Former J6 Committee Co-Chair and Rep. Liz Cheney has long been criticized for her role in creating a one-sided and at times erroneous record of what occurred on January 6th. That includes editing out Trump’s call for supporters to protest “peacefully,” burying evidence on Trump’s offer to supply National Guard support for that day, and highlighting a false account of Trump in his presidential limo that was directly contradicted by witnesses.
She now stands accused of unethically contacting a key represented witness to get her to change her testimony. In my view, ethical proceedings are unlikely after the disclosure of ex parte communications with former Trump aide Cassidy Hutchinson. However, the evidence seemingly contradicts public accounts of how Hutchinson decided to fire her counsel and change her testimony.
Hutchinson was represented by Stefan Passantino, who some clearly viewed as a stumbling block to getting Hutchinson to turn against Trump. Hutchinson would claim under oath that Passantino pressured her to stay “loyal” to Donald Trump and coached her responses to support Trump despite her conflicting accounts.
However, newly disclosed evidence allegedly contradicts that account, including Hutchinson telling former Trump aide (and now The View co-host) Alyssa Farah Griffin that “[Passantino’s] not against me complying.” Griffin reportedly responded “I actually agree with Stefan’s approach and think it’s accomplished everyone’s goals. I am happy to tip liz off.”
Hutchinson would later dump Passantino and testify to allegations that have been challenged as untrue. That includes the limo allegation that was repeatedly raised by Cheney and others. Hutchinson recounted the story that Trump allegedly grabbed the wheel of the vehicle after the Secret Service allegedly refused to take him to the Capitol.
Cheney and the Committee were aware that the account was directly and clearly refuted by the driver of the vehicle. However, they buried his account and highlighted that claim in its final report as being credible.
The new allegation concerns the communications leading up to that changed testimony. Rep. Barry Loudermilk, R-Ga., chairman of the House Administration oversight subcommittee has released the new evidence while alleging that Cheney used an encrypted phone app to evade defense counsel in speaking with Hutchinson.
Under Rule 4.2 of the Rules of Professional Conduct, “a lawyer shall not communicate or cause another to communicate about the subject of the representation with a person known to be represented by another lawyer in the matter, unless the lawyer has the prior consent of the lawyer representing such other person or is authorized by law or a court order to do so.”
Cheney is a D.C. licensed lawyer.
At the outset, in my view, Cheney was acting as a member of Congress in this matter. That has always been a rather grey area for lawyers who are also members of Congress. The bar has taken a broad view of the need for lawyers to adhere to these ethical standards. However, it is not clear politically or ethically if the Bar officials would be inclined to pursue Cheney, who has been lionized in Washington for her role in the investigation.
Yet, the record does indicate that Cheney was not just aware of the represented status but the policy of the House to respect the rules governing represented parties. In one message Griffin tells Hutchinson, “Her one concern was so long ad [sic] you have counsel, she can’t really ethically talk to you without him.”
That did not appear to prove a barrier. Before Passantino withdrew as counsel, Cheney communicated secretly with Hutchinson. A later message was sent to Cheney reading on June 6, “Hi, this is Cassidy Hutchinson. I’m sorry for reaching out this way, but I was hoping to have a private conversation with you (soon), if you are willing.”
Cheney responded, “I would be happy to. Let me know what time works for you.”
A few days later, Hutchinson fired Passantino, who told Just the News that “I absolutely had no knowledge at the time that Congresswoman Liz Cheney was communicating with my client behind my back – either directly, through her staff, or through cutouts.”
However, Cheney has claimed that it was Hutchinson who reached out to her and indicated that she was severing her counsel. As an investigating member of Congress, she had an institutional interest, if not a duty, to pursue witnesses.
In her memoir, Cheney said that it was Hutchinson who contacted her directly after her third interview and added “I was very sympathetic to her situation, but I did not want our committee to be advising her on what she should do next…I told Cassidy that she could consult another lawyer, and seek his or her independent advice on how best to move forward.”
We have previously discussed Passantino’s defamation lawsuit against MSNBC legal analyst and former Mueller aide Andrew Weissmann.
Once again, I am doubtful that this would rise to a formal Bar ethics investigation. However, the evidence shows the communications leading to Hutchinson’s firing of her counsel and changing of her testimony, including accounts later challenged by critics.
Hutchinson, Griffin, and Cheney have been reportedly campaigning together this month in support of Vice President Kamala Harris.
In the end, there are ethical concerns raised by these communications. Cheney should have worked through new counsel and proposing alternative counsel raises additional concerns given the interest of Cheney in having the witness “flip” against Trump. She could have waited for new counsel to communicate with her and the Committee.
Alternatively, Hutchinson could have fired her counsel and formally contacted the Committee as an unrepresented party. The ethical rules are designed to avoid this type of murky representational posture. Nevertheless, I am doubtful that this will result in any ethical proceedings against Cheney.
I think hat Baier did extremely well in the 20minutes that Harris’s campaign allowed.
To those people who beleived the things she was saying before this interview started the will claim she did well.
They do not need answers to any of the questions that Baier asked.
Most of Fox’s audience is likely to say that all they heard was Harris lying, evading answering, and blaming trump for 20+ minutes.
But none of those groups matter – they have already decided how they are voting.
Independents and undecides are likely to favorably note that Harris did not get lost in word salad, she took an agressive stance and stood her ground.
But these are people who are looking for ANSWERS from Harris – and she did not provide any of those.
I am not sure her anger will play well with moderates – though I am sure it worked well for her base.
I am certain that people who were looking for answers as to why they should vote for Harris came away disappointed.
I do not think 20 minutes of blaming Trump went over well with moderates. They do not need a lecture on Trump.
He was president for 4 years they KNOW what they are buying with Trump.
I would further note that while Trump constantly blames others for what he does NOT accomplish.
At the same time he has a long list of ACTUAL accomplishments – as president and privately and all DESPITE massive opposition.
If you are on the left you may not like some of his accomplishments – but there is zero doubt that he has many, and that he is proud of them and that when he sits down with undecides and/or hostile audiences he is willing to shout out those accomplishments, and defend them.
What we got from Harris was 20 minutes of why Donald Trump has made it impossible for her and Joe Biden to accomplish anything.
Even if true that is really sad.
But worse, it is obviously untrue.
Trump had 4 years as president facing hostility that makes anything Harris has had to deal with tame,
and he is still not only able to but bragging about what he accomplished.
He does not spend most of his time blaming others.
Trump whines plenty – and he is atleast partly entitled to.
But that is FAR from all he does. Before or after the whining is ALWAYS a long list of accomplishments he is proud of.
Harris offered lots of whining about how bad her TDS has been. And blamed Trump for the absence of any accomplishments.
That is not a winning message.
But I still must give Harris credit where credit is due – she knew going in that Baier would not be a pushover.
While she did alot wrong, She did NOT space out into nonsense as she has even in friendly interviews in the past.
She showed evidence that she understands that she has a problem and that she is working to improve.
She has managed something of critical importance that good politicians learn early and others eventually through practice
The non-answer answer.
What she has NOT mastered is in the midst of non-answer answers telling the people that have NOT decided to vote for her yet,
Why they should vote for her.
She is not up to 3hrs with Joe Rogan.
She is not up to an open mike Town Hall – with or without Trump.
She is not up to the Chicago Economic Club.
She is not up to any of the tough interviews Trump does everyday,
This interview was a disaster – but only because there are 20 days left in the election and she needs to reverse trend NOW, and this is NOT the big win she needs.
If she was the Democratic candidate doing this interview 9 months ago it is likely by the time the election rolled arround she MIGHT get good enough to do alot better.
There are 20 days, not 9 months. She needs a long train of REALLY good interviews RIGHT NOW.
This is not going to make things worse.
But it is not going to make things better for her.
Say less. Once a crook always a crook
Congratulations, Bret Baier!
You conducted an interview as an objective and resolved journalist.
You let the chips fall where they may.
Because of the vacuous, incompetent, and unqualified nature of the interviewee, you destroyed her incidentally, not maliciously.
Trump’s new campaign ad just dropped. It’s the full Bret Baier interview of Kamala Harris.
Give her credit, Kamala is actually making B8den look smart.
https://x.com/TheBabylonBee/status/1846694763124097144
Register my shock.
None.
If you believed anything about DC, believe this: they are unaccountable scum that will destroy the USA just to say Trump did it.
