Author: clearandpresentdanger

His attorneys have approached around 30 surety companies through four separate brokers, NOT ONE OF THEM WILL TOUCH HIM.

Donald Trump cannot obtain a bond to secure the $454 million civil business fraud judgment against him as he pursues an appeal of the case, his attorneys said in a New York court filing Monday.

Attorneys for Trump and his co-defendants in the fraud case argued that it was “impossible” for them to secure a complete appeal bond, which would “effectively” require “cash reserves approaching $1 billion.”

″Defendants’ ongoing diligent efforts have proven that a bond in the judgment’s full amount is ‘a practical impossibility,’” the lawyers wrote, quoting an affidavit in the filing with the Appellate Division of Manhattan Supreme Court.

They said they have approached roughly 30 surety companies through four separate brokers, and that they have spent “countless hours negotiating with one of the largest insurance companies in the world.”

The lawyers said that if the appellate division considers denying the requested stay of the judgment, it should schedule oral arguments on the issue. And if the division declines to grant the stay, the lawyers asked that it allow them to file an appeal with the Court of Appeals, the highest state court in New York.

Manhattan Supreme Court Judge Arthur Engoron in February ordered Trump and his co-defendants to pay a total $464 million in damages and interest for violating a New York anti-fraud statute. Of that total, Trump was ordered to pay $454 million. Trump’s post-judgment interest continues to accrue at a rate of nearly $112,000 a day.

The case brought by New York Attorney General Letitia James accused Trump, his two adult sons, his company and its top executives of falsely inflating Trump’s asset values for years to boost his net worth and get financial perks.

The nearly 5,000-page filing includes an affidavit echoing that view from Gary Giulietti, president of the Northeast division of the Lockton Companies, which he describes as the largest privately held insurance brokerage firm in the world.

Giulietti, who was hired to help the defendants obtain a bond, wrote, “Despite scouring the market, we have been unsuccessful in our effort … for the simple reason that obtaining an appeal bond for $464 million is a practical impossibility under the circumstances presented.”

Only a handful of bond surety companies are approved by the U.S. Treasury Department to do underwrite a bond that large, and many of those will only issue a single bond up to $100 million, Giuletti wrote.

He added that none of those entities will take illiquid assets, such as real estate, as collateral.

“Simply put, a bond of this size is rarely, if ever, seen,” Giulietti wrote. “In the unusual circumstance that a bond of this size is issued, it is provided to the largest public companies in the world, not to individuals or privately held businesses.”

It would be unattainable for any private company, unless they have around $1 billion in cash or cash equivalents to put up as collateral while still being able to satisfy their other business obligations, Giulietti added.

“While it is my understanding that the Trump Organization is in a strong liquidity position, it does not have $1 billion in cash or cash equivalents,” he wrote.

Trump’s attorneys also noted in the filing that bond issuers will often demand collateral totaling 120% of the judgment, which equates to over $557 million.

Those issuers are also likely to demand a two-year advance on a 2% annual bond premium, which would require the defendants to pay over $18 million up front, the defense attorneys said.

The defendants had previously offered to post a $100 million bond, less than one-fourth the total judgment, in order to pause James from collecting the penalties during the appeal process.

Appeals court Judge Anil Singh rejected that proposal, but allowed the defendants to continue doing business in New York and lifted Engoron’s three-year ban on Trump seeking loans in New York. Singh’s order is temporarily in effect before a full appeals court panel hears the motion for a stay.

Trump’s attorney Alina Habba did not immediately respond to CNBC’s request for comment on the filing.

Trump earlier this month obtained a $91.6 million bond from the Chubb insurance company to secure a civil defamation judgment against him in favor of the writer E. Jean Carroll while he appeals that judgment.

I never cared about pieties around personal behavior and we have known forever that evangelicals are mostly gigantic hypocrites when it comes to personal behavior. Like many of us, I wondered how these people could stomach Donald Trump, since at least I kind of sort of took them at face value that they believed in this stuff. I saw a presentation by the Pew religious pollster in 2018 and he explained that they saw Trump as an Old Testament king whose personal behavior might be bad but he was leading them to the promised land.

Well, maybe, but it sure now seems that for a lot of evangelicals, just admitting that you like to swear and grab your date’s dick in public and joke about your out-of-marriage sex in front of ministers is the real impact of Trump.

The “Conservative Dad’s Real Women of America” 2024 pinup calendar features old-school images of sexiness — bikinis, a red sports car, a bubble bath.

The models are influencers and aspiring politicians familiar to the very online pro-Trump right. In one image, a BlazeTV host in a short skirt lights a copy of The New York Times on fire with a cigar. Another model, the former N.R.A. spokeswoman Dana Loesch, hoists two rifles.

