Clown Show: Corey Lewandowski Amuses Himself at Jerry Nadler’s Circus
This exchange, believe it or not, was not on the reading rug of a kindergarten classroom, but in the House Judiciary Committee testimony of Corey Lewandowski by Rep. Eric Swalwell:
Swalwell: Mr. Lewandowski, I’m going to put a slide up and it’s the words President Trump dictated to you on July 19. Can you read what you wrote down?
Lewandowski: I’m happy to have you read it, congressman.
Swalwell: Well why don’t you want to read it Mr. Lewandowski?
Lewandowski: I think you should afford me the same privilege you afforded director Mueller.
Swalwell: Would you like to read it?
Lewandowski: No, you’re welcome to read it.
Swalwell: Are you ashamed of the words that you wrote down?
Lewandowski: President Swalwell, I’m very happy of what I’ve written, but you’re welcome to read it if you’d like.
Swalwell: Are you ashamed to read it out loud?
Lewandowski: I’m not ashamed of anything in my life, are you?
*
Swalwell: Have you ever put any words that the President asked you to write down before in a safe, or was this the first time you’d done that?
Lewandowski: I believe it’s my standard operating procedure when taking notes, Congressman.
Swalwell: So every note you take of the President you put in a safe?
Lewandowski: I don’t — It’s a big safe, congressman, there’s a lot of guns in there.
That was one of the more coherent, less offensive exchanges in the day’s festivities.
One thing the train wreck that was this hearing should do is lay to rest any notion that the House Judiciary Committee is going to produce anything that is politically effective. Corey Lewandowski was perfectly happy to have the whole of his snarky duplicitousness on display for the world to see and challenge the dais to do anything about it. The Jerry Nadler-lead Democrats on the committee had a lot of outrage for the witness, but not a lot they could do about some who refused to play along, openly mocked them at every opportunity, and frustrated and angered them throughout the course of the day. The brashness of it all left the committee mostly sputtering at the idea that someone would dare not play along, couldn’t be shamed, and could care less what anyone thought about it.
BERKE: Did you hear that, sir? That’s you saying on MSNBC, you “don’t ever remember the president ever asking you to get involved with Jeff Sessions or the Department of Justice in any way, shape or form.” That wasn’t true, was it sir?
LEWANDOWSKI: I have no obligation to be honest to the media because they’re just as dishonest as anybody else.
BERKE: So you’re admitting, sir, you were not being truthful?
LEWANDOWSKI: My interview with Ari Melber…can be interpreted any way you like.
There were audible gasps at that piece of purposeful defiance. The problem of course is the contemptible Lewandowski is right, he isn’t under any obligation to be honest with the media. And all the tut-tut-ing from this panel isn’t going to change the Corey Lewandowskis of the world one bit. While Rep. Nadler and company can call witnesses and even, as he is threatening to do with Corey Lewandowski, hold those witnesses in contempt, the one thing he could control but failed to do is the optics of this circus. No one comes off looking good in these hearings, but when you are trying to establish yourselves as paragons of justice and virtue for the purposes of impeaching a president, being collectively clownsuited by someone like Corey Lewandowski can be taken a lot of ways. Chief among them being if you cannot manage a defiant witness in a committee hearing you are not up to the complicated task of actually impeaching a sitting president.
Folks are noticing that Nadler’s committee might not be up to the task, and not just the president’s supporters. Even many of the opinion makers and talking heads that have been laser-focused on impeachment since Donald Trump won the election are starting to criticize the method and means of the is-it-or-isn’t-it impeachment investigation. A rather exasperated Don Lemon phrased it on his CNN program thusly: “I just kept wondering if Democrats had ever watched TV, had ever seen Corey Lewandowski?”
