The moment when I realized that Trump wasn’t just damaging our domestic politics nearly beyond repair but was destabilizing the world for his own personal purposes in a way that went even beyond my own pessimistic imaginings was Helsinki. I knew he would be bad. But something shifted that day and I realized that something much darker was at work

So, I was very glad to see Adam Schiff shove that in those Republicans’ faces. He made them watch the man they are defending so vociferously as he made clear that he was so far in over his head that the whole world is in danger with a man such as him at the head of the world’s only superpower:

Crooks and Liars caught the video:

You don’t have to be a Russia hawk to be gravely disturbed by Trump’s performance.

And it’s astonishing that Republicans would defend it. There is no episode that illustrates more perfectly just how deep into Trump cultism the GOP has fallen:

The transcript, helpfully provided by C&L follows:

I’m sure you remember this. It was I think unforgettable for every American. But I’m sure it was equally unforgettable for Vladimir Putin. I mean, there he is, the President of Russia, standing next to the President of the United States, and hearing his own Kremlin propaganda talking points coming from the President of the United States.

Now, if that’s not a propaganda coup I don’t know what is. It’s the most extraordinary thing. It’s the most extraordinary thing. The president of the united states standing next to the president of Russia, our adversary, saying he doesn’t believe his own intelligence agencies. He doesn’t believe them. He’s promoting this crazy server theory cooked up by the Kremlin. Right next to the guy that cooked it up. It’s a breathtaking success of Russian intelligence. I don’t know if there’s ever been a greater success of Russian intelligence.

Whatever profile Russia did of our president, boy, did they have him spot on. Flattery and propaganda. Flattery and propaganda is all Russia needed. And as to Ukraine, well, they needed to deliver a political investigation to get help from the United States. I mean, this is just the most incredible propaganda coup.

Because as I said yesterday, it’s not just that the President of the United States standing next to Vladimir Putin is reading Kremlin talking points. He won’t read his own national security staff talking points but he will read the Kremlin ones. But it’s not just that he adopts the Kremlin talking points. That would be bad enough. It is not bad enough, not damaging enough, not dangerous enough to our national security that he’s undermining our own intelligence agencies. It’s not bad enough that he undermines those very agencies that he needs later that we need later to have credibility.

We’ve just had a vigorous debate over these — the strikes against General Soleimani and the president made his argument of what the intelligence says and supports. How do you make those arguments? When you say the U.S. Intelligence community can’t be believed.

Now, we have had a vigorous debate about what that intelligence has to say. That’s not the issue here. The issue here is that you undermine the credibility of our own intelligence agencies. You weaken the country! For when you need to rely on them. For when you need to persuade your friends and allies. You can trust us when we tell you this is what the intelligence shows.

How do you make that argument as the President of the United States when you just told the world you trust the Russians more than your own people? You trust Rudy Giuliani more than Christopher Wray. How do you make that case? If you can’t make that case what does that mean to our security? But that’s not the end of it. It’s not just a propaganda coup. It is not just the undermining of our agencies.

It is also that the buy-in to that propaganda meant that Ukraine wasn’t going to get money to fight the Russians. I mean, that’s one hell of a Russian intelligence coup. They got the President of the United States to provide cover for their own interference with our election. They got the President of the United states to discredit their own intelligence agencies, to drive a wedge between the United States and Ukraine, the President of the United States to withhold aid from Ukraine in a war with Russia, in a war claiming Ukrainian lives every week.

Has there ever been such a coup? I would submit to you in the entire length of the Cold War the Soviet Union had no such success, no such success and why? Because a former mayor of New York persuaded a president of the United States to sacrifice all of that. Was it worth it? I hope it was worth it. I hope it was worth it. For the president. Because it certainly wasn’t worth it for the United States.

You’ve got to give Putin credit. He had Trump’s number from the get and he’s handled him perfectly.

There’s a whole lot of pearl-clutching going on among the GOP Victorian Spinsters of the Senate. The latest is that they were very, very, VERY offended by Adam Shiff referring to a new report that Trump had said if they voted against him their heads would be on pikes.