Published by a “woke-free beer” company hastily launched last year as an alternative to Bud Light, the calendar was clearly meant to provoke liberals. But when photos of it began circulating online in December, progressives did not pay much attention. Instead, it sparked a heated squabble on the right over whether “conservative dads” who happen to be Christians should reject the calendar on moral grounds, or embrace it as an irreverent win for the good guys.

Allie Beth Stuckey, an evangelical commentator and podcaster, condemned the calendar as “soft porn” marketed to married men, and saw it as proof of growing polarization between Christian and secular conservatism. Other prominent Christian conservatives joined her in expressing their disgust.

The shift is perhaps most visible in politics. Representative Lauren Boebert, who has called for an end to the separation of church and state, was caught on a theater security camera in September vaping and groping her date. (She later blamed her “public and difficult divorce” for her behavior, and said the behavior “fell short of my values.”) Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene, who has embraced the label of “Christian nationalist,” drops vulgarities in hearings, on the House floor and in conversations with reporters.

Last summer, Nancy Mace, a Republican representative from South Carolina, joked about premarital sex and cohabitation, once obvious taboos, from the lectern at a Christian prayer breakfast in Washington. Praising the event’s host, Senator Tim Scott, she opened her talk by saying she had made a special effort to arrive early.

“When I woke up this morning at 7, I was getting picked up at 7:45, Patrick, my fiancé, tried to pull me by my waist over this morning in bed,” she told the audience, which included her pastor and Mr. Scott, an outspoken evangelical. “And I was like, ‘No, baby, we don’t got time for that this morning.’”

She added: “He can wait, I’ll see him later tonight.”

Ms. Mace later brushed off backlash to the remarks, writing on X that “I go to church because I’m a sinner not a saint!”

Sure Nancy.

I don’t entirely know what to make of all of this, in the sense that I kind of appreciate them losing the hypocrisy and that talking about sex more publicly maybe could limit the crazy and horrifying sex scandals that constantly come out of right-wing figures. But nah, it’s just that evangelicals are having fun with fascism and the vulgarity of Trump and since that is so much more than any religious belief they have, they are just going to embrace it too. God wants us to fuck so long we are killing libs!

In a rally yesterday, Trump declared if he lost the election, “there will be a bloodbath.”  Earlier he had rambled on with some nonsense about imported automobiles, so, the MAGAts (rhymes with “maggots”) said, well, he’s not talking about spilling blood, he’s talking about prices dropping or rising and causing a financial bloodbath.

BULLSHIT.

If they want us to consider the full context, let’s do just that because the full context is that Trump kicked off the same exact rally by saluting the people who were convicted for the deadly assault on the US Capitol on January 6th, all to the tune of the national anthem sung by a choir of imprisoned insurrectionists.

The full context is that some of the first words out of Trump’s mouth last night, same rally were thanking those rioters and calling them patriots.

The full context is that he also said in this same rally, quote, if this election isn’t won, I’m not sure that you’ll ever have another election in this country.

The full context is that he went on to say some undocumented immigrants are quote, “not people”.

And of course, the full context is that this is much bigger than one single speech.

This embrace of political violence, this dehumanizing language. This is what Donald Trump has been preaching for years.

In January, he warned that there will be quote “bedlam in this country” if his criminal prosecution derailed his campaign.

He echoed the dehumanizing language of Adolf Hitler comparing his political opponents to vermin and saying immigrants are quote poisoning the blood of our country last month.

He said there would be death and destruction if he was charged in the Manhattan criminal probe.

And during his first term, he flat out refused to condemn the political violence at a white nationalist rally in Charlottesville, Virginia saying there were very fine people on both sides.

In 2020, he asked his defense secretary about shooting people who were protesting the death of George Floyd saying, can you just shoot them, just shoot them in the legs or something?

And of course, his very words inspired violence on January 6th 2021 when he told a crowd of his supporters to walk down to the Capitol and fight like hell because quote, you’ll never take back our country with weakness.

Trust me, I could go on and on and on.

And — speaking of a bloodbath — if you are a MAGAt and are polishing up your guns ready for a bloodbath when Trump loses in November, you need to know there are a lot of us armed liberals around and we WILL shoot back.  We may even shoot first.

Donald Trump, who was impeached for inciting his supporters to storm the U.S. Capitol in an effort to overturn his 2020 electoral loss, warned his supporters on Saturday that there will be a “bloodbath” if he doesn’t win the election this November.  (NOTE:  Trump does not realize there are a LOT of us armed liberals who will be happy to help him with his bloodbath.)

In his first campaign appearance since officially becoming the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, the former president headlined a rally in Ohio to whip up support for Bernie Moreno ahead of Tuesday’s GOP Senate primary. Moreno, a hardliner endorsed by Trump, is locked in a three-way primary race with state Sen. Matt Dolan and Secretary of State Frank LaRose.

