{"id":136893,"date":"2018-09-04T11:47:59","date_gmt":"2018-09-04T17:47:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2018\/09\/04\/tweetizen-trump-2018-09-03-all-politics-is-personal-to-donald-trump.html"},"modified":"2018-09-05T20:52:44","modified_gmt":"2018-09-06T02:52:44","slug":"tweetizen-trump-2018-09-03-all-politics-is-personal-to-donald-trump","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2018\/09\/04\/tweetizen-trump-2018-09-03-all-politics-is-personal-to-donald-trump.html","title":{"rendered":"Tweetizen Trump &#8211; 2018-09-03 &#8211; All Politics Is Personal (to Donald Trump)"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Donald lashed out yesterday (once again) at Attorney General Jeff Sessions for having the audacity to run a Justice Dept. that dared file charges against two of Trump&#8217;s earliest Congressional supporters. (The charges against Rep. Collins and Hunter were not for <i>that<\/i> particular lapse of ethics and taste, of course, but for a variety of securities fraud, insider trading, campaign finance violations, etc.)<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"550\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">Two long running, Obama era, investigations of  two very popular Republican Congressmen were brought to a well publicized charge, just ahead of the Mid-Terms, by the Jeff Sessions Justice Department. Two easy wins now in doubt because there is not enough time. Good job Jeff&#8230;&#8230;<\/p>\n<p>&mdash; Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/realDonaldTrump\/status\/1036681588573130752?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">September 3, 2018<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p>For Donald, the great crime here seems to be that &#8230; well, Sessions wasn&#8217;t partisan enough. Because <i>of course<\/i> the Attorney General should be partisan, otherwise what is the point of having the President being able to nominate him?<\/p>\n<p>I mean, look at the &#8220;charges&#8221; Donald is lobbing:<\/p>\n<p>1. This was a &#8220;long-running&#8221; investigation &#8212; because Donald wants to be able to just accuse people of things and have it go directly to trial. Long-term investments, careful gathering of evidence, careful consideration of what charges can be prosecuted, that&#8217;s all just namby-pamby <i>process<\/i> to him. Which, as we all know, is something Donald abhors.<\/p>\n<p>2. These were &#8220;Obama era&#8221; investigations &#8212; therefore it is immediately suspect, probably evil, and certainly something out to get Donald Trump. The Justice Department should clearly only prosecute crimes the President wants them to prosecute, and any investigations still ongoing from a previous administration should be immediately dropped as soon as someone new is in the White House.<\/p>\n<p>(Note: the Duncan Hunter investigation actually began\u00a0<em>during<\/em> the Trump Administration. But why cavil over dates, amirite?)<\/p>\n<p>3. The accused are &#8220;two very popular Republican Congressmen&#8221; &#8212; because being very popular should make one immune to prosecution (careful of the implications of that line of thought, Donald), and the fact that they are Republicans should make them doubly immune, right?<\/p>\n<p>4. This came out in &#8220;a well publicized charge&#8221; &#8212; because of course only the &#8220;Fake Media&#8221; would have any interest in publicizing that two members of the US House of Representatives were facing federal charges.<\/p>\n<p>5. The charges came out &#8220;just ahead of the Mid-Terms&#8221; and when &#8220;there is not enough time&#8221; for them to be fully prosecuted \/ defended \/ dismissed before the election &#8212; There&#8217;s an informal rule at Justice that you don&#8217;t release charges and stuff like that within 60 days of an election (thus Democratic outrage at Comey&#8217;s &#8220;October Surprise&#8221; &#8212; which Donald loved at the time) &#8212; but not only is that not actual law, these charges came out well before that informal 60 day limit before the November midterms.<\/p>\n<p>I mean, what does Donald think should represent a go\/no-go point for charges to be filed? 60 days? 90 days? 180? Or does Donald thing that charges should <i>never<\/i> be filed against the President&#8217;s co-partyists?<\/p>\n<p>Does anyone truly think that Donald would be pitching a fit if these charges were against Democratic Representatives? That, right there, is telling.<\/p>\n<p>6. These Congressmen were facing &#8220;Two easy wins now in doubt&#8221; &#8212; That may or may not be so (Donald, of course, is convinced that the GOP are going to blow the Dems away in November, because he knows this is a referendum on him, too), but this accusation only makes sense if one assumes that these charges are made up out of whole cloth, presented and timed solely for political reasons.<\/p>\n<p>Bottom line, Donald Trump thinks the Justice Dept. should serve the interests of the party in power in the White House &#8212; and not only thinks it, but is willing to <i>say<\/i> it.<\/p>\n<p>That, right there, should be grounds for gelding any influence he has by getting rid of GOP majorities in both houses. I&#8217;d even suggest it shows a disrespect for the rule of law that should be impeachable, though I doubt that will actually happen.