The list includes Stephen Colbert, Brad Raffensberger, Letitia James, Morning Joe and Seth Meyers.

Raffensberger and James, in particular, are not involved in foreign policy. To my knowledge, neither of them has made any public statements about Russia, but they are among Trump’s bugbears. Perhaps the most obscure private citizen on the list is the Capitol Police officer who killed one of the January 6th rioters. (Although this man has no connection to Russia in any way, he is the subject of lunatic conspiracy theories among the Trumpies, and has also been singled out by Putin in the past.)

The list is confusingly inconsistent.

  • One of the most baffling omissions is Jimmy Fallon, given that Kimmel, Meyers and Colbert are banned. If Fallon’s writers ever return to work, they should have a lot of fun with this. Conan O’Brien is not on the list either, and he’s just ballsy enough to go to Russia for a comedy special.
  • In another example of inconsistency, the list does not include others perceived by Trump as enemies, like Alvin Bragg.

The list of 500 new names means that there are now 1,344 Americans covered by Russian sanctions. I was kind of heartbroken to see that I did not make the cut.

I think you probably know which one. Surprisingly, Jimmy Carter was never indicted over those two drifters he killed.

Interesting sidebar:

In the article “Republican rivals, leaders rally around Donald Trump after indictment,” not one single Trump defender suggested he was innocent! All of the defenses are deflections, basically consisting of “Sure he’s a crook, but he’s OUR crook, and those mean old Democrats are just using his guilt as a political weapon.”

It was a bad day for Trump. It was a far worse day for Judge Cannon in Florida. The appeals court ruled that every element of Judge Cannon’s ruling was incorrect, and totally agreed with the DoJ in every particular.

Trump’s declassification argument was ruled (1) unproved; and (2) even if it had been proved, irrelevant. It is irrelevant for two reasons: (1) declassification does not impact the content of the documents, and none of the cited criminal statutes are affected by whether any documents are classified; (2) even if everything was declassified, the documents would still belong to the United States, not to Trump, and the government agents therefore had the right, and obligation, to seize them.

The appeal was reviewed by a three-judge panel, two of whom were Trump appointees.

There is another issue with declassification that nobody has mentioned but (surprisingly) Bill Barr. If Trump did in fact declassify some documents that include material that needs to be secret for the security of the United States, thus making them accessible to anyone through the freedom of information act, that would be an act of recklessness more dangerous than anything else Trump has ever done.

To make an extreme example, suppose some documents showed that Al-Qaeda was developing a nuclear weapon, based on a tip by our spy within Al Qaeda. If declassification allowed Al-Qaeda to find out about the spy and to move their base of operations, and thus to continue the operation while eliminating our eyes on it, that would be providing aid and comfort to an enemy of the United States.

Declassifying that kind of information would meet the precise constitutional definition of treason. If I were in his shoes, I’d be less concerned with a charge of mishandling some papers than a charge of treason. I think it would be wise of him to drop that “I declassified everything” argument.

But then again, when has he ever been wise?

Note: The fact that somebody has the POWER to do something does not automatically make it legal. A President of the United States has pretty much unlimited power to grant federal pardons, but if he offered to grant pardons for ten million dollars each, it would still be corrupt and would be prosecuted (after the President left office) under the RICO and other statutes.

Similarly, the Vice-President has the POWER to break a tie in the Senate, but if she were to do so in return for a massive kickback from the Pharma companies, it would be criminal.

The same logic applies to declassification. If the Presidential declassification of a necessarily secret document provides aid and comfort to America’s enemies … well, he has the POWER to do that, but it could be an act of treason.

(Those are hypothetical arguments. I have no idea what is actually in the secret papers because … well, mainly because if a schmuck like me knew, they wouldn’t be very secret, would they?)

HUMOROUS SIDEBAR: I assume that back in his school days, Trump’s excuse for not having his homework was that he did it in his head. Today he said there is no documentation of declassification because he did it in his head!

“If you’re the president of the United States, you can declassify just by saying, ‘It’s declassified.’ Even by thinking about it.”

He also speculated that the FBI may have been looking in his desk for the missing Hilary Clinton e-mails, a speculation which is utterly demented even by his own lofty standards.


“I just can’t believe they were there for some measly papers instead of the large pile of skulls that sits in the middle of the Grand Ballroom, or the still-decomposing arms and legs that protrude from sand traps all over the golf course. But good for me! If they want to haul a bunch of boxes out of that place while walking upon the shallow, unmarked graves of people I’ve had tortured and killed, what do I care?”

Another great Onion headline:

Trump Boys Thrilled FBI Seized Documents, Leaving Dozens Of Empty Boxes To Play In”

Who could that quote be from?

Well, whoever has done the most for religion, step forward.

