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Category Archives: American Domestic Affairs

VladimirPutin #ParanoidMalignantNarcissist

16 Friday Feb 2024

Posted by commart in 21st Century Feudal, 21st Century Modern, American Domestic Affairs, Conflict - Culture - Language - Psychology, Europe, North America, Political Psychology, Russia, Ukraine, United States of America

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

Democracy v. Dictatorship, malignant narcissism, Medieval v. Modern, political psychology, Putin, Russian aggression, Russian Invades Ukraine, Russian invasion of Ukraine, Trump, TrumpPutin

On Elon Musk’s X platform, all Xpression may as well be flushed down the digital river of tweeted communications: the appearance is brief and the flood mighty.

Countermeasure: copy-paste and blog the message as well.

Prompt: Vladimir Putin’s laughable statement: “We did not initiate this war [in Ukraine]. Rather, we are striving to end it.”

Vladimir Putin using Viktor Yanukovych as his lackey had sorely abused Ukrainian business with time-honored mafia methods, i.e., plain skimming theft in the end:

https://www.occrp.org/en/yanukovychleaks-national-project/; https://www.occrp.org/uk/yanukovychleaks-national-project/.

A popular turn toward Europe against the will of the Kremlin’s puppet and a related “Revolution of Dignity” ensued.

Euromaidan2014.

#RussianInvades #Crimea #Donetsk – https://euromaidanpress.com/2014/12/07/fsb-colonel-girkin-tells-details-of-how-russia-invaded-ukraine-in-twice-censored-interview/; https://www.brookings.edu/articles/watch-out-for-little-green-men/.

#Putin & #RussianNazis #RusNazis spread chaos, degradation, deprivation, and desperation worldwide, and then cover their crimes with lies, specifically baseless accusations, deflections, denials, erasures of collective memory, fabrications, and omissions of facts.

Regarding #EvilMirroring and #Narcissism: https://conflict-backchannels.com/2023/06/28/a-dark-mirror-in-language/.

#DarkMirrorInLanguage #MalignantNarcissism #MedievalVModern #PhantomOfTheSoviet #PoliticalPsychology #TrumpPutin


Thematically Related

#TrumpPutin’s shared basic psychology: Malignant Narcissism and Process. The lies told by both represent the “Covering” of deeply seated humiliation (“Narcissistic Mortification”) and the fear of its repeat. The psyche creates an alternative undamaged courageous-heroic self, and that becomes the leader’s principle project both in its assertion and its defense (in the psychology, “Splitting” or, together, “Covering/Splitting”). Complementary observation, term, or trope: “delusional, grandiose, messianic ideation absent of normal boundaries or limits, i.e., the parameters of conscience” (so I quote myself). The end of the process for the Russian dictator and the American wanna-be dictator: “Unlimited Narcissistic Supply”, i.e., the validating infinite love of millions without end in sight.

Putin rose to power on a false-flag operation, the “Moscow Apartment Bombings” (also reference David Satter’s “The Unsolved Mystery Behind the Act of Terror That Brought Putin to Power”, National Review, August 17, 2016 or on this blog “Reference: Journalist, Alexander Zhilin, Operation Storm in Moscow AKA Moscow Apartment Bombings” – May 3, 2023 ); Trump, by contrast, appears to have run fairly for 2016 but then attempted to rig the 2020 election with the Big Lie that it had been stolen while he, in fact, he had lined up fraudulent election ballots to steal it for himself–he had hoped to order Mike Pence to interrupt the count, have authentic ballots replaced, and then reclaim power with the now apparent intent to functionally disestablish America’s democracy as well as the NATO security umbrella against the rapacious and politically absolute enemies of freedom.

–33–

#AmericanTraitor #DonaldJohnTrump

14 Wednesday Feb 2024

Posted by commart in 21st Century Feudal, 21st Century Modern, American Domestic Affairs, Conflict - Culture - Language - Psychology, Epistemology, Europe, Extreme Brown vs Red-Green, North America, United States of America

≈ 3 Comments

Tags

14th-amendment, 2020 Election Denial, American Fascist Reactionary Putsch, American Traitor, DJT, Donald John Trump, Donald Trump, Jan6, news, politics, Trump, Trumpolini, TrumpPutin

After years of blogging defined by “collect, select, and opine”, I have found with the national and global obsessions with “#FeloniousTrump” (“#4FelonyCases91Counts”)–so I frequently refer to him on Elon Musk’s X post-Twitter platform–a certain saturation. I have tired of Donald John Trump’s image and voice, his skewed anti-democratic American political stances, his now infamously malign and surreal (delusional, grandiose, messianic) narcissistic psychology, his paranoia and related lies and lying, and the uncritical and other than Christian self-righteous viciousness of his fan base. 

I have seen enough as well of the Hitler-Stalin Trump-Puntin (#TrumpPutin) dance and related intents, and would wish not only fellow Americans but Europeans and others free of them and all similar political criminals and elevated crackpots. 

Instead of writing (much), I’ve chosen to produce a page of reference with two of Liz Cheney’s YouTube videos at the base. Before one reaches them: excerpts form suggested reference.

Motivation

Donald Trump has failed perhaps more than his share of bank loans and debts, and he has had to deal with a rough world, one often lawless beyond his own reach. The pressures must get “up there” with always incessant needs for cash. Well, he found his cash, and much of it in concentration.

Trump’s Business and Banking Failures; Trump Rescued by Russian Money; Trump’s Russian Real Estate Entanglements; Trump’s Malignant Narcissism.

Moscow is in Russia; Little Moscow: Miami Beach, Florida.

Malice Aforethought: Trump’s Fake Electors Scheme

https://www.cnn.com/2023/12/28/politics/recordings-trump-team-fake-elector-ballots/index.html; https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/oct/22/trump-fake-elector-scheme-case-tracker; https://apnews.com/article/trump-georgia-electors-205d1fc6a02e1225c8c51214980a1232; https://apnews.com/article/donald-trump-jan-6-investigation-fake-electors-608932d4771f6e2e3c5efb3fdcd8fcce; https://www.nytimes.com/2022/07/27/us/politics/fake-electors-explained-trump-jan-6.html. Addendum: https://www.msnbc.com/opinion/msnbc-opinion/trump-supreme-court-immunity-arizona-fake-electors-rcna149359.

