trump wants to end funding for the Gateway tunnel project. A major construction project that is crucial to our economy. The reason is because he wants Penn Station and Dulles Airport named after him. Ten years of this is so fucking exhausting. Thanks for your hard work.
donna woodward; The problem is that it won't save him from what ails him. And we'll all suffer on account of it.
If he has harbored a lifelong plan to get to this place and so set the conditions to be impeached and jailed, he has been spectacularly successful. He needs to wear a sign around his neck: "IMPEACH ME! IMPEACH ME! PULEESSE! THEN THROW ME BEHIND THE GLASS! I'M BEGGING YOU!"
On the other side of it, people still talk to him as if he were sane.
I'm still trying to figure out why they all don't just turn their backs to him, whenever he speaks. You couldn't possibly make more noise by doing so. Once they start to disavow him, he will crash...God willing.
None of our allies and international officials should invite this creep to ANY of their meetings or celebrations, ever again! THAT's how they can turn their backs on him. :)
We definitely need to remove Bondi ( who deserves to lose her law license and be prosecuted) and Noem BUT Bondi said prosecution of the Epstein rapists and sex traffickers wool collapse the system and I say let this system collapse. The illegalities of ICE far supersede the horrid “Gold Card”. It sounds to me that the entire Administration needs ripped out, prosecuted, deported or imprisoned (I have issues with my taxpayer dollars buying prison spaces for such a Treasonous Crew). Trump is afraid of the Truth of the Epstein Files while we already know he measured the privates of little girls and auctioned them off—this, this garbage is the President of the United States??! I don’t know about you but to me, that’s the last “straw”! I may just be a voter, an activist in a sick red state and I am also an enraged woman who believes sex traffickers should be prosecuted and immediately removed from office anywhere in America. That includes Trump. It also includes much of his staff. I refuse to let this reckless sex abusing Grifter heckle me— and if we would unite we could effectively rise up and win. That Rise includes lawyers and law firms, techies, boycotting Verizon who supplies tech to ICE. We are not powerless—we just need to claim the Power we a,ready have.
A RARE WIN/WIN FOR BOTH PLAINTIFF AND DEFENDANT IN A $10 BILLION SETTLEMENT
Donald Trump's lawsuit for $10 billion dollars against the U.S. Treasury and the IRS for the damages he sustained, primarily pain and suffering, from negligently allowing the unlawful disclosure of his tax returns, actually creates a win/win for both Donald J. Trump, plaintiff and Donald J. Trump defendant, the latter as the ultimate authority to whom Treasury and the IRS report.
Trump has been assured by his sycophantic Attorney General, Pam Bondi, and by his Deputy Attorney General and former unsuccessful criminal defense attorney Todd Blanche, that he has no conflict of interest in serving as both the plaintiff and defendant, given that it is not his own money that will be disbursed to the plaintiff, but rather the taxpayers' money, who are not parties to the case. Trump now feels confident that he can rely on such scholarly legal sophistry to reconcile such positions.
Undoubtedly, Donald Trump as the plaintiff believes that given the magnitude of his pain and suffering resulting from the disclosure of how little he paid in taxes, he believes that an award of $10 billion from the defendant, in this case himself, would be adequate to mollify his pain and suffering and allow him sufficient time and resources to recover from it.
As the defendant to whom Treasury and the IRS report, Trump agrees with the plaintiff that $10 billion would be a fair and equitable settlement.
To sweeten the deal, as the plaintiff, Trump has promised to disburse one-half of the proceeds, i.e. $5 billion, to worthy public undertakings, retaining only $5 billion for himself.
As for Trump's disbursement of the $5 billion that he is promising to expend on behalf of the states, we have only to review the conversation that Senator Schumer recounted that he just had with President Trump. Trump advised Schumer that he would withhold the remaining funds of the $16 billion due to pay for the completion of the Gateway/Hudson Tunnel Project connecting New York and New Jersey unless Schumer agreed to arrange for the gilded age Penn Station Railroad Terminal in New York City to be re-named The Donald J. Trump Railroad Terminal.
