and it doesn't matter. He's infamous, and has people willing to kiss his ample backside and pave the way for him to do what he wants. 

Poor people get dumped on, and told to pull themselves up by the bootstraps. Rich and well-known people get handed things for free, on top of their huge tax breaks and other comped luxuries. Things go bad? Hide as much as you can, declare bankruptcy, then start a publicity tour or join a reality show to generate more public interest and therefore cash. Get somebody to write an "autobiography" for you, and get fed and put up in nice hotels by all the talk shows you go on to promote it.

Besides, he's stupid, but he's also cunning, in his own unethical, criminal way. He's got money stashed away, no doubt. Under fake names, his kids' names, etc. I think Ivanka is his own little money laundress (he seems to somewhat trust her, and she's less likely to snort it all up her nose), and no doubt he's got money stashed away in Barron's name that the kid won't have access to yet so dad is the one in charge of it. Heck, I'd bet most of it isn't even HIS money in the first place - it's embezzled from his defunct charity or his/his family's businesses, grifted from the suckers who listen to him, and I wouldn't be surprised if he had lots of "gifts" from people wanting favors. As long as he's free, he's going to find ways to live the life he's accustomed to, no matter what the truth of his financial situation is. 

[GreyhoundFan]

He definitely sounds bored: "In self-imposed exile, Trump watches with unhappiness as second impeachment trial unfolds"

Quote

As he faces his second impeachment trial, Donald Trump has been unusually quiet.

Ensconced in his private Mar-a-Lago Club in Palm Beach, Fla., the former president has spent his days golfing. He has rolled through his phone, calling old friends and allies simply to check in. He has dined on the patio of his lush retreat, often accompanied by a coterie of political aides still on his payroll.

And, as Congress on Tuesday took up a second Senate trial for Trump almost exactly a year after his first, Trump has remained sanguine that an evenly divided Senate will acquit him of a charge of inciting an insurrection by egging on an angry crowd that attacked the Capitol on Jan. 6.

Yet despite his overall confidence, Tuesday’s opening arguments did not unfold as Trump or his allies had hoped. Trump was especially disappointed in the performance of his lawyer Bruce Castor, who gave a rambling argument, wore an ill-fitting suit and at one point praised the case presented by the Democratic House impeachment managers, two people involved in the effort said. The former president — monitoring the trial on television from Florida — had expected a swashbuckling lawyer and instead watched what was a confusing and disjointed performance.

Several Trump advisers also described Castor’s performance in harsh terms as underwhelming, as did a number of senators, including Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.), who said the shoddy defense spurred him to change his vote on the constitutionality of the proceedings.

In self-imposed exile in South Florida since leaving office on Jan. 20, Trump has created a gilded bubble around himself — a protective shield further enforced by the decision of Twitter and other social media companies to ban the former president from their platforms after the Capitol riot, which resulted in the death of a police officer and four others.

He is adrift, friends say, with no clear sense of what comes next for the first time in his political life. They add that Trump is calmer than they expected as he faces down another historic indictment in a career littered with them. Four former senior Trump administration officials independently described the former president as “chill” or “chilling.”

Nonetheless, the Senate impeachment trial that began Tuesday is never far from his mind, allies say. The former president is still privately fuming over fellow Republicans who he believes have wronged him, from Rep. Liz Cheney of Wyoming (who voted to impeach him) to House Republican leader Kevin McCarthy of California (who said that Trump “bears responsibility” for the attack on the Capitol, before backtracking).

“He’s decompressing. He’s enjoying some of the time he hasn’t had in the past,” Sen. Lindsey O. Graham (R-S.C.), a Trump ally, said in a recent interview. “And he’s thinking about impeachment.”

This portrait of Trump in this moment is the result of interviews with 11 advisers, allies and confidants, many of whom spoke on the condition of anonymity to share candid details.

Trump initially pushed his impeachment lawyers to make the baseless case that the election was stolen, an approach they ultimately rejected while still arguing that the First Amendment protects their client’s right to share misinformation and false claims.

Worried about his instinct for self-sabotage, Trump’s lawyers and allies counseled him to largely stay quiet until the Senate trial ends, fearful that anything he might say or do would only serve to strengthen the case against him or make Republicans more reluctant to acquit him. Daughter Ivanka Trump and her husband, Jared Kushner, also urged him not to get in the way of the Senate proceedings, which seemed to be headed toward a positive outcome for him.

Unlike during special counsel Robert S. Mueller III’s Russia investigation, and Trump’s first impeachment trial in 2020, the former president also did not press the idea of testifying himself.

But Trump’s seeming quietude, said one confidant who recently spoke with the former president, is less the result of newfound discipline and more a consequence of Twitter’s decision to ban Trump, who no longer has an instant public forum to blast out his latest grievances.

In many ways, Trump’s former world is crumbling around him. President Biden handily defeated him in November. His Florida neighbors are trying to ban him from living at Mar-a-Lago where, after leaving office, he lost the special permit to have a helicopter pad. Buildings emblazoned with his name are trying to remove their Trump insignia, the PGA of America pulled its 2022 championship from one of Trump’s golf clubs and the lobby of the former president’s namesake Washington hotel now sits conspicuously empty just five blocks from the White House.

