"It would be my recommendation you should resign."
April 21, 2022 5:45 AM Subscribe
“The Democrats are going to take care of the son of a bitch for us." (archive.org link) In which Congressional Republicans briefly contemplate breaking from Trump after January 6, and then... don't. Adapted from Jonathan Martin and Alexander Burns' 'This Will Not Pass: Trump, Biden, and the Battle for American Democracy.'
More news that we should have known at the time, and would have known, if Martin and Burns hadn't been squirreling away information for the career-plumping book they planned to write all along (instead of doing their job, which is defending American democracy).
Someone might well say "that isn't actually their job," but if it isn't the central part of their job, the risk is that fascism will obviate the need for that entire profession. Someone this outspoken might even be taken away to the camps, to remove the threat that they might recover their scruples about the entire affair and speak out.
posted by ivanthenotsoterrible at 6:23 AM on April 21, 2022 [37 favorites]
Someone might well say "that isn't actually their job," but if it isn't the central part of their job, the risk is that fascism will obviate the need for that entire profession. Someone this outspoken might even be taken away to the camps, to remove the threat that they might recover their scruples about the entire affair and speak out.
posted by ivanthenotsoterrible at 6:23 AM on April 21, 2022 [37 favorites]
What absolute assholes. All of them, including Martin and Burns.
posted by Gadarene at 6:26 AM on April 21, 2022 [9 favorites]
posted by Gadarene at 6:26 AM on April 21, 2022 [9 favorites]
Parker Molloy: It's hard to trust the press when journalists keep saving scoops for future books
posted by Glegrinof the Pig-Man at 6:27 AM on April 21, 2022 [53 favorites]
For years, there’s been a big discussion about what can be done to fix the public’s trust in media as an institution. A lot of the time, these discussions deal with trying to bridge partisan divides by pandering to the right. But rather than trying to find some sort of ideological sweet spot where Republicans will suddenly declare that CNN is a super-great-and-awesome-totally-not-fake-news-network (which will never, ever happen, even if someone as far right as Steve Bannon was put in charge of it), maybe these outlets and the journalists they employ should focus more on making it less acceptable for journalists to sit on stories for months for the purpose of selling books at a future date.Bonus: Molloy later updated the article with Jonathan Martin (one of the columnists of the article in the FPP) throwing a temper tantrum for being called out on his shit.
Members of the political press in the U.S. too often see their job as less about holding the powerful to account and more about becoming the powerful. Events like the White House Correspondents’ Dinner, throwing parties for the likes of Sarah Sanders, or the insufferably-named (and attended by the insufferable) Churchill Tommy Gun Society dinner parties lay bare what many DC journalists crave: power and celebrity. When you look at how the people tasked with being a check on the powerful actually act, it’s no coincidence that we live in an age where democracy hangs by a thread.
It’s hard to trust the press when you don’t know what they’re hiding, why they’re hiding it, or who they’re protecting by doing so.
posted by Glegrinof the Pig-Man at 6:27 AM on April 21, 2022 [53 favorites]
More news that we should have known at the time, and would have known, if Martin and Burns hadn't been squirreling away information for the career-plumping book they planned to write all along
How do you know when the reporters learned about this stuff? Unless they were on the conference call, probably not in real time. I'm not sure what difference it would have made if it had come out in April 2021 instead of April 2022.
posted by BungaDunga at 6:36 AM on April 21, 2022 [3 favorites]
How do you know when the reporters learned about this stuff? Unless they were on the conference call, probably not in real time. I'm not sure what difference it would have made if it had come out in April 2021 instead of April 2022.
posted by BungaDunga at 6:36 AM on April 21, 2022 [3 favorites]
How do you know when the reporters learned about this stuff?
We don't know for sure, but it fits a pattern.
In the early days of the pandemic, Woodward himself had actual fucking recordings of Trump admitting that covid was very serious and that he was deliberately lying to preserve the economy and his approval ratings. And Woodward sat on those recordings until it was time to publish his book.
posted by RonButNotStupid at 6:40 AM on April 21, 2022 [44 favorites]
We don't know for sure, but it fits a pattern.
