It just keeps getting more and more bonkers.

I never watch this stuff -- I just tuned in after seeing on Twitter and elsewhere what was going on. But bananas, crazypants stuff. Every lunatic possibility about how Trump might have been behaving behind the scenes was true.

So bananas. I didn't think I was capable of being surprised about any of this at this point, but here we are. Presumably the next hearing will just be the pee tape.

If a secret service protectee attacks a secret service agent, are they allowed to fight back?

"Ketchup" is trending on Twitter.

They have to clock out.

If the work of the Jan. 6 committee doesn't convince people that Trump is a worthless asshole, nothing will change people's minds.

Seriously: I really do appreciate the committee's work, whether or not it accomplishes anything. They have exceeded my expectations as communicators. This is all great theater.

The whole surprise witness thing is straight out of a crappy crime procedural series -- and that's a good thing!

Sometimes all you can do is put yourself on the record for the benefit of history.

Sounds like to referrals to DOJ for witness tampering are likely.

"They're not here to hurt me. Take the fucking mags [magnetometers] away." My God.

Staff drafted for him: "Anyone who who entered the Capitol without proper authority should leave immediately." He refused to tweet or otherwise release it.

It's not the legally significant part, but to pf's point about this being excellent TV: the imagine of the ketchup dripping down the wall, and the exchange "Was this the only instance in which you were aware of the president throwing dishes?" "No, it was not" will stick with me for a long time.

Shocking? Fox news hosts aren't shocked.

Moments after a colleague referred to Tuesday's January 6 committee testimony as "stunning," Fox News host Martha MacCallum downplayed new revelations about former President Donald Trump's violent outbursts surrounding his efforts to overturn the 2020 election.

"I mean, I'm not sure that it really shocks anybody that the president just -- knowing what we've seen, observing him over the years -- if he got angry then he might throw his lunch," MacCallum said. "I'm not sure. It's obviously a very dramatic detail, and the way that she describes it, um, is. But I'm not sure if this is wholly out of character with the Donald Trump and the President Trump that people came to know over the years."

Shocking? Fox news hosts aren't shocked.

Moments after a colleague referred to Tuesday's January 6 committee testimony as "stunning," Fox News host Martha MacCallum downplayed new revelations about former President Donald Trump's violent outbursts surrounding his efforts to overturn the 2020 election.

"I mean, I'm not sure that it really shocks anybody that the president just -- knowing what we've seen, observing him over the years -- if he got angry then he might throw his lunch," MacCallum said. "I'm not sure. It's obviously a very dramatic detail, and the way that she describes it, um, is. But I'm not sure if this is wholly out of character with the Donald Trump and the President Trump that people came to know over the years."

12, 13: Actually Martha went on, "Peep double-posting is far more of a scandal as far as I'm concerned."

Not to mention your parking ticket.

Is Trump's raging part of the mainstream public's understanding of him? I think he fact that he said dumb shit on twitter became pretty universally understood, but I'm not sure his wild unchecked rage did.

Here's a publication that reports time-lagged TV ratings. Checking next week for a drop in Fox viewership will be a way to tell how many of its viewers either chose to inform themselves or retreated from news altogether.

https://www.adweek.com/tvnewser/category/ratings/

Honestly, DJTs personality and impulse control-- good theater, and maybe they draw attention to the stuff that matters, which IMO is statements like the one in 9 (They're not here to hurt me). Those will make a difference for bringing charges if there's anyone up to doing that. Also mention of specific communications which are undeniable.
But "get me 11000 votes" didn't move the needle.
Merrick Garland was chosen as a possible SC candidate acceptable to Rs, with an unobjectionable personality and record. That's still who he is as far as I can tell.

Or switched to Newsmax.

Man, I picked the wrong day to actually be working instead of compulsively scrolling Twitter.

Also, I don't understand whether or not there are records of the audio of these critical calls-- clearly there's metadata (Trump's personal out-of-date Android mobile phone called Raffensberger at 14:20.. ), and probably the Russians and Saudis have all of his communications.

But keeping what you say out loud into a telephone confidential, I actually don't know how that works for powerful people. Do they just trust WhatsApp or maybe Telegram ?