“If we’ve learned anything today, anything at all, … you can brazen your way through anything if you’re Team Trump.”@DonLemon examines former Trump campaign manager Corey Lewandowski’s testimony during the House Judiciary Committee’s first official “impeachment hearing.” pic.twitter.com/NcgysosaF8
— CNN Tonight (@CNNTonight) September 18, 2019
The answer to Lemon’s question was in the fact that, in the clip, Nadler reads from a prepared statement about how Lewandowski is behaving, so they did know. Which makes it all the worse that either through hubris, ignorance, or a previously-unseen public failing in their ability to be self-aware, House Democrats thought this was going to help them, make them look good, and be convincing to the American people. Someone should pull Jerry aside and re-explain the child’s tale of not wrestling with the misbehaving pig because you just end up in the muck with them, but of course it’s too late for that now.
Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi’s reluctance to go full-bore impeachment has been seen by many to be a political calculation. With impeachment regularly on the wrong end of a 60-40 split in polling, that would be the obvious answer, especially in an election cycle where the tried and true method of removing a president by ballot box is at hand. But maybe there was another reason. The political veteran that is on her second stint with the gavel might just have known more than we did from the outset; Jerry Nadler and a large chunk of her caucus just isn’t up for such a fight. They want the fight, but are not capable either in ability or temperament to carry it through. The Speaker presumably knows her caucus, chairs, and members better than we do. Perhaps in her reluctance was a message, a leader knowing that going to a battle — already impossible to win with the Senate safely in Republican hands — could go from a political loss to a generational embarrassment. Speaker Pelosi remembers that while the Republicans did get their futile impeachment hearings against President Clinton, this is a different era and very different world. Such a windmill tilt could not only affect her Speakership and majority, but could well play right into the hands of a President who loves to play the victim against a congress and media that is, as he constantly reminds us, “out to get him.” In the last act of her political career, it is doubtful Nancy Pelosi is interested in taking the blame for a doomed to fail quest that hinges on the farcical shenanigans of an out-of-control committee, which is what any honest observer saw in that pitiful spectacle in the hearing room.
So on to the next thing, which apparently will consist of a lot more of this type of committee theater. Corey Lewandowski will go on, having put up and promoted a webpage teasing a Senate run in New Hampshire while still sitting at the witness table. He won’t win, but since the grifting is eternal he can take donations and charge his living expenses to a campaign for a while, all bolstered by the platform Jerry Nadler just gave him. Nadler and other house Democrats will slog onward investigating hither and yon seeking for something, anything, that will recapture the public’s attention that has gone elsewhere since the dud that was the Mueller Testimony. Speaker Pelosi will still be torn between donors and a base that wants impeachment and the hard-won House majority she leads that will almost certainly be in danger if she does so. President Trump will continue to play both bully and victim in his run seeking re-election. And on and on it goes with no real end in sight.
This was a clown show, with clowns on the dais questioning a clown in the witness chair, a small minority thinking something was being accomplished while most others wondered why such a pathetic show was put on in the first place.
I am not impressed by Lewandowski, but I almost want to watch him engage the committee while having exactly zero fecks to give. Nadler an Co. are all a bit too impressed with themselves and their committee.Report
Nadler prepping his committee for battle: “I trust that you’ve all practiced a smooth delivery of your best soundbites, but I want to remind you it could get rough out there. Did everyone bring a knife?”Report
They did, but they were those cheap while plastic butter knives that don’t even make decent shivs when they break.Report
They brought knives to a bazooka fight.Report
Nadler to committee after the hearing: “Good job everyone. Our plan worked. All of America saw that the GOP brought guns to what was obviously a knife fight.”Report
The Republicans on the committee were little better, mugging for time to get a pat on the head from Trump and the Right Wing grifters. Gaetz in particular gave this huge speech about why the Obama Administration didn’t brief Trump on the Russian interference .. conveniently ignoring that they DID, just after Lewandowski left the campaign. This prompted Lewandoswski’s most disgusting moment, claiming the Obama Administration hates Trump more than they love the country.