In the early days of the pandemic, Woodward himself had actual fucking recordings of Trump admitting that covid was very serious and that he was deliberately lying to preserve the economy and his approval ratings. And Woodward sat on those recordings until it was time to publish his book.
posted by RonButNotStupid at 6:40 AM on April 21, 2022 [44 favorites]
The Republicans need an LBJ. When signing the Civil Rights bill, he said, "There goes the South for a generation," but he knew it was the right thing to do.
posted by CheeseDigestsAll at 6:48 AM on April 21, 2022 [14 favorites]
posted by CheeseDigestsAll at 6:48 AM on April 21, 2022 [14 favorites]
I know what Woodward did, but it doesn't seem particularly fair to assume that these reporters were, like, on the conference calls.
posted by BungaDunga at 6:57 AM on April 21, 2022 [1 favorite]
posted by BungaDunga at 6:57 AM on April 21, 2022 [1 favorite]
Reporters are hired to report.
It doesn't matter when they learned of something. If they're holding back until such time as they've accumulated enough material for a book, they're not doing their job.
posted by RonButNotStupid at 7:00 AM on April 21, 2022 [22 favorites]
It doesn't matter when they learned of something. If they're holding back until such time as they've accumulated enough material for a book, they're not doing their job.
posted by RonButNotStupid at 7:00 AM on April 21, 2022 [22 favorites]
We have a 24/7 news cycle that's absolutely desperate for content.
And yet so much of what we know about the day-to-day goings on of the Trump administration we first learned months afterwards by reading a reporter's own memoir of their time spent covering the Trump administration.
This does not compute.
posted by RonButNotStupid at 7:08 AM on April 21, 2022 [34 favorites]
And yet so much of what we know about the day-to-day goings on of the Trump administration we first learned months afterwards by reading a reporter's own memoir of their time spent covering the Trump administration.
This does not compute.
posted by RonButNotStupid at 7:08 AM on April 21, 2022 [34 favorites]
How do you know when the reporters learned about this stuff? Unless they were on the conference call, probably not in real time. I'm not sure what difference it would have made if it had come out in April 2021 instead of April 2022.
If the reporters heard about if afterward, then they're just contributing to Republican attempts to launder their reputation. Either way, the NYT has lost the script and is, at the absolute best possible reading, ignoring the very obvious signs that the fascists are going to keep trying coups until someone -- including the fourth estate -- stands up to them and makes it painfully obvious what will happen to the next person who tries one.
posted by Etrigan at 7:25 AM on April 21, 2022 [7 favorites]
If the reporters heard about if afterward, then they're just contributing to Republican attempts to launder their reputation. Either way, the NYT has lost the script and is, at the absolute best possible reading, ignoring the very obvious signs that the fascists are going to keep trying coups until someone -- including the fourth estate -- stands up to them and makes it painfully obvious what will happen to the next person who tries one.
posted by Etrigan at 7:25 AM on April 21, 2022 [7 favorites]
I know it's been a cliché since 2016 and before, but all I can think about when I read articles about Jan 6th is the Tomorrow Belongs to Me scene in cabaret. "Still think you can control them Max?"
posted by Wretch729 at 7:41 AM on April 21, 2022 [11 favorites]
posted by Wretch729 at 7:41 AM on April 21, 2022 [11 favorites]
Not if McConnell votes against impeachment...which he did.