Not so fast, Jesus of Nazareth, Saul of Tarsus, Abraham, Mohammad, Joseph Smith, Gautama Siddhartha, the Dalai Lama, America’s founding fathers, Cool Pope Frank, and all of you other pretenders.

There’s a new holy man in town!

Nearly 60 per cent of US voters would back independent candidate over Biden or Trump

Ross Perot made the mistake of being born too early and having to run against two fairly popular candidates. If he were alive now, he could probably beat these two! Come to think of it, I don’t think there is anything in the Constitution that requires the candidate to be alive.

Speaking of not being alive … I don’t remember how to do actuarial calculations, but I wonder about the odds that both Biden and Trump will be alive in November, 2024. They are both elderly. Biden looks more feeble every day, and Trump is obese. That would be an interesting prop bet for those online gambling sites.

I can’t see how this position could be in his interest.

OK, let’s say he’s right.

Now let’s assume Trump runs against Kamala Harris in 2024 and beats her fair and square.

According to his theory, barring any new legislation to the contrary, Vice-President Kamala Harris has the authority to reject any slate of electors she has any question about, accepting instead alternate electors beholden to her, thus installing herself as President!

(That’s a pretty sweet authority – essentially the right of any party to hold power forever!)

“We can say that it was marginally better than 2020. Granted, this is not high praise. It’s like saying that somebody is marginally nicer than Hitler. But it’s something.”

“The Capitol is invaded by thousands of people who are fiercely loyal to Trump and determined to ensure that his enduring legacy, as president, will be that he inspired a tragic, futile and utterly stupid riot at the U.S. Capitol.”

“President Biden proposes a fiscal 2022 federal budget of $6 trillion, to be raised by what the White House describes as ‘an exciting new partnership with Herbalife.'”

“The big story in August is the withdrawal of American forces from Afghanistan, a country that, thanks to 20 years of our involvement, has been transformed — at a cost of many lives and more than $2 trillion — from a brutal, primitive undemocratic society into a brutal, primitive undemocratic society with a whole lot of abandoned American military hardware lying around.”

I don’t know whether I really give a crap, but I don’t think Trump ever dresses like this. I think he always golfs in a white shirt and unpatterned pants.

Just a matter of passing interest.

In the era between WW2 and Trump, only two elected presidents have run for a second term and lost the general election:

In 1980, Jimmy Carter ran for a second term. Forty-four million Americans went to the polls to vote for his main oppponent (Reagan). In all, 51 million Americans voted against him.

In 1992, George Bush the Elder tried for a second term. Forty-five million Americans went to the polls to vote for his main oppponent (Clinton). In all, 65 million Americans voted against him.

In 2020, Donald Trump the Elder ran for a second term. Eighty million Americans went to the polls to vote for his main oppponent (Biden). In all, 83 million Americans voted against him.

The comparison is made more significant by the fact that Americans were not universally and specifically rejecting Carter and Bush, two decent men. Many Americans liked those two but nonetheless turned out to vote for charismatic opponents in elections complicated by substantial third-party voting. In the 2020 election … well, nobody thinks of Biden as Joey Charisma. Furthermore, down-ballot Republicans did fairly well. It’s obvious that the vast majority of those eighty million people who voted against Trump were casting votes specifically to reject Donald Trump.

It was the most resounding rejection of a president in modern history, and by a very large margin. Before this, no modern President trying to be re-elected for a second term had ever been replaced by an opponent receiving more than 45 million votes. Trump has been replaced by an opponent receiving 80 million votes.

In fairness, we should also note that no President running for re-election ever received as many votes as Donald Trump.

Voter turnout in the 2020 Presidential election was the highest it has been in 120 years! There were record numbers of votes for the president, and even more impressive record numbers of votes against him. Because Donald Trump is so loved and so hated, he has in a sense re-energized American democracy as much as he has polarized it. His very presence has made people on both sides more aware of the importance of the right to vote, and of the potential cost of not exercising that right. He has raised the stakes.

For these medical professionals, it is difficult to hold back tears:

“From a nurse in South Dakota who spoke on CNN today, the brainwashed are literally dying and fighting with the nurse that it’s a hoax and must be something else:”

“I have a night off from the hospital. As I’m on my couch with my dog I can’t help but think of the Covid patients the last few days. The ones that stick out are those who still don’t believe the virus is real. The ones who scream at you for a magic medicine and that Joe Biden is going to ruin the USA. All while gasping for breath on 100% Vapotherm.

They tell you there must be another reason they are sick. They call you names and ask why you have to wear all that “stuff” because they don’t have COViD because it’s not real. Yes. This really happens. And I can’t stop thinking about it. These people really think this isn’t going to happen to them. And then they stop yelling at you when they get intubated. It’s like a fucking horror movie that never ends. There’s no credits that roll. You just go back and do it all over again.”