Thursday Reads: Checks and Balances Are Coming!
Posted: January 3, 2019 Filed under: morning reads, U.S. Politics 59 Comments
Good Afternoon!!
Here she comes again! Today Nancy Pelosi will take the Speaker’s gavel from Paul Ryan, and Trump will begin to realize that he can no longer treat Congress as his doormat. Pelosi isn’t going to cringe in fear of Trump’s tantrums like Ryan did. She knows exactly what she’s doing and Trump’s tweets and rants will roll off her back as she works toward the restoration of our democracy. Trump won’t know what hit him.
I remember very clearly the day when Pelosi announced that “impeachment is off the table” back in 2006 when George W. Bush was president. I was furious. But she’s not saying that today.
The Today Show: Nancy Pelosi says she won’t rule out indictment, impeachment for Trump.
Incoming House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said she wouldn’t rule out President Trump being indicted while in office, describing the topic as “an open discussion.”
During an exclusive interview with TODAY’s Savannah Guthrie, the House Democratic leader said it’s possible that special counsel Robert Mueller could seek an indictment against the sitting president, despite Justice Department guidelines against such action….
Nancy Pelosi with JFK
“I think that that is an open discussion. I think that is an open discussion in terms of the law,” she said, on the eve of reclaiming her former title as speaker of the House. Pelosi will become the first lawmaker in recent history to hold that office twice when the 116th Congress convenes Thursday….
Although Democrats have discussed the idea of impeaching the president, Pelosi said it would not benefit the country to pursue one. But she wouldn’t rule the idea out either.
“We have to wait and see what happens with the Mueller report. We shouldn’t be impeaching for a political reason, and we shouldn’t avoid impeachment for a political reason. So we’ll just have to see how it comes,” she said.
She said Trump isn’t getting his ridiculous border wall either.
“No, no. Nothing for the wall. We’re talking about border security,” she said. “There is no amount of persuasion he can do to say to us, ‘We want you to do something that is not effective, that costs billions of dollars.’ That sends the wrong message about who we are as a country.”
“This is the Trump shutdown, through and through. That’s why he has proudly taken, in his view, proudly taken ownership of it. There’s no escaping that for him,” Pelosi said. “That doesn’t mean we take any joy in the fact that there is a Trump shutdown. We want government to open.”
Pelosi remains the first woman ever to be Speaker of the House. From Politico’s somewhat patronizing piece on Pelosi: The survivor: Nancy Pelosi makes history — again.
The past seven speakers of the House have lost their majority, been forced out by their own colleagues, or stepped down amid personal scandal. One of them — Nancy Pelosi — now has a second chance to rewrite her legacy.
The past seven speakers of the House have lost their majority, been forced out by their own colleagues, or stepped down amid personal scandal. One of them — Nancy Pelosi — now has a second chance to rewrite her legacy.
On Thursday, the 78-year-old Pelosi will be the first person in more than six decades, since the legendary Texas Democrat Sam Rayburn, to return to the speaker’s chair after losing it. She will be surrounded by children as she does so, a replay of an iconic moment from her January 2007 swearing-in ceremony as the first female speaker in history.
Pelosi with George W. Bush
But Pelosi will also tie Rayburn on another front by becoming the oldest person ever elected speaker and the oldest to hold the post, a testament to both her staying power and the fact that her return engagement to the speakership will be limited.
Unlike her original go-round as speaker from 2007 to 2011, when the California Democrat was at her most powerful, Pelosi will face a whole new set of challenges during the 116th Congress — a fractious caucus full of upstart progressives who want to move an ambitious agenda; the unpredictable President Donald Trump, who has greeted Pelosi’s return to power with an ongoing government shutdown; a determined, experienced foe in Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), who runs his own chamber with a tight grip; and self-imposed term limits on her speakership of four years.
All that, however, shouldn’t diminish the scale of what Pelosi has done. She survived a challenge to her leadership after a 63-seat wipeout in the 2010 tea party wave. She faced more Democratic complaints in 2014 and 2016 — the latter heightened by the Democratic despair over Trump’s victory. Throughout this latest election cycle, moderate Democratic incumbents and candidates warned they wouldn’t vote for Pelosi for speaker and a band of rebels sought to derail her return to the speaker’s chair.
In the end, Pelosi overcame it all.
“I’m telling you what I know and what I have seen. … Nancy Pelosi is in charge of the Democratic Caucus, and to believe otherwise is perilous for an opponent,” said Rep. Emanuel Cleaver of Missouri, who has occasionally differed with Pelosi.
“She understands legislation down to the minute details and can flip you back and forth in a negotiation session based on her knowledge, skill and experience,” Cleaver noted. “And I’m kind of an independent person, so I’m not necessarily in her camp.”
Elle also gave an interview to Elle yesterday: Nancy Pelosi on Her New Role, Trump’s Manhood, and That Red Max Mara Coat.
Born in Baltimore with five older brothers and a father who served as mayor, Pelosi became the first woman to ever lead a political party when she was elected Democratic Leader of the House in 2002. In 2007, she made history again as the first female Speaker of the House. Famous for being a fundraising juggernaut—she pulled in over a hundred million dollars for the Democratic party last year—Pelosi has also proven herself to be a formidable politician, having been on the national stage longer than some of the incoming Congress members have been alive.
When Pelosi is sworn in, 106 women of all races, sexual orientations, and walks of life will join her in Congress. Many of them have voiced their concerns that a 78-year-old, wealthy white woman who currently lives in San Francisco may not be the best representative for all Americans. Just days before her holiday break with family (she has five grown children) and the partial government shutdown, Pelosi spoke with ELLE about the shifting face of the party, the prospect of impeaching President Trump, and the fiery coat that spawned a thousand memes.
Nancy Pelosi during her first run for the House in Maryland
ELLE: Diving right in here, you’ve been cast as a villain. There are Democrats who won their elections by saying they wouldn’t vote for you. Republicans have spent enormous sums to vilify you. What does it feel like to be hated in that way?
Nancy Pelosi: I don’t necessarily feel hated. I feel respected. They wouldn’t come after me if I were not effective. I consider myself a master legislator. Republicans fear me for that, but also because I am a successful fundraiser, enabling our candidates to have the resources they need to win. So from a political standpoint they have to take me down, and from an official standpoint they have to take me down. But I’m spending more time talking about it right now than I ever have thinking about it.