Malice Aforethought: Trump Compromises Capitol Defense for January 6, 2021

https://www.businessinsider.com/pentagon-hindered-dc-national-guard-response-to-insurrection-attempt-report-2021-1; https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/senate-report-details-sweeping-failures-around-jan-6-attack; https://www.nytimes.com/2021/06/08/us/politics/capitol-riot-security.html; https://www.npr.org/2021/01/15/956842958/what-we-know-so-far-a-timeline-of-security-at-the-capitol-on-january-6; https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/january-6-senate-investigation/2021/06/08/a8cc5b1e-c7d4-11eb-81b1-34796c7393af_story.html; https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/january-6-senate-investigation/2021/06/08/a8cc5b1e-c7d4-11eb-81b1-34796c7393af_story.html; https://apnews.com/article/capitol-riots-hearing-security-officials-a9ecf8efd4d76f02d5ab9c7a01c5bdb1;

Trumpolini #Jan6

https://www.reuters.com/world/us/us-capitol-probes-season-finale-focus-trump-supporters-three-hour-rage-2022-07-21; https://www.cnn.com/2024/02/08/politics/fact-check-trump-january-6/index.html; https://abcnews.go.com/US/special-counsel-probe-uncovers-new-details-trumps-inaction/story?id=106131854; https://ny1.com/nyc/all-boroughs/news/2023/09/17/trump-refuses-to-say-what-he-did-during-the-jan–6-attack-unfolded-at-the-u-s–capitol; https://www.aljazeera.com/news/liveblog/2022/7/21/jan-6-live-news-panel-to-examine-trumps-conduct-during-riots; https://time.com/6199490/trump-jan-6-oath-dereliction-duty/; https://www.courthousenews.com/jan-6-hearing-to-focus-on-trumps-inaction-during-capitol-riot/; https://apnews.com/article/capitol-siege-panel-hearing-3e3dc618ed8cee37147cf6a792c0c0fa; https://www.nytimes.com/2022/07/21/us/politics/trump-jan-6.html; https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/trump-lit-that-fire-of-capitol-insurrection-jan-6-committee-report-says; https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-64071723; https://www.voanews.com/a/final-report-on-jan-6-attack-points-finger-at-trump-/6888552.html; https://www.politico.com/news/2022/07/21/jan-6-panel-trump-attack-00047130.

2020 Election Affirmation

https://www.usatoday.com/in-depth/news/politics/elections/2021/01/06/trumps-failed-efforts-overturn-election-numbers/4130307001; https://www.cnn.com/2020/12/14/politics/2020-election-electoral-college-vote/index.html; https://www.npr.org/sections/live-updates-2020-election-results/2020/11/19/936647882/georgia-releases-hand-recount-results-affirming-bidens-lead; https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/14/us/politics/biden-electoral-college.html; https://www.michigan.gov/sos/resources/news/2021/02/12/statewide-election-audit-process-affirms-presidential-election-outcome; https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/maricopa-county-election-cyber-ninjas-fraud-trump-senate/2022/01/05/9bc64ace-6e50-11ec-aaa8-35d1865a6977_story.html; https://madison.com/news/state-regional/government-politics/wisconsin-fake-electors-settlement/article_69073b5a-9452-11ee-a516-37d30bea32bc.html; etc.

2020 Election Denial

For former President of the United States Trump: https://apnews.com/article/trump-2020-election-lies-debunked-4fc26546b07962fdbf9d66e739fbb50d; https://www.reuters.com/world/us/who-allegedly-conspired-with-trump-overturn-2020-election-2023-08-02/; https://www.nytimes.com/2023/08/17/us/politics/trump-election-lies-fact-check.html; https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/trump-repeats-false-election-fraud-claims-during-speech-in-washington; https://www.cnbc.com/2020/11/07/trump-refuses-to-accept-election-results-says-it-is-far-from-over.html;

For present Speaker of the House Mike Johnson: https://apnews.com/article/congress-house-speaker-2024-election-certification-8cd7c5a9e6ae69635bbb4624cc78e5c5; https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/oct/25/mike-johnson-trump-january-6-democracy-threat-election-denier; https://www.politico.com/news/2024/01/07/johnson-election-denier-nonsense-biden-2020-election-00134184; https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/watch-trump-who-denied-2020-election-loss-announces-new-white-house-run;


As a bipartisan effort, the report does not delve into the root causes of the attack, including Trump’s role as he called for his supporters to “fight like hell” to overturn his election defeat that day. It does not call the attack an insurrection, even though it was. And it comes two weeks after Republicans blocked a bipartisan, independent commission that would investigate the insurrection more broadly.

“This report is important in the fact that it allows us to make some immediate improvements to the security situation here in the Capitol,” said Michigan Sen. Gary Peters, the chairman of the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, which conducted the probe along with the Senate Rules Committee. “But it does not answer some of the bigger questions that we need to face, quite frankly, as a country and as a democracy.”

https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/senate-report-details-sweeping-failures-around-jan-6-attack


But the DHS and the FBI do not create an intelligence report focused specifically on the upcoming pro-Trump rally. That’s important because these reports go beyond raw intelligence — they validate information and put it into context that would help local law enforcement develop a plan. These threat assessments or intelligence bulletins are typically written as a matter of course ahead of high-profile events. It’s not clear why this didn’t happen.

https://www.npr.org/2021/01/15/956842958/what-we-know-so-far-a-timeline-of-security-at-the-capitol-on-january-6


“There were significant, widespread and unacceptable breakdowns in the intelligence gathering. .?.?. The failure to adequately assess the threat of violence on that day contributed significantly to the breach of the Capitol,” Sen. Gary Peters (D-Mich.), chairman of the homeland security panel, told reporters. “The attack was, quite frankly, planned in plain sight.”

https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/january-6-senate-investigation/2021/06/08/a8cc5b1e-c7d4-11eb-81b1-34796c7393af_story.html


Sources said Scavino told Smith’s investigators that as the violence began to escalate that day, Trump “was just not interested” in doing more to stop it.

