Nerd Balls ✡️🌻✡️🌻✡️🌻

Trump Trials:  Last week, National Enquirer’s former publisher David Pecker confirmed that his “catch and kill” arrangement with Trump was about aiding Trump’s run for the presidency by squelching stories about Trump’s affairs and pushing mendacious slime about his political opponents rather than protecting Melania and Ivanka’s delicate ears from learning about his extramarital dalliances. Following Pecker’s testimony and cross examination, prosecutors called their next witnesses, Rhona Graff and Gary Farro.  Graff, who acknowledged that her lawyers are being compensated by the Trump Organization, was Trump’s long term personal assistant.  She confirmed that both porn star Stormy and longer-term Playmate girlfriend Karen McDougal’s contact information were in Trump’s personal phone list, an indication that despite Trump’s assertions that he didn’t know either woman, he clearly did. Graff also confirmed that she’d seen Stormy when she visited Trump Tower to talk to Trump about being a contestant on Celebrity Apprentice.  Gary Farro who was Michael Cohen’s long-term banker at the now defunct First Republic Bank helped Cohen establish Essential Consultants, LLC, the special purpose entity used to funnel the “hush”  money payments to Stormy.  Graff and Farro’s testimony was less sensational than Pecker’s since they weren’t there to titillate but to contribute to the fact pattern at the heart of the case, that Trump manufactured false business records to hide his sexcapades from the electorate in the run up to the 2016 election.  Michael Cohen will say as much when he’s called to testify but because of his sketchy and sometimes mendacious past prosecutors need corroboration for what he’s expected to say which is why Farro and Graff’s testimony was essential.  The Court isn’t in session today so there won’t be any more testimony until tomorrow when Farro is expected back on the stand.  We’re still waiting for presiding Judge Juan Merchan to rule on whether Trump should be penalized for his earliest violations of his gag order, not to be confused with some more of his violations which are the subject of a hearing scheduled to take place on Thursday, nor his continued violations, like the one in which he made some comments about nice guy David Pecker this weekend.  The way things are going there may be a hearing on gag order violations each week of this trial, the question is less about Trump violating the order and more about what Judge Merchan is willing to do about it.   

Politics Unusual:  Mitch McConnell still thinks that Trump is a creep, holds him responsible for January 6, and doesn’t believe that he should be immune from prosecution but none of that will stop him from voting for the Republican candidate come November. Like Bill Barr, he’s all in because taxes, migrants, social policy and maybe inflation, which is way lower in the US than anywhere else.  Add Florida Governor Ron DeSantis to that list. Word is that he and Trump made up this weekend at the Mar a Lago omelet bar with Ronnie D promising to help Trump tap into his bigly money donors. No word yet on Nikki Haley but if this pattern holds, she could jump on board too despite all those awful things she’s said about him though I hope I am wrong about that. However, it doesn’t look like RFK Jr will be invited to partake of eggs slathered in ketchup with a chug of Diet Coke anytime soon.  Over the weekend, Trump went on a Truth Social tirade against the nepo guy, calling him a “Democrat Plant” put in place to help “Crooked Joe.”  Trump went on to say that he’d vote for Biden before he’d vote for that far left RFK and his “Chief Funder” VP partner.  Sounds like Trump has seen some polling showing RFK pulling more votes from him than from Biden.  Who really knows, but it’s clear that RFK has the potential to be a spoiler, even he acknowledges that he knows he can’t win, he just wants to throw the election into chaos. Calling him a “dangerous conspiracy theorist and science denier” a dozen environmental groups including those RFK previously worked with have come out against his presidential run saying his “agenda would be a disaster for our communities and the planet.” Not a good sign when your family and the people you used to work with all think you’re dangerous and have gone over the edge. SNL’s Colin Jost won’t be dining on eggs anytime soon either.  At Saturday night’s White House Correspondents dinner also known as the Nerd Ball, he made it clear that he’s Team Decency and by decency he means Biden.  He’s also as baffled and scared as the rest of us about the polls that indicate that the outcome of the election is anyone’s guess.  

Fog: College campuses are still a mess and judging by the “updates” I received from two of those I attended, a thoughtful one from the University of Rochester Hillel and a worthless one from Columbia University’s Alumni Send Cash Crowd, things remain turbulent though in Rochester as opposed to NYC, the situation seemed more toned down.  Hamas and/or their designees continue to hold the hostages hostage though they did release two more proof of life videos.  To be clear, they didn’t release hostages, just videos.  Negotiations for the release of some though not all of the hostages in exchange for a ceasefire continue.  Videos don’t count, only releases do. And calling for the eradication of all Jews should not be tolerated anywhere, on college campuses, city streets, or outside of White House dinners. That’s not protesting for a cause, that’s just unbridled hate.     

#BringThemAllHomeNow