Jim Jordan Publishes Intelligence Analysis of Trump’s Authoritarian Tendencies
As I laid out here, I’ve been going through the transcripts from Jim Jordan’s search to find people who politicized intelligence, like his investigation showed John Ratcliffe to have done.
And in addition to the way Jordan exposed new information about Ratcliffe politicizing intelligence, Jordan also helpfully elicited an intelligence analysis of Trump’s dictatorial personality.
A Republican staffer was asking Mike Morell why he sent an email thanking those who signed the 50 spook letter, in which Morell said the 2020 election was the most important since the Civil War. And then, violating the rule that you never ask a question to which you don’t know the answer, the staffer then asked why Morell said that.
Q In an email you sent to signatories thanking them for signing on, you described this as, quote, the most important election since 1860 and 1864 when the very existence of the country was on the ballot.
[snip]
Q Why did you believe that this was the most important election since 1860 and 1864?
So Morell answered, drawing on his training analyzing the personality traits of world leaders.
I have to tell you that, you know, spending 33 years at CIA and watching literally hundreds of world leaders during that time, President Trump’s personality traits deeply concerned me, what I believed to be deep narcissism, what I believed to be deep paranoia, what I believe to be a type of sadism where you — not sexually, of course, but a type of sadism where you, you know, are happy when your opponents have been injured in some way — I’m talking politically — that those were all traits that I saw in foreign leaders who did significant damage to their country and significant damage to the democracies of their country. I’m thinking — you know, I’m thinking of Mugabe in Zimbabwe. I’m thinking of Chavez in Venezuela. I’m thinking of Putin in Russia. So I was deeply concerned about the potential impact of President Trump on our democracy.
And, you know, my fear, in my view, was borne out by his failure to act on January 6, 2021. So that’s what I meant when I wrote that. That’s what I was thinking.
Q The public statement —
Chairman Jordan. You couldn’t have been thinking about January 6, 2021, because —
Mr. Morell. No. I wasn’t thinking about January 6th. I was thinking about everything I said up to that point, sir. You’re correct.
To Jordan’s credit, he caught Morell seeing, in January 6, confirmation of his analysis.
Which it was.
If someone were to ask me what the guiding principle of Trump and his MAGA base were, my answer would be schadenfreude. It didn’t take me 33 years as CIA analyst to see how destructive that would be.
I might go further and identify their guiding principle as Morose delectation. A slightly worse state of schadenfreude.
From Wiki I see:
“The act of lingering with pleasure on an impure thought.”
That’s bad. A very scary kinda bad.
If you haven’t read it, I recommend Adam Serwer’s “The Cruelty Is the Point” — https://web.archive.org/web/20181003223036/https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2018/10/the-cruelty-is-the-point/572104/
He later came out with a book of the same name.
Yep. Read it when it came out.
He nailed it.
And in their zealot duties to control a nation unraveling, our conservatives on current SCOTUS would be more than comfortable having this monster lead us to ruin? As if they think they can control him with granting him immunity?
I believe they think they can control him by have him tilting at the the windmills of retaliation and retribution to consume the few hours of work he commits to any job these days. Giving them a lot more time to just slide other stuff across his desk, much of which since it’s administratively destructive by nature will require no help from his toadies in Congress.
When Trump said that he would only be dictator for the first day, I took that to mean that he will unleash his attack dogs and sit back and watch them attack enemies and dismantle the regulators. Stephen Miller, Roger Stone, etc. won’t need the boss to issue orders.
Every day will be the first day of the rest of his presidency.
To Matt Foley,
LOL! Like that movie Fifty First Dates!
[Except that [main character’s] memory loss was due to head injury]
I glanced through a few of the transcripts. They were all in excess of one hundred pages. I could not find any reference to the name “Smirnov” in the transcripts I searched.
By ignoring clear proof that the Burisma bribery story was a political hoax, this “oversight” exercise by Jordan is a naked attempt to distract from what is now validation that the letter warning of Russian disinformation was correct.
“To Jordan’s credit”. Zowie, how often do we see those words in that order around here?
Excellent piece! Many thanks!
There are reasons Jim Jordan studied the law in college but never became a lawyer. Speculation is that he failed a state’s bar exam more than once and gave up while never admitting he took the exam and failed.
Jordan is not smart. In fact, he’s dumb. He’s nothing more than a loud mouth empty suit bully made of soft clay. He and Trump are made for each other—Gumby 1 and Gumby 2.
And he was a disaster as a wrestling coach at OSU.
Marcy.
