Knowing Putin...

Here's how I put it, over at WarrenKinsella.com:

Too funny. Prigozhin has been royally played by Lukashenko. Prigozhin needed to move as quickly as possible on Moscow, to win, or at least survive personally. The only thing now in Prigozhin’s future is either the end of a noose, or a firing squad. Boy, has he ever been clearly outmanoeuvred by Putin.

However, offing Prigozhin is a big mistake in the medium term: why did state TV go live? Because they know perfectly well that at least a plurality of the people are with Prigozhin. So, in the end, Putin may end up cutting his own throat if he kills Prigozhin.

The Phoney Baloney Fake As Shit Feminist.

Well, hopefully speaking for most Canadians: why don't you go royally and thoroughly fuck yourself!?

A grateful nation will thank you for it.

SNC Lavalin: And Now Watch Them Shit Their Pants.

This isn't some kind of a triviality we're talking about: this is about quite deliberate obstruction of justice by government officials, likely both elected and not elected.

They must be about to shit their pants. The RCMP is definitely gunning for someone. I wonder if any of them will get to spend some time in the big house? Couldn't happen to a more ethical bunch.

Frankly, I'm sure the Mounties already have them dead to rights.

So...watch the news and thoroughly enough the exquisite payback. JWR and JP, not to mention CCC, did not leave for nothing.

Obstruction of justice. In deeds but not in words. Stupid is as stupid does. That's too bad.

O'Toole Is Leaving Politics.

O'Toole is about to resign his Commons seat to take a job in the private sector. I wish him well and thank him for serving his fellow Canadians to the best of his abilities.

Full disclosure: I was among those who felt that he needed to be replaced as leader, and therefore I pushed on this blog and elsewhere for his removal. I won't go into all of that again here. Most of the CPC caucus ended up agreeing with us.

In his exit QP interview airing today, O'Toole makes his case on how he sees the political world and how he thinks the leader and caucus have to perform to win. He also points out that there are plenty of MPs in caucus who hold the exact opposite view, which he thinks is wrong.

My views on this are already well-known, and I'm not about to change them. It's all about the right path to follow to win a majority government on our first shot at power. I think Pierre is smart enough to figure this out himself. He will examine the valid arguments on both sides and hopefully come down somewhere on the centre-right. His personal journey to being pro-choice is an example of that. Pierre actually cares what Canadians think and that's why he genuinely listens, unlike that phoney across the aisle, that most Canadians have finally had enough of. 

One good thing about Pierre: what you see, is what you get. Being your authentic self is crucial in cementing a trusting relationship with at least a plurality of voters.

So, hopefully, for O'Toole, it's on to bigger and better things. May he find both personal and occupational contentment in his new, challenging and exciting role.

Trump: Florida Indictments.

In short, watch for this. I'm expecting it, as much as I hope they can't pull it off:

Ty Cobb said he [Trump] is already dead. More than likely, he is in a courtroom...but for his lawyers and jury consultants who will try to sausage, pretzel or at the very least massage the grand jury selection process. Interesting.

Remember, they don't need acquittals. All they need is the Mother of All Jury Deadlocks in the Florida Southern District. Like I said, interesting.

I doubt they can pull it off thirty-seven times, but hey, they'll likely try like hell on the most serious counts, at minimum.

Trump And Classified Documents.

Donald Trump likes to live in fantasy land: you know, where he any time or on any day can declassify what up until then has been deemed classified documents. Of course, Trump is full of shit. First off, only a sitting president can declassify documents unless, by executive order, he or she enumerates a list of people who can also declassify documents on the president's behalf. That's what Obama did with Biden when he was VEEP, so Biden did declassify documents while Vice President.

Once a president is out of office, that power ends upon expiry of the presidential term. So, No, you can't declassify documents while at Mar-a-Lago, nor can anyone for that matter declassify documents just by "thinking about it". That last beauty even applies to a sitting president. Various laws have to be followed.

And then there's this: why does the president declassify? Quite simply, documents are declassified so at least part of them if not all can be released into the public domain. That's not what Trump did at Mar-a-Lago. He shoved those boxes in a closet only for his own personal access as an ex-president. That doesn't cut the mustard. Period.

The Presidential Records Act (PRA) is the statute that governs classified documents. All classified documents, by their very nature, are national security documents. At the end of a term, a former president must transfer all of them to the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) in a timely manner. None can be omitted, nor can any be held back at the whim of a former president. If any are, that could potentially amount to obstruction of justice. So Trump is on thin ice, to put it mildly.

So...to quote Trump, I guess we'll see what happens.

DeSantis: Twitter Bitter.

Too funny. DeSantis, otherwise aptly known as DeSanctimonious, can't even launch his presidential campaign correctly. Even Trump managed to do that. Sure, he raised eight million but lost a lot of support precisely because of this launch fiasco. So, in short, Trump must be smiling broadly. A lot of people who watched DeSantis have now apparently moved to Trump, the second most unpopular politician in America. Guess who the first one is? Here's a hint, he's already running for re-election. Dope.

Just wait until the United States defaults on its debt, because it's coming. All of these bozos from both parties couldn't successfully manage a three-ring circus. Way beyond ridiculous.

It's not just independents that are crying out for bold, innovative leadership. That certainly ain't Biden nor Trump, and it's not DeSantis either.

And then there's the total joke of running a third-party candidate, who can't ever win and will only siphon off precious votes from one side to the other and ensure that the other guy gets in. Think Ross Perot.

God help the United States of America. What kind of a crappy president-elect is coming?