(Because it’s the only way I can bear it. Also, blue language within, though not gratuitous.)
LIVE: Are The Worldwide Threats In The Room With Us Right Now? A Tulsi Gabbard Hearing! by Rebecca Schoenkopf
And a John Ratcliffe hearing. And a Kash Patel hearing. Read on Substack
For once, Kash Patel might not even be the biggest shitshow in the room today when he and other Trump agency heads sit before the Senate Intelligence Committee for the annual Worldwide Threats hearing! You know, unless he thinks the greatest “worldwide threats” are somehow his enemies list. That would be sad and pathetic.
But yeah, that hearing is today, because the universe has a sense of humor. Tulsi Gabbard (DNI) and John Ratcliffe (CIA) were on that funny little text thread where JD Vance was like “Donald Trump is wrong about bombing Yemen, and Europe is stinky and I hate it!” (slight paraphrase) and Secretary Shitfaced was like [vomits extremely detailed bombing plans into text thread on Signal, which is not where classified war plans go] and Mike Waltz (National Security Advisor) was like “LMAO let me accidentally invite the editor of the Atlantic to read all this”!
Oh yeah, and John Ratcliffe reportedly blabbed an active intelligence officer’s name on that text chat. You know, because he’s good at his job and a serious man.
Will we even have time to hear Tulsi Gabbard share her EXPERTISE on what the greatest worldwide threats are, and why none of them are her buddies in Moscow? Will Kash Patel read from his children’s books and explain to us why the true greatest worldwide threat is “Hillary Queenton”?
Or are we just gonna talk about these dumbass clownfucking fools and their group chats all day? Let’s find out!
10:00: Yeah, though, it really is on the nose that this is the Worldwide Threats Hearing, starring Tulsi Gabbard. Ha ha! Good morning.
10:05: One thing you might not know about our current hell is that Tom Cotton is now the chair of the Senate Intelligence Committee. You know, in case you thought there might be a Republican in there who actually cares about national security, ha ha, you were wrong.
10:08: Tom Cotton leads off with Communist China being very bad. Hey, he should ask about that billionaire South African apartheid creep currently terrorizing the government, who ALSO happens to be all the way up China’s ass.
Tom Cotton just said Yemen, drink ‘em if you got ‘em! And if you don’t got ‘em, ask the secretary of Defense if he’s got an extra!
10:13: Cotton refers to the Trump intel team as “impressive,” hahahahahahahahahahahaha.
Now vice-chair Mark Warner is discussing how several on the panel today were part of the big group chat full of classified information and the name of at least one intelligence officer and all the war plans and whatever drinking games MAGA Republicans like to do to celebrate bombing Yemen on unsecured channels.
Mark Warner will now talk about some other times the Trump administration has fucked off when it comes to national security.
- Canceled all foreign assistance. He’s explaining how that relates for slow learners/traitor Republicans.
- Fired some of the best and brightest FBI agents, like the people who led the counterterrorism division and the heads of offices who work every day to keep America safe and who work to counteract threats on the homeland.
- Firing thousands of people at the CDC and NIH, who protect America from disease.
- Firing hundreds of intelligence officers, who you can’t just rehire or replace with some pig you found on the street.
- Hey remember that time when they disclosed hundreds of names of CIA officers, spies and other employees?
Every time they show the panel, they literally look like a bunch of dumbass children who just got caught being absolute fucking morons again.
Not right out of central casting, Donald Trump!
10:25: LOL, Tom Cotton is such a pissy little baby. Just told the whole room he’s going to encourage the US attorney (this dork, presumably) to THROW THE BOOK at anybody who disrupts the hearing. Okeydoke, Senator Dachschund McPomeranian from Dardanelle, Arkansas. You’re real tough.
Anyway, Tulsi Gabbard is giving her opening statement. Hasn’t said anything in Russian yet, is talking about cartels, sounds like she binged “Narcos” this weekend, very impressive, very prepared.
10:31: Gabbard is reading whatever was prepared for her, it’s very “This is my book report on being DNI.” (Remember how she didn’t really know what the DNI did when she was nominated.)
