Tom of Temecula
Tom of Temecula's Journal'I hate that': Trump veers off into rant about being called 'unpopular'
Former President Donald Trump went on a rant Wednesday after saying he had been called "unpopular" in media reports. During a rally in Waukesha, Wisconsin, Trump's reaction to his 'unpopular' portrayal in media reports was palpable. "You know what bugs me?" the former president asked. "When they say, we have two very unpopular candidates, Joe Biden and Donald Trump. They're very unpopular. He's unpopular."
"I'm not unpopular," he insisted. "I'm like at 94% approval in the Republican Party. I'm not unpopular. They're fake news. I hate that. It's terrible."
The former president appeared at the Wisconsin rally amid an ongoing criminal court trial in New York City where he faces 34 counts of falsifying business records to conceal hush money payments to an adult film star.
Experts say that trial raises multiple optics problems for the presumptive Republican nominee amid his 2024 presidential reelection campaign. "The optics of it aren't great," his former press secretary Sarah Matthews said Tuesday. "This was an [alleged] affair he had with a porn star shortly after his wife gave birth to their child."
https://www.rawstory.com/trump-unpopular/
Trump's 'outright psychopathy' on display in his new email meltdowns
Concurrent with Donald Trump's hush money trial finishing up its second week of prosecution testimony, the former president's emails to his supporters are becoming increasingly over-the-top and shrill, leading to speculation he is not only having donation problems but also the pressures of his legal problems are getting to him. As noted by Salon's Chauncey DeVega who has been reporting on the former president's diminishing mental state and possible psychological problems, there is a growing vibe of panic in Trump's emails as evidenced by a recent one that blared: "All hell breaks loose in 24 hours!" and another declaring he is being held "hostage."
According to DeVega's report, the strident tone in the emails begging for donations are demonstrating an increasing spiral in victimhood as he sits day after day in a Manhattan courtroom while facing the possibility of jail time if convicted on just one of the 34 felony counts he is charged with related to paying hush money to adult film star Stormy Daniels.
"With the beginning of Trump’s first criminal trial in New York, his emails have only become more extreme – and will only continue to – as the 2024 election and potentially three other criminal trials are closing in on him," he wrote before pointing to the recent Trump email that stated: "Friend, in 24 hours, the hearing on my GAG ORDER will begin. I COULD BE THROWN IN JAIL AT THAT VERY MOMENT! This is what the Hate-America Deep State has always dreamed of. STAND WITH TRUMP I won’t be able to campaign. I will be muzzled and silent. And Democrats will have free rein to destroy our country."
That led DeVega to argued that, "Of course, Donald Trump is lying. There is no substantive evidence to support his fabulist conspiratorial delusions-fantasies of persecution and other harm. The corrupt ex-president is in no way a victim, except perhaps of his own apparent sociopathy if not outright psychopathy, and other parts of his obviously diseased mind."
https://www.rawstory.com/trump-mental-state-2668130889/
RFK Jr. is all over conservative media. Trump's camp is concerned.
Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s increasingly frequent appearances on conservative media platforms are beginning to raise alarms at Mar-a-Lago. It’s another sign of the rising threat that Kennedy, the independent presidential candidate, poses to Trump. In recent months, Kennedy has become a regular on Fox News and Newsmax, and he is now a staple on the conservative podcast circuit — being interviewed by the likes of Ben Shapiro, Glenn Beck and Megyn Kelly. While railing against President Joe Biden, Kennedy is actively courting an audience with the young listeners of bro podcasters and conservative-coded YouTubers that skew anti-“woke.”
That’s squarely on Trump’s turf, not Biden’s. “It is concerning and beyond logic,” said Chris LaCivita, Trump’s co-campaign manager, “that there are some conservative platforms that continue to give a voice to someone that has called the NRA a terrorist group, who believes in eliminating gas powered engines, believes in a 70% tax bracket and generally subscribes to the same school of thought as Karl Marx.”
Though Kennedy has been popular with conservative media since he initially launched his candidacy as a Democrat, his frequent appearances on Trump-aligned platforms now come as he runs as an independent candidate who could cut into Trump’s support. The former president this past weekend went on multiple tirades about Kennedy on his Truth Social site, declaring him a “Democrat ‘Plant’” and “far more LIBERAL than anyone running as a Democrat.” And he said “A Vote for Junior’ would essentially be a WASTED PROTEST VOTE.”
“They see an opening, they see a robust ecosystem on the right that they can pull votes from,” said Matt Gorman, a former communications adviser for Sen. Tim Scott’s presidential campaign, referring to Kennedy. “I think sometimes, Republicans tend to lull ourselves into believing, ‘Oh, he’s just taking votes from Biden.’ No, he’s going after everybody.” Kennedy has also taken on championing one of Trump’s top policy issues: closing the U.S. border. That’s in addition to questioning the legitimacy of the charges brought against rioters at the Jan. 6, 2021, riot at the Capitol, a cohort who Trump has praised and suggested he would pardon.
https://www.politico.com/news/2024/05/01/rfk-jr-trump-2024-elections-00155425
Graham reveals potential phone hack involving someone impersonating Schumer
Sen. Lindsey Graham said Wednesday that the FBI took possession of his phone after someone attempted to trick the South Carolina Republican into thinking he was communicating with Senate Majority Leader Charles E. Schumer.
Mr. Graham revealed the potential hack in remarks at the Hill & Valley Forum on Capitol Hill, which is a gathering of top tech and government officials meeting in Washington to discuss artificial intelligence security. Asked about spies targeting Silicon Valley and how AI labs should prepare themselves, Mr. Graham said people should be concerned and relayed his own brush with apparent hackers.
“My phone is in the hands of the FBI now,” Mr. Graham said at the forum. “So I get a message, I think, from Schumer, it ain’t from Schumer, and next thing you know, my phone’s, I don’t know what. Anything you can create apparently can be hacked.”
Mr. Graham did not identify who he suspected was responsible. Taylor Reidy, Mr. Graham‘s spokeswoman, said the Senate’s Sergeant at Arms was investigating. The FBI did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2024/may/1/sen-lindsey-graham-reveals-potential-phone-hack-in/
Trump lawyers scramble as trial witnesses blow up Michael Cohen strategy
Former top Justice Department prosecutor Andrew Weissmann claimed Tuesday that the witnesses being called in the Donald Trump hush money trial are confirming every detail of Michael Cohen's story — with bombshell accuracy. Speaking to MSNBC's Nicolle Wallace, Weissmann said testimony from David Pecker, the ex-publisher of the National Enquirer, was "so powerful I think we have to recalibrate the lens [through which] we were thinking about this case."
The assumption from legal analysts has been that Trump's former lawyer Michael Cohen would be the prosecution's star witness, with documents and information that could confirm his ex-boss's involvement in hush money payments paid to coverup a potentially damaging sexual relationship with adult movie star Stormy Daniels.
Instead, Weissmann said, Pecker has proven to be the big witness — and subsequent witnesses backed up everything he testified about. "This case is made very much without Michael Cohen," said Weissmann. "I mean, this is so corroborated, and it is not just that you have David Pecker and now [ex-attorney for Stormy Daniels] Keith Davidson."
He called the witnesses' stories "hand and glove," fitting together "so perfectly." "It is completely corroborated, particularly with respect to Mr. Davidson, by so many texts and email exchanges and the written documents," said Weissmann. Davidson served as the attorney who negotiated the deal for Playboy playmate Karen McDougal and was working with Daniels on her story as well. Both women attempted to sell the National Enquirer details of sexual relationships with Trump.
https://www.rawstory.com/trump-trial-witnesses-confirm-cohen/
'Irreparable breakdown': Trump campaign law firm suddenly retreats from years-long case
A longstanding legal firm serving former President Donald Trump's campaign and businesses is seeking to withdraw from a lengthy case because of “irreparable breakdown in the attorney-client relationship,” according to a new report and court records.
The firm LaRocca, Hornik, Greenberg, Rosen, Kittridge, Carlin and McPartland on Friday requested to remove itself from a lawsuit filed by a campaign surrogate who said the campaign sidelined her in 2016 after she revealed she was pregnant, the New York Times was first to report.
"The timing of the motion was notable," the Times notes, "just two days after the same federal court had ordered the campaign to turn over in discovery all complaints of sexual harassment and gender or pregnancy discrimination from the 2016 and 2020 campaigns — materials that the defendants have long resisted handing over."
The surrogate, A. J. Delgado, is representing herself and objected to the withdrawal in a filing Monday, arguing it should not be allowed until the discovery process has been completed and calling the request a “scheme to avoid compliance," the Times reports. Delgado made headlines in 2022 when she accused longtime Trump aide and political confidante Jason Miller of engaging in "a cycle of sexual coercion, rape, sexual assault, abuse, battery, sexual harassment, and sex trafficking."
https://www.rawstory.com/trump-law-firm/
Seinfeld Pop Tarts Movie Shows First Ever Satire of January 6th as Cereal Characters Attack Kellogg's HQ
The audience tonight at the Hollywood premiere of Jerry Seinfeld’s “Unfrosted” will have a lot of laughs and a bit of an unexpected political surprise. In the 90 minute comedy, Seinfeld can claim a first: a satirical segment sending up the January 6th Capitol insurgency. The premise of the film is a war between Kellogg’s and Post Cereals over which one will get a jelly filled snack to grocery stores.
Hugh Grant plays the actor in the Tony the Tiger suit for Kellogg’s Frosted Flakes. But he becomes increasingly upset with Kellogg’s for not ventilating the suit. Finally. as the company ignores his complaints — as well as Frosted Flakes — the character, Thurl, turns against Kellogg’s. He leads an insurgency at the Kellogg’s headquarters. Grant’s costume is quite absolutely the same as the barechested guy who attacked the Capitol on January 6th wearing horns and a helmet. The real rioter, known as the Q-Anon Shaman, has been in jail since 2021. Grant’s Thurl, dressed the same way leads a huge riot outside Kellogg’s with armies of cartoon cereal characters including Snap, Crackle, and Pop. They breech the perimeter, enter the building, and start ransacking it.
Too soon? I’m told it’s like the MAD magazine version of January 6th. The movie, set in 1963, also includes send ups of JFK, Walter Cronkite, Johnny Carson and Ed McMahon, Nikita Khrushchev, and other 60s characters. There’s also a hilarious bit about “Mad Men” with Jon Hamm and Jon Slattery playing their old characters. Will the January 6th parody get laughs? Or spark outrage? I would guess the first, although even that might be upsetting that we don’t take what happened three years ago seriously.
Here’s a funny promo featuring the great veteran actor Geoff Pierson. The actors in the glass box are Larry Thomas as the Soup Nazi, Phil Morris (son of “Mission Impossible” star Greg Morris) as Jackie Chiles, and Alexandra Wentworth (aka Mrs. George Stephanopolous) as “Shmoopie.”
https://www.showbiz411.com/2024/04/30/exclusive-seinfeld-pop-tart-movie-shows-first-ever-satire-of-january-6th-as-cereal-characters-attack-kelloggs-hq
'I will murder you': Stormy Daniels bodyguard says threats mount as hush money trial looms
Adult film star Stormy Daniels' bodyguard says his client has been hit with a wave of death threats as her court date in former President Donald Trump's criminal hush money trial looms. Travis Miller appeared on CNN Tuesday night to share the threats Daniels faces as she prepares to testify about the affair she contends she had with the former president, and the money Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg says she was paid to keep quiet.
