Remember that surge of invention in the US when we came up with the light bulb and the wheel? That was great, wasn’t it?

Trump seems to believe the wheel was invented in the United States: "We have to protect all of these people that came up with, originally, the light bulb and the wheel and all of these things." pic.twitter.com/re6CyRi6HY

— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) January 22, 2020

… Read the rest

I look forward to hearing how his lawyers explain this one away. https://t.co/0fuAPx9Ir0

— Jim Sciutto (@jimsciutto) January 22, 2020

“We have all the material, and WE’RE SITTING ON IT.”

Aka obstruction of justice.

The second article of impeachment.… Read the rest

Trump says traumatic brain injuries are no big deal.

On Wednesday, Trump held a press conference on his last day in Davos, Switzerland, at which CBS News White House correspondent Weijia Jiang pressed Trump about the 11 service members who were evacuated from Iraq to Kuwait and Germany with symptoms of potential brain injuries.

“Initially you said repeatedly to Americans that after Iran retaliated for the Soleimani strike, no Americans were injured,” Jiang said, and added, “We now know at least 11 US service members airlifted from Iraq.”

“Can you explain the discrepancy?” she asked.

“No, I heard that they had headaches and a couple of other things, but I would say, and I can report, it is not

Schiff’s powerful opening statement.

“The misconduct set out in those articles is the most serious ever charged against a president.” – @RepAdamSchiff begins the Senate trial in the impeachment of Donald J. Trump pic.twitter.com/j53Kchw6ib

— House Intelligence Committee (@HouseIntelDems) January 21, 2020

… Read the rest

Another book with further details about the horror that is Trump, this one by Philip Rucker and Carol Leonnig of the Washington Post (we read an excerpt the other day):

Trump’s West Wing is tantamount to a family business and everything is personal. Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump obtain security clearances because they are kin.

After publicly punting the issue to Kelly, Trump is described as applying pressure privately. “I wish we could make this go away,” he reportedly told Kelly. “This is a problem.” Said differently, protocols and national security were treated as impediments, not safeguards, when Javanka got involved.

It’s just his personal excellent con, it’s nothing to do with the country or its people.

At a

I saw this

President Trump and Vice President Pence just made an unannounced trip to the Martin Luther King Jr. memorial in Washington. They stood in front of it for approximately 30 seconds with their heads bowed before turning and leaving without making remarks.

— Kaitlan Collins (@kaitlancollins) January 20, 2020

so I had to go looking for it.

She’s not kidding. He walks up, shaking his stupid little fists, the two of them stand there with their backs turned as if at a urinal, then Trump puts a “that’s enough I’m bored” hand on Pence’s shoulder and they turn around and Trump shakes a stupid little fist again.

God I wish he would just spontaneously melt into a pool … Read the rest

Trump did a talk for donors at Mar-a-Lago last night, in which he explained that he killed Suleimani because he said bad things about us.

In his speech — held inside the gilded ballroom on his Mar-a-Lago property — he claimed that Soleimani was “saying bad things about our country” before the strike, which led to his decision to authorize his killing.

“How much of this shit do we have to listen to?” Trump asked. “How much are we going to listen to?”

Who knew that badmouthing the US was a capital offense? Trump says bad things about most countries; does that mean those countries all have a right to take him out with a drone?

Trump did not

Ah yes, the Governor of Virginia is worried that a gun rights rally could turn violent, so what does Trump do? Trump does his bit to encourage violence. Of course he does.

Your 2nd Amendment is under very serious attack in the Great Commonwealth of Virginia. That’s what happens when you vote for Democrats, they will take your guns away. Republicans will win Virginia in 2020. Thank you Dems!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 17, 2020

There's a real threat of violence Monday. The governor has announced a state of emergency. FBI has arrested three white supremacists with weapons they planned to take to Richmond. A real president would offer help to our state government and emphasize violence

NPR on the Parnas hotel room notepad scribbles:

The records provided by Parnas, who has been indicted in New York for alleged campaign finance violations, add to the evidence already released documenting Giuliani’s efforts to get the new Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, to publicly announce an investigation related to former Vice President Joe Biden and his son Hunter Biden, who had ties to a Ukrainian energy company.

It’s not that there’s anything new in that, it’s just that I keep wanting to underline how DERANGED it is. Trump’s personal lawyer is working with random guy Lev Parnas to try to force another head of state to damage one of Trump’s political competitors. Trump might as well be sending Barron … Read the rest

This. Don’t. normalize. Trump.

Neal Katyal and Joshua Geltzer in the Post:

The new documents released Tuesday evening by the House Intelligence Committee were devastating to Trump’s continuing — if shifting — defense of his Ukraine extortion scandal, just days before his impeachment trial is likely to begin in the Senate. These new documents demolish at least three key defenses to which Trump and his allies have been clinging: that he was really fighting corruption when he pressured Ukraine on matters related to the Biden family; that Hunter Biden should be called as a witness at the Senate impeachment trial; and that there’s no need for a real, honest-to-goodness trial in the Senate.

They point out that even Nixon didn’t think he could … Read the rest

Why truth matters. People in charge of the guns and bombs and soldiers aren’t supposed to get inventive with the intel.

