CSI: American Carnage (Tuesday, November 20, 2018)
Washington. The Times guy pushes his way into the Off the Record bar and sees his friend from the Post. Hey, long time no see, he says, sitting down and ordering a Brewdog. The Post guy says, Howdy, you’ve been a stranger. The Times guy says, I’ve been on the Mueller speculation team, you know. We got a team of guys and gals who try to think of everything Mueller might be doing, everyone he might be looking at, every road he might be going down. We put it all into a huge spreadsheet. We got Nate back to work up the math on each possibility. For instance, say Mueller’s team is interested in George Nader, who is, already, cooperating. What does George Nader know? Will that connect to Jared Kushner? Will Kushner link back to the Saudis? What about Jared’s ties to the crown prince? What does Jare know about Khashoggi? And once you get Jared in the mix, you gotta be talking money, and when you’re talking money, you gotta be talking Donald. And Donald loves the Saudis. Loves their glowing balls. Remember, he even told the rallies: I get along great with all of them. They buy apartments from me. They spend $40 million, $50 million. Am I supposed to dislike them? I like them very much! So, says the Times guy, you put this all in the Mueller hopper, you sprinkle it with a little Nate Silver, and presto! You want a Venn diagram? We got it. That’s my personal favorite. You can see who’s involved in anything you want and who they did it with. Some of them are so crowded with names, you can barely read them. So. That’s what we’re up to. What’s with you? The Post guy says, Not much. Today I watched Donald and the missus come out of the house and look at a Christmas tree tied on the back of a cart pulled by a horse. Donald patted the horse’s rump. A little pat. He wiped his hand afterward and went back inside. The Times guy says, Geez. Nothing about the troops? Nothing about Adm. McRaven? The Post guy says, No. Nothing. They just went back inside. The Times guy says, Probably had a lot of calls to make. The Post guy says, Tomorrow looks promising. The Times guy says, Oh? The Post guy says, Yeah. Donald will pardon the nation’s Thanksgiving turkey. The Times guy says, That could be revealing. The Post guy says, Yeah. He’s got to decide between Peas and Carrots. Which one will he bestow his beneficence upon? The Times guy says, That’s tough. The Post guy says, We are getting conflicting stories from sources inside the White House. One group of staffers says Donald doesn’t want to pardon either. He says that if they’re in custody, they are guilty. He wants them, at the least, out of the country. The Times guy says, But they’re native birds! He can’t do that! The Post guy says, We have another group of sources that says Donald has been talking to Rudy about the possibilities of a blanket pardon. He wants to know why it should only be the turkeys. He says that there are much worse birds. I dunno. We’ll have to see. So that’s what the Leader of the Free World has done this week. Inspected a tree, patted a horse, and thought a lot about some turkeys.
— Tuesday, Nov. 20, 2018