I wish we could say Jim Jordan is a “loud mouth empty suit bully” but alas, as his suit jackets have yet to appear he will remain, as always, simply “a loud mouth bully” with no sartorial taste or training whatsoever.
Can’t wait til Trump and Maga reverse intelligent, unselect and injustice cabals.
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Jaw dropping. Thanks for staying on this.
To stop power and control we have to intervene. The woman must leave and risk his wrath and potential beating or death to get free. We have to face our fears. Just as the slave had to do to get free. Just as we had the civil war. Freedom costs us because we must suffer power and control and survive it, to stop it!!
Separating kids at the border resulting in attachment wounds for these families. Some of these kids separated and missing for months!!! A potentially life long mental health problem. Violence against children. We watched it.
Trump knew Epstein “liked em young”. He knew Epstein was a pedophile. He said so when he acknowledged Epstein’s attraction to the young girls. Technically there is a federal law that says we are all mandatory reporters of child abuse!!! He literally validated Epstein’s behavior!!! Trump, like Jordan doesn’t think it’s that bad!!! Violence against children!! (Yes I am screaming!!) Just not that evil to Americans. But Biden…dementia…wtf!!!
Jan 6th. Watching for 3 hours and not stopping it. Trying to kill Pence!!! We tip toed around the crime. We still are!!
Covid. Allowing more republicans to die because they followed his lies and distortions. The stats are clear!! It killed people. Killed people. Intentionally to protect himself.
It could not be more plain that this is an extremely dangerous man. All facts. All before our eyes.
Our own biases explain why this is happening. We are too afraid to go against his power and control. Too afraid of his criticism and wrath. We cowered in his power and control. Especially the press. (Not here, but out there) we have been too intellectual and not emotional enough.
Just as if you just saw him slap his wife in public. Move to do something. He did worse. He killed people before our eyes. He abused children! Just as if we saw him use the N word. Are we truly behaving as if we are in danger? No. No we are not. We are in our heads thinking about it analyzing it. It’s right there before our eyes!!!
A coordinated community response is the most effective way to fight DV. A message that says the behavior is unacceptable. Behavior that says we are all on board and the behavior is unacceptable.
The press is complicit for treating him as if he’s a valid candidate. He is NOT. It’s before our eyes. All we ever had to do was act like it.
“So oftentimes it happens that we live our lives in chains
And we never even know we have the key”
We must act like we are in the real danger we are in. Movement. Biden or Trump is no analysis required.
Biden with dementia is no risk. He has a team he listens to. Let’s just tell the f’n TRUTH. And act like Trump has killed people before our very eyes!!! My god!! It’s ridiculous. We are not living in the truth!
Leading causes of death of U.S. police since 2014:
Covid: 802
Illness: 585
Gunshot: 502
Automobile crash; 292
Struck by vehicle: 150
Source: https://nleomf.org/memorial/facts-figures/officer-fatality-data/causes-of-law-enforcement-deaths/
But according to Fox News the real danger to cops is violent illegal immigrants.
“The press is complicit for treating him as if he’s a valid candidate”. Exactly. And you’re right; “he’s NOT”.
I venture that the press is responsible for just about every sick quagmire and bit of evil phuckery we’ve been subjected to since Reagan’s trickle down bs and Iran/Contra.
The media is a commodity and makes its money on clicks which is supposed to drive honesty and accuracy (free market principles) but it doesn’t actually work that way when folks figure out how to game the system by figuring out what sells best and costs the least to produce.
It’s up to us. Vote! this time or perhaps never vote again.
Now that the Supreme Court has ruled that Biden and the “Biden Crime Family” is immune from prosecution, is Jordan’s committee necessary anymore?
Seems like Democrats should use Morells words in advertising against Trump.
o/t [but sometimes it feels like nothing is…]
Vatican Excommunicates Its Former Ambassador to the U.S.
Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò, who was informed of his excommunication on Friday, has long been a vocal critic of Pope Francis. https://www.nytimes.com/2024/07/05/world/europe/vatican-excommunication-archbishop-carlo-maria-vigano.html July 5, 2024 Updated 6:14 p.m. ET
He’s a favorite of Bannon and Flynn.
From the Daily Beast’s story:
Sounds like he wants to go back to the 19th century.
13th century might be a better fit all around. I read some years ago in a Mediaeval handbook of penance (many around and I forget which) that it was okay to continue beating your wife even if unconscious. However one must stop if she farted as that signaled impending death. Blessed be the Universal church.
