> Still, Patel has his fans. The president has been pleased by Patel’s efforts to purge agents who worked on January 6 cases and other probes into Trump. The president has also indicated that he is relatively unbothered by grumblings about Patel from within the FBI, according to White House and other administration officials. That’s not surprising: Patel views many of the bureau’s veterans as anti-Trump “deep state” agents who have worked against him and his followers. But Patel has, on occasion, earned the president’s ire. Trump has complained that the FBI director has seemed unprepared for TV appearances and that some high-profile investigations that he directed Patel to pursue have not moved quickly enough. These include inquiries into former Biden-administration officials and other political opponents.
This is a casual admission that Trump is engaged in Stalinist tactics of using alleged law enforcement to punish his political enemies. It's disgusting to me how normal that has become. I'm angry at everyone who helped make it happen.
>This is a casual admission that Trump is engaged in Stalinist tactics of using alleged law enforcement to punish his political enemies. It's disgusting to me how normal that has become. I'm angry at everyone who helped make it happen.
It's so obvious and well documented in every thing Trump and his people touch. Anyone who claims ignorance to this fact is lying.
I think it’s pretty obvious that there are bubbles of information in the country that do not overlap.
People act like everyone still watches the same three channels and gets the same evening newspaper. Not even close.
I’m not defending anyone’s decisions, one way or the other, but I am pointing out that if people don’t have the same information, it’s kind of unreasonable to expect people to act on that same information that you have and they don’t or vice versa.
And many people don’t understand the difference between professional journalism and editorial.
My father was a life-long Republican until Trump and is now completely disgusted with what the party has become. He doesn't have any social media and gets his news entirely from NPR and the newspaper. I'm certain this is why MAGA never got him.
Similar with my mom. Ex-hippie who somehow got into the Reagan revolution, was a daily Rush listener for decades. Voted for Trump the first time purely because of her hard-wired revulsion of Hillary, then went conclusively "never again" within the first year.
Like you, I believe a HUGE factor in her continued connection to reality is having zero interest in social media whatsoever. I really feel for people whose parents have been swept up in Qanon and the like. It has to be awful witnessing your folks spend their twilight years buried in anger and paranoia.
> Ex-hippie who somehow got into the Reagan revolution
All of the Woodstock hippies became neo-liberal corporate patsies. They had their fun in the sun and then failed their children like it was their sworn duty.
Too much LSD and philandering without any sense of personal accountability.
I think you are being very generous. You would have to be living under a rock in bikini bottom and you would still be able to see how corrupt and self serving and bigoted in every way Trump and company are. Kids in poor countries certainly know.
I’m not overly generous. I simply travel a great deal, and I meet people of all political persuasions, incomes, and educational opportunities. And people are more likely to align with information that confirms their biases. And that is true regardless of the bias.
Just stumbled across this about a minute ago on my feed: https://www.psypost.org/cognitive-dissonance-helps-explain-why-trump-supporters-remain-loyal-new-research-suggests/
I will add that deeply held beliefs, like the ones mentioned in the linked article aren’t necessarily nefarious.
Some are people who are conservative about money, strongly held religious beliefs, or maybe someone who’s lived in the same community their entire life, and have not encountered a wide variety of points of views. Unfortunately, most human beings when they are hammered on a decision they made instead of changing their mind they double down.
And 30% of the country would see this and shrug since they think this is exactly what Biden/garland did. This whole two realities thing is not going great.
It’s galling because he had publicly bragged about this. It came up in his confirmation hearings and he promised under oath that he wouldn’t do purges of the FBI. And they voted for him anyway.
I’m furious at republicans for playing dumb and voting yes. I’m angry at Fox News for downplaying it at the time and cheering on his confirmation. I’m angry at Musk for promising to throw millions in the primaries to unseat any senator who voted against any of Trump’s nominees.
Yeah, this guy never would have passed security clearances under normal circumstances. But you can't have an actual professional in this position and still use them as a sock puppet.
You can make the argument that with him MIA the FBI is more competent without him making political decisions. Vast majority of the FBI are career employees who want nothing more than to be done with this crap, him not coming over the top with political decisions let’s them work
Submission statement: This article details the alarm in the government sector over Kash Patel’s excessive blackout drinking. One of the major concerns is Patel‘s ability to react appropriately to domestic terrorism.