ELLE: Before her passing, California congresswoman Sala Burton anointed you as her successor. Because of Burton’s support, one of your biographers wrote that you are “Exhibit A for the case that the only way for women to reach the top echelon in politics is through the committed assistance of other women.” Do you agree with that?
NP: Absolutely. I say to women all the time, “This is not a zero-sum game. One woman’s success is not subtracting from anybody else’s opportunity. It’s the reverse. Every woman’s success helps other women.” Imagine, Sala Burton, a member of Congress, deciding she was going to encourage me to run? That was remarkable. Usually it’s men to men. Because of her encouragement, I ran, and I won. Women helping women—people are now seeing the magnified impact of that, and it’s a beautiful thing to behold.
Read the rest at Elle.
Alexandra Pelosi with her mother Nancy Pelosi
Pelosi’s daughter spoke about her mother on CNN this morning. The Washington Post: Nancy Pelosi will ‘cut your head off and you won’t even know you’re bleeding,’ daughter Alexandra Pelosi says.
“How does she approach meetings with President Trump, A, and B, just what are your feelings about this person who you know quite well becoming speaker of the House for a second time?” host John Berman asked during an interview Wednesday on CNN’s “New Day.”
The younger Pelosi responded: “She’ll cut your head off and you won’t even know you’re bleeding.” [….]
“No one ever won betting against Nancy Pelosi,” she continued. “She’s persevered. You’ve got to give her credit.” [….]
Alexandra Pelosi…hailed her mother as someone who “knows what she’s doing — and that should make you sleep at night, knowing that at least somebody in this town knows what they’re doing.”
Pelosi has been busy hiring staff to help her deal with Trump. Vanity Fair: “A Formidable Opponent for Anyone: Pelosi Hires Her Legal Talent to Take on Trump.
As stained coffee cups and empty takeout containers pile up on the National Mall in Washington, D.C., and Donald Trump points fingers at the Democrats, Nancy Pelosi has been quietly preparing to assume her role as the president’s chief antagonist. During the reprieve between Christmas and the New Year, the California lawmaker announced the appointment of Justice Department veteran Doug Letter as the new general counsel for the House of Representatives. Though Pelosi’s decision was met with little fanfare, Letter will be the linchpin in the oversight nightmare that House Democrats are preparing for Trump and his administration, circa tomorrow. “It is fanciful to think that there won’t be a substantial oversight function served by the new House. There are just so many issues that have gone without scrutiny,” Robert Loeb, a D.C. appellate lawyer, told me. It will be Letter’s job to inform Pelosi and other lawmakers “what their options are and what the risks and costs are” when it comes to leveraging Congress’s oversight authority.
Democrats have not been coy about their plans to exhume the scandals their Republican colleagues buried during the first two years of Trump’s presidency. As I previously reported, House Democrats have been treating January 3—the day Pelosi takes the gavel from Paul Ryan—like D-Day, with teams of staffers already lined up to open investigations into the president’s deputies, associates, and businesses. The anticipated lines of inquiry run the gamut—child separation at the border; Trump-Russia collusion; the F.B.I. investigation into the sexual misconduct allegations against Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh; White House security clearances; emoluments; the list goes on. And regardless of the specific rabbit holes that House Democrats choose to go down, protracted federal court battles seem assured. As general counsel, Letter would be the point person in any litigation brought on behalf of Pelosi and the House.
To former colleagues, Letter seems poised for the challenge. “For the last dozen years, I’ve litigated against Doug and with him at my side in some of the most consequential appeals in our lifetimes. Every time, he has been brilliant, professional, nonpartisan, and balanced,” Neal Katyal, who served as acting solicitor general at the Justice Department under Barack Obama, told me. “There is no one more experienced, and no one better suited to this job.” Letter has signaled as much, himself. “I am eager to apply my litigation experience as I take on the challenges and opportunities that come with the important position,” he said in a statement about his appointment.
Click on the Vanity Fair link to read the rest.
What else is happening? What stories have you been following?
Tuesday Reads: Happy New Year!!
Posted: January 1, 2019 Filed under: morning reads, U.S. Politics 35 Comments
People waiting in the rain to see the fireworks on First Night in Boston.
Welcome to 2019!!
The madman in the White House is up and tweeting nonsense in all caps, and the U.S. Strategic Command tweeted and then deleted a “joke” about dropping bombs. Welcome to 2019 everyone!
NBC News: U.S. Strategic Command deletes New Year’s Eve joke about dropping something ‘bigger.’
U.S. Strategic Command made an unexpected joke in a now-deleted Twitter post about American military might on Monday in its New Year’s Eve message.
Noting the “big” Times Square ball drop celebration at midnight, the unified command’s account tweeted, “if ever needed, we are #ready to drop something much, much bigger.”
The joke was followed by a slickly produced video of stealth jets with the words “stealth, ready, and lethal” flashing across the screen. The tweet encouraged followers to “watch to the end!” If you do, you’ll see two bombs released from a plane, followed by several massive explosions.
The tweet was later deleted, and a subsequent tweet from the unified command’s account said the first was “in poor taste & does not reflect our values. We apologize.”
Not funny. Who are these people?? Read more excuses at the link.
Thank goodness, we only have two more days to wait until the Democrats take over the House. The Washington Post: House Democrats ready strategy to reopen government, deny Trump wall money.
Democrats will take control of the House on Thursday with a stark challenge to President Trump, voting on legislation that would fund the federal government while denying Trump the money he has demanded to build a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border.
GOP leaders in the Senate said they would support only a proposal that has the president’s backing. And without additional wall money, the Democrats’ offer is unlikely to break the stalemate that has shuttered large parts of the federal government since Dec. 22.
But the strategy Democrats announced Monday would usher in a new era of divided government in Washington with a dare to Trump, aimed at forcing him and Senate Republicans to take their deal or prolong a partial government shutdown.
House Democrats plan to use their new majority to vote through measures that would reopen nearly all of the shuttered federal agencies through the end of September, at funding levels Senate Republicans have previously agreed to. Those spending bills contain scores of priorities and pet projects for lawmakers on both sides of the aisle.
The Democratic proposal holds out one exception: The Department of Homeland Security, which oversees border security, would keep its current level of funding, with no new money for a border wall. The plan would also extend the department’s budget only through Feb. 8, allowing Democrats to revisit funding for key parts of Trump’s immigration policy in a month.