Trump said on Fox that the intelligence showed Iran plotting against four of our embassies.

As a member of the Gang of 8, that was news to me.

Now, Esper says this was not intelligence, only Trump’s personal belief.

That’s no basis to take us to the brink of war. pic.twitter.com/G2VRkoW9QE

— Adam Schiff (@RepAdamSchiff) January 12, 2020

Esper said well no he didn’t actually see any evidence but…but…but…well he had a hunch.

Secretary of Defense Mark Esper said he “didn’t see” specific evidence that top Iranian military commander Qassem Soleimani was planning attacks on four U.S. embassies,

Samples of Trump’s horrors:

"We've got him lined up Adam! You little pencil neck. He has the smallest shirt collar you can get, and it is loose." — Trump heaps abuse on Adam Schiff while mocking him for demanding congressional oversight of military strikes pic.twitter.com/nXyrw13r2C

— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) January 10, 2020

"I made a deal, I saved a country, and I just heard that the head of that country is now getting the Nobel Peace Prize for saving the country. I said, 'what, did I have something do with it?'" — Trump whines about not having a Nobel Peace Prize pic.twitter.com/PjVsZCkThY

— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) January 10, 2020

Huh? What was that? What’s he talking about? What country did … Read the rest

Greg Sargent at The Post underlines the obvious: Trump is an abusive monstrosity bent on destruction.

At a rally in Ohio on Thursday night, President Trump drew deafening cheers by boasting about his order to assassinate Maj. Gen. Qasem Soleimani, deriding Democrats with petty schoolyard taunts and mocking the very idea that Congress should act to constrain his warmaking powers.

…

At his rally, Trump belittled House Speaker Nancy Pelosi as “not operating with a full deck.” He derided House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff as “you little pencil neck.” The crowd roared, demonstrating how heavily Trump’s petty abusiveness figures as a factor in his appeal.

But what Trump really displayed here is that his deranged attacks on the

Top Trump stooges “briefed” members of Congress today, leaving them underwhelmed.

The quartet of US secretary of state Mike Pompeo, the still relatively new defense secretary Mark Esper, chairman of the US joint chiefs of staff Mark Milley and the historically-controversial CIA director Gina Haspel strode across Capitol Hill today to brief members of Congress on the Iran issues.

It would be like being briefed by the Marx Brothers, but less fun.

Senior Democrat and chairman of the House foreign affairs committee, Eliot Engel, who was deeply involved in the Trump impeachment inquiry, was unimpressed.

Democrat Pramila Jayapal said of the administration’s stated justification for assassinating Iranian general Qassem Suleimani in the Baghdad area last week: “There

So I guess this is what Trump was going for?

Rockets hit airbase in Iraq where US troops are located https://t.co/zKCrT6eIpn

— Jim Acosta (@Acosta) January 7, 2020

CNN:

At least 10 rockets hit al-Asad airbase in Iraq, which houses US forces, a Sunni commander of the paramilitary forces in a nearby town told CNN. The attack comes days after the US killed top Iranian general Qasem Soleimani in an airstrike in the Iraqi capital of Baghdad.

The administration has sought to cast that strike as an attempt to de-escalate tensions with Iran, but Tehran has vowed revenge for the killing, which it says was an “act of war” and “state terrorism.”

Like hell it was an attempt to … Read the rest

It doesn’t get much more phony than this:

They came to pray with their president, though in truth many came just to worship him. Donald Trump’s Friday launch of his so-called “coalition of evangelicals”, an attempt to shore up the support of the religious right ahead of November’s election, had the feel of any other campaign rally, except this time with gospel music.

An estimated 7,000 “supporters of faith” packed the King Jesus international ministry megachurch in Miami to hear the word of the president, and decided that it was good. The Maga hat-wearing faithful cheered Trump’s comments on issues calculated to resonate with his churchgoing audience, including abortion, freedoms of speech and religion, and what he claimed was a

So, is a tweet “official notification of Congress”?

President Trump claimed Sunday that his tweets are sufficient notice to Congress of any possible U.S. military strike on Iran, in an apparent dismissal of his obligations under the War Powers Act of 1973.

Trump’s declaration, which comes two days after his administration launched a drone strike that killed top Iranian military commander Qasem Soleimani, was met with disbelief and ridicule from congressional Democrats, who called on the president to respect the role of the legislative branch in authorizing new military action abroad.

…

Trump’s claim that the United States will retaliate against Iran “perhaps in a disproportionate manner” also contrasts with Secretary of State Mike Pompeo’s statement hours earlier on “Fox

Trump is – of course, of course, of course – doubling down on the cultural sites threat. Of course he is. Tell him it’s a war crime and he’ll tell you why he doesn’t care.

NEWS from AF1 – POTUS doubled down on cultural sites in Iran as appropriate sites for retaliation.

— Maggie Haberman (@maggieNYT) January 6, 2020

After Trump threatened to hit Iranian cultural sites, he tells the pool: “They’re allowed to kill our people. They’re allowed to torture and maim our people. They’re allowed to use roadside bombs…And we’re not allowed to touch their cultural site? It doesn’t work that way.”

— Kaitlan Collins (@kaitlancollins) January 6, 2020

Are there any leaders in the Republican Party who