Now out of office, Trump has also lost his protective press pool — the captive audience of reporters that follows a sitting president nearly everywhere — and Biden has made clear that he does not plan to extend the courtesy of intelligence briefings to Trump, citing him as an intelligence risk. According to a Post-ABC poll conducted after the Jan. 6 attack, 38 percent of Americans said they approved of Trump’s handling of the presidency — the lowest measurement in Post-ABC polling for Trump since fall 2019.

Trump has pushed for a speedy trial, initially arguing that he wanted the Senate to take up the House’s article of impeachment while he was still in office, aides said. After Republicans lost two Senate seats in a Georgia special election, Trump was hoping the Senate would vote before the two new Democratic lawmakers were sworn in. But he struggled to assemble a legal team willing to defend him, and, though he eventually found a team of South Carolina lawyers with the help of Graham, those lawyers ultimately quit.

Trump is not expected to make a public appearance during the trial and is staying at his Florida club, two advisers said. But he has asked a number of Republican allies in the House, including Reps. Matt Gaetz (Fla.) and Jim Jordan (Ohio), to appear on television on his behalf. 

Talking points shared with Senate offices by Trump’s impeachment team urged Republicans to stress that the “entire Impeachment trial is unconstitutional” and an act of “political vengeance” by Democrats. Anticipating a potential question — “Why are the Democrats and some members of the media saying President Trump didn’t take to social media to stop the violence on January 6th like he should have?” — the memo offered a concise answer: “Because they’re liars.”

The former president has been furious with the Republican lawmakers who voted to impeach him and has told aides that he is especially eager to help defeat Cheney, Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) and Rep. Tom Rice (R-S.C.). He is also hoping to help unseat Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp, a Republican, who resisted his entreaties to overturn his state’s election results in favor of Trump.

Trump has railed against Cheney, the daughter of former vice president Richard B. Cheney. He views her as allied with her father’s previous boss, former president George W. Bush, and claims the Bush family is aligned against him because he “crushed” former Florida governor Jeb Bush in the 2016 Republican primaries.

He has also griped about how he “made” McCarthy and how McCarthy let him down by initially blaming Trump for the insurrection and not pushing Cheney out of his leadership team after she voted for impeachment. But Trump seemed calmer after McCarthy traveled to Florida and met with him at Mar-a-Lago, part of an effort by McCarthy, Republican National Committee Chairwoman Ronna McDaniel and others to prevent Trump from trying to destroy the Republican Party.

For the first time since Trump descended the escalator at Trump Tower in Manhattan in 2015 and announced his presidential bid, his next chapter remains uncertain — and without any clearly defined focus, advisers said.

The former president has asked advisers what he should do with his super PAC funds that he has raised since the election, and he is closely monitoring the finances.

Within Trump’s orbit, there are two competing camps on how he should try to wield his remaining power. One group, which includes longtime outside advisers such as David Bossie and Corey Lewandowski, is working with Trump to recruit candidates to seek retribution against Republicans who were insufficiently loyal.

Another group, which includes McDaniel, McCarthy and former White House counselor Kellyanne Conway, has argued that Trump can best burnish his legacy by helping Republicans win back the House and supporting fellow Republicans in the process.

Some of his former aides, including his top economic adviser Larry Kudlow, are forming a nonprofit group to advance portions of Trump’s policy agenda. They are expected to hire some senior staff, but Trump himself is not expected to be a part of the effort, a person familiar with the project said.

Trump has talked about reemerging in March, officials said, after taking a few weeks off. He has told some friends that his forced sojourn from Twitter has improved his standing.

He has recently gloated about falling ratings at Fox News, the conservative-leaning news channel that he abandoned in recent months in favor of rivals Newsmax and One America News. One person who spoke with the former president described him as sounding “bored out of his mind” and pressing for gossip: “What are you hearing? What are they saying?” Trump queried.

“He’s still licking his wounds to some extent, and he’s also waiting for this to be behind him,” said one Republican in Trump’s orbit, adding dryly, “and then he’ll relaunch himself as the savior of the Republican Party.”

Mike DuHaime, a Republican consultant who worked for former New Jersey governor Chris Christie, said that while Trump “remains very  influential within the party,” his influence has dissipated from even two months ago and is likely to further erode over time.

“Some of this is less about Trump and more about the reality that you’re a former president than a president,” DuHaime said. “People move on. Voters move on, too.”

On a recent Friday evening at Mar-a-Lago, Trump came to the club to eat dinner with his wife, Melania, and several friends.

But unlike his usual habit as president, he did not walk around and mingle with other guests, staying at his table and soon retreating to his residence.

 

[GreyhoundFan]

This ticks me off royally. He is NOT an employee, he's the owner. He doesn't work there, he wouldn't know work if it kicked him in his ample ass.

 

[GreyhoundFan]

David Fahrenthold is still on the trail of all the money taxpayers put in the OFM's pocket:

 

[clueliss]

Go Georgia!