Trump has already rejected the plan. We’ll see if Republicans in the Senate want to anger their constituents by going along with him.
Meanwhile, a federal employee union is suing Trump over his government shutdown. Politico reports:
The nation’s largest union representing federal employees filed a lawsuit Monday afternoon against the government, seeking damages for the roughly 400,000 federal employees forced to work without pay during the partial government shutdown.
The two plaintiffs — Justin Tarovisky and Grayson Sharp — work for high-security prisons the Justice Department runs. The American Federation of Government Employees argues that both plaintiffs have dangerous jobs and have been forced to work overtime without pay.
AFGE represents roughly 700,000 federal employees and has challenged the Trump administration over a number of issues, including major restructuring at the Education Department.
J. David Cox, AFGE’s national president, said forcing federal employees to work without pay “is nothing short of inhumane.”
“Positions that are considered ‘essential’ during a government shutdown are some of the most dangerous jobs in the federal government,” he said in a statement. “They are front-line public safety positions, including many in law enforcement, among other critical roles. Our intent is to force the government and the administration to make all federal employees whole.”
AFGE said the federal government is still calculating pay it owes to federal workers for the 16-day shutdown in October 2013.
A GOP representative suggested that if Trump wants his wall so badly, he should pay for it himself. Roll Call: GOP Rep. Walter Jones Suggests Trump Pay for Part of His Wall.
Rep. Walter Jones
Rep. Walter Jones is worried that President Donald Trump’s proposed border wall will add to the federal debt — so worried, in fact, that he’s proposing the president pony up some of his own money for the wall.
“If Mexico isn’t going to be made to pay for a wall, that means funds must be found internally,” the North Carolina Republican said in a statement Friday.
“As a wealthy man, the president might consider pledging some of his own funds as well [to help build the wall],” Jones said. “Whatever it takes, just so long as we don’t add to the debt that is bankrupting our great country.”
Trump may have his crazy base of around 30% of the electorate, but Americans appear to be dumping Fox News for MSNBC these days. The Washington Post’s media maven Eric Wemple: MSNBC is surging.
MSNBC host Rachel Maddow can speak at length on many topics. The whims and demographics of her cable-news audience, however, are not among them. “I think I may just be lucky that we’re at a time in the news cycle where there is an appetite for that kind of explanatory work,” Maddow told the Erik Wemple Blog back in the early months of the Trump administration, when her eponymous nightly program was posing a ratings threat to the top dogs over at Fox News.
That threat has turned into a full-time menace. Whereas “The Rachel Maddow Show” several years ago finished in the double digits in annual rankings of cable-news programs, it’s now in the tastemaking vanguard. Over the first three quarters of 2018, Maddow sat in between No. 1 Sean Hannity and No. 3 Tucker Carlson in the cable-news elite. Her show finished fourth for all of 2017.
MSNBC bragged that they were number 1 for the week of December 17.
And indeed: Fox News pointed out that MSNBC’s historic win for the “week of Dec. 17” included only Monday-through-Friday numbers — and excluded the weekend, which put Fox News in its normal place: No. 1. Another consideration: Hannity was on vacation that week.
Caveats noted. Still, MSNBC has something to crow about. Its news programming is sharp, energetic and relentless. Its anchors are prepared. Its correspondents are on the scene.
Read more Wemple caveats at the WaPo, but still Rachel is pulling viewers with her intelligent analysis of the news and her focus on the Russia investigation.
Speaking of that investigation, Robert Mueller hasn’t been slowed down by the government shutdown or the holiday season. Yesterday federal prosecutors filed a sealed status update on cooperating witness Sam Patten, an associate of Konstantin Kilimnik and Paul Manafort: Lobbyist who got Trump Inaugural tickets for Ukrainian still having secret dealings with prosecutors.
Washington lobbyist W. Samuel Patten, who has been one of the most low-profile but potentially significant cooperators in the special counsel’s office investigation, appears to still be involved with sensitive aspects of Robert Mueller and the Justice Department’s work.
In a court filing Monday meant to update a judge on his case and whether he should proceed to sentencing, prosecutors revealed nothing. Instead, they filed the entire status update under seal, giving no public reason for keeping details of his case private.
The secret court filing Monday comes in contrast to several disclosures prosecutors previously made about Patten’s admitted crimes — especially related to him procuring Trump inauguration tickets for a Ukrainian client — and the related lobbying work for Ukrainians done by former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort.
Patten previously admitted to procuring Trump inauguration tickets illegally for a Ukrainian oligarch and a Russian closely associated with Paul Manafort. Patten was a corporate lobbyist in business with the former Trump campaign chairman’s longtime Russian associate Konstantin Kilimnik, whom the Mueller team has asked about in recent months and accused of having ties to the Russian intelligence group that allegedly hacked the Democrats in 2016.
Patten agreed to cooperate with the Mueller investigation and other Justice Department actions before Manafort pleaded guilty to criminal charges in September.
Here’s a little background on Patten from CNN in August:
Patten, 47, reached a plea deal with the Justice Department. He faces up to five years in prison and a $250,000 fine for the felony charge and has agreed to cooperate with prosecutors.
Patten’s personal website describes him as a “strategic advisor” who has worked in politics on four continents. He has taken on numerous roles for campaigns and organizations over the last two decades, including as Eurasia director for the pro-democracy organization Freedom House in Washington, as well as a consultant for politicians in Ukraine, Georgia, Iraq and Nigeria, among other countries.
In the early to mid-2000s, Patten worked in Moscow for another pro-democracy organization, the International Republican Institute, along with Konstantin Kilimnik, who has been charged by Mueller’s office with obstruction of justice and conspiracy to obstruct justice.
Business records list Patten as an executive of the company Begemot Ventures International with Kilimnik in 2015, which is touted as “a strategic and political advisory firm that helps its clients win elections, strengthen political parties … and achieve better results” on its website, which does not list any clients.
Prosecutors have said in separate court filings that Kilimnik has ties to Russian intelligence. Kilimnik is also a close business associate of President Donald Trump’s former campaign chairman Paul Manafort, who also did political work in Ukraine and has been found guilty on eight counts of financial crimes.
Patten performed various services for Cambridge Analytica, the company that became embroiled in controversy earlier this year due to its sweeping collection of Facebook data, as well as its parent company SCL Group.
