toucana

Apparently a spokesman for the US Secret Service is now telling media outlets that Tony Ornato, the former WH deputy head of operations, and Bobby Engel the driver, are prepared to offer testimony disputing the latest account of what happened inside the presidential SUV on 1/6. The one big problem is that Cassidy Hutchinson was deposed under oath in a public hearing, and spoke under penalty of perjury if she lied. The Jan 6 committe and Miss Hutchinson’s lawyers have now invited these two SS agents to do likewise - Don’t hold your breath, because I don’t think either of them will be in any great hurry to do so. Tony Ornato was actually removed from the presidential protection detail within minutes of president Biden taking office in 2021, because Ornato was widely seen as a total Trump sycophant who simply could not be trusted with the responsibility of protecting his successor. Even senior Republicans distrusted him, notably VP Mike Pence who flatly refused to get into a limousine sent by Ornato to remove him from a Capitol basement parking bay in the middle of the 1/6 mayhem. “I trust you” Mike Pence told his own personal SS guard, “But you aren’t the one driving the car”. Pence seriously feared that once driven away from the Capitol, he would be placed on a plane and flown to a ‘secure location’ in Alaska. He chose to remain in the Capitol and complete the electoral count. There are credible reports that a number of members of Trump’s SS security detail were such gung-ho supporters of the MAGA movement, that they were posting messages on their personal social media accounts, cheering the insurrectionists along on their march to the Capitol - even though the SS agents, of all people - would have known from 11 a.m. onwards that there were people carrying AR-15 rifles and Glock pistols in that crowd. Attached is a clip of a panel discussion from last night that includes Carol Leonnig the Pulitzer prize award winning journalist for the WP who has also written two books about the Secret Service. They discuss these issues in some detail. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5h0ci208Txo

An interesting article by Jill Lepore published in the New Yorker in May 2022 makes the point that the 4,000 words of the US Constitution written in 1787 contain no references to women https://www.newyorker.com/news/daily-comment/why-there-are-no-women-in-the-constitution That is by no means the end of of the derelictions in the Constitution either. It doesn’t mention, black people, Jews, or people who identify as LGBT for example; nor does it have anything lucid to say about climate change, nuclear fission, nuclear fusion, the internet, the expansion of the universe, the Hubble constant, the nature of dark matter, SETI - or a dozen other topics of pressing interest either. Most critical of all, the US constitution (in Ailto’s view at least) has nothing to say about a fundamental right to privacy. That at least seems to be the cornerstone of his decision to overthow 50 years of stare decisis, and to throw the USA into legislative chaos.