Gabbard says Russia is a “formidable competitor” and fawns over their nuclear weapons. Says Russia does some bad cyber things too. Bet she hates reading this part. You know how Trump hates it when you say hurtful things about, UH OH! RUSSIA PART OVER!
Moved on to Iran. Well, that was fast.
The NBC feed keeps showing senators looking bored.
10:39: Wow, if Gabbard is going to keep talking about dictators like Kim Jong-un and bad guys like Russia, she should probably say something about all the world leaders they have in their pockets, like her boss.
10:42: We guess the other morons won’t be giving opening statements, because Cotton has already started prancing around about all the immigrants that have been arrested in Arkansas.
Now Code Pink protesters doing their Code Pink protesting, which is always so effective. Prods Cotton to peacock around about “Communist China.” It’s all very productive.
Anyway, back to Kash Patel talking about the threat of Mexicans in Arkansas, which is what Tom Cotton wants to know about.
10:45: Kash Patel has personally arrested 10 million Mexicans in Arkansas, and now the crime in Arkansas is over!
10:46: Tom Cotton notes that China is a “techno-totalitarian police state,” which is hilarious because what is Elon Musk doing right now? Carole Cadwalladr’s Substack is a good place to read to get a better understanding of that.
Here comes Mark Warner. Let’s talk about the fucking text chat, y’all!
10:49: Why won’t Tulsi Gabbard talk about what happened in the group chat? Is it because it was CLASSIFIED? If it wasn’t CLASSIFIED can you show us all the texts?
And John Ratcliffe? What about you?
John Ratcliffe says they put Signal on his computer, and everybody uses it! They can totally use it, as long as they also record what they do there on normal channels! (They were literally sharing war plans, reportedly, or at least Hegseth was.)
It’s useful to remember that John Ratcliffe is holyshit stupid.
Gabbard just claimed that there was no classified information shared in the chat. Warner is like fuck off, you can’t have it both ways. If it wasn’t classified, share it all.
WARNER: If a rank-and-file intel officer did this shit, what would you do with them?
GABBARD: No classified! No classified! You are classified!
WARNER: Is Edward Snowden a traitor? You’re an idiot.
Lotta people bringing up this tweet right now:
10:55: Now Republican John Cornyn seems to be forcing Tulsi Gabbard to agree with him that Russia does horrible things all over the world, specifically he’s talking about in Europe. Also about how Russia views its unprovoked war against Ukraine.
10:56: John Cornyn wants to make sure Tulsi Gabbard and the others understand the consequences of European insecurity. He’s having Jeffrey Kruse — director of the Defense Intelligence Agency, a Biden appointee! — explain what happens if nuclear weapons proliferate throughout Europe. Also the arrangement called the Budapest Memorandum, where Ukraine gave up its weapons “for the protection of others.”
That’s how John Cornyn spent his time. Huh. Interesting.
Now Ron Wyden. He says Mike Waltz and Pete Hegseth need to fucking resign now.
WYDEN: Gabbard and Ratcliffe, how many classified group chats have you done?
GABBARD/RATCLIFFE: No classified! No classified! Ron Wyden is classified!
RATCLIFFE: I like using Signal!
11:01: WYDEN: Hey Gabbard, you think it was kinda fucked, that whole thing about how Pete Hegseth was gonna show Elon Musk all our secret China war plans?
GABBARD: Hegseth and Trump denied it! End of story, obviously!
11:03: James Lankford thanks these people for their “service,” on behalf of “Oklahoma.”
11:06: Kash Patel is a fucking dweeb.
“I’m the FBI director! I’m learning how to FBI real good!”
11:09: Martin Heinrich of New Mexico, asks Ratcliffe who precisely determined there was no classified info on that Signal group chat?
Ratcliffe either doesn’t understand or is pretending he doesn’t understand the question. (Remember, he is legitimately stupid.)
And continues to insist that Signal is OK and fine!
Heinrich asks for confirmation of whether this conversation included extremely specific military plans about weapons and timing and so forth. Jeffrey Goldberg says sure the fuck did. Ratcliffe and Gabbard are like DEF NOT! and “defer to Pentagon.” So that’s two different answers, respectively.
