The thing about “Trump Whisperer” Maggie Haberman is she is, at the same time, both way too close to Trumplandia AND a great journalist. So the Twitter liberals who defend her no matter what and the populist pitchfork crowd on Twittter who hate her both have vaild arguments.
Recently, however, Trumplandia “thought leaders” like Sean Hannity are freaking out about her, apparently out of the blue. It makes you think maybe she’s up to something that she’s asking questions about and they’re doing a pre-emptive freak out to prepare to base for whatever bombshell she’s about to drop.
What I HOPE she’s going to tell us is exactly why Trump was so absolutely desperate to remove 1/3 of America’s troops from Germany right before the 2020 election. I have yet to get any explanation for this directive on Trump’s part and, as best I can tell, the whole thing was off the books to begin with.
Trump just started demanding it happen, without going through any proper channels at all.
This was and is very suspicious.
At the time, I kept ranting about how I thought it was YET ANOTHER quid pro quo between Trumplandia and Russia — Trump removes a big chunk of our troops from Germany, the Russians hack into our election systems.
But…the Russians this go round strangely sat on their hands, even though Trump did everything in his power to give them a major geopolitical windfall in Europe.
But, I’m just a hayseed rube in the rural part of a flyover state. Though, if I guess that this is what Maggie Haberman is about to drop, well, I take back all my snarky comments about her being an “access journalist” and will want to buy her a beer.
Ms. Haberman, however, has to produce the goods. It could be whatever she’s looking into isn’t nearly as momentous as the scenario I’ve proposed. But I will note that my 2020 ranting about this topic is beginning to get just a tick of traffic out of the blue, as if other people, out there in the aether are thinking about what I was thinking.
The more I think about it, the less I care about Maggie Haberman and her closeness to Trump. Some of this comes from how pointless it all is — she’s member of the media elite. As such, any time some hayseed rube like me points out much of her reputation comes from TrumpWorld scoops netted through…uhh…access journalism, it’s just scoffed at by her fellow nattering nabobs of negativism as not understanding what journalism is.
One of the key issues in this meaningless media kerfuffle is how nebulous and vague it all is. Yes, Ms. Haberman is a good journalist who is well respected — and defended — by her peers. And, yet, it’s also self-evident that she’s close enough to TrumpWorld that the average person is within their rights to be a bit squeamish about it all. It’s like how if your best friend breaks up with their significant other, there may not be any hard and fast taboo about dating their ex, but you try to at least wait a little bit before jumping in the sack with them.
As such, Twitter people get angry about Ms. Haberman bringing down the latest morsel of TrumpWorld news and her Twitter liberal peers get VERY UPSET that anyone might not see such morsel as just another example of how great a reporter she is. So, it’s something of a stalemate.
So, I think I’m going to go back to cursing the bread and pondering if it’s going to be civil war or autocracy that we face between now and January 2025.
Let me begin by saying I never fucking let anything go. Maggie Haberman was weirdly mean to me on Twitter out of the blue and it still smarts. So, she’s become something of a running gag in my content. Anyway, for those of you playing the home game, for about four years, people like The New York Times‘ Maggie Haberman have told us in hushed tones what a fucking political mastermind Trump is.
How things have changed.
Welp, as of right this second, I ain’t seeing it, Ms. Haberman.
I mean, if Internet crank me can think of six different ways RIGHT NOW whereby Trump could stay in office as long as he likes and that ding-dong can’t even figure out one, well, it looks like he was just a very lazy right guy at the right historical place.
Trump is a lot like Hitler in the sense that he simply didn’t really do anything other than use the existing rot in his country’s political system to get what he wanted. Hitler was notoriously lazy. And, if you just look around, you can tell that Trump is pretty lazy, too.
So, about selling your soul to House Trump for access — you got what you wanted, Ms. Haberman, but you will forever be the journalistic equivalent of Leni Riefenstahl…in a sense. What I mean by this is when History judges Trump, she is likely to judge YOU too.
And I’ll freely admit that Ms. Haberman is a far, far better journalist than me. But you’re supposed to have a least a thin veneer of conflict between yourself and the people you report on.
Regardless, I’m just an anonymous Internet crank. No one listens to me, and they probably shouldn’t.
The only reason why I rant against MAGA asshats on this blog these days is I get the sense from my Web traffic that a small portion of my microscopic audience comes from MAGA people spooging their pants at my dire worst case scenario pontification. There’s not much I can do but just tell them to fuck off and eat shit. You’re such a partisan that you actually want Trump to put people like me in an ICE Camp and murder me then, well, what more can I say but fuck of you piece of shit.