Doesn't this grabbing the steering wheel and "throttling" a SS agent stuff seem... weird in a not Trump-weird way? Throwing a plate of food that the help has to clean up: Trumpy. Laying hands on a federal agent who could easily disassemble you in fifteen different ways? Not Trumpy. Trying to wrest the steering wheel away from a driver to force them to drive somewhere they don't want to drive? What is this, Shang-Chi?

Oh, I'm sure he's been abusing the help since he was a toddler.

Picture not an adult martial artist wrestling for control of a vehicle, but a toddler throwing a quick tantrum, with a toddler's understanding of a steering wheel.

Today's details do feel more slapstick-y than most of the usual parade of items. The ketchup on the wall especially. Like a forgettable 90's comedy or something.

Now imagine that toddler with nukes.

I can sort of understand how it happened, but it's just bizarre how so many people in the administration just ignored the president routinely. If the president tells you to take him to the riot, then you either need to get him removed under the 25th amendment, or you take him to the riot.

Maybe the Secret Service gets psyched up enough about their Sacred Duty of protecting him physically that they see it as a higher priority than obeying his orders?

I wonder how many of the rioters were heartened to hear how hard he tried to join them.

So desirous of joining the riot as to try to choke someone, but not so far as to walk a mile and a half.

https://twitter.com/the_law_boy/status/1541877874638168065?s=21&t=x3pyqYnmEomMrQHVXHKUmw

https://twitter.com/noahgarfinkel/status/1541864380437909504?s=21&t=x3pyqYnmEomMrQHVXHKUmw

I haven't been watching the hearings (I'm interested but . . . not enough to actually turn them on). I feel like I've been generally following the news.

But I just saw this thread (which predates the hearings) and realized that I hadn't actually been following the details of what happened at the Capital that day: https://twitter.com/capitolhunters/status/1535027665337569290

I had no idea that DC bike cops may have been crucial to the defense of the capital, but I also hadn't quite absorbed how tactical the attack was.

The ketchup is funny especially because when you Google Trump and ketchup one of the hits is an article from 2017 from some genius pundit arguing that it matters that Trump puts ketchup on his steak.

The tweet in 32 has been deleted.

32 " I love how Trump tried to strangle a secret service agent and physically take control of the presidential limo to get to the Capitol, and when that didn't work, he still wasn't willing to walk there."

I had the same thought as 22. Man, this stuff better be true.

We're so far gone, I can only enjoy this as theater. I guess some accountability would be good, but there's always a chance that you expose the bonkers and there are no consequences, which is worse than not exposing the bonkers. And all this probably helps DeSantis anyway. Yay?

Seems right. https://twitter.com/_cingraham/status/1541957254970089472

There might be video.

Shape of the coup: views differ.

"Profiles in coup rage"

37: Yeah. Unfortunately some of it is going to go down like so many Trumpy things, focus is on the more "sensational" aspects (pee tape) which are then called into doubt and on we go. In this case what she testified was to being told about that incident; it was actually among the "weaker" parts of the testimony. One of the more despicable responses the RW "fringe" so far, but wait) has been referring to her as Amber Heard 2.0*).

Who they really want to testify is Cipollone and I see part of putting Hutchinson on as trying to bait him in to doing so. Meadows sure came off as being as bad as I imagined.

And of course, we knew *something* like all of this had to be going on behind the scenes. But details are of course important.

*Gamergate and Depp/Heard provide keys to understanding much of our current politics.

And I think one of the main effects of the hearings so far is to increase the behind-the-scenes intra-Republican tensions over A Trump 2024 candidacy. I think most Rs in Congress (as well as Federalist and other R functionary fuck pig types) would love to throw him over if they could do so and retain the base. I think Fox would be willing to go big on DeSantis but it will be a delicate operation.

I do think the immediacy and purity of nastiness in Trump' rage Truth Socialing tells that a lot of it was spot on. In retrospect, chief aide to the chief of staff is where a lot of stuff gets funneled through (presumably why McCarthy called her immediately after Trump said he was going to the Capitol during his speech).