He’s also a favorite of hard right, arch-conservative American Catholic bishops, who want to take American governance back considerably farther than the 19th century. I would say, oh, the 16th – 17th centuries would suit them better.
Nobody expects the Spanish inquisition!
Well, we better start…
Wow. That’s one hell of an article.
I’m not a Christian, so the Church and the Pontiff aren’t really my thing so to speak. You could fairly say I have negative views….
BUT, I’ve seen a number of Popes come and go and this so far has been my favorite. By far. And this gives him even more positive points imo.
Can’t recall which community member made an overbroad generalized statement this week about Catholics being the hard right in the US.
This excommunication limns the biggest split in the US Catholic church, and Vigano was a supporter of the hard right portion of the US Catholic church.
#NotAllCatholics
Vigano would hate some of the Catholics in my family. Many are now dead, but Uncle Mike, for example, was a divorced Irish Catholic (His first marriage, her second of three). And Uncle Jim was excommunicated for some offense, way back, probably advocating for democracy or unions or something that was forbidden by the then-pope.
The hierarchy has always been far to the right of the laity in America. I attribute that to the fact that Italians choose America’s bishops. If the congregations had even an advisory voice, it would be a different church.
These are Amy Barrett’s people, as well. And, possibly Alioto’s as well. . Despise Pope Francis. Deep cult medievalists.
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Vigano helped the pro-Trumpers during the coup attempt.
He addressed Trump supporters in DC during the so-called Jericho March rally on December 12, 2020. [Ref: Rod Dreyer writing in The American Conservative, What I Saw At The Jericho March], which Dreher called a “hugely significant development, one no doubt brokered by Steve Bannon”, given Vigano’s credibility with conservative Catholics.
Then his interview by Bannon appeared in a conservative Catholic magazine [Crisis, “An infamous betrayal of the mission of the Church”: Interview with Archbishop Viganò], published on January 5, 2021. During the interview, Vigano told Bannon “It would be an irreparable disaster if Joe Biden, who is heavily suspected of being complicit with the Chinese dictatorship, would be designated as President of the United States”. And: “on the one hand we have the Trump administration and the traditional values that it holds in common with those of Catholics; on the other hand we have the deep state of the self-styled Catholic Joe Biden, who is subservient to the globalist ideology and its perverse, anti-human, antichristic, infernal agenda. “
“we have the Trump administration and the traditional values that it holds in common with those of Catholics;”
Ever notice how it’s always the Trump administration and not Trump himself that extreme Christians laud for having conservative values.
Harpie and Critter7 – TY for the sub-thread. The coverage I found helpful: https://www.christianpost.com/news/archbishop-vigan-excommunicated-from-catholic-church.html — It linked to a Vatican online document: “PRESS RELEASE OF THE DICASTERY FOR THE DOCTRINE OF THE FAITH” https://press.vatican.va/content/salastampa/it/bollettino/pubblico/2024/07/05/0554/01148.html#ing
“Original text: English” Written for us. “The lifting of the censure in these cases is reserved to the Apostolic See.” Given the intransigence and lack of remorse, not showing up for the hearing, this one seems aimed to last a long time. Francis has no cause to lift the censure.
His strongest supporters are the Mel Gibson-like, radical American bishops, who want to return the Church to its era of medieval dominance.
The Pope said getting the covid vaccine is a moral obligation and an act of love. I know some MAGA Catholics who ignored him, esp. my county’s commissioner. Hey, it’s not in the Constitution or bible. Forget about that papal infallibility thing. Common sense and personal choice!
I didn’t know, but now I do know, that I ha e waited years to hear Donald described as sadistic. That is an exact description.
Trump’s a malignant narcissist — a personality disorder that combines narcissism, antisocial behavior, paranoid thinking, and sadism.
Had you been able to ask anyone who worked for him, especially the Polish immigrants who built Trump Tower, and any of the people who sued him for defamation or to collect what he owed them, the sadism would have been more apparent.
His speeches about undocumented immigrants and the “wall” – he wants them injured or dead, in nasty ways. That’s sadism.
Those characteristics of Trump were shown in the debate when Biden was not up to par. Trump got sadistic about it in the sense described. Gloating. And self congratulatory. It showed. The media are not discussing that, but it was there in the video excerpts I saw after the debate, (which I had not watched). Whether it was a constant Trump showing I cannot say, but the excerpts online said those things to me. Not a statesman by any measure. I am decided and biased that way against Trump, not impartial, but I wonder what impression may have been formed with truly undecided voters.
kicking himself in the nutz is one of Gym Jordan’s specialties