Happy New Year 2020

It's that time of the year*, and I have no choice but to wish you a happy next year, considering what's going to happen in 2019:

January 2019
During their first week in charge, House Democrats issue a combined 3,320 subpoenas (over 500 each for Adam Schiff, Elijah Cummings, Jerrold Nadler, Maxine Waters, and Richard Neal) for past and present members of the Trump administration. Meanwhile, Robert Mueller starts investigating GOP lawmakers blackmailed with kompromat by Putin and Trump. Lindsey Graham, Devin Nunes, and other powerful figures abruptly flee for Brazil, where Jair Bolsonaro grants them political asylum.

February 2019
Facing prison charges, Benjamin Netanyahu takes the first plane for Brasilia.

March 2019
No blessing from lawmakers, no referendum, no deal, but no no Brexit either: the UK crashes out of the Union with the only consolation that Theresa May will no longer be in 10 Downing Street (the building being sold to pay part of the EUR 55 bn fine, the PM moves in 221B Baker Street). Boris Johnson parades at the 2019 Rio Carnival on the Monstrosity float:

April 2019
The day Akihito abdicates, Nippon Kaigi and Shinzo Abe have Naruhito, Akishino, and Hisahito murdered to install on the throne an obscure member of the Imperial Family compliant with their lifetime dream to restore fascism. At Japan's top military academy, the new Emperor welcomes his first Head of State with a vibrant homage: 'we do have a lot to learn from people like Jair Bolsonaro'.

May 2019
Vladimir Putin wins the European Elections in every single member state, the Gilets Jaunes Party claiming 41% of the ballot in France, and Marine Le Pen's movement 33%.

June 2019
In North Korea, Mount Paektu explodes, allowing KIM Jong-un to get six more unnoticed nuclear tests before going on a trek along the Amazon river, joined by Bashar al Assad the time for chemical weapons to dissipate across Kurdistan.

July 2019
Metoo: France wins the Women's FIFA World Cup at home just days after five players of the male team get jailed for domestic abuse.

August 2019
Coldest month of August on record: global warming takes a short pause thanks to Korea's nuclear winter.

September 2019
The day Mike Pence is forced to quit by Mueller Probe revelations, Donald Trump is impeached. Nancy Pelosi is sworn in, with Vice President Beto O'Rourke by her side. Jeff Flake declares his candidacy for 2020, then withdraws after being spotted in the same elevator as Brett Kavanaugh.

October 2019
At long last, Vladimir Putin wins the Nobel Peace Prize for restoring eternal peace in Syria.

November 2019
Only the third asset collapse of the year for China, but XI Jinping still believes he can, like the US, pull a fifth one by the end of the year.

December 2019
Carlos Ghosn is re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-arrested. Japan gives up all hope of getting a confession from him, and extradite the Brazilian back home, where Jair The First puts him in charge of the merger of Brazil with Hungary.


blogules 2019
Since 2003, nonsensical posts about noncritical issues in nonenglish (get your blogules transfusion in French)
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* see "Happy New Year 2010" (Jan 2009), "Happy New Year 2011" (Dec 2009), "Happy New Year 2012" (Dec 2010), "Happy New Year 2013" (Dec 2011), "Happy New Year 2014" (Dec 2012), "Happy New Year 2015" (Dec 2013), "Happy New Year 2016" (Dec 2014), "Happy New Year 2017" (Dec 2015), "Happy New Year 2018" (Dec 2016), "Happy New Year 2019" (Dec 2017), "Happy New Year 2020" (Jan 2019)... and in French: "Bonne Année 2009" (Jan 2008), "Bonne Année 2010" (Dec 2008), "Bonne Année 2011" (Dec 2009), "Bonne Année 2012" (Dec 2010), "Bonne Année 2013" (Dec 2011), "Bonne Année 2014" (Dec 2012), "Bonne Année 2015" (Dec 2013), "Bonne Année 2016" (Dec 2014), "Bonne année 2017" (Dec 2015), "Bonne année 2018" (Dec 2016), "Bonne année 2019" (Dec 2017), "Bonne année 2020" (Jan 2019).

