Pod Mates 🌻 🌻 🌻

Finally, Accountability:  Yesterday wasn’t the best of days for either Donald Trump or George Santos.  Trump was found liable for sexual abuse and defamation and fined a total of $5 million.  The jury didn’t find that he had committed rape but did find that he had committed battery defined as sexual contact by physical force, the distinctions between the two offenses are a bit too gruesome to discuss here but suffice it to say the jury did conclude that he did do more than just grab E Jean Carroll by her crotch, maybe because when you’re caught on tape bragging about grabbing women by their pussies, are accused by several women of doing just that and then say that stars can do what they want, jurors take note. Naturally, Trump still asserts that his victim E Jean Carroll is lying, in fact he still claims that he never even met her, a lie easily dismissed by photos of the two of them together. Though a few of the usual Republican suspects, including Asa Hutchinson and Mitt Romney said that being found liable for sexual assault disqualifies Trump for the presidency, most either ran away when asked about it or like Senator Cornyn said that the verdict was only a problem because it made it more difficult for him to win, or like Senators Graham and Rubio attacked the jury alleging that all New Yorkers including the juror who revealed during the voir dire that he’s an avid watcher of right wing media, were biased against Trump. Sex offender Trump, whose lawyer says that he’ll be appealing the “flawed” decision is still scheduled to participate in a CNN townhall tonight where, based on last night’s flurry of truth social posting, he’ll likely continue to defame Carroll assuming of course, that the desperate for ratings CNN hasn’t agreed to avoid the subject of yesterday’s verdict and all those inconvenient sexual assault allegations altogether.

Devolder, Santos, Rivache: Several media outlets report that George of many names Santos has been charged with one or more federal offenses.  Assuming he hasn’t already hopped a plane to Brazil or Moscow, Santos, who when questioned by one reporter claimed that he knows nothing about any of that, a lie of course, is expected to make an appearance in Federal Court in Brooklyn today at which point we will learn exactly what those charges are.  He’s not being charged for lying about being Jew ish, or even for cross dressing in his garish Kitara Rivache ensemble but probably is being charged for some campaign violations, something to do with the mysterious $700k contribution he claims to have made to his campaign from personal funds he didn’t have and for making false statements to federal authorities. Unfortunately, being indicted won’t affect Santos’ House status since he’s already been stripped of his committee assignments, the usual punishment for indicted House members. Following “usual” protocol, as if there is anything usual about the bizarro Santos, and desperately in need of his vote, Kevin McCarthy says that he’ll leave Santos be until he’s actually found or pleads guilty. And to be clear, Kevin really needs Santos’ vote if he hopes to remain Speaker for much longer because the debt ceiling crisis continues to loom and will only be resolved when Kevin moves off of his currently untenable “cut, cut, cut spending” position because there’s no way that President Biden,  the Senate or even Mitch McConnell are going to agree to the wide swath of cuts that he’s holding out for as even Republicans have to bring pork back to their states, and by pork think the farm bill and all the goodies it provides to those states with Senate seats that the Republicans are desperate to flip in 2024.  Yesterday, Biden finally met with the Chuck, Mitch, Hakeem and Kevin quartet to talk about the debt ceiling. After the meeting Kevin, who refused to comment on the Trump verdict because he wasn’t up to speed and hadn’t vetted any talking points with Trump yet, reported that the sides were still miles apart.  Later Biden seemed to indicate that at least four of the leaders in the meeting, presumably one of whom was Senate minority leader Mitch M, recognized that a default would be unimaginably awful while also saying that he would consider allowing a claw back of some unspent COVID money so maybe, just maybe some progress is being made behind closed doors.  Kevin may soon have to decide between his Speakership and national solvency.  A hard call for Kevin.  Maybe if Biden promises to lend him a plane if he’s dethroned, he’ll cave?       

Fish Sticks: Trump may never pay, or at the very least will stall paying, Carroll the $5 million he now owes her, but it does appear that he’s topped up Melania’s account.  The “I really don’t care” former FLOTUS announced yesterday that she’s onboard with her hubs’ presidential redux ambitions and we know she doesn’t work solely for Manolos and Louboutins. Another person who appears to be quite flush is Swanson fish stick heir Tucker Carlson who seems to be willing to jeopardize the $25 million or so remaining on his contract with Fox. That contract which includes a non-compete runs until 2025, but Tucker has no interest in just twiddling his fingers or tanning his testicles until then. Yesterday, he announced, on Twitter, that he’s coming back soon, with a new version of his show, on Twitter, the only platform where he can tell the truth because the “so-called mainstream media is full of propaganda and lies.” Yesterday, Elon Musk, the owner of that “truth telling platform” retweeted some conspiracy theories claiming that last weekend’s neo-Nazi, swastika tattooed Allen, Texas mall shooter wasn’t really an anti-Semitic, white supremacist but that all those heinous social media postings attributed to him and uncovered by the “so-called mainstream media” and the deep state FBI were just Russian disinformation.  Carlson and Musk are two peas in a moldy, infected pod. Fox will try to prevent Carlson from reconstituting his show for as long as possible and Musk says it isn’t a done deal yet but when the show lands it will drive right wing traffic to Twitter, turning it into a Gettr, Rumble or Truth Social while finally driving a critical mass of Twitter’s mainstream users to one of the newer, emerging Twitter replacement platforms.  Check your BINGO card for a Twitter- Truth Social merger, maybe that’s next?

And:  DiFi is back in DC.  Maybe not compos mentis but if she can vote, who cares?