Brittany Kaiser, a former director at Cambridge Analytica, described Patten in testimony before the British Parliament as a “trusted senior consultant” to SCL Group. She said Patten did work for SCL in Nigeria and that he helped to organize an event on Capitol Hill in Washington.
That’s all I have for you today; believe it or not, it has been kind of a slow news day so far. What stories are you following?
New Years Eve 2018 Reads: Welcoming the Year of Speaker Nancy Pelosi
Posted: December 31, 2018 Filed under: morning reads 69 Comments
Les Fêtes Galantes de Paul Verlaine, illustrations de Georges Barbier, Piazza, 1928
Good Morning Sky Dancers!
We made it through another year of KKKremlin Caligula! This upcoming year may have a lot of surprises and we’re looking forward to them!
Senator Elizabeth Warren officially entered the 2020 Presidential race and joins Beto O’Rouke on Bernie’s Enemy list. How long before he starts his narcissistic zombie sashay to bring down Democratic Candidates all over the country? Annie LInskey and Matt Viser of WAPO follwed Warren’s announcement of an ‘exploratory committee’.
Sen. Elizabeth Warren jumped into the 2020 presidential campaign Monday, offering a message of economic populism as she became the best-known Democratic candidate yet to enter what is expected to be a crowded race.
Warren’s announcement that she was establishing an exploratory committee — the legal precursor to a run — came as other candidates, including several of her fellow senators, made final preparations for their own announcements, some of which are expected in days.
“America’s middle class is under attack,” the Massachusetts Democrat said in a four-minute, 30-second video emailed to supporters Monday. “How did we get here? Billionaires and big corporations decided they wanted more of the pie. And they enlisted politicians to cut them a bigger slice.”
The video is part biographical, showing her hardscrabble Oklahoma upbringing; part economics lesson, replete with charts illustrating how the middle class is losing economic ground; and part red meat for the Democratic base, with images of President Trump and others disliked by liberals: presidential aides Kellyanne Conway and Stephen Miller and former adviser Stephen K. Bannon.
KASAMATSU — “Night in Summer (Fireworks)”,1957,Nagashima/Saji
(Note: Correct carver’s name should be Okura.)
While I share hard scrabble Oklahoma roots with the candidate, I’m doing my usual thing of waiting until the first debate performance to start winnowing my field. Here’s an August, 2018 article from The Atlantic you may want to check out by Franklin Foer: ” Elizabeth Warren’s Theory of Capitalism. A conversation with the Democratic senator about why she’s doubling down on market competition at a moment when her party is flirting with socialism.”
Franklin Foer: All the investment bankers who have voodoo dolls of you might be a bit surprised that you recently described yourself as “capitalist to the bone.” What did you mean?
Elizabeth Warren: I believe in markets and the benefits they can produce when they work. Markets with rules can produce enormous value. So much of the work I have done—the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, my hearing-aid bill—are about making markets work for people, not making markets work for a handful of companies that scrape all the value off to themselves. I believe in competition.
Foer: To what end?
Warren: Markets create wealth. Okay, so I used to teach contract law, and if you really want to go back to first principles: On the first day, I used to take my watch off and I would sell it to someone in class. We’d agree on a price, $20. Then the question I always asked the students was: What did the buyer value the watch at? Much of the class would say $20.
That’s not the right answer. All we know is that the person would rather have the watch than have the $20 bill. What did you know about the value I placed on it? Exactly the inverse. I’d rather have the $20 bill than have the watch. Now, most people think the benefit of markets is: I walked away with a $20 bill, great, which I valued more highly than the watch, and you walked away with the watch that you valued more highly than the $20, but look at all the excess value there.
Maybe you wanted that watch because it completed your fabulous watch collection or you desperately needed a watch or it was so attractive to you that the value you placed on it would be in the hundreds of dollars. You got all that surplus value, and me, I really needed that $20. I had an investment opportunity over here for that $20 that has yielded a manyfold return for me. That’s how markets create additional value.
Foer: But markets right now are doing a good job of producing wealth. Yes?
Warren: Right.
Foer: In your description, that’s markets working.
Warren: The problem is that when the rules are not enforced, when the markets are not level playing fields, all that wealth is scraped in one direction. For example, leading up to the financial crash, there were a lot of mortgage brokers out there selling mortgages. Wow, did they get rich doing it. Families thought they were buying a product they could afford, whose payments they understood. Many of them lost everything. That’s a market that clearly was not working. The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, after it passed, the first thing we did there at the bureau was to put new rules in place about mortgages. Not so that you could control the mortgage market, but so that the market would work.
Takehisa Yumeji fireworks over the Sumida river 1910-20s
Interesting things are running amok among Berniebots who are featured in this Politico article: “Bernie alumni seek meeting to address ‘sexual violence’ on ‘16 campaign. The signees are looking to change what they call a pervasive culture of toxic masculinity in the campaign world.”
More than two dozen women and men who worked on Bernie Sanders’ 2016 presidential campaign are seeking a meeting with the senator and his top political advisers to “discuss the issue of sexual violence and harassment on the 2016 campaign, for the purpose of planning to mitigate the issue in the upcoming presidential cycle,” according to a copy of letter obtained by POLITICO.
“In recent weeks there has been an ongoing conversation on social media, in texts, and in person, about the untenable and dangerous dynamic that developed during our campaign,” they wrote.
More than two dozen women and men who worked on Bernie Sanders’ 2016 presidential campaign are seeking a meeting with the senator and his top political advisers to “discuss the issue of sexual violence and harassment on the 2016 campaign, for the purpose of planning to mitigate the issue in the upcoming presidential cycle,” according to a copy of letter obtained by POLITICO.
“In recent weeks there has been an ongoing conversation on social media, in texts, and in person, about the untenable and dangerous dynamic that developed during our campaign,” they wrote.
Organizers of the effort said they did not intend for the letter to become public, but they confirmed that they sent it to senior Sanders officials on Sunday afternoon.
You can read the letter at the link.
Russian foreign relations resemble a cold war spy novel. This is breaking news from Newsweek: “AMERICAN PAUL WHELAN ARRESTED IN RUSSIA ON SPY CHARGES AS POTENTIAL RETRIBUTION FOR MARIA BUTINA”.
Russia has arrested an American citizen in Moscow for alleged espionage, according to the country’s security services, the FSB.
“On December 28, 2018, staff members of the Russian Federal Security Service detained U.S. citizen Paul Whelan in Moscow while on a spy mission,” the FSB’s public relations center said in a statement. The statement implied that Whelan had been caught “during an act of espionage.”
