Tag Archives: DOJ

Patel to weaponize FBI

Let me see if I have this straight: Donald J. Trump has accused the Biden administration of “weaponizing” the Justice Department to go after Trumpkins and other MAGA goons, yet the new president has selected a guy, Kash Patel, to run the FBI with the expressed purpose of finding political foes and prosecuting them for unknown reasons.

Talk about weaponization!

Patel, of course, has no business running the nation’s top police force. He is a Trump loyalist and so far has spoken the words the boss wants to hear. I use the term “boss” with caution, because in reality you and I are the bosses. Patel doesn’t see it that way. He sees the president as the boss, is answerable only to him and therefore must be held accountable only by the nimrod sitting behind the Resolute Desk.

Not true, not by a long shot.

Patel is likely to get picked apart by Senate Judiciary Committee members, maybe even some of his fellow Republicans.

I’m tellin’ ya, Donald Trump’s next term as president is going to be one for the books … likely the comic books.

Trump: Slipperiest man alive

Donald J. Trump has just earned a new title that smacks of royalty.

I hereby crown this guy King Donald, The Slipperiest Man Alive. The dude received this unofficial title when special counsel Jack Smith announced today he would move to dismiss all the federal charges leveled against Trump.

They include his role in the Jan. 6, 2021 assault on our government as well as his keeping of classified documents at his Florida estate.

What happened to force Smith to make this decision? Near as I can tell, it was the Supreme Court ruling that granted Trump immunity from prosecution while he sits in the Oval Office.

So, the two federal charges appear headed for the dustbin. All that’s left to prosecute is the Georgia case alleging that Trump sought to pressure state officials to “find” enough votes in Georgia to swing that state’s total in 2020 to Trump’s column.

The feds have no authority over DA Fani Willis’s right to prosecute that case as an elected state official. Then again, that case appears to be sucking wind at this stage.

Here we stand. A man who was impeached twice during his first term in office, convicted of 34 felony counts in New York on a hush-money payment to an adult film actress and then was charged in multiple cases on state and federal felonies has been re-elected to the nation’s highest office.

He now wears the crown awarded to the Slipperiest Man Alive.

Stunning … simply stunning.

Gaetz is gone; good riddance!

Matt Gaetz spared himself the embarrassment of being denied a seat in the Trump administration Cabinet by pulling his name out of consideration to be the next attorney general.

I would offer a word of praise to Gaetz … except he doesn’t deserve any good word from me.

Gaetz had no business being considered for a post that demands extreme moral rectitude from the individual who occupies it. Gaetz had been investigated for sex trafficking, for having sex with an underage girl and for use of illicit drugs. The House ethics committee compiled a report that allegedly contains a ton of sordid details.

Now, he wasn’t ever charged with a crime. The report is still out there. House Republicans have blocked its release so far. Gaetz’s decision to back out of the AG search likely will diminish the public’s chances of seeing the report.

I will argue that the public still needs to see what it contains. To what end? To determine the nature of the character of an individual that the incoming president would nominate to become attorney general of the United States.

It appears to me that learning about the former AG candidate’s (lack of) character would speak volumes as well about the guy who selected him.

Matt Gaetz is gone … but we still have Donald Trump.

Speaker excels in lame excuses

Stand tall, U.S. House Speaker Mike Johnson, for you have just coined the lamest excuse I’ve ever heard into why a former member of your governing body shouldn’t have to be held to account for allegations of severe misconduct.

Former Republican U.S. Rep. Matt Gaetz has been nominated by Donald Trump to be the next attorney general. He quit the House and, thus, delivered Johnson the ammo he fired off to earn the title of King of Lame Excuses.

Republicans and Democrats alike believe the House ethics committee needs to release findings of an investigation into whether Gaetz had sex with an underage girl and used illegal drugs.

Johnson said the panel should keep it secret because — drum roll — Gaetz “is no longer a member of the House.”

So, there you have it. A nimrod whom the incoming president wants to become the nation’s next chief law enforcement official should skate simply because he’s no longer in Congress?