Heinrich now trolling Gabbard asking why the intelligence community doesn’t list the Canadian border as one of the prime drivers of fentanyl trafficking into the United States, considering how Trump is always lying and saying that’s why he has to tariff them.
Gabbard does not have the specifics on that answer. Heinrich does. It’s less than one percent of the fentanyl we interdict.
Time for a very dumb Republican senator, Ted Budd from North Carolina.
11:18: Now talking about Section 702 (FISA) Courts. Tulsi Gabbard says 702 is one of the most important tools we have. Kash Patel has a much weirder history with FISA beacuse, you know, he got MAGA famous by being Devin Nunes’s little lapdog on the House Intelligence Committee when they were trying to cover up Donald Trump’s Russia scandals.
11:21: Senator Angus King is confused as to how if Pete Hegseth put the whole battle plan in the group text, before it happened, how was that not classified?
GABBARD: No classified! Also again defer to Pete Hegseth!
KING: You’re the head of the intelligence community. You’re supposed to know about classifications, I think?
King asks why this year’s Worldwide Threats Assessment report doesn’t include global climate change. “Has it been solved?”
Gabbard says she is aware of “occurrences within the environment” and how they might affect operations. Tulsi Gabbard is not an Occurrences Within The Environment denier!
King wants to know directly who decided to leave climate change out of the report, when it’s been in the last 11.
11:25: King wants to know what kind of policy reason there would be to weaken CISA, which protects American elections and cyber infrastructure, which Trump is of course gutting. Tulsi Gabbard has no real answer.
Republican Senator Mike Rounds will not be talking about the group chat in the open session. (They will be going into closed session after this.)
Makes us wonder if a couple of these Republican senators are about to ream some asses as soon as the cameras are off.
11:29: LOL LMAO Mike Rounds just said something weird about how there are things Kash Patel did in his “previous life” that are so heroic, but we can’t talk about them. Was he Kash Patel, Super Spy? Does he have superhuman athletic spying abilities?
Don’t tell us it’s classified, ain’t none of these fuckwits give a shit about that.
11:31: Michael Bennet from Colorado always seems like a puppy dog, but then in some of these hearings he starts kicking people in the dick. Let’s see!
BENNET: Does CIA have rules for handling classified intel?
RATCLIFFE: Yes.
BENNET: Secretary Shitfaced’s response to this was to attack Jeffrey Goldberg. Are you also mad at Jeff Goldberg? Do you think he is a hoaxer? Deceitful?
RATCLIFFE: I don’t know him!
BENNET: You are the director of the CIA. Did he do a hoax to get on your group chat? Answer the question, dippy.
RATCLIFFE: I don’t know how he got there!
BENNET: Would it be cool to have a deceitful hoax reporter on a Signal group chat? Why would you add somebody like that? YOU’RE THE CIA DIRECTOR. How did you not notice who was on it?
RATCLIFFE: Maybe you don’t use Signal and don’t understand it.
BENNET: I do! Not for classified shit, obviously.
RATCLIFFE: Me neithers!
BENNET: Kind of fucking weird that Jeff Goldberg was reading your war plans before they happened in the parking lot of a grocery store. What kind of fucking CIA are you running?
RATCLIFFE: I don’t like the way you’re talking about my stupid actions!
BENNET: Hey bitch, did you know that Trump’s Kremlin/Middle East adviser boy was literally in Moscow while you were doing this group chat that he was part of? You’re an embarrassment, you need to DO BETTER.
SO THAT WAS FUN.
11:42: Todd Young very concerned about North Korea stealing his cryptos! They can’t talk about it right here, though!
Young also referred to Gabbard and Ratcliffe and Patel as “a bunch of spies.” LOL yeah buddy, definitely our best and brightest “spies.”
Mark Kelly now.
11:43: KELLY: Did your group chat mention targets?
GABBARD: I don’t think we talked about targets?
KELLY: What about general targets?
GABBARD: I think we talked about targets.
KELLY: What about weapons?
GABBARD: I don’t remember anybody saying any specific weapon names!
KELLY: What about timing?
GABBARD: No specific timing!