Sources also said former Trump aide Nick Luna told federal investigators that when Trump was informed that then-Vice President Mike Pence had to be rushed to a secure location, Trump responded, “So what?” — which sources said Luna saw as an unexpected willingness by Trump to let potential harm come to a longtime loyalist.

https://abcnews.go.com/US/special-counsel-probe-uncovers-new-details-trumps-inaction/story?id=106131854


As he pushed to overturn the election, Trump relied on a band of outside allies who undertook what federal prosecutors have called a “criminal scheme” to fraudulently overturn the 2020 results instead of relying on the advice of attorneys in the White House who urged him to accept his loss to Biden./Trump was asked in the interview why he didn’t listen to those lawyers.

“I didn’t respect them,” Trump said.

https://ny1.com/nyc/all-boroughs/news/2023/09/17/trump-refuses-to-say-what-he-did-during-the-jan–6-attack-unfolded-at-the-u-s–capitol


In public, he made more than 800 inaccurate claims about the election from the time the polls began closing on Nov. 3, 2020, to the end of his presidency, according to a database compiled by The Washington Post. Dozens of times, he simply characterized the election as “rigged,” “stolen” or “a hoax,” and flatly and falsely declared he had won — even as a mountain of evidence proved otherwise. Other falsehoods were more specific about the voting and ballot-counting process, contained unproven allegations and promoted conspiracy theories.

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/08/17/us/politics/trump-election-lies-fact-check.html


Also Related on BackChannels

https://conflict-backchannels.com/2017/02/02/united-states-of-america-basic-training/; https://conflict-backchannels.com/2024/01/19/gop-and-the-ridiculous-traitorous-mister-trump/.


On YouTube, July 27, 2021.

On YouTube July 12, 2022.


On YouTube November 11, 2020

Fourteenth Amendment Equal Protection and Other Rights

  Section 3 Disqualification from Holding Office

No person shall be a Senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice-President, or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any State, who, having previously taken an oath, as a member of Congress, or as an officer of the United States, or as a member of any State legislature, or as an executive or judicial officer of any State, to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof. But Congress may by a vote of two-thirds of each House, remove such disability.

https://constitution.congress.gov/browse/amendment-14/section-3/

Addendum-Additional Reference Online-From March 28, 2024 and Forward

Protess, Ben, Alan Feuer, Danny Hakim. “Catch Up on Where the Trump Investigations Stand.” The New York Times, March 20, 2024.



–33–

GOP and the Ridiculous Traitorous Mister Trump

19 Friday Jan 2024

Posted by commart in 21st Century Feudal, 21st Century Modern, American Domestic Affairs, Conflict - Culture - Language - Psychology, Epistemology, Extreme Brown vs Red-Green, Political Psychology, United States of America

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

American Traitor, American Traitors, DJT, Donald John Trump, Donald Trump, Fascism in America, The Traitorous Mister Trump

Donald John Trump may not think of himself as a cowardly and smarmy con man, felon, mafia chief, or traitor to his nation in light of his own delusional, grandiose, and messianic character and apparent absence of conscience. However, all indicators point back toward cooperation with Vladimir Putin in relation to seeing himself installed in power–with immunity from felony-level wrongdoing, no less–by an overwhelmingly White Christian American Nationalist Front that itself appears to have America’s Republican Party leveraged away from its traditional adult, civil, Constitutional, lawful, and responsible navigation.

When FBI arrested Russian mafia engaged in money laundering operations at Trump Tower, we, more or less Americans who read the news, gave him a pass.

When Trump covered for Putin in the now infamous “Helsinki Moment”, mainstream media and moderate cognizant and good Americans were shocked but then gave that moment two minutes of squawking before some other drama displaced it.

Here, copied verbatim, is what Trump said in that now hideous and signal moment:

***

all I can do is ask the question my people came to me dan coates came to me and some others they said they think it’s Russia I have president putin he just said it’s not russia i will say this i don’t see any reason why it would be I will tell you that President Putin was extremely strong and powerful in his denial today and what he did is an incredible offer he offered to have the people working on the case come and work with their investigators with respect to the people I think that’s an incredible offer

Guardian News. “Key moments from the Trump-Putin press conference.” Start: 0:0:07.  Transcript machine generated.  July 16, 2018.

***

And there Trump is, no different back then than he is today: inveigling, lying, infantilizing, pandering and far gone in the sordid business of trading country–and American law–for the lowest in the way of criminal, corrupt, and ruthless power.

And where has been the GOP in relation to Trump?

***

…Trump and company don’t simply want to “deconstruct the administrative state,” as Trump whisperer Steve Bannon famously said. They want to remake the state to concentrate political and economic power in the hands of themselves and their wealthy friends. That requires removing the checks on executive power that are embedded in the federal bureaucracy.

Basically, Trump wants to transform a system that already tilts dangerously in the direction of oligopoly into a full-blown patronage state along the lines of what Viktor Orbán has done in Hungary and Vladimir Putin has accomplished in Russia.

Feffer, John. ”What Will the World Look Like if Trump Wins?” Fair Observer, December 18, 2023

***

In X-speak, has #America tired of #FeloniousTrump #4FelonyCases91Counts?

Today, Americans know that Trump knew he had lost the 2020 election and with premeditation chose to lie to his base, which may now be considered either gullible or just plain traitorous and vicious, and then he drove a violent portion to insurrection in an attempted coup. Those whom Trump betrayed and inveigled in his madness should be especially angry with him.

Call him “Trumpolini” and hope America–the vast majority of Americans–will find the courage to defend their nation, its revolutionary Constitution and spirit, and be finished with him as well.

Related On BackChannels

Oppenheim, James S. “Mafia ‘Don’? Laundering the Authoritarian President’s Image.” BackChannels, September 7, 2018.

