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"A Farce, or a Tragedy, or Perhaps Both."

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Quinn Norton
Why Trump Won The making of the electorate Trump just won, and thusly the United States we have now, started decades ago in school. The Conservative Takeover of America was not secret, it was worse than secret; it was boring and bureaucratic.…
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Amid Global Threats that Remain (Publicly) Unspeakable, Trump Makes Himself Vulnerable

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emptywheel
What Trump will do to the United States is awful.  But because he hates the US government so much, he'll also make "America First" wildly vulnerable to hostile forces, at a time when they're already poised to undercut America's strength.
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Yes, Trump Plans to Flush NATO, But It's Part of a Larger Whole

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emptywheel
By rolling out one after another wildly inappropriate nominee, Trump has brilliantly done what he always does: used a series of distractions to drown out any coherent discussion of the whole. To combat Trump's assault on America, we need to maintain focus on that whole.
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With Matt Gaetz, Donald Trump's Myth Cannot Fail -- It Can Only Be Failed

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emptywheel
Already, in Trump's first term, crony US Attorneys managed to claim evidence was the opposite of what reality said it was. But in a Matt Gaetz DOJ, a willingness to sustain Trump's myth would be the price of admission. Trump's myth cannot fail, it can only be failed.
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David Weiss Dons His "Let's Go Brandon" Frame

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emptywheel
In motions in limine in advance of the Alexander Smirnov trial, Leo Wise and Derek Hines made a superb case they're treating Alexander Smirnov differently than the gun shop owner who doctored the Hunter Biden gun purchase form after the fact.
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Special Counsel Reports Include Declination Decisions

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emptywheel
Jack Smith's declination decisions, which by regulation he must include in any closing report, may prove to be of great interest.
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Trump's Blacklist: His Fascism, Legal Fuck-ups, and Business Failures

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emptywheel
In addition to using lawsuits to seed his false claim that the election was not fair, Donald Trump bullied the NYT for a group of stories that debunked his con.
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Lessons from Red States on How to Push Back

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Peterr
For many, last week's election was a paralyzing shock. But progressives in red states have proven that it is possible to push back against MAGA -- and win.
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Boris Epshteyn's One-Two Punch on DOJ

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emptywheel
According to Politico, Co-Conspirator #6 is the guy who suggested Matt Gaetz would make a good Attorney General.
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Republicans Get to Chew on Matt Gaetz for Two Months and a Week

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emptywheel
Sure, Matt Gaetz is the worst possible pick to be Attorney General. But there are some upsides to Trump having picked the worst possible pick, especially early enough to give Republicans two months to pick him apart.
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The Orbanization of US Politics Began Years Ago

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emptywheel
The assault on civil society that we expect from a second Trump Administration already accelerated two years ago, and already had an impact on the election.
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Litmus Tests Likely Explain Who the Fuck is Pete Hegseth

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emptywheel
Trump likely picked Pete Hegseth to run the largest military in the world because would be willing to do with it things that none of his qualified candidates would do.
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Russia Attempts to Collect Its Winnings

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emptywheel
Russia has been engaged in a whole bunch of dick-wagging since Trump won the election. That's likely because the last time they helped Trump get elected, he deferred on and then failed to deliver his side of the bargain.
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How Garland-Whinger Ankush Khardori's Willful Impotence Helps Trump Evade Accountability

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emptywheel
There's a telling quote from Greg Sargent in his description of Kamala Harris' difficulties in convincing voters that Trump was a bad president. Some Democrats believe that the leading pro-Harris Super PAC, Future Forward, failed to spend enough…
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Two Elections: "The rules were that you guys weren’t going to fact-check"

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emptywheel
There were two elections last week. A traditional political one, in which Democrats had some down ballot successes. And a far bigger propaganda one, in which Trump -- but not always the rest of his party -- had tremendous success.
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The Mixed Emotions of November 9th

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Peterr
From the Beer Hall Putsch in 1923 to Kristallnacht in 1938 to the Fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989, November 9th brings very mixed emotions. On this November 9th, they are being mixed once more.
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Jack Smith Asks for Three Weeks

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emptywheel
Jack Smith has asked for three weeks -- until December 2 -- to inform Judge Tanya Chutkan what they plan to do with the January 6 case going forward.
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The Legal Cases Implicating Donald Trump's Conduct That Won't Go Away [Because of His Election]

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emptywheel
By dint of his twin prosecutions, Hunter Biden has what virtually no one else in the country will be able to get now: standing to raise questions about Donald Trump's conduct.
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