You can hate the playa (Trump), but damn, understand the game that a legion of evil scumbags are running on you.
Cheney, an ordinary sloppy pig in mud-filled quagmire of DC lawyers, lobbyists and leeches with Ds and Rs after their name but dollar signs always in their eyes, follows the playbook honed by her daddy and all his political friends, and fake enemies, like Joe Biden.
Nothing will change.
Good bye Republic.
The Elite best hope the Robespierre urge doesn’t come to pass.
But who can blame us serfs?
I was for the republicans before I was against the republicans.
When the ship is going down, the rats are always the first to leave.
“Two Trump Docs Prosecutors Depart Jack Smith’s Office”
–By Nicole Wells | Wednesday, 16 October 2024 04:15 PM EDT
https://www.newsmax.com/politics/donald-trump-jack-smith-doj/2024/10/16/id/1184313/
“The Times reported that they likely won’t be the last to exit Smith’s team, which was assembled in late 2022 after Attorney General Merrick Garland appointed the special counsel to investigate Trump.”
There is a lawsuit and apparently criminal investigation involving ActBlue engaging in identity theft for alleged small campaign donations.
This surfaced when a republican political consultant found receipts for Donations to Act Blue coming to an old email account of his.
This consultant has NEVER donated to actblue.
This has resulted in an investigation that is now dealing with allegations of using identity theft to filter large political donations using identity theft attributing the donations to small donors to avoid reporting requirements and donation limits.
“Bah! Humbugery…”
A quotation because *I* would never, ever say such a thing.
Yesterday Dennis was ranting about alleged Trump lies about FEMA.
Here is a Youtube video addressing some of that.
While the Video is about the “red neck airforce” an ad hock private group that is now up to 150 aircraft engaged in supply releif and rescue operations in North Carolina. A significant portion of the video addresses complaints about FEMA.
Apparently things are getting WORSE not better.
FEMA is coming in at night and blocking access roads.
they are stealing the supplies of private groups that have now found they must provide security at night for their supplies to avoid having the government confiscate them.
Even simple things – Trump volunteered to come into the area served by the “red neck airforce” – they told him they welcomed the assistance, but they would prefer if he stayed away as there would be a 30Mile radius shutdown of all air traffic anywhere he visited and that would stop their rescue and supply operations.
But Biden and Harris did not ask them and showed up and shutdown operations for two days for their “photo ops”.
Aparently FEMA is s bad that NC residents are telling FEMA to “Go Away” when they come to “help” prefering to rely on themselves or private efforts to assist.
https://youtu.be/MhDYxJYgsXU
As usually Dennis’s remarks are “full of schiff”
All “emergency assistance” is, by definition, local.
Would you please cite a legal basis for FEMA in the Constitution?
FEMA, as with most of the government, is arbitrary, and unconstitutional in the former land of the free.
Would you please cite a legal basis for FEMA in the Constitution?
Curious George, you Confederate Kluxxer Monkey, will you cite a legal basis for Confederate slavery that you found in that Constitution?
While there are indirect references in the constitution – non-free blacks are counted as 3/5 of a person for the census,
Fundimentally Slavary was a private evil, not a public one.
You DO realize (1) The argument at the time was between those who didn’t want slaves to count at all & those who wanted each slave counted as a person; (2) the “count them as a person” crowd was the slave owning South because doing so would increase their clout in the House of Representatives, thereby making it easier to defend slavery; and (3) the South only wanted them counted to increase its clout – they had no intention of allowing them to vote, run for office, etc.
Anonymous – the question was is slavery in the constitution. They Answer is the only reference to slavery in the constition is that non-free blacks count as 3/5 of a person.
The existance of slavery IS noted in the constitution. But the constitution did not create slavery, justify slavery, or end slavery.
I am aware of the constitutional debate regarding the counting of slaves – but that was NOT the question.
practiced throughout the history of the world by nearly all nations. There finished the story for you.
Fun fact: in the 1860 Vensus of the U.S., Athe last to enumerate slave owners, there 393,000 of them. All but a single one was a Democrat. Another fun fact: the KKK was a Democrat organization. Jim Crow Laws were passed by Democrats. Bull Connor, George Wallace and Lester Maddox were Democrats.
With all of the vestiges of slavery and the civil war being erased, why does the Democrat Party still get to exist?
George, you are correct there is no constitutional basis for FEMA.
But that is not a winning argument today.
FEMA is a waste of money, a disaster and net negative with respect to disaster relif is somethin that people are seeing.
John Say, I must say that you are always correct.
Having said that, I trust the Constitution and Bill of Rights explicitly.
I will lose with the constitutional argument just to make the point that most of the government is unconstitutional and aberrations such as labor and public worker unions are unconstitutional criminal organizations, the only leverage of which is trespass, vandalism, and violence.
Lincoln had no power to deny secession, and the Confederate States must have been free to secede and wither, no, rot on the vine; there was never any future in reprehensible slavery, but, again, it must have been abrogated by legislation in a democratic republic; an advocacy war must have been fought, not a Civil War—Lincoln threw the Constitution out with despicable slavery; he threw the baby out with the bathwater.
The entire communist American welfare state has no basis in the Constitution, and “emergency management” must be done locally and by free market private enterprises.
America must be corrected back to the Constitution and Bill of Rights which were stolen from us Americans by communists.
Thank you. Minor quibbles. I am not a big fan of Labor unions. I think there is an excellent argument that government employees can not form a union – their employer is the public and they can express their views regarding employment by voting
Beyond that governments role regarding labor unions is to protect peoples rights – those of property owners, those of workers.
What it can not do is put its thumb on the scale.
I am 100% for any persons right to attempt to negotiate any free exchange they are part of.
If you want to go to McD’s and ask for a discounted Burger, go for it McD’s can say yes or no as they wish.
If you are employed you are free to ask for a raise or better working conditions or free dry cleaning if that is what you want – and your employer is free to say yes or no.
If you and other employees wish to get together and negotiate collectively – individuals do not lose their rights when they act in groups.
After a Great deal of thought, I am ultimatgely opposed to “right to work laws” – laws that bar unions from negotiating deals that require all workers to be part of a union. I do not like closed shops. But if we are going to stick with the constitution – which requires that states can not interfere with contract rights, then a union is free to negotiate a closed shop contract.
I expect government to enforce contracts – that is the 2nd most important thing government does.
With a few exceptions – I do not think you can sell yourself into slavery and there are bars against contracts in perpetuity, It is not governments role to decide if a contract is good or bad, just to enforce it.
In parts of the 19th century governemnt wrongly sided against unions. In the 20th century they wrongly sided for unions.
Regardless, Unions are part of the free market just like every other form of free exchange.
In arguably unions resuled in the failure of the US auto industry in the last 3rd of the 20th century.
But I strongly suspect that if Government had kept its thumb off the scales that would not have happened.
At the same time if I am wrong, If organized labor is stupid enough to destroy the businesses that pay them, and if those businesses are stupid enough to agree to contracts that they can easily KNOW will result in their failure – I am OK with that.
Free markets are designed to learn from failure. They are SUPPOSED to fail – frequently and easily.
That is how learning takes place. Failure may be as important as success.
In the real world market failure is about 7 times more common than success. But the benefits of success are so large compared to the costs of failure that in the end we still end up better off.
But ending my diatribe on free markets and labor unions
I am not stupid or naive – The constitution is NOT going to be properly applied. I am not going to get what I want.
I am not going to get what is right.
But we CAN make things better.
And frankly we must.
A free market can tolerate an enormous amount of failure and still survive and thrive – but there is a threshold after which we get serious failure.
Public choice theory applies the same principles of human behavior that drive economics to govenment and the results are really really really bad. Everything that drives free markets towards continuous improvement drives government to increasing totalitarianism and failure.
Right now people think our government is going in the wrong direction.
Our government is almost always going in the wrong direction. The right direction for government is to stay put or reduce itself nearly always. That is NOT the direction that humans will ALWAYS drive government. Government failure is almost inevitable.
But we can buy time periodically by doing anything that reigns govenrment in, that shrinks it.
We also have an advantage because MOST of the time the free market creates additional freedom faster than government can take it away.
Under Harris/Biden we are simultaneously worse off and better off then we were in 2020.
We have more freedom and less at the same time.
If we lose no critical freedoms, and we grow the free market faster than govenrment – the insatiable appetite for government to take away our freedom does not have to drive us to failure.