Oppenheim, James S. ”Trump and the Question of Insurrection.” BackChannels, January 9, 2021.

Oppenheim, James S. ”Trump’s Russian Collusion: No Delusion (Probably).” BackChannels, December 7, 2023.

Also Related Online

Cheney, Liz. Oath and Honor: A Memoir and a Warning. Little, Brown and Company, December 5, 2023..

Desjardins, Lisa. ”Key takeaways from the Jan. 6 committee report summary.” PBS. December 19, 2022.

Feffer, John. “Trump’s Dirty Money.” Foreign Policy in Focus, December 18, 2023.

Feffer, John. ”What Will the World Look Like if Trump Wins?” Fair Observer, December 18, 2023. 

“Final Report of the Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol.” PDF or Text. GovInfo, December 22, 2022.

Frum, David. “They Do It for Trump: Behind the GOP’s shifting excuses for abandoning Ukraine.” The Atlantic, December 18, 2023.

Gellman, Barton. “The Election That Could Break America.” The Atlantic. November 2020.

Hansen, Claire. ”To Russia, With Love: The GOP Divide on Putin and Ukraine.” U.S. News and World Report, April 11, 2023.

Harding, Luke. ”The Hidden History of Trump’s First Trip to Moscow.” Politico, November 19, 2017.

Houghtaling, Ellie Quinlan. ”Russia Celebrates Republicans Blocking Aid to Ukraine With a Missile Barrage.” The New Republic (TNR), December 8, 2023.

Illing, Sean. ”Trump’s ties to the Russian mafia go back 3 decades.” Vox, January 12, 2019.

Jeffries, Hakeem. ”Hakeem Jeffries singles out Republican ‘pro-Putin caucus’ opposing Ukraine aid.” The Guardian, December 13, 2023.

Kelly, Laura. ”Biden says GOP giving Putin ‘the greatest gift’ in stonewalling Ukraine funding.” The Hill. December 6, 2023.

Leonhardt, David. ”The G.O.P.s ‘Putin Wing’.” The New York Times, April 7, 2022.

Murphy, Chris. (U.S. Senator, D-Conn.). ”Murphy: The Republicans Lifting Up Putin Are the Same Ones Trying to Destroy Democracy.” February 17, 2023.

PBS. ”Mitch McConnell, standing apart in a shifting GOP), digs in on his decades-long push against Russia.” PBS, November 10, 2023.

Porter, Tom. ”Putin was gloating in public after Republican moves to block US aid for Ukraine.” Business Insider, December 14, 2023.

Sipher, John. ”Piling up incriminating information about Trump’s Russian connections.” The Washington Post, January 29, 2021.

Smith, David. ”‘The perfect target’: Russia cultivated Trump as asset for 40 years – ex-KGB spy.” The Guardian, January 29, 2021.

Unger, Craig. House of Trump, House of Putin: The Untold Story of Donald Trump and the Russian Mafia. New York: Dutton, 2018.

Unger, Craig. ”Trump’s businesses are full of dirty Russian money. The scandal is that it’s legal.” The Washington Post, March 29, 2019. 

Unger, Craig. “Trump’s Russian Laundromat.” The New Republic, July 13, 2017.

Will, George, F. ”Is the House GOP about to give Putin a pat on the back for his barbarism?” The Washington Post, November 3, 2023.

Winters, Michael Sean. ”The GOP does Putin’s bidding.” National Catholic Reporter, December 15, 2023.


Addendum to Reference

Cheney, Kyle. “Docs reveal new details of Trump lawyer’s fringe push to overturn 2020 election.” Politico, March 5, 2024.

Winer, Jonathan M. “Countering the Threat of a Contingent Election.” The Washington Spectator, February 23, 2024.



–Donald John Trump, American Traitor–

-33-

The Speaker Lies

14 Thursday Dec 2023

Posted by commart in 21st Century Feudal, 21st Century Modern, American Domestic Affairs, Conflict - Culture - Language - Psychology, North America, United States of America

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

Biden Impeachment, Criminal Speech, disingenuous speech, Donald Trump, GOP, Lies and Lying, Medieval v. Modern, Political Reactionaries, politics, Republican Party, Republican Sedition and Subversion, Speaker Mike Johnson


Later that same month, the subcommittee held a hearing aimed at promoting Missouri v. Biden, the lawsuit filed by Republican attorneys general in Missouri and Louisiana that challenged the Biden administration’s efforts to work with social media companies to control disinformation.

“The executive branch has undertaken a broad campaign to censor the American people,” Johnson declared. “That’s the headline. That’s the takeaway today.”

Roth, Zachary. ”How U.S. House Speaker Mike Johnson helped derail a fight against election lies.” Kansas Reflector, November 27, 2023.

While the Biden Administration’s program focused on integrity in the interest of the American People, Johnson and Republican attorneys general chose to hamper the effort in their own partisan interest, an interest that belies a lust for power unbridled by any interest in the bedrock that is truth x context x empirical observation x careful handling, sifting, and weighing of factual data x reasoning with good character and good sense — all of that to fool what they may presume to be their own sheep.

Call the sort of lie Speaker Mike Johnson uttered disingenuous speech or sophistry. Our “executive branch” encouraged honesty and integrity, but Johnson took it as a moment to call it censorship and thereby safeguard disinformation, chicanery, and fraud, which may to Johnson may rank among Christianity’s most fundamental and necessary virtues for they are not so useful to any sustained secular democratic republic. 

Johnson has also touted the Dominion Voting Machine Hoax, i.e., that America’s voting machines were built in Venezuela and rigged against Trump (Trump has another relationship involved with Venezuela, and it’s not rigged against him).

Regarding the baseless assertion that the 2020 national election had been rigged or made fraudulent in some way, Trump lawsuits launched the courts into 62 investigations of the allegation, and all but one were found against Trump–and the one turned out trivial and far from changing the election.

