"The Defense Department is withdrawing the nomination of Rear Adm. Michael 'Buzz' Donnelly... under whose command drag performances took place on board the USS Ronald Reagan."

The Daily Wire reports.

Donnelly served as commanding officer of the aircraft carrier from April 2016 to September 2018, during which time Yeoman 2nd Class Joshua Kelley performed as a drag queen under the name “Harpy Daniels” at a department-sanctioned “Morale, Welfare, and Recreation” event on the aircraft carrier.

Harpy Daniels? Is that like Stormy Daniels? Was it political commentary? Political commentary of the anti-Trump kind?

I don't know but drag in the Navy was right there in "South Pacific," the classic Rodgers & Hammerstein musical based on a James A. Michener's 1947 book "Tales of the South Pacific."

Who can forget "Honey Bun," the sailor with grass-skirt hair and a coconut bra, performing in front of a huge Navy audience?

America, when did you become so repressive?

'Cause we're a having so much fun with Honey Bun... not anymore.

Can you pay celebrities millions to appear at your rally and report it as an "event production" expense to the FEC?

I'm reading "Did Kamala Harris Pay Celebrities to Endorse Her? Oprah Winfrey Speaks Out" (Newsweek)(examining various claims, e.g. Beyoncé got $10 million just to walk up to the podium and say a few pro-Kamala words):

Nonprofit fact-checking website FactCheck.org said that a Harris campaign official told them the claim "is not true." PolitiFact also said that it had found "no evidence" for the claim and that Beyoncé's publicist told them it was "beyond ridiculous."

Newsweek reached out to the Harris campaign for comment via email outside of regular working hours. Newsweek also reached out to representatives for other celebrities who endorsed Harris and have been accused of being paid for it, including Beyoncé, Megan Thee Stallion, Lizzo, and Eminem, via email. 

Some social media users pointed out that two payments to Winfrey's production company, Harpo Productions Inc, can be found under the Harris campaign's disbursements on the Federal Election Committee website. The payments, of $500,000 each, were made on October 15 and are marked as "event production."

"Marked as 'event production'"? I hope they didn't mismark anything! What was the "production" that cost a million dollars? Causing Oprah to appear onstage? The social media users are trying to help, but it looks as though they are calling attention to what might be a false statement to the FEC.

Wouldn't that be much worse than mislabeling the hush money paid to Stormy Daniels in private business records?

"On Tuesday, Judge Juan Merchan loosened the gag order’s conditions, allowing Trump to publicly comment..."

"... on the witnesses that testified in the trial as well as members of the jury.... Under the new ruling, Trump will be able to speak about the trial’s key witnesses, including his former attorney Michael Cohen and adult-film star Stormy Daniels.... Trump will not be allowed to identify individual jurors or disclose any information about them...."

New York Magazine reports.

It's good to remove this chill on Trump's speech, especially with the debate coming up.

"So we’re left with a two-bit case that has devolved into dirty bits, filled with salacious details...."

"Trump came across as a loser in her account — a narcissist, cheater, sad Hugh Hefner wannabe, trading his satin pajamas for a dress shirt and trousers (and, later, boxers) as soon as Stormy mocked him. The man who was the likely source of the 'Best Sex I Ever Had' tabloid headline, attributed to Marla Maples at the time, no doubt loathes Stormy for having described their batrachian grappling, as Aldous Huxley called sex, as 'textbook generic.' Like a legal dominatrix, Stormy continued to emasculate the former president after her testimony, tweeting: 'Real men respond to testimony by being sworn in and taking the stand in court. Oh … wait. Nevermind.' The compelling part of this case is not whether Trump did something wrong with business papers. The compelling part is how it shows, in a vivid way, that he’s the wrong man for the job."

Writes Maureen Dowd in her new column "Donnie After Dark" (NYT).

1. Dowd seems to approve of using the criminal process not for its proper purpose — to enforce specific written law — but to expose and humiliate one's political enemy. Let's look at him in his underwear and sneer at his sexual fumblings, as described by someone who openly hates him — please, emasculate him! — and let's laugh.

2. It's so exciting — sexually and politically — that she doesn't see the downside. The aggressive desire to humiliate and crush him makes him sympathetic and makes you look like a bully. 

3. I'm imagining the jurors talking about this testimony and trying to connect it to the elements of the crime — assuming they can get their mind around what this crime even is. In my vision, they say: What was that Stormy Daniels testimony even about? Why did we have to know what material his pajamas were made out of? Satin! A shiny fabric. Waved about... to distract us.

4. "Batrachian" — it means "Of or pertaining to the Batrachia, esp. frogs and toads" (OED). It wasn't Daniels's adjective. Dowd got it from and credited Aldous Huxley. I found the relevant passage, in his "Point Counterpoint":

‘But what has love to do with it?’ asked Slipe. ‘In Beatrice’s case.’

‘A great deal,’ Willie Weaver broke in. ‘Everything. These superannuated virgins—always the most passionate.’

‘But she’s never had a love affair in her life.’

‘Hence the violence,’ concluded Willie triumphantly. ‘Beatrice has a n*gger sitting on the safety valve. And my wife assures me that her underclothes are positively Phrynean. That’s most sinister.’

‘Perhaps she likes being well dressed,’ suggested Lucy.

Willie Weaver shook his head. The hypothesis was too simple.

‘That woman’s unconscious as a black hole.’ Willie hesitated a moment. ‘Full of batrachian grapplings in the dark,’ he concluded and modestly coughed to commemorate his achievement.

"Necheles notes that in [Stormy] Daniels’s book, she describes the early part of the encounter, writing that she made him her 'bitch.'"

"Necheles seeks to suggest there’s an inconsistency here, because Daniels wrote about being aggressive with Trump but then testified that she was intimidated when he approached her for sex. Necheles is in extremely dangerous territory here: She could convince jurors that Daniels was inconsistent. But these jurors may also understand how complex these types of situations — and memories of them — are. Necheles eventually cuts right to the point of her cross-examination about the sexual encounter: 'You made all this up, right?' she asks. Daniels responds forcefully: 'No.'"

From the NYT coverage of the the cross-examination in the Trump trial. Nechelles is Trump's lawyer, Susan Nechelles.

From an earlier point, there's more about this "complexity": "Stormy Daniels’s story of her sexual encounter with Trump is very nuanced and complex, and Daniels describes a lot of different types of motivations and a really conflicted approach to the whole episode.... Susan Necheles, I think, is going to attack her mixed motivations directly, making her seem as if she was lying about how much she wanted to have dinner with Trump in 2006, and how she understood the encounter."

"Daniels smirks as she looks at celebratory tweets she sent on March 30, 2023, the day Trump was criminally indicted for the first time."

"She posted about drinking champagne and selling 'Team Stormy' merchandise.... So many of Stormy Daniels’s retorts are versions of 'so did Trump.' He calls her 'horseface,' so why can’t she call him an 'orange turd'? He sells his merchandise, so why can’t she sell hers?... Watching Susan Necheles attempt to pull Stormy Daniels apart, I am reminded of a point we made in coverage about Trump not long ago. His goal is not to make people think he’s pure so much as his goal is to suggest his antagonists are all impure.... The defense’s playbook is very clear: Portray Daniels as a money-grubbing, sleazy, dishonest operator who tried to use Trump to get fame and riches from the anti-Trump resistance.... Trump is leaning forward and staring at the screen showing the exhibits of Stormy Daniels’s merchandise, including t-shirts and comic books. He is seemingly very interested in her efforts to make money off of her account of the liaison with him. Necheles brings up a '$40 Stormy Saint of Indictments Candle,' with Daniels draped in a Christ-like robe. Trump recently made news by hawking a Bible for $59.99...."

From the NYT live-blog of the cross-examination.

ADDED: "He is seemingly very interested in her efforts to make money off of her account of the liaison with him" — that makes it sound like a challenge for the contestants on an episode of "The Apprentice." Imagine him coolly assessing the merchandising effort. Perhaps in some secret way, in his businessman/showman mind, he admires her dogged effort to work with what she had.

The loophole Stormy Daniels didn't see... or declined to take.

From the NYT live-blog of the cross-examination of Stormy Daniels, 25 minutes ago:

The defense is now showing a statement that was released in January 2018, in which Daniels said that she did not have an affair with Trump. But [Trump's lawyer Susan] Necheles did something clever, changing the wording to suggest she denied having sex with Trump — and Daniels agreed, not splitting hairs about the wording here....

So I take it the idea is that Daniels could have said: The statement is true. I did not have an affair with Trump. I had sex with him on one occasion. That is not an affair. 

Did Daniels miss an opportunity? The NYT credits Necheles with cleverness: She got Daniels to admit that she made an inconsistent statement by denying that she ever had sex with Trump. 

If Daniels had seen the loophole and chosen to take it, it would also have hurt her credibility. She'd look like someone who is crafty with word choice and issued a phony denial, claiming no "affair" and reserving the power to say that she did or did not have sex with Trump — whichever better served her interests.

"Stormy Daniels is talking about going to the bathroom in Trump’s hotel suite... Daniels keeps chuckling as she describes the scene, as if she's giving an interview."

Writes Maggie Haberman at the NYT.

I think "keeps chuckling... as if she's giving an interview" reveals Haberman's opinion that Daniels is not a good witness.

Then there's this from Jonah Bromwich, one of the other NYT reporters watching the trial:

"The dramatic decision to call Ms. Daniels to the stand would carry both possible benefits and definite risks for prosecutors...."

"Her presence would let Mr. Trump’s defense lawyers attack Ms. Daniels as an extortionist.... Ms. Daniels could also offer context about the environment in which she sold her story of their 2006 encounter, which Mr. Trump denies. She was shopping the story as Mr. Trump’s campaign was reeling in 2016 from the disclosure of a recording on the set of Access Hollywood in which he bragged of groping women. Michael Bachner, a New York City defense lawyer not involved in the case, said that if prosecutors did not call Ms. Daniels to testify, 'it would just be a glaring hole' that the defense would question.... Mr. Trump’s lawyers contend that he did not know that the checks he signed for Mr. Cohen were not for legal fees, and that Mr. Cohen and Mr. Trump’s employees were responsible for any false records. They would be likely to portray Ms. Daniels as someone whose only real connection to Mr. Trump was wanting to be a possible contestant on his reality show...."

From "Stormy Daniels, Once Paid to Keep Quiet, Could Testify Against Trump/Ms. Daniels could take the stand this week, allowing jurors to see and hear from the person at the center of the criminal case against the former president" (NYT).

I would think the prosecutors want to avoid calling her:

"Trump defense suggests he was shakedown target, not hush money schemer/During contentious questioning of Stormy Daniels lawyer Keith Davidson, Donald Trump’s lawyers portray their client as the victim in the case."

 A headline at The Washington Post.

In the most contentious testimony yet in the criminal trial, Los Angeles lawyer Keith Davidson denied accusations that he flirted with extortion when he negotiated settlements with celebrities to keep potentially damaging stories out of the public eye.

By accusing him, Trump’s lawyers displayed a key element of their defense strategy: getting jurors to focus on the lawyers and middlemen....

Trump’s lawyers... tried to use Davidson to show that he was well versed in squeezing money out of celebrities, and that Daniels thought her chances of getting paid for her story would vanish after the 2016 presidential election, which she expected Trump to lose.

Fortunately, something of Trump's side of the story is coming out, but I do not trust mainstream media to tell us the story straight. We're not able to watch the trial, and we don't even get a transcript, just whatever the media see fit to report. And yet there seems to be this idea — among the Trump antagonists — that we the voters will allow this trial to substantially manipulate our opinion of the man. The case was brought to manipulate us. The presidential election is at stake. Give us a transcript. 

[CORRECTION: Even though I read the news every day, I had not noticed that the New York court system announced, back on April 22, that it would provide transcripts: "The court system is taking the novel step of posting the daily transcripts of the trial proceedings on its public website.... 'With current law restricting the broadcasting of trial proceedings and courtroom space for public spectators very limited, the release of the daily transcripts on the court system’s website is the best way to provide the public a direct view of the proceedings in this historic trial,' said Chief Administrative Judge Zayas."]

Back to the WaPo account of Trump's lawyer, Emil Bove, cross-examining Davidson:

But election denial is reprehensible, no?

Saying Trump is on trial for paying hush money to a porn star is like saying John Wilkes Booth was tried for sneaking up behind Lincoln in Ford’s Theater. Silencing Stormy was just the means Trump used to commit the crime of fraudulently killing Hillary’s 2016 presidential bid.

— Laurence Tribe 🇺🇦 ⚖️ (@tribelaw) April 12, 2024

"I wouldn’t trust her farther than I can spit. She’ll say whatever..."

"... she’ll say something to you, and something else to you, in the same day — if she thinks it’s going to help her, whether it be money, whether it be fame or power."

Said Ellen Doughty, about Stormy Daniels, quoted in "The horse wars of Stormy Daniels/As she tangles with a former president, the adult-film actress also plays a starring role in a drama that has rocked the world of competitive English riding" (WaPo)(long article, free access link).

Before Stormy Daniels came forward to attack Donald Trump, she attacked Ellen Doughty. Doughty is suing Daniels for defamation after Daniels accused Doughty, a horse trainer, of mistreating horses.

"Less than two weeks before Donald J. Trump is set to go on trial on criminal charges in Manhattan, the prosecutors who brought the case proposed a delay of up to 30 days..."

"... a startling development in the first prosecution of a former American president. The Manhattan district attorney’s office, which accused Mr. Trump of covering up a sex scandal during and after the 2016 presidential campaign, said the delay would give Mr. Trump’s lawyers time to review a new batch of records. The office sought the records more than a year ago, but only recently received them from federal prosecutors, who years ago investigated the hush-money payments at the center of the case...."

The NYT reports.

"Justice Juan M. Merchan’s decision to start former President Donald J. Trump’s hush money trial in Manhattan next month opens the possibility..."

"... that Mr. Trump’s federal trial on charges of plotting to overturn the 2020 election could take place in the late spring or early summer. But the scheduling of the election interference case, which is taking place in Washington, is now in the hands of the Supreme Court.... The election trial in Washington had initially been set to begin on March 4. But the judge overseeing it, Tanya S. Chutkan, recently scrapped that date as Mr. Trump pursued his immunity claims. Justice Merchan has set the hush money case for March 25 in Manhattan, noting on Thursday that the trial could last about six weeks. He also mentioned that he had spoken to Judge Chutkan about the timing of their cases, all but sealing that the Washington matter would not go to trial until May at the earliest...."

From "Live Updates: Judge Sets Trial Date in Trump’s Manhattan Criminal Case/Ruling that the case against Donald J. Trump can proceed, Justice Juan M. Merchan said he planned to begin the trial on March 25" (NYT).

"Judge Tanya S. Chutkan said that she would set a new date for the proceeding in Federal District Court in Washington 'if and when' former President Donald J. Trump’s immunity claims are resolved."

Photo caption in "Judge Scraps Trial Date for Trump Election Subversion Case/Judge Tanya Chutkan removed the planned March 4 start for the trial from her calendar, formalizing a delay that had become increasingly unlikely in recent weeks. It remains unclear when the trial might start" (NYT).

ADDED: "The 'runt' of Trump cases now likely to be his first criminal trial/A trial about 2016 hush money will be the first criminal charges to test Trump in 2024" (WaPo).

"Porn star Stormy Daniels loses appeal in Trump case, owes former president almost $300,000."

 CNBC reports. 

In its decision Friday, the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit said it had no jurisdiction over Daniels’ appeal of the attorneys’ fees issue because she failed to file a notice of appeal within a 30-day deadline of a federal judge granting the fees to Trump....

The amount Daniels owes Trump in the case is about the same amount she was swindled out of by Michael Avenatti, her former lawyer....

Trump commented: "The lawsuit was a purely political stunt that never should have started... Now all I have to do is wait for all of the money she owes me."

It's hard to remember what this lawsuit was about, isn't it? 

Daniels sued Trump when he was president in 2018, seeking to void the nondisclosure agreement with Cohen. While Trump later agreed not to enforce the agreement, a judge in 2020 ordered him to pay Daniels more than $44,000 for her legal fees in that case.

Later in 2018, Daniels sued Trump again, claiming he defamed her when, in a Twitter post, he scoffed at a police sketch artist drawing of a man who Daniels said had threatened her in 2011 over her allegation of having had sex with Trump.

Trump called the sketch a “con job” about a “nonexistent man.”A federal judge dismissed that lawsuit later in 2018, saying Trump’s statements were protected by the First Amendment of the Constitution.

I wanted to see that police artist drawing again. I'd forgotten. I'll just link to my Google search because I see the drawing, signed "Lois," presumably the police artist, is emblazoned with "© Michael Avenatti, Esq."... and he's litigious. But he's not an "esquire" anymore. And he's in prison.

Despite the clear image of the face — which is so generically good-looking it's funny — the height is given as 5'9" to 6'. Who doesn't know the difference between a 5'9" guy and a 6' guy? I guess if you think he's 5'10 or 5'11" the police say 5'9" to 6'.

In Scranton, Trump stepped on Mr. Biden’s general-election rollout.

In "Joe Biden Accepts Democratic Nomination: ‘I Will Draw on the Best of Us’/Mr. Biden urged Americans to have faith that they could 'overcome this season of darkness,' and he pledged to bridge the country’s divisions in ways President Trump had not," the NYT observes that Trump — "[s]hedding the political tradition whereby each party defers to the other during the week of its nominating convention" — has been trying " to step on Mr. Biden’s general-election rollout" but "with little success."

What's the evidence of "little success"? Is it the way Rasmussen's "approval index" jumped 6 points overnight from Wednesday to Thursday? The Times is just making an assertion — essentially wishful thinking. Trump, deviating from tradition, is having "little success." Just report what you want to be be true! Meanwhile, you'd think Joe Biden was some sort of religious transfiguration — the embodiment of light! It's so stupid that I'm drawn to read the transcript of the speech Trump gave yesterday in Joe Biden's home town of Scranton.

Maybe later I'll get to some of the convention speeches. I will confess to being seated in front of the TV at one point last night. It was just Chris Coons talking into the camera. I tried to watch for approximately 20 seconds, then said "Why do I have to listen to Chris Coons?" and got up and left. Oh! And I saw a triple-split screen of the [Dixie] Chicks singing the national anthem. Why them? Because long ago, in 2003, they outraged country music fans by openly opposing the war in Iraq? But Joe Biden voted for the war in Iraq. Because after all these years they dropped the word "Dixie" from their name, though they kept "Chicks"? The name Dixie Chicks was interesting because of the rhyme and the specificity. Now, they are generic, and why do these dames get to be all women?

I think it's that there's some idea that they have been irritating the deplorables since 2003. The Democrats wanted to pick that scab, remind people of the pain of that war their candidate supported?! "When the war was debated and then authorized by the US Congress in 2002, Democrats controlled the Senate and Biden was chair of the Senate committee on foreign relations. Biden himself had enormous influence as chair and argued strongly in favor of the 2002 resolution granting President Bush the authority to invade Iraq" (The Guardian).

Now, let's look at what Trump said in Scranton:

"Ew. That’s really the only way to describe the experience of reading 'All the President’s Women: Donald Trump and the Making of a Predator,' a deep dive into..."

"... the many allegations that depict Trump’s relationships with women as vulgar, misogynistic, demeaning, sometimes violent and always puerile. The accusations wash over a reader like a tidal wave of sewage until you are thoroughly caked in muck and light-headed from the stink."

So writes Robin Givhan in "A thorough, revolting history of Trump’s behavior toward women" (WaPo). It was interesting to read that right after immersing myself in the meaning of "human scum."