 

[47of74]

Fuck face will not be getting his twitter account back

Quote

Former President Donald Trump will not be permitted back on Twitter even if he runs again for office and wins, according to the company's chief financial officer.

Asked during an interview on CNBC Wednesday whether Trump's tweeting privileges could be restored if he wins the presidency again, CFO Ned Segal clarified that Trump's ban is permanent.

"The way our policies work, when you're removed from the platform, you're removed from the platform," he said, "whether you're a commentator, you're a CFO, or you are a former or current public official. Remember, our policies are designed to make sure that people are not inciting violence, and if anybody does that, we have to remove them from the service and our policies don't allow people to come back."

 

[GreyhoundFan]

Sadly, I'm sure he'll still have whatever lawyers are still working for him try to cheat the US out of as much money as possible "Now out of office, Trump may have to face tax questions"

Quote

Once his impeachment trial concludes and former president Donald Trump returns to his business, he will face some obvious challenges, such as declining real estate income and investigations from New York authorities.

But he may also have to finally face two tax issues that have been simmering in the background, either of which experts say could carry significant consequences should they materialize now that he is out of office.

One is a massive income tax refund Trump received before entering office, according to the New York Times, one that has quietly been under a years-long review by the Internal Revenue Service and a little-known congressional panel, the Joint Committee on Taxation.

The refund, which the IRS issued to Trump in 2010 for $72.9 million, according to the Times, could be a nonissue for Trump if the agency rules that it was issued appropriately and he should keep the funds.

But if the agency rules against him, he could be asked to pay it back with interest, handing him a debt of more than $100 million at a time when some of his biggest properties are suffering severe revenue losses and the law firm that handled his tax issues cut ties with him following the attack on the U.S. Capitol.

After the Times story, Trump Organization attorney Alan Garten issued a statement to The Washington Post saying parts of the story were inaccurate, without identifying them. “Over the past decade the President has paid tens of millions of dollars in personal taxes to the federal government,” he said. He declined to comment further Wednesday.

Steven M. Rosenthal, a tax expert who worked for the Joint Committee on Taxation in the 1990s, said he was not surprised that the IRS and the committee didn’t issue a decision while Trump was in office. He said it’s more likely they’ll move forward now.

“The outcome of all this may be a huge liability for Donald Trump,” Rosenthal said. “This is real money.”

The other issue Trump faces is the possibility that Democrats, after five years of trying, will finally pry free Trump’s tax returns now that the party controls both Congress and the White House. Leading House Democrats are still pursuing a lawsuit seeking six years of Trump’s returns. On Feb. 3, a federal judge gave officials in the Biden administration until March 3 to decide whether it plans to comply.

No decision has been scheduled for either issue, but experts say legal and administrative authorities are more likely to address Trump’s tax issues now that he is a private citizen, even as Biden administration officials debate how much to hold Trump accountable for past actions while also trying to move the country forward.

“With Trump out of the White House, the IRS and state and local taxing authorities will no longer fear going after him,” said Bert Ely, a consultant who has testified before Congress on financial matters.

Because the refund is a private tax matter under federal law, the IRS has not said anything about when a decision will be rendered, or whether it already has. The Joint Committee on Taxation also has provided the public with no information.

“The staff of the Joint Committee on Taxation does not comment on the receipt of any review case, nor comment on when any review case’s review has been completed,” said Thomas A. Barthold, the agency’s chief of staff, in an email to The Post.

Rosenthal, the former committee staffer, said the IRS sometimes quickly issues refunds but then later reconsiders whether doing so was proper. In cases involving large sums, the IRS consults with the committee. Committee staff members offer an opinion, but the final decision on whether to “claw back” a refund belongs to the IRS.

Rosenthal said the Joint Taxation Committee “plays merely an advisory role. It reviews a refund, at least a quickie refund, after the refund has already been paid. And it may raise questions for the IRS to think about. But the IRS is not bound to resolve those questions.”

Rosenthal, now a senior fellow at Washington’s Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center, said he had no direct knowledge of Trump’s case. But he said that if the IRS believed Trump would resist paying the money back, it may have delayed a final outcome until after he left office.

“The IRS — and, I imagine, even Joint Tax — wouldn’t be really crazy about trying to get into a big confrontation while Trump was president. So a delay was understandable,” Rosenthal said. Now, he said, “I think it’ll finish.”

Rosenthal said there might be no public notice if the fight concludes with the IRS or Trump backing down. But Trump himself could make the matter public if he refuses to accept a decision and files a lawsuit to block it.

The IRS is still under the control of Commissioner Charles P. Rettig, whom Trump appointed to the agency in 2018 and whose term runs until November 2022. Rettig, a Beverly Hills attorney before joining the IRS, owns a 50 percent share in two units in Trump International Hotel Waikiki, prompting concerns from congressional Democrats about whether he would remain impartial in decisions affecting Trump’s finances, such as the refund.

