Jenny Nicholson- Star Wars Costumes

Uh, what’s wacky about this is that nobody else is committing (at this moment) in detail this specific what his testimony was today, likely because it’s embargoed. So I’m not going to vouch for it’s entire accuracy, but since not much of it is new in the sense of stuff we didn’t already know I’ll recommend it as a well organized recap of what happened when.

William Taylor testifies about deep-seated push for Ukraine quid pro quo
By ANDREW DESIDERIO and KYLE CHENEY, Politico
10/22/2019 10:03 AM EDT
Updated: 10/22/2019 01:37 PM EDT

Weeks before Taylor testified, it emerged that he had deep concerns that Trump was possibly withholding military aid to the eastern European nation to pressure Ukrainian leaders to launch the investigations — one of which centers on an unsubstantiated claim about the origins of Russia’s interference in the 2016 election.

Taylor, who replaced U.S. ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch after her unceremonious ouster by Trump in May, raised alarms with colleagues on Sept. 1 in a text message exchange released earlier this month by the three committees spearheading the inquiry.

“Are we now saying that security assistance and [White House] meeting are conditioned on investigations?” he wondered, referring to a potential meeting between Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.

Eight days later, Taylor’s concerns grew more urgent. In texts with two other diplomats, Taylor said it was “crazy” that military aid to Kiev was being blocked in order to force “help with a political campaign.” Nearly $400 million in military assistance to Ukraine was put on hold in late July by the White House but was released in September two weeks after POLITICO revealedbegun to slip.
…
Taylor had left government service for a senior position at the U.S. Institute of Peace but returned to the diplomatic corps in June after Yovanovitch’s ouster. She testified to lawmakers earlier this month that her removal was the result of a smear campaign engineered by Trump allies who portrayed her as disloyal for rebuffing Giuliani’s mission in Ukraine.

Taylor’s two correspondents in the text exchanges — former ambassador Kurt Volker and Gordon Sondland, the U.S. ambassador to the European Union — have already testified to impeachment investigators. They painted a portrait of a foreign policy that had been outsourced by Trump to his personal lawyer, Rudy Giuliani. Both described deep discomfort with the arrangement and worried that Giuliani’s freelancing — especially in a country fending off Russian aggression and battling systemic internal corruption — could undermine America’s years-long diplomatic efforts.

Taylor voiced those concerns in a July text exchange days before Trump called Zelensky, who was elected in the spring on a platform of fighting corruption.

“Gordon, one thing Kurt and I talked about yesterday was Sasha Danyliuk’s point that President Zelenskyy is sensitive about Ukraine being taken seriously, not merely as an instrument in Washington domestic, reelection politics,” he said. Danyliuk is likely a reference to Oleksandr Danyliuk, Ukraine’s former finance minister.

Sondland replied, “Absolutely, but we need to get the conversation started and the relationship built, irrespective of the pretext. I am worried about the alternative.”

After Trump canceled a late August trip to Poland, where he was to meet Zelensky, the ambassadors again fretted about building a relationship between Trump and Zelensky. Volker said he hoped Vice President Mike Pence would attend in Trump’s place and set up a White House visit for Zelensky. He also said he hoped Energy Secretary Rick Perry would join.

But Taylor, on Sept. 1, worried that the White House visit itself would be conditioned on Trump’s demand for Ukraine to investigate Biden as well as an unfounded conspiracy theory that Ukraine — not Russia — interfered in the 2016 election.

As Taylor’s concerns about a quid pro quo grew more explicit, Sondland sought to put him at ease.

“Bill, I believe you are incorrect about President Trump’s intentions. The President has been crystal clear no quid pro quo’s of any kind,” Sondland texted on Sept. 9, urging his colleagues to stop the text message exchanges.

Last week, Sondland told House investigators that he sent this message after speaking directly to Trump and that he could not speak to whether it was true.

So there you have. Pretty cut and dried. Unidicted Co-conspirator Bottomless Pinocchio solicited a Campaign contribution from a Foreign Government. That is illegal because it breaks Campaign Finance Law. It’s also Unconstitutional because it violates the Emoluments Clause. Unidicted Co-Conspirator withheld the property of the Government who’s favor he was soliciting. This is highly Illegal, it’s called Extortion. He did so with money duly authorized by the Congress, both Houses, in a lawfull appropriation authorized by his signature scrawl. This is Contempt of Congress. This is failure to uphold your Oath of Office to ensure the laws of the United States are faithfully executed.