Several senators in the room shook their heads, audibly said “that’s not true.” Ernst and McSally — two of those swing states Schiff has been talking about! — were visibly upset as they whispered about it after.

— Emily Cochrane (@ESCochrane) January 25, 2020

The press, of course, went right along with it as if it made any sense at all:

Unforced error by @AdamSchiff near end of closing: His reference to a @CBS report that if GOP Senators vote against Trump "your head will be on a pike." "That's not true," Susan Collins said from her seat on the floor, shaking her head AND Lisa Murkowski just told reporters…

— Lynn Sweet (@lynnsweet) January 25, 2020

To explain: except for "pike" remark, @AdamSchiff delivered strong closing. He did not need to cite the CBS report; it portrayed Republican senators in an unflattering manner. The error was to spark controversy that diverted attention from the strength of his argument.

— Lynn Sweet (@lynnsweet) January 25, 2020

And so did some of the Democrats, naturally:

“I don't know why he would do that. That could have been left out, that's for sure," said Sen. Manchin. Schiff was "very articulate" and "very compelling" but Manchin acknowledged the misstep: "A lot of my colleagues, it was upsetting to them."

— Burgess Everett (@burgessev) January 25, 2020

Let’s be clear. If it wasn’t the “heads on pike” comment that made then stage their phony outrage, they would have found something else. This is a tactic. Reporters have been around long enough to know this and so have the Democrats.

I wrote about it a long time ago:

The Art of the Hissy Fit

Written by Digby / TomPaine.Com October 25, 2007

I first noticed the right’s successful use of phony sanctimony and faux outrage back in the 90’s when well-known conservative players like Gingrich and Livingston pretended to be offended at the president’s extramarital affair and were repeatedly and tiresomely “upset” about fund-raising practices they all practiced themselves. The idea of these powerful and corrupt adulterers being personally upset by White House coffees and naughty sexual behavior was laughable.

But they did it, oh how they did it, and it often succeeded in changing the dialogue and titillating the media into a frenzy of breathless tabloid coverage.

In fact, they became so good at the tactic that they now rely on it as their first choice to control the political dialogue when it becomes uncomfortable and put the Democrats on the defensive whenever they are winning the day. Perhaps the best example during the Bush years would be the completely cynical and over-the-top reaction to Senator Paul Wellstone’s memorial rally in 2002 in the last couple of weeks leading up to the election.

With the exception of the bizarre Jesse Ventura, those in attendance, including the Republicans, were non-plussed by the nature of the event at the time. It was not, as the chatterers insisted, a funeral, but rather more like an Irish wake for Wellstone supporters — a celebration of Wellstone’s life, which included, naturally, politics. (He died campaigning, after all.) But Vin Weber, one of the Republican party’s most sophisticated operatives, immediately saw the opportunity for a faux outrage fest that was more successful than even he could have ever dreamed.

By the time they were through, the Democrats were prostrating themselves at the feet of anyone who would listen, begging for forgiveness for something they didn’t do, just to stop the shrieking. The Republicans could barely keep the smirks off their faces as they sternly lectured the Democrats on how to properly honor the dead — the same Republicans who had relentlessly tortured poor Vince Foster’s family for years.

It’s an excellent technique and one they continue to employ with great success, most recently with the entirely fake Move-On and Pete Stark “controversies.” (The Democrats try their own versions but rarely achieve the kind of full blown hissy fit the Republicans can conjure with a mere blast fax to Drudge and their talk radio minions.)

But it’s about more than simple political distraction or savvy public relations. It’s actually a very well developed form of social control called Ritual Defamation (or Ritual Humiliation) as this well trafficked internet article defines it:

Defamation is the destruction or attempted destruction of the reputation, status, character or standing in the community of a person or group of persons by unfair, wrongful, or malicious speech or publication. For the purposes of this essay, the central element is defamation in retaliation for the real or imagined attitudes, opinions or beliefs of the victim, with the intention of silencing or neutralizing his or her influence, and/or making an example of them so as to discourage similar independence and “insensitivity” or non-observance of taboos. It is different in nature and degree from simple criticism or disagreement in that it is aggressive, organized and skillfully applied, often by an organization or representative of a special interest group, and in that it consists of several characteristic elements.