One thing I’ve seen up-close and personal by using Periscope over the years is there are some pretty fucking insane MAGA people. The vast majority of Periscope users seem to be MAGA dead-enders who should they see Trump murder me in cold blood would lulz it and say “at least they don’t have an Obama phone.” After the “poor optics” of Mueller’s testimony to Congress, these asshats gloated over Trump’s victory. That Trump would use this political victory to turn around and do the exact same thing within 24 hours apparently was lost on them.
The thing about many MAGA shitheads is they confuse a lack of political will with a lack of crimes on Trump’s part. So, what I fear will happen is at some point between now and Thanksgiving, a Barr Report will be released which somehow manages to implicate people like John Brennan in some sort of far-reaching conspiracy involving Ukraine, the Democrats and Crowstrike. These MAGA loyalists will cackle as Maggie Haberman or Chris Wallace say politically impeachment is dead in the water and, by the way, John Brennan, call your lawyer.
Given how dumb the conspiracy that Trump apparently believes actually is, what specifically the Barr Report will say is a struggle for me to imagine. But he’s going full speed ahead with it. The point is to so muddle the conversation about impeachment that we’re all debating the merits — or lack thereof — of the Barr Report and not all the very public criming Trump has done. So, really, Barr probably doesn’t have to do all that much. Any conversation that House Republicans are having about the bullshit findings of the Barr Report is a conversation they’re not having about Trump being criminally incompetent.
Or, more broadly, I think the issue for Twitter liberals is the Republican Party is SUCH a bad faith actor on an existential level that they are going to fight dirty. They are going to lie. They are going to cheat. They are going to get so wrapped up in their overwrought, overheated messaging of the MAGA base that they completely and totally lose sight that some idiot, somewhere will take their messaging seriously AND literally and someone who opposes House Trump is going to get hurt. I really, really, really, hope I’m wrong on this one. I want to beat House Trump on strictly a political level.
I honestly don’t know what’s going to happen at this point. There’s no ready endgame for impeachment. It could still go either way. Things have stabilized a little bit in the last few days, enough for me there may be some pretty big “HOLY SHIT” moments between now and the end of the year. What they might be, I have no idea.
But I am beginning to think Trump might not be as thrilled about being impeached by the House as Maggie Haberman would have me to believe in her soothing tweets she writes on this matter. I would go so far as to suggest that if, despite the Barr Report, Trump is still in danger of even being impeached, some pretty dark shit is going to happen because Republicans will suddenly realize what has always happened in the past is not going to happen this time.
Trump is going to, in fact, face some political consequences for being a moronic tyrant.
I just don’t know. I just don’t know how things are going to work out. Trump is apparently going to release another “transcript” on Tuesday (tomorrow) and that could be a series of FUD mindfucking on the part of House Trump to throw political roadblocks in the way of impeachment.
If Barr does fancy himself Q, then there will be two potential reactions. Either his bullshit works — again — or it doesn’t. If it doesn’t, then buckle up. House Trump is going to flip the fuck out in some pretty astonishing ways.
We have to begin this gut wrenching discussion with the obvious — in real terms, if what I fear might happens, happens, it will be one of the biggest political fuck ups on the part of an American party since the end of the Civil War. There simply is no way to weasel your way out of it — if there’s any type of anti-impeachment violence, Republicans — and Trump — are ultimately going to be blamed.
But, let’s move forward.
The issue right now is I just can’t speculate what the anti-impeachment violence will be. It could be anything from harm of some sort befalling the Whistleblower to a car bomb exploding somewhere like Times Square. But let’s go with something simple — the Whistleblower’s identity becomes so well know within the batshit insane MAGA echo chamber that someone decides to hurt him.
And, for the sake of argument, let’s say this happens sooner rather than later so Trump still has his marbles. But maybe it happens late enough that while there isn’t a direct link between Trump’s Twitter ranting and what happens, it’s pretty clear he established the conditions for it to happen. So things are still a bit nebulous.
The first thing would be the entire nation would come to a screeching halt for about 24 hours. For just around 24 hours, the nation would for once be on the same page: HOLY SHIT.
But this wouldn’t last very long. Once we began to process what happened, the two sides would be at each other’s throats again. MAGA Republicans would trade their hysterical rhetoric over the Whistleblower for hysterical rhetoric about how this unprecedented example of political violence is absolute proof that we “have to let the people decide” in 2020 instead continuing with the impeachment process.
