April 20-21, 2018: Trump Says He Has Tapes - and the Koch Brothers Go Shopping for Lawmakers

 4/20/18: Besides bingeing on Fox News and wondering if Melania will dump his fat ass for lying about porn stars and Playboy Bunnies, and pregnant house cleaners, what is the president up to today? He’s fuming every time he hears the name “James Comey.” He rages every time he thinks about Comey’s memos, which Comey says outline conversations he and Trump had about the Russia investigation. 

For months, Trump insisted those memos didn’t exist. He insists Comey never took notes while they were together! 

Comey just made them up later to cover his F.B.I. butt. 

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Trump hints he has tapes. Comey hopes so.

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In fact, at one point, Trump went for a kind of lying-sack-of-presidential-poop bluff. He could prove Comey was lying: 

 

 

Several weeks passed. Trump laid low. Apparently, he was laying in wait to catch Comey in a “perjury trap” of his own. (See: 1/26/18.) 

Okay. No. Trump finally admitted, if there were tapes….um…he didn’t happen to have them.

 

 

Now the Comey memos have been released. They don’t directly implicate the president in any collusion with Russians. 

You know what that proves! According to the White House, suddenly the Comey memos are real and prove Trump is innocent.  

You can’t make this up.

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4/21/18: Speaker Paul Ryan decides to do his part in draining the swamp by firing House chaplain Father Patrick Conroy. This is the first time in history a chaplain has been fired before completing his term.

 

How much does it cost to buy the Speaker of the House?

 

A billion-dollar tax cut. Annually. 

You are probably thinking: Another sex abuse scandal! Or: Conroy must have been flying all over Kingdom Come, like Scott Pruitt! (See: 4/15/18.) Not at all. Ryan took umbrage when Father Conroy offered up this prayer during House debate on the huge Republican tax cut bill: 

As legislation on taxes continues to be debated this week and next, may all members be mindful that the institutions and structures of our great nation guarantee the opportunities that have allowed some to achieve great success, while others continue to struggle. May their efforts these days guarantee that there are not winners and losers under new tax laws, but benefits balanced and shared by all Americans.

 

At this point you realize Ryan doesn’t care enough to pretend he cares about the typical American. He passed a giant tax cut with hundreds of billions going to the wealthy few. He’s going to retire before he can slash Social Security, which was always his blue-eyed dream. But you wonder if he wouldn’t have fired Jesus, had he been House chaplain, for saying: “When you give a banquet, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind, and you will be blessed. Although they cannot repay you, you will be repaid at the resurrection of the righteous.” 

Americans for Tax Fairness estimates that under the Ryan/Trump tax plan each of the Koch brothers, Charles and David, will see their income taxes slashed – annually – by at least $1 billion. This explains why they donated $500,000 to “Team Ryan” in January. The Koch brothers don’t buy the message of Jesus. 

They buy lawmakers.

August 23, 2019: David Koch Decides to Take His Billions with Him

 

8/23/19: The president goes off on another Twitter rampage. After Fed Chairman Jay Powell warns that Trump’s tariff policies are causing “turbulence” in the markets, Trump loses his cool. 

“The only question is, who is the bigger enemy, Jay Powel or Chairman Xi?” he tap-taps. 

Fourteen minutes later, he corrects the spelling of Powell’s last name. But the damage is done. By the end of trading Friday, the threat of an escalating tariff war causes the Dow Jones average to drop 623 points. 

As much as Trump loves to brag about how great the markets are doing under his guiding hand, the Dow has been essentially flat since January 2018.

 

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A bonus of $104,167 for each employee? 

IN OTHER FINANCIAL NEWS, David Koch, head of Koch Industries, passes away after a losing battle with prostate cancer. “You can’t take it with you,” people say. But you can have the gall to protest increased taxes on people like yourself, as Koch – rest his immensely rich soul – did. 

At his demise, it is estimated that after he paid all those abominable taxes he still had a few dollars tucked away. He was worth $50.5 billion when he passed on to the Big Bank in the Sky.

 

In 2017, Forbes magazine estimated that Koch Industries had 120,000 employees. So, let’s imagine a boss wanted to reward workers for helping him pile up all that vast wealth. He could have said to himself, “These great people worked hard to help me make my company a success. I didn’t pull this off by myself. I will divide up $12.5 billion among my employees. That will mean a bonus of $104,167 each.” 

Mr. Koch would still have had $40 billion left. 

Instead, he decided to give hundreds of millions of dollars to GOP causes and candidates. That way, he could ensure that Republicans would fight increases to the minimum wage and tougher environmental regulations.