The article goes on to lay out several defining characteristics of ritual defamation such as “the method of attack in a ritual defamation is to assail the character of the victim, and never to offer more than a perfunctory challenge to the particular attitudes, opinions or beliefs expressed or implied. Character assassination is its primary tool.” Perhaps its most intriguing insight is this:

The power of ritual defamation lies entirely in its capacity to intimidate and terrorize. It embraces some elements of primitive superstitious belief, as in a “curse” or “hex.” It plays into the subconscious fear most people have of being abandoned or rejected by the tribe or by society and being cut off from social and psychological support systems.

In a political context this translates to a fear by liberal politicians that they will be rejected by the American people — and a subconscious dulling of passion and inspiration in the mistaken belief that they can spare themselves further humiliation if only they control their rhetoric. The social order these fearsome conservative rituals pretend to “protect,” however, are not those of the nation at large, but rather the conservative political establishment which is perhaps best exemplified by this famous article about how Washington perceived the Lewinsky scandal. The “scandal” is moved into the national conversation through the political media which has its own uses for such entertaining spectacles and expends a great deal of energy promoting these shaming exercises for commercial purposes.

The political cost to progressives and liberals for their inability to properly deal with this tactic is greater than they realize. Just as Newt Gingrich was not truly offended by Bill Clinton’s behavior (which mirrored his own) neither were conservative congressmen and Rush Limbaugh truly upset by the Move On ad — and everyone knew it, which was the point. It is a potent demonstration of pure power to force others to insincerely condemn or apologize for something, particularly when the person who is forcing it is also insincerely outraged. For a political party that suffers from a reputation for weakness, it is extremely damaging to be so publicly cowed over and over again. It separates them from their most ardent supporters and makes them appear guilty and unprincipled to the public at large.

Ritual defamation and humiliation are designed to make the group feel contempt for the victim and over time it’s extremely hard to resist feeling it when the victims fail to stand up for themselves.

There is the possibility that the Republicans will overplay this particular gambit. Their exposure over the past few years for incompetence, immorality and corruption, both personal and institutional, makes them extremely imperfect messengers for sanctimony, faux or otherwise. But they are still effectively wielding the flag, (or at least the Democratic congress is allowing them to) and until liberals and progressives find a way to thwart this successful tactic, it will continue. At this point the conservatives have little else.

What do you suppose today’s enforcers of proper decorum would say to this?

Americans too often teach their children to despise those who hold unpopular opinions. We teach them to regard as traitors, and hold in aversion and contempt, such as do not shout with the crowd, and so here in our democracy we are cheering a thing which of all things is most foreign to it and out of place – the delivery of our political conscience into somebody else’s keeping. This is patriotism on the Russian plan. — Mark Twain

++++

By the way, Trump commonly uses the term “heads on pikes.” And he’s said it before in the exact context that was reported:

This indicates it was Trump himself who said it.

Of course it was. Everyone knows it . And the hissy fit that followed over Schiff bringing it up is 100% bullshit.

I’m just putting this here in case you have momentarily forgotten that your president is an imbecile:

Emo Trump recites poem on White House lawn pic.twitter.com/rAD3xRjX4L

— “Big Nick” Lutsko (@NickLutsko) November 20, 2019

Here’s the strategy:

Pat Cipollone, the White House counsel, and Jay Sekulow, Trump’s personal attorney, plan to use their time in the trial to target the former vice president and his son, Hunter, according to multiple GOP officials familiar with the strategy.

They won’t bother trying to rebut the case the Managers made against Trump. The outcome of this farce is foregone so demonstrating reasonable doubt, etc, won’t change anything. It’s just a waste of time. Even worse, it would miss a splendid opportunity.

The purpose is to so damage Biden that he will not get nominated. And if he is nominated, there will be so much garbage about him out there — total garbage, but garbage with the imprimatur of a Senate trial — that people who haven’t been playing close attention (the vast majority of voters) will think he’s just as corrupt as Trump.

