by John Walters

Starting Five: “Another Day of Trump”

Man Of Steele Returns*

*The judges will also accept “Brit’s Krieg,” “Brit’s burgh” and “Christ(opher) Has Risen”

Remember Christopher Steele, the British ex-MI6 spy who put together the dossier on the alleged collusion between the Russians and team Trump and then went underground after Buzzfeed printed it in full? After nearly two months being AWOL, Steele resurfaced yesterday and apparently plans to return to his normal life. Good luck with that.

On March 20 the U.S. House Investigation Committee will purportedly begin looking into allegations that Russia interfered in the presidential election and that Trump’s gang either cooperated or was fully aware of it. As of now, though, they don’t plan on calling Steele to testify. I mean, I can’t think of a treason why they’d involve him.

The penalty for treason is death or a minimum of five years in jail. Because Mike Flynn and Jeff Sessions lied about talking to the Russians (and what it was about), they eventually should be charged with treason. As should, and hopefully will, Carter Page. And Jared Kushner. And Paul Manaforte. And eventually Steve Bannon and Donald Trump.

This isn’t going away for a very simple reason: it’s more than likely true. The smirk that rests on Page’s face (and Sessions) as he cutely non-deny denies talking to the Russians underscores the point that he doesn’t quite get the gravity of what he has done. He thinks this is just party politics. But it’s not.

Watergate led to the near-impeachment of a president (he resigned) and jail sentences for some of his associates. That was about nothing more than one campaign playing dirty tricks on the other, including paying for a crime to be committed.  This is, if true, far more series. This is one campaign colluding with America’s most dangerous enemy to undermine an election.

If an when this eventually comes to light, I hope they don’t spare the rod one bit. This isn’t a career public servant, e.g. Nixon, who went astray. This is a complete interloper who and his band of thieves who attampted to hijack the republic. Let ’em all hang.

2. Sessions Doubles Down 

If you go back to January 10—it will eventually be seen as a fateful day in the Trump administration, between the above dossier leak and Sessions’ appearance at the confirmation hearing—you will notice that Senator Al Franken (an original writer at SNL) NEVER ASKED Jeff Sessions if he had met with or spoken to the Russians. Franken asked Sessions if it were to be proven that anyone affiliated with the campaign HAD met with the Russians, “WHAT WOULD YOU DO?”

 

NEW: Attorney General Jeff Sessions sends to Senate Judiciary Committee “supplement” to disputed congressional testimony of January 10. pic.twitter.com/rOTLIS2qvv

— ABC News Politics (@ABCPolitics) March 6, 2017

Sessions, in his answer, pointed out that he had sometimes been called a Trump surrogate,  and that he himself never met with the Russians. Beyond that, he said, he could not comment. Yesterday Sessions sent his mansplanation letter and said that he did not lie or mislead Congress, which he most certainly did. He’ll be wearing an orange jumpsuit someday and one can only hope he’s put into the general population in a prison in Alabama, Mississippi or Louisiana.

 

3. Don T. Care, or Don’T Care

Even some Republicans are calling the new rollout of the Affordable Care Act “Obamacare Lite” or “Obamacare 2.0.” I won’t mire us in all the details (because I don’t understand them), but it does seem from the comments by Republicans that the GOP plan was to simply keep most of Obamacare, take out a few parts they didn’t like and as for how to resolve the issues created by their exclusion, the response is simply, “We’re going to get to that later. Trust us.”

I tried to explain the entire “Here’s the Affordable Care Act” followed by “Obamacare is a Disaster” followed by “Here’s Our New Plan” kerfuffle in one :30 FedEx ad (that, incidentally, was written by a college classmate of mine who also wrote for the Keenan Revue):

4. Is Trump Aping “Fake News?”

I had this thought last night. Donald Trump accuses Barack Obama of wiretapping his phones during the election. The press goes nuts, and at yesterday’s White House presser they almost completely ignore the new Don T. Care proposal to pepper Salty Spice with questions about the accusation. It seems so simple, after all: If President Trump has information that Obama bugged his phones, why doesn’t he just say what the source of that information is?

Now, let’s go back over the past three weeks, to all the frustration the White House has had about WaPo breaking news with unnamed sources. The White House has wanted them to name a source, but they haven’t. So is it possible that Bannon just said to Trump, “Two can play that game.” Let’s just make up a big fat lie and then not reveal our source. How is that any different than what WaPo is doing?”

Of course, the difference is that WaPo would be committing libel if it did that and then we might see the mother of all lawsuits between Peter Thiel and Jeff Bezos. Whereas, what is the penalty for the president? Apparently, they don’t believe there is one. But could it possibly be an impeachable offense, to falsely and without merit accuse your predecessor in the White House of committing a felony? One Harvard professor thinks so.

 

3/Using power of WH to falsely accuse predecessor of impeachable felony does qualify as an impeachable offense whether via tweet or not

— Laurence Tribe (@tribelaw) March 7, 2017

5. Dirk Does It

Last night in Dallas seven-foot tall German Dirk Nowitzki scored 25 points in a 122-111 takedown of the Lakers to put him north of 30,000 points for his career. The Teutonic Terror joins Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Karl Malone, Kobe Bryant, Michael Jordan and Wilt Chamberlain as the only players to ever eclipse the 30,000-point mark. Or, as my buddy A.J. observed, “The first white guy to do it.”

Ah, but where to all six stand in the coveted Points Per Game stat? Here’s the list, the number in front of their name being where they each rank on the all-time list:

1. Jordan, 30.12  2. Chamberlain, 30.07  11. Malone, 25.02 12. Bryant, 24.99 15. Jabbar, 24.61 33. Nowitzki 21.79

Music 101

Constant Craving

What happens when you combine a heavenly voice with an accordion? You get this 1992 crossover hit from Canadian Coach K doppelgänger  K.D. Lang. The song won Lang a Grammy for Best Female Pop Performance and hit No. 2 on the Adult Contemporary chart (aren’t all charts contemporary?) and No. 38 on the Billboard big chart. It’s a very smooth song and helped elevate Lang to Lilith Fair Goddess status.

Remote Patrol

John Wick 

8 p.m. USA

Everyone tells me that I should see this Keanu Reeves film from 2014 and besides, conference tourneys don’t get interesting until at least tomorrow. Are John Wick and Jack Reacher basically the same character? Here’s Step 1 to finding out….