The Frankish Reich

Ooh, trouble in Mar-a-Lago paradise! Melania won't let Barron be a Republican convention delegate after all. So where's Melania? Fair question, right Donald? I mean, you asked it about Nikki Haley's husband and he had a damn good excuse, being deployed overseas.

Ahh, the Trump Girls. Most women hit a certain age and their hair gets shorter, their cleavage gets covered, their manner of dress gets a little more professional. Megyn Kelly, meet Kristi Noem. There's a couple dozen women in India with buzz cuts just for their combined hair extensions.

And you better believe the Dems will be ready this time with their counter-strategy. Trump took everyone by surprise last time.

If you'd told me in 2006 (when Stormy and Trump shared a minute or two of intimacy) that in 10 years the Republican nominee would be a guy who happily posed for a photo with an adult film actress when he was almost 60 years old, that the same nominee would be on video saying he just "grabs 'em by the p[]ssy," that the same nominee would be a twice divorced 69 year old who was quite openly cheating on his third wife, and that that same nominee would be the darling of Evanglicals, well ... Good Lord, how did we get here

I think I caught a glimpse of Ray Epps ...

Not if Trump loses in November ... remember, his real defense is "get elected, by hook or by crook."

Hey, Hunter Biden's laptop fooled me too. I'll admit it. Who would just drop off a laptop full of photos of drug use and confidential business documents at a hole-in-the-wall repair shop, and then forget to pick it up? And then somehow the contents wind up in the hands of ... Rudy Giuliani?? You gotta be sh!ttin me. Nobody is that stupid, and nothing is that convenient for Biden's opponents. What I forgot is that drug addicts are that stupid, that out of control. I mean, Hunter had just returned a rental car to a tiny location in Prescott AZ with a crack pipe in the center console. So the wildly implausible turned out to be real. I don't think it was foolish or ridiculously partisan for anyone to doubt that story.

Rare case in which I agree with Trump. Excuse me while I go vomit.

Ask yourself this: is there ANY possible Presidential election result in which Biden wins that Trump would accept as legitimate? Even if Biden doubles his margin in all of the swing states? Is there ANY scenario in which Trump would concede a loss? Isn't it far more likely that he'd fall back on his 2020 bag of tricks? Mail-in ballot harvesting. Electoral machine irregularities. Illegals voting. He's already paving the way for it again by making the same old claims about how 2024 may be rigged just like 2020 was. It is literally heads I win, tails you lose for him and his supporters.

Amen. What you point out here is that the "mainstream media" (I guess they consider Politico as such, even though it is a relative newcomer to that status) does at least try to investigate and to approach people who may be on the other side with an opportunity to comment. Do you ever see Julie Kelly or Jack Posobiec or any of the other faves of the alt right even mentioning an opposing viewpoint, much less seeking out the subject of one of their postings for comment? The Politico article is news. It reports that 50 former members of the intelligence community signed off on a letter saying the Hunter Biden laptop documents have the hallmarks of Russian disinformation. It then quotes Trump's DNI Ratcliffe saying no it isn't, and Rudy Giuliani saying "if it was hacked, I didn't do it, and it was information on his laptop." That is a news story. Not opinion. Not everything in the mainstream media is opinion. Everything in the right-wing twittersphere IS opinion.

