(TRUE STORY) In the weeks before the 2020 election, ex-Overstock CEO Patrick Byrne was desperately trying to get to me through an intermediary to share info about the coming election he claimed was critical.

I ignored his overtures.

Donald Trump invited him to the Oval Office.

(THREAD) Independent journalists have already created a comprehensive list of impeachment trial witnesses who can *confirm* Team Trump helped plan the insurrection. Those witnesses can now be called. This thread lists the proof. Please RETWEET this widely.

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(THREAD) Pre-election Russia collusion may take down Trump. It's equally possible the Trumps' pre- and post-election collusion with Saudi Arabia, the UAE, and Israel will do it—a course of collusion also connected to the Kremlin. I explain here. I hope you'll read on and retweet.

1/ I must stress how unbelievably complex the "Grand Bargain" theory of the Trump-Russia case is—a different thing from saying it's not substantiated. It's substantiated in *almost every single particular*—it just *also* happens to be very confusing. Not byzantine—just confusing.

2/ The basics: Saudi Arabia, Israel, and the UAE all view Iran as their chief regional enemy. Iran is propped up by Russia. Therefore the Saudis, Israelis, and Emiratis all need a US government willing to find a way to get the Kremlin to *stop* supporting Iran in the Middle East.

3/ The best way to get Russia to stop supporting Iran—or reduce support—was/is to drop all sanctions on Russia over its 2014 annexation of Crimea, as that'd be worth *trillions* to the Kremlin over the next decade. Everyone knew that Clinton wouldn't do this—and that Trump would.

4/ Per the NYT, on August 3, 2016, Donald Trump Jr. met secretly at Trump Tower with a Saudi and Emirati emissary, George Nader, as well as an Israeli intelligence expert, Joel Zamel, with *significant* ties to both Israeli intelligence *and* Russian oligarchs allied with Putin.

Hey, fun fact, threatening an elections official with criminal prosecution unless he rigs an election in your favor is not just impeachable but a federal crime

1/ Many federal criminal statutes could come into play here, but here's one: 52 U.S.C § 20511 punishes by up to 5 years in prison "attempting to deprive or defraud the residents of a State of a fair and impartially conducted election process by the procurement or tabulation...

2/ "...of ballots that are known by the person to be materially false, fictitious, or fraudulent under the laws of the State in which the election is held." When the chief elections official of the State of Georgia tells you the votes you want him to "find" would be fictitious...

3/ ...and you persist in not just urging him but threatening him to "find" those "votes" and give them to you, federal law does not allow you to be *willfully ignorant* of the fact that you are urging fictitious votes to be added to the State of Georgia's legally certified tally.

4/ But it's even worse than this for Trump, as he explicitly tells the chief elections official for Georgia that he only "needs" enough votes to win—which is an acknowledgment that he doesn't have a specific actionable complaint but is merely trying to *rig* the election outcome.

MSNBC medical experts are underscoring that the course of treatment Trump is on is one you would *not* apply to someone who's doing well—but to someone who is struggling. Indeed, the experts say, it would be a *dangerous* treatment to give to a COVID-19 patient who is doing well.

NOTE/ The specific cause for concern here is the steroids; they're given to "severe and critical" hospitalized patients, and could harm patients who are not having breathing or immune-response issues. Keep in mind Trump's doctors claim they're discussing discharging him tomorrow.

NOTE2/ Tomorrow Trump's doctors will come up with a reason why he can't be discharged. Or they'll recall what was always the case—Trump can get basically the same treatment at the White House. I maintain the most likely scenario is that he demanded Walter Reed, then regretted it.

NOTE3/ Another possibility: Trump's White House doctors are basically jokes who just do whatever he tells them, and he wanted the real doctors at Walter Reed. Now that *real* doctors have set the course of treatment, Trump can go to the White House unless/until it becomes acute.

Some quick thoughts on Sam Gyimah's resignation after conversations with various Conservative MPs: 1) the chances of a second referendum are a lot higher than I thought:

2) At this point, if you are a young and ambitious Tory MP it is now so overwhelmingly in your interest to vote against the withdrawal agreement. V v hard to see how Julian Smith can cap rebellion at under 100:

3) Really just to reiterate 1) Gyimah is the kind of "No, never gonna rebel" vaguely pro-EU Tory you'd need to get on side to outweigh Labour Leavers and Real Concerners.

1. "They're leaving! They're leaving!"" yell seditionist as they watch House members fleeing the floor through the glass doors the only thing (+ some under-armed officers + office furniture" that protected our elected REPs (same ballot as Trump, each & everyone

@McConnellPress

2. of them felt so inclined towards martyrdom and/or possessed the weapons (Jesus, what if they'd has a grenade & guess what, in America, yes, you can come up w functional equivalents of that bc barring people from them is a betrayal of freedom so great we must simply acquiesce

3. their eventual death tolls. One functional "freedom grenade" down that hallway, tossed w ease through a hole in the glass door, could have easily hit anyone fleeing.Unless it was Mo Brooks, MTG, or one of their well-known crazy boosters, here's a thing @LeaderMcConnell ought

4. to reflect upon as he makes his CRITCAL pivot decision, which he could rally 17 people & start a fight for control of the party that rest of the country will help him with,EVEN AFTER ALL THE SHIT HE'S DONE TO PEOPLE, YES, THE REST OF THE COUNTRY WOULD HELP HIM IF HE WAS TO

5. RALLY 17 SENATORS FOR IMPEACHMENT, he'd find his whole 🌎awakened. And Mitch, as far as I understand it, you could do it anonymously!! How much would THAT fuck w them?? How great would it be, for the 1st time in 5 yrs, to be the one w power- you LOVE power! Think of the FUN!

This letter is... something. But, it illustrates two points. First, most Americans don't realize that the majority of of the GOP base thinks this is a religious war for the soul of the nation. They're willing to abandon democracy FTW. 1/n


The other illuminating part is where they insist Trump is a Christian. I agree with @C_Stroop the "real" vs. "fake" Christian debate is unhelpful. However, if someone thinks religion is "b******t", they're not Christian regardless of how you define it 2/n

It always amazes me how strong the cult of personality is. They're completely willing to rearrange their beliefs to support Trump (grab 'em by the pussy). They're willing to ignore the evidence he regards them as rubes, suckers, and morons. 3/n

Of all the awful things he's done, bilking his followers with fake raffles somehow stuck with me as just about the sleaziest. He's already rich. Even Rand Paul, Hannity, Carlson, Cruz, Cotton, and Hawley don't stoop this low. 4/n

On February 26th last year, I predicted that the US would handle the pandemic poorly for a lot of reasons: poor scientific literacy, bad employers, poor laws against endangering employees, lack of hospital beds, lack of preparedness. But, I whiffed badly on one thing... 5/n