While Schumer flatly refused, it dawned on Trump that he could dispense the $5 billion dollars from the $10 billion lawsuit settlement among the states and cities throughout the U.S. providing that they either change the names of landmark edifices to his name or commission that statues in his honor be constructed and prominently displayed.
So all in all, Trump sees these scenarios as a win/win for the U.S.government and himself, with only the taxpayers picking up the $10 billion bill.
"And I'll probably give it to charity, you know, that would be nice." We know that if it's nice he'll never do it. Never has given to charity unless it's a charitable foundation under his own control.
Just to clarify, Penn Station is no longer a "gilded age railroad terminal." It was destroyed many years ago to make way for Madison Square Garden.
Even with its recent renovations, it does not come anywhere close to the amazing beauty of the original Penn Station. I am fortunate to be old enough to have been there numerous times as a teenager, catching trains to Pennsylvania and beyond.
We can thank Jacqueline Kennedy that Grand Central terminal did not meet the same fate. She fought relentlessly to preserve it, and it is one of the most beautiful and iconic places in NYC.
Sad she wasn't here to save her Rose Garden or the East Wing or the Kennedy Center... or heaven knows what else will need saving before our Vulgarian-in-Chief leaves DC.
You're absolutely right DW. While the original Penn Station was a magnificent gilded-age edifice, I mistakenly was thinking of Cornelius Vanderbilt's gilded-age Grand Central Station which still stands on 42nd Street. Thanks for correcting me!
Receiving this amount of money should be considered a significant violation of the Emoluments Clause (not that it has ever made any difference) and the whole amount, should he get it, be taxed by the IRS.
The re-naming game is nothing short of bribery and blackmail. We should refuse to play.
Norm, thank you immensely for all of that tremendous work you are doing to hold people in particular accountable and for those updates!
Jen, thank you for your tremendous work in keeping us up on people and their actions we need to know about to stay informed! I don’t know how either or any of you find time to sleep! Also, although I quit my subscription i to the post when you left, I do miss getting to read the Pinocchio‘s. When I see their articles at all, it is only because they are included on the phone automatically. I am sorry for people who lost their jobs, and it is hard yo trust a paper that did not support the honest and caring candidate. They did not even tell it like it was in their headlines when they had an opportunity to help save so many people and our country snd world from what is happening now and from what has been happening for just over a year.
Especially, I love getting to see the pets! Thanks to each pet owner, and most recently to Lorraine and her Simone, and to all of you for making it possible for us to feel the love as a treat and retreat from this crucial time by at least getting to see the pets and to learn a bit about them!
Keep those thieving swine wrapped up in court until we can restore order in Congress and start checking the fool and his goons. Thanks for all you do. I was a charter Contrarian subscriber and I intend to remain in the fold.
'Since our justice system moves verrrrrryyyyyyyy ssssslllllloooowwwwwlllllyyyyy at the best of times. After felon 47 is dead, can the country move against his heirs to recover all this money?
Epstein files. It is NOT just the extra files they say they won't release. It is the improper use of redactions which is contrary to the Epstein Files Transparency Act. The got the redactions ass backwards, protecting the perps and revealing the victims.
Thank you for this reporting. As a retired DOD senior executive in the budget field, I am especially shocked a5 how this government is ignoring all monetary laws and treating government funds as a big slush fund. It is illegal to reprogram funds over a certain amount without prior congressional approval. Yet $1B (!!! Which has grown from an estimated $400M) was moved from a nuclear program to retrofit the Qatari “gifted” plane. Accountants will never find all of the audit trails of misused funds by this administration.
And the GOP do-nothings who have loudly complained about "waste, fraud, and abuse" are suddenly blind, deaf, and dumb in the ominous shadow of the ballooning national debt.