The Democrats were bad. But the Republicans reminded me again of why I can never be a part of that party again.Report
Huh, well looky there, a human sized mirror to post modernism.
haReport
So it turns out that the administration’s disrespect for the rule of law has consequences. Who knew?Report
Nothing I saw on that hearing changed my opinion that Pelosi is making the right call by leaving matters as they are. The hearings are mostly letting the pro impeachment portion of her coalition blow off steam and also demonstrate to the whole party that impeachment isn’t going to fly and only the tiny minority of active political commentators will be paying close attention which means the downside risks are low. Meanwhile Pelosi can focus on other matters. It’s a good call.Report
Meanwhile Pelosi can focus on other matters.
What other matters? Her entire focus, seems to me, is on playing both sides of impeachment politics.Report
She has to make people thirsty to vote for Democratic Representatives.
Which means that she can’t quench their thirst but neither can she make people despair and think “there’s no point”.
She is doing her part for presidential election turnout.
Making The Squad represent the Dems rather than Pelosi was a heck of a gamble. If the squad disappears, Trump doesn’t have an opponent who is playing his game.Report
Rep Pressley dropped the doomed but inevitable “Impeach Kavanaugh” motion yesterday so if the squad fades it isn’t from lack of effort.Report
The national media has the attention span of a schizophrenic flea and a toxic allergy to repetition. Since the Squad doesn’t actually represent the Democratic Party and doesn’t have any actual power beyond their four votes and their media cachet they will fade as long as they don’t keep upping their ante which is going to be difficult to do.Report
“The national media has the attention span of a schizophrenic flea and a toxic allergy to repetition.”
-North wins the truth statement of the dayReport
Exactly what she should be doing. Give the pro-impeachment side the leeway to dig, exert their animal spirits and see if they can actually find a theme or smoking gun that will actually make impeachment a practical possibility rather than a public embarrassment to the party or a turnout mechanism for republicans. While also, of course, keeping the leash tight enough that things don’t whirl out of control and end up helping the republicans.
Hmm actually I kind of agree with Jay’s point above.Report
The best argument against going for impeachment that i’ve seen is that Pelosi knows her own coalition is to incompetent and disorganized to do it. Nadler is proving that bigly. But the “lets see if that pile of tinder and oily rags will start itself on fire” is a failing strategy. Pelosi’s neither here nor there plan just looks weak. It may be a winner in the long run ( 2020) but we need new leaders, ones that aren’t’ such sporking weather vanes and incompetent at oversight. At least Schiff seems to be trying to do his job.Report
well, according to Jennifer Rubin over at WaPo today the staff attorney actually did a great job of questioning the witness and got him to testify to being asked to intercede with Mr. Sessions to shut down the Russia investigation. Which gets at the core pf the obstruction charges that Mr. Mueller laid out. Since all I have to work from is the reporting – and little of it focused on this episodes, I have to conclude the Committee could make much head way if it let the professionals do their jobs – not unlike the Watergate hearings . . . .Report
Yeah, completely agree. Rep’s unless they have specific experience should just let lawyers with skills do the questioning. Rep’s wanting their tv time is not a wise use of hearings unless the Rep’s are, to use a technical term, good at their f’n jobs.Report
The best argument against going for impeachment that i’ve seen is that Pelosi knows her own coalition is to incompetent and disorganized to do it.
I also hold this theory. But as Philip mentions, it’s a problem easily solved *if* there is a political will within the party to hold Trump admin officials accountable.
There isn’t. And the irony here, IMO, is that there’s a straight line from the Obama admin’s failure to hold Bush officials accountable to Trump’s election as POTUS. Pelosi is gambling that *not* holding government officials in a rogue administration will work out better for Dems this time.Report
I’m not sure about the straight line from Obama since not holding officials to account has become a bit of national past time. People still whine about poor ol Bork being Borked with any apparent knowledge of him. He got a sweet fed judgeship out of going all in on covering up watergate.
I’m not a Pelosi hater, she has done a good job at times. But we need a new younger gen of D pols.Report
I don’t disagree with your last point though I can feel for Obama’s conundrum at the time. Going after Bush would have both utterly falsified his hope’nchange post partisan branding and would have utterly consumed his Presidency as the GOP fought him to the death on the matter (since their very survival would have been at stake). And it’s not like all of the old Dem hands would have been clean either, Bush made sure to ensnare as many Democrats as he could when the jingoism was running hot after 9/11. It’s entirely possible it would have cost Obama a second term too.