Through a spokesman, Rettig declined to comment on whether he would personally review large, prominent refunds such as the one reportedly received by Trump. Rettig also declined to say if he would recuse himself in matters related to Trump’s business. Trump’s company manages the Waikiki hotel and splits revenue with unit owners.

“Regarding recusals generally, the Commissioner follows the advice provided by career IRS Ethics Officers,” said IRS spokesman Terry Lemons in a statement. Lemons said Rettig had been briefed on conflicts of interest and recusal requirements and that he “is committed to fair and impartial operation of the IRS in its service and enforcement matters.”

John Koskinen, Rettig’s predecessor at the IRS, said that in his experience commissioners were not involved in decisions about whether to grant a refund or claw back one that had previously been granted. An IRS directive allows the commissioner to delegate such issues to career staff.

“In four years, I never saw a tax return. And nobody ever asked me about a particular case or a refund, or the status of an audit,” Koskinen said.

Although dealing with a sitting president’s taxes is highly unusual, the IRS tradition was for those decisions to be made by career staff, without involving the agency’s two presidential appointees, the commissioner and general counsel. “I don’t think there’s a statutory provision that says the commissioner can’t be asked,” Koskinen said.

Though Trump is known to demand loyalty from his appointees, Rettig may be of little assistance to Trump when it comes to keeping the former president’s tax returns private.

After Trump became the first president since the 1970s not to release his tax returns, Democrats demanded that Rettig provide Trump’s returns to the committee overseeing the IRS.

Under questioning in 2019 from Senate Finance Committee Chairman Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), Rettig said the decision was not his but that of Trump’s treasury secretary, Steven Mnuchin, who oversaw the IRS at the time.

“We are a bureau of the Treasury. We are supervised by Treasury,” Rettig responded.

Rep. Richard E. Neal (D-Mass.), chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, then sued Treasury and the IRS for the returns later that year. Neal issued a statement to The Post saying he will continue seeking the returns with Trump out of office, as part of a program of automatic audits of the president and vice president.

“The Committee will continue to pursue its case for the President’s tax returns as part of our oversight of the mandatory presidential audit program,” he said.

Attorneys for Trump from the law firm Consovoy McCarthy have argued in a related suit that Neal “is trying to expose the President’s financial information for political gain, not to study the IRS’s audit procedures,” according to court filings. They did not respond to a request for comment Wednesday.

Newly installed Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen has not yet said how she will handle the request for Trump’s taxes, and Treasury Department officials declined to comment. U.S. District Judge Trevor N. McFadden is waiting on the Biden administration to take a position on the case before moving forward.

IRS experts said it’s probably Yellen’s decision to make on whether to surrender Trump’s tax returns to the committee.

“Given that so far it’s been controlled by Treasury, I’d be surprised if it was reverted to the IRS,” said Mark Everson, who served as IRS commissioner under President George W. Bush. “That would put Rettig in a very tough position.”

Koskinen agreed, saying it would be odd for Rettig to get involved.

“This is a matter of politics,” he said. “The treasury secretary is the right person to be making this decision. The commissioner stayed out of it last time around and I assume he will this time around as well.”

However, Koskinen tried to temper expectations among Trump opponents that the returns might reveal some previously unknown business relationships, since tax returns often don’t address the filer’s partners.

Wyden said through a spokesperson that he will continue to push legislation requiring that presidents and vice presidents make their tax returns public.

“There needs to be transparency and the American people need to know that the president and vice president are paying what they owe,” he said.

 

[clueliss]

Not that anyone here is surprised by this revelation given the weirdness that was the Trump has covid press conferences.

 

[47of74]

I’m guessing Vornado wants to get the fuck nugget stink off the buildings. 

Quote

While Donald Trump undergoes a second impeachment trial in Washington, he is also confronting a potent threat to the crown jewel of his real estate holdings, according to a person familiar with the matter.

The threat, involving a highly profitable real estate partnership that generates significant cash for the Trump Organization, is ratcheting up pressure on the former president as his real estate and hospitality operations struggle under hefty debt and vastly reduced revenues, largely a result of the coronavirus pandemic.

The partnership owns two first-class commercial buildings — one on Sixth Avenue in New York City and the other in downtown San Francisco — and it is the single most profitable asset in the Trump empire. The Trump Organization owns a 30 percent stake in the buildings, while its partner, Vornado Realty Trust, a huge public real estate concern in New York City, owns 70 percent.

But now Steven Roth, Vornado's powerful founder and chairman, is considering whether to withhold the partnership's cash flows from Trump, said a person familiar with the matter. Such a move would slash the Trump Organization's cash receipts, and it could force Trump to sell his stake back to Vornado at a discount, leaving him with a smaller gain and eliminating a crucial source of cash.

 

[GreyhoundFan]

"Donald Trump’s version of an insanity defense: His critics are insane"

Quote

In the summer of 2015, two months after Donald Trump announced he was running for president, a blogger named Esther Goldberg read a Washington Post column by the conservative commentator George F. Will that accused Trump of being phony, vulgar and unprincipled. Goldberg saw Will’s column not just as poor analysis but as a sign of mental illness.