Thank you Norm Eisen and all others for the good work you do defending and fighting for our democracy. I subscribe to the Contrarian and will continue to. And I keep you in my prayers that your courage and stamina prevail.
And sadly, repulsively, there is more than his corruption. His pussy-grabbing brag. His murder-on-Fifth-Avenue boast. His sh*t-hole-countries insults. His failed appalling monkey-head "joke." (The list could go on and on and on and on...) Would any other country ever elect such a creature their representative to the world?
People keep saying "This is not who we are." Sadly, it is who we have become. A vulgar, racist, perversely-permissive nation. Our veneer of respectability is see-through thin. Unless we begin holding ourselves, each other, and our elected leaders to much higher standards of behavior, does this culture we tolerate really deserve to survive?
There is no shortage of grift and corruption in this administration. In terms of what I consider most important, please concentrate on immoral federal law enforcement and, most of all, election interference. "Nationalizing elections" is the most dictatorial, authoritarian line I have yet seen, and there have been way too many "lines" from this atrocious White House.
Thanks for keeping track and taking names. I hope the new DOJ after the criminals are out of power will have the manpower and stamina to clean house.
I think they will have a mandate to do so.
A great roundup of his most flagrant corrupt acts. thank you Norm et al.
And the inclusion of the "Current Status" report is really helpful.
trump wants to end funding for the Gateway tunnel project. A major construction project that is crucial to our economy. The reason is because he wants Penn Station and Dulles Airport named after him. Ten years of this is so fucking exhausting. Thanks for your hard work.
Today's news report is that a judge ruled funding must continue because it was already approved and allocated.
"The United States of Trump:" that's what he would really love to see.
Sorry, Donna. As the great divider that he is, to name it 'United' would be another lie, and a colossal one at that. Ain't gonna happen.
Silly me. :)
Not silly at all. You just stated the obvious in saying "that's what he'd like to see". That's perfectly true. Of course it is.
donna woodward; The problem is that it won't save him from what ails him. And we'll all suffer on account of it.
If he has harbored a lifelong plan to get to this place and so set the conditions to be impeached and jailed, he has been spectacularly successful. He needs to wear a sign around his neck: "IMPEACH ME! IMPEACH ME! PULEESSE! THEN THROW ME BEHIND THE GLASS! I'M BEGGING YOU!"
On the other side of it, people still talk to him as if he were sane.
As if he were sane and as if he had countless positive qualities and accomplishments that need to be flattered non-stop.
I'm still trying to figure out why they all don't just turn their backs to him, whenever he speaks. You couldn't possibly make more noise by doing so. Once they start to disavow him, he will crash...God willing.
I'd like to see that happen whenever he's at some international meeting, too. (That is, if they every invite him again.)
None of our allies and international officials should invite this creep to ANY of their meetings or celebrations, ever again! THAT's how they can turn their backs on him. :)
We definitely need to remove Bondi ( who deserves to lose her law license and be prosecuted) and Noem BUT Bondi said prosecution of the Epstein rapists and sex traffickers wool collapse the system and I say let this system collapse. The illegalities of ICE far supersede the horrid “Gold Card”. It sounds to me that the entire Administration needs ripped out, prosecuted, deported or imprisoned (I have issues with my taxpayer dollars buying prison spaces for such a Treasonous Crew). Trump is afraid of the Truth of the Epstein Files while we already know he measured the privates of little girls and auctioned them off—this, this garbage is the President of the United States??! I don’t know about you but to me, that’s the last “straw”! I may just be a voter, an activist in a sick red state and I am also an enraged woman who believes sex traffickers should be prosecuted and immediately removed from office anywhere in America. That includes Trump. It also includes much of his staff. I refuse to let this reckless sex abusing Grifter heckle me— and if we would unite we could effectively rise up and win. That Rise includes lawyers and law firms, techies, boycotting Verizon who supplies tech to ICE. We are not powerless—we just need to claim the Power we a,ready have.
