DL Open Thread: Friday, January 26, 2024

Vince McMahon And Donald Trump–Separated At Birth?  Two self-entitled males who play the role of WWE villains because, well, that’s what they are.  And serial abusers, OK, rapists, of women.  While Trump is about to lose bigly a second time for having made E. Jean Carroll’s life a living hell, McMahon has been accused of the following:

The lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court in Connecticut, alleges that Mr. McMahon, who was subject to an internal investigation in 2022 over allegations of misconduct, sexually exploited and trafficked the former employee, Janel Grant, from 2019 to 2022. Another W.W.E. executive, John Laurinaitis, and the company itself are also named as defendants.

Mr. McMahon also pressured Ms. Grant to sign a nondisclosure agreement, the suit says, in which he agreed to pay her $3 million in exchange for not discussing their relationship.

The lawsuit seeks to void the nondisclosure agreement.

You know why?  Because McMahon reneged on his legal obligation to pay her.  But I digress:

Ms. Grant’s complaint, which was previously reported by The Wall Street Journal, includes graphic descriptions of sex acts, threats and intimidation that she says she faced over several years as Mr. McMahon, 78, gained control over her professional and personal lives and wielded that power to abuse her psychologically and sexually.

When Ms. Grant met Mr. McMahon in 2019, the complaint says, her parents had recently died, and she was unemployed. Mutual friends suggested that she contact Mr. McMahon about a possible job at W.W.E. When the two met, Mr. McMahon greeted her wearing only his underwear, according to the complaint.

After promising her a position with power and a high salary within W.W.E., Mr. McMahon eventually offered Ms. Grant an entry-level position on the company’s legal staff in June 2019, in exchange for sex, according to the lawsuit.

Ms. Grant “felt trapped in an impossible situation,” the complaint says, “submitting to McMahon’s sexual demands or facing ruin.”

Once she was working at W.W.E. headquarters in Stamford, Conn., the abuse intensified, the lawsuit says. Mr. McMahon took nude photos of her and filmed them having sex, the complaint says. He showed the photos and videos to other employees and later used them to intimidate her into silence, according to the complaint.

The relationship grew increasingly violent and coercive, according to the lawsuit. Mr. McMahon pressured Ms. Grant into having sex with other people, the complaint says, including the other executive named as a defendant, Mr. Laurinaitis. In one episode described in the suit, Ms. Grant says that Mr. McMahon and Mr. Laurinaitis locked her in an office and took turns raping her.

There’s so much more, much of it too graphic, even for me.  However, to buttress the Trump/McMahon similarities, suffice it to say that Vince and Trump are ‘two pees in a pod’.  I won’t belabor the point further.

UN Court Orders Israel To Stop Wanton Killing In Gaza:

THE HAGUE — The International Court of Justice on Friday ordered Israel to do more to prevent the killing and harm of Palestinian civilians in Gaza, a landmark decision that is part of the case determining if genocide is taking place, and will add to pressure to change course in the military campaign.

Israel’s offensive has killed some 26,000 Palestinians, according to the Gaza Health Ministry, the majority of them women and children. It was launched after Hamas militants attacked Israel on Oct. 7, killing roughly 1,200 people and taking around 253 hostage.

Will Biden Issue An Ultimatum To Netanyahu?  Possibly:

The director of the Central Intelligence Agency and his Israeli counterpart will meet Qatari officials in coming days for talks on a second potential Gaza hostage deal and pause in fighting, three sources familiar with the matter told Reuters on Thursday.

William Burns and the head of Israel’s Mossad intelligence service, David Barnea, will meet Qatari prime minister and foreign minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani in Europe this weekend, one official briefed on the meeting told the news agency.

Gee, I’ve got an idea–stop sending weaponry to Israel.  Humanitarian aid only.

The Moral Bankruptcy Of Rethugs.  Let’s see if I’ve got this straight.  Rethugs refuse to consider aid to Ukraine unless it’s part of a package with ‘border security’.  Biden and a group of bipartisan legislators come up with a deal that will address both.  Trump wins New Hampshire, then instructs Rethugs to kill the deal because he doesn’t want to give Biden a victory.  They acquiesce.  Have I missed anything?:

Trump’s intervention is close to completely scuttling the deal, the product of months of negotiating by a bipartisan Senate group. As recently as Tuesday, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) was saying it’s the “ideal time to do it.”

“This is a unique opportunity where a divided government has given us an opportunity to get an outcome,” McConnell added in a press conference. 

“To lose this opportunity to get it passed into law, I think, is malpractice,” Sen. Thom Tillis (R-NC) said last week.

Trump put a quick end to all of that.

“Politics on this have changed,” McConnell told Republican senators of the border legislation on Wednesday, per NBC News. 

“We don’t want to do anything to undermine him,” he added of Trump. 

It’s a stunningly naked display of fealty to Trump — and the congressional majorities he’d presumably bring with him if he won — over taking action to address what Republicans have claimed for years is the biggest crisis the country faces. It’s particularly reflective of Trump’s power, as even Senate Republicans were surprised by how much Democrats were willing to give away to strike a deal. That dynamic reveals both how damaging the border crisis talking points have been to them, and how badly they want to pass Ukraine aid, which was conceptually linked to the immigration deal.

Carney’s Proposed Budget.  A little bit more of the same.

What do you want to talk about?