So I took a look at what we have so far from Stormy. A standard jury instruction regarding credibility is "you may believe all of a witness's testimony, none of a witness's testimony, or you may find a witness credible with respect to certain matters but not credible with respect to others." I believe any reasonable/unbiased jury would say: Credible: - that Trump had her invited up to his hotel suite for the purpose of having sex with her - that they did have sex - that Trump continued to want to "see" (read: screw) her, and that he egged her own with vague/illusory promises of a role on The Apprentice, including inviting her to Trump Tower to talk about that - that she was offered and accepted a payment in exchange for not talking about this to anyone Not credible: - that she was surprised that Trump wanted sex, not a discussion of her career (and The Apprentice) over dinner - that she was surprised to find him partially undressed when she exited the bathroom - that she "blacked out" and can't recall much after the sex began - that she felt intimidated by the old man and his bodyguard such that the sex could be considered something less than consensual - that she didn't have sex with him for the purpose of helping her career (The Apprentice again) - that she had no interest in money when Cohen approached her with the offer, and that she just wanted to make the story go away. She realized that the story of "I had sex with the host of The Apprentice" wasn't worth much at the time, but "I had sex with the Republican candidate for President" was worth a whole lot in 2016. So ... not a perfect witness for the prosecution by any means, but the prosecution can argue that you don't have to think she's perfect and honorable, and that as long as you believe the parts any reasonable person would believe, her testimony fits together perfectly with the rest of the evidence. The defense, at Trump's bidding, seems stuck with the "you can't believe a word she says" theory, even when I can't see any other reason Trump would invite an "adult film actress" (sex worker) to come to his hotel suite alone.

The bolded part: yeah, I think it was. But that is was for "maximum effect" on the public doesn't strike me as somehow exonerating Trump or showing that he is being railroaded in Court. It has no impact on his right to a fair trial. It wasn't a smart thing to do, but it's hardly the BLOCKBUSTER REVEAL that some here are making it out to be.

Here we go again. You say the "case has already collapsed" because TRUMP told you so. Ask anyone with any expertise in criminal law and procedure and they'll tell you that the prosecution has laid out a surprisingly strong case - surprising because we didn't know how tight it was even without Cohen's testimony. Will the definitely get a conviction? Of course we don't know that now. They haven't even rested and we have no idea what the defense will put on.

If these morons would actually read the news instead of these second-hand Julie Kelly commentaries on the news, they'd see this: https://www.politico.com/news/2024/05/03/mar-a-lago-trump-classified-documents-00156124 The documents were not all in the same boxes in which they were found because classified documents were removed and replaced with a placeholder card before scanning by a contractor. In other words, unlike Trump, they protected the still-classified materials. There was a mistake, and it was in saying to the court that everything was as found. But they admitted that mistake, and explained exactly what it was. It is not "tampering." As far as the cover sheets and the photo on the carpet - I don't think anyone was saying that this was the crime scene as it was found. The documents, including classified cover sheets, were laid out on the carpet after they were discovered. I regret I had to click on Julie from Monsanto's substack to see what she's really saying, and it's this: that the FBI arrayed the documents on the floor, including classified cover sheets that weren't in the same box, in order to make it look worse to the public. If so, that wasn't a great idea, but arranging things to make for a more striking photo isn't the same thing as fabricating evidence or lying to the court. There is a tiny molehill here, but Julie, as usual, knows she can send her fanboys (and aren't they all boys?) into a tizzy by trumpeting this as some kind of Sacco and Vanzetti cause celebre.

Walt Nauta's testimony before the Grand Jury: Grand Juror asks him: when Trump got the National Archives demand for return of certain documents, what did you do? Nauta: Trump told me to just send a dozen random boxes to them. https://www.cnn.com/2024/05/07/politics/mar-a-lago-trump-nauta-classified-documents/index.html We learned this week that that's how the prosecution originated. Remember when Nauta kept asking for continuances before entering a plea? He couldn't get counsel. Until two Trump PACs agreed to take care of it. Do you think maybe - just maybe - Nauta flipped back and won't testify because he now sees what side his bread is buttered on? Mafia style tactics. It worked. Trump effectively derailed the prosecution by playing carrot and stick with little Diet Coke Valet Walt. Trump and Nauta being picked on? No. In any normal prosecution this is witness tampering and Trump would've got himself into even more trouble. But launder the funds through a political PAC and I guess it's ok. https://www.newsweek.com/walt-nauta-paid-trump-pac-fec-1816581

You might want to count your posts in the various transgender threads

VDH finds himself in such esteemed company! Dennis Prager of Trump U Prager U. That's right up there with Fresno State! But I hear the view is better.