Maybe Obama should have done it, maybe even probably he should have done it… but I can understand why he recoiled from the undertaking.Report
I would agree 100% that if the committee Dems had just assigned their time to a professional to do the questioning it would have gone much better for them. But politicians run to opportunities to grandstand like hippos run to water. *shrugs*Report
I agree with Jaybird’s point too: by definition her job as Speaker is to ensure that Dems retain the House. It doesn’t follow from that platitude that whatever actions she takes will, in fact, increase the likelihood of Dems holding the House.Report
Looking at Nadlers performance and the GOP’s intransigence I feel that people claiming full on impeachment would improve those odds have a steep hill to climb to make their case.Report
Then you need to rethink the tea leaves. I’ve talked to a lot of folks who voted trump because of his fighter persona. Whether he delivers or not is not their primary metric – they don’t see politicians on either side fighting for them. They aren’t looking for wins, just for fight. Which is why Speaker Pelosi learned the wrong lessons from the Tea Party and is using them wrongly to deal with this.Report
I don’t think the Democratic Party’s electoral base is a left leaning mirror of the Republican Party’s base so I am dubious that their strategy is replicable on this side of the aisle.
Also on a more selfish note, as a wonky inclined person I do not look at the GOP staggering around as a rabid fighting zombie having had what was left of its brains devoured by the Tea Party and say “yep, that’s what I want for my side!”Report
Expressing dignity in defeat is something Democrats are getting quite good at.
OTOH, dignity might require holding Trump WH officials accountable, by holding them in contempt or even opening up impeachment inquiries.Report
Sure, but if they hold them in contempt that is supposed to be enforced by… … Trump’s Justice Department. Now I still think they should hold them in contempt of course if for no other reason then for Trumps Justice department to show their true colors.Report
the democrats electoral base cares about the environment, fair labor practices, actual successful public education and ending racial gender and sexual discrimination. The only reason the proposals to deal with that look so far to the left the the DNC – as a entity – has moved its policies rightward to chase campaign donations.
Most people are not as wonky as you a re I are – they are way more motivated in political spaces when by solid narratives that speak to the emotional needs they have that align with policy concerns.Report
+100.
That exactly.Report
Let’s not tell anyone we agree on this. It may shatter the good order of the universe.Report
Some comments to North and in general:
1. Pelosi said Trump is “just not worth it” re impeachment. Considering his open corruption regarding using the government and lick spittle lackeys as profit maker for is properties, if Trump is not worth it, who is?
1a. Or do you think she does not have the votes in her own coaltion but does not want to say that out loud?
2. She also said Trump “self-impeaches.” This seems to mean that she thinks Trump is so gross that you just let him give him a rope to hang himself and voters will not reelect him in 2020. Is this a weasel way out?
3. I agree that impeachment is dead letter in the Senate. I still fail to see what is wrong with doing something because you think it is right and then hanging out on Moscow Mitch for being a lickspittle lackey.
4. FWIW, I think Pelosi is an earnest policy wonk and heart and finds it vaguely distasteful to run and win on Trump’s corruption and other unfitness for office. She wants a grand debate on policy and for millions of Americans to tell the media that they voted Democratic because the Democratic Party has the best policies for ordinary Americans. Of course, the real world does not work that way.Report
I agree Trump is impeachment worthy. The D’s like Pelosi don’t seem to get the current media world or that they need to drive a narrative. Waiting to see if impeachment catches fire is to passive. It’s not like there are a dozen dollops of grift or scandal weekly with the Trump crew. The D’s don’t seem to be able to know how to highlight and drive home what is going on. That said if Nadler is the kind of person you will have to depend on in an impeachment that is sad.Report
Co-sign.
Pelosi and Dem leadership aren’t trying to win an election, they’re trying to not lose it.Report
Great Comment Saul!