The public has a compelling need to know whether someone who could become AG is a child molester and/or someone who engages in rampant drug abuse.

Maybe I am getting too worked up over what well might not occur, as I hear a growing number of Gaetz’s fellow Republicans in Congress believe he is unfit for the office he seeks.

Gaetz as AG? Holy crap!

Donald J. Trump’s Cabinet hit parade just picked up a huge head of steam today with his announcement of who he wants to serve as U.S. attorney general.

It is none other than Republican Party human grenade launcher Matt Gaetz, a Florida congressman who says the Justice Department is a cesspool of corruption. What’s more, he vows to clean the place up from top to bottom.

Oh, there’s more. Gaetz has been investigated by the very same DOJ on corruption charges himself. So now, the new POTUS wants him to run the DOJ? Is this for real? Don’t answer that. I know that it is.

Trump has been on a roll as he seeks to fill out the Cabinet. He announced today that former Democratic congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard will be the director of national intelligence. And …. he has selected former North Texas congressman John Ratcliffe to lead the CIA. Gabbard and Ratcliffe both have negligible intelligence backgrounds. Indeed, Trump once picked Ratcliffe to be DNI, only to have his name pulled because of questions about his intelligence background.

The Gaetz pick clearly is going to spark a sh**storm on Capitol Hill as the AG nominee will be forced to answer questions about the ethics probe and what on Earth he intends to do about all the dedicated professionals who toil day and night to keep us safe.

Gaetz’s rhetoric about the agency he might lead is most troubling. He has levied specific accusations against FBI director Christopher Wray and a host of other officials. Gaetz has behaved like the right-wing blowhard he is and has brought nothing but shame and embarrassment to anything he touches.

How in the world is this guy going to get 50 Senate votes to confirm him as attorney general? Let the rumble begin.

Who’s dumber?

The dumbest individual to ever be elected president of the United States never should question another public figure’s intelligence.

Never! Not ever should he go there. But … Donald Trump has ventured down that blind alley.

He said this week that Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris isn’t intelligent enough to stage a press conference with national media. He said President Biden is “smarter” than the person he wants to succeed him in the White House.

This, of course, comes from an individual without a single forward-looking policy agenda. He has offered no plan on how he intends to govern, other than to exact revenge on his political foes by siccing the Justice Department on them.

He hasn’t developed a single constructive thought. He doesn’t understand how government works.

Republicans have nominated a certifiable dumbass — oh, and a convicted felon — to be their nominee for president of the United States.

I believe I am going to scream!

Fourth of July = more poignant

Quite naturally, we are now getting ready to celebrate the birth of our great nation while wondering and, yes, worrying about its future.

An election is coming up. Donald Trump reportedly is leading the two-man race for the White House. His campaign theme is a muddled mess, but millions of us have determined that one thing Trump wants to do is dismantle the democratic tradition that grants this country its greatness.

We had better pay attention to what might be transpiring in real time. Donald Trump plans to sic the Justice Department on his political foes. He will demand blind loyalty among those who serve him if hell freezes over and is elected POTUS. He said he would be a dictator on the opening day of his administration.

The nation’s founders, wherever they are, must be spinning in their graves.

Trump plans to cozy up to dictators, morons he calls “very strong leaders.” He is making broad promises he cannot possibly keep and is spouting lies he knows to be false.

Let us salute the wisdom our founders demonstrated in creating this nation. Their creation wasn’t perfect, but we have sought to improve through all those amendments to our Constitution, The founders knew that perfection was impossible to achieve, given their stated aim to form a “more perfect Union.”

DOJ isn’t anti-GOP … got it?

Let us all just take a deep breath while pondering a key jury verdict … and then dispel this fu**ed-up notion that the US Department of Justice is being “weaponized” for use against Republican politicians.

Hunter Biden, the surviving son of Democratic President Joe Biden, has been convicted by a jury of three felony counts related to his purchase of a firearm while he was abusing drugs.