I am also wondering what specifically Meadows needed to talk to Jim Jordan about that led him to leave the President to take his call.

If you're going to ignore a serious crime committed in front of your face, there aren't many people who are better situated to give advice than Jordan.

And Adam Davidson has this right:

Reporters and editors should pay far more attention to how they are being played. They are being played all the time. Nearly all leaks and all anonymous sources are playing the media to advance some agenda. That can be good (Mary Trump; Mark Felt) and it can be bad.

Like the anonymous secret service leaks yesterday.
One rule of thumb: the standards should be higher when the leak is anonymous and clearly part of a concentrated effort to derail the news cycle.

37.last, 43.last: DeSantis doesn't actually worry me.* People talk about him as a threat for his similarities to Trump, minus the absurd incompetence. But the incompetence is part of the point, and I don't think DeSantis's ineptitude is as charismatic as Trump's. I admit that he'll have a mainstream media selling him hard as a moderate, but if he tries himself to make his case that way, a lot of the nuts are going to lose interest. I say: Look out for Tucker Carlson.

*Admittedly, there was a time when Trump didn't worry me.

I still remember when my mom saw Trump on the TV and asked why he was in the news. I said he was president and she didn't believe me. Granted she'd dealt with me making shit up for fifty years by that point.

I say: Look out for Tucker Carlson.

That's one particularly gross possibility. I suspect the first big-name campaign to flame out in humiliating fashion will be Greg Abbott, but Tom Cotton is the one I'm watching most warily.

I have never gotten around to trying out political prediction markets as a hobby, but at 33 cents, Trump himself seems like a great deal for 2024. And DeSantis is ridiculously over-estimated at 43 cents. Mike Pence at 7 cents is far too high, and even at 2 cents, Larry Hogan is overpriced.

Among the longshots, I like Cotton, Carlson and maybe even Cruz at 2 cents, and I really like Don Jr. at a penny.

I was just listening to a podcast which said that Cotton is on Fox, specifically Laura Ingraham, about 3-4x/week. So clearly they're intent on grooming him for a run.

I still think the key to beating Trump in the primary is a display of physical dominance. Just punch him, or like call him a name and fuck up his hair while you do it.

I feel simultaneously baffled at, sorry for, and angry at Hutchinson's arc - such a young person who somehow has enough clear sight and fortitude to come forward now in the face of pressure and threats, but also thought Cruz, Scalise, and Trump were so nifty she worked for all of them starting as a college intern.

50: Chris Sununu doesn't even make the list. He'll be so disappointed.

52 This is why we should run Fetterman for president. Trump would wet his pants on stage.

Am I the only one who wishes they had let Trump go to the capitol?

53: I'm kind of fascinated by that. I assume White House intern positions go to "Mommy and Daddy know someone with a connection", so her personal politics are probably Republican but not necessarily deeply engaged true believer. I think the most you can assume about her is careerist and went for an exciting opportunity without being dissuaded by working for terrible people. If she ever shows up in public life again, it'll be interesting to see what she's turned into at 40.

(I mean, for her own safety I would think she should probably head straight to a salon and get a blonde pixie cut before disappearing. But after that.)

I think Tony Ornato's alleged claims need to be treated skeptically at this point. If he is willing to testify, he should be willing to talk to the press for attribution, and he hasn't done that yet. And he certainly isn't yet demanding to testify.

My bet today: The committee doesn't seek his testimony, and he doesn't seek to volunteer it.

One of the more despicable responses the RW "fringe" so far, but wait) has been referring to her as Amber Heard 2.0*

They are, of course, pretty much correct by definition -- or at least describing their aspiration.

It worked for Michelle Williams.

She even went to public high school and university! Not in the bubble.

Is it something about Pennington, NJ? Virtually every city in NJ tells you something about the person, I understand.

52: The key to defeating Trump in the primaries is his lifetime of sloth and McDonald's. Unfortunately, he seems pretty robust and unlikely to keel over.

But I take your point and agree with it. The propensity for violence (really for inciting violence) is how I'm calculating Republican odds. That's why I put Trump in front and am skeptical of DeSantis. At a penny a contract, Don Jr. is a steal.