1. I would take Pelosi to be saying that Trump isn’t worth ruining the Democratic Party’s chances on and she’s right that there’s a very real risk that going for impeachment would do just that. In that light Trump is not worth it. Also would it be worth impeaching Trump if it guaranteed Pence the Presidency in 2020? I would agree with Pelosi that Trump wouldn’t be worth 4-8 years of Pence. Trump is, obviously, astonishingly corrupt and is the most impeachment worthy President, probably in the history of the republic. That the GOP is lockstep in formation behind him says horrific things about the GOP. That Pelosi is realistic enough to recognize those political facts speaks well of her to me at least.
2. Yup, I think that means the voters repudiate him in 2020. Is it a weasel way out? I don’t think so. Elections are fundamentally more valid in the minds of voters than legal procedures. A President eliminated by failure to win reelection garners little sympathy; on the other hand history would be far less kind to an impeached Trump than an unelected one. This comes back to your question #1. Do we hate Trump so much we’d be willing to risk a heightened chance of his reelection on the long shot of impeaching him? Pelosi says that gamble isn’t worth it; I agree.
3. This seems predicated on Mitch stonewalling the impeachment proceeding instead of him swiftly scheduling a vote after perfunctory hearings, the Dems failing to get the necessary majority and then the GOP trumpeting “Trump acquitted by Senate after partisan Dems try to impeach” in the last months running up to 2020’s election. Again, back to #1. If the long odds of Trump being impeached worth the very real risk of him being strengthened? Especially now when he appears to be in a bad position electorally?
4. I disagree with your analysis here. I believe if Nancy Pelosi thought there were good odds of Trump being impeached by her pulling the trigger on impeachment proceedings she’d do it in a heartbeat. She’s always been pretty realistic about vote counting and costs. She pushed the ACA over the finish line, for instance, knowing the risks. She’s not been afraid to make a gamble for a big payoff or win. But I think that she doesn’t see this as being a big gamble for a big payoff; I think she sees it the way I do: a big gamble for either nothing in the Senate or a potential base motivating win for Trump in the Senate. She thinks it’s a mugs game and I do too.Report
Democrats have consistently failed to learn the key Republican lesson since Reagan – tell a good damn story. Perhaps fold your policy preference into it, but tell the story. Humans are narrative, emotional creatures. We don’t do well with graphs and charts and white papers.
Republicans have told a story and told it very consistently for 40 plus years. And they keep being rewarded for their stories with greater power.Report
Republicans have a narrower coalition, a more extreme base and a dedicated propoganda media arm which makes weaving and delivering a persuasive story much easier for them. The Democratic party depends on a much more diverse camp of interests, its electoral base tilts much more moderate and they have to deliver their message through a media apparatus that, while sympathetic to liberalism, is aligned with itself and its media priors far more than with liberalism or the Democratic Party. They have higher bars to clear to weave a unifying narrative.Report
They haven’t tried to weave a coherent narrative since the early 1970’s. Thus we don’t know if they can. What we do know is Republicans have remained successful at expanding and holding power because they have maintained story telling discipline for 40 plus years.Report
For 1, even more than corruption is Trump’s obvious authoritarian manner and his insistence in bringing mass amounts of cruelty to our immigration system. He and his administration are committing human rights violations against countless people. Is this not worth impeachment? Whether or not there enough Democrats for impeachment is interesting. I can’t imagine why any House Democratic party member would vote for Trump in an impeachment vote. Their constituencies are going to be at least somewhat anti-Trump. Many are very anti-Trump. Voting for impeachment will not hurt them next election. Why would anybody want to come out as pro-Trump?
Re 4, Pelosi has to deal with the politics she has, not the politics she wants. You can’t have a grand debate about policy when the other side simply even refuses to debate in bad faith. People mainly vote out of inchoate tribal reasons than grand policy. Democratic voters want blood.Report
Impeaching him! Just like Clinton, he won’t be removed. And as we’ve seen with Bill, his supporters won’t care, and the other side will move on.