Now- that’s enough really, but like everything else in this organization it’s corrupt to the bone and it’s hard to pull on a single thread without the whole damn thing starting to unravel. The main point is these are all incontrovertable facts, uncontested by Unindicted Co-conspirator Bottomless Pinocchio because he did them on the Public Record, often on Video Tape.

À La Recherche Du Temps Perdu is a Septology by Marcel Proust with the first part being Du Côté De Chez Swann which itself has 4 parts- Combray I, Combray II, and Noms De Pays: Le Nom which features both the famous Madeline incident and a self contained novella, Un Amour De Swann that features the romance of Charles Swann and Odette de Crécy.

If you read it in order it can easily seem an “endless collection of memories and philosophizing or melancholic episodes” and can be quite a chore, especially in the original French (didn’t really like The Forsyte Saga either) but the Madeline incident is one of the cultural touchstones that you need to know to appear educated. It turns out this nostalgic rambling is precipitated by the sight of a Madeline, basically a small sponge cake in the shape of a scallop. What makes it a work of art is the attention to detail and the philosophizing which is considered profound.

But Wait! There’s More!

It is certainly long. The initial part is generally considered 4 novels worth of content so- 4. The next part was À L’ombre Des Jeunes Filles En Fleurs, that’s 5. The 3rd part overall but the 6th and 7th in our count is Le Côté De Guermantes I and Le Côté De Guermantes I. Likewise Sodome et Gomorrhe, Part 4, is 2 books- Sodome Et Gomorrhe I and Sodome Et Gomorrhe II, Books 8 and 9. Parts 5 and 6 are collectively known as Le Roman d’Albertine but are universally counted separately, Part 5 (Book 10) is La Prisonnière and Part 6 (Book 11) is La Fugitive. The final volume (Part 7, Book 11), <(Le Temps Retrouvé, was written at the same time as Du Côté De Chez Swann but updated as additional material was added.

What? This isn’t the All England Summarizing Proust Competition?

My bad.

Our boys are back in town having been away during a week when much happened. They certainly had plenty of time to do something special. Let’s see what made the cut shall we?

Stephen

Seth

Was that memorable? I’m hungry. Think I’ll find me a cookie.

I sense a theme developing.

Jenny Nicholson- Costumes Nobody Wanted

Welcome to The Breakfast Club! We’re a disorganized group of rebel lefties who hang out and chat if and when we’re not too hungover we’ve been bailed out we’re not too exhausted from last night’s (CENSORED) the caffeine kicks in. Join us every weekday morning at 9am (ET) and weekend morning at 10:00am (ET) (or whenever we get around to it) to talk about current news and our boring lives and to make fun of LaEscapee! If we are ever running late, it’s PhilJD’s fault.

A Cold War crisis over Cuba leads to brink of nuclear war; Shah of Iran allowed into U.S. for treatment; ‘Pretty Boy’ Floyd killed; Last victim slain in D.C. sniper shootings; Cellist Pablo Casals dies.

Revolution is about the need to re-evolve political, economic and social justice and power back into the hands of the people, preferably through legislation and policies that make human sense. That’s what revolution is about. Revolution is not about shootouts.

Bobby Seale

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I used to be entirely more active on the Internet than I am today. I was Show Running about 5 or 6 regular features and writing about 8 or 9 posts a week (of course I used Sockpuppets, they were all labeled by function And identified as me, besides my and pyrhho’s sharp disagreement over the “One Diary A Day” Policy came shortly after I joined and was very public. kos knew exactly what I was doing and let me do it because he wanted the content.), and engaged in a fierce battle with Elise for the 6th or 7th spot on the most frequent commenter list over at dK, all in addition to my activities at DocuDharma as Admin and Managing Editor and the 14 or so (maybe more, I was very busy) pieces a week I contributed over here.

During almost 15 years of constant Trolling (I am as obnoxious and unrepentant as ever) I’ve never been doxxed. On certain levels I’m not really surprised, while I have my accomplishments in Meatspace I’m not exactly famous except among a particular crowd who are in fact obligated to stand and applaud when I am introduced entering a room. I own a Tux too, cheaper than real clothes.