“Many Ruling Class Republicans seem to suffer from Trump Derangement Syndrome,” she wrote in the American Spectator, describing what she considered a type of mania the reality-star-turned-candidate engendered among snooty conservatives.

The cause? Emasculation. The prognosis? The afflicted could either become liberals, or take their medicine, “man-up” and fall in line behind Trump.

Fast-forward five and a half years. “One might have been excused for thinking,” wrote the now-former president’s lawyers in a 78-page brief, released ahead of this week’s impeachment trial in the Senate, “that the Democrats’ fevered hatred for Citizen Trump and their ‘Trump Derangement Syndrome,’ would have broken by now.”

The original apologia for Trump has become his final defense: Trump Derangement Syndrome.

It’s an insanity plea. As in, everyone appalled by Trump’s behavior must be insane.

“This is a process fueled irresponsibly by base hatred,” David Schoen, one of Trump’s impeachment lawyers, said on Tuesday, teeing up a video montage of Democrats calling for Trump’s removal at various points during his presidency. Bruce Castor, another member of the defense, suggested that those looking to prosecute the president were simply “overpowered with emotion where logic does not immediately kick in.”

It’s a prime example of the I’m-rubber-you’re-glue strategy that helped Trump win the presidency in the first place. In this case it’s a term to describe not the conspiracy-flogging kooks who violently stormed the Capitol in Trump’s name, armed with bear spray and body armor; but rather, the lawmakers arguing that the ex-president should be held responsible for their actions.

This idea, that Trump’s critics are the real deranged ones, has found purchase among plenty of the former-president’s allies. “I think it’s an obsession,” Sen. James M. Inhofe (R-Okla.) said Wednesday in an interview. “It’s a level of hatred I’ve never seen before.”

“I’m not a doctor, so I don’t know what to call it, but I know that this thing where Trump lives rent-free in people’s brains is a thing,” said Matt Schlapp, a confidant of the former president. “I just don’t know if it’s a medical condition, a psychological condition or just a political state of mind.”

What are we talking about when we talk about Trump Derangement Syndrome (TDS)?

First off, we’re talking about an old idea. Like Ronald Reagan’s 1980 campaign slogan, “Make America Great Again,” or Woodrow Wilson’s non-interventionist line, “America First,” TDS is an old edifice affixed with the Trump name.

“Bush Derangement Syndrome,” the late columnist Charles Krauthammer wrote in The Post, in 2003, could be understood as: “The acute onset of paranoia in otherwise normal people in reaction to the policies, the presidency — nay — the very existence of George W. Bush.”

Although there’s no precise definition for TDS, it can basically be described as experiencing a hatred of the president so strong that it distorts reality. Those suffering are said to have an inability to differentiate truly bad actions from reasonable ones.

“Derangement” as an affliction of the politically engaged presented in a gruesome new way on Jan. 6, when hordes of Trump supporters, espousing false claims that their man had won the election, laid siege to the Capitol, brutalizing police officers, hunting for lawmakers and defacing their offices. Some of the rioters supported QAnon, a sprawling set of outlandish disinformation — for example, that Trump’s political opponents are sickos who abuse children and eat babies — that has coalesced into an extremist ideology and radicalized its adherents. (The FBI has designated QAnon a domestic terrorism threat.)

Afterward, Trump’s supporters feared the new strain of TDS was spreading among Republican leaders in Washington.

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell said the president “provoked” the insurrection. House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy said Trump “bears responsibility” for the attack. Ten Republicans in the House voted to impeach Trump over it, and there was talk of asymptomatic cases in the ranks — Republicans who wanted Trump punished but weren’t saying so out loud for fear of reprisal.

“The President of the United States summoned this mob, assembled the mob, and lit the flame of this attack.” wrote Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wy.), chair of the House Republican Conference, explaining why she was voting to impeach Trump. “Everything that followed was his doing.”

Cheney, a stalwart conservative, was cheered by liberals for her vote.

“Only Trump Derangement Syndrome could make something like that possible,” Donald J. Trump, Jr. told Fox News host Laura Ingraham. (What other explanation could there be?)

Whatever bug had been circulating in the GOP — whether it was TDS or an attack of conscience — seemed to have mostly cleared up by the time the impeachment trial rolled around. McCarthy backtracked by expanding the list of those who bear responsibility for Jan. 6 to “everyone across this country.” McConnell voted against holding an impeachment trial in the Senate on the basis that it was unconstitutional since Trump was no longer president.

Now the trial is happening, and Trump Derangement Syndrome has been resurrected by the president’s defense team as way to paint the proceedings as nothing more than a sham trial — an expression of pathology rather than patriotism.

“It’s a stupid talking point designed to deflect attention away from what he did,” former deputy solicitor general Neal Katyal said.

“There is no question that the American left and Washington Democrats are obsessed with their incandescent hatred of Trump, but that in no way excuses his own actions,” said Michael Steel, the former spokesman for Republican Speaker of the House John A. Boehner. “Saying the left hates Trump isn’t a logical response to, ‘Why won’t you convict him for inciting a mob to attack the Capitol?’”