Russian officials said they had launched an investigation and that Whelan could spend 10 to 20 years in prison if he is found guilty of violating Article 276 of Russia’s penal code. It is unclear what activities Whelan was allegedly engaged in. The U.S. Embassy in Moscow directed questions to the State Department.
“We are aware of the detention of a U.S. citizen by Russian authorities. We have been formally notified of the detention by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs,” a State Department spokesperson said. “Russia’s obligations under the Vienna Convention require them to provide consular access. We have requested this access and expect Russian authorities to provide it.”
The State Department declined to provide additional information about Whelan, citing privacy concerns.
On December 26, the U.S. Embassy in Moscow posted a message on its Facebook page claiming that passport and visa services at the embassy would continue through the government shutdown. The message implied that the embassy was not working at full capacity, noting that “we will not update this account until full operations resume, with the exception of urgent safety and security information.”
Whelan’s arrest took place shortly after a Russian woman named Maria Butina pleaded guilty to conspiracy against the United States for attempting to infiltrate Republican political circles on behalf of the Russian government. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs and spokespeople for the Russian government have attempted to portray Butina as a victim, and some analysts speculated that the arrest of Whelan could be retribution for Butina’s case.
Despite President Donald Trump’s openness to talking with Russian President Vladimir Putin and having closer ties with Russia, the U.S. relationship with Moscow has deteriorated amid special counsel Robert Mueller’s ongoing investigation into whether members of the Trump campaign collaborated with Russia to influence the outcome of the 2016 election.
Numerous Russian citizens and companies were indicted by the Justice Department as a result of the investigation. Meanwhile, U.S. intelligence agencies unanimously concluded that Russia attempted to influence the outcome of the 2016 presidential election on behalf of Donald Trump.
“Fireworks at Ikenohata Pond”
(“Ikenohata Hanabi”), KOBAYASHI, Kiyochika,1881
The Trump administration is in completely disarray and will likely be caught up in the LA Times interview with out going General Kelly. I doubt they have time for all the chaos they’ve created abroad. There’s basically chaos in every policy aspect these days so why not with Trumpski’s puppet master?
Unlike Kelly’s friend James N. Mattis, the retired Marine general who resigned as secretary of Defense with a public letter rebuking the president for abandoning allies and undermining alliances, Kelly kept his counsel.
But his impending departure from the eye of the storm created an embarrassing void at the White House as one candidate after another publicly pulled out or declined the chief of staff job.
On Dec. 14, Trump named Mick Mulvaney, his budget director, as acting chief of staff.
Even administration critics see Kelly’s departure as worrisome, saying he brought hard-edged national security experience and the integrity and ability to stand up to the president.
“It’s a loss, there’s no question,” said Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif).
“Now, it just seems to be a free-for-all,” said Sen. Jack Reed (D-R.I). “There’s no real consistent figure that’s going to stand there and just make sure literally the trains run on time. I think that was one of Kelly’s major contributions.”
Kelly leaves as Trump has been cocooned in the White House as a partial government shutdown moves into a second week over his demands for $5 billion for a wall on the U.S.-Mexico border.
The president has responded by firing off angry tweets at Democrats, who refuse to provide more than $1.3 billion for border security, rather than seeking to negotiate a solution.
The stalemate also highlights the distance, at least in language, between Kelly and Trump over the president’s signature promise — to build a wall.
“To be honest, it’s not a wall,” Kelly said.
When Kelly led Homeland Security in early 2017, one of his first steps was to seek advice from those who “actually secure the border,” Customs and Border Protection agents who Kelly calls “salt-of-the-earth, Joe-Six-Pack folks.”
“They said, ‘Well we need a physical barrier in certain places, we need technology across the board, and we need more people,’” he said.
“The president still says ‘wall’ — oftentimes frankly he’ll say ‘barrier’ or ‘fencing,’ now he’s tended toward steel slats. But we left a solid concrete wall early on in the administration, when we asked people what they needed and where they needed it.”
Asked if there is a security crisis at the Southern border, or whether Trump has drummed up fears of a migrant “invasion” for political reasons, Kelly did not answer directly, but said, “We do have an immigration problem.”
So this is the weirdest–but highly believable story– from Raw Story last night: “Sarah Sanders has ‘struggled’ to find a new job as the White House press office becomes ‘Night of the living dead’: report”.
Back in June, CBS reported that White House Press Secretary Sarah Sanders and her deputy Raj Shah were already planning to leave the administration by the end of the year. Sanders never denied the report. But with January just around the corner, no official announcements of their departures have been made, even as other top officials are shown the door or scramble for the exits of their own accord.
So why are they hanging on? According to Yahoo News, Sanders and Shah are struggling to find work elsewhere.
A stunning development, given the low unemployment rate.
Sanders reportedly declined to respond to specific questions about her plans but said she is currently “traveling.”
Yahoo News pointed out that Sarah has all but stopped delivering press briefings. What were once called “daily” briefings have now essentially become “monthly” briefings — with emphasis on the “brief.”
The outlet also observed that Shah has removed the title “deputy white house press secretary” from his Twitter bio.
Meanwhile, it seems the press shop itself has been nearly abandoned. This is not much of surprise — Trump has long considered himself to be his best spokesperson, and he has proven incapable of sticking to any coherent media strategy. And part of the problem, an anonymous source told Yahoo News, is that no one credible wants to work for the White House press office.
“No professional in good standing will even interview for a job,” the source said. “It’s a zombie comms shop. Night of the living dead.”
So we have a lot to look forward to in 2019. First, there’s the return of Nancy Pelosi to speaker and the return of Democratic committee chairs. Second, there’s more on the Mueller front and many expect that the next group of indictments will be quite close to the Trumpski himself. Then, there’s the fact we’re still here and standing and following things and there’s still some journalism out there that matters.
Happy New Year Sky Dancers! And, what’s on your reading and blogging list today?
Happy New Year from Temple and me!!
Lazy Caturday Reads: So Much Winning!
Posted: December 22, 2018 Filed under: Foreign Affairs, morning reads, U.S. Politics | Tags: Afghanistan, Bob Corker, Donald Trump, iran, James Mattis, Russia, Syria, Turkey 42 Comments
Maine Coon Cat
Good Morning!!