KELLY: John Ratcliffe, Tulsi Gabbard, any mention of specific military units?
GABBARD, RATCLIFFE: No unit! No unit! You are the specific military unit!
KELLY: Gabbard, does the IC have a policy against discussing Controlled Unclassified Information?
GABBARD: Yes.
KELLY: Was everything you talked about on Signal something you would approve for public release.
GABBARD: HgeeeeeeghncnchnchffGH!
KELLY: What about you, Mr. CIA super-spy?
RATCLIFFE: HgeeeeeghncnchnchffGH!
KELLY: Is it probably classified to discuss your literal actual war plans for strikes you’re going to do?
GABBARD: Maybe, maybe not!
RATCLIFFE: Yes.
TOM COTTON: Aw piss! John Ratcliffe just confessed on accident! Yain’t supposed to confess on accident! Tom Cotton gonna try to clean it up now by saying the secretary of Defense IS THE ONLY ONE ALLOWED TO SAY what’s classified with military strikes! Aw piss! Fiddlesticks! Pissfiddle!
(Dramatic interpretation of what just happened. Tom Cotton did not admit out loud that he felt the need to interject because John Ratcliffe had just accidentally told the truth.)
Mark Warner interjects to say it’s kind of fucking weird and stunning that none of these dipshits can even admit there was a fuckup.
11:55: Republican Jerry Moran wants to know what kinds of threats to America would arise if Russia got everything it wanted out of a Ukraine/Russia “peace agreement.”
Even Ratcliffe is saying out loud that people have been underestimating Ukraine for years now, would “fight with their bare hands” if they had to.
It remains very strange how, with a possible remainder of Tulsi Gabbard, nobody seems to share the devotion to Russia that Trump has.
11:58: Ratcliffe and Gabbard are trying to change their testimony midstream here, from earlier swearing that there was NO CLASSIFIED INFORMATION on that group chat, to now insisting that nothing was unclassified on their end, while insisting that original declassification authority for military matters rests with Hegseth. In other words, DRUNKY’S FAULT!
So Jack Reed would like to know if Pete Hegseth declassified all the classified information he talked about in that group chat.
REED: Tulsi Gabbard, were you overseas during your bullshit group chat?
GABBARD: Yes.
REED: Did you do this on your private phone or public phone?
GABBARD: I cannot say that out loud! I won’t! I shan’t!
12:02: REED: If you are just pretty sure nothing you did on the group chat was classified, would it be cool for Jeff Goldberg to release all the transcripts?
RATCLIFFE: I think he released all the things about me!
REED: Nope. Not what the article says.
RATCLIFFE: All the me parts are fine, definitely!
REED: So he can release it?
PATEL: I can’t prejudge that! Ask Pam Bondi!
Now we have Jon Ossoff.
12:04: OSSOFF: On your sexxxy group chat, JD Vance talked about how he disagreed with Donald Trump on the Yemen strike.
RATCLIFFE: I don’t recall!
OSSOFF: [reads it]
RATCLIFFE: I don’t recall!
OSSOFF: You don’t recall anything about the group chat you were on, which all the news is about? You don’t recall all the things that were said? You don’t recall how Pete Hegseth also disagreed with Trump? How Hegseth shared all these battle plans? Etc.?
RATCLIFFE: I’m a real dummy!
OSSOFF: Don’t you think foreign intel services would be interested in literally everything about this group chat?
RATCLIFFE: I reckon!
It’s funny, Ratcliffe keeps saying “I don’t know that,” and Ossoff keeps replying, “You do know that.”
OSSOFF: This was a HUGE mistake, yes?
RATCLIFFE: No!
OSSOFF: Jesus Christ, the fuck it wasn’t. This was hugely embarrassing, it was an absolute fuckup, we are going to get the full text of this group chat, and we’ll measure your testimony against that.
Mark Warner is going to end this up by continuing to call these people dumb fucking pieces of shit.
Warner ends by saying that these idiots’ inability to admit what a “colossal screwup” this was “speaks volumes.”
Susan Collins was not in attendance because she is under the weather, but she is concerned.
(snip)
What a shitshow.
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