Not all politicians lie so brazenly to their constituencies–and for the privileges of power itself, no less. Today’s Grand Old Party has stained itself with its abandonment of the Constitution, honor worth the recognition, and general integrity. Speaker Mike Johnson has only led the cowardly and seditious charge and been booted into place potentially to fully subvert the 2024 election.

How to Lie Like A Speaker (Representing the Devil)

For those daring to cross over to the forever burnt side of history, here is a smorgasbord of methods known to delusional or practiced liars: baseless accusations; defamations; deflections of responsibility; denials of culpability; erasures, omissions, and revisions in the telling of events; fabrications and frame-ups; fishing expeditions; libels and slanders.

For criminals, there are more potent forms of foul speech in the abuse of the law: conspiracy to commit crime and incitement to violence are two. Speech intended to defraud is another. Trump himself appears to own a special collection of tools with his finesse in vocalized or otherwise signaled coercion and intimidation–or marching orders. He has, after all, developed a reputation as a highly motivational speaker.

At the moment, the House has embarked on a programmatic impeachment of the incumbent President Biden and has done so without a single affirmed assertion or charge. 

For his part, Mike Johnson has recently approved a thing most precious to our reactionary Republicans, i.e., a Fishing Expedition under the facade of democracy.


The US House of Representatives has voted to formally open an impeachment inquiry into president Joe Biden, moving forward a process that has been promised by Republican leaders since they regained control of the lower chamber in midterm elections in 2022. / Although no evidence has been produced, Republicans have accused Biden and his family of personally profiting from his position while vice-president under Barack Obama.

Yerushalmy, Jonathan. ”Biden impeachment inquiry explained: what is happening and could the president be convicted? The US House of Representatives has voted to formally open an impeachment inquiry into Biden–without any evidence he has committed wrongdoing.” The Guardian, December 14, 2023.

Related Online

Anderson, Lisa Marie. ”Speech in a Low Dishonest Decade.” The Wilson Quarterly. Winter 2020.

Biden, Joe. ”Statement from President Joe Biden on Baseless House Republican Impeachment Stunt.” White House, December 13, 2023.

Baragona, Justin. ”Mike Johnson Just Hired the Perfect Flack to Push More Election Lies.” Daily Beast, November 1, 2023.

Broadwater, Luke, Steve Eder. ”Johnson Played Leading Role in Effort to Overturn 2020 Election.” The New York Times, October 25, 2023.

Cheney, Liz. Oath and Honor: A Memoir and a Warning. Little, Brown and Company, 2023.

CNN Facts First. ”Does the Dominion Voting Systems organization have ties to Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, George Soros, and the Clinton Foundation?” n.d.

Colbert, Stephen. ”Republicans Have No Evidence to Impeach Biden | MAGA-Approved Anti-Woke Coffees.” Video, YouTube, December 14, 2023.

Cummings, William, Joey Garrison, Jim Sergent. ”By the numbers: President Donald Trump’s failed efforts to overturn the election.” USA Today, January 6, 2021.

Basu, Zachary. ”MAGA movement gets its speaker.” Axios. October 25, 2023.

Cancryn, Adam, Jennifer Haberkorn. ”Mike Johnson pushed the ‘Big Lie’. But Biden world sees thornier issues ahead.” Politico, October 26, 2023.

Cheney, Kyle, Nicholas Wu. ”‘I’ve prayed for each of you’: How Mike Johnson led a campaign of election denial.” Politico, October 25, 2023.

French, David. ”‘MAGA Mike Johnson’ and Our Broken Christian Politics.” The New York Times, November 5, 2023.

Glasser, Susan B., Jane Mayer, Evan Osnos. ”Mike Johnson and the Power of the Big Lie.” The New Yorker, October 27, 2023: Podcast. “You have to lie about the election to rise in power if you’re a Republican in the House,” the staff writer Jane Mayer says, “but when you face potential sentencing in a court yourself, the truth finally comes out.”

Manderson, Nathaniel. ”Mike Johnson claims to hate the devil. Maybe he should look in the mirror.” Salon, December 3, 2023.

Marcotte, Amanda. ”Mike Johnson’s Satanic panic: How evangelical delusions trained Republicans to love Trump lies.” Salon, October 31, 2023.

Oppenheim, James S. ”Trump and the Question of Insurrection.” BackChannels, January 9, 2021.

Roth, Zachary. ”How U.S. House Speaker Mike Johnson helped derail a fight against election lies.” Kansas Reflector, November 27, 2023.

Warburton, Moira and Katharine Jackson. ”Biden impeachment inquiry authorized by House Republicans, despite lack of evidence.” Reuters, December 13, 2023.

Wilson, Rainn. ”The metamorphosis of Jesus Christ from a humble servant of the abject poor . . . .” X, August 3, 2019.

Whitehead, Andrew, Samuel L. Perry. ”The Christian Nationalism of Speaker Mike Johnson.” Time, October 27, 2023.

Yerushalmy, Jonathan. ”Biden impeachment inquiry explained: what is happening and could the president be convicted? The US House of Representatives has voted to formally open an impeachment inquiry into Biden–without any evidence he has committed wrongdoing.” The Guardian, December 14, 2023.


Speaker Mike Johnson Commits the Sin of Omission

###

Trump’s Russian Collusion: No Delusion (Probably)

07 Thursday Dec 2023

Posted by commart in 21st Century Feudal, American Domestic Affairs, Conflict - Culture - Language - Psychology, United States of America

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

DJT, Donald John Trump, Donald Trump, Russia, Russian Money, Russian Real Estate Business, Trump, Trump Real Estate

“Probably” because the mafia boss signs no contracts and his lieutenants leave few clues and don’t talk. Nonetheless, Donald John Trump and Russian Real Estate Money appear to have a sensible relationship that starts with borrowing a lot of money from American banks and failing to return it. Trump’s business failures have been legend, and I have left a compilation of that lot of stories here: #DJT The Sucess! (At Failing): Two Tweets,” BackChannels, September 27, 2022. For the fortuitous arrival of Russian real estate revenue: “Trump’s America in Retrospect: Russian Real Estate Entanglements,” BackChannels, October 9, 2021. For emphasis and not on this blog, one may read this in Foreign Policy by Michael Hirsh: “How Russian Money Helped Save Trump’s Business,” December 21, 2018.