<\/p>\n<p>Just to add to the mix, he later tweeted:<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"550\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">&#8230;.The Democrats, none of whom voted for Jeff Sessions, must love him now. Same thing with Lyin\u2019 James Comey. The Dems all hated him, wanted him out, thought he was disgusting &#8211; UNTIL I FIRED HIM! Immediately he became a wonderful man, a saint like figure in fact. Really sick!<\/p>\n<p>&mdash; Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/realDonaldTrump\/status\/1036685082650705920?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">September 3, 2018<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p>Again, remember that all politics is personal to Donald, not unlike a Mafia capo. The idea of a mixture of loyalties, of appreciating things about a person vs not appreciating other things, is foreign to him. You are either loyal to Donald Trump, or a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.cnbc.com\/2018\/09\/04\/new-bob-woodward-book-shows-worried-president-trump-after-mueller-nod.html\">traitor<\/a>\u00a0to him.<\/p>\n<p>Speaking personally as a Democrat, I do not love Jeff Sessions. His policy positions are, generally, loathsome. I do feel sorry for the guy sometimes &#8212; he gave up an influential Senate seat to take on a cabinet position he thought would be at the forefront of (legally) implementing a conservative reign over American law, only to become a perpetual punching bag for his boss because of one, very public ethical stance he took: recusing himself from any oversight of the Mueller investigation because of his own role in the Trump campaign.<\/p>\n<p>I admire that stance. I don&#8217;t love the man. But, then, not understanding that kind of nuance seems to be Donald&#8217;s way.<\/p>\n<p>Similarly, I (like many others) still strongly disagree with Comey&#8217;s disclosure of more <i>possible<\/i> stuff to investigate just prior to the 2016 election &#8212; one more factor in how that election played out &#8212; but can do so without considering him a foul fiend, or without appreciating his apparent candor and ethics regarding Trump&#8217;s shenanigans. Again, it&#8217;s nuance, something that With-Me-Or-Against-Me Donald doesn&#8217;t recognize.<\/p>\n<p>Which is ironic. Because just as Trump accuses the Dems of flip-flopping on Comey (&#8220;hating&#8221; him until suddenly they &#8220;loved&#8221; him), so Donald flip-flopped on him, &#8220;loving&#8221; him for his October Surprise, until he refused to bow knee and kiss the ring sufficiently; then Donald suddenly &#8220;hated,&#8221; him, fired him, and has released unrelanting vitriol toward him.<\/p>\n<p>Which should be a lesson to us all: when Donald is accusing someone of something, look to see how that reflects is own behavior.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"sm2wp\"><p><a style=\"display: inline;\" href=\"https:\/\/www.cnn.com\/2018\/09\/03\/politics\/donald-trump-jeff-sessions-justice-department\/index.html\"><br \/>\n<img decoding=\"async\" style=\"max-width: 650px;\" src=\"https:\/\/lh3.googleusercontent.com\/proxy\/14qybB_TXKnNelX-qO_gsFJw15Q8A11TyXyhZShWeDmUeb8VenX7E9ui87qm0sxzQM0eZ690WaGltWGF2iCVed_du-G-j9nAAi68SVMbU7Vz4JpdivDYa4TjNzfVflvnoQCXHEzACC5v3w=w506-h910\" border=\"0\" \/><br \/>\n<\/a><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: large;\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.cnn.com\/2018\/09\/03\/politics\/donald-trump-jeff-sessions-justice-department\/index.html\">Trump blasts Sessions over GOP congressmen indictments &#8211; CNNPolitics<\/a><\/span><br \/>\nPresident Donald Trump on Monday blasted his Attorney General Jeff Sessions and lamented the indictments of two lawmakers who were his earliest supporters in Congress during the 2016 election, suggesting they should not have been charged because they are Republicans.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><span style=\"font-size: small;\"><a href=\"https:\/\/plus.google.com\/+DaveHill47\/posts\/U3tGkgzCVxx\">Original Post<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Donald lashed out yesterday (once again) at Attorney General Jeff Sessions for having the audacity to run a Justice Dept. that dared file charges against two of Trump&#8217;s earliest Congressional supporters. (The charges against Rep. Collins and Hunter were not for that particular lapse of ethics and taste, of course, but for a variety of &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2018\/09\/04\/tweetizen-trump-2018-09-03-all-politics-is-personal-to-donald-trump.html\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;Tweetizen Trump &#8211; 2018-09-03 &#8211; All Politics Is Personal (to Donald Trump)&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":136994,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_seopress_robots_follow":"","_seopress_robots_imageindex":"","_seopress_robots_snippet":"","_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_robots_breadcrumbs":"","_seopress_robots_freeze_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_custom_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_canonical":"","_seopress_social_fb_title":"","_seopress_social_fb_desc":"","_seopress_social_fb_img":"","_seopress_social_fb_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_height":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_title":"","_seopress_social_twitter_desc":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_height":0,"_seopress_redirections_value":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled_regex":"","_seopress_redirections_logged_status":"","_seopress_redirections_param":"","_seopress_redirections_type":0,"_seopress_analysis_target_kw":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[106,715,1140,358,1071],"tags":[1701,1401,1077],"class_list":["post-136893","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-plusposts","category-crime-punishment","category-elections-2018","category-poor-citizenship","category-trump","tag-justice","tag-law-and-order","tag-trump"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/09\/trump-pensive.