So in the end, what’s it get you?Report
Did I miss a scandal, are we assuming what should be proven, or are we assuming every rented hotel room in an international empire threatens the republic?Report
Little did the Founders suspect that “George Washington Slept Here” was an impeachable offense.Report
For Stillwater:
I don’t think she is necessarily incorrect. Letting Trump hang himself could be a viable political strategy and I don’t think 2018 was just passive luck either. Democrats went out and recruited and campaigned hard. The 2020 nominees are going to campaign hard.
I try to resist the “Dems in disarray” narrative because I find it Republican biased and false but she has said some real puzzlers still.Report
Its especially disconcerting since my favorite Pelosi saying is that “we came here to do a job, not keep one” in response to nervous caucus members.Report
Letting Trump hang himself could be a viable political strategy
Yes yes! Let’s try that out!*
* Well, I’d like to see ol Donny Trump wriggle his way out of THIS jam!
*Trump wriggles his way out of the jam easily*
Ah! Well. Nevertheless,Report
Well it arguably at least partially contributed to 2018’s wave. We should also be clear that impeachment is dead letter in the Senate. Only death ends Trump’s Presidency before 2021.Report
Your ideas intrigue me, etc.Report
I’m beginning to think the retirements of Republicans in right leaning districts before the election is tied in part to a desire to avoid voting on impeachment.Report
What is funny is that little vignette fits much better with Dems trying to impeach him than it does with Trump and his utter lack of accomplishment going before the electorate in 2020 and trying to repeat his 2016 miracle without HRC or Comey to help him out and without being able to pretend he’s a new kind of Republican like he did in 2016.Report
North, the point of impeaching Trump isn’t to remove him from office, it’s to (pretend to) fight against a corrupt administration in order to give the (false) impression that Democrats care about the rule of law and accountability. But at this point I’m convinced that the reason people resist impeaclhment isn’t because of the base politics or whatever other nonsense excuse they give, but because they think the Democrats are too incompetent to pull it off. That’s a helluva campaign message going into 2020, right? “Vote Dem in 2020. We’re too incompetent to fight for our values but we’re not as bad as Trump!”Report
I’m not impressed with the Dems ability to push the impeachment case. You may blame it on weakness on the part of the prosecuting party or it may be due to the weakness of the core case. I don’t deny Trump deserves impeaching but I doubt that a case can be made with the evidence currently available that will sway the republican and independent voters that would need to be swayed.
I recognize you think the Dems are almost as badly corrupt and contemptible as the GOP is. Fair enough but I don’t share your view on that. I like you plenty buddy but impressing Stillwater is not enough upside reason to risk blowing the next election and heightening the odds of another Trump term. It just ain’t.Report
but I doubt that a case can be made with the evidence currently available that will sway the republican and independent voters that would need to be swayed.
The point isn’t to convince them on the merits, North. It’s to convince them – and more importantly convince liberal-leaning folks who don’t vote or won’t vote for Ds – that the Democrats can, and will, use the levers of power to actually fight for a tangible goal.
Getting rolled on every level of politics and governance on\ly to stand up in an election year and say “vote for us!” is a tough sell to anyone who isn’t already a Dem voter.Report
Yes, I’m aware of the “fightin’ Dems will be more popular” argument. It might even hold water for that portion of the electorate who are paying close attention. That portion is, however, the overwhelming minority.
Now maybe you’re right and the electorate in general will go the same way. I don’t know, you don’t know, no one can truly know right now. But the polls and our prior experience in the scenario most like this one suggest the opposite.
With the current fundamentals the way they are and the way the winds currently seem to be blowing I don’t blame Pelosi for not wanting to roll the dice on the question of which of us are right.Report
One of the amusing and slightly disturbing consiequences of discussing this issue with you and Saul and others is that each conversation makes it slightly more difficult for me to justify voting for Democrats. Which is weird….Report
Hmm that is interesting considering how very differently the two of us approach the party. Maybe the GOP should cut us a check?Report
I think it is more that they see the writing on the wall and know 2020 will be difficult for them.Report
1. Berke’s elicitation of Lewandowski’s admission that he feels no shame in lying to the media is a torpedo below the waterline of Lewandowski’s political career. “Are you lying now, Corey? You’re not under oath.” “Was that a lie, Corey? You haven’t been sworn in.”