Logical or not, as a political strategy — and an impeachment trial is ultimately a political event — crying “derangement” (or “WITCH HUNT” or “PRESIDENTIAL HARASSMENT”) has worked for Trump.

“Some people HATE the fact that I got along well with President Putin of Russia,” Trump tweeted in July 2018 after a cozy news conference with Vladimir Putin in Helsinki, in which Trump suggested that he trusted Putin over U.S. intelligence on the question of election interefence.“They would rather go to war than this. It’s called Trump Derangement Syndrome!”

That TDS would eventually grace Trump’s Twitter feed was inevitable, it was in the bloodstream. Brian Kilmeade had been discussing the term on Fox News just a half-hour before the Helsinki tweet, and the idea that criticism of Trump was a symptom of a diseased mind was tailor-made for a president fond of smearing his critics as mentally enfeebled (see: “Crazy” Megyn Kelly, “very Low IQ individual” Robert De Niro and — hey, why not? — “dummy” Charles Krauthammer).

That TDS would eventually grace an anti-impeachment brief was, perhaps, just as inevitable.

“It doesn’t sound very different than the accusations they have made throughout the first four years,” Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) said about the TDS defense offered by Trump’s lawyers. “Yes, we are very focused on Donald Trump, more so than perhaps prior presidents because we think he has done more to destroy the country and imperil our democracy than anyone in office before him.”

House impeachment managers have spent the past three days demonstrating the extent of this peril. With the most comprehensive footage shown to date, they’ve painted a horrifying picture of mayhem and violence, and showed just how close various politicians, including then-Vice President Mike Pence, came to being swallowed up by the mob.

“The fact that we got out of there unscathed is nothing short of a miracle,” said Sen. Jon Tester (D-Mont.).

For Tester, the Senate trial has been a surreal experience, as he’s forced to play the role of both witness and juror. If he’s being honest, having to relive that day has come with side effects.

“It’s made my blood boil,” he said.

Could it be he’s got a case of TDS?

“I’ve got a minor in psychology, and I’ve never heard that,” he said. “That’s not what this is about. You just have to look at the facts and ignore all the emotions.”

Here are the facts, as laid out by House impeachment managers: since the spring of 2020, then-President Trump began warning that Democrats would try to steal the election. After President Joe Biden won, Trump continued to contest the election, vowing, in a series of clips played for jurors to “never surrender” in his fight against the election outcome. He told his supporters to “fight like hell, and if you don’t fight like hell, you’re not going to have a country anymore.” And when his supporters showed up to fight at the Capitol, many of them shouted that Trump had sent them.

“This case is much worse than someone who falsely shouts fire in a crowded theater,” said Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.), the lead impeachment manager. “It’s more like a case where the town fire chief, who’s paid to put out fires, sends a mob not to yell fire in a crowded theater but to actually set the theater on fire.”

The response from Trump fans: Wow, why so mad? TDS much?

“This is psychopathy,” former Trump aide Sebastian Gorka said on Sean Spicer’s Newsmax show. “Trump Derangement Syndrome is a clinical condition.”

“I just wonder if it’s covered under Obamacare,” quipped Spicer, Trump’s former press secretary.

“It’s a progressive disease, in ever sense of the word, and end stage is particularly devoid of wit and full of venom,” tweeted pro-Trump commentator Hugh Hewitt. “Pray for the afflicted. Really.”

Tim Miller is a former spokesman for Republican presidential candidate Jeb Bush and one of the first known people to be diagnosed with TDS. He readily admits that he probably thinks too much about Trump and gets worked up into a lather more than he’d like. But watching these impeachment trial proceedings has hammered home in him something he’s long believed.

“I would say that this proves that the ‘deranged’ were the ones who were seeing things clearly,” he said. “If anyone has become deranged by Trump, it’s the people who can’t stop supporting him.”

Miller has found himself fantasizing about traveling back in time to warn Trump’s enablers about what the future would hold. Perhaps if he could explain that in the future the president of the United States would tell his people the election was stolen, he’d urge them to bring their fight to the Capitol, and after they attacked carrying flags bearing his name, Trump would tell them he loved them. Maybe then, all this could be avoided.

Or, perhaps, they would offer a more likely response.

“They would have looked at me,” Miller sighed, “And said, ‘You have TDS.”

 

[ADoyle90815]

On 2/11/2021 at 1:56 PM, clueliss said:

Not that anyone here is surprised by this revelation given the weirdness that was the Trump has covid press conferences.

 

That makes me think he faked having Covid, since if he was as sick as they're claiming, he would have been hospitalized for much longer than a weekend.

[Ozlsn]

3 hours ago, GreyhoundFan said:

“I’m not a doctor, so I don’t know what to call it, but I know that this thing where Trump lives rent-free in people’s brains is a thing,” said Matt Schlapp, a confidant of the former president. “I just don’t know if it’s a medical condition, a psychological condition or just a political state of mind.”

I find this darkly amusing given some of the response to Obama and the Clintons.