55: Not sure that works for a Democrat. But I'd kinda like to find out.

I don't find Hutchinson all that mystifying. Republicanism is all fun and games until the nuts cross some personal line of yours. Hutchinson's line was insurrection.

I agree with 62.

Tony Ornato's alleged claims need to be treated skeptically at this point

Recent history supports you.

Trump and the Secret Service guy are both lashing out against Hutchinson. If I were Moby, I would call this a performance by Tony Ornato and Don.

I didn't even know who Tony was before reading 64.

Am I the only one who wishes they had let Trump go to the capitol?

Nope. I also wish they'd caught Pence and any or all of the Senators over 70. I know you're all 'it was a fucking armed insurrection, what more do you need?' but I still think it would be stronger to say 'they fucking killed a bunch of politicians'. We are still getting 'it was a peaceful protest' bullshit that wouldn't be possible if there were a picture of beheaded Mike Pence to show. Besides, nothing else will ever clear out the Olds and it feels like they never ever die.

Hanging only beheads someone if you did it wrong.

That's just a cultural norm.

Has the issue of hanging Mike Pence been polled? Could be a winner for the Dems.

My bad. Hanging then.

I can't help it(1), I'm optimistic(2). Yesterday's hearings look very bad for Trump. It's worse than a crime, it's an embarrassment. It has legs because it's funny, and what's their response going to be, because what's the alternate explanation for Trump not going to the Capitol?

This might or might not actually make Trump lose the base, but it might, and it'll definitely lose him the Republican elites. If he runs in the 2024 primary at all then he'll lose to DeSantis or Abbott and they'll lose to the Democratic nominee due to the fundamentals. (Incumbents have an advantage, they don't have Trump's name recognition, they have to run on their record of leadership...)

(1) I'm not generally inclined to optimism, but when everyone else around here is so uniformly despondent, I can't help playing devil's advocate.

(2) More optimistic about the impact of these hearings, and the Democrats' prospects in 2022 and 2024, than I was a month ago. Really big-picture stuff, eh, who knows.

64: Also this re: Pence's potential removal from the Capitol on JG: (Apo's link is to Ornato denying a conversation with Alyssa Farah about warning the press about Lafayette Sq. being cleared before the photo op (she said they needed to warn reporters).

Around this time, Kellogg ran into Tony Ornato in the West Wing. Ornato, who oversaw Secret Service movements, told him that Pence's detail was planning to move the vice president to Joint Base Andrews.

"You can't do that, Tony," Kellogg said. "Leave him where he's at. He's got a job to do. I know you guys too well. You'll fly him to Alaska if you have a chance. Don't do it."

Pence had made clear to Giebels the level of his determination and Kellogg said there was no changing it.

"He's going to stay there," Kellogg told Ornato. "If he has to wait there all night, he's going to do it."

Ornato, through a spokesman, denied having this conversation.

64, 73: I'm pretty sure Ornato was on leave from the USSS during all of these, and working as Trump's chief of staff for operations.

(Incumbents have an advantage, they don't have Trump's name recognition, they have to run on their record of leadership...)

Trump will certainly savage all the other Republican candidates and he will certainly tell his base to stay home if they can't vote for him. He will also say that the Republican primaries are rigged if he doesn't win. I have more faith in his pettiness than in any other factor.

Maybe he'll stage a coup at the Republican convention if he doesn't win the primary. Delegate voting seems easier (and more legal) to manipulate than the electoral college.

Or he'll throw his own convention and run third party, but not be on the ballot anywhere because they're too incompetent to figure out actual rules, and then throw a huge hissy fit about how it's voter fraud that he's not on the ballot.

That's got to siphon off some R votes.

This might or might not actually make Trump lose the base, but it might, and it'll definitely lose him the Republican elites.

He's lost the Republican elites several times already. And then they notice that the nutcases whose votes they depend on still love him and they slither back to him.

I do think a contested primary with a viable candidate who isn't Ted Cruz will be a bit different from what we saw the last two cycles. DeSantis really wants to be president and I don't think he's just going to drop out just because Trump decides to run, and then the elites have a real choice on their hands.

Yesterday's hearings look very bad for Trump. It's worse than a crime, it's an embarrassment.

I do kind of feel that the image of Trump lunging helplessly for the steering wheel as he is driven fuming away from the Capitol is going to hurt him. His supporters don't mind cruelty - that's the point, really - but they mind weakness.

(It would be even better if the driver had been a woman or a minority, but sadly it seems not.)

Since the post at the top of the front page currently has a perfect last comment, I'll ask here: What would it take for Wilhoit's Observation not to be a thought-stopper?

(Though I've forgotten just whose hobby-horse that is. My excuse (hopefully not for much longer) is that I've got covid and my brain is a little mushy.)

(That's probably marginally less a niche question than two others that have been occupying idle brain cycles today: What could help with de-Hollywoodifying sales and marketing for books? And, what would a Worldcon for 20,000 people look like & what would it take to make that happen?)

Obviously legally and morally this is irrelevant, but politically, tell me how this helps Trump.

It worked for Chris Farley.

83: Everything helps Trump. This proves Hutchinson is lying in the exact way that Depp showed -- in a court of law! -- that Heard was lying.

(If the media is going to spend time on this crap, I'd like to see some journalist actually do the homework on this and find out the dimensions of the space involved. The SS guy here is claiming that Trump couldn't get from the back seat to the front, but nobody is saying that's what Trump did -- and the SS guy is clear that there is enough space between the front seats for an entire adult human being to pass through, if awkwardly.)

85: I know you know this, but she only testified to being told about the incident. As a slew of access whores in the press have ignored. (NBC following Peter Alexander's lead have been dreadful on this.)

The Republican response to this damning testimony is completely predictable and unfortunately effective. They pick one or two trivial points about which they can raise some doubt and/or provoke a long, technical, unresolvable debate, and then declare the entire narrative rebutted. Since adverse consequences never follow, the factions cheer in vindication, stew in outrage, or shrug and go back to their lives, according to their ideologies.

I will go to my grave certain that the GWB campaign fed a faked document on his TANG service explicitly to provoke this reaction and inoculate him against any further charges.

87.3: Even though I was very online when that "scandal" was happening, I had to dig deep to remind myself what TANG stood for.

Would the word "kerning" have reminded you . . .

Cheryl Rofer at LGM thinks Onrato and Engel intentionally told her a fake story to plant something that could be debunked later if she flipped. I don't know if they had the foresight to do that or if they did it to all junior staffers in case any went off the reservation. Seems like too high a level of cognition for this bunch.

I'll buy the 87.last conspiracy as being plausible given the facts; I'm less impressed with Rofer, who seems to think that the SS guys were planning for Hutchinson's testimony. I guess it's possible!

As far as conspiracies I will go to my grave believing: GWB was wearing a wire and being fed answers during his debate with Kerry.

It's hard to believe they'd have the foresight to arrange for little lies like that on that day. It's *very* easy to believe they told an embellished story to the cute wide-eyed aide just to get her attention.

But look at us here, picking at the corners of this stupid irrelevance when the damning testimony is that the president knew his supporters were armed, intended violence against his enemies, and directed them to assault Congress.

I will relish the opportunity to eat these words but -- when no one of importance is held criminally liable for any of this, the rule of law is a dead letter.

92.1: Yes, this seems to me by far the most plausible explanation.

87.3: Even though I was very online when that "scandal" was happening, I had to dig deep to remind myself what TANG stood for.

I'm not deep enough.

It's just orange juice that's been to space.

94: Oh! It's very basic, but I didn't remember it as an acronym - Texas Air National Guard.

Thanks! I do now remember that being a thing.

I finally got a look at Chait's watch-out-for-DeSantis piece, and I find it really unpersuasive.

Chait points to the Republican Establishment, including the rightwing media, as favoring DeSantis, but he doesn't even gesture toward the fact all of the forces allegedly arrayed against Trump are ones that he has already defeated repeatedly and decisively.