2. I wonder whether Pelosi is holding fire because she knows a bigger, landscape-shifting revelation is on the way–a bombshell from Trump’s financial records or a worsening of Trump’s dementia–and she wants to be able to say when that comes out that she had not previously been advocating impeachment.Report
Possibility 2 is covered by my diary
Jan 20, 2017: Week 1 of the Trump Presidency. Next week they will reveal evidence that destroys him! Also, a customer asked if I have Prince Albert in a can.
Week 2. New revelations will come out next week and bring Trump down! Customer called again about tobacco.
Week 3. Next week Comey will prove Trump colluded with Russia and he will be removed! And wondering if the tobacco inquiries may involve underage smokers.
Week 4. Ditto
…
… skipping on down through Russian collusion, Mueller Mueller Mueller, Stormy Daniels, tax records, white supremacy, hotel stays, and constant calls to see if I have Prince Albert in a can.
…
Week 137: Nadler’s committee will depose Lewandowski and Trump will be destroyed! Ordering more Prince Albert tobacco based on ongoing interest in it.
Week 138. Nancy will reveal Trump-ending revelations next week! Also getting continued calls about Prince Albert tobacco.Report
Trump’s base delights in being lied to, if it owns the libs.
Notice there is always the short pause between one of his bizarre lies, where they are frantically trying to decide if the party line should be “Fake news, he didn’t say that!” Or “Of course, the hurricane was really going to hit Alabama!” In which case they will defend it to the death.Report
During NOAA’s updates they had Alabama getting with hurricane level or tropical storm winds and torrential rain, and the prediction cone even had the eye hitting Alabama before shifting back to the northeast.
All these are available in NOAA’s massive archive of NOAA’s Dorian predictions.
Try “Graphics Archive” near the top center of the page, then “Cone with Wind Field” and “5-day with line”. Having the eye hit Alabama was within their cone, as were predictions of very high winds hitting Birmingham and other inland Alabama cities.
It’s hilarious that Trump can take a Sharpie and make the press leap around like a cat chasing a laser dot.Report
The point of that whole debacle was that Trump couldn’t be bothered to get the latest NOAA predictions, he was showing data that was (IIRC) already a day or two old.Report
His laziness and stupidity in not reading or preparing was point #1;
The continued lying and fragile bluster of a man incapable of admitting error was point #2;
Point #3, and the center of my comment was that Trump can take a Sharpie and make his supporters leap around like a cat chasing a laser dot.Report
Stop overreacting Chip. It’s not like some putz took a pic of highly classified secret satellite intell and tweeted it out divulging some of our capabilities.Report
Here is a thread from a few months back where we discussed the FBI’s policy on talking to the press.Report
Which is entirely different from, purely theoretically of course, a putz with a phone tweeting a pic of highly classified sat imagery a couple weeks ago.Report
Who is the highest declassification authority in the country?Report
Here sir, the People are sovereign.Report
Oooh! Can they own AR-15s?Report
Lets put it to a vote and let the people decide.Report
…that’s a weird definition of “sovereign”.Report
It is the very definition of “The People”, plural, “are sovereign.”Report
ya ever wonder how to get out from under mob rule Jay?Report
Personal sovereignty and living “as if”.Report
That works for non-coercive, mobs. We aren’t talking about those kinds anymore.Report
And now with the emerging story of the DNI whistleblower, the frantic defense is now in the “Well technically it was ephebophilia” type, where they need to parse the most elaborate and contrived legalistic theories to wave it away.Report
Everybody’s known the “leaked capabilities” since the 1980’s. The Hubble is a Big BIrd built by a different vendor with technical input from the people who’d been building big space telescopes that looked down instead of up. The astronomers in those meetings had to get used to dealing in microradians instead of arc seconds.