[thoughtful]

23 minutes ago, Ozlsn said:

I find this darkly amusing given some of the response to Obama and the Clintons.

Anyone who makes a big tzimmis about a tan suit and dijon mustard is pretty obsessed.

Well, unless someone has just spilled dijon mustard on your tan suit.

[clueliss]

Imagine!  I want him charged, convicted and staying in Leavenworth 

 

[fraurosena]

Serious question: now the political charges failed as they were doomed to do from the start, we know that criminal charges at (at least) state level are possible. But would also it be possible for civil charges to be made against him? From officers or reporters or even politicians and aides who were under such duress that day?

[Xan]

16 hours ago, fraurosena said:

Serious question: now the political charges failed as they were doomed to do from the start, we know that criminal charges at (at least) state level are possible. But would also it be possible for civil charges to be made against him? From officers or reporters or even politicians and aides who were under such duress that day?

I would assume that Dominion voting systems could probably sue him.  He certainly slandered them enough.  

As for the people under duress from the riot, I think that would still come under criminal charges.  Inciting a riot comes under state and federal law.

[Alisamer]

On 2/12/2021 at 5:54 PM, ADoyle90815 said:

That makes me think he faked having Covid, since if he was as sick as they're claiming, he would have been hospitalized for much longer than a weekend.

Don't forget the White House basically has a tiny hospital inside it. The fact that he went to an actual hospital at ALL means it had to have been pretty bad. He'd already had many treatments before they took him to Walter Reed, and was still sick after they sent him home to the White House. I'd think that a weekend in the hospital for him probably equals a week and a half for the regular person who doesn't have an in-house hospital room, doctors standing by, and a helicopter ready to go at any minute. I think they only transported him because they thought they were going to have to intubate him soon. 

[fraurosena]

I just threw up in my mouth a little.

 

[thoughtful]

5 minutes ago, fraurosena said:

I just threw up in my mouth a little.

 

Movement, eh? Well, we now have the name for their new party  - The Bowel Movement.

Instead of the GOP, they can be the FOS (for "full of shit," of course).

After all, some of their followers spread feces in the Capitol. I mean, when these people launch a smear campaign, they take it literally. They might as well identify with shit, having gone that far, and make it their symbol. The poop emoji coming out of an elephant's rear would be a nice logo.

[CTRLZero]

CNN article re lawsuit under KKK Act

Former President Donald Trump and attorney Rudy Giuliani are being accused of conspiring with the far-right groups Proud Boys and Oath Keepers to incite the January 6 insurrection in a civil lawsuit filed Tuesday in federal court by the Democratic chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee. The suit cites a post-Civil War law designed to combat violence and intimidation by the Ku Klux Klan. 

The lawsuit, filed by Mississippi Democratic Rep. Bennie Thompson in his personal capacity, is the first civil action filed against the former President related to the attack at the US Capitol and comes days after the Senate acquitted Trump in his impeachment trial.

***The more lawsuits, the merrier.  There is a link to the complaint in the body of the full article (first two paragraphs above).  I’m still learning how to post on my iPad, so apologies if I’ve messed up.  The lawsuit makes for interesting reading. ***

[Dandruff]

1 hour ago, CTRLZero said:

CNN article re lawsuit under KKK Act

Former President Donald Trump and attorney Rudy Giuliani are being accused of conspiring with the far-right groups Proud Boys and Oath Keepers to incite the January 6 insurrection in a civil lawsuit filed Tuesday in federal court by the Democratic chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee. The suit cites a post-Civil War law designed to combat violence and intimidation by the Ku Klux Klan. 

The lawsuit, filed by Mississippi Democratic Rep. Bennie Thompson in his personal capacity, is the first civil action filed against the former President related to the attack at the US Capitol and comes days after the Senate acquitted Trump in his impeachment trial.

***The more lawsuits, the merrier.  There is a link to the complaint in the body of the full article (first two paragraphs above).  I’m still learning how to post on my iPad, so apologies if I’ve messed up.  The lawsuit makes for interesting reading. ***

I expect at least a few corrupt, nutless Rs to continue to bleat out of both sides of their faces to (1) throw the book at the insurrectionists at the Capitol, because Jan. 6th was terrible and (2) help protect Trump, through refusal to fully connect the dots.

[fraurosena]

2 hours ago, CTRLZero said:

The more lawsuits, the merrier.  

Yep. And ones that keep digging deeper and deeper, like this one:

Subpoenas in Trump criminal probe suggests fresh scrutiny of his Seven Springs estate

Quote

Manhattan prosecutors conducting a criminal investigation into possible bank, tax and insurance fraud by former President Donald Trump and his company recently subpoenaed documents from an engineer who worked on an expansive property owned by the Trump family in Westchester County, north of New York City.

The engineer, Ralph Mastromonaco, told CBS News he recently received the subpoena and quickly complied, turning over maps of the 200-acre Seven Springs Estate and other documents he produced for the Trump Organization nearly a decade ago. The subpoena has not been previously reported and there is no indication that Mastromonaco is being investigated for wrongdoing. 

Mastromonaco said his work included surveying Seven Springs as part of an effort by the Trump Organization to get approval for a subdivision in 2013, and that he doubts his work will prove relevant to the tax fraud investigation. 

"I think they are just touching every base. I really had nothing to do with the project after (that). My role ended after they got an approval and whatever they did after that, I had nothing to do with," Mastromonaco said. 

Mastromonaco's subpoena came weeks after Manhattan investigators sent another subpoena to the town clerk of Bedford, New York. Seven Springs straddles Bedford and two other affluent suburban towns, North Castle and New Castle. The grand jury subpoena, which was obtained by CBS News, requests documents related to Seven Springs valuations and tax assessments, tax appeals, and conservation easements.

Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance first began investigating Mr. Trump in 2018, and initially targeted hush-money payments made during the 2016 campaign to adult film star Stormy Daniels by former Trump attorney Michael Cohen. However, Vance's office has indicated in court filings that the investigation has since widened to look at possible crimes as wide-ranging as fraud and tax evasion.

Seven Springs has also drawn scrutiny from New York Attorney General Letitia James, who is conducting a civil probe into the Trump Organization.

James' office has indicated in court documents it is interested in a 2015 valuation of Seven Springs that factored into a $21.1 million tax deduction taken by Mr. Trump. 

Vance's office said in a September court filing that in the past decade, Mr. Trump's valuation of the property ranged from between $25 million and $50 million, to between $261 and $291 million. 

As part of his investigation, Vance is seeking Mr. Trump's tax records. The Supreme Court ruled in July that a subpoena of the records was constitutional, but their release was held up by a follow-up appeal on different grounds. The Supreme Court has not yet said if it will hear that appeal.

Vance's office has not said why it is interested in documents Mastromonaco produced for the Trump Organization, and declined to confirm the subpoena or comment for this article. His investigation is one of two known criminal probes focused on Mr. Trump. On February 10, the District Attorney in Fulton County, Georgia, launched an election fraud and racketeering investigation into Mr. Trump's attempts to influence the outcome of the 2020 presidential election in Georgia.

Alan Futerfas, an attorney who is counsel for Mr. Trump in the Supreme Court proceedings, declined to comment on the subpoena. Attorneys for the Trump Organization did not reply when asked for comment.

Mr. Trump has previously called Vance's investigation a "witch hunt," and one of his attorneys, William Consovoy, referred to it in court in October 2019 as a "fishing expedition." 

For the New York State civil case, James' office has said in court filings that it is "seeking information concerning whether the Trump Organization and its agents improperly inflated, or caused to be improperly inflated, the value of the Seven Springs Estate."

"Valuations of Seven Springs were used in connection with an appraisal….to claim an apparent $21.1 million tax deduction for donating a conservation easement on the property in tax year 2015, and in submissions to financial institutions as a component of Mr. Trump's net worth," attorneys for James's office wrote in an August 2020 court filing.

Mastromonaco said James' office subpoenaed similar documents more than a year ago.

James' office has interviewed Eric Trump and squared off in court with a lawyer for the Trump Organization who initially refused to hand over emails relating to Mastromonaco's work, citing attorney-client privilege. A New York court rejected that argument in December.

Mr. Trump purchased Seven Springs in 1995 for $7.5 million, and originally planned to build a golf course on it. After that plan faced local opposition, Mr. Trump considered building and selling 15 mansions on the property, which includes what once was H.J. Heinz Jr.'s 10-acre family estate, called "Nonesuch." 

Donald Trump Jr. and Eric Trump told Forbes in a 2014 interview that they have used the property as a vacation and weekend residence. Eric Trump called the estate "home base for us," and said the brothers enjoyed riding ATVs and fishing on the property. 

The New York Times reported last September that in 2014 Mr. Trump deducted $2.2 million in property taxes by claiming Seven Springs was an investment property. The deduction was not applicable to personal residences.

Trump and Seven Springs gained nationwide attention in 2009 when then-Libyan dictator Muammar Qaddafi rented the property where he planned to pitch a Bedouin-style tent that he often brought with him while traveling. Qaddafi was visiting New York for a United Nations' General Assembly and had been turned away by other officials in New York City and Englewood, New Jersey. Tents were installed on Trump's property, but the plan was scrapped when Bedford town officials objected. In 2016, Mr. Trump told CBS News' "Face the Nation" that he made "a fortune" on the brief deal.

By 2015, Mr. Trump had dropped all public plans for development of the property, and placed much of it in a conservation easement, which came with a $21.1 million tax deduction. 

In an August 2020 court filing, the New York Attorney General's office accused the Trump Organization of refusing "to produce records sufficient to show how a $21.1 million apparent tax deduction in connection with the Seven Springs conservation easement was reflected on applicable tax returns." The two sides continue to litigate that dispute.

Mastromonaco said his work for the Trumps had long since ended by then.

"I'll save you a lot of time, because I don't really think I had any relevance to any of this, because my role in the project ended well before there was any controversy," Mastromonaco said.

 

[GreyhoundFan]

Orange Man Mad: