And also important, the leaked memo shows unequivocally that tRump's own advisors know that he rarely acts with his own agency, rather simply responds to prompts, cajoling, proffered blandishments, and blatantly naked flattery, amongst other tools of the trade used by tRump's manipulators, including — as has been evident in tRump2.0 — his own family members for their own self-enrichment. It further illustrates the business of "the last person tRump confers with" carries the message of his interlocutor.
A senile old fool, sitting behind the Resolute Desk, imagining he is The Lord of All Before Him...such a sad and dangerous picture of the presidency.
All accurate. Except he's taken our property - the historic Resolute desk - to his Florida Temu Xanadu and is displaying it there. So, like so much else one of us will have to wrestle it out of his grubby thieving paws before this ends.
And, tRump will exhibit the 2026 World Cup Trophy on that desk, after stealing it before the FIFA award presentation to the winning side, much as he did brazenly this past summer following the FIFA UEFA Club Cup tournament.
Great posts this morning! Democracy oozes through the fissures of invasive, blatant cronyism and mobsters that have crept in over the past 4 decades or so... thanks also Lance's inputs...
Vicky Ward's decades-long reporting on the Epstein-(Robt.)Maxwell world reveals a thoroughly self-centered, corrupt, seamy/sleazy world identified by Ro Khanna as the Epstein Class, leaning deep into multi-generational European wealth and impunity. They are a world of their own with separate rules controlled by all the nasty things wealth can afford. See her on The Ink with Anand Giridharadas. Treason is everyday stuff with these people, who recognize no sovereign but themselves (and the greater pile of money). These are the same people sought by wannabes throughout corrupt corporate culture and the dark web. It may take several generations to shake this blight on the human prospect, and we need to cultivate sharp focus and creativity as well as mutual protection from their carefree impositions (akin to Trump's flagrant lawlessness but with "finesse"). It is the Davos Class writ large, far more extensive and far less polished.
So here is where I stand up to salute Mike for speaking out:
"Apparently, taking people at their word about wanting to end democratic governance makes you a conspiracy theorist."
⇢ I call this the "human confessional." I have told family, friends and patients that humans cannot help but DECLARE who they are. People declare themselves. We others, must be better listeners rather than "hear what you want to hear, and see what you want to see." The late comedian, and former neighbor of mine in Topanga, Robin Williams, said this but did not elaborate:
“Reality, wow, what a concept!” − Robin Williams.
To this, add this stanza from Paul Simon:
And in the naked light I saw
Ten thousand people, maybe more
People talking without speaking
People hearing without listening
People writing songs that voices never share
No one dare
Disturb the sound of silence
"Actually observing oligarchs coordinating with authoritarian systems must make one positively delusional."
These quotes are Mike speaking. The Trump enthusiasts would inform us that it is we, not them, that have Trump Derangement Syndrome (TDS). I say, as both physician and lay person, it is Trump and his subservients that are the deranged ones.
The big and immensely critical picture here is that Trump and the GOP blatantly fucked Ukraine and its citizens by withdrawing financial and military support. I would add to this that the European Free Nations also have been weak in not going all out to support Ukraine against Putin.
What Putin has done in Ukraine mirrors prior atrocities in
1. 1st Chechen War 1994-1996: (35,000 civilian deaths, including 5,000 children),
2. 2nd Chechen War 1999- 2009: (3,170 civilian deaths)
[3. Kosovo War 1998-1999 (13,500 civilian deaths)]
4. Russo-Georgian War 2008 (380 civilian deaths)
5. Crimean Annexation 2014 (8 civilian deaths)
6. Russian-Ukrainian War (Donbas) 2014-2022: (3,400 civilian deaths)
7. Russian-Ukrainian War 2022-June 2023: (9,177 civilian deaths)
Total CIVILIAN Murders: 50,500 and counting (excluded Kosovo)
* historical note: the Crimean War (1853-1856) between Russia vs Britain, France & Ottoman Empire resulted in 500,000 deaths)
Are those in Washington, and especially the Congress this fucking naive, to think that Putin will not push further in his land grab and invade further into Ukraine and then go after bordering countries? How can we supposedly educated people be this fucking stupid?