Trump threw a tantrum and forced a partial government shutdown that will force some government employees to work with out pay and others to be furloughed without pay. Merry Xmas from the fake “president.”
The Washington Post Editorial Board: Trump’s shutdown stunt is an act of needless stupidity.
As it became apparent Friday that no agreement could be reached on a stopgap spending measure, President Trump warned that a shutdown would “last for a very long time.” Affected is about a third of the government workforce — about 800,000 employees — in key departments, including Homeland Security, State and Justice. Because of the weekend and upcoming Christmas holidays, the impacts of a shutdown may not immediately be felt, but there should be no mistake that curtailment of these government agencies will impose costs across Washington and the country.
That seemed to be of little matter to Mr. Trump, who last week boasted he would be “proud” to shut down the government, glad to “take the mantle. I will be the one to shut it down.” He changed his tune on Friday in trying to shift the blame to Democrats for not going along with his demand for money to build a border wall he once promised would be financed by Mexico. Nothing better illustrates the needless stupidity of the shutdown than Mr. Trump’s claim to be taking a stand for border security when one of the agencies being caught up is Customs and Border Protection.
Himalayan Cat
Any doubt that it is politics — not principle — driving Mr. Trump was erased when he flip-flopped this week on the stopgap spending bill. He signaled he would sign on to a measure, passed by both House and Senate, without wall funding, but then buckled to criticism from the conservative media.
The likes of Sean Hannity, Ann Coulter, and Rush Limbaugh are determining Trump’s domestic policies. His foreign policy are being run out of Moscow and Istanbul and he is being celebrated by the Kremlin, Iran, and the Taliban for his decisions to pull troops out of Syria and Afghanistan.
Julia David at The Daily Beast: Russia Gloats: ‘Trump Is Ours Again.’
The Kremlin is awash with Christmas gifts from Washington, D.C. and every move by the Trump administration seems to add to that perception. On Wednesday, appearing on the Russian state TV show “The Evening with Vladimir Soloviev,” Director of the Moscow-based Center for Middle Eastern and Central Asian Studies Semyon Bagdasarov said that the U.S. Secretary of Defense James Mattis is “struggling to keep up” with the flurry of unexpected decisions by the U.S. President Donald Trump. The news that Mattis decided to step down sent shock waves across the world, being interpreted as “a dangerous signal” by America’s allies.
Norwegian Forest Cat
Meanwhile, the Mattis departure is being cheered in Russia. Konstantin Kosachev, head of the Foreign Affairs Committee in the Upper House of the Russian Parliament, has said that “the departure of James Mattis is a positive signal for Russia, since Mattis was far more hawkish on Russia and China than Donald Trump.” Kosachev opined that Trump apparently considered his own agenda in dealing with Russia, China and America’s allies to be “more important than keeping James Mattis at his post,” concluding: “That’s an interesting signal, and a more positive one” for Russia.
Jubilation was even more apparent on Russia’s state television, which adheres closely to the Kremlin’s point of view. The host of the Russian state TV show “60 Minutes,” Olga Skabeeva asserted: “Secretary of Defense Mattis didn’t want to leave Syria, so Trump fired him. They are leaving Syria.”
The Washington Post: U.S. troop withdrawal from Syria is ‘a dream come true for the Iranians.’
BEIRUT — One of the biggest winners of President Trump’s decision to withdraw troops from Syria will be Iran, which can now expand its reach across the Middle East with Washington’s already waning influence taking another hit.
The abrupt reversal of U.S. policy regarding its small military presence in a remote but strategically significant corner of northeastern Syria has stunned U.S. allies, many of whom were counting on the Trump administration’s seemingly tough posture on Iran to reverse extensive gains made by Tehran in recent years.
Ragdoll Cat
Instead, the withdrawal of troops opens the door to further Iranian expansion, including the establishment of a land corridor from Tehran to the Mediterranean that will enhance Iran’s ability to directly challenge Israel. It also throws in doubt Washington’s ability to sustain its commitment to other allies in the region and could drive many of them closer to Russia, an Iranian ally, analysts say.
“This is a dream come true for the Iranians,” said Riad Kahwaji, who heads the Institute for Near East and Gulf Military Analysis, a defense consultancy in Dubai. “No longer will Iran take the Trump administration seriously. It’s an isolationist administration, it will no longer pose a threat, and Iran will become bolder in its actions because they know this administration is more bark than bite.”
NBC News: Taliban greets Pentagon’s withdrawal of troops from Afghanistan with cries of victory.
PESHAWAR, Pakistan — News that the White House had ordered the Pentagon to draw up plans for a troop withdrawal from Afghanistan provoked widespread criticism that the move would kneecap efforts to broker a peace deal to end America’s longest war.
But there was one group on Friday celebrating the reports — the Taliban.
Senior members told NBC News the news was a clear indication they were on the verge of victory.
Siberian Cats
“The 17-year-long struggle and sacrifices of thousands of our people finally yielded fruit,” said a senior Taliban commander from Afghanistan’s Helmand province. “We proved it to the entire world that we defeated the self-proclaimed world’s lone super power.”
“We are close to our destination,” added the commander, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the group’s leadership had prohibited members from talking to the media about current events. He added that all field commanders had also been told to intensify training efforts to capture four strategic provinces in the run up to the next round of talks between the U.S. and Taliban, which are expected in January.
Are you tired of winning yet?
The Syria pullout has “Thwarted ‘Major’ Operation Targeting ISIS,” according to Bob Corker. From The Daily Beast:
The chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee revealed on Friday that the U.S. military was planning a “major clearing operation” targeting ISIS before President Donald Trump decided abruptly this weekto withdraw U.S. forces from Syria.
“One thing that hasn’t been reported is, we were six weeks away from a major clearing operation that has been planned for a long time. I got briefed on this a year ago—with ISIS in the Euphrates River Valley,” Sen. Bob Corker (R-TN) said Friday on Capitol Hill, referring to the area where ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi is believed to be hiding.
Chartreaux Cat
Trump’s decision, which at least partly led to the resignation of Defense Secretary Jim Mattis, has rattled congressional Republicans, who have questioned the wisdom of withdrawing from Syria before ISIS is fully eradicated. In defending his decision, Trump claimed that the extremist caliphate has been defeated, but Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC), a top Trump ally, called that claim “fake news,” and said America’s adversaries will benefit from Trump’s order.