It was a federal case, meaning that DOJ prosecuted it. It’s the same DOJ run by Attorney General Merrick Garland, who this past week mounted a stern and forceful defense of his agency’s conduct.

“No one is above the law,” became the mantra of the DOJ as it prosecuted Hunter Biden. It was the same mantra followed by Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg, whose office achieved a conviction of Donald J. Trump on a hush money charge.

Will the Biden conviction silence DOJ’s critics? Will they ever acknowledge publicly what most of the rest of us know, that the AG takes seriously the oath he pledged to defend the Constitution?

I shall add that President Biden has declared that a pardon for his son will not occur. 

I should point out, too, that two more Democratic politicians — U.S. Sen. Bob Menendez of New Jersey and U.S. Rep. Henry Cuellar of Texas — both have trials pending; they, too, are being prosecuted by the Justice Department.

This idea that jury verdicts are “rigged” and that the system is “corrupt” and “broken” just does not wash.

The only “rigging” that has occurred within the federal system has been done by the 45th POTUS, the purveyor of the Big Lie and the man who now stands before us as a convicted felon.

DOJ is the wrong target

Can we set the record straight while seeking to determine who is responsible for what cases? Sure, I’ll try …. not that it’ll do any good, given the numbskulls whose vacuous brains I need to probe.

Donald Trump is now a convicted felon. A jury of 12 of his peers delivered a stunning unanimous decision convicting him on 34 counts associated with his hush money payment to Stephanie Clifford, aka Stormy Daniels. She and the former POTUS had a fling in a hotel room in 2006 and Trump paid her to keep quiet about an event he denies even occurred.

The jury believed her and not him. What does Trump do in response? He blames President Biden for bringing the case against him. He and his allies blame the Justice Department for “weaponizing” its resources to “get” the former POTUS.

He calls Judge Juan Merchon everything but the spawn of Satan. He says the judge is corrupt.

Let’s hold it for a moment. This case was brought by the state of New York. He was prosecuted by an elected district attorney who does not answer to the DOJ, let alone the president. This case was handled under the rule of law. It was done properly. The jury heard the evidence and then delivered its verdict.

I cannot help but wonder whether the former Liar in Chief is cutting his own throat by trashing the very judge who, on July 11, could sentence him to prison. The judge vows to follow the law.

However, he is a human being.

DOJ report: Police failed miserably in Uvalde

Words fail me at this moment as I ponder the release of a nearly 600-page report chronicling the mass shooting at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde.

U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland told the world Thursday of a systematic failure — from top to bottom — of the police response to the massacre of 19 children and two educators.

For 77 interminable minutes the cops did nothing while an 18-year-old lunatic was holed up in the school … and murdering children and the teachers who sought to protect them.

State troopers were present, along with Uvalde municipal cops, officers of the Uvalde school district, sheriff’s deputies. They were leaderless. They received no instruction to storm the school and take the shooter out.

The officers sat on their hands and allowed the carnage to continue.

I have no words of wisdom to offer. I cannot think of a way to prevent this sort of tragedy from recurring.

All I know is that the men and women who suit up as “leaders” failed to perform the essential tenet of leadership. They failed to issue orders to storm the school and do whatever it took to “neutralize” the moron who had purchased legally an AR-15 rifle and then used it to take the lives of innocent and precious children.

AG Garland took specific note that the AR-15 is intended for “the battlefield.” Its purpose is to kill people as quickly as people. It does not belong in the possession of individuals — such as the Uvalde madman — who then can rein havoc and mayhem on defenseless children.

How do we stop this madness? I have no clue on how one can do so while navigating the rough political water that so far has prevented any meaningful laws to curb such senseless violence.

Were I the King of the World, I might ponder whether there’s a way to amend the Second Amendment, the one that gun-rights advocates use as their political shield against solutions to the gun violence plague.

But I’m not. I am left only to gasp in horror at the findings of the Department of Justice and share the attorney general’s grief over the senselessness of the slaughter that no doubt will continue.