“Donald Trump is nothing less than a threat to the American way of life. His term in office comprises an existential threat to the republic, the gravest since the Civil War. Not since 1860 has the future of the Union itself been in such doubt.”

[THREAD]

Let's do another thread about Kushner/Khashoggi/MbS/Trump.

[THREAD]

1/ Overview
The 30something Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (MbS) became heir apparent in 2016. Although he began his regime with a series of modest if widely-publicized reforms, these were designed to disguise his true despotic aims.

2/ Jamal Khashoggi was a Saudi journalist critical of MbS, who portrayed him as the tyrant he is at heart. For this, MbS had Khashoggi brutally murdered.

Jared Kushner is chummy with MbS. Donald Trump is a staunch supporter. Both men have ulterior motives for siding w/MbS.

3/ TIMELINE

April 2017
Charles Kushner, father of Jared Kushner, asks Qatar for a loan to bail out the troubled property at 666 Fifth Avenue in Manhattan. The Qataris turn him down.

4/
June 2017
Saudi Arabia organizes a blockade of Qatar, a country where the US has a major military base. Kushner leads the extreme minority view in the West Wing to support the blockade. To the consternation of the State Department, Donald Trump praises the move.

My friend’s father went to the Virginia Military Institute, which is as hardcore as the name implies. He tells a story that has always stuck with me:

[THREAD]

1/ The school had a rivalry with another school, I can’t remember which. My friend’s father was one of three cadets guarding the school’s canon during the big football game. The rival school thought it would be a funny prank to steal and/or deface the canon.

2/ A dozen or so drunken students came upon the three of them, guarding the canon. My friend’s father was a bit scared, because they were badly outnumbered. But the cadet in charge was not scared. At all. He stood there with his rifle, holding it as if to bludgeon.

3/ The drunk students approached, rowdily demanding that the cadets move so they could deface the canon.

“Stand down,” the cadet said.

The students got closer, grew rowdier. Now they were taunting.

“Stand down.”

4/ The taunting grew. The drunk students fanned out, surrounding the three cadets. My friend’s father was now terrified.

Again: “Stand down.”

I'm back from my hiatus, with a rather unorthodox "Sunday Pages" involving the Matrix, Slacker, Better Call Saul, the 2016 World Series, and the racist origins of the Cubs' 108-year

Trump is a Russian asset, a mob money launderer installed by his mob whoremasters to sow chaos and weaken the US & our allies.

EVERY SINGLE THING HE’S DONE since taking office is to achieve those purposes—that and to enrich himself personally.

[THREAD]

1/ His entire family is part of this. Melania is a fucking crook. Ivanka is a fucking crook. Junior and Gums are fucking crooks. They will all die in prison, except for Kushner, who, if he really *did* trade US intel for money, should be executed for espionage.

2/ Why do you think Trump installs uniquely corrupt & awful people to Cabinet positions? Pruitt, Zinke, Betsy, Rex/Pompeo, Wilbur "Melting Nazi Face" Ross. They are not there to serve us. They are not there to drain the swamp. They are there to BURN THE REPUBLIC DOWN.

3/ Trump steals. He takes taxpayer money—your money and mine—and lines his pockets with it. He exploits his office to make himself richer. This is all he cares about. Why are Republican citizens, you “fiscal conservatives,” not more angry about this? Riddle me THAT, #MAGA.

4/ Matt Whitaker, the human dildo and “acting AG,” was illegally installed to throw a monkey wrench in the Mueller investigation. That’s why they won’t release his financials. He’s fucking bought and sold. He’s going to prison for obstruction.

As we now have an hour-long recording of Donald John Trump going full mobster on a Georgia state official, I thought I'd do a thread highlighting some of my work on the criminality of Trump & his associates.

[THREAD]

1/ We begin with the three-part series written with mob expert @LincolnsBible. Part One discusses how Trump, a second-generation mob money launderer, became a Confidential Informant, thus avoiding

2/ Part Two details how a guy owned by La Cosa Nostra came to be owned by the Russian mafiya. The 80s were boon times for hostile

3/ In the final segment, @LincolnsBible explains why Trump's criminality is not more widely known, and how the IC's commitment to secrecy above all else failed us these last four

4/ If you believe Rudy Giuliani, now the president's private attorney, somehow changed in the years after 9/11, you'll be surprised to learn that he's always been awful, INCLUDING during his "America's Mayor"

#Justin A day before the @MyMDC_T EOC, the party Treasurer General says he is unable to fund travel costs for delegates to congress because the money was allegedly stolen. We share contents of the letter from #ChiefNdlovu

“My office has been inundated with calls from concerned EOC delegates who by now should have received their Provincial transport allocation.
It has come to my attention that some of our members may not be able to travel to the EOC due to lack of funding.”