The first couple of days after the attempted insurrection he and McCarthy were scared for their life/physical security. They had the realization that when the mob starts putting people up against the wall the leopard might eat their face. That wore off in a week or so and then it was about mainaining power.
posted by Mitheral at 7:43 AM on April 21, 2022 [4 favorites]
The first couple of days after the attempted insurrection he and McCarthy were scared for their life/physical security. They had the realization that when the mob starts putting people up against the wall the leopard might eat their face. That wore off in a week or so and then it was about mainaining power.
posted by Mitheral at 7:43 AM on April 21, 2022 [4 favorites]
In related news
posted by Mitheral at 7:49 AM on April 21, 2022
The presidential campaign of Donald Trump has been ordered by an arbitrator to pay $1.3 million in legal fees to Omarosa Manigault Newman in connection with a dispute over a book about her tenure as a White House advisorThis comes seven months after her NDA with the Cheeto was thrown out under NY law.
posted by Mitheral at 7:49 AM on April 21, 2022
Everybody wants to be Bob Woodward when they grow up. Nobody notices that Bob Woodward has been kind of a schmoe ever since the Reagan years, to the point where the good that he did covering Watergate has been undone by his contribution to the progressive normalization of conservative pathologies even as the latter become floridly sociopathic and subversive. That doesn't matter, because Woodward got fuck-you money and people call him to be on TV saying his opinion.
posted by Aardvark Cheeselog at 8:09 AM on April 21, 2022 [16 favorites]
posted by Aardvark Cheeselog at 8:09 AM on April 21, 2022 [16 favorites]
Won't someone save us from this monster we created, enabled, and encourage with our craven unconditional support???
"You mean all those people over there who have been trying for five years?"
Oh, uh, nahhhhhh. They're on the wrong side. Silly libs. No. Who will save us???????
Here's a McConnell interview where he flaunts his views on working with anyone in his party.
https://www.axios.com/mitch-mcconnell-interview-jonathan-swan-axios-9ee7be91-c6ff-4517-9eff-f22eedf2442d.html
posted by Jacen at 8:15 AM on April 21, 2022 [4 favorites]
"You mean all those people over there who have been trying for five years?"
Oh, uh, nahhhhhh. They're on the wrong side. Silly libs. No. Who will save us???????
Here's a McConnell interview where he flaunts his views on working with anyone in his party.
https://www.axios.com/mitch-mcconnell-interview-jonathan-swan-axios-9ee7be91-c6ff-4517-9eff-f22eedf2442d.html
posted by Jacen at 8:15 AM on April 21, 2022 [4 favorites]
Oh, uh, nahhhhhh. They're on the wrong side. Silly libs. No. Who will save us???????
It's much worse than that. Holding Trump accountable takes effort, risks political capital, and is downright dangerous considering some of his supporters. Republicans aren't just sitting idle while Democrats do their dirty work for them, they're also making sure that Democrats will sustain as much damage as possible while doing what they themselves should be doing to reign Trump in. It's an astoundingly craven power-at-all-costs, have-your-cake-and-eat-it-too display of bad faith and privilege.
posted by RonButNotStupid at 8:45 AM on April 21, 2022 [14 favorites]
It's much worse than that. Holding Trump accountable takes effort, risks political capital, and is downright dangerous considering some of his supporters. Republicans aren't just sitting idle while Democrats do their dirty work for them, they're also making sure that Democrats will sustain as much damage as possible while doing what they themselves should be doing to reign Trump in. It's an astoundingly craven power-at-all-costs, have-your-cake-and-eat-it-too display of bad faith and privilege.
posted by RonButNotStupid at 8:45 AM on April 21, 2022 [14 favorites]
It doesn't matter when they learned of something. If they're holding back until such time as they've accumulated enough material for a book, they're not doing their job.
And the NY Times itself isn't doing its job. I'd like to know what kind of arrangements a publication makes with its reporters that allows them to save important information for their own books rather than timely reporting it for readers and the public. Does the NYT get a percentage of the advance or sales? (Or whatever publication, this isn't just a problem with the NYT.)
I was a reporter for a while. Everything I learned about on the job as a reporter was information developed for the newspaper I worked for. No way could I have kept the good stuff for myself so I could write a book about it later, at least if I wanted to stay employed.
posted by marguerite at 8:51 AM on April 21, 2022 [18 favorites]
And the NY Times itself isn't doing its job. I'd like to know what kind of arrangements a publication makes with its reporters that allows them to save important information for their own books rather than timely reporting it for readers and the public. Does the NYT get a percentage of the advance or sales? (Or whatever publication, this isn't just a problem with the NYT.)