Raises my opinion of Chelsea? Not the Stanford grad thing. No - the thing about getting s-faced every weekend. That's the way to do it. The Webb Hubbell thing is hilarious. I must have missed that nutso theory. Chelsea's appearance is clearly a mash-up of the worst features of Hillary and Bill.

Why are they hiding Barron? I mean, yeah, I'm not gonna pick on the kid. But think about it: Sasha and Malia. The Bush twins. Chelsea. Amy Carter. Every non-adult kid in the White House is typically out there for functions, etc., at least a few times a year. Barron? Basically zero. Exactly. Senator = 6 year term. I think we should set an age limit for being sworn in. 70 works for me, 75 at the max. President? 4 years. I'd go with 75. Supreme Court Justice? 80 max. I'd prefer 70. Continually refresh, particularly since the new thing is to appoint 40-somethings. Half a century on the Court is too much. Representative? Basically no one cares. These days they vote party line. They might as well not even be present, just let their staffers press the button.

does the "or something" = "someone who doesn't pay $130,000 for 2 minutes of sex?"

Umm, isn't that kind of on Trump? I mean, if I'm ever on trial for falsifying financial records, I can assure you that a porn star (and I generally refuse to use that term - I will call her what she is, a sex worker; no one is a "star" if only porn addicts know their name) will not be involved in any way.

One semester in law school I did an internship. One of my fellow interns was a Stanford Law student. He was also a full-time commercial pilot for a major airline, and had been for years. How did he ever get through law school? He told me pilots have a lot of down time so he'd study then. What about class? He said he'd go on the first day and then fix his schedule so he was free for exams. And they gave out A grades like candy. So, yeah, you do have a point. But they still rule the world (if they want to).

At this point, it doesn't make sense to focus on individual polls. I'm more interested in looking at aggregate trends. And this Trump v. Biden race seems to be accelerating some of the political realignment trends we've seen starting to bubble up over the last eight years. From fivethirtyeight: - Overall, Trump +1.1. But there's a whopping 18 percent still "undecided" or supporting third party (mostly RFK Jr) candidates. That's kind of crazy when we have two candidates about as perfectly well known as anyone could be in national politics. I don't think anyone knows how that will resolve. - The generic ballot: Dems +0.7. Not so good for them, but still (despite Biden dragging it down) essentially tied. - Favorability/Approval: Biden - 18 percent, Trump -11. It really is true that we have a race with the two most unpopular candidates ever. That introduces even more uncertainty since we haven't seen this before. As noted here, the realignment by age group seems real. There's a significant move of older people to Democrats, younger people to Republicans. (at least in the polls). Step back a minute and it kind of makes sense - older people tend to be "conservative" in a non-American politics sense, meaning they don't want to see radical change. They're at a stage in life where they value continuity (even stasis) over sharp change. And which party is the one that wants more radical change now? Republicans of the Trump variety. It is exactly the opposite of what I've seen in most of my adult life. The realignment by sex also appears to have accelerated, and the issues that are most salient with men vs. women (particularly abortion rights) probably have a lot to do with this. As always (and as always disappoints me), it'll be turnout, turnout, turnout in November. Which side can energize it's somewhat altered base. Which side can get that 18 percent to swing to its side (and to actually turn out). I really don't think Trump's legal woes will have much impact, since that's already baked into the cake. Barring some kind of obvious health crisis, so is Biden's age. I hate the choice the parties have given us, and I'm hardly alone. But I will vote, and a lot of people won't.

We'll have to wait for Barron's graduation for our tea-leaf readings. Unless Trump dodges it to do a campaign event in Minnesota (despite what he told the judge). Maybe she'll swat his attempt at hand-holding again. Unless the renegotiated pre-nup requires her to engage in minor PDA.

https://www.justice.gov/archives/jm/criminal-resource-manual-1748-elements-perjury-materiality#:~:text=1748.-,Elements Of Perjury -- Materiality,was addressed." Kungys v.