When will they ever learn? Please, Scotty, beam me up and get me away from such idiots. Where is my spaceship?
Mike believes that "Witkoff’s collaboration isn’t aberrant corruption. It’s the logical outcome of the oligarchic worldview that sees democratic accountability as the primary threat to be eliminated." I would opine and say that Witkoff knows how much Trump will praise him and keep him in the family if Trump is able to make another "notch" in his obsession to get the Nobel.
I think we have morons behind the wheel and the leader of this caravan of incompetents is the Incompetent-in-Chief, the Mafiosa POTUS, Don Trumpolini, bastard son of Benito Mussolini. This family of "Olini's" includes Stalinolini, Adolfolini, and Putinolini. If we had an ethical House, this plague on the world stage would be impeached, then tried and convicted.
At this rate, it feels like The Onion is going to have to cease publication on account of its writers being unable to make up anything dumber than actual reality.
Putin wants to reconstruct the Russian empire as it was under Catherine the Great. He bemoans the collapse of the Soviet Union even though it lacked the economic foundation to continue as a superpower. Now Putin has Russia on a war footing selling oil to finance it and hoping Ukraine surrenders after the U.S. withholds military support. Highly unlikely. Witkoff is obviously Putin’s stooge as is Kushner. They expect billions later on from Russian gold reserves and cash. What does it take to get Trump on board with a Russian plan? Flattery, of course!
“…professional recognition that some betrayals are too systematic to tolerate, too dangerous to accommodate, too complete to ignore.”
“I'd like to live just long enough to be there when they cut off your head and stick it on a pike as a warning to the next ten generations that some favors come with too high a price. I would look up at your lifeless eyes and wave like this. [gives a mockingly cheerful finger waggle] Can you and your associates arrange this for me?”
And also important, the leaked memo shows unequivocally that tRump's own advisors know that he rarely acts with his own agency, rather simply responds to prompts, cajoling, proffered blandishments, and blatantly naked flattery, amongst other tools of the trade used by tRump's manipulators, including — as has been evident in tRump2.0 — his own family members for their own self-enrichment. It further illustrates the business of "the last person tRump confers with" carries the message of his interlocutor.
A senile old fool, sitting behind the Resolute Desk, imagining he is The Lord of All Before Him...such a sad and dangerous picture of the presidency.
All accurate. Except he's taken our property - the historic Resolute desk - to his Florida Temu Xanadu and is displaying it there. So, like so much else one of us will have to wrestle it out of his grubby thieving paws before this ends.
And, tRump will exhibit the 2026 World Cup Trophy on that desk, after stealing it before the FIFA award presentation to the winning side, much as he did brazenly this past summer following the FIFA UEFA Club Cup tournament.
Great posts this morning! Democracy oozes through the fissures of invasive, blatant cronyism and mobsters that have crept in over the past 4 decades or so... thanks also Lance's inputs...
Vicky Ward's decades-long reporting on the Epstein-(Robt.)Maxwell world reveals a thoroughly self-centered, corrupt, seamy/sleazy world identified by Ro Khanna as the Epstein Class, leaning deep into multi-generational European wealth and impunity. They are a world of their own with separate rules controlled by all the nasty things wealth can afford. See her on The Ink with Anand Giridharadas. Treason is everyday stuff with these people, who recognize no sovereign but themselves (and the greater pile of money). These are the same people sought by wannabes throughout corrupt corporate culture and the dark web. It may take several generations to shake this blight on the human prospect, and we need to cultivate sharp focus and creativity as well as mutual protection from their carefree impositions (akin to Trump's flagrant lawlessness but with "finesse"). It is the Davos Class writ large, far more extensive and far less polished.
So here is where I stand up to salute Mike for speaking out:
"Apparently, taking people at their word about wanting to end democratic governance makes you a conspiracy theorist."