And the press — still in thrall to an ancient theory of objective reporting with the fatal flaw that it depends upon relatively good faith and honesty by its subjects — will mindlessly repeat all their garbage, in breathless headlines and made-for-tv soundbites. There will be peremptory fact-checking, of course, and long-winded nuanced attempts to clarify the half-truths mixed in with the lies — which no one will listen to or read.

But by simply repeating the Trumpists’ lies, misrepresentations, and distortions, the damage will be done.

“Someone should ask Democrats if they plan to carry on this newfound reverence for the Constitution and Founding Fathers after impeachment is over. I hope so,” Rep. Mark Meadows of North Carolina tweeted Friday evening. The Raleigh News and Observer reports the retiring Republican congressman is now part of Donald Trump’s quasi-official, eight-member “impeachment team.”

Seeing Republicans conduct themselves during three impeachment proceedings in the last half-century leads to the suspicion that for many since the Reagan years patriotism has become something like teenage boys bragging about sex, an affectation. Those that talk about it the most practice it the least. Men and women who risked their lives for their country in battle and experienced its sights, sounds, and smells up close, and especially their losses rarely discuss it. Jesus admonished disciples not to pray like the hypocrites, “standing in the synagogues and in the corners of the streets, that they may be seen of men.”

That advice is lost on Meadows and many of his Republican colleagues. They presume, perhaps, because citizens to their left engage less in public displays of love of country that they love this country less, and that when they do express patriotic feelings publicly they are inauthentic. Perhaps that is because we believe public patriotism — especially theatrical stunts like hugging flags — comes cheap and is worth what it cost. Here, where loud, chest-thumping men drive pickup trucks displaying American flags and Confederate ones side by side, one wonders. Lately, they are as likely to be Trump flags as battle flags once waved by traitors to the republic.

Meadows’s comments likely arose from House impeachment manager Rep. Adam Schiff’s closing speech on Thursday. Quoting from Col. Alex Vindman’s testimony before the House Intelligence Committee, Schiff argued that more than the Constitution is on the line in the Trump impeachment. “Here, right matters,” Schiff began:

Well, let me tell you something, if right doesn’t matter, if right doesn’t matter, it doesn’t matter how good the Constitution is. It doesn’t matter how brilliant the framers were. Doesn’t matter how good or bad our advocacy in this trial is. Doesn’t matter how well written the Oath of Impartiality is. If right doesn’t matter, we’re lost.

If the truth doesn’t matter, we’re lost. Framers couldn’t protect us from ourselves, if right and truth don’t matter.

Trump’s defenders seem committed only to protecting the truth from seeing daylight. It remains doubtful that the Republican Senate majority will allow witnesses to testify in what is supposed to resemble a trial.

Paul Savoy, a former prosecutor in the office of the Manhattan District Attorney, argues in The Atlantic that without witnesses Mitch’s Potemkin court is itself unconstitutional:

… Supreme Court Justice Byron White, in a concurring opinion in Nixon v. United States (1993), a case involving the impeachment of federal Judge Walter Nixon, found in the impeachment-trial clause of Article I, Section 3 of the Constitution a limitation on the method by which the Senate can conduct an impeachment proceeding. The text of the clause states, “The Senate shall have the sole Power to try all Impeachments.” Justice White interpreted the word try to mean that the impeachment proceeding must be in the nature of a judicial trial, and concluded that “a procedure that could not be deemed a trial by reasonable judges” would be unconstitutional.

“The Constitution itself is on trial, not just Donald Trump,” civil rights activist Maya Wiley told MSNBC hosts ahead of House impeachment managers’ Friday afternoon arguments.

Schiff continued soon thereafter, arguing that leaving Trump in place is a threat to national security. In his closing last night, he argued the whole world is watching to see whether the United States still holds true to the ideals it espouses:

“From their prison cells in Turkey, journalists look to us. From their internment camps in China, they look to us. From their cells in Egypt, those who gathered in Tahrir Square for a better life look to us. From the Philippines, those that were the victims and their families of mass extrajudicial killings, they look to us.”

“From all over the world, they look to us. And increasingly, they don’t recognize what they see. It’s a terrible tragedy for them, it’s a worse tragedy for us, because there’s nowhere else for them to turn.”

Trump’s attorneys begin their opening remarks this morning. They will present less a defense of the president’s actions than an all-out attack on his accusers and on the constitutional impeachment process itself. Trump will tolerate nothing less.

Republicans know what Trump did in extorting Ukraine and obstructing Congress violated his oath to the Constitution. They will violate theirs in refusing to hold him to account.

I awoke an hour early this morning dreaming about funeral preparations.

● ● ● ● ● ● ● ●

For The Win, 3rd Edition is ready for download. Request a copy of my free countywide election mechanics guide at ForTheWin.us. This is what winning looks like.

Schiff ended the House presentation with this:

https://twitter.com/justinamash/status/1220570844856029184

That’s very inspiring.

But I’m a little bit depressed. Tomorrow begins the Trump Team shitshow. We are given to understand they are going to impeach Hunter Biden. And maybe Adam Schiff.

This will be the only dignified, reasoned, rational, persuasive portion of the trial. Watch that and enjoy.

It’s all downhill from here.

Never lose hope:

California is trying to help shelters make the state a no-kill state:

Woof-woof-hooray! 🐾

Governor @GavinNewsom dedicated $50 million to the UC Davis Koret Shelter Medicine Program to give CA’s animal shelters the training and resources they need to meet the state’s no-kill goal in 5 years. #CaliforniaForAll #CAbudget pic.twitter.com/zO7GG4eEMF

— California Governor (@CAgovernor) January 10, 2020

Mike Pompeo had a tantrum on NPR. And then it got really ugly:

Change of subject. Ukraine. Do you owe Ambassador Marie Yovanovitch an apology?

You know, I agreed to come on your show today to talk about Iran. That’s what I intend to do. I know what our Ukraine policy has been now for the three years of this administration. I’m proud of the work we’ve done. This administration delivered the capability for the Ukrainians to defend themselves. President Obama showed up with MREs (meals ready to eat.) We showed up with Javelin missiles. The previous administration did nothing to take down corruption in Ukraine. We’re working hard on that. We’re going to continue to do it.

I confirmed with your staff [crosstalk] last night that I would talk about Iran and Ukraine.

I just don’t have anything else to say about that this morning.

I just want to give you another opportunity to answer this, because as you know, people who work for you in your department, people who have resigned from this department under your leadership, saying you should stand up for the diplomats who work here. [crosstalk]

I don’t know who these unnamed sources are you’re referring to. I can tell you this, when I talked to my team here —

These are not unnamed sources. [crosstalk] This is your senior adviser Michael McKinley, a career foreign service officer with four decades experience, who testified under oath that he resigned in part due to the failure of the State Department to offer support to Foreign Service employees caught up in the impeachment inquiry on Ukraine.

I’m not going to comment on things that Mr. McKinley may have said. I’ll say only this. I have defended every State Department official. We’ve built a great team. The team that works here is doing amazing work around the world.

Sir, respectfully [crosstalk] where have you defended Marie Yovanovitch?

I’ve defended every single person on this team. I’ve done what’s right for every single person on this team. [crosstalk]

Can you point me toward your remarks where you have defended Marie Yovanovitch?

I’ve said all I’m going to say today. Thank you. Thanks for the repeated opportunity to do so. I appreciate that.

One further question on this.

I’m not going to — I appreciate that. I appreciate that you want to continue to talk about this. I agreed to come on your show today to talk about Iran.

And you appreciate [crosstalk] that the American public wants to know as a shadow foreign policy, as a back channel policy on Ukraine was being developed, did you try to block it?

The Ukraine policy has been run from the Department of State for the entire time that I have been here, and our policy was very clear.

Marie Yovanovitch [crosstalk] testified under oath that Ukraine policy was hijacked.

I’ve been clear about that. I know exactly what we were doing. I know precisely what the direction that the State Department gave to our officials around the world about how to manage our Ukraine policy.

[Katie Martin, deputy assistant secretary, bureau of global public affairs at the State Department: Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.]

Secretary, thank you. Thank you.

He wasn’t a happy boy, was he? He doesn’t like being asked why he failed to do his job so he could lick Donald Trump’s boots.