However, Trump was far more interested in airing his grievances about the dozens of criminal indictments he’s currently facing and the decisive election he lost to President Joe Biden than he was in actually campaigning for Moreno. Furthermore, he painted an extremely dark and dystopic vision for the nation if he were to once again lose to Biden this fall.

Complaining about automobile manufacturing plants in Mexico and China, Trump said that if he gets back into the White House he will impose massive tariffs on any Chinese-built vehicles imported into the United States.

Read more: https://www.thedailybeast.com/trump-declares-it-will-be-a-bloodbath-for-america-if-hes-not-elected?ref=home?ref=home

“My name is Laura Haynor, and I’m a Minnesota resident and a Minneapolis-based pilot for Delta Airlines”

GOP State Senator Gene Dornink: “Can you tell me what a typical work week looks like for you as a stewardess?” 🤦‍♂️

pic.twitter.com/oXGlSbuhwL

— Republicans against Trump (@RpsAgainstTrump) March 15, 2024

In case you missed it . . .  THE RIDICULOUS ATTEMPT TO IMPEACH PRESIDENT BIDEN IS OVER. DEAD. STICK A FORK IN IT. As are the attempts to impeach DHS Secretary and to put Hunter Biden in jail.

The Republican effort to impeach President Biden has collapsed. That is good news for Joe Biden, Democrats, and the American people. Here’s what happened:

• The witnesses touted by the House Oversight Committee turned out to be non-existent, liars, or favorable for Joe Biden.
• The Committee’s “smoking gun” witness was Alexander Smirnov, who turned out to be a Russian tool who was lying to the FBI about Hunter Biden’s alleged corruption.
• Hunter Biden demolished the House Oversight Committee in his deposition.
• In desperation, the Committee turned to a securities fraudster currently serving a 14-year prison sentence for swindling the Oglala Sioux Native American tribal entity out of $60 million.

With a two-vote majority in the House, Republicans have been openly musing to members of the press about their inability to pass an impeachment resolution.

On Friday, a lawyer for the White House sent a letter to Speaker Mike Johnson telling him that the impeachment inquiry is over. See https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/mar/15/biden-impeachment-mike-johnson-white-house-letter

Former President Donald Trump has said he will be a dictator on “day one.” He and his advisors and associates have publicly discussed hundreds of actions to be taken during a second Trump presidency that directly threaten democracy. These vary from Trump breaking the law and abusing power in areas like immigration roundups and energy extraction; to summarily and baselessly firing tens of thousands of civil servants whom he perceives as adversaries; to prosecuting his political opponents for personal gain and even hinting at executing some of them. We track all of these promises, plans, and pronouncements here and we will continue to update them in real time.

We assess there is a significant risk of autocracy should Trump regain the presidency. Trump has said he would deploy the military against civilian protestors and his advisors have developed plans for using the Insurrection Act, said he would invoke the Alien Enemies Act to conduct deportations of non-citizens, continued to threaten legally-established abortion rights, and even had his lawyers argue that a president should be immune from prosecution if he directed SEAL Team Six to assassinate his political enemies. Trump also seeks the power to protect his personal wealth as he faces staggering civil fines, and to bolster his immunity as he faces 91 criminal charges in prosecutions in different parts of the country.

While Trump has claimed he will be a dictator for only the first day of his administration, his promise to do so–even for 24 hours–is antithetical to American democracy. History teaches us that dictatorial powers, once assumed, are rarely relinquished. Moreover, Trump cannot possibly achieve his stated goals for the use of that power (in immigration and energy policy) in one day, meaning that his “dictatorship” would of necessity likely last much longer.

Trump’s former advisors—those with the most experience watching him govern behind the scenes—believe he is a danger to the country. John Bolton, Trump’s former National Security Advisor, said, “I think Trump will cause significant damage in a second term, damage that in some cases will be irreparable.” Alyssa Farah Griffin, former Trump White House Director of Strategic Communications, noted, “Fundamentally, a second Trump term could mean the end of American democracy as we know it, and I don’t say that lightly.”

Trump’s dictatorial aspirations are complemented by an extensive pre-election plan to fundamentally alter the nature of American government: the Heritage Foundation’s 2025 Presidential Transition Project (Project 2025). Created by Trump allies and staffed by those including his past and likely future administration appointees, it is in the words of Heritage Foundation president Kevin Roberts, a plan for “institutionalizing Trumpism.” Trump has returned the compliment, saying of Roberts (and Heritage) that he’s “doing an unbelievable job, he’s bringing it back to levels we’ve never seen … thank you Kevin.”

 

READ THE REST OF THIS ARTICLE . . . IT IS LONG, IT IS IMPORTANT.

Which photo is the real Howler Monkey???