Last week, beginning in the 24 blazing hours following Trump’s sacking of James Comey, the nature of Trump’s incumbency markedly shifted.  It started with the free flowing lies coming from every single one of his surrogates, then continued when the Big Cheeto threw that very same crew under the bus by contradicting his own talking points the next day after the firing.   Also, that same day, all of the networks, including Fox Noise, started using the word “lie”.  The words “chaos”, “turmoil”, and a dozen other descriptors of the Trump WH are now a regular part of network reporting.

Trump then threatened Comey with “tapes” of their conversations, and that was the moment mainstream GOP leadership started to part ways.  The Senate Intelligence committee has now asked the U.S. Treasury Department’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) to turn over documents related to Trump’s businesses.  Why is that significant?  FinCen enforces laws against MONEY LAUNDERING.  Over the years before Trump’s Atlantic City casino finally closed, it was caught several times money laundering.  This shift into serious investigation into his actually business dealings marks a change in emphasis from dark figures like Manafort, Stone, and Flynn to Trump.  That’s not insignificant. Referring to the request, Mark Warner, the ranking member on the committee, said, “[is] our effort to try to follow the intel no matter where it leads.”

There is now talk of Trump cleaning house and “rebooting” his administration.  Apparently, he’s furious with his staff for doing exactly what he’s told them to do, so the rumble is that he’s going to blow up the West Wing and start over.  Even if he does that, his problems are far from being over.  Money laundering? No one, including Mitch McConnell and Paul Ryan can ignore that.  Mix in Russian money with that story, and Trump will finally be toast.

Fingers crossed here, but there is a clear shift of support away from Trump.  It can’t come too soon.

There’s a newspaper in England called the Daily Mail Online.  They like to report American goings-on because we’re so damn entertaining.

Today they did a story about how Louisiana is the most corrupt state in America.  They have charts, graphs, and big ole pictures.

So the cutline under this graph says, “The states with the most public corruption convictions per 100,000 population.”  So, what you have here is not the most corrupt states, but a list of the states actually doing something about corruption.

Texas heads up the bottom quarter on that list only because we don’t indict or convict our crooks. And if we do, they just keep putting off their trial until everybody dies or the law changes.  Texas Republican Attorney General Ken Paxton has been under felony indictment since July of 2015 and from all appearances, he’ll be going to trial after Jesus comes again.

And if we don’t ever get around to indicting them, it’s just easier to send them to Washington, DeeCee to be a congressman or Secretary of Energy or something.

Honey, if “probably” is the best they could do …

He took money from Russia and Turkey and then didn’t reveal that when he wanted his security clearance back to serve President Trump.

Here’s the Fun With Republican Math part.

Chaffetz stressed that the government ought to “recover the money” that was paid to Flynn by foreign entities — a figure that would at least be in the tens of thousands of dollars.

We know he took $45,000 from Russia and more than $500,000 from Turkey so, yeah that’s tens of thousands.  That’s 545 tens of thousands.

Flynn could face jail time but don’t count on Jeff Sessions to make a big deal of it.  Or to even see it. I don’t even think Sessions even casts a reflection in a mirror at this point.

Shockingly, the General Services Administration (GSA) issued a determination letter yesterday that the lease of the old post office in Washington, DC, now known as the Cheeto International Hotel, is VALID, even though it states in plain language in the lease that, “No … elected official of the Government of the United States … shall be admitted to any share or part of this Lease, or to any benefit that may arise therefrom…”   Stupidly, the letter hides behind the fact that Cheeto Jesus put this business in a trust.  Yes, it is in a trust – a revocable trust, run by his children.

The Daily Beast interviewed George Washington University Professor of Government Procurement Law Steven L. Schooner who said, “Not only is the conclusion unexpected and unpersuasive, as a matter of law, but, as a matter of policy, it is harmful to the integrity—and thus credibility—of GSA, the Presidency, and federal procurement process.” When asked how the GSA could come to the conclusion it did he gave a simple reason, “Spine-ectomy.”

So lets lay this out in plain language – the GSA employee who negotiated the contract, Kevin Terry, has just stated publicly that his boss’s boss, who is in clear, undeniable conflict of interest, is not actually in conflict of interest, even though he is the highest elected official in the land.  It’s basically “Nothing to see here, move along.”

If you had any doubt, this is what creeping corruption looks like.  We are becoming Russia, one lease at a time.

Okay, so a lie is a lie is a lie is a lie.

(Typing that made me feel like a back-up singer in a Hawaiian band.)

But, here’s the deal.

That’s the headline.

Then we get to the story.

Steve Mnuchin, former chairman and chief executive officer of OneWest Bank, known for its aggressive foreclosure practices, flatly denied in testimony before the Senate Finance Committee that OneWest used “robo-signing” on mortgage documents.

But records show the bank utilized the questionable practice in Ohio.

“The guy is just lying. There’s no other way to say it,” said Bill Faith, executive director of the Coalition on Homelessness and Housing in Ohio.

You can read the whole horror stories of what this sumbitch did.  What he did was steal people’s houses.  Gleefully.  I suspect he shaved off his Snidely Whiplash mustache right before the hearing but he still has Miss Nell tied up somewhere.

If he will lie in a sworn statement and commit raw perjury to get this job, what the fool tarnation do you expect him to do under the sweet protective arm of Donald Trump and Steve Bannon?

He’s gonna screw us all.

North Carolina, after passing it’s radical gerrymandering plan and repressive voting regulations designed to make it harder to vote, has now been rated by the Electoral Integrity Project as comparable to Cuba, Sierra Leone, and Indonesia.  It’s legal framework and registration restrictions position the state comparable to Venezuela and Iran.  Looking at all the relevant measures, North Carolina can no longer be considered a real democracy.  Welcome to the new “normal”.