The world is complex – and amazingly it does not have to be perfect to work – even work well.
My Wife is a criminal public appelate attorney. She see govenrment misconduct all the time.
The good news is we do not need to have perfection to have good.
Contra the idiocy of the George Floyd/BLM riots – we do not need and will never have perfect policing.
We must make law enforcement work with the people we have in the world we live in – not some pie in the sky.
We need the police and we WILL always have SOME bad policing, and some just plain incompetence and laziness.
We must make the system work with the people we have – not the ones we wish we had.
I would also note the common theme from the left and right that we should just increase wages and hire better cops an better teachers and better ….
All well and good, but the ONLY truly limited resource is the human mind.
We have only so many people who would make wonderful teachers or policemen.
And unfortunately many of those also make wonderful engineers and doctors.
With free markets this all balances out – but police and teachers are government employees, and they are only lightly governed by the free market.
One of he very common problems with the left is being limited to first order thinking.
I really do not give a schiff if pink haired 20 somethings who think they are gods git to teaching, are telling my 5yr old children – fortunately now adults that LGBTQ+ unicorn farts make the world work – so long as they also teach them to read, write and arithmatic.
But I am not stupid – if you allow teachers to talk freely with children about Sex – you can absolutely guarantee that every pedophile in the world will move into teaching.
As Adam Smith said 250 years ago it is not good intentions that drive human behavior – it is INCENTIVES.
It is very easy for people with Good intentions to F@#K things up, but being blind to the bad incentives they create.
Hear, hear!
What concessions did Fox’s Chief RINO, Bret Baier, make to KamalaSalad to secure the interview?
Nothing but softballs?
Why didn’t Fox give the interview to Greg Gutfeld who would rip the vacuous charlatan, “Willy’s Girl,” a new one?
Obama’s attempt to shame black men has not gone down well with African Americans – both men and women:
https://x.com/bennyjohnson/status/1845646215452496049?t=24s
(Warning: salty language)
It’s starting before it’s starting
Georgia judge blocks rule requiring hand-count of US election ballots
Oct 15 (Reuters) – A Georgia judge on Tuesday temporarily halted a new rule requiring poll workers to hand count ballots in November’s U.S. elections, in a defeat for Donald Trump, whose Republican allies pushed the change after he lost the battleground state in 2020.
The hand-count rule was passed on Sept. 20 by a pro-Trump conservative majority of Georgia’s election board, who said they were attempting to make the Nov. 5 election more secure and transparent.
By: Jack Queen – Reuters ~ October 16, 2024
https://www.reuters.com/world/us/georgia-judge-blocks-rule-requiring-clerks-hand-count-number-ballots-nyt-reports-2024-10-16/
IOW, election integrity favors Trump. The judge recognizes this, hence the ruling.
The ruling was against an integrity check and for convenience – in this case of election officials, and was against Trump.
More importantly it was the Judge acting as an executive, not a jurist.
The rule was within the power of the Election commission,
it is not the judges role to second guess them or substitute his judgement.
The rule was constitutional and legal and therefore outside the Judges perview.
There are good reasons for blocking the rule. True to form, MAGA didn’t plan for training, vetting, and getting people to volunteer. Chaos and confusion would ensue. They made the rule too close to the election.
why do youtake your uneducated and shallow opinion and present it as authoritative fact? That really is a sign of a person with reading comprehension and context problems who projects them onto others.
False and irrelevant. it is not the role of the judiciary to guess what MIGHT occur,
only whether a rule is legal and constitutional.
This rule was.
The judge erred.
We are a month from the election – there is virtually no need to vet people to count the number of envelopes in a box, andno need to train them. Nor would this cause chaos or confusion – and that is outside the domain of the judge regardless.
The Judiciary is NOT there to 2nd guess the executive or legislature.
They are there to decide if a rule, or regulation is within the law and constitution – it Was.,.
The judge erred.
As is typical we get made up and out of scope arguments by left wing nuts and left wing judges ignore the law, the constitution and the limits to the power of the judiciary.
A hand count of the number of Ballots is not going to be perfectly accurate – neither is the machine count.
But a significant discrepancy means that Ballots have been injected.
This is how you catch people bringing suitcases of ballots in, or sitting infront of a tabulator scanning the same ballots over and over.
Not only is it how you catch these – it is how you prevent them.
If election officials KNOW that there is an independent count of the number of ballots they are not going to inject ballots – because they will be caught,.
That is how election integrity measures work – they prevent fraud, they do not catch it.
Because few people commit crimnes unless they beleive they will not be caught.
The new rule was not to Hand count Votes, it was to hand count the number of ballots.
This is a perfectly legitimate check of the voting tabulators.
The Judge erred – while there was nothing wrong with his arguments, he erred because the efficiency of the election and the convenience are NOT legal grounds. They are issues for the executive, not judicial.
The Judicial is there to make sure the rules and laws and constitution are followed,
Not to decide whether the Judge likes those rules, and laws.
There are myriads of these checks that were eliminated in 2020 – most of which have been subsequently fixed.
Though even the checks are only important if they are used.
Raffensberger aggreed to a random hand signature check of 5000 ballots in Cobb county in 2020.
That GBI conducted audit found that 6% of all signatures on the 5000 randomly selected ballots did not meet the requirements of GA law, abd those ballots should not have been counted. That is 120K ballots that should have been rejected in GA where Biden won by 6400.
But worse – 0.6% of the audited ballots were Fraudulent – that would have been 12,000 fraudulent ballots in GA.
After hearing the results – Raffensberger refused to conduct a wider audit.
Prior to the 2020 election GA had budgeted funds for random hand recounts of a small proportion of the voting machines as a means to validate their results. This is a very effective fraud and other problem detection method and therefore a fraud prevention method.
Raffensberg dropped the random audit months before the election.
Nearly everything that you do to increase election integrity and trust slows the process down andmakes it less convenient.
If you want complete voter convenience we can dispense with voting alltogether and just hire psychics to determine how people would have voted.
Measures like hand counting the number of ballots, no only detects fraud – it prevents it.
The odds are those who challenged the rule are not affraid of slowing the count – it took GA Days in 2020,
But affraid of detecting Fraud – as is the judge in question.
This is too important to not share.
The Biden/Harris FBI just updated their 2022 violent crime statistics to show that in fact it increased year-over-year and not decreased. What other October surprises does Joe have for Kamala, Schumer and Pelosi and the rest of the Democratic party?
“To give people an idea of the size of the change, when the 2022 data came out in September 2023, they initially reported that violent crime had fallen by 2.1% in 2022.… That’s the final data, supposedly, for 2022. The revision of that final data that came out last month, now claims that rather than the 2.1% drop, that there was actually a 4.5% increase in violent crime that occurred in 2022. That’s a 6.6 percentage point change there,” Lott told Fox News Digital.
https://nypost.com/2024/10/16/us-news/fbi-quietly-revised-2022-crime-data-to-show-violent-offenses-rose-rather-than-dropped/
Wrong link to the quote.
https://www.foxnews.com/politics/fbi-quietly-updates-crime-data-show-big-jump-violence-under-biden-harris-admin-shocking
* Yes, and it will continue to rise. “The people” will hide in their homes, run from place to place, or fight. Trump and Musk are fighting.
* basic animal behaviors. The dems are the wolves right now until they lose. Then they run.
The Dems aren’t wolves, they’re more akin to the skulking hyenas. A matriarchal society that steals from the lion, attacking only when they’re in number. Running and hiding when the lion tires of their antics and turns his wrath their way.
“Hutchinson would claim under oath that Passantino pressured her to stay “loyal” to Donald Trump and coached her responses to support Trump despite her conflicting accounts.”
Sounds like Passantino was not working for Hutchinson’s best interest as his client, but manipulating her to testify in the best interest of Trump. That speaks of indirect witness tampering on Trump’s (Meadow’s) part. Any fair-minded, disinterested lawyer looking at this would be equally concerned with witness silencing as with Liz Cheney taking a phone call from Hutchinson saying she was dumping Passantino as her lawyer.
Hutchinson is showing great integrity and courage to come clean about the inept plotting she witnessed in the WH.
If Trump had any honor and authenticity, he would have volunteered to talk directly to the J6 Committee, or better still, go on national TV and explain everything he did to obtain a 2nd term, and why he felt justified to do it. Maintaining denial and cover-up is a sign of consciousness of guilt. To this day, he refuses to be honest about what he attempted.