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":137207,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2018\/09\/17\/not-at-all-surprisingly-trump-releases-information-to-attack-his-enemies.html","url_meta":{"origin":136893,"position":0},"title":"Not at all surprisingly, Trump releases information to attack his enemies","author":"***Dave","date":"Mon 17-Sep-18 11:43pm","format":false,"excerpt":"Okay, go ahead and take it as a given that Adam Schiff is a partisan hack. I consider him on the side of the angels here, but not significantly more noble and altruistic and non-partisan than, say, Devon Nunes (though a lot smarter).That said, the story as a whole is\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;~PlusPosts&quot;","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":132705,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2017\/01\/30\/blaze-of-glory-justice-dept-style.html","url_meta":{"origin":136893,"position":1},"title":"Blaze of Glory (Justice Dept. Style)","author":"***Dave","date":"Mon 30-Jan-17 5:21pm","format":false,"excerpt":"Sally Yates is acting US Attorney General since Loretta Lynch's resignation was accepted by Donald Trump, and as Jeff Sessions has not yet been confirmed. She has contacted the lawyers in the Justice Dept. to not defend Donald Trump's Executive Order banning people from seven Muslim-majority countries from traveling to\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;~PlusPosts&quot;","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":132088,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2016\/11\/22\/apparently-donald-trump-wont-lock-her-up.html","url_meta":{"origin":136893,"position":2},"title":"Apparently Donald Trump won&#039;t &quot;Lock! Her! Up!&quot;","author":"***Dave","date":"Tue 22-Nov-16 8:08am","format":false,"excerpt":"It's all leaks from inside sources and\/or Kellyanne Conway, but it seems that Trump is backing off of threats of special prosecutors and the like to pursue criminal charges against Hillary Clinton for her email server stuff.On the one hand, this would be a Good Thing, for a variety of\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;~PlusPosts&quot;","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":132423,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2016\/12\/23\/so-who-is-donald-trumps-most-dangerous-cabinet-pick.html","url_meta":{"origin":136893,"position":3},"title":"So, who is Donald Trump&#039;s most dangerous cabinet pick?","author":"***Dave","date":"Fri 23-Dec-16 9:58am","format":false,"excerpt":"Trump keeps a lot of the spotlight on himself, and there's been a lot of focus on his national security team, esp. Mike Flynn as National Security Advisor.Now, don't get me wrong -- Flynn, who always looks like he's about fifteen seconds from a brain aneurysm from scowling so hard,\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;~PlusPosts&quot;","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":132060,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2016\/11\/18\/trump-nominates-alabama-senator-jeff-sessions-as-ag.html","url_meta":{"origin":136893,"position":4},"title":"Trump nominates Alabama Senator Jeff Sessions as AG","author":"***Dave","date":"Fri 18-Nov-16 7:22am","format":false,"excerpt":"The best thing I can say for Jeff Sessions as a nominee for Attorney General is that he's not Rudy Giuliani. The second best is that it would remove a senior GOP leader from the Senate (not that I expect Alabama to flip blue any time soon).That said, there are\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;~PlusPosts&quot;","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":132966,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2017\/03\/02\/tweetizen-trump-2017-03-02-part-deux-so-are-they-all-honest-men.html","url_meta":{"origin":136893,"position":5},"title":"Tweetizen Trump &#8211; 2017-03-02, Part Deux &quot;So Are They All, Honest Men&quot;","author":"***Dave","date":"Thu 2-Mar-17 9:58pm","format":false,"excerpt":"I'm busy tomorrow morning, Donald, so I'm going to hop on Today's Tweets Today. Because you've been busy on the Twitter in the past couple of hours ...\u25ba Jeff Sessions is an honest man. He did not say anything wrong. He could have stated his response more accurately, but it\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;~PlusPosts&quot;","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/136893","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=136893"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/136893\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":136995,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/136893\/revisions\/136995"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/136994"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=136893"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=136893"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=136893"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}