"She's worried," Miller told Erin Burnett. "The biggest thing is just protecting her and and just give her as much peace as possible during this process." Trump pleaded not guilty to charges he falsified business records ahead of the 2016 presidential election and denies the affair with Daniels.
Miller told Burnett Daniels is not new to such violent threats, but has grown alarmed as the messaging intensifies. It's definitely gotten worse," Miller confirmed. Burnett read aloud a two missives Daniels was sent. "Evil will never win," the first read. "The truth will come out and I don't know how you live with yourself."
The second Burnett cautioned was so vile she could not read most of it on air. "I'm going to physically abuse... you and your entire family," it reads. "This is a death threat and I swear to god I will murder you." In a statement provided to CNN, Daniels said she was resolved to speak out in court. "No amount of threats will change what happened," she said. "The truth is the truth."
https://www.rawstory.com/stormy-daniels-bodyguard/
Trump Removes Truth Social Posts After Being Threatened With Jail
After being threatened with potential jail time, Donald Trump removed posts from Truth Social that violated the judge’s gag order. Via CNN:
Former President Donald Trump has removed the social media posts that Judge Juan Merchan ruled violated the gag order he is under for his New York criminal hush money trial. Trump was fined $9,000 earlier on Tuesday for violating the gag order by criticizing expected trial witnesses nine times in posts on social media and his campaign page. Trump was ordered to remove the posts by 2:15 p.m. ET on Tuesday and pay the fine by close of business day on Friday, May 3.
The posts that cost Trump $9,000 are now gone. It turns out that all it takes to get Trump to comply with a court order is to threaten to toss him behind bars. Trump has a campaign event scheduled for Wednesday, so it will be interesting to see if he can keep it together in front of his fans.
How Trump could be incarcerated and what the logistics would look like could be challenging, but the ex-president is taking the threat seriously enough that he is not pushing his luck by leaving the Truth Social posts up. Donald Trump wants to be a martyr and get sent to jail. He thinks jail will help his presidential campaign; so far, the judge isn’t playing along, but if Trump keeps it up, Judge Merchan doesn’t seem like the type of judge who will tolerate nonsense.
https://www.politicususa.com/2024/04/30/trump-removes-truth-social-posts.html
OAN Retracts Lie That Michael Cohen Had Affair With Stormy Daniels
So right-wing media continues the deliberate degradation of information, and then pulls it back when threatened with legal action. OAN is not really all that different from Fox, where Jesse Watters gleefully spreads manure on the air. Via the Daily Beast:
Far-right cable news network One America News apologized to Donald Trump’s former lawyer and “fixer” Michael Cohen Monday after retracting a report that suggested he—rather than Trump himself—had been the one who carried out an affair with adult film star Stormy Daniels. The affair in question, and a subsequent hush-money payout to Daniels orchestrated by Trump and Cohen, is at the center of Trump’s first criminal trial, which opened two weeks ago in New York City.
“OAN today has retracted its March 27 article entitled “Whistleblower: Avenatti Alleged Cohen Daniels Affair Since 2006, Pre-2016 Trump Extortion Plan,” and is taking it down from all sites and removing it from all social media,” a note from the network reads. “This retraction is part of a settlement reached with Michael Cohen. Mr. Avenatti has denied making the allegations. OAN apologizes to Mr. Cohen for any harm the publication may have caused him.
“The article, quoting a source, falsely claimed that Mr. Cohen and Ms. Daniels “were having an affair since 2006” and that, according to a source, ‘the whole hush money scheme was cooked up by [Mr. Cohen] to extort the Trump Organization before the 2016 election.’ These statements were false. OAN regrets their publication.”
Cohen quickly hired a well-known defamation lawyer after the story appeared, and they quickly withdrew the story.
https://crooksandliars.com/2024/04/oan-news-network-retracts-story-about
Fox News folded today on its Hunter Biden libel, and OAN did the same with its Michael Cohen smear. Both Biden and Cohen should sue the useless bastards anyway.
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