If he did nothing wrong, what’s stopping him from defending his actions to the public?
Hutchinson is showing great integrity and courage to come clean about the inept plotting she witnessed in the WH.
Same Hutchinson who multiple witnesses pointed out that Hutchinson lied when she testified she saw Trump fighting the driver of the vehicle for the wheel, right pbinca? That one? The evidence of the Secret Service agents in the car, who testified she lied? The contradictory testimony regarding Hutchinson that Cheney and the J6 Committee concealed from Americans and attempted to hide from Republicans?
Tell us: as Hutchinson wasn’t among the many criminal referrals made by the J6 committee with a referral to be tried for perjury, was it because the J6 Committee worked so hard to hide all that incriminating evidence from the Secret Service that unequivocally said that Hutchinson was lying under oath?
House GOP report details testimony that contradicted key Jan. 6 witness
The testimony by a Secret Service agent that was previously unreleased contradicts that of Cassidy Hutchinson, a former White House aide
https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2024/03/11/jan-6-committee-secret-service-testimony/
Or are you referring to a DIFFERENT Hutchinson who “showed great intergrity and courage” that you’re fawning over as she tried to help take down Trump?
If Trump had any honor and authenticity, he would have volunteered to talk directly to the J6 Committee
If you had a shred of human decency, honor, and authenticity at the very least you wouldn’t continue these false flag attempts to portray yourself as intellectually honest commentator applying equal standards to all. Rather than your pathetic attempts to conceal your BBBUUUTTTT…. MUH TRUMP!!!!
But no… tell us how honorable and just the J6 Committee was. Which Republicans Pelosi selected for it versus the GOP selections she barred from being on, how they concealed and hid exculpatory evidence, perjured themselves to the citizens of the USA, leaked, coordinated with Biden, etc. Sell us on how both Cheney and the J6 Committee were the epitome of American justice investigations.
pbinca… you are such an obvious pathetic Cheap Fake Police State Fascist Democrat.
“Screaming Lil Bow Wow,” what were your MOS, Awards, Campaign, and Theater, or is yours stolen valor “Tampon Tim” style? Your MOS was Combat Cookie, right?
92G – Culinary Specialist – MOS Description – The Culinary Specialist supervises, prepares, and serves food in field or garrison operations.
You launch this boring ad hominem attack every time he posts a comment. And you do it anonymously, which speaks poorly of your character. Give it a rest, Mr. Craven, he is allowed to comment here just like anyone else.
It is only an “attack” if it is untrue that he has stolen the valor of genuine “airborne dog” war fighters.
Why don’t you ask your craven protectee to answer the question?
What were his “airborne dog” MOS, Awards, Campaign, and Theater?
It would appear that your protectee’s “military record” is suspicious or “anonymous.”
You’re apparently unable to argue substance with him so you harp on things that have nothing to do with what he said or the topic under discussion. If you had ever learned even five minutes worth of logic you would know that that’s an ad hominem attack, a transparent attempt by the weak debater to distract from their losing position on the merits.
ATS
I post here constantly.
I have provided SOME of my CV on occasion and enough that if you wish to do the work you can find alot out about me.
On many occasion I have drafted a post explaining precisely why I am expert on some topic and providing my credentials,
and other personal facts, accomplishments, measures etc to demonstrate my expertise to speak authoritatively on many subjects.
After I have finished those drafts – I delete them.
My posts rest on the FACTS – Facts that can be verified by googling – presuming google is not lying today.
So maybe it should be “DDG’ing or some less biased search engine.
Regardless, I do not make appals to my own authority – or atleast I try to avoid them.
I have no idea whether OAD is just a pseudonym or someone who served with great distinction.
Nor am I entitled to know, nor does it matter regarding any debate here.
What matters is that what he SAYS is consistent with know facts – especially in areas that relate to the impliactions of his pseudonym.
If he is wrong about a FACT – challenge it.
I could care less about the rest of you nonsense.
Little Bachi Boy who learned some words in pillow talk from a Navy wog who never once stood on a two way rifle range – do either of you bum buddies have any of those of your own that you’d like to list along with specific accusations instead of insinuations?
I know the hajjis Bachi Boys never set foot outside of the hut to even plant an IED… how about you, bum boy?
I know of a few marines that were killed in Iraq while waiting in the chow line. Mortar attacks from afar, so what does an MOS matter when you are in Indian country? Tampon Tim never made it past his driveway. What does an army run on ? Bullets and Beans, some one has to serve the beans dipstick.
Haliburton beans and Haliburton bullets that is.
The forces against him are so thoroughly corrupt – the J6 “committee” being one example – that he would be a chump and a loser if he agreed to play their evil little game.
As for “That speaks of indirect witness tampering on Trump’s (Meadow’s) part” – are you aware of any evidence, or are you in the land of pure speculation?
Re read the article, seems you missed part of it.
Pbinca – Turley addresses the ethical issue regarding Cheney – though he mistate the strenght of that obligation – as the equivalent of a judge her ethical burden is HIGHER.
You are adressing another issue – though you Miss the glaring problem.
Both Hutchinson’s book and here texts with Cheney contradict her sworn testimoney about Passantino
There does need to be an investigation – If Passantino did something unethical – he shoudl be disbarred.
But the evidence is leaning strongly away from that and toward Hutchinson lying under oath defaming Passantino
and toward Cheney participating in that fraud on the tribunal.
None of the claims regarding Passantino in Hutchinson’s testimony are present in her book or in the communications with Cheney.
There are some Complications as Giffords is in the middle of this – but at best that complicates evaluating Cheney’s potential ethical lapses.
It does not change the fact that Hutchinson lied under oath regarding Passantino
pbinca – you seem to have a problem with reality.
We have alot of evidence.
We have first person accounts, we have the accounts of those who purportedly provided Hutchinson with her Hearsay,
we have the communications between Hutchinson, and Gifford and Hutchinson and Cheney.
We have Hutchinson’s testimoney,
and we have Hutchinson’s book.
For Hutchinson to be telling the truth under oath – not only would everyone else have to be lying – under oath,
But Hutchinsons book would have to be a lie, and her communications with Cheney and Gifford atleast partly lies,
Conversely if you assume that Hutchinson lied in her public sworn testimoney – then everything else is factually consistent.
The odds ALWAYS favor one person lying under oath – especially about hearsay, rather than a vast consipriacy that not only invoves Trump
and Trump supporters but even to a small extent Cheney and Gifford.
Ocham’s razor tells us that the simplest explanation – Hutchinson lied in her public testimoney, is the best.
What we are seeing is Sir Walter Scotts aphorism
“oh what a tangled web we weave when first we practice to deceive”
at work.
Th problem with lying is that the lie must not conflict with what is known – and sometimes what is not yet known but will be known in the real world. It is very very rare for a lie not to have a growing number of conflicts with the real world resulting in a growing body of lies to fix the previous ones.
Hutchinson is clearly lying.
Eitehr she lied in here initial testimony as she said she did, then told the truth publicly, and then told a whole bunch of lies about Passantino, and here communications with him, her reasons for dismissing him … in public and later in here book – often contradicting her prior lies.
Or the simpler alternative is she lied under oath. Then almost everything else she has said is true, and there are very few conflicts with anything we know from her – in the past or present or from others.
While I think it is pretty easy to determine that Hutchinson made up the “Beast Story”,
Even more disturbing is that those involved would go to this much trouble over an irrelevant lie.
Lets assume that Hutchinson is correct – and Trump did try to go to the capitol.
There is nothing wrong with his doing so.
But he would have been thwarted as the SS was not letting the president co to the capitol on J6.
While Hutchinson’s story is unlikely to be true,
It is also not harmful to Trump if true.
Which is another reason that if her story were true, neither Trump nor the SS agents nor anyone else involved would have lied to protect Trump from a truth that wasnot harmful to him.
While Turley weakly focuses on the ethical issue regarding Cheney,
Given the near certainty that Hutchinson lied under oath this whole thing is leading towards Cheney an Gifford suborning perjury.
We do not have all the dots on that yet, But THEY are actively invoved in getting a witness to tell a story that is near certain perjured.
* By whom was the lie grabbing the driver of the beast told by CH under oath to the J6 committee created? Where did CH get this incredible lie? Cheney? Seriously… Did CH meet with LC before or after the whopper was told?
