Chomping a wall off the East Wing of the White House? That's so distracting that it must be intended as the distraction. Why do it this week and not next month? Because there's something else that's harder to see, and I'm certainly not seeing it.
"Demanding that the Justice Department pay him about $230 million in compensation for the federal investigations into him" — that's something "people familiar with the matter" fed to the New York Times but it's not at the top of the front page anymore.
It's below the story about how dogs are peeing:
It's down there on a level with Springsteen's "Nebraska," which came out in 1982 and is the focus of a new biopic that already been in the news for weeks.
The dog piss is fresher.
The top story on the Times front page seems like another throwback: "Trump Empowers Election Deniers, Still Fixated on 2020 Grievances."
They're still fixated. We're still fixated. It's all about paying attention. Are we dangerously attached to our fixations? Or are we distracted by the latest thing? There's something that's neither of those 2 things and it's what I'm afraid we're not doing.
CORRECTION: There are 2 headlines about the $230 million and I see now that one of them is higher than Bruce and at the level of the second half of the bit about dogs peeing. Sorry. I should have paid better attention. But my point remains and is, perhaps, underscored: We're caught up in a game of paying attention.
Posts
116 comments:
Chomping a wall off the East Wing of the White House? That's so distracting that it must be intended as the distraction. Why do it this week and not next month? Because there's something else that's harder to see, and I'm certainly not seeing it.
Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar. That ballroom has been in the works for months.
2020? Pikers, there are plenty of people still complaining about the 2000 election.
All trying to distract from the nominee Trump pulled yesterday due to yet another text thread with some guy proclaiming having a Nazi streak.
Chomping like OrangeGodzilla
When the Times writes "people familiar with the matter,” they’re writing about something they made up over cheap beers in a dive bar.
Still, fairness suggests that people targeted for political prosecutions by rogue prosecutors ought to be entitled to financial compensation. Doesn’t the law have some notion about being made whole?
It’s a distraction away from the Arizona AG suing the US House for refusing to swear in Adelita Grijalva, who would be the 218th vote on the Epstein discharge petition.
Hoo boy, can't wait for that Springsteen movie.
I'll shoehorn that in after I volunteer to clean the homeless kitchen's grease trap.
Ann, you may not have gotten the details right, but you are seeing the general nature of the problem with the NYT's version of the "news that's fit to print". It's essentially "manipulation 24x7x365". Selection. Placement. Positioning. Arranged just so. All. The. Time.
The Times is still using the term election deniers? Such a serious newspaper…
It's, it's, the ballroom blitz! Yeah, it's the ballroom blitz!
“Dog piss is fresher”? I dunno, Althouse, canids have been pissing since before Hesperocyon evolved. Seems stale to me.
The NYT is lamenting their own waning ability to determine what it is you will be either fixated by or distracted by.
There are so many things I wish Trump would just drop, but that’s because I am your typical non confrontational female. OTOH, how can any serious person believe that Joe Biden garnered 10 million more votes than Obama? C’mon, man.
We already have two commenters telling us what we're supposed to be distracted from. Trump certainly has a gift for making people chase their tail.
*commentators
Still waiting to hear someone here justifying the $230 million graft. Give it your best and we can have a courteous debate.
Discovery should be a ball of fun!
Bruce hasn't had a decent song since the Reagan administration. Not interested in him as the subject of a movie, an article, a play, an extended conversation or a song.
Should Trump be compensated at all let alone at that level? There is reason courts/legislatures should discuss the issue so I take no position on that. I will just make the point that people have been compensated in the past. During the BLM riots there were people arrested and their cases simply dropped. Class actions suits were filed and the Biden administration chose not to defend against them. Checks were issued. No idea what the context was if Trump made the claim but it is nothing to hyperventilate about.
Maybe he should be compensated after a factual hearing by an independent judge. Of course he would never agree to that because the investigations were appropriate based on the facts
. The problem is the obvious conflict where he alone decides the amount of the compensation. H has already acknowledged he is the decision maker. If we’re ok with 230 million why not 230 billion?
‘…how can any serious person believe that Joe Biden garnered 10 million more votes than Obama?’
Which is why the NYT continues to use a churlish term like ‘election deniers’. It gives their readers the approved slogan, while avoiding a simple plot of the data and recognizing the mathematical absurdity of Joe’s alleged eighty-one million votes.