Are we in a new age of squeamishness? Or are we just pretending to be disgusted?

Givhan writes:

Somewhere between the descriptions of casual groping and the lengthy investigation of Trump’s possible involvement in a threesome with an underage girl, you long to scrub your memory bank with bleach, to douse yourself with disinfectant.

Do you? Personally, I am revolted by the idea of putting dangerous chemicals on my body. I'm never so disgusted with others that my impulse is to attempt to clean myself in some crazily exaggerated fashion.

Givhan goes on to say the book isn't shocking, because we've heard the main things before: "the affair with Karen McDougal, the sex with Stormy Daniels, the sexual intimidation of Ivana Trump, the gutter talk with Howard Stern, the ogling of half-dressed Miss Universe contestants, and the personal insults hurled at women ranging from Megyn Kelly and Rosie O’Donnell to former beauty queen Alicia Machado."

Gutter talk with Howard Stern. This is America in 2019? Disturbed by conversations with Howard Stern? I hope this is pretend offense. I've read Howard Stern's collection of interviews, which has lots of Trump, and it's lively and funny, and everything that's said is said for a reason. I wouldn't call it "gutter talk."

Givhan informs us that "All the President’s Women" has "a 70-page appendix filled with truncated tales of lascivious behavior — bonus nuggets of lechery." A fashion photographer calls Trump a "predator" because "He was always chasing models." The book says that in the presence of models, Trump "liked to paw their shoulders, cup their bottoms, grab at their breasts and plant sloppy kisses on them when they least expected it."

Paw, cup, grab, plant — How would your gestures of physical affection be described by your worst enemy? Every playful, tender move you make would be disgusting.

Givhan faults the book for collecting the stories but never analyzing why Trump is the way the stories, as told by the authors, make him look. What made him "a lecher"? Something about his childhood, his mother? Some "cultural forces"? "Was he created by some collision of generational, social and demographic storms? Is he a volatile result of a tectonic shift in gender roles?"

And what about us? What makes anybody want to read a compilation of all the scurrilous sexual material about Trump? What kind of result of a "collision of generational, social and demographic storms" are you?

A federal district judge orders Trump to turn 8 years of personal and corporate tax returns over to the Manhattan district attorney.

The NYT reports.

The Manhattan district attorney, Cyrus R. Vance Jr., has been investigating whether any New York State laws were broken when Mr. Trump and his company reimbursed the president’s former lawyer and fixer, Michael D. Cohen, for payments he made in the run-up to the 2016 election to the pornographic film actress Stormy Daniels, who had said she had an affair with Mr. Trump....

Mr. Trump’s lawyers sued last month to block the subpoena, arguing that the Constitution effectively makes sitting presidents immune from all criminal inquiries until they leave the White House....

Federal prosecutors are barred from charging a sitting president with a crime because the Justice Department has decided that presidents have temporary immunity while they are in office.... Local prosecutors, such as Mr. Vance, are also not bound by the Justice Department’s position....

No response from the President's lawyers yet. Presumably, they'll appeal (and win).

UPDATE: "The president's attorneys have filed an emergency order of appeal."

AND:

The Radical Left Democrats have failed on all fronts, so now they are pushing local New York City and State Democrat prosecutors to go get President Trump. A thing like this has never happened to any President before. Not even close!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 7, 2019

UPDATE 2: Bloomberg reports:

Trump immediately appealed and in less than two hours won a delay to give the federal appeals court in Manhattan time for expedited review. The delay postponed what would have been a 1 p.m. Monday deadline for [his accountants] to begin turning over the records to prosecutors....

Scott Adams: The Democrats are pushing "the stalest old stories" — Kavanaugh, impeachment, Stormy Daniels, Russian collusion — "are ya frickin' kiddin' me?"

"It's starting to get sad... They've completely given up at this point. It feels like they're not even working on task. It feels like busy work. That's what it is: busy work.... It feels like the Democrats can't figure out anything useful to do, but they have to do something...."



The S.E. Cupp thing he's referring to in that clip is, I think, this: