Speaking with MSNBC host Rachel Maddow on Monday evening, just days after a massive $83.3 million legal victory over failed former president Donald Trump, writer E. Jean Carroll shared a description of how the ex-head of state looked at the defamation trial that concluded last week in New York.
“He is like a walrus snorting and like a rhino flopping his hands. He is not there. That was the surprising thing to me.”
Carroll admitted that she had been terrified of facing Trump in court, but her fears quickly abated when she took the stand and began testifying.
“Amazingly, I looked out, and he was nothing,” she said. “He was nothing. He was a phantom. It was the people around him who were giving him power. He himself was nothing.”
That moment of clarity, Carroll continued, gave her new insight regarding the Donald.
“We don’t need to be afraid of him. He can be knocked out.”
Others who have observed Trump over the years agreed with Carroll, suggesting that he’s just an impotent coward.
The point Carroll and her counsel were making over and over is that Trump is nothing to be afraid of. Remove the trappings and he’s just a man clawing for and trying to cling to power. https://t.co/UoVcMabXTG
— Andrew Weissmann (weissmann11 on Threads)🌻 (@AWeissmann_) January 30, 2024
EJC is giving #tRump a taste of his own medicine! This must be driving him crazy, that a woman, a few years older than him, now has the upper hand. The would-be Emperor indeed has no clothes! https://t.co/tSA6i5t0VB
While he was speaking at Donald Trump’s campaign headquarters, Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL) got reminded that he’ll never be able to live down the allegations that have been made against him regarding his reported love for underage girls.
Gaetz told those gathered at the Trump HQ, “Now, as to what I’d say to young folks today, man, you meet a young conservative today. It’s a different breed, because if they, if they’re outspoken, they’ve already been called every name in the book. Just for being a Republican, they’ve been called a racist, a sexist, a xenophobe, phobes I haven’t even heard of.”
That’s when a man dressed in Trump garb began heckling the controversial Florida Republican.
“What’s the youngest schoolgirl you’ve ever been with?”
The man also asked if Gaetz had flown on Jeffrey Epstein’s plane, but was quickly escorted from the room.
Gaetz told those who remained, “Think about being a part of a party where they haven’t even tried to make an argument about winning your vote. The Democratic Party today has basically put up as their candidate a nursing home escapee and the annoying lady from the HR department.”
Just last year, the Department of Justice decided not to charge Gaetz as part of a sex trafficking investigation. The congressman was accused of having sex with an underage girl and paying her off via Venmo to keep quiet.
Over the few days, it seems Republicans have been much more offended, upset, and downright apoplectic about the fact that the Senate dress code has been relaxed than one of their own, Rep. Lauren Boebert, (R-CO) being ejected from a Denver theater for vaping and engaging in sex play with her boyfriend even though there were children in the audience.
Of course, that shouldn’t surprise anyone who’s been paying attention over the past several years (especially since Donald Trump appeared on the national political scene), because today’s GOP is a party of massive hypocrisy on so-called “moral” issues regarding freedom and sexuality.
Today, however, some equilibrium was restored to the political universe with a tweet sent out by Sen. John Fetterman (D-PA), who has been shamed by Republicans for not wanting to wear a business suit to perform his duties as a member of the Senate.
Here’s how Fox News breathlessly reported on Fetterman and the new relaxed dress code:
DRESS TO IMPRESS?: People are furious after the Senate dropped its dress code requirement — and they’re saying there is only one lawmaker to blame. Why the bar is being “lowered”
People are furious? What people? Republicans, of course. Most Democrats aren’t upset, and, truth be told, if indeed clothes make man, how does the GOP explain that the person their party worships is a convicted sex abuser who has lusted after his own daughter and is now facing 91 criminal charges? He almost always wears a suit, but he’s still a disgusting pervert and scumbag.
What we need here is some levity and sanity to make the debate more palatable, and that was provided by none other than John Fetterman himself, who fired off this:
“I figure if I take up vaping and grabbing the hog during a live musical, they’ll make me a folk hero.”
Even though the posting was on social media, you could almost hear the applause across the digital ether.