Stephen Miller should be tried for treason and hanged
Hear, hear! Like Peter Finch in the movie Network, at 77, I too have had more than enough.
At 81, enough already!!
A RARE WIN/WIN FOR BOTH PLAINTIFF AND DEFENDANT IN A $10 BILLION SETTLEMENT
Donald Trump's lawsuit for $10 billion dollars against the U.S. Treasury and the IRS for the damages he sustained, primarily pain and suffering, from negligently allowing the unlawful disclosure of his tax returns, actually creates a win/win for both Donald J. Trump, plaintiff and Donald J. Trump defendant, the latter as the ultimate authority to whom Treasury and the IRS report.
Trump has been assured by his sycophantic Attorney General, Pam Bondi, and by his Deputy Attorney General and former unsuccessful criminal defense attorney Todd Blanche, that he has no conflict of interest in serving as both the plaintiff and defendant, given that it is not his own money that will be disbursed to the plaintiff, but rather the taxpayers' money, who are not parties to the case. Trump now feels confident that he can rely on such scholarly legal sophistry to reconcile such positions.
Undoubtedly, Donald Trump as the plaintiff believes that given the magnitude of his pain and suffering resulting from the disclosure of how little he paid in taxes, he believes that an award of $10 billion from the defendant, in this case himself, would be adequate to mollify his pain and suffering and allow him sufficient time and resources to recover from it.
As the defendant to whom Treasury and the IRS report, Trump agrees with the plaintiff that $10 billion would be a fair and equitable settlement.
To sweeten the deal, as the plaintiff, Trump has promised to disburse one-half of the proceeds, i.e. $5 billion, to worthy public undertakings, retaining only $5 billion for himself.
As for Trump's disbursement of the $5 billion that he is promising to expend on behalf of the states, we have only to review the conversation that Senator Schumer recounted that he just had with President Trump. Trump advised Schumer that he would withhold the remaining funds of the $16 billion due to pay for the completion of the Gateway/Hudson Tunnel Project connecting New York and New Jersey unless Schumer agreed to arrange for the gilded age Penn Station Railroad Terminal in New York City to be re-named The Donald J. Trump Railroad Terminal.
While Schumer flatly refused, it dawned on Trump that he could dispense the $5 billion dollars from the $10 billion lawsuit settlement among the states and cities throughout the U.S. providing that they either change the names of landmark edifices to his name or commission that statues in his honor be constructed and prominently displayed.
So all in all, Trump sees these scenarios as a win/win for the U.S.government and himself, with only the taxpayers picking up the $10 billion bill.
Easy-Peasy!
"And I'll probably give it to charity, you know, that would be nice." We know that if it's nice he'll never do it. Never has given to charity unless it's a charitable foundation under his own control.
Yes. And we do remember that he was charged with fraud for personally plundering his own charity.
Just to clarify, Penn Station is no longer a "gilded age railroad terminal." It was destroyed many years ago to make way for Madison Square Garden.
Even with its recent renovations, it does not come anywhere close to the amazing beauty of the original Penn Station. I am fortunate to be old enough to have been there numerous times as a teenager, catching trains to Pennsylvania and beyond.
We can thank Jacqueline Kennedy that Grand Central terminal did not meet the same fate. She fought relentlessly to preserve it, and it is one of the most beautiful and iconic places in NYC.
Sad she wasn't here to save her Rose Garden or the East Wing or the Kennedy Center... or heaven knows what else will need saving before our Vulgarian-in-Chief leaves DC.
But good thing she wasn't here to see what happened
You're absolutely right DW. While the original Penn Station was a magnificent gilded-age edifice, I mistakenly was thinking of Cornelius Vanderbilt's gilded-age Grand Central Station which still stands on 42nd Street. Thanks for correcting me!