I’ll wrap this up with three opinion pieces:
Dana Millbank at The Washington Post: It’s official. We lost the Cold War.
Perhaps the timing of George H.W. Bush’s death last month was merciful. This way he didn’t have to see America lose the Cold War.
Bush presided over the Soviet Union’s collapse in 1991. But the triumph he and others earned with American blood and treasure over 71 years, defeating the Soviet Union and keeping its successor in check, has been squandered by President Trump in just two.
Trump’s unraveling of the post-war order accelerated this week when he announced a willy-nilly pullout from Syria, leaving in the lurch scores of allies who participated in the campaign against the Islamic State, throwing our Kurdish partners to the wolves, isolating Israel, and giving Russia and Iran free rein in the Middle East. Then word emerged that Trump is ordering another hasty withdrawal, from Afghanistan. Trump’s defense secretary, retired Gen. Jim Mattis, resigned in protest of the president’s estrangement of allies and emboldening of Russia and China.
Egyptian Mau Cat
The TV series “The Man in the High Castle” imagines a world in which Nazis won World War II. But we don’t need an alternative-history show to imagine a Soviet victory in the Cold War. We have Trump.
David Rothkop at The Daily Beast: Mattis’ Message to the World: Trump Is Out of Control. The gist:
Mattis, who took his duty very seriously, came to the conclusion that the value of such checks was now gone. Repeatedly—in Helsinki with Putin, in Singapore with Kim, in his defense of Saudi Arabia’s murderous crown prince Mohammed bin Salman, in his attacks on the FBI and the intelligence community, in his rejection of facts obvious to all—Trump has shown he cannot be controlled from within the administration.
Now, we can expect even worse. The checks on his relations with Putin within the administration are gone. The experienced hands are few and far between and the policy process is non-existent, the most dysfunctional in U.S. history—which suits both Trump and Bolton. Bolton and Pompeo, Iran hawks and apologists for the Saudis, the Israelis, and other Gulf states, will have more freedom. Relations with the military, already bad, will sour. Stephen Miller will gain stronger control over our border and immigration policies which suggests more human rights abuses are ahead. Our allies will have few champions and even less trust in the administration.
All this will happen because today Trump’s most highly regarded aide sent a message to the world and in particular to those responsible for presidential oversight on Capitol Hill. The president is not only outside the mainstream in his thinking, he is out of control. The man who controls the world’s most powerful military and the resources of the world’s richest government, is beyond assistance, beyond redemption, beyond influence other than by our enemies and his greed and narcissism.
Susan Glasser at the New Yorker: The Year in Trump Freakouts.
Bengal Cat
President Trump is ending the year as he began it: outraging Washington with a Twitter diktat, one that was cheered in Moscow and jeered on Capitol Hill. On Wednesday morning, the city awoke to an unexpected Presidential announcement that Trump was unilaterally pulling American forces out of Syria, despite having agreed this fall that U.S. troops would remain on the ground there indefinitely. Trump portrayed the decision as both a final victory over the Islamic State, which had overtaken much of the country from the Russia-supported regime of the Syrian dictator, Bashar al-Assad, and the fulfillment of a campaign promise to exit the Middle East. A full-scale bipartisan freakout ensued, culminating late Thursday with the long-awaited, long-feared news that Defense Secretary Jim Mattis would join the procession of Trump officials calling it quits. Was it a direct result of the abrupt about-face on Syria? “I believe it is right for me to step down from my position,” Mattis wrote in his resignation letter to the President, “because you have the right to have a Secretary of Defense whose views are better aligned with yours.” What we do know is that all the chaos at year’s end is a powerful reminder that the manner in which the President operates is so outside of any normal parameters for governing, so disdainful of process, and so heedless of consequences that his decisions don’t resolve crises so much as create them.
It is, of course, possible to have a reasonable policy debate over whether U.S. forces belong in Syria, given the military’s small footprint (about two thousand troops), the haziness of American objectives, and the fact that there is no political appetite for an expanded intervention in the country’s long-running civil war. But it is not possible with Trump. The retired Admiral James Stavridis, the former commander of nato forces, called the President’s decision “geopolitically the worst move I have seen from this Administration.” Others disagreed, seeing in Trump’s move a disaster in process that otherwise resembled President Barack Obama’s desire to withdraw from the endless conflicts of the Middle East. “Trump is very capable of doing intelligent things in very stupid ways,” Ian Bremmer, the head of the geopolitical-analysis firm the Eurasia Group, said in an interview with CBS on Thursday morning.
It is hard to get past the stupid, though.
It certainly is “hard to get past the stupid” with Trump. I haven’t even scratched the surface of today’s news. What stories are you following? Please share.
Winter Solstice Reads: The Cold Moon and the New Light
Posted: December 21, 2018 Filed under: Afghanistan, Federal Government Shutdown, morning reads, Syria | Tags: Winter Solstice 19 Comments
Yule and Solstice Greetings Sky Dancers!
Today we have the longest night, the Ursid Meteor Showers. and a Full Moon for Saturday. Yes, Saturday is the full moon. It wasn’t yesterday but don’t tell that to the lunatic in the Oval Office. Tomorrow is the new light. I think that’s an important symbol for those of us that are overwhelmed with the Chaos Demon dwelling in the White House.
So what’s going on with this full moon?
Our last full moon of the year will come less than a day after the solstice. Again, for those of you who love precision, it will occur on Saturday, December 22, at 17:49 Universal Time (that’s 12:49 p.m. ET), EarthSky says.
However, when you’re looking out into a clear sky on Friday night, the moon will appear full to you — and could be so bright that people with pretty good eyesight could read by it.
Over many centuries, this moon has been called several names: Cold Moon, Cold Full Moon, Long Night Moon (by some Native American tribes) or the Moon Before Yule (from the Anglo-Saxon lunar calendar).
If you’re wondering how special this Cold Moon is so close to the solstice, it will be 2029 before it happens again. So it’s not a once-in-a-lifetime event, but still, you don’t see this too often.
Now what about that meteor shower?
The annual Ursids meteor shower is expected to peak a day or two after the solstice. You might be able to see up to 10 “shooting stars” per hour depending on your location.
The website In the Sky has a great feature that helps you figure out where to watch and how many meteors you might see. For instance, people in South Florida might expect just three per hour while people in Juneau, Alaska, might expect seven per hour.
One caveat: That Cold Moon will be so bright that it could outshine some of the meteors as they streak in, making them harder to spot.