Pbinca, I assume you saw Trump on TV and the cars that transport him. This is where logic comes in, and normal people realize that Hutchinson wasn’t telling the truth.
Can Trump’s arms reach the wheel and overpower the Secret Service agent? Some people believe this is true despite the data not fitting. I would not call them the smartest folk in the room, and I want to believe you are not one of them. TDS can cause that, as can an ideology that trains people to lie.
As a final kicker, the Secret Service and the driver said this didn’t happen. Why would you take Hutchinson’s word when she wasn’t there? Hutchinson had to make these things up, and based on recent evidence, it appears that Liz Cheney had an ethical lapse, which proves she doesn’t deserve the right to hold a legal license or a seat in Congress.
With trump swaying insanely to Ave Maria at a town hall meeting the other day while refusing to take questions (probably after getting a peek at his internal polling data) can’t we just drop the pretense and label trump as the treasonist that 1/6 culminated in him being? His actions that day alone prove he’s incapable of being president. His lumbering dance conniptions the other day just drive home the point.
So Turls…, no, the problem isn’t about Liz Cheney or Cassady Hutchinson. It’s about the dessicated orange man skank instead. Can’t we just be rid of this con man???
It’s about the dessicated orange man skank instead. Can’t we just be rid of this con man???
It’s not about President Depends? Bribery Biden, Mr. Ten Percent, The Big Guy? Or Cackling Calloused Knees Kamala, who put the political stink in the word Skank?
ATS how clueless are you ?
Trump was taking questions, he was disrupted by Two medical emergencies.
he asked the crowd if they wanted him to DJ while they waited for the doctors,
They agreed, so he picked some songs and played them.
I would note Trump ALWAYS stops his speachs and interviews to let doctors deal with medical emergencies.
That is nothing new.
“You had a case in Georgia not very long ago, didn’t you? They made an ad about it, a young woman who had been killed by an immigrant. Yeah, well, if they’d all been properly vetted that probably wouldn’t have happened.”
“And America isn’t having enough babies to keep our populations up, so we need immigrants that have been vetted to do work – there wouldn’t be a problem.”
– Bill “Slick Willy” Clinton
https://www.youtube.com/shorts/MGhY_uLLBHY
Women’s suffrage gave America abortion and eradication of the population.
A country that is led by women has no babies and is self-terminating.
The 19th Amendment is a national suicide pact.
Jonathan: With your fixation on Liz Cheney you missed an important court ruling this week in Georgia. As everyone knows DJT learned some hard lessons from his loss in 2020. So for the past 4 years he and his MAGA supporters are desperately trying to suppress the vote of likely Dem voters–filing over 125 lawsuits in 26 states to restrict mail-in voting, challenging voter registrations, limiting polling places and drop-off ballot boxes, stricter ID voting requirements, etc. DJT knows his only chance of winning the election this year is to deprive millions of voters of their franchise.
This is playing out in Georgia where DJT and his MAGA supporters now have a 3-2 majority on the state’s Board of Elections. So last month the MAGA Board passed new rules– which calls for a hand count of all Georgia votes and the right of local election officials to refuse to certify the November election based on a vague “reasonable inquiry” standard.
In a ruling yesterday Fulton County Superior Judge Robert McBurney said the hand count rule is “too much, too late” and blocked the rule. In a companion case McBurney also made another significant ruling. In that case Julie Adams, a MAGA supporter and Fulton County election commissioner, had sued and asked for a declaratory judgment claiming she had no duty to certify the election results in November. In this case McBurney held that Adams had no choice under Georgia election laws that specify that election results “shall” be certified by 5 pm on the Monday after the election (November 12). McBurney said: “If election superintendents were, as Plaintiff urges, free to play investigator, prosecutor, jury and so–because of a unilateral determination of error or fraud, refuse to certify elections results, Georgian voters would be silenced”. McBurney held the “reasonable inquiry” standard was too vague.
So in the critical swing state of Georgia DJT’s attempts to sabotage the election system have thus far failed. DJT learned a lesson from his loss in 2020 when he tried to get Brad Raffensperger to change the vote count after the election. This time around he and his MAGA supporters have tried to change the voting system in Georgia in advance of the election. Didn’t work with Judge McBurney and probably won’t work in other critical swing states.
Jonathan: With your fixation on Liz Cheney you missed an important court ruling this week in Georgia.
Dennis, with your desperate attempts to deflect from Cackling Kamela, you’re attempting to hide information about Cackling Kamala that more and more Americans are becoming aware of. And no, let’s not remind you yet again that she’s been found out and revealed to be a worse plagarist than President Big Guy, Mr. Ten Percent. And almost as much a pathological serial liar about what she’s done while in public office.
Let’s remind you (and your good friend Jonathan) about her allegedly being qualified to be president because she was supposedly an incredibly good prosecutor.
No Dennis: she qualified under the Peter Principle in more than one way – in this way, she has continued failing up as a Democrat.
Harris took a job with the City of San Francisco after she resigned from the San Francisco district attorney’s office after her poorly organized coup to overthrow deputy attorney general Darrell Salomon failed.
Harris left the District Attorney’s office to work for city attorney Louise Renne, as a deputy attorney to run the Child Services Unit for the city in 2000. But Harris’ leadership skills in her new job were not that impressive either.
But as she spent her time in her new job plotting to challenge her old boss District Attorney Terrence Hallinan for his job, she was not taking her new job seriously.
By September 2002, Department of Human Services issued a performance review for the team that was less than favorable. On a scale of one to five, Harris only got a ‘2’ on whether she was ‘thorough, helpful, and proactive and only a three on whether she showed good judgement. Harris also got a ‘2’ rating for recognizing deadlines, fast turnaround, and anticipating their needs. Even more embarrassing was her failure to return phone calls and emails promptly.
Harris’ performance review is one more example of how she offered only average or even poor leadership in her position after running a successful campaign to achieve it.
Harris was appointed to two high-paying part-time state board positions while she was in a sexual relationship with then-state assembly Speaker Willie Brown, but was frequently absent for the meetings, even though they were only held once or twice a month. After campaigning and beating Hallinan in 2003 for the job of district attorney, conviction rates fell on her watch followed by a scandal in the the crime lab that prompted her to dismiss over a thousand cases.
As vice president, Harris is now running for president on her record of service as a prosecutor, her record as a prosecutor.
You can’t lie often and hard enough to hide her sufficiently up to election day, Dennis:
As is typical you are clueless.
The judge erred and acted outside the law and the constitution.
It is his duty to determine if the rule was unlawful or unconstitutional under GA law.
It was neither.
The judges opinions about the rule its necessity or how it would work are irrelevant – he is not a member of the legislature, or the election board.
With respect to certification – McBurney is correctish. “Shall” in this context mean that if the commissioner is going to certify she must do so by the deadline. The law and constitution can not require her to certify and election unless the election was properly conducted.
Adam’s MUST certify by the deadline OR not at all. That is all that SHALL in this law can legally mean.
I would note that YOUR argument – and McBurney’s misread of the law is ludicrously stupid.
You are litterally saying that even if the election is rife with obvious Fraud that Adam’s is required by law to certify it.
Are you really that stupid ?
Adam’s is obligated to do everything in her power to be able to certify that the election was conducted properly by the deadline and certify it.
If she is going to certify, she MUST do so by the deadline. After that she no longer has the power to certify.
I would note – we get these stupid arguments from left wing nuts all the time.
When the constitution or the law gives someone a duty to perform a task – that duty is NOT pro forma.
That btw is a fundimental principle of law.
If Adams was obligated to certify NO MATER WHAT – if here role was “pro forma” or cerimonial, the law would just specify that the election is automatically certified on a specific date.
The law and consgtitution can not delegate a power to someone, and concurrently tell them exactly what decision they must make.
It can only specify deadlines.
The Shall language in this law is a deadline after which the election commissioners no longer have the authority to certify.
Dennis – while both of McBurney’s decisions were WRONG – and numerous judges in other counties and states have found the opposite – because that is the correct reading of the law, and McBurney will with certainty be overruled – if the commissioners decide to appeal.
At the same time – this is NOT a major decision.
McBurney has made election fraud a little bit easier in Fulton County, That is all.
He has removed two smaller checks against election fraud.
He should not have done that – it is not his job and it is outside the scope of judicial powers.
But absent large scale fraud that is not caught another way – it will not matter.
Most of the new laws and rules precluding fraud in GA are in effect.