Chait spends a lot of time talking about how the media crazies all say nice things about DeSantis, but that's only because DeSantis has remained carefully in Trump's shadow. Chait argues that the Establishment is lining up for DeSantis the way it once lined up for GWB, but somehow fails to mention Jeb or any of the others the Establishment would have preferred.

Turns out that the Establishment doesn't always pick the candidate.

You know what always kills presidential aspirations? Losing a presidential election. Leading an insurrection has also played poorly in politics. That's not true any more, and Chait needs to catch up with the new rules.

The other thing that kills presidential aspirations is being in prison, but it seems like Garland isn't gonna help us with that one.

I do think it matters that some big portion of the right crazifaction will not vote for anyone but Trump. Anyone going to a Trump rally will not switch over to someone who beats Trump in the primary. What was the phrase? "Trump is a turnout machine"? He is, but only if he is the candidate. If not, he'll sulk and punish the candidate.

Either way, I think the Republicans have a big problem. Trump already lost once and generates turnout on the left as well. Not-Trump will suffer from Trump's pique and not have Trump's magic turnout powers.

Since the abortion thread is off the front page and Megan is here, an interesting Traister article on how there weren't enough personal stories pushed about abortion, on likely misguided strategic logics.

Saw that. Everything Traister writes is just spot-on.

That is good, and I don't think it's just misguided strategic logic. As the article points out there's a collective action problem:

In this context, those who wanted to control the stories could be a little like Goldilocks: The narratives couldn't be too happy lest they be perceived as cavalier; they couldn't be too sad lest they give the impression that abortions are tragedies; the abortions couldn't have been too late, or too casual, or too tied to sex or ambition or pleasure or self-interest. "We're still fighting about which stories get to get told," says Bracey Sherman. "If it's, 'My abortion was great, I took the pills at home, it was wonderful,' that's considered frivolous. There's always some regulation: It's never the right time; it's never the right type of story."

The fewer stories that get told, the more representational weight each one carries. Each individual narrative is asked to stand in for so much, rather than exist simply as one grain of sand on a beach's worth of reproductive experience. In the lived world, abortion isn't some heavily weighted reality siloed off from the rest of life, health care, and humanity. Abortion is life, health care, and humanity.

It also makes me think of this article about the SNL "clown abortion" sketch.

The sketch unforgettably illustrates that we're sometimes pushed to treat abortion like something unspeakable, a tragedy or a mark of permanent shame (or both). In an environment where a topic is so stigmatized that having reasoned debate around it becomes impossible, the addition of clown goggles and a spinning bow tie highlights how ludicrous the controversy has become -- all while making us laugh despite ourselves.

... Strong frames the sketch around the concept of empathy and kindness, using something her -- sorry, Goober's -- abortion doctor told her.

It's her "favorite joke," she says, a warm-hearted zinger about how relatively early she was in her pregnancy ("Did you get pregnant on the way over?" the doctor asked.) It's not "a funny ha ha" kind of humor, she clarifies, but a "funny 'you're not an awful person and your life isn't over' kind of joke -- the best kind."

Since the abortion thread is off the front page and Megan is here, an interesting Traister article on how there weren't enough personal stories pushed about abortion, on likely misguided strategic logics.

FWIW, I shared with someone who's very active in working for abortion access and reproductive justice and her response was that, storytelling has been an interest for quite a while and that Traister misstates the level of concern or opposition about it.

That said, I think it is a good reason to, again, appreciate people like Megan telling their stories.

103: Are people like your friend in touch with Irish folks who led the campaign to repeal that country's anti-abortion constitutional amendment? My anecdatal impression is that storytelling at every level played a big role in helping repeal win by a 2-1 margin (with a majority in 39 of Ireland's 40 parliamentary constituencies). When there are a lot of stories -- reflecting many different realities -- it reduces the pressure on any given one to be "representative."

No, I don't know anybody connected to the Irish campaign, but there was some discussion of it in this thread (link goes to the first comment to mention Ireland): www.unfogged.com/archives/comments_17990.html#2139244

Darn it, I was expecting that would automatically create a link, but it looks like it doesn't do that without the http -- http://www.unfogged.com/archives/comments_17990.html#2139244