In reality, this would be more about simply punting the debate over the criminal incompetence of Trump back into the political sphere and out of the “OH MY GOD, TRUMP GOT SOMEONE MURDERED” sphere. The usual suspects would pop out to message the base or carry water for House Trump. Hugh Hewitt would say Democrats are to blame because they should not have attempted to impeach Trump in the first place. House Republicans would scream at the top of their lungs that Rep. Adam Schiff should be charged as an accessory to murder. The New York Times‘ Maggie Haberman would coo that Trump was a political genius for getting someone murdered.
Now, remember, this is just the first 24 hours. The whole issue of a funeral would have to be addressed. Then there would likely be an epic battle over who would speak at the funeral and why. My personal belief is that the populist rage of Twitter would burst into a supernova when the shock wore off and people realized what Trump’s hysterical and bombastic rhetoric had done.
Remember, the reason why Trump is so very, very stupid on a political level is right now the true backbone of his support is simple apathy. The vast majority of the populace is not on Twitter and is too busy raising their kids and paying their mortgage to care, in real terms, what Trump may or may not have done. The moment they a shocked out of their stupor by such un-American political violence, all bets are off.
I mean, the only thing I can think of that would possible force the hand of the living ex presidents would be something like anti-impeachment violence. Say what you will about Bill Clinton’s personal life, but I suspect he would be able to give a barn burner of a eulogy in such a situation.
So, the moment the funeral was over, Trump — who is completely devoid of human empathy — would go back to his old bullshit games. But I think his political fate would be sealed. While MAGA House Republicans would continue to caterwaul, in the end, Trump would be convicted by the Senate.
I still do not think anything like this is going to happen. It’s just so out of the American experience for there to be political violence. And, really, while I do think it’s inevitable that the Whistleblower will be “kavanaughed” by Republicans with great gusto as impeachment proceedings progress, I still am not prepared to accept in real terms that anyone on their side will go beyond that.
This is how Trumplandia is governed. Shelton Bumgarner
by Shelton Bumgarner @bumgarls
I had a minor tempest-in-a-teapot run-in on Twitter with The New York Time’s Trump Whisperer Maggie Haberman. She sniffed – in so many words — that I was a hayseed rube in a flyover state who did not know how REAL journalism was practiced. It says a lot about my personal relationship to power I have a lingering resentment over this little minor event. It’s not like I have any recourse. She’s got fame, ACCESS, power and the respect of her peers.
All I got is a novel I’m trying to write.
Anyway, the whole point of that was to bring up something I feel Haberman gets so very, very, very wrong about Trump. Trump is a doofus. He’s a moron. Something is mentally wrong with him and he lacks any sense of empathy. As Benjamin Wittes of the Lawfare blog quipped once, Trump’s “ambivalence is only mitigated by his incompetence.” Trump won the political lottery of a lifetime. Someone like him was probably going to pop up between 2016 and 2024 do to macro socio-economic trends in the United States. Trump just happened to the would-be president of Sharknato who happened to jump in at just the moment.
You could, of course, make the case that Trump got a little help from his Russian friends along the way. But in real terms, just won because of dumb fucking luck.
The Dear Leader
Haberman and her fellow access journalists simply can not process that Trump is simply a doofus — nothing more than a deranged version of Being There’s Chauncey Gardner. They probably feel that if they accept that Trump is just a very lucky Right Wing celebrity Twitter troll then their own investment in their person ascent to power is somehow invalidated. They have a vested interest in making me believe that Trump’s latest clusterfuck is really him subtly messing white women ages 24-35 in the exurbs of Phillie.
There’s no there there when it comes to Trump’s acumen. Yeah, he’s an adept marking and branding guy. And he has a celebrity’s knack for knowing an intended audience. But to suggest he has some sort of native political acumen is an insult to my intelligence.
One need go no further than what’s going on at this very moment. Trump is such a fucking moron that he not only waited 24 hours to do the exact same thing that Mueller’s poor “optics” in front of Congress pardoned him for, he bragged about it on the very phone call! Then was so clueless that instead of slow walking the release of the damaging information until sometime early next year, he releases it so House Democrats had time to find their backbones and start the impeachment process with time to spare before the ever-critical 2020 primaries.