"The president has been pleased by Patel’s efforts to purge agents who worked on January 6 cases and other probes into Trump. "
Trump doesn't mind appointing people with criminal histories and/or substance use disorders to important positions as long as they are useful tools. Kash "money" Patel is at the mercy of a notoriously faithless Trump's whims and is at even greater risk of being fired because he is a non-white person in a government currently dominated by white supremacists. He should be worried. If the aryan-looking Pam Bondi can get fired, Kash is in even more danger of being fired. I'm not surprised if that worry increases his alcohol abuse.
Since post Watergate reforms, FBI Directors have typically been seasoned legal professionals often having spent 15- 20 years in the US legal system as federal prosecutors, DOJ officials or federal judges.
They are generally chosen from high ranking federal prosecutors or the Judiciary with extensive experience in the US legal system.
Patel was a public defender. Then became a Congressional aide to Rep Dunes, Later, he served as DOJ junior staff member. a liason officer to the Joint Special Operations; and a Chief of staff to an Acting Secretary of State in the final months of the 1st Trump Administration..
So basically, he doesn’t have any field experience and yet he wants to cosplay in a flak jacket. /s
I think his qualifications do need to be noted if only because they make the reality seem even more stark.
More seriously, I believe alcoholism, and or alcoholism combined with other substance abuse does not make for good decision-making especially in a field where good judgment is supposed to be the baseline.
All the legal training in the world makes no difference when a Secret Service detail has to use SWAT equipment to break down the director of the FBI’s door when he’s been drinking.
Just a btw - all FBI directors have been Republican. Patel is the first non white Republican to be fbi director and participated in an American Bar Association’s DEI program in law school
There are days I hope I live long enough to read in the history books about exactly how fucked up this administration is. Since I'm 52, I'm not holding my breath on that, but you never know.
I love how the media is trying to pretend now that nobody knew Cash Patel was a drunk, we all knew cash Patel was a drunk you were the only ones pretending like he wasn't because media is owned
The guy got black-out drunk on one of his junkets with a full diplomatic corps and everything, they had to get a (presumably) local fire department to bust down his door to do a wellness check on him and get him to a point where he was resting where he was able to be verifiably safe.
I've worked with alcoholics and have a deep sympathy for folks in dire straights that way - but I can't imagine the fuckery everyone in Trump's orbit has to deal with, a full-flower sociopath, with a flamboyantly criminal lifestyle and a visceral need to get himself into trouble on a nearly daily basis. Combine having to correct and address these problems if (for a moment) we presume that at some point Mr. Patel meant to do the job correctly.
I can imagine that would bring sober men to the bottom of a bottle or two, but these guys were all picked by the FSB for being the maximum possible damage-causing agents available and they were presented to Mr. Trump as "candidates" by whomever is sock-puppeting his son or whomever Mr. Trump is himself handled by.
The first and principal thing each and every one of these clowns will be is incompetent, next they will have fringe ideas and this might make them wildly inappropriate for the job. But it will still wear on them just as it would on competent and capable people.
So I suspect that even if we presume they are operating (however defectively) with the intention to serve or intentionally to serve in a duplicitous fashion, both roads end in the same ruin.
That's as much sympathy as I'm prepared to dole out to the murderous clowns today , when it's over, these guys , if they survive at all , will be embittered pickled alcoholics or addicts as many of them already are, Kennedy, Hegseth, Patel, and others are just the clown cart where the shit surfaced in just the last 72 hours.
Just consider for a moment that these fuckups have served up more drama than the hundreds of people who worked under Presidents Obama and Biden combined over 12 YEARS of Democratic leadership.
I listed to a podcast with a psychiatrist explaining how extremely stressful it is to be a member of a post truth administration anywhere in the world. They’re forced to perpetuate things they know are untrue - it’s extremely corrosive to one’s own character. They are highly, highly stressed people. Not surprising that drugs and alcohol and all kinds of other things come into the equation.
Go figure Trumps law enforcement officials are dropping like flies. Noem. Bonding, Patel. Tough working for a guy who fully expects his lackeys to lie to Congress.
There’s no evidence of that. He was part of the January 6 insurrection. He flatly denied that the Epstein files even existed.
I honestly don’t know why he supports Trump. I just don’t think there’s any hesitancy. He is just one of those stooges who is helpful for a while, then discarded.
It's because he can't look at himself in any mirror. He's a vile excuse for a human and a disgrace to his family and heritage. He is completely in over his bug eyes in his position and is just waiting to be slaughtered by Daddy Shitshispants at any moment like a good little sacrificial lamb.
VampireOnHoyt | 8 hours ago
> Still, Patel has his fans. The president has been pleased by Patel’s efforts to purge agents who worked on January 6 cases and other probes into Trump. The president has also indicated that he is relatively unbothered by grumblings about Patel from within the FBI, according to White House and other administration officials. That’s not surprising: Patel views many of the bureau’s veterans as anti-Trump “deep state” agents who have worked against him and his followers. But Patel has, on occasion, earned the president’s ire. Trump has complained that the FBI director has seemed unprepared for TV appearances and that some high-profile investigations that he directed Patel to pursue have not moved quickly enough. These include inquiries into former Biden-administration officials and other political opponents.
This is a casual admission that Trump is engaged in Stalinist tactics of using alleged law enforcement to punish his political enemies. It's disgusting to me how normal that has become. I'm angry at everyone who helped make it happen.
Cowboywizzard | 8 hours ago
>This is a casual admission that Trump is engaged in Stalinist tactics of using alleged law enforcement to punish his political enemies. It's disgusting to me how normal that has become. I'm angry at everyone who helped make it happen.
It's so obvious and well documented in every thing Trump and his people touch. Anyone who claims ignorance to this fact is lying.
[OP] horseradishstalker | 7 hours ago
I think it’s pretty obvious that there are bubbles of information in the country that do not overlap.
People act like everyone still watches the same three channels and gets the same evening newspaper. Not even close.
I’m not defending anyone’s decisions, one way or the other, but I am pointing out that if people don’t have the same information, it’s kind of unreasonable to expect people to act on that same information that you have and they don’t or vice versa.
And many people don’t understand the difference between professional journalism and editorial.
Legal-Koala-5590 | 7 hours ago
My father was a life-long Republican until Trump and is now completely disgusted with what the party has become. He doesn't have any social media and gets his news entirely from NPR and the newspaper. I'm certain this is why MAGA never got him.
ManbadFerrara | 7 hours ago
Similar with my mom. Ex-hippie who somehow got into the Reagan revolution, was a daily Rush listener for decades. Voted for Trump the first time purely because of her hard-wired revulsion of Hillary, then went conclusively "never again" within the first year.
Like you, I believe a HUGE factor in her continued connection to reality is having zero interest in social media whatsoever. I really feel for people whose parents have been swept up in Qanon and the like. It has to be awful witnessing your folks spend their twilight years buried in anger and paranoia.
Legal-Koala-5590 | 6 hours ago
Honestly, I'm impressed Rush wasn't a gateway drug into the MAGA/QAnon pipeline. Good on your mom for knowing her limits.
Gilsworth | 4 hours ago
> Ex-hippie who somehow got into the Reagan revolution
All of the Woodstock hippies became neo-liberal corporate patsies. They had their fun in the sun and then failed their children like it was their sworn duty.
Too much LSD and philandering without any sense of personal accountability.
ziggy_santo5 | 56 minutes ago
boomers gonna boom
Cowboywizzard | 7 hours ago
I think you are being very generous. You would have to be living under a rock in bikini bottom and you would still be able to see how corrupt and self serving and bigoted in every way Trump and company are. Kids in poor countries certainly know.
[OP] horseradishstalker | 7 hours ago
I’m not overly generous. I simply travel a great deal, and I meet people of all political persuasions, incomes, and educational opportunities. And people are more likely to align with information that confirms their biases. And that is true regardless of the bias.
Cowboywizzard | 7 hours ago
I don’t consider the small disagreement we have on this point that important. Hopefully we’ll be rid of the Maga people sooner than later.
[OP] horseradishstalker | 7 hours ago
Just stumbled across this about a minute ago on my feed: https://www.psypost.org/cognitive-dissonance-helps-explain-why-trump-supporters-remain-loyal-new-research-suggests/
I will add that deeply held beliefs, like the ones mentioned in the linked article aren’t necessarily nefarious.