And then there’s the lunatic in the Oval Office who is ensuring the end of the year is utter chaos. From Sarah Grillo at Axios: “Pre-Christmas Trump: Rebuked, rampaging”.
The last member of an informal alliance of top Trump officials with enough swat or stature to stand up to President Trump — the Committee to Save America, as we called these officials 16 months ago — resigned in epic fashion.
The bottom line: Unlike most others, who pretended to leave on fine terms, Defense Secretary Jim Mattis bailed with a sharp, specific, stinging rebuke of Trump and his America-first worldview.
It’s really difficult to document all the shit hitting the fan today. The withdrawals from both Syria and Afghanistan are getting press play. The equity markets are nosediving again. Then, there’s the entire debacle about keeping the government open and paying people that do things like stand watch on battle fields, process social security checks, and take eager tourists through national parks and historic sites.
Aren’t we all getting tired of budget brinkmanship? Last night, the House sent forward the budget with KKKremlin Caligula’s $5 million wall craziness. Many voted for it just to spite Pelosi. Paul Ryan cannot get out of town quick enough for me. He’s a blob with no spine, no guts, and no brains. The Senate has the blob ball today.
GOP Hardliners are okay with a shut down. What about the rest of the country?
House Freedom Caucus Chairman Mark Meadows picked up the phone early Thursday morning and dialed up a frustrated Donald Trump for yet another pep talk.
The president was agitated over suggestions in the conservative media that he was caving on his border wall campaign promise. He had just taken to Twitter to downplay the importance of securing new wall funding before Christmas and suggested he’d fight for the wall next Congress — GOP leadership’s preferred strategy to avoid a shutdown.
But Meadows, who is close with the president and was recently in the running to be his next chief of staff, urged Trump to make a stand now before Democrats took the House in January — just as he had the night before and multiple times earlier in the week. Stick to your guns, the North Carolina Republican told the president, according to a source familiar with the conversation. We conservatives will have your back. And now is the last best chance to fight.
Never mind that half the Senate had left town for the holidays having voice-voted passage of a temporary funding bill without wall money, all while Democrats sang Christmas carols on the floor. And never mind that House GOP leaders were already twisting arms in their caucus to support a proposal they thought the White House wanted.
Not four hours later, the president hauled Speaker Paul Ryan, House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy and other GOP leaders to the West Wing and instructed them to change course. And they did.
“I’m OK with a shutdown,” Trump told the group, according to two sources in the room.
The hard-liners had defeated leadership once again, and Washington was barreling into another crisis of its own making with no endgame in sight.
All of this has the markets dropping like it’s 1929 and the US government is disrupted. This is likely Bannon’s wetdream come true. From the big guns and WAPO:
President Trump began Thursday under siege, listening to howls of indignation from conservatives over his border wall and thrusting the government toward a shutdown. He ended it by announcing the exit of the man U.S. allies see as the last guardrail against the president’s erratic behavior: Defense Secretary Jim Mattis, whose resignation letter was a scathing rebuke of Trump’s worldview.
At perhaps the most fragile moment of his presidency — and vulnerable to convulsions on the political right — Trump single-handedly propelled the U.S. government into crisis and sent markets tumbling with his gambits this week to salvage signature campaign promises.
The president’s decisions and conduct have led to a fracturing of Trump’s coalition. Hawks condemned his sudden decision to withdraw U.S. troops from Syria. Conservatives called him a “gutless president” and questioned whether he would ever build a wall. Political friends began privately questioning whether Trump needed to be reined in.
fter campaigning on shrinking America’s footprint in overseas wars, Trump abruptly declared Wednesday that he was withdrawing U.S. troops from Syria, a move Mattis and other advisers counseled against. And officials said Thursday that Trump is preparing to send thousands of troops home from Afghanistan, as well.
The president also issued an ultimatum to Congress to fund construction of his promised U.S.-Mexico border wall, a move poised to result in a government shutdown just before Christmas. Trump and his aides had signaled tacit support for a short-term spending compromise that would avert the shutdown, but the president abruptly changed course after absorbing a deluge of criticism from some of his most high-profile loyalists.
Leon Panetta, who served as defense secretary, CIA director and White House chief of staff for Democratic presidents, said, “We’re in a constant state of chaos right now in this country.” He added, “While it may satisfy [Trump’s] need for attention, it’s raising hell with the country.”
Putin must love these Trumpertantrums. He already got a big gift with the Syria surrender. All the ” adults in the room” have left the building. The guardrails are gone. What’s left? None of the folks left are likely to do the 25th Amendment. This is getting stomach wrenching and this AP article describes the vestiges of those media memes.
Mattis will be the last to go, and his abrupt resignation Thursday marks the end of the “contain and control” phase of Trump’s administration — one where generals, business leaders and establishment Republicans struggled to guide the president and curb his most disruptive impulses. They were branded in Washington as the “troika of sanity,” the “axis of adults” and the “committee to save America.”
But as Trump careens toward his third year in office, their efforts are in tatters and most are out of a job.
The early consequences of the new era were already apparent at year’s end, with Trump on the verge of a government shutdown over the advice of GOP leaders and ordering the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Syria over Mattis’ objections. A similar pull-back in Afghanistan appeared to be in the works. The financial markets, spooked by uncertainty from a nearly yearlong trade war, tanked.
“We are headed toward a series of grave policy errors which will endanger our nation, damage our alliances & empower our adversaries,” Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., tweeted after Mattis’ resignation.
The shrinking circle around Trump is now increasingly dominated by a small cadre of longtime Trump loyalists and family members, ex-Fox News talent and former GOP lawmakers who were backbenchers on Capitol Hill before being elevated by the president. Attracting top flight talent will only get more difficult as more investigations envelop the White House once Democrats take over the House in January.
To some of Trump’s most ardent supporters, the exodus leaves the president with a team that is more in line with his hardline campaign promises. They viewed some of his early advisers as obstacles to enacting the unabashed nationalist agenda they believe Trump had been elected to implement.
These are really trying days but the new light is coming. Maybe that will be in an Omen. I mean this has always been the ancient symbolism of winter. It’s long, dark, and cold wait but with some good food, friends, and fun then we can wait it out. That’s always my question these days thought. How long can we wait this out because things are getting super crazy out there.
What’s on your reading and blogging list today? Have a warm and snug longest night!!!
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