Equally I have received allegations that the Treasury is refusing to make payments for EOC, nothing could be further from the truth. I would like to take this opportunity as your Deputy Treasurer to inform you that as treasury we are not able to pay due to the fact that...

that funds were withdrawn from the party account on the 18th December 2020, we are still pursuing and trying to get some Standing Committee members who were involved in the unapproved transfer to return the money to the Party.
I was left a bit shocked to learn that the SG expects

Treasury to release money when he is the one who transferred all the money out of the account without my explicit approval. Perhaps the SG must inform members where the money is. I certainly do not have any knowledge of who he sent the money to or what has happened to those funds

CAPITOL RIOT QUESTIONS FOR SPEAKER PELOSI: There is no group in America more interested in the safety and security of the Capitol than members of Congress. To that end, members have asked @SpeakerPelosi to answer these basic questions:

1/ What was your role in authorizing or denying National Guard support before and after Jan. 6?

2/ Reps. Rodney Davis, R-Ill., Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, and James Comer R-Ky., on Feb. 15 asked you five pointed questions about your role in Jan. 6 and your preservation and compliance with document requests. Will you answer them?

3/ After the 2011 shooting of now-former Rep. Gabby Giffords, D-Ariz., what changed with regard to security?

4/ After the shooting of Republican House Whip Steve Scalise, R-La., were any changes made to security?

South African science was crucial in helping UK discover its new variants; but then the UK govt claimed (wrongly) that the SA variant is more transmissible. No evidence to support this, according to @krisp_news

From the Times article: SA scientists "were the first to recognize the importance of a genetic change in the spike protein, something that allows the virus to attach more easily to human cells, making it more infectious than the original version."

The SA discovery was shared on Dec 4 over the WHO’s Covid-19 Evolution Working Group. “Our British colleagues were able to go back to their own databases and interrogate them as a result of the work we shared,” Richard Lessells, an infectious diseases specialist at Krisp, said.

More from the Times article by @janeflan: "While working on a much smaller budget than their British colleagues, the South African team, experienced with work on HIV, have the skills to decode the genome of viruses."

"They started work on samples of the Covid-19 virus soon after the first cases reached South Africa in March. In October they identified the first example that had changed significantly."

SPOILS OF WAR

#2allthosewhothoughtIwascrazy:

"When I see Harris & her husband, I see us. Will more BW begin to see the same potential 4 romantic love w/white men? Harris' next 4 yrs in the WH could help provide an answer. The power of Harris'

Black men, you are officially expendable, at least have the media tell you. And black women, to hell w/black men. White people will reward you handsomely following Harris' lead. Never forget this country was founded on breaking up black families. I predicted this would happen.

Make Michelle Obama white & Barack Obama's campaign doesn't sniff an ounce of support from black women. The reason being was that the picture of an intact black family in power was a beautiful sight for black women & fulfilled their greatest dreams. There is nothing wrong w/this.

There is nothing wrong w/wanting to see black people in love together in power. It's a beautiful sight, but what of Harris? If the Obama's marriage communicated to black people the power of black love in power, what does Kamala Harris' marriage to a white man communicate?

That black men are expendable & that 2 rise in a white world, black men are baggage that U need 2 discard. Think I'm off kilter w/this? Consider the fact that many black women in powerful positions either say little of or attribute little of their success 2 their black fathers.

@ProjectLincoln @tedcruz Texas failed to winterize its generation sources the last time this happened in 2011.

Now ask yourself, why?

Simple. Texas's extended power outage is a result of negligent GOP infrastructure policy.

THREAD.

@tedcruz The Texas GOP has continuously rebuffed plans to invest in better infrastructure to upgrade TX power grids.

Texas was warned to weatherize power plants.

Why didn’t they?

@tedcruz TX power companies said electricity prices are too low to provide incentives (profit) to build new plants or improve older ones. (a result of privatization of basic services.)

@tedcruz The electrical grid in Texas was deregulated, privatized, and removed from interconnected networks to avoid federal regulation and increase profits for a small number of wealthy individuals.

Go figure.

@tedcruz If TX ERCOT grid was on the national grid, or simply reinvested in their privatized infrastructure, they'd be fine by now.

They did neither, b/c it wasn't profitable.

It's a failure of TX leadership –– total, inexcusable, and utterly catastrophic.

Not fucking windmills.