“People are furious” — who are the people “furious” over his casual dress? Oh, that’s right, rich politicians and political pundits angry that he’s far more relatable to average people than the rest of them.
Rep. Lauren Boebert’s lewd behavior at a Denver theater performance of a musical last week may soon result in her being charged with a sex crime under Colorado law.
Colorado law states that public indecency is committed when a person performs certain acts in a public place, or in a place where the public is likely to see, including lewdly fondling or caressing another individual. Sexual intercourse; lewd exposure of the body but not the genitalia, with the intent to arouse or satisfy a sexual desire; and knowingly exposing one’s genitals to the view of another, under the circumstances in which such conduct is likely to cause affront or alarm, are considered public indecency, as well.
According to statute 18-7-301 of the Colorado criminal code, public indecency is a petty offense sex crime punishable by fines and up to six months in prison for more serious offenses. It tends to carry lighter penalties, though, such as 10 days in jail and/or up to $300 fines, in addition to potential probation, community service or mandatory counseling.
Boebert and her date were caught on video sexually fondling each other, with the man grabbing at her breasts while the congresswoman placed her hand on his crotch.
Does their behavior fall under the Colorado statute? Possibly, but Denver defense attorney Matthew Hand says the indecency law is “vague and overreaching.”
“To be blunt, not all intimacy is intercourse, and lewdness is in the eye of the beholder.”
Even if Boebert isn’t formally charged, the political price she’ll have to pay may be the final straw in what was already projected to be difficult reelection bid for the Colorado Republican, with polls showing her losing favor among voters in her district.
Ironically, Boebert’s ex-husband was convicted of a sex crime in 2004 after he exposed his penis to two underage girls in bowling alley.
In January 2004, when Jayson Boebert was 24, he was arrested for exposing himself to two young women at a Colorado bowling alley. His future wife Lauren Roberts (as she was then known), who was 17 at the time, was also present and was told she was no longer welcome at the bowling alley.
Jayson Boebert pled guilty to “public indecency and lewd exposure” after that incident, according to The New York Post, and was sentenced to four days in jail with a subsequent two years on probation.
Ohio Congressmnan Jim Jordan (R) may be even angrier and more on edge than usual in the days ahead as the result of a Supreme Court ruling handed down that leaves in place a prior decision allowing over 230 men to sue Ohio State University for sexual abuse committed by Richard Strauss, a deceased former doctor who was employed by the university.
Two cases involving the abuse were on a list of many cases the court said it would not hear. And, as is typical, the court did not comment in saying it would not hear the cases.
They say university officials failed to stop him despite complaints raised as early as the late 1970s. Many of them allege Strauss abused them during required physicals and other medical exams at campus athletic facilities, a student health center, his home and an off-campus clinic.
Jordan’s connection to the scandal involves his role as an assistant coach for the OSU men’s wrestling team during the time of the alleged sexual assaults.
Six former wrestlers say Jordan knew they were being abused by Dr. Strauss but did nothing to stop or even report what was taking place.
As CNN noted in 2020, the wrestlers allege that “Jordan heard or responded to sexual misconduct complaints about team doctor Richard Strauss. Eight others say Strauss’ inappropriate behavior was an open secret in the athletic department and that Jordan, among others, must have known about it.”
Jordan has repeatedly denied he knew anything about the abuse, but one of the former wrestlers, Tito Vasquez, says the congressman is lying:
“When these complaints come and he pretends now that he had no knowledge of it, that’s betrayal in the highest level.”
The Supreme Court decision could also have repercussions for Jordan, if only by placing the matter back in the public eye with the congressman seeking reelection 2024 and drawing strong criticism for his hearings on what he calls the “weaponization” of the FBI and Justice Department by the Biden administration.
Additionally, Jordan is facing the prospect of being further damaged by an upcoming HBO documentary being compiled by actor George Clooney’s Smokehouse Pictures, with Clooney remarking, “It’s a devastating story about people in power abusing and then covering up their criminal actions against students. The fact that it hasn’t been resolved as of yet is deeply disturbing.”