Most of the idiotic changes in 2020 are gone – in GA and elsewhere.
Further Poll watchers KNOW what they are looking for.
If Democrats attempt the same kind of election fraud in 2024 as in 2020 – they will be caught and it will be spectacularly public.
Further RCP has Trump up by 1% in GA – most polls have him up 3-5.
The likely Fraud in GA in 2020 was under 200K that scale of fraud is not possible in GA in 2024.
Trump will win GA by more than 200K votes.
Fraud beyond about 1/2percent in a large election is incredibly hard to get away with even without laws to prevent fraud.
She has a point. Who is Obama to be telling Black men what to do? Does he think he’s their master like in old slave days?
https://x.com/CitizenFreePres/status/1846589478346895382
Obama wouldn’t make a pimple on a solid brothers azz, except for Diddy maybe and he likes the freakyfreaky…
Obama lives rent free in you numb skkkul.
Perhaps, I despise all Marxists but my hopes are that it is he that will be living rent free in Leavenworth or GITMO after Trump takes the Presidency and the conspiracy is revealed.
Wally, given that Trump has been living rent free since 2016 in that head of yours that is empty of everything else other (than your two brain cells that have each other in a stranglehold), normally you should be accepted as an expert on cranial occupation.
However, as far as your hero The Mad Magical Marxist Mulatto Clown goes, he pretty much gets the same treatment that you do, for the very same reasons.
That is, he is mocked, jeered, reviled for his sophomoric lies, and generally held in contempt again as he was when he briefly left his life of White Privilege to run for office as a po’ black chil’ from da’ Hood.
And now that he’s re-adopted his life of commie White Privilege in his mansions among The White Rich Who Don’t Pay Their Fair Share in Martha’s Vineyard and Hawaii, our ridicule of him is now joined by “the brothers” who now also reject him as a phony as he attempts to shame them into being racists like himself: vote for the candidate that has the same skin color.
Bolshevik Barack must think “the brothers” must be morons like Wally if he thinks they’re going to believe that Cackles Harris grew up exactly like them, living in elegant university housing with two well paid tenured Ph.D professor parents and then moving to the wealthy area of Montreal to do her public shool years living there.
Wally, little Useful Idiot – it’s a long, LONG drive to find a black inner city ghetto anywhere near Montreal. Obama knows that – but he’s pretty sure you’re too stupid to realize that.
Well I mean, the party he represents did engage in a bit of slavery a while back.
Barack Obama is not African.
Kamala Harris is not African.
Obama is half American.
Harris is half Indian.
Both are all wrong.
______________________
“If you’re half right, you’re half wrong; if you’re half wrong, you’re all wrong.”
– Anonymous
In the oldest of “old slave days,” Africans created slavery in the New World.
African chiefs captured and sold Africans.
Arab slave traders globalized the market and created British slavery.
Africans are solely responsible for the slavery of Africans.
There is still a reasonably profitable slave trade taking place today globally, but for some strange reason the Democrat party doesn’t ever speak about that.
I wonder why?
“Oh I wish I was in the land of cotton…”
https://www.antislavery.org/slavery-today/modern-slavery/
Someone should apprise DJT of the lyrics to “YMCA” because he appears to be unaware of the fact that it is a GAY song:
Young man, there’s no need to feel down
I said, young man, pick yourself off the ground
I said, young man, ’cause you’re in a new town
There’s no need to be unhappy
Young man, there’s a place you can go
I said, young man, when you’re short on your dough
You can stay there and I’m sure you will find
Many ways to have a good time
It’s fun to stay at the Y.M.C.A.
It’s fun to stay at the Y.M.C.A.
They have everything
For young men to enjoy
You can hang out with all the boys
It’s fun to stay at the Y.M.C.A.
It’s fun to stay at the Y.M.C.A.
You can get yourself clean
You can have a good meal
You can do whatever you feel
Young man, are you listening to me?
I said, young man, what do you want to be?
I said, young man, you can make real your dreams
But you’ve got to know this one thing
No man, does it all by himself
I said, young man, put your pride on the shelf
And just go there, to the Y.M.C.A.
I’m sure they can help you today
It’s fun to stay at the Y.M.C.A.
It’s fun to stay at the Y.M.C.A.
They have everything for young men to enjoy
You can hang out with all the boys
It’s fun to stay at the Y.M.C.A.
It’s fun to stay at the Y.M.C.A.
You can get yourself clean
You can have a good meal
You can do whatever you feel
Young man, I was once in your shoes
I said, I was down and out with the blues
I felt, no man cared if I were alive
I felt the whole world was so jive
That’s when someone came up to me
And said, young man, take a walk up the street
There’s a place there called the Y.M.C.A.
They can’t stop you back on your way
It’s fun to stay at the Y.M.C.A.
It’s fun to stay at the Y.M.C.A.
They have everything
For young men to enjoy
You can hang out with all the boys
Y.M.C.A.
It’s fun to stay at the Y.M.C.A.
Young man, young man, there’s no need to feel down
Young man, young man, pick yourself off the ground
Y.M.C.A.
It’s fun to stay at the Y.M.C.A.
Young man, young man
Are you listening to me?
Young man, young man
What do you want to be?
Y.M.C.A.
You buy in at the
Y.M.C.A.
Young man, young man
Does it all by himself
Young man, young man
Put your pride on the shelf
Y.M.C.A.
And just go to the
Y.M.C.A
Young man, young man, I was once in your shoes
Young man, young man, I was down with blues
Y.M.C.A
Songwriters: Jacques Morali, Henri Belolo, Victor Edward Willis
For non-commercial use only.
Trump has never been against gays, in fact one of the very first public statements he made, despite irritating many in his base, was that he had no problem with unisex bathrooms being legalized on a “state by state” basis.
“As President Trump has clearly stated, he believes policy regarding transgender bathrooms should be decided at the state level,” the White House said in a statement. “The joint decision made today by the Department of Justice and the Department of Education … paves the way for an open and inclusive process to take place at the local level with input from parents, students, teachers and administrators.”
https://www.cnn.com/2017/02/23/health/transgender-bathrooms-trump-q-and-a/index.html
“Phil Kazmierczak, a gay real estate agent in Virginia who said he’s “100 percent on board” with the president, blames Democrats for fixating on identity politics.”
“They force you to believe, with the help of liberal media bias, that you are no more than your sexuality or your gender or your race,” Kazmierczak said in an email. “They want you to believe that someone is constantly coming for your rights. If you’re gay, specifically, Democrat propaganda states that the Republicans are going to take away your rights.”
“Kazmierczak called Trump a “staunch supporter of gay people and their rights,” but he said he makes a distinction when it comes to religious groups.”
https://www.nbcnews.com/feature/nbc-out/trump-pride-gay-republicans-why-they-re-backing-president-n1243469
As Lawrence O’Donnell pointed out, Trump probably heard “YMCA” at some disco when he was a “swinging bachelor” in the NYC club scene, so it’s on his Spotify play list. MAGA and Christian Nationalists, to whom Trump pitches his lies and empty promises, are very anti-LGBTQ. When did Trump ever say or do anything indicating “staunch support” for LGBTQ people and their rights? In fact, Project 2025 specifically calls for abolishing protections for LGBTQ Americans, and was written by several former members of his administration. Project 2025 is described as the playbook for the next Republican President. From “Buzz Feed News”, dateline 6/30/2018:
“When Donald Trump ran for president, he pledged he would be an LGBT ally, even carrying an “LGBTs for Trump” rainbow pride flag at a rally in 2016. Shortly after he reached the Oval Office, the White House announced, “President Trump continues to be respectful and supportive of LGBTQ rights.”
It hasn’t worked out that way.
This is now the second year Trump has gone without acknowledging LGBT Pride Month. But more critically, Trump and his administration have aggressively rolled back and fought against LGBT rights.
For the end of Pride Month, BuzzFeed News has compiled a list, based on our reporting from the past 17 months, of those anti-LGBT efforts. They include:
1. Saying it’s legal to fire workers for being transgender.
Last October, Attorney General Jeff Sessions reversed a federal policy that said transgender workers were protected from discrimination under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. This new position runs contrary to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission — a federal agency — and numerous federal courts, which have found Title VII does protect transgender workers. For example, the 6th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in March that Title VII protects transgender workers even if the employer raises a religious objection.
2. Arguing that it’s legal to fire workers for being gay.
The Justice Department made an unexpected move last July when it stepped into in a major federal lawsuit to argue the Civil Rights Act of 1964 doesn’t protect gay workers from discrimination. The Trump administration’s filing was unusual in part because the Justice Department wasn’t a party in the case, and the department doesn’t typically weigh in on private employment lawsuits. Further, the Justice Department was fighting against a separate, autonomous federal agency that had supported a gay man’s case. The court ruled in favor of LGBT rights, but the Trump administration hasn’t reversed its stance that it’s legal under federal law to fire employees for being gay.
3. Making transgender female prisoners live with male prisoners.
The Bureau of Prisons rolled back rules May 11 that had allowed transgender inmates to use facilities, including cellblocks and bathrooms, that match their gender identity. The Trump administration was reversing course on an Obama administration effort to protect transgender prisoners from sexual abuse and assault. Federal officials now “will use biological sex” to determine the type of housing transgender inmates are assigned, resulting in conditions that increase the likelihood of rape for transgender women. The administration won’t explain how they will determine who is transgender and who isn’t.
4. Telling the Supreme Court that shopkeepers can turn away LGBT customers.
In a surprise move last September, the Trump administration supported a Christian bakery owner in Colorado who refused to make a cake for a gay couple’s wedding. The Justice Department filed a brief at the Supreme Court that argued the baker’s religious convictions allow him to sidestep Colorado law, which bans businesses from anti-LGBT discrimination. US Solicitor General Noel Francisco also took up argument time at the Supreme Court’s oral hearing in December to support the baker, even though the federal government wasn’t a party to the case.
5. Withdrawing protections for transgender students.
Weeks after taking office, the Trump administration withdrew guidance that said Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972 bans anti-transgender discrimination in federally funded schools. That Obama-era policy had said transgender students must be treated in accordance with their gender identity in classes, sports, and school facilities. As such, it instructed schools to give transgender students access to gender-appropriate restrooms and locker rooms.
6. Refusing to investigate anti-transgender discrimination complaints in public schools.
In April 2018, the Education Department told BuzzFeed News that it wasn’t investigating or taking action on any complaints filed by transgender students banned from restrooms that match their gender identity. Up to that point, Trump administration officials had simply said they were still considering the whether Title IX covered transgender students. Officials did not answer questions about how the department reconciles its new position with circuit court rulings that conflict with their position. The Education Department also hasn’t said why it won’t accept complaints arising from students inside those circuits (which encompass Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Michigan, Ohio, Tennessee, and Wisconsin).
7. Trying to kick transgender people out of the military.
In July 2017, Trump announced he would ban transgender people from serving in the military in any capacity, thereby reversing a policy created under the Obama administration. He claimed he had consulted “[his] generals” and determined that transgender people would harm troop readiness. But his top general wasn’t consulted, and federal courts found no evidence to support the president’s claims. One judge called the president’s claims “capricious, arbitrary, and unqualified,” and added they were “shocking.” Four courts blocked his ban, but the Justice Department is still fighting to enact it and the Pentagon has issued recommendations on how to fully implement the policy.
8. Issuing a religious liberty policy.
Attorney General Sessions instructed federal agencies and attorneys in October to protect religious liberty in a broad, yet vague, guidance memo that critics fear could give people of faith — including government workers and contractors — a loophole to ignore federal bans on discrimination against women and LGBT people. The memo says officials should construe the Constitution and existing federal law in favor of religious rights. Sessions was asked by Congress in October if the guidance would allow federal employees and federal contractors to discriminate against LGBT people, but Sessions refused to answer.
9. Starting to rescind protections for transgender patients.
After a US District Court judge in Northern Texas blocked the Obama administration’s protections for transgender patients and women seeking abortions, the Trump administration stopped defending the rules. The Department of Health and Human Services rewrote the policy, which is currently pending at the Office of Management and Budget.
10. Declining to appoint an LGBT liaison for the White House.
Trump doesn’t have an LGBT liaison at the White House, a position that previously served under president Barack Obama as a conduit between the executive branch and organizations — and individuals — when decisions were made on LGBT policies. The last White House LGBT liaison under Obama had said she was afraid this would happen.
11. Protecting health care workers who don’t help transgender patients.
The Department of Health and Human Services’ Office of Civil Rights created a division in January to protect health workers with moral or religious objections to performing certain procedures, including abortions or sex-reassignment surgery for transgender patients.
12. Dropping its lawsuit against North Carolina’s anti-transgender law.
The Department of Justice dropped a lawsuit, which began under former president Obama, that challenged a North Carolina law that restricted transgender people’s use of bathrooms. The move last year came weeks after North Carolina lawmakers repealed part of the state’s anti-transgender law and replaced it with a different anti-LGBT law. Transgender people sued the state again, this time, without the Justice Department’s assistance.
13. Retracting plans to count LGBT people in the Census.
Last year, the Trump administration retracted a proposal to collect demographic information on LGBT people in the 2020 Census. Critics say that not asking citizens about their sexual orientation and gender identity — like other characteristics — undermines the government’s ability to craft policies that serve LGBT people’s health, safety, and other needs. The Department of Health and Human Services, meanwhile, has also said that a survey of older Americans would no longer collect information on LGBT people.”
Trump is clueless that “YMCA” is about cruising and hooking up in the male gay community, and, apparently, so is the MAGA crowd and especially the Christian Nationalists. The song is very catchy and even has its own arm movements spelling out “YMCA”, so it is often played at half-time at sporting events. It’s hilarious that some radical right-wing Christian schools used to play Queen’s “We Are The Champions” to encourage their sports teams before they became aware that the song was performed by Freddy Mercury, who was very flamboyantly gay. It’s the same thing with “YMCA”. Trump is bigoted, misogynistic, and anti-LGBTQ. And, please, stop calling that convicted criminal “President” — we have only ONE President, and he is Joe Biden, who beat Trump. Trump forfeited any claim to an honorific title when he began spreading the Big Lie and started the insurrection based on that lie.
Gigi: Please read Sam’s response this morning, providing a direct quote from Victor Willis, the writer of the song “YMCA,” who says that the song is NOT about gays, or their “hooking up,” and that he is not gay. Maybe you know a little more about that song than the writer does?
A little truth goes a long way against simple minds who believe Wiki, Google, and any other website that comports with what they WANT things to say or mean, n’est ce pas?
Willis is only one of 3 of the writers. Because if the current attacks on LGBTQ and the intention of Project 2025 to abolish all legal protections for LGBTQ people, and Trump’s utter stupidity and lack of awareness of how the song has always been perceived while he does his pathetic dancing, I’m not surprised that Willis would deny the obvious meaning. EVERYONE in the music industry AGREES that “YMCA” is and has always been about gay cruising and hookups. How do you explain lines like: “you can do whatever you feel”; “You can stay there and I’m sure you will find many ways to have a good time”; “They have everything for young men to enjoy; You can hang out with all the boys”. If the lyrics weren’t enough to convince you, then maybe the videos showing the Village People would make a dent in your perception. Look up the videos on line–you have obviously gay dancers in various costumes, showing of their physique and body hair–all of which would appeal to gay men.
And, lin, you don’t look sophisticated when you try to throw out French phrases–just ask Veda Pierce– especially when you accuse others of having a “simple mind”.
Who is your favorite member of the Village People–the lead singer, posing as a motorcycle cop with handcuffs dangling above his package, well-outlined in his skin-tight pants, or the Native American? How about the cowboy with the short-sleeved shirt showing off his muscles, or the Army guy? My fav is the guy dressed all in leather with lots of chains, with the heavy chest and body hair and a thick mustache. None of them looks like they are at the YMCA to play basketball. The song promises that “they have everything for a young man to enjoy” and “many ways to have a good time”. And, BTW, the song speaks to “staying” at the YMCA to “hang out with all the boys”–not going there to play basketball.
No, wrong. You are including the other guy who wrote the music, not the lyrics.
“However, the song’s lyricist [Willis] stated that “YMCA was not written to be a gay song because of the simple fact I’m not gay. I wrote it about hanging out in urban neighborhoods in my youth”.
https://recording-history.org/the-meaning-of-y-m-c-a-song-by-village-people/
“hanging out” by neighborhood kids to play basketball is one thing–but they wouldn’t STAY at the YMCA–the song tells a “young man” that it’s “FUN to STAY at the YMCA”. If you lived in the neighborhood, you already had a place to stay. In this era of culture wars, if I had written the song, I’d claim it wasn’t about being gay, cruising or hooking up, because you MAGAs are dangerous and believe lies–some of you even threatened FEMA workers who were just there to help. Look at the video–it’s online–and then tell me it’s not about gay men cruising and hooking up.