Unfortunately the spy folks didn’t sufficiently emphasize the importance of making the solar panels extremely rigid to avoid causing vibrations from thermal shock twice every 90 minutes, so the Hubble’s original panels had to be replaced by proven ones.
A new class of spy satellites under development has a 20 meter aperture, vastly larger than Hubble’s 2.4 meters and the James Webb’s 6.5 meters. And that’s the stuff they’ll openly talk about.Report
Standard George response. 90% off the point details to distract and nothing about the actual issue. Do we want to do the “What if Obama had done this?” thing?Report
President Carter gave classified SR-71 aerial recon photographs to Soviet allies engaged in war. Where’s the outrage?
Everybody on the planet with an Internet connection knows what satellite photos look like. Everybody with a calculator can determine the resolution of a KH-11, which is about 4-inches. NASA even owns two of them and is trying to modify them into space telescopes.
The KH-11’s have a shorter focal length than the Hubble, and have a steerable and focusable secondary mirror, plus a lighter and more advanced primary mirror.
What Trump did was take an otherwise absolutely useless piece of intelligence (ooh, a satellite launch failed!) and turn it into military and diplomatic gold by trolling the Iranians with it.Report
He was making a point that it was an earlier map.
CNN’s story on it said
The particular map he used (NOAA produces several per day) was two or three maps away from the one that showed the outer line of eye probabilities entering Alabama (which is in the NOAA archive I linked above), and which would have sent hurricane force winds throughout the region he circled.
Trump wouldn’t be talking about Dorian making the turn and saving Alabama and the Florida panhandle if he was unaware of the turn that Dorian made, nor would he have referred to that map as an “original chart”.
From this, the press spun a vast conspiracy theory because they have the minds of four-year olds.Report
At no point was there ever a prediction that the cone of the hurricane would hit Alabama, and by the time he tweeted his fervent prayers for the safety of the people of Alabama, the threat had long passed.
Again, Point #1 is trivial. Point #2 is significant, but point #3 is actually serious.
Democracy and the rule of law can’t coexist with a Stalinesque mindset.Report
Then why is that prediction of hitting Alabama sitting in NOAA’s archive of predictions, where I just saw it, and where it’s been sitting since they made it?
People in Florida were keenly aware of every prediction NOAA made. One of my friends had to blow his weekend in emergency prep meetings for the Tampa area, because for days the most likely predicted path had it plowing right over Hillsborough county.
As it turns out, they gave out enormous numbers of sandbags but don’t bother to go collect them if the hurricane changes course. I warned him that if they keep doing that, Florida is eventually going to run out of sand. ^_^
I have no idea what a Satlineque hurricane prediction would look like because the Soviet Union never had a hurricane hit it, just waves of socialism that did far more damage than any storm.Report
You need to back off NOAA or you and I will be stepping outside.
Aside from giving a totally by then false forecast drawn in with the Sharpie, once it was pointed out by the local forecast office that he had erred (since they were fielding dozens of panicked calls from locals who hadn’t prepped), he apparently then sent the Commerce Secretary to smack the acting NOAA Administrator, who then publicly rebuked said weather office for doing its job through an cowardly unsigned NOAA press release (and internal emails saying directly no one should publicly contradict the president).
Stuff like that makes people question NOAA, and that will eventually get people killed because they won’t believe the forecasts. That aside, its sickening political meddling of the kind we never saw in prior administrations.Report
If you read the CNN transcript, you’ll see he wasn’t giving a forecast. He was pointing out that the hurricane had turned from it’s original forecast path, which is what he was illustrating with the Sharpie.
The NOAA updates show that indeed, at one point the forecast path had the eye hitting Alabama.
Follow my NOAA archive link and watch it for yourself. Then read Trump’s words as dutifully recorded by CNN.
As I said, our press has the comprehension of 4-year olds, and they love to lie to generate a story.Report