Some are people who are conservative about money, strongly held religious beliefs, or maybe someone who’s lived in the same community their entire life, and have not encountered a wide variety of points of views. Unfortunately, most human beings when they are hammered on a decision they made instead of changing their mind they double down.
geodebug | 8 hours ago
Casual admission? I’d say proud boast.
Yet still, complete yawn by anyone with any power to do anything about it.
AL_GEE_THE_FUN_GUY | 7 hours ago
The ones who can do something are living high on the hog right now and/or they're enjoying the vengeance, cruelty and weaponized governing.
BKlounge93 | 7 hours ago
And 30% of the country would see this and shrug since they think this is exactly what Biden/garland did. This whole two realities thing is not going great.
sulaymanf | 6 hours ago
If only we had known. /s
It’s galling because he had publicly bragged about this. It came up in his confirmation hearings and he promised under oath that he wouldn’t do purges of the FBI. And they voted for him anyway.
I’m furious at republicans for playing dumb and voting yes. I’m angry at Fox News for downplaying it at the time and cheering on his confirmation. I’m angry at Musk for promising to throw millions in the primaries to unseat any senator who voted against any of Trump’s nominees.
Royal_Annek | 9 hours ago
Functioning as intended.
A competent FBI would be very harmful for our president's criminal family and friends.
NativeMasshole | 9 hours ago
Yeah, this guy never would have passed security clearances under normal circumstances. But you can't have an actual professional in this position and still use them as a sock puppet.
FeeHot5876 | 9 hours ago
You can make the argument that with him MIA the FBI is more competent without him making political decisions. Vast majority of the FBI are career employees who want nothing more than to be done with this crap, him not coming over the top with political decisions let’s them work
notacrook | 3 hours ago
The Atlantic article supposes as such, too.
Less_Tacos | 4 hours ago
Then again if he is passed out drunk he can't be zealously following Trumps wishes , which is good for democracy.
[OP] horseradishstalker | 9 hours ago
Submission statement: This article details the alarm in the government sector over Kash Patel’s excessive blackout drinking. One of the major concerns is Patel‘s ability to react appropriately to domestic terrorism.
sunflower53069 | 8 hours ago
Hard to react when you are passed out drunk. Trump actually disapproves of drinking, so this could be the end for him.
Floomby | 6 hours ago
He doesn't seem to have any problem with Hehseth's alcoholism and had none with Musk's obvious drug abuse.
sunflower53069 | 6 hours ago
Good point. Kash being terrible at his job might be enough to save him.
vcsx | 3 hours ago
He doesn't disapprove of it. In fact he has his own vodka brand (guess the name).
He just personally chooses not to drink, likely due to having experienced his brother Fred struggle with and ultimately die from alcoholism.
If he disapproved of it, we'd be seeing a repeat of prohibition.
DrSnidely | 8 hours ago
None of these people were picked for their qualifications or job skills. It's all because they said something Trump liked.
Procure | 6 hours ago
Reminder that he’s only FBI director because he wrote a children’s book about the 2020 election being stolen
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/jan/07/trump-fbi-pick-kash-patel-childrens-books
Cowboywizzard | 8 hours ago
"The president has been pleased by Patel’s efforts to purge agents who worked on January 6 cases and other probes into Trump. "
Trump doesn't mind appointing people with criminal histories and/or substance use disorders to important positions as long as they are useful tools. Kash "money" Patel is at the mercy of a notoriously faithless Trump's whims and is at even greater risk of being fired because he is a non-white person in a government currently dominated by white supremacists. He should be worried. If the aryan-looking Pam Bondi can get fired, Kash is in even more danger of being fired. I'm not surprised if that worry increases his alcohol abuse.
IntrepidWeird9719 | 7 hours ago
Since post Watergate reforms, FBI Directors have typically been seasoned legal professionals often having spent 15- 20 years in the US legal system as federal prosecutors, DOJ officials or federal judges.
They are generally chosen from high ranking federal prosecutors or the Judiciary with extensive experience in the US legal system.
Patel was a public defender. Then became a Congressional aide to Rep Dunes, Later, he served as DOJ junior staff member. a liason officer to the Joint Special Operations; and a Chief of staff to an Acting Secretary of State in the final months of the 1st Trump Administration..