The order of events in the Trump business saga and the near thematic coverage of Trump-related dark money and Russian money support the case for “#CollusionNoDelusion.

When it comes to Trump properties in America, Donald Trump has never had an issue with Russian immigrants. Wealthy ones, of course. How did he find them? How did they find him? We might suppose that part of the business “proprietary” in the extreme.

Also Related Online

Harding, Luke. “‘A very different world’–inside the Czech spying operation on Trump.” The Guardian, October 29, 2018.

Harding, Luke. ”The Hidden History of Trump’s First Trip to Moscow.” Politico, November 19, 2017.

Sipher, John. ”Piling up incriminating information about Trump’s Russian connections.” The Washington Post, January 29, 2021.

Smith, David. ”‘The perfect target’: Russia cultivated Trump as asset for 40 years – ex-KGB spy.” The Guardian, January 29, 2021.


###

Does Everybody Lie? A Menu for the Paranoid Malignant Narcissist

05 Tuesday Dec 2023

Posted by commart in 21st Century Feudal, 21st Century Modern, A Little Wisdom, American Domestic Affairs, Conflict - Culture - Language - Psychology, Philosophy, Political Psychology, Politics, Qualities of Living (QOL), Religion

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

America, American Cultural Evolution, American Future, Donald Trump, malignant narcissism, malignant narcissists, Medieval v. Modern, New American Community, next new world, political psychology, Secular Democratic Republic, Vladimir Putin

Does everybody lie?

Perhaps a little bit to be less blunt or hurtful in the criticism or solicited response to another’s cooking, demeanor, fashion, or life.

Perhaps now and then for hooky, nooky, and bong–that’s not so good but fair in a mood or pinch.

Perhaps a convenient compliment for a kiss.

Perhaps to spare another pain or worry in souring conditions, so one is thought just fine when things are dicey.

To hide something (not so big a deal); to get something (and make life a little more sweet).

It takes another kind of nut to snowball a whopper, to put one over on a community, to seduce, fuck over, and ruin an associate, family, institution, or state–but that’s what malignant narcissists wind up doing in the process of covering the memory of their own humiliation or mortification with a great projection of an undamaged and unassailable heroic self, courageous in adversity, heroic before all, and totally full of bullshit.

The type I have in mind: delusional, grandiose, messianic and in appearance absent of normal boundaries and limits, i.e., the parameters of conscience. In the cause of their own baseless glory, one may wade into their swamps of baseless accusations, defamations, deflections, denials, fabrications, frames, omissions, and revisions (some of them alibis). And downstream to be found in their targets: baseless belief, confusion, and eventual disappointment as the “reality” painted turns out having had nothing to do with reality at all.

Infamous Lies

Chechen Rebels Destroyed Apartment Buildings in Moscow

More likely, Russia’s secret political police, FSB, loaded basements with explosives in the dead of night, set off the detonations, and “credited” an allegedly unruly Chechnya resistance for the act in order to convince Russians to elect Vladimir Putin as their best problem solver and hope for security and stability. Code name: “Storm in Moscow”; on this blog: “Reference: Journalist Alexander Zhilin, Operation Storm in Moscow AKA Moscow Apartment Bombings” (May 3, 2023). And the payoff for the False Flag Operation? Not only election to power–and today absolute and imperious power–for Putin, but in his head and for his twisted spirit “Unlimited Narcissistic Supply”, i.e., the adoration and validation of the Russian People without end.

Democrats Stole the 2020 American Election

The United States of America has for its defense against all enemies foreign and domestic the services of 27 integrated Federal security agencies. For election, the nation enjoys a full suite of relevant threat detection and law enforcement capabilities from Homeland Security on down to security assistance for local districts. Against all of that, Donald Trump has launched the lie, rumor, belief, and “alternative truth”–which is no truth at all!–that his opposition (how dare they…) stole the 2020 national election. “Election Denialism” appears to have become for some–including Speaker of the House Mike Johnson–their faith-based religious obligation, but no factual basis for it has surfaced, and without that, Trump’s efforts to overturn the previous election amount to no more than the most delusional and grandiose attempted theft imaginable.

A Note On Stealing A Modern Or Transitional State to Operate as Criminal Enterprise

Putin and the Russian Mafia State appear to have set a certain tone in the region of archaic-reactionary and brutally repressive kleptocracy, and my guess is Trump is trying to catch up. Well, this is for America’s Christians to know as regards how criminal power exploits faith and related institutions: “KGB FSB ROC M-O-N-E-Y” (January 18, 2021).

From gutter to mansion, America supports an extraordinary duality in relation to sinners and saints, and, quite frequently, the would-be saints turn out the most curious of sinners. The famous are known: Jerry and Becki Falwell and the Pool Boy, Giancarlo Granda (People, Jan. 25, 2022)–and noted Becki in relation to the couple’s role at Liberty University, “We had to put on an act” ; Jim Bakker and his wife Tammy Faye (maiden name LeValley) who together in marriage stumbled over the husband’s one seemingly acknowledged affair–one allegedly forced with Jessica Hahn, who was paid off for her silence–and allegations involving several homosexual flirtations or liaisons (The Washington Post, Sept. 22, 1988). The less famous but in their own wild way as infamous, whether charmingly so (old rascal) or heinous (for having committed a crime), we may be collectively just not all that angelic. Penance, piety, prayer, and promise afterward may suffice for easing conscience and erasing guilt, and sometimes penance precedes change, present and future, for the better. In any case, I wonder if all Americans, and regardless of religious subscription, may not expect some level of pious hypocrisy in themselves, if honest, or in their ranks (if that’s more comfortable) while striving to do better, but to cover repetitive criminal intent or behavior with the appearance of piety, that is something else.