And then he went full gangster:

Here's part of Kelly's interview. https://t.co/LwzBl4mZOC

— Daniel Dale (@ddale8) January 24, 2020

That is the Secretary of State of the United States talking like a cheap thug.

I would say that somebody has to do something about this asshole but who? He’s just following the lead of the monster in the White House and they don’t answer to anyone.

My God.

Listen to the last half where she relates what he said to her: “People will hear about this”

Thugs . All of them.

“she’s going to go through some things …” “take her out!”

Gabe Sherman dishes:

As Donald Trump’s defense team prepares to make its first arguments on the floor of the Senate on Saturday, top Republicans are increasingly worried that Trump’s lawyers are woefully unprepared to counter Democrats’ meticulous, fact-based case for removing Trump. In the president’s circle there’s not full-blown panic—but there’s worry. “A lot of Republicans think the Democrats have done a very good job,” a prominent Republican who is close to Trump’s legal team told me. “It’s been a lot better than we expected.” Florida congressman Matt Gaetz, one of Trump’s fiercest House allies, seemingly spoke for many when he blasted Trump’s lawyers, telling Politico this week that the Trump team’s presentation was worse than “an eighth-grade book report.”

Trump himself is making the situation worse, both with his rages—he set a 142-tweet record on Wednesday—and his insistence that Republicans buy in fully to his defense strategy. “It’s really not helpful,” the Republican close to the legal team said. “Trump is mad at Republicans that they aren’t saying his call with [Volodymyr] Zelensky was perfect. He really thinks his call was perfect. It wasn’t.”

He says the Republican Senators are tired of defending Trump but I don’t believe it.

Trump’s circle is waking up to the notion that impeachment is a serious drag on his campaign. “Impeachment is drowning out all his accomplishments,” a Republican insider said. But impeachment is only one aspect of the problem. Inside the campaign there is an intensifying debate between Trump and his advisers about whether the campaign should run on base-incitement issues like immigration or a moderate-appealing message about the economy that could win back suburban voters. “They’re all trying to get Trump to run on general election issues and not get caught up in side issues,” a source close to the campaign said. “But Trump is focused on other stuff and going after [Joe] Biden.”

[…]

Meanwhile, Trump has been in a particularly foul mood as impeachment drags on. Trump recently told some Republicans that he decided to say “fuck it” and kill General Qasem Soleimani, according to a source briefed on the conversation.

Jesus.

Trump’s mood has the West Wing bracing for a new round of staff turmoil. According to sources, Trump is unhappy with Kushner’s recent Time cover story, which showed Kushner posing solemnly inside the magazine’s iconic red border. One source said there is speculation inside the West Wing that Trump may rein in Kushner by bringing in Kushner antagonist Chris Christie to replace acting chief of staff Mick Mulvaney. According to one source, Kushner, perhaps realizing the problems the cover could cause, lobbied Matt Drudge not to link to the article.

As usual, it’s impossible to know whether these sources are just jockeying for power or stabbing their rivals in the back. Trump’s White House has been worse than the Borgias for palace intrigue. But I can imagine that he’s losing his mind. Even he can see that this is a serious business. I suppose this might explain threatening senators that if they don’t vote against removal “their heads will be on pikes.”

Still, I don’t think there’s any doubt that Trump is going to run his race the way he wants to run it and that means instinctively reacting to the news cycle every single day rather than following any sort of strategy. They can’t possible be under the illusion that he’s going to be disciplined after all this time.

image:  (DonkeyHotey/cc)

From the “you can’t make this stuff up” files:

President Donald Trump said at a press conference in Davos, Switzerland, on Wednesday that he opposed the impeachment of President Bill Clinton even though Clinton was doing bad things, like lying.

Trump added: “Now, with me, there’s no lying.”

via GIPHY

I’m sure I don’t have to add this, but for the record:

Trump has been serially dishonest about impeachment and about Ukraine. Case in point — he made at least 14 false claims related to these subjects at the Davos press conference and in interviews that aired Wednesday on CNBC and Fox Business — plus a bunch of false claims on unrelated subjects, which we’ll leave out of this particular article.