[OP] horseradishstalker | 7 hours ago
So basically, he doesn’t have any field experience and yet he wants to cosplay in a flak jacket. /s
I think his qualifications do need to be noted if only because they make the reality seem even more stark.
More seriously, I believe alcoholism, and or alcoholism combined with other substance abuse does not make for good decision-making especially in a field where good judgment is supposed to be the baseline.
All the legal training in the world makes no difference when a Secret Service detail has to use SWAT equipment to break down the director of the FBI’s door when he’s been drinking.
CharleyNobody | 6 hours ago
Just a btw - all FBI directors have been Republican. Patel is the first non white Republican to be fbi director and participated in an American Bar Association’s DEI program in law school
hughk | 3 hours ago
He was the ~~DEI~~ DUI hire.
wraithnix | 7 hours ago
There are days I hope I live long enough to read in the history books about exactly how fucked up this administration is. Since I'm 52, I'm not holding my breath on that, but you never know.
LevelPerception4 | 2 hours ago
I’m still waiting for historians to catch up with what a disaster the Reagan administration was.
Few-Boysenberry1285 | an hour ago
You are absolutely 100% correct
isthereadrwho | 7 hours ago
I love how the media is trying to pretend now that nobody knew Cash Patel was a drunk, we all knew cash Patel was a drunk you were the only ones pretending like he wasn't because media is owned
KitchenBomber | 7 hours ago
I love how they make these clear and well sourced allegations and his response is "say that about me and I'll sue you."
They already said it. He can already sue if he wants, he just knows he'll lose.
It's giving big Black Knight from Monty Python energy.
I wonder what he'll say once he sobers up.
markth_wi | 7 hours ago
The guy got black-out drunk on one of his junkets with a full diplomatic corps and everything, they had to get a (presumably) local fire department to bust down his door to do a wellness check on him and get him to a point where he was resting where he was able to be verifiably safe.
I've worked with alcoholics and have a deep sympathy for folks in dire straights that way - but I can't imagine the fuckery everyone in Trump's orbit has to deal with, a full-flower sociopath, with a flamboyantly criminal lifestyle and a visceral need to get himself into trouble on a nearly daily basis. Combine having to correct and address these problems if (for a moment) we presume that at some point Mr. Patel meant to do the job correctly.
I can imagine that would bring sober men to the bottom of a bottle or two, but these guys were all picked by the FSB for being the maximum possible damage-causing agents available and they were presented to Mr. Trump as "candidates" by whomever is sock-puppeting his son or whomever Mr. Trump is himself handled by.
The first and principal thing each and every one of these clowns will be is incompetent, next they will have fringe ideas and this might make them wildly inappropriate for the job. But it will still wear on them just as it would on competent and capable people.
So I suspect that even if we presume they are operating (however defectively) with the intention to serve or intentionally to serve in a duplicitous fashion, both roads end in the same ruin.
That's as much sympathy as I'm prepared to dole out to the murderous clowns today , when it's over, these guys , if they survive at all , will be embittered pickled alcoholics or addicts as many of them already are, Kennedy, Hegseth, Patel, and others are just the clown cart where the shit surfaced in just the last 72 hours.
Just consider for a moment that these fuckups have served up more drama than the hundreds of people who worked under Presidents Obama and Biden combined over 12 YEARS of Democratic leadership.
TorontoTom2008 | 4 hours ago
I listed to a podcast with a psychiatrist explaining how extremely stressful it is to be a member of a post truth administration anywhere in the world. They’re forced to perpetuate things they know are untrue - it’s extremely corrosive to one’s own character. They are highly, highly stressed people. Not surprising that drugs and alcohol and all kinds of other things come into the equation.
Reasonable-Plate2982 | 7 hours ago
Go figure Trumps law enforcement officials are dropping like flies. Noem. Bonding, Patel. Tough working for a guy who fully expects his lackeys to lie to Congress.
backbypopularsupply | 3 hours ago
Imagine if all of a dems picks were getting fired left and right for incompetence
BeneficialTrash6 | 3 hours ago
They're called secret missions! What, you expect the director of the FBI to NOT go on secret missions? He's getting to the bottom of a lot of cases!
Responsible-Hour1403 | 2 hours ago
Cocaine....its his cocaine use.
cspank523 | an hour ago
Its the NHL playoffs, hes got games to watch.