It’s like trying to focus on a single snowflake in a blizzard.
Walk away, ann.
Put down the paper. Do not reward them with more clicks or try to hook your readers here...
You have an addiction. You need to break free, not navel gaze daily and examine your fixation and share/promote it to others.
You're hooked like a bad druggie and pushing your preferred product on anyone who gets close... "Look at this! See how BAD it is and how it's rotted MY brain... I can't focus anymore. Look, look here. You try it too and see if it does the same to you?"
Cancel your subscription and try to replace your addition with something else. Do you ever read classics? Have a favorite author who challenges your mind and leaves you feeling nourished, not like you've consumed a load of junk food?
What you put into your mind is much like what you put into your body. Never too late to break old habits and try to relearn what you need to stay heathy. Hth. Good luck.
The process is the punishment, so to undo the punishment you have to undo the process, namely the legal fees.
Seems like we are not going to stop the revenge cycle as the parties succeed each other. So the next best thing is to make it clear all damage will eventually be reversed. CC, JSM
Sorry. I should have paid better attention. But my point remains
----------
I have NEVER seen you do a real apology, where you accept responsibility for your error, period. You always try to spin it, and also?
Own YOUR fixation. Not everybody clicks your NYT links, even when you offer freebies. "Try it... first hit's free!" lol.
Stop trying to drag others in to who you are and the distractions you are making. It's not age or dementia so much, just that you have gotten lazy working in higher ed for so many years where there is no accountability for performance, and excuse-making (because you all hold yourselves in such high esteem: "I am a LAW professor, or once was...") is the norm.
Free yourself by taking responsibility for your errors, and maybe either not taking to task so many when you slip up so often yourself, or else spending more time on your own work. Relying on grok all the time contributes to the laziness, which shows in the errors in your work.
Hth. Don't mark down my grade for thinking critically! ;-)
No clicks for those who lie to Americans for a living.
Don't support lies. Choose truth.
If they arrested election deniers from 2000 2004 and 2016 they wouldnt have anyone to write their columns
“I have a lawsuit that was doing very well, and when I became president, I said, ‘I’m sort of suing myself.’ I don’t know, how do you settle the lawsuit. I’ll say, 'Give me X dollars’. And now I won, it sort of looks bad. I’m suing myself, right? So I don’t know. But that was a lawsuit that was very strong, very powerful,”
the crooks and liars stole 2020. Soviet Dems: It's illegal to say or think that.
Standing is a funny thing isnt it
jim5301 said... [hush][hide comment]
Maybe he should be compensated after a factual hearing by an independent judge. Of course he would never agree to that because the investigations were appropriate based on the facts
Where do you get this idea that Trump can order the DOJ to just write him a check? Because that's how it works when a Democrat administration is in power and their allies file fake claims?
They jailed tina peters for trying to obtain the data in colorado (the same state that tried to kick off the ballot)
If you back up the ballots as they did in six cities you can steal the election you only need possums like kemp and ducey
I suspect that a substantial portion of the $230 million is for defense of the state cases in New York and Georgia.
They write the headline then they make up the story around it
"Where do you get this idea that Trump can order the DOJ to just write him a check?
Would you want to be the one who tells him that. It might be interesting to see how this pans out, but the optics are so shitty, I expect it to just fade away.
Christopher-sounds like we are in agreement. It should not happen
Why should the federal government pay for what a state did. Let hm sue the states
You wanted him to die in jail, you dont get an opinion
Thank you for the attention to this matter.
narciso obviously has this covered.
I discovered on TikTok a hot bed of commenters who deny the moon landing, 9/11, the death of Charlie Kirk, COVID, the assassination attempt on Trump, you name it, just asking questions etc.
I guess it's just easier that way to not believe anything. This relieves you of the burden of events.
"It’s a distraction away from the Arizona AG suing the US House for refusing to swear in Adelita Grijalva, who would be the 218th vote on the Epstein discharge petition."
So the Democrats' favorite idea of what we're being distracted from is the Epstein files.
But have they really thought about whether Epstein is their favorite distraction and there is something else — or multiple other things — that really deserve our attention that they are complacently being distracted from?
I think if they have they still wouldn't talk about it because they believe "EPSTEIN!!!!" is such a great talking point.