Trump meets his maker, off the record

Unlike last month's Trump-Kim summit in Singapore, the upcoming Trump-Putin meeting in Helsinki has been carefully prepared by the leader of America, who these days happens to be... not American:

Donimir Prump or Vladinald Trutin?

Before meeting his maker on July 16, Donald Trump will attend a NATO Summit starting July 11, and meet Queen Elisabeth II on July 13. And what just happened over the past few days?
- the POTUS undermining Putin's nemeses NSA, NATO and the EU, cornerstones of the Western alliance against Russia
- the POTUS defending Russia's annexation of Crimea as legitimate
- new cases of Novachok contamination in the UK, this time without the spy-vs-spy storyline, a convenient 'false no-flag' perfectly timed to torpedo the warnings Brits are bound to give DJT days before Helsinki
- the POTUS insisting on meeting Putin without US witnesses, raising many eyebrows (judging by how XI Jinping and KIM Jong-un played him last month*, how could he win his one-on-one with a supertrained KGB official?)

Now there is absolutely no doubt left about whom Trump is working for, and that's not the American people. We can also confirm that he's very much aware of the fact that he is helping Putin, even if it goes against the interests of his own country. What I'm not sure at this stage is whether he is doing it willingly and not just consciously, but I'm convinced that anyway, Vlad has dirt or kompromat on him (there's already so much of both all over the media).

This is not just about Trump's special weakness for dictators. He can be tough on Russia at times, but he never criticizes Putin.

This is personal.

Don needs to talk to Vlad off the record, and it won't be about the World Cup that ended the day before. 

We'll read declarations about this and that (including probably Syria), and once more, Trump will say that they talked about the 2016 elections, and that Putin is innocent, but 2018 elections will somehow on the agenda.

Trump is making sure no one interferes with the interference. Putin is still shaping the news, splitting democracies from the inside. Both must be happy to see Democrats fall in ideological traps, torn between an organization not yet purged from the Clinton era on one hand, and Independent-Scarecrow socialists like Bernie Sanders or Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez on the other, between reforming ICE and getting rid of it. If Maxine Waters didn't exist, Don and Vlad would have invented her.

Republicans, who have long imploded along ideological lines, face an even deeper crisis because they enabled and keep enabling Trump and Putin, with Mitch McConnell as America's Paul von Hindenburg.

Without that shameless weasel blocking Obama's Supreme Court pick, the nation wouldn't be this close to the abyss. Trump's nominee for Justice Kennedy's seat will be grilled on such issues as abortion or impeachment, but all will depend on the last GOP moderates willing to take a stand. 
The usual suspects have already made themselves heard: Susan Collins and Lisa Murkowski said Roe v. Wade shouldn't be revoked.

And there's John McCain who, like Trump, had to take a fundamentalist running mate (Sarah Palin) to get his nomination. The war veteran recently confessed that he regretted that choice, and I expect him to defend his country till his last breath, particularly against Russia. 

I wouldn't be surprised to hear powerful messages from McCain and Robert Mueller on time to prevent Putin from winning these elections as well.


blogules 2018
Since 2003, nonsensical posts about noncritical issues in nonenglish (get your blogules transfusion in French)
NEW: join blogules on Facebook!!! and Twitter (@stephanemot, @blogules)

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 * I couldn't resist pulling, after "Donald Trump: "I never lie, I just invent my own truth"", another fake interview of DJT about that summit: "Trump: The Art of the Dealapidation (Exclusive Interview)".

'Boys with toys: Trump in cartoon being played by KIM Jong-un, XI Jinping, Putin... see a pattern?' (20180426 - twitter.com/theseoulvillage/status/989314185338081282)