But I’ve always been extremely careful not to link my Meatspace Identity to my blogging activity and I must admit that despite striving for a level of emotional honesty I’ve deliberately misled my audience about details that I feel would expose me. For instance it’s easy to guess that Lake House is on a lake somewhere in a remote part of New Hampshire however there are a lot of places like that. I’ve pretty much changed the names of the non-public people I write about and I elide dates that are not part of my public Internet record. Other times I’m an observer and not the protagonist or the other way round. They’re all true enough in the way that memoirs are.

I have mixed feelings about my policy of strict separation. On the one hand it’s prevented me from sharing some interesting stories that I think are too personal, on the other hand it’s enabled me to make a few observations about folks I know, and who know I write (because I’m fairly open and honest about it if I already know you), that they might not find represents them in the best light. I solace myself with the fact that either they are too polite to mention it or don’t care enough to read it.

Things I don’t do are Sock to feign approval of my policy positions or to hide my hand while making a pretense of friendship (or neutrality) and secretly undercutting people. You may not understand exactly how I’m insulting you, but you’ll get the message I’m sure and I always sign my work.

Now on to the strange and savage tale of the Mittster or as we on the Internet know him- Pierre Delecto.

‘C’est moi’: Mitt Romney admits to running secret Twitter account under the alias ‘Pierre Delecto’
By Allyson Chiu, Washington Post
October 21, 2019

For years, Pierre Delecto’s presence on Twitter largely went unnoticed. Operating a bare-bones account with the handle @qaws9876, the user’s limited activity revealed only an interest in politics — namely, supporting Sen. Mitt Romney (R-Utah). So when “Pierre Delecto” started trending Sunday on the social media platform, people were understandably confused.
…
On Sunday, Twitter users lost their collective minds when they learned that Pierre Delecto wasn’t a bot or a random Romney superfan, but an account run by the Republican senator himself. As Delecto, Romney, who has become one of President Trump’s most vocal GOP critics, used the account to like critical tweets about the president, while also occasionally defending himself against detractors. By early Monday, the unusual pseudonym was a trending moment on Twitter and had been mentioned in more than 47,000 tweets.

The Romney-Delecto connection was first made by Slate’s Ashley Feinberg, who went hunting for the secret account after the senator mentioned its existence to the Atlantic in a profile published Sunday. In a follow-up call with Atlantic reporter McKay Coppins, Romney confirmed that the account, which has since been made private, is his.

“C’est moi,” Romney said after being asked about Delecto.
…
Romney brought up his covert Twitter persona during an interview with the Atlantic as he discussed Trump lashing out at him on social media. The 72-year-old senator has condemned Trump for allegedly attempting to get officials in Ukraine to dig up dirt on former vice president Joe Biden and slammed the president’s decision to withdraw U.S. troops from Syria. In response, Trump has labeled Romney a “pompous ‘ass’” and called for his “impeachment,” though senators cannot be impeached.

According to Coppins, Romney shrugged off Trump’s insults and grabbed an iPad off his desk during the interview.

“He explained that he uses a secret Twitter account — ‘What do they call me, a lurker?’ — to keep tabs on the political conversation,” Coppins wrote.

The senator declined to name the account, noting only that he was “following 668 people,” listing journalists, late-night comedians and athletes, Coppins reported.

But those slim details were more than enough for Feinberg, who previously discovered that former FBI director James B. Comey was on Twitter using the alias “Reinhold Niebuhr.”

The process, Feinberg wrote, hinged on the assumption that “Romney, a known family man, would want to keep close tabs on his offspring.” Instead of targeting his family members with tens of thousands of followers, Feinberg homed in on a public account belonging to Allie Romney Critchlow, the senator’s oldest grandchild. Critchlow’s account “has just 481 followers, making digging through them an annoying-but-not-impossible feat,” Feinberg wrote.

Then, as Feinberg looked through Critchlow’s followers for users who “appeared to make an effort to conceal their real identities,” one caught her attention: Pierre Delecto.