⇢ I call this the "human confessional." I have told family, friends and patients that humans cannot help but DECLARE who they are. People declare themselves. We others, must be better listeners rather than "hear what you want to hear, and see what you want to see." The late comedian, and former neighbor of mine in Topanga, Robin Williams, said this but did not elaborate:
“Reality, wow, what a concept!” − Robin Williams.
To this, add this stanza from Paul Simon:
And in the naked light I saw
Ten thousand people, maybe more
People talking without speaking
People hearing without listening
People writing songs that voices never share
No one dare
Disturb the sound of silence
"Actually observing oligarchs coordinating with authoritarian systems must make one positively delusional."
These quotes are Mike speaking. The Trump enthusiasts would inform us that it is we, not them, that have Trump Derangement Syndrome (TDS). I say, as both physician and lay person, it is Trump and his subservients that are the deranged ones.
The big and immensely critical picture here is that Trump and the GOP blatantly fucked Ukraine and its citizens by withdrawing financial and military support. I would add to this that the European Free Nations also have been weak in not going all out to support Ukraine against Putin.
What Putin has done in Ukraine mirrors prior atrocities in
1. 1st Chechen War 1994-1996: (35,000 civilian deaths, including 5,000 children),
2. 2nd Chechen War 1999- 2009: (3,170 civilian deaths)
[3. Kosovo War 1998-1999 (13,500 civilian deaths)]
4. Russo-Georgian War 2008 (380 civilian deaths)
5. Crimean Annexation 2014 (8 civilian deaths)
6. Russian-Ukrainian War (Donbas) 2014-2022: (3,400 civilian deaths)
7. Russian-Ukrainian War 2022-June 2023: (9,177 civilian deaths)
Total CIVILIAN Murders: 50,500 and counting (excluded Kosovo)
* historical note: the Crimean War (1853-1856) between Russia vs Britain, France & Ottoman Empire resulted in 500,000 deaths)
Are those in Washington, and especially the Congress this fucking naive, to think that Putin will not push further in his land grab and invade further into Ukraine and then go after bordering countries? How can we supposedly educated people be this fucking stupid?
When will they ever learn? Please, Scotty, beam me up and get me away from such idiots. Where is my spaceship?
Mike believes that "Witkoff’s collaboration isn’t aberrant corruption. It’s the logical outcome of the oligarchic worldview that sees democratic accountability as the primary threat to be eliminated." I would opine and say that Witkoff knows how much Trump will praise him and keep him in the family if Trump is able to make another "notch" in his obsession to get the Nobel.
I think we have morons behind the wheel and the leader of this caravan of incompetents is the Incompetent-in-Chief, the Mafiosa POTUS, Don Trumpolini, bastard son of Benito Mussolini. This family of "Olini's" includes Stalinolini, Adolfolini, and Putinolini. If we had an ethical House, this plague on the world stage would be impeached, then tried and convicted.
I love that quote: Actually observing oligarchs coordinating with authoritarian systems must make one positively delusional.
Inspiring piece, thank you.
Where is the transcipt that prompted the post?
At this rate, it feels like The Onion is going to have to cease publication on account of its writers being unable to make up anything dumber than actual reality.
Putin wants to reconstruct the Russian empire as it was under Catherine the Great. He bemoans the collapse of the Soviet Union even though it lacked the economic foundation to continue as a superpower. Now Putin has Russia on a war footing selling oil to finance it and hoping Ukraine surrenders after the U.S. withholds military support. Highly unlikely. Witkoff is obviously Putin’s stooge as is Kushner. They expect billions later on from Russian gold reserves and cash. What does it take to get Trump on board with a Russian plan? Flattery, of course!
“…professional recognition that some betrayals are too systematic to tolerate, too dangerous to accommodate, too complete to ignore.”
“I'd like to live just long enough to be there when they cut off your head and stick it on a pike as a warning to the next ten generations that some favors come with too high a price. I would look up at your lifeless eyes and wave like this. [gives a mockingly cheerful finger waggle] Can you and your associates arrange this for me?”
It’s a positive sign that the entire world including patriots now know what Israel and the deep state learned 9+ years ago
Wonderful insightful article for those moments wherein honourable choices must be made in considering the common good!🇨🇦