Oh no. Anyway
OT, but a friend of mine was abducted by a group of mimes.
They did unspeakable things to him.
Epstein carries the same risk as #MeToo and other selfie-incriminating movements.
"according to people familiar with the matter. They spoke on the condition of anonymity because the claim has not been made public."
Anonymous? Heh.
"Mime... abduction.. unspeakable acts."
Silent hillarity.
I saw from man from uncle mimes go back to the 60s
’So the Democrats' favorite idea of what we're being distracted from is the Epstein files.’
Any port in a Trumpnado.
“I’m a working class kid and I can barely sing these songs up here, I’m so tired from working in the factory all day.”
—— Bruce Springsteen
"Nebraska" got Springsteen a lot of magazine covers and coverage, but what has he done since? It's hard to be creative and innovative decade after decade but wanting to be the new Woody Guthrie may have been where Bruce went astray. Anyway, wasn't Bob Dylan already that?
That would raskin and the bowman
What Reagan's people understood is that you had to give the media a story or they'd go looking for (or inventing) one of their own. That has been the practice of successful administrations since then (and even before then). The press does what it can to spread the talking points and publicize the fake events for the Democrats but balks when the Republicans' stories dominate the headlines.
Valerie jarretts family
If you take one disreputable source, Trump is said to have demanded $230 million. This source puts it on the front page. If you take another disreputable source, the question is asked to Trump a number of times, and he asks for clarification a number of times because he apparently had not heard about it yet, and ultimately he said there's no such lawsuit, but if anything came his way he would give it to charity, maybe to renovate the White House.
The difference between the two disreputable sources is that the second one has a video of Trump taking the question, and answering it, in yet another one of his impromptu press conferences in the Oval Office. It's anybody's guess why the first source did not watch the video - I guess they're not allowed in the Oval Office anymore.
No one likes pearl clutchers and overly serious people telling everyone what to do.
Trump embodies the fun and off-color joke you want to say or laugh at but don’t because the HR lady will fire you.
Trump winds those people up like no other. All the left has to do is eye roll and talk ideas that most people like. But they refuse to either of those things.
Trump administration under growing pressure over Argentine intervention ~ FT
“Size of US bailout and support for agricultural rival begin to rankle the president’s political allies”
The more important part of Milei's agenda . . .
is selling off the country's inheritance to politically connected foreigners and loading future governments up with an unsustainable debt burden.
The debt burden in particular is absolutely critical because it ensures that a future center-left government is forced to either default or to increase poverty through the maintenance of a foreign imposed austerity regime. The same process has played out under previous governments, and is part of the way that you end up with a buffoonish ideologue like Milei in charge.
In 2018, Trump gifted a massive IMF loan to his friend Macri, who used a substantial portion of the fund to repay foreign creditors -- including Trump donors. That record $57 billion loan package tied the hands of the Fernández government, helping to ensure its political failure, paving the way for Milei. A critical mass of people completely forgot when the original IMF loan package was originated, and how it was spent. Right-wingers are wagering on voter amnesia again. Although, it frankly doesn't matter. When the next accounting is made, billions of dollars will be gone again to foreigners and foreign bank accounts and what will be left is another massive IOU on the part of ordinary people.
The simple fact that Milei and Argentina are burning through a $40 billion emergency facility as we speak, underscores the reality of the situation. Unless a person is a politically connected friend of Trump, we aren't looking at a success story.
“ What Reagan's people understood is that you had to give the media a story or they'd go looking for (or inventing) one of their own.”
Exactly, if you are explaining you are losing. The media environment moves so much faster today. Trump refuses to let it stop on an issue that negatively impacts him.
The problem is they lie without consequence we have so many examples
We need at least one crisis per day.
It's all a distraction. Even the "significant" topics you think are the purpose of the distractions are themselves mere distractions. And it's working everywhere everyday and right here on the Althouse blog where us miserable peons they call consumers continue to battle it out with each other.
Kak doesn’t understand TLDR.
It’s not an attack on his particular post. It does exemplify using 500 words when about 100 will do. No one likes 400 words of overly earnest pearl clutching.
Twitter took off for a reason.
Its the same tripe from financial times or politico doesnt quite matter where
Trump should sue the Justice Department for $20 billion.
And then Pam Bondi should settle for $18 billion.