A deeper dive into Delecto’s account found that it matched the description Romney gave to the Atlantic. The account was created in July 2011, shortly after Romney announced he was going to run for president, Slate reported. Beyond politicians, political reporters and pundits, Delecto follows late-night hosts Conan O’Brien, Jimmy Kimmel and Jimmy Fallon and athletes such as New England Patriots quarterback Tom Brady and former Green Bay Packers quarterback Brett Favre, according to Slate.

The clues pointing to Romney continued to add up, Feinberg wrote. The first user Delecto followed was Tagg Romney, the senator’s eldest son. The account later followed a number of people associated with Romney, such as advisers, aides and reporters who have covered him.

Another clue was Delecto’s Twitter activity. In the past eight years, Delecto has liked 257 tweets and only tweeted 10 times, all of which were replies to other Twitter users. According to Slate, Delecto liked nearly 70 tweets that either came directly from Romney’s official accounts or were posts quoting from those accounts.

Screen shots from the account show Delecto liking tweets that praised Romney’s criticism of Trump’s Syria decision. Delecto also liked tweets denouncing Trump, including one that read, “If this is a stable genius, I would hate to see what an unstable idiot would do,” and another criticizing the president for playing golf amid the Syria crisis.

But perhaps even more telling were Delecto’s sparse tweets, several of which defended Romney.

“Only Republican to hit Trump on [Mueller] report, only one to hit Trump on character time and again, so Soledad, you think he’s the one without moral compass?” Delecto wrote earlier this year in response to a critical tweet from journalist Soledad O’Brien, who had called out the senator for his “utter lack of a moral compass.”

The account’s most recent tweet, dated Saturday, appeared to be a tongue-in-cheek response to conservative radio host and blogger Erick Erickson applauding Romney for taking a public stand against Trump.

“Don’t read the comments, ever,” Delecto wrote.

Social media users quickly became obsessed with the bizarre moniker the senator chose for his alter ego.

As some praised Romney for the name, describing it as “exquisite” and “objectively terrific,” others were reminded of equally distinctive pseudonyms used by public figures in the past.
…
It remains unclear exactly how Romney decided on “Pierre Delecto,” but that didn’t stop eager Twitter sleuths from trying to figure it out.

People suggested that “Pierre” might come from Romney’s time spent as a missionary in France and that “Delecto” could be a reference to the Latin phrase “in flagrante delicto,” which translates to “while the crime is blazing,” according to Merriam-Webster.

More rules for Trolls- don’t use Twitter. Ever.

Don’t Follow, don’t Like, don’t Retweet

And don’t Tweet. I have an account, it’s under my name, I have exactly 1 Tweet.

“I have no thoughts I can express in 140 characters or less.”

Temporarily at North Lake to take the pulse (WMUR surprisingly empty of ads Sunday 11 pm, full tilt otherwise. Add Klobuchar and Sestak to Steyer and Gabbard in terms of spenders, the front runners are all personal appearances) where I had a big blow and power problems Friday. Took the weekend to tune the configuration but everything seems to be working now.

Unfortunately I also have a full agenda on what could be the only good weather this week so as Atrios says things will probably still suck, but I didn’t fall off the face of the earth either.

I think of the Mika and Joe show as both farce and tragedy. Scarborough is abusive ON THE AIR. The defense of Conservatism and the status quo that led us to what they now consider the death of the Republican Party and the Republic itself is darkly ironic in the classical sense (the audience perceives fatal character flaws that the protagonist does not which lead to their inevitable doom).

So they’re not hah hah funny but it’s a good enough summary of what’s happened since Friday.

Joker

Welcome to The Breakfast Club! We’re a disorganized group of rebel lefties who hang out and chat if and when we’re not too hungover we’ve been bailed out we’re not too exhausted from last night’s (CENSORED) the caffeine kicks in. Join us every weekday morning at 9am (ET) and weekend morning at 10:00am (ET) (or whenever we get around to it) to talk about current news and our boring lives and to make fun of LaEscapee! If we are ever running late, it’s PhilJD’s fault.

Thomas Edison perfects workable electric light; Anthrax scare claims first of two U.S. postal workers in Washington, DC; Britain wins Battle of Trafalgar; Actress and author Carrie Fisher born.

Everything is negotiable. Whether or not the negotiation is easy is another thing.

Carrie Fisher

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