From the website “Beat Craze”:
“Is “YMCA” considered a gay anthem?
Yes, “YMCA” is often regarded as a gay anthem. The song’s release coincided with the LGBTQ+ liberation movement, and its lyrics became a source of empowerment and celebration for many in the community.”
BTW: The Village People also perform the song “Macho Man”.
Here’s an excerpt from your link:
“The band name itself was a nod to gay culture, being inspired by the predominantly gay New York City neighborhood, Greenwich Village.
The lyrics of “Y.M.C.A.” are open to interpretation, leading to various theories about its meaning. One prevalent interpretation is that the song is an anthem for the gay community, although the band members themselves have stated that the song was intended to fit anyone’s lifestyle.”
gigs, gay people are ALWAYS trying to read into lyrics and messages to validate themselves. You sound very gay. That’s OK with me, but stop making up stuff. Willis is the lyricist. Do you know what that word means, gigi?
And gigs, you don’t look sophisticated when you foul-mouth Trump and “MAGATs.” You look simple-minded.
BUT.. I’m not wrong. “YMCA” has always been viewed as a gay empowerment song about directing a “young man” to the YMCA as a safe place to explore his interest in homosexuality–hence the lyrics: “Young man, young man, there’s no need to feel down; Young man, young man, pick yourself off the ground; Young man, young man–Are you listening to me?- What do you want to be? Young man, young man; Does it all by himself; Young man, young man; Put your pride on the shelf; And just go to the Y.M.C.A; Young man, young man, I was once in your shoes; Young man, young man, I was down with blues.” None of these lyrics is about playing basketball or other sports.
The entire purpose of my post was to point out the utter hypocrisy and ignorance of Trump, supported by Christian Nationalists who have an anti-LGBTQ agenda specifically set out in Project 2025, but who plays and awkwardly dances around to the gay anthem, totally unaware of the meaning that most people attribute to the song. AND, since most of us “get it” and don’t care because most of us aren’t anti-LGBTQ–“YMCA” is popular at sporting events all of these decades after it was released, like baseball and basketball games. At the local baseball stadium where I live, there’s a guy who stands on the roof of one of the dugots and directs the fans with the arm movements. We love it. Have you ever been to a gay pride parade? I have. It’s lot’s of fun–no hate–no prejudice involved.
And, you don’t have to take my word for it–just look on the internet for the various sources that EXPLAIN the lyrics and WHY “YMCA” is considered a “gay anthem”.
It is a stupid left wing nut trope that Trump specifically and Republicans generally are anti LGBTQ+
20 years ago when I was fighting for the equal rights of homosexuals – nearly everyone – including Obama, Biden, Clinton and Harris were against them.
The fight over equal rights for Homosexuals had been going on for my entire lifetime.
People were arrested for being Gay and the vast majority of people supported that. The president of the local state college resigned and nearly went to jail when he was outed as gay.
And suddenly in a few years everything changed. Republicans were a few microseconds behind democrats in that change.
even Evangelicals have made peace with the change.
But the left was not satisfied with equal rights – they wanted revenge and worse still they wanted the one thing that the fight for equal rights had promised would NOT happen – the sexual grooming of children.
Boycott Master Cake if you like – but do not be so stupid as to FORCE people who still think that homosexuality is a sin to publicly disavow their own beliefs. Do not FORCE people who do not agree with you to make web sites and wedding cakes celebrating your values.
Do not put men into women’s sports.
Build all the new unisex bathrooms you want. Do not put high school girls into gang showers with boys.
As I noted in another post – MOSTLY people do not give a schiff what purple haired 20 something with a teaching certificate and zero experience in the real world many of whom are still virgins, and are clueless about kids, tell 5yr olds at drag Queen Story hour.
The REAL concern is that if you allow adult teachers to converse about sex with children just about every pedophile in the world will become a teacher overnight.
Have you heard of the priesthood ?
Have you heard of the Boyscouts ?
In my very conservative HS 50 years ago there were deep in the closet gay teachers sleeping with 13yr olds. There were also married straight teachers sleeping with 13 yr olds.
We have a massive problem with the sexual abuse of children – very young children, older children, Children in HS.
While there is no evidence this has anything to do with homosexuality or Transgenderism,
We Absolutely KNOW that pedophiles actively seek positions of trust that involve working with children
Add to that a mandate to address sexual issues with those children and it is happy hunting for Pedophiles.
The problem with the left is that they beleive that good intentions are an excuse for bad policies.
Humans are driven by INCENTIVES not intentions.
There is no end to the list of policies with good intentions that have failed spectacularly because they failed to understand the incentives they created.
Out side of left wing nutjobs Trump has excellent relations with Gay people – he appointed the first openly Gay ambassador, and the first openly gay cabinet member.
Trump has been openly supportive of Gay Rights and Tran rights.
Trump has been VOCALLY OPPOSED to bad policies driven by good intentions.
Curtis Bashaw, a distinguished and successful hotelier from Cape May, is running as a Republican in NJ for the Hernandez US Senate seat. Bashaw is gay, has a spouse he calls his “husband”, and firmly supports the candidacy of Donald Trump for President.
“’YMCA’ [. . .] is a GAY song”
Except for the fact that it isn’t:
“Y.M.C.A. was not written to be a gay song because of the simple fact I’m not gay. I wrote it about hanging out in urban neighborhoods in my youth. ‘You can hang out with all the boys’ was a term about me and my friends playing basketball at the Y.” (Victor Willis — the man who wrote the song)
Leave it to the Left to propagandize and politicize everything.
Look at the videos–LOOK AT THEM. There are many online. THEN tell me what message is being conveyed.
Look at gigi’s comments and responses. LOOK AT THEM. There are many over the weeks and months. THEN tell me that she is not a hateful, rude, lying and ridiculous poster.
How does pointing out that the video that goes with “YMCA” makes me “hateful, rude, lying (and) ridiculous”. The point of my post is that your hero is totally unaware of the gayness to “YMCA”. The video says it all. You are a perfect example of the damage Trump has done to this country–hateful attacks against anyone with whom you disagree–name-calling–verbal abuse and endless lying. From the website “Song Facts”:
“Y.M.C.A. stands for “Young Men’s Christian Association,” commonly associated with the gyms that often provide temporary housing to men. The Village People sing about the YMCA as a place where you can hang out with all the boys. It’s implied that this is more of a concealed kind of place to gather in-the-closet gay young men so they can leave their worries and troubles behind and let loose. While the lyrics don’t contain any specific gay references, the song became a gay anthem.”
hey gigs, would you like us to post all your past comments (they are archived) which are “hateful attacks against anyone with whom you disagree–name-calling–verbal abuse and endless lying?” Your mouth would easily fit in with those husky hairy guys at the Y that you idolize. As Meghan McCain said the other day (taunting Kamala that she would release what her father REALLY said about her) “don’t tempt [us].”
that shut her up!
For phucks sake, who cares?! Slavery is as old as mankind and it wasn’t just for blacks. Why are we still talking about this?
If for no other reasons:
(1), Slavery is still taking place throughout the world and closer to home our own government doesn’t seem the slightest bit interested after completely losing track of over 30K children somewhere in this country undoubtedly being used as either illegal child labor or illegal sex exploitation, after our tax money was used to ferry them illegally across our border.
https://abcnews.go.com/US/dhs-watchdog-warns-urgent-issue-after-immigration-officials/story?id=112964072
(2), Our appointed Presidential wannabe Harris and many others, wants to spend your tax money on reparations for slavery that took place 160 years ago (not yet having figured out what to do with African Americans like say, Musk)…
(3), Because the party that the black minority populace is so steadfast loyal to is the same party that enslaved them 160 years ago, fought against their citizen rights, and voting rights, and equal opportunity rights, to name just a few, and the irony of all that is just too much to ignore.
We’re all slaves now
Do you pay to live in your own home that you own free and clear?
Do you pay to own and run a business?
Does your master take .25 out of every dollar you earn?
Does your master tell you how to vote?
Does your master tell you what kind of lite bulbs to use, what kind of car to drive?
Freedom?
All Hail Plankton