I was a reporter for a while. Everything I learned about on the job as a reporter was information developed for the newspaper I worked for. No way could I have kept the good stuff for myself so I could write a book about it later, at least if I wanted to stay employed.
posted by marguerite at 8:51 AM on April 21, 2022 [18 favorites]
The Republicans need an LBJ. When signing the Civil Rights bill, he said, "There goes the South for a generation," but he knew it was the right thing to do.
The problem of the present-day Republican party is that they are literally the ideological descendants of the people who looked at the giant hole that LBJ had ripped in his own party's Southern constituency and dove right in, heedless of the consequences. They're never going to do the right thing, because they already chose to do the diametrically-opposed wrong thing 60 years ago, and have basically refashioned the entire party around Doing The Wrong Thing All The Time as the one plank in its platform.
posted by Strange Interlude at 9:02 AM on April 21, 2022 [29 favorites]
The problem of the present-day Republican party is that they are literally the ideological descendants of the people who looked at the giant hole that LBJ had ripped in his own party's Southern constituency and dove right in, heedless of the consequences. They're never going to do the right thing, because they already chose to do the diametrically-opposed wrong thing 60 years ago, and have basically refashioned the entire party around Doing The Wrong Thing All The Time as the one plank in its platform.
posted by Strange Interlude at 9:02 AM on April 21, 2022 [29 favorites]
You can also argue that the Republicans did have those kinds of politicians who were wiling to make a stand and do the right thing, and they've been primaried by their own party and voted out of power or driven to resign themselves. John Boehner's no great paragon, but he at least tried to get budgets passed and keep Congress functioning, then he got driven out by ideologues.
Republican voters won't vote for an LBJ like principled politician concerned with doing the right thing. They'll vote for a tribal champion who will help them keep what privileges they see as rightfully theirs. All of the principles outside of that model have been purged. This will keep happening for as long as the nation's politics continue to be a pendulum or as long as Republican state and local parties manage to gerrymander and steal elections to keep themselves in power.
The solution is not to wait for some messiah-like politician to emerge from the ether who will lead the Republicans back to sanity. It's to fight in all of those red states and all of those communities to bring equal footing on elections and drum home for conservatives how small their minority really is, and show Republican politicians that they can't rely on a small, devout following to keep them in office. Change the equation away from following the whims of the Fox and QAnon base.
posted by bl1nk at 10:28 AM on April 21, 2022 [6 favorites]
Republican voters won't vote for an LBJ like principled politician concerned with doing the right thing. They'll vote for a tribal champion who will help them keep what privileges they see as rightfully theirs. All of the principles outside of that model have been purged. This will keep happening for as long as the nation's politics continue to be a pendulum or as long as Republican state and local parties manage to gerrymander and steal elections to keep themselves in power.
The solution is not to wait for some messiah-like politician to emerge from the ether who will lead the Republicans back to sanity. It's to fight in all of those red states and all of those communities to bring equal footing on elections and drum home for conservatives how small their minority really is, and show Republican politicians that they can't rely on a small, devout following to keep them in office. Change the equation away from following the whims of the Fox and QAnon base.
posted by bl1nk at 10:28 AM on April 21, 2022 [6 favorites]
“I didn’t get to be leader by voting with five people in the conference,” Mr. McConnell, the Senate Republican leader, told a friend.I got news for you, Mitch. That means you're not the leader, you're just another pawn.
posted by biogeo at 10:47 AM on April 21, 2022 [7 favorites]
This is extremely small beans, but in the "local elections matter" column: right now we're having a primary in Nashville for judicial and school board positions. I have strong opinions about the candidates (memail me if you live here and want to talk) but one thing I noticed is that people who live in school board district 2 have an opportunity to vote for a reasonable Republican (who is, like, still awful, but in a business-can-do-no-wrong way rather than a full-on-white-supremacy way, as far as I can tell) so that in the general, it would be the Dem incumbent and the less-awful Republican - but to do that, they have to ask for a Republican ballot and forego voting on basically every judicial appointment (because the contested races are all on the Dem ballot). That's a weird wrinkle of US-style democracy I hadn't noticed before (in my defense I only became a citizen a couple years ago).