One may not refer to either Donald John Trump or Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin as ethically or morally good men. As the governors of nation-states, neither has offered much evidence of care, concern, or interest for the whole body and spirit of their respective nations–Russians suffer sustained abuse and neglect if beyond Putin’s near direct circles of influence and power; for ordinary Americans, Trump has bragged to his wealthy friends from his own gilded halls at Mar-a-Lago, “You All Just Got a Lot Richer” (Vanity Fair, Dec. 24, 2017) after signing into law substantial tax breaks for them. Having ceded substantial tax revenues to private sector interests–and the public be damned (which it literally might be if such power prevails)–why should the buccaneer not commandeer the entire ship of state for his own crony capitalist private enterprise–just as Vladimir has done? He has already developed a base ripe for ripping off.

Marching Forward Into the Past

Around the world, constituencies will find leaders who prefer to treat the idea of the state as a private and family enterprise to be milked for their own profit and the securing of their family and their associates. They’re motivated by greed and lust and–given their underlying fear of humiliation and consequent delusional self-concept and obsession with their own aggrandizement–the allure of their own potential to control others without question. Centuries ago, that characterization would have fit well with a medieval world more than familiar with the concept of “Absolutism” or “Absolute Power” and its violent and not infrequently tyrannical enforcement. Today, the same personalities and personal psychology–associate what I have in mind with Erdogan, Orban, Putin, and Trump–appear archaic but difficult to address and ameliorate from the perspective of any democratic idealism, especially from the vantage of the still revolutionary Constitution of the United States of America (related in the way of inspiration for revolution and the idea of a new nation–Thomas Paine’s “Common Sense”, January 10, 1776). The named would be quite comfortable beneath the titles of Sultan Erdogan, Tsar Putin, King Orban, and, perhaps, King Trump.

Marching Forward Into The Future: A New American Community

Now that we’re all here, we’re going to have to deal with ourselves as a whole community and not so much as myopic and parochial islands fit for some Americans and not for others.

All American citizens are Americans.

Our guests are of two kinds: aspiring Americans or foreigners who have come here for business or travel.

As Americans, our challenges are not only American but by way of our own far expanded global awareness–apprehension or “consciousness”, actually–we have made ourselves global and universal in character. So have others, and with transnational business (and crime) all of the next functional steps have already been taken. Basically, our connections have changed and become enjoyable, essential, and permanent–or if adverse or made cautious by our own dependence, then a part of the challenge of an evolving new world.

Also as Americans, we have lived by a deeply devoted and earnestly defended Constitution designed to establish and sustain forever a secular democratic republic. Our western civilizational heritage–Judeo-Christian well acknowledged; Greco-Roman for the history, legends, and myths still echoing our own existence–has arrived here compassionate, down to earth, and reasoning. The wealth of the world has been brought here a long time, and as there is only one world, one Earth, we’re already blended with it and perhaps ready to adjust and assimilate, discard what’s not going to work, and appreciate that which proves good universally. We’ve been doing that a long time too, but for international relations, more may be involved than wearing cashmere and sipping tea.

We may see more than we once did; we may do more than we once could; and we should look ahead and do more than live in the past–or allow the greatest future ever to be stolen from all by evildoing feudal-medieval nutcases, whether religious extremists or criminal politicians who cannot contain their own worst compulsions.

So this much I may suggest about the next New World that is the one in which we are already living: it just hasn’t room for malignantly narcissistic “leaders” and their self-absorbed devotion to their own aggrandizement, enrichment, and power through fraudulent display and theft outright. The Next New World will need knowledgeable, powerful, and visionary high-integrity souls for its leadership in the development, establishment, and distribution of extraordinary systems for agriculture, business, education, health, justice, and general prosperity and security worldwide.

###

Prove the Cheat, #LizHarrington.

03 Sunday Dec 2023

Posted by commart in 21st Century Feudal, 21st Century Modern, American Domestic Affairs, Conflict - Culture - Language - Psychology, FTAC - From The Awesome Conversation, United States of America

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

2020-presidential-election, cnn, Donald Trump, election-of-2020, Felonious Trump, GOP, Liz Harrington, local, news, Russia

Donald Trump’s base claims to have been cheated out of winning the 2020 American election, and so there are a few cheerleaders on X apparently devoted to the surreal task of expressing outrage as an offensive measure. Trump hire Liz Harrington has been insistent about a lost election that Trump, in fact, has been trying to steal for himself.


Prove the cheat, #LizHarrington.

–https://www.usatoday.com/in-depth/news/politics/elections/2021/01/06/trumps-failed-efforts-overturn-election-numbers/4130307001/
–https://www.cisa.gov/topics/election-security/rumor-vs-reality
–https://apnews.com/article/fox-news-dominion-lawsuit-trial-trump-2020-0ac71f75acfacc52ea80b3e747fb0afe

Here are examples of attempts to invalidate 2020 election results by guile and by force.

–https://youtu.be/o3hrN0cP58Y (it was a perfect phone call).
–https://youtu.be/Iludfj6Pe7w

#FeloniousTrump #4FelonyCases91Counts

AmericanCharacterMatters #IntegrityMatters #TruthMatters #ModernAmericansMatter

DJT-delusional, grandiose, messianic and without normal boundaries and limits. The psychology’s well known. Nothing was taken away from the #AmericanPeople in the course of the 2020 election.

Our #UnitedStatesOfAmerica is no medieval polity. It is no “mafia state”. It is a modern secular democratic republic, and not one elected official, including President, “rules” by cabal, divine right, fraudulent claims, force, or violence.


In fact, the role of an American President is not to rule the country but to act as its most powerful management executive in compliance with the Constitution of the United States and its Legislative and Judicial branches. Only recently, so it seems to me, has the Republican Party embarked on or endorsed a program of what appears an effort to install authoritarian, corrupt, and evidently criminal control of the state.


The Xpression has been well received, and here you may see it yourself.

Prove the cheat, #LizHarrington.

–https://t.co/UgWV1qEKiL
–https://t.co/HjPxia8NOS
–https://t.co/cTLZUgnDW5

Here are examples of attempts to invalidate 2020 election results by guile and by force.

