“It’s hard for the United States to pursue international anticorruption and ethics initiatives when we’re not even keeping our own side of the street clean. It affects our credibility,” he told the New York Times over the weekend. “I think we are pretty close to a laughingstock at this point.”
Sometimes I think the worries about how we´re perceived overseas can be a bit overblown.
But not in this case.
“I think we are pretty close to a laughingstock at this point.”
yeah. “pretty close.”
“It creates the appearance of profiting from the presidency,”
APPEARANCE!?!?!?!?!
He’s interested in grandstanding and lobbying for more expansive powers in the office he holds.”
Um, considering that he won’t be in the position for much longer, the idea of “grandstanding” just doesn’t make any sense. (Like anything in this regime.)
“The truth is, the White House Mr. Schaub is not interested in anyone advising the executive branch on ethics."
FIFY, Lindsay Walters
If this administration had the faintest whiff of interest in hewing to ethical standards we would never have heard of Mr Shaub. I’m sure he tried, in the beginning. But he never had any hope of getting them to toe the line, and he left what was certainly a career-capping position because of it. So they’re in no damn position to scold him. When they’re all locked up I hope he gets some satisfaction out of it.
There’s no “pretty close” about it — that ship has sailed.
Here in Germany the news anchors don’t even bother to try and couch comments in anything approaching a careful “polite” formulation. It’s pretty close to face-palm every night. My husband says he’s never seen anything like this before.
Good.
Love how discussion of ethics and perceptions of corruption are apparently “outside the scope” of the Ethics Director.
And, since July 17 is World Emoji Day…
Oh right. The tax returns. When’s that shoe gonna drop?
This guy, and Richard Painter. Someone (forget who) said we would be saved from Trump by serious people doing their jobs. Who’s more serious than ethics lawyers and FBI directors?
So many shoes, right?
You know who’s laughing? Donald Trump. All the way to the bank. Besides, who’s going to hold him accountable? CONgress? Ha! Democrats? Ha! They want him in place as long as possible in order to raise as much money from the rubes as possible. If they do somehow manage not to successfully throw the next election they’ll just go back to the same Neoliberal Economic and Neoconservative warmongering script that cost us 1000 seats since 2009, so what will we have gained? “Our team” will be in charge? Yeah, that worked out great the last time. The actual people, as opposed to billionaire sociopaths, need to take over at least one of the major Parties before it’s too late…
Imelda Marcos would be jealous.
The Trump administration’s new theme song:
I think Donald’s main drives through most of his life have been and still are sex, money and positive publicity, but not necessarily in that order anymore.
Speaking of being a laughingstock, is there a good goddamned reason the streets of the nation are apparently patrolled by graduates of the “Rodrigo Duterte School of Security Services”?
A 40-year-old woman who family members said called 911 to report a possible assault in the alley behind her home Saturday night was fatally shot by a Minneapolis police officer.
The shooting happened at the end of the alley on W. 51st Street between Washburn and Xerxes avenues S. in the city’s Fulton neighborhood.
The woman, Justine Damond, from Sydney, Australia, and her fiancé lived in the 5000 block of Washburn.
Three sources with knowledge of the incident said Sunday that two officers in one squad car, responding to the 911 call, pulled into the alley. ***Damond, in her pajamas, went to the driver’s side door and was talking to the driver. The officer in the passenger seat pulled his gun and shot Damond through the driver’s side door, sources said. No weapon was found at the scene.***
“Two Minneapolis police officers responded to a 911 call of a possible assault just north of the 5100 block of Washburn Avenue S. just before 11:30 p.m. Saturday,” the state Bureau of Criminal Apprehension said in a news release. “At one point, an officer fired their weapon, fatally striking a woman.
http://www.startribune.com/woman-killed-in-officer-involved-shooting-in-south-minneapolis/434782213/#1I just read about this in WaPo, it is simply incredible. Since the woman was white, we’ll get a thorough investigation and probably punishment for the officers who killed her. I’m not being snarky, just stating the facts - and at least some justice might be done.