I don't live in that district so I'm asking for a Dem ballot, but I've basically decided to vote in the Republican primaries in August so I can vote for the most moderate people, because I'm so horrified by the people Republicans here select to represent them.
posted by joannemerriam at 10:56 AM on April 21, 2022 [2 favorites]
I don't live in that district so I'm asking for a Dem ballot, but I've basically decided to vote in the Republican primaries in August so I can vote for the most moderate people, because I'm so horrified by the people Republicans here select to represent them.
posted by joannemerriam at 10:56 AM on April 21, 2022 [2 favorites]
The problem of the present-day Republican party is that they are literally the ideological descendants of the people who looked at the giant hole that LBJ had ripped in his own party's Southern constituency and dove right in, heedless of the consequences.
While that's true, LBJ was descended from actual slaveholders. Every generation changes and all it takes is one person with power to take a stand.
posted by CheeseDigestsAll at 11:19 AM on April 21, 2022
While that's true, LBJ was descended from actual slaveholders. Every generation changes and all it takes is one person with power to take a stand.
posted by CheeseDigestsAll at 11:19 AM on April 21, 2022
The Republicans don't need one LBJ; they need hundreds of them, at federal, state and local levels.
Because being a modern Republican isn't about ideas or policy; it's about allegiance. Not once, not twice, but every single time on every single issue. If you waver from the party line even once, if you call out certain grifters as grifters, if you cross the line to vote for something vital, elements of your base will declare you a RINO and a liberal and a horrible turncoat to be primaried, tarred and feathered.
That is the death spiral. Moderates slowly disappear because demagogues and rabble-rousers replace them. Conservatives who have moments of clarity get disowned if those become public knowledge. And a tiresome load who's done more than anyone else in modern history to destroy the Senate and the SCOTUS as institutions, thwart progress and fairness at every turn, and put incompetent boobs into judicial appointments is a horrible traitor and an enemy to many Trumpoids because he's even _capable_ of considering breaking with Trump and the alt-right crush-all-who-are-not-us movement.
One person declaring, no, this isn't right, this isn't acceptable, this isn't what the Republican Party should stand for does nothing. It needs to be an overwhelming wave, a force that is willing to call out the Cawthorns and the MTGs and the Gosars and the Biggses and the Gohmerts and the Gaetzes and the Boeberts and the Hawleys and tell them that their calculated insanity is no longer welcome and they should shut their goddamned mouths. They have to call out their own and in sufficient numbers to leave no doubt that a continued Gateway Pundit insurgency cannot seize control.
It would be very, very good if that was to happen. But it won't, because Jello Biafra's First Rule of Rioting applies just as much to griftstorms; there's more of us if we want there to be badly enough, but who goes first?
posted by delfin at 7:00 PM on April 21, 2022 [4 favorites]
Because being a modern Republican isn't about ideas or policy; it's about allegiance. Not once, not twice, but every single time on every single issue. If you waver from the party line even once, if you call out certain grifters as grifters, if you cross the line to vote for something vital, elements of your base will declare you a RINO and a liberal and a horrible turncoat to be primaried, tarred and feathered.
That is the death spiral. Moderates slowly disappear because demagogues and rabble-rousers replace them. Conservatives who have moments of clarity get disowned if those become public knowledge. And a tiresome load who's done more than anyone else in modern history to destroy the Senate and the SCOTUS as institutions, thwart progress and fairness at every turn, and put incompetent boobs into judicial appointments is a horrible traitor and an enemy to many Trumpoids because he's even _capable_ of considering breaking with Trump and the alt-right crush-all-who-are-not-us movement.