Trump should then crow about saving US taxpayers $2 billion.
I'm not saying that Trump is playing three card monte with the press. But he shuffles so fast that the NYT can't figure out which shell the "pee" is under.
"that's something "people familiar with the matter" fed to the New York Times"
I translate this to; probably BS, but we'll print it anyway.
So more fake news day ending in y
No surprise rich is fronting for ex montoneros probably backed by china although which faction is unclear
“If you take another disreputable source, the question is asked to Trump a number of times, and he asks for clarification a number of times because he apparently had not heard about it yet, and ultimately he said there's no such lawsuit, but if anything came his way he would give it to charity, maybe to renovate the White House.”
I saw the video where Trump gets asked about this $230 from the DOJ, the press person had to explain it to him, he had no idea what she was talking about. It’s his dementia.
“The president took questions from the press in the Oval Office on Tuesday, where he was asked about the report.
“Are you asking the Justice Department to pay you compensation–”
“Whose compensation?” Trump interrupted.
“–for the federal investigations into you?” she continued. “Are you asking them to pay compensation, and how much?”
“I don’t get any compensation,” Trump said. “I do it for nothing. I gave up my salary.”
The president seemed either confused or taken aback and asked, “Into me?”
The reporter repeated her question. Trump responded:
Well, I guess they probably owe me a lot of money for that, probably. That’s true. That’s very interesting. No, I get no salary. I gave up my salary. It’s a good salary, not as much as these guys make, but that’s ok. It’s a lot of money. And as you know, I did not take it in the first four years. I’ve not taken it in these four years either.
But as far as all of the litigation, everything, yeah, they probably owe me a lot of money. But if I get money from our country, I’ll do something nice with it like to give it to charity or give it to the White ouse, where we restore the White House. And we’re doing a good job. As you know, the ballroom is under construction.”
https://www.yahoo.com/news/articles/trump-confronted-over-report-demanding-234418655.html
I see that Kakabich still doesn't understand how a currency swap works while also not understanding how the IMF works.
I saw the video where Trump gets asked about this $230 from the DOJ, the press person had to explain it to him, he had no idea what she was talking about. It’s his dementia.
The Occam's Razor explanation - he had no idea what she was talking about because it was bullshit.
FormerLawClerk said...
Trump should sue the Justice Department for $20 billion.
And then Pam Bondi should settle for $18 billion.
Trump should then crow about saving US taxpayers $2 billion.
Agreed. This is the exact playbook for the Left.
"Oh the cops hurt your feelings after you threw a molotov cocktail at their car?"
"Well here's a million to help you finish your Columbia law degree!"
And like Trump will eventually get, they all had the charges dropped too.
Leftists don't believe in punishment unless its for Republicans. Same way they don't believe in gun control when the law says to lock up brown people illegally carrying and using guns.
Milei's mistake was in not shuttering Argentina's central bank on day one. Now, I don't think he had the political power to do so but it is what was always needed for Argentina since the entire country is addicted to peso inflation.
I am guessing Trump really didn't know about the $230 million reimbursement request which suggests the story was mostly or completely fabricated.
Yancey, Trump denied knowing a thing about Project 2025, then installed one of the main authors as head of OMB and followed the exact playback.
Claiming lack of knowledge is clear bullcrap
Somewhere deep in the Althouse annals I predicted a successful strategy of overwhelming the rubes with too many things to worry about. It's working...
$$$$$$BILLIONS$$$$$$ in USAID wasted on lefty causes all around the world and look what kaKAW focuses on, lol…
“Trump signaled his interest in compensation during a White House appearance last week with Blanche, FBI Director Kash Patel and Attorney General Pam Bondi, who was part of Trump’s legal team during one of the impeachment cases against him.
Ceneta)
“I have a lawsuit that was doing very well, and when I became president, I said: ‘I’m suing myself. I don’t know. How do you settle the lawsuit?’” he said. ”I’ll say, ‘Give me X dollars,’ and I don’t know what to do with the lawsuit. It’s a great lawsuit and now I won, it looks bad. I’m suing myself, so I don’t know.””