Receiving this amount of money should be considered a significant violation of the Emoluments Clause (not that it has ever made any difference) and the whole amount, should he get it, be taxed by the IRS.
The re-naming game is nothing short of bribery and blackmail. We should refuse to play.
Duck Frump!!!!!!!
Norm, thank you immensely for all of that tremendous work you are doing to hold people in particular accountable and for those updates!
Jen, thank you for your tremendous work in keeping us up on people and their actions we need to know about to stay informed! I don’t know how either or any of you find time to sleep! Also, although I quit my subscription i to the post when you left, I do miss getting to read the Pinocchio‘s. When I see their articles at all, it is only because they are included on the phone automatically. I am sorry for people who lost their jobs, and it is hard yo trust a paper that did not support the honest and caring candidate. They did not even tell it like it was in their headlines when they had an opportunity to help save so many people and our country snd world from what is happening now and from what has been happening for just over a year.
Especially, I love getting to see the pets! Thanks to each pet owner, and most recently to Lorraine and her Simone, and to all of you for making it possible for us to feel the love as a treat and retreat from this crucial time by at least getting to see the pets and to learn a bit about them!
Norm, Jen, and everybody:
🚩 This site shows Donald Trump Admitting to interviewer Alex Friedman, in Podcast #442, that he lost the 2020 election. The site is:
https://youtu.be/qCbfTN-caFI
Keep those thieving swine wrapped up in court until we can restore order in Congress and start checking the fool and his goons. Thanks for all you do. I was a charter Contrarian subscriber and I intend to remain in the fold.
'Since our justice system moves verrrrrryyyyyyyy ssssslllllloooowwwwwlllllyyyyy at the best of times. After felon 47 is dead, can the country move against his heirs to recover all this money?
I don't understand why crypto and bitcoin aren't counterfeiting...
Epstein files. It is NOT just the extra files they say they won't release. It is the improper use of redactions which is contrary to the Epstein Files Transparency Act. The got the redactions ass backwards, protecting the perps and revealing the victims.
Thank you for this reporting. As a retired DOD senior executive in the budget field, I am especially shocked a5 how this government is ignoring all monetary laws and treating government funds as a big slush fund. It is illegal to reprogram funds over a certain amount without prior congressional approval. Yet $1B (!!! Which has grown from an estimated $400M) was moved from a nuclear program to retrofit the Qatari “gifted” plane. Accountants will never find all of the audit trails of misused funds by this administration.
And the GOP do-nothings who have loudly complained about "waste, fraud, and abuse" are suddenly blind, deaf, and dumb in the ominous shadow of the ballooning national debt.
That seems to be the basic problem with our government now, that Congress is doing nothing (and also a little aiding and abetting from the SC)
You and your team are fearless heroes. Thank you.
Thank you Norm Eisen and all others for the good work you do defending and fighting for our democracy. I subscribe to the Contrarian and will continue to. And I keep you in my prayers that your courage and stamina prevail.
There is not much difference between Civil War slavery and present day Autocratic Fascism. America is AGAIN at a crossroad. Democracy or Autocracy
And sadly, repulsively, there is more than his corruption. His pussy-grabbing brag. His murder-on-Fifth-Avenue boast. His sh*t-hole-countries insults. His failed appalling monkey-head "joke." (The list could go on and on and on and on...) Would any other country ever elect such a creature their representative to the world?
People keep saying "This is not who we are." Sadly, it is who we have become. A vulgar, racist, perversely-permissive nation. Our veneer of respectability is see-through thin. Unless we begin holding ourselves, each other, and our elected leaders to much higher standards of behavior, does this culture we tolerate really deserve to survive?
There is no shortage of grift and corruption in this administration. In terms of what I consider most important, please concentrate on immoral federal law enforcement and, most of all, election interference. "Nationalizing elections" is the most dictatorial, authoritarian line I have yet seen, and there have been way too many "lines" from this atrocious White House.