–https://t.co/5RZOdrfH1p (it was a perfect phone call).
–https://t.co/eMwx6BMFbv…

— J. S. Oppenheim (@JS_Oppenheim) December 3, 2023

###

X-Pression: American Fascist Nationalist GOP

27 Friday Oct 2023

Posted by commart in 21st Century Feudal, 21st Century Modern, American Domestic Affairs, Conflict - Culture - Language - Psychology, Epistemology, United States of America

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

American Nationalist Fascism, American Reactionary Conservatism, Donald Trump, Fascist Nationalist GOP, GOP, Republican Party


Updated and revised post from October 26, 2023

I had had three X tweets here, but they were not showing to my satisfaction, so I have recreated the one that matters most.


A responsible #RepublicanParty would end #Denialism and the sustained entertainment of #FeloniousTrump as a potential #AmericanPresidentialCandidate–but your assembly of Americans-In-Name-Only appear unable to question #DJT‘s #AbsoluteReactionaryDemagoguery. For that, it appears you have chosen to destroy your nation.

#GOP #MikeJohnson #Trumpsters->#AmericansInNameOnly #AINOS

Posted to X on October 26, 2023 by J. S. Oppenheim.


I have found “X-pression” becoming pointless as the forest wakes up, all of the birdies go tweet tweet tweet and one’s own expression drowns in the cacophony. Nonetheless, X interaction feels engaging and here serves as part of a morning routine involving strong coffee, access to a portion of the world’s best journalism online, and, sigh, also a collection of voices practically medieval in their bludgeoning unreason.


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Epigram

Hillel the Elder

"That which is distasteful to thee do not do to another. That is the whole of Torah. The rest is commentary. Now go and study."

"If I am not for myself, who will be for me? If I am not for others, what am I? If not now, when?"

"Whosoever destroys a soul, it is considered as if he destroyed an entire world. And whosoever that saves a life, it is considered as if he saved an entire world."

Oriana Fallaci
"Whether it comes from a despotic sovereign or an elected president, from a murderous general or a beloved leader, I see power as an inhuman and hateful phenomenon...I have always looked on disobedience toward the oppressive as the only way to use the miracle of having been born."

Talmud 7:16 as Quoted by Rishon Rishon in 2004
Qohelet Raba, 7:16

אכזרי סוף שנעשה אכזרי במקום רחמן

Kol mi shena`asa rahaman bimqom akhzari Sof shena`asa akhzari bimqom rahaman

All who are made to be compassionate in the place of the cruel In the end are made to be cruel in the place of the compassionate.

More colloquially translated: "Those who are kind to the cruel, in the end will be cruel to the kind."

Online Source: http://www.rishon-rishon.com/archives/044412.php

Abraham Isaac Kook

"The purely righteous do not complain about evil, rather they add justice.They do not complain about heresy, rather they add faith.They do not complain about ignorance, rather they add wisdom." From the pages of Arpilei Tohar.

Heinrich Heine
"Where books are burned, in the end people will be burned." -- From Almansor: A Tragedy (1823).

Simon Wiesenthal
Remark Made in the Ballroom of the Imperial Hotel, Vienna, Austria on the occasion of His 90th Birthday: "The Nazis are no more, but we are still here, singing and dancing."

Maimonides
"Truth does not become more true if the whole world were to accept it; nor does it become less true if the whole world were to reject it."

"The risk of a wrong decision is preferable to the terror of indecision."

Douglas Adams
"Isn't it enough to see that a garden is beautiful without having to believe that there are fairies at the bottom of it too?" Epigram appearing in the dedication of Richard Dawkins' The GOD Delusion.

Thucydides
"The Nation that makes a great distinction between its scholars and its warriors will have its thinking done by cowards and its fighting done by fools."

Milan Kundera
"The struggle of man against power is the struggle of memory against forgetting."

Malala Yousafzai
“The terrorists thought that they would change our aims and stop our ambitions but nothing changed in my life except this: weakness, fear and hopelessness died. Strength, power and courage was born.”

Tanit Nima Tinat
"Who could die of love?"

What I Have Said About the Jews

My people, not that I speak for them, I nonetheless describe as a "global ethnic commune with its heart in Jerusalem and soul in the Land of Israel."

We have never given up on God, nor have we ever given up on one another.

Many things we have given up, but no one misses, say, animal sacrifice, and as many things we have kept, so we have still to welcome our Sabbath on Friday at sunset and to rest all of Saturday until three stars appear in the sky.

Most of all, through 5,773 years, wherever life has taken us, through the greatest triumphs and the most awful tragedies, we have preserved our tribal identity and soul, and so shall we continue eternally.

Anti-Semitism / Anti-Zionism = Signal of Fascism

I may suggest that anti-Zionism / anti-Semitism are signal (a little bit) of fascist urges, and the Left -- I'm an old liberal: I know my heart -- has been vulnerable to manipulation by what appears to me as a "Red Brown Green Alliance" driven by a handful of powerful autocrats intent on sustaining a medieval worldview in service to their own glorification. (And there I will stop).
One hopes for knowledge to allay fear; one hopes for love to overmatch hate.

Too often, the security found in the parroting of a loyal lie outweighs the integrity to be earned in confronting and voicing an uncomfortable truth.

Those who make their followers believe absurdities may also make them commit atrocities.

Positively Orwellian: Comment Responding to Claim that the Arab Assault on Israel in 1948 Had Not Intended Annihilation

“Revisionism” is the most contemptible path that power takes to abet theft and hide shame by attempting to alter public perception of past events.

On Press Freedom, Commentary, and Journalism

In the free world, talent -- editors, graphic artists, researchers, writers -- gravitate toward the organizations that suit their interests and values. The result: high integrity and highly reliable reportage and both responsible and thoughtful reasoning.

This is not to suggest that partisan presses don't exist or that propaganda doesn't exist in the west, but any reader possessed of critical thinking ability and genuine independence -- not bought, not programmed -- is certainly free to evaluate the works of earnest reporters and scholars.

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