One person declaring, no, this isn't right, this isn't acceptable, this isn't what the Republican Party should stand for does nothing. It needs to be an overwhelming wave, a force that is willing to call out the Cawthorns and the MTGs and the Gosars and the Biggses and the Gohmerts and the Gaetzes and the Boeberts and the Hawleys and tell them that their calculated insanity is no longer welcome and they should shut their goddamned mouths. They have to call out their own and in sufficient numbers to leave no doubt that a continued Gateway Pundit insurgency cannot seize control.
It would be very, very good if that was to happen. But it won't, because Jello Biafra's First Rule of Rioting applies just as much to griftstorms; there's more of us if we want there to be badly enough, but who goes first?
posted by delfin at 7:00 PM on April 21, 2022 [4 favorites]
“The Democrats are going to take care of the son of a bitch for us."
Seems even the Republicans don't get that letting people down is the Dems raison d'etre
posted by thatwhichfalls at 7:46 PM on April 21, 2022 [6 favorites]
Seems even the Republicans don't get that letting people down is the Dems raison d'etre
posted by thatwhichfalls at 7:46 PM on April 21, 2022 [6 favorites]
Well, I guess someone recorded the conference call (twitter clip)
posted by BungaDunga at 8:44 PM on April 21, 2022 [3 favorites]
posted by BungaDunga at 8:44 PM on April 21, 2022 [3 favorites]
There are situations where political journalists are given juicy material by sources under the condition that it isn't released until book publication at an agreed date after the election/administration is over.
The issue is journalists run headlong into the embrace of this delayed reporting bullshit because they usually want to sell a book more badly than they actually want to do their job. From what I've read being a pool reporter is an awful grinding mess of a job and a successful book is one of the few things can quickly elevate you out of it.
posted by zymil at 8:55 PM on April 21, 2022 [3 favorites]
The issue is journalists run headlong into the embrace of this delayed reporting bullshit because they usually want to sell a book more badly than they actually want to do their job. From what I've read being a pool reporter is an awful grinding mess of a job and a successful book is one of the few things can quickly elevate you out of it.
posted by zymil at 8:55 PM on April 21, 2022 [3 favorites]
"Well, I guess someone recorded the conference call."
Oh lordy, there's tapes.
posted by bz at 11:23 PM on April 21, 2022
Oh lordy, there's tapes.
posted by bz at 11:23 PM on April 21, 2022
"Well, I guess someone recorded the conference call."
Proving beyond any doubt that McCarthy's denials were a straight-up lie.
posted by Gelatin at 8:01 AM on April 22, 2022
Proving beyond any doubt that McCarthy's denials were a straight-up lie.
posted by Gelatin at 8:01 AM on April 22, 2022
Being caught lying is not the death knell in politics that it used to be.
posted by Miss Cellania at 8:07 AM on April 22, 2022 [2 favorites]
posted by Miss Cellania at 8:07 AM on April 22, 2022 [2 favorites]
Being caught lying is not the death knell in politics that it used to be.
Sadly, no. It should destroy McCarthy's credibility among journalists, but it likely won't even do that much.
posted by Gelatin at 8:12 AM on April 22, 2022 [3 favorites]
Sadly, no. It should destroy McCarthy's credibility among journalists, but it likely won't even do that much.
posted by Gelatin at 8:12 AM on April 22, 2022 [3 favorites]
To be clear, journalists should know, if they didn't before, that there's no value at all in quoting McCarthy, ever, for anything, not even as a pro forma denial of yet another Republican scandal. It isn't "balanced" journalism to give one side a platform to tell lies; it isn't journalism at all, in fact.
posted by Gelatin at 8:53 AM on April 22, 2022 [1 favorite]
posted by Gelatin at 8:53 AM on April 22, 2022 [1 favorite]
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Not if McConnell votes against impeachment...which he did.
posted by Gelatin at 6:11 AM on April 21, 2022 [16 favorites]