Trump is so stupid on a political level that instead of taking the L with impeachment and laughing all the way to acquittal in the Senate, he is actively doing everything in his power to produce the conditions for his fate being decided by extra-political means. By this I mean anti-impeachment violence. Of course, that problem goes hand in hand with the real likelihood he’s going to snap on a mental level at some point during the impeachment process.
So, Maggie Haberman, spare me the ever-so-serious tweets about Trump’s fucking political genius. He’s a doofus and your willingness to trade access for any semblance of journalistic independence is enough to make me smirk whenever I hear one of your peers tout your journalistic abilities.
On a strictly political level, I feel confident in saying Trump is safe. He will be impeached by the House, acquitted by the Senate and be given yet ANOTHER political pardon for him to instantly abuse. He’ll grow far more brazen. He’ll pardon everyone he needs to, get Barr to indict an array of his political opponents, get Russians to directly hack into our election systems or get some MAGA plutocrat to bribe Electors as need be.
Lulz!
But there are some known unknowns I can’t possibly case out.
Trump’s Mental State He’s already hysterical and he hasn’t even been formally impeached yet. So, there’s at least a reasonable chance his mental state could explode, not implode. He’ll grow transactional with his Twitter feed, especially in regards to the Whistleblower. Things may get so bad that it’s not the politics of impeachment that is Trump’s downfall, it’s that he’s completely bonkers and the 25th Amendment is a currently a dead letter.
The Fate Of The Whistleblower While it might be an immediate goal of Congressional Republicans to out the Whistlebower so they can make impeachment about him and his motives, it’s reasonable to believe that will only work with the 35% MAGA base. Everyone else will be able to process that even though the Whistleblower has some professional connection to both Biden and Susan Rice, Trump still, in fact, did crimes against the Constitution that warrant his removal from office. This is really tricky, given that on an institutional level The New York Times continues to carry water for House Trump. (See, also, Maggie Haberman.) So, maybe it’ll work. But maybe it won’t. Who knows. The fate of the Republic hinges on the answer to this question, but lulz. Optics! The Whistleblower is murdered in cold blood by a MAGA fuckwit because of a throwaway line by Trump, then the criminal fascist Republican Party will in the position to finally have to defend Trump directly leading to someone’s murder. They’ll do it, too. They will win the news cycle, but there’s a good chance that their argument — that we have to end impeachment because people are dying — may not actually be as effective as they believe.
General Rat-Fucking By Republicans Republicans are criminal fascists. They don’t believe in either liberal democracy or civil society. They only believe in power and making as much money as possible to the detriment to the nation as a whole. Barr could hand down bogus criminal referrals at any moment. All they want is to maintain power. They are willing to destroy everything to further that goal. Nothing is off limits. This will grow ever more so as there fucking moron of a leader grows more and more hysterical.
It’s because of these factors that I simply can’t case out the impeachment endgame. If this was any other person as president, I would resign myself to darkness finally falling across the land. I would assume I’d die at some point in Trump’s second term at an ICE Camp with a bullet to the back of the head. While that still may happen, we’re still at the beginning of the process.
I was going to shut up about this until I saw someone praise Maggie Haberman “habering” me on Twitter. “Bravo, Maggie,” is the exact quote. The issue is you can “huzzah, grrl power” all you want to, access journalism still sucks.
But why?
Apparently, Ms. Haberman’s argument is by definition journalism requires access and so, well, fuck you. But let me be honest — Ms. Haberman is no better than Trump for putting me on blast to make her point. Punching down is never cool, no matter who you are. So, in a sense, my pique is more about her flex on me than it is the facts. I find that Blue Check Nattering Nabobs have started to do this more often. For some reason, they want to do it to me. This is grating because generally — but not always — they put me on blast after having made a snap, inaccurate judgement about what my tweet was about.
Instead of getting information the easy way by coddling Trump — or whomever — maybe Ms. Haberman should be willing to burn her bridges in the bowels of House Trump if it means she’s able to be more critical of the would-be Thousand Year Trump.
She has her argument and I have mine. She’s powerful, I’m not. I’ll let you make up your own mind. I believe we’re in a crisis. It’s time for the press to forgo cozy relations with the criminal fascist Trump Adminstration and be patriots, to think about the best interests of the nation first.
All I can say is I love to write and fairly cogent in my rhetoric. What’s more, I’m not Ben Shapiro. I actually am working in good faith. And, really, it wouldn’t even be an issue if Ms. Haberman was a bit more polite to in her efforts to defend herself.
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