@10:19. Trump knew about this settlement last week, yet this week he has forgotten about it, or ?
https://apnews.com/article/trump-fbi-justice-department-177d42d89b97385132a927686d788d11
Everywhere we look we see sombreros…
https://x.com/miguelifornia/status/1980656495776919951
2025? Does the constitution scare you, Mark? Or is it that Trump is holding Democrats to the same standard they held him only this time using the law.
Iman @ 8:28
How long have you been waiting to use that?
Dingabat, I don't doubt for a second that Trump thinks the government owes him court costs- I think that as well- but I don't believe the story the NYTimes is peddling has any facts in it at all.
Jeez, Mark, not knowing what the fuck Project 2025 is and hiring a guy who does know isn't proof of anything, you dumb fuck. It wouldn't be implemented if the Democrats hadn't shut down the government- so why don't you write Chuck Schumer and tell him to open the government before more of the project gets implemented.
So many things to be distracted from, here’s two more…
Like starting a war in Latin America and the extrajudicial killings of unknown persons in boats in the Caribbean.
Screwing US farmers with the $40 bailout to Argentina who is selling soybeans to China. And now Trump wants the US to buy beef from Argentina? That’ll surely help American farmers and ranchers who voted for him, eh?
Trump is moving at lightning speed. We can either try to keep up, or simply sit back and take in the finished processes as they complete. There is literally no reason to not begin the demolition of the East Wing of the White House if his plan is to use the ballroom during our Semiquincentennial, or at least before he leaves office. I don't know if it'll be ready by next summer, but I do know that Trump will make more progress in 8 months than Gavin Newsom's team did on the high-speed rail in almost 11 years (hint: it hasn't moved one human being one mile).
It's interesting, and more than a little head-shaking watching the leftist networks pick out which of Trump's projects to zero in on and make their stand. I had a friend call me yesterday- an avid MSNBC watcher. Trying to jab at me he quipped something about Jim O'Neill being tapped to join RFK Jr.'s team and how he has some "crazy ideas about life extension."
So...MSNBC, running out of things to whimper about is now taking the tack that extending life is evil? Well, yes. Now that I think about it. That would be on brand.
Approximately 35 seconds, Rusty… 😁
His first administration was a teachable term. 1.5 garnered Democratic vice. His second term has been delayed but not aborted by kings and queens: antidemo.
Igna longs for President Otto Penn and #LeftyChaos
Its devlin barrett ignore
“I see that Kakabich still doesn't understand how a currency swap works while also not understanding how the IMF works.”
Hilarious — the Trump administration is gambling in FX markets with taxpayer money!
I thought they were conservatives. This will end the way every long peso trade ends.
US investors hold 71% of Argentina bonds. Some large holdings with hedge funds that have connections with Bessent. This is the only reason this happened. Rob Citrone (Discovery Capital) an old hedge fund friend of Bessent will have a chance to get out before the peso falls again.
If Soros were 25 yrs younger, he might short the Argentine peso like he did the British pound in 1992 when he and an associate made a killing--at the expense of the Bank of England. The associate's name? Scott Bessent.
Trump denied knowing a thing about Project 2025, then installed one of the main authors as head of OMB and followed the exact playback.
Reminds me of the greatest SNL skit ever, Phil Hartman as Ronald Reagan, Mastermind.
https://substack.com/@coffeeandcovid
I have only four words to say about the "230 million":
Peter Strzok, Lisa Page
@Yancey Ward:
"Milei’s government fell into crisis last month after a landslide loss at local elections in Buenos Aires province, where almost 40 per cent of Argentines live, casting doubt on the level of support for his free market reforms." ~ FT
Keeping a currency artificially overvalued is not exactly free market, but it is one that appeals to the masses until it comes to bite. It is a shame though because Milei had a historic opportunity to float the Peso and selectively default on Argentina's marketable debt. He had the political capital to handle the economic pain which would ensue, and could tap into the IMF for FX reserves temporarily. The highly devalued peso would have made exports much more competitive and eventually brought in FX reserves on their own.
Trump did everything he possibly could to overturn the election and stay in power — threatening Pence, Governors and Secretaries of States, organizing a mob to storm the Capitol. He knew if he ordered a military coup they would’ve refused and he would’ve been tried for treason. That’s why he left.
But now Trump has immunity (which he didn’t before), has installed civilian leadership at the Pentagon and DOJ who will refuse him nothing, and is in the process of purging senior military and DOJ careerists who might stand up to them.
"Screwing US farmers with the $40 bailout to Argentina who is selling soybeans to China. And now Trump wants the US to buy beef from Argentina? That’ll surely help American farmers and ranchers who voted for him, eh?"
A near verbatim copy of a Rich comment from the other day.
I've always been a big Orwell fan and it's been a lot of fun these last 10 years watching Progs do skits from 1984, Homage to Catalonia, and Animal Farm. Super solid!
Too legs good four legs bad
Igna actually longs for Mueller putting Trump in jail for some such total nonsense. I guess Epstein is just as good as bed peeing in Moscow.
Proscription was the word i was looking for
"Hilarious — the Trump administration is gambling in FX markets with taxpayer money!"
Again, demonstrating that you have literally zero clue what a currency swap is, Bich. Do you need me to tell you what is wrong with all your comments about this or do you have the brains to figure it out for yourself?
Somebody is taking great pains to identify even the slightest twitches as suggestive of dementia, if it isn't otherwise a criminal impulse - when just a few months ago, the world was treated to daily, graphic displays of advanced dementia on no uncertain terms, on tape and live, for four years - and yet this same somebody was curiously silent though each and every graphically obvious example.
It's almost like they're unreliable, or so hopelessly biased that their ranting can be disregarded, the same as the street-corner, bipolar Jesus in their manic phase, screaming into their bullhorn. Repent !
I thought I was immune to Trump’s personal corruption, the Qatar airplane, the crypto scam, all of it, but the $230 million heist takes the cake.
Yancy @ 10:46
You have to remember this is the guy that kept on saying that Musk is an idiot and will be broke in a year. Not a good look for someone who claims to be a lawyer.
We can't go on together. With suspicious minds
“Any money I would get, I would give to charity.”
Seems pertinent.
A 106-comment thread scrolls by pretty fast when half of them are leftist bullshit.
Let's see what's in the next post ....
Trump moves so fast Ferris Bueller had to take a day off work to make sure he doesn't miss him.
“Any money I would get, I would give to charity.”
If this were the Biden's you could bet your last dollar Charity was a favorite stripper.
'crypto scam' Ha Ha you shouldn't have kicked him out of the banking system Ha Ha that's the only reason why he even looked at crypto.......then he figured out the Dems couldn't be trusted not to try it again. He was a real estate billionaire, YOU MADE HIM A CRYPTO BILLIONAIRE Ha Ha Ha
I don’t often drop distracting things, but when I do, they’re usually my pants. CC, JSM
“ But my point remains and is, perhaps, underscored: We're caught up in a game of paying attention.”
But isn’t that the method used at all Universities?
I thought I was immune to Trump’s personal corruption, the Qatar airplane, the crypto scam, all of it, but the $230 million heist takes the cake.
If there was a Deep State conspiracy to illegally spy on Trump's 2016 campaign, illegally sabotage his first administration, illegally frame him for Jan. 6, and illegally coordinate targeted lawfare against him on the most spurious and flimsy charges -- as indeed seems greatly to be the case -- then a settlement of $230 million of TAXPAYERS' money is pretty small beer indeed.
Personally I would like to see the severed heads of all involved mounted permanently on spikes over the Potomac bridges, where all the rest of the government scum have to see them on their daily commute, and ponder how unforgivable it is to use the powers of government in this manner.
But I would settle for 50 years in supermax for each of them, plus a denial of qualified immunity, so they could be stripped of everything they own right down to their toothbrushes to pay compensation to the victims of their tyranny. For that is what it is. Stasi-style tyranny. Let the punishment fit the monstrous crime, far far FAR worse than anything Trump has done in his life.
The urine you smell in the city isn't from dogs.
There ought to be real consequences for rampant lawfare. For public urination, too, though I confess to being a past offender. In the woods, though, not in urban areas.
“Still fixated?” NYT is staffed with Pauline Kaels living in a “special world.” We are “outside [their] ken.”
Post a Comment
Please use the comments forum to respond to the post. Don't fight with each other. Be substantive... or interesting... or funny. Comments should go up immediately... unless you're commenting on a post older than 2 days. Then you have to wait for us to moderate you through. It's also possible to get shunted into spam by the machine. We try to keep an eye on that and release the miscaught good stuff. We do delete some comments, but not for viewpoint... for bad faith.