A new episode of The Josh Marshall Podcast is live! This week, Josh and Kate discuss the ascendant Nikki Haley, the war on the administrative state and Hunter Biden’s journey towards Congress as George Santos is on his way out.
You can listen to the new episode of The Josh Marshall Podcast here.
Henry Kissinger’s death yesterday at the grand, round age of 100 was greeted with a broad chorus of “It’s about times” and “good riddances” and “go straight to hells.” I have always been fascinated by the intensity of the animus toward the man. And to be clear: that’s not because I necessarily disagree with the verdict.
In the quickest possible summary, during his roughly eight years as first National Security Advisor and then Secretary of State, Kissinger spearheaded or oversaw two broad policies which account for most, but by no means all, of what that vituperation is about.
Continue reading “Why Did So Many People Hate Henry Kissinger So Much?”It was just after 8 p.m. ET on Jan. 6, 2021. Law enforcement had just finished clearing the Capitol building, and Congress was beginning to reconvene to finish the task which Stop the Steal supporters had violently disrupted: formalizing Biden’s win, and Trump’s defeat, in the 2020 election.
Continue reading “How Scott Perry Went Off The Deep End In Effort To Debunk Trump Loss”Senate Judiciary Republicans on Thursday invoked a rarely used rule to try to run down the clock and prevent committee Democrats from voting to authorize subpoenas for right-wing power players Leonard Leo and Harlan Crow.
Continue reading “Senate Republicans Use Procedural Stunts To Try To Block Subpoenas Of Leo And Crow”This article is part of TPM Cafe, TPM’s home for opinion and news analysis. It was originally published at The Conversation.
Henry Kissinger, who died on Nov. 29, 2023, at age 100, exercised more than 50 years of influence on American foreign policy.
I am a scholar of American foreign policy who has written on Kissinger’s service from 1969 to 1977 as national security adviser and secretary of state under the Nixon and Ford administrations. I have seen how his foreign policy views and actions played out for good and, mostly, for ill.
When Kissinger entered government as Richard Nixon’s national security adviser, he espoused a narrow perspective of the national interest, known as “realpolitik,” primarily centered on maximizing the economic and military power of the United States.
Continue reading “A Tortured And Deadly Legacy: Kissinger And Realpolitik In US Foreign Policy”As the sun broke over the House office buildings Thursday, it enveloped George Santos — and the roughly 50 reporters and photographers, shivering in the 30-degree morning — in a heavenly glow.
Continue reading “George Santos On Brink Of Demotion Back To Baruch Volleyball Team”A lot of things happened. Here are some of the things. This is TPM’s Morning Memo. Sign up for the email version.
Jennifer Little, a former Trump attorney, has told Special Counsel Jack Smith that she warned Trump that if he did not comply with a federal grand jury subpoena for all classified documents at Mar-a-Lago it would be a crime, according to new reporting from ABC News.
Sources said the lawyer, Jennifer Little, told investigators Trump “absolutely” understood the warning, which came during a pivotal meeting at Mar-a-Lago with Trump and another attorney, Evan Corcoran, who had recently joined Trump’s legal team.
The subpoena came after months of demands from the National Archives for Trump to return government documents that he took with him from the White House to Mar-a-Lago. Little says she was trying to impress upon Trump that a grand jury subpoena was different and more serious. “You’ve got to comply,” she allegedly warned Trump.
Again, these are the purported words of Trump’s own lawyer. Little and Trump attorney Evan Corcoran were forced to testify to the grand jury after U.S. District Judge Beryl A. Howell ruled that attorney-client privilege did not apply because their legal advice was used in furtherance of a crime.
It looks like the DC Circuit Court of Appeals inadvertently unsealed a filing that it should not have. It came in the case of Rep. Scott Perry’s phone, which was seized by the FBI back in August 2022. Months of litigation ensued over whether Perry, a Pennsylvania Republican, was protected by the Constitution’s Speech or Debate Clause, and Perry won a partial though significant victory when he appealed the case. Those records had been under seal but they were briefly unsealed Wednesday afternoon, only to be resealed and blocked from public view later in the evening.
Politico’s Kyle Cheney has a good rundown on what the inadvertently unsealed documents show about Perry’s communications between Election Day 2022 and Jan. 6, 2021.
Two county supervisors in Cochise County, Arizona, have been criminally charged by the state attorney general for refusing to certify 2022 election results.
The Henry Kissinger remembrances:
Spencer Ackerman: Henry Kissinger, War Criminal Beloved by America’s Ruling Class, Finally Dies
David Corn: Dead at 100, Henry Kissinger Leaves Behind a Bloody Legacy
The headline really does say it all: “Tucker Carlson, Trump’s shadow diplomat”
I can’t speak to the broader geopolitical implications, but in spy thriller terms the alleged Indian plot to assassinate a Sikh separatist in New York is heady – and comical – stuff.
It’s probably easiest to explain by separating what was real from what was law enforcement subterfuge, as alleged in the new federal indictment:
REAL:
Nikhil Gupta, the defendant charged with acting as an intermediary between Indian intelligence and would-be assassins
Gurpatwant Singh Pannun, the victim, who is not named in the indictment but matches the description as a vocal Sikh critic of India based in New York
Unnamed Indian government officer who has claimed to work in intelligence and recruited Gupta in the plot to assassinate Pannun
SUBTERFUGE:
The confidential source, an unnamed “criminal associate” who Gupta contacted for help in hiring a hitman but who turned out to be a U.S. government informant
The hitman, who turned out to be an undercover U.S. law enforcement officer
As you can see, this started as an assassination plot and ended up as a sting. And, man, do they have the receipts: communications, photos and video as it all played out, with Gupta fooled into thinking he was dealing with real bad actors.
As funny as that is, the stakes were real. As this sting was unfolding, the alleged Indian assassination plot on Canadian soil took place and was even referenced in the communications between Gupta and his Indian handler.
John Ganz: Israel Has Already Lost
Josh Marshall: Decision Time
In two separate private conversations being reported on by the WaPo, Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) claims to have said “Fuck you” to Donald Trump after his ouster as speaker last month. McCarthy’s office now denies that he swore.
Politico: “Johnson has antagonized conservatives most acutely by engaging in policy talks with fellow leaders, rather than pushing exclusively for base-pleasing wins that won’t survive in the Senate. That traditional approach won’t hurt Johnson with most of the House GOP — but as McCarthy’s ouster made clear, it only takes a handful of fed-up members to make a speaker’s life difficult.”
TPM’s Kate Riga on oral arguments yesterday in a case the high court may use to chip away at the administrative state.
A revealing, disturbing, and inexplicable public outburst by Elon Musk:
The videopic.twitter.com/cPWVO1MQCD https://t.co/d1kE5ICJ7k
— Alex Thompson (@AlexThomp) November 29, 2023
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Before leaving town for the holiday, former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) told CNN he was going to spend some of the break talking to his family about whether he should continue on with his career in the House. A month and a half removed from the spotlight and all the right flank-induced humiliation that came with it, McCarthy lamented he missed having a seat “at the table” and said he was “going to look at all options” politically for himself.
“I got the holidays. I will talk to my family about the ideas of what is going forward, and then I will make a decision,” he told CNN.
Continue reading “McCarthy Undecided On Whether To Continue Humiliation”The right-wing Supreme Court justices occasionally tipped into outright hostility Wednesday as they pressed a government lawyer with questions and hypotheticals about stripping the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) of some of its enforcement discretion.
Continue reading “Right-Wing Justices Train Their Anti-Agency Ire On Big Bad Financial Regulator”I wanted to flag to your attention this post by John Ganz, someone who, if you’re not familiar with him, is well worth becoming familiar with. Ganz and I see the questions about Israel, the Palestinians and Zionism differently. Indeed I disagree with the title of the post I’m sending you to. But what is most important in writing, especially in commentary, is not that it be “right” but that it be illuminating. Reading what is “right” is often reading a more polished version of what we already think — the utility of which is limited. Ganz manages to approach these questions with insight as well as texture and elegance, no simple feat.
On that matter of disagreement, I want to note something about what I have written on this issue. If you read carefully, I seldom make positive arguments for any particular position or question on this topic. I tend to point up what I see as disconnects or inconsistencies in pat arguments and responses. This is partly temperamental. I don’t like making arguments or claims that aren’t packaged with strong and concrete defenses. It’s also because with all the internal media and imagery there’s a huge amount of what is going on that we simply don’t know. One such question is whether Israel’s retaliation in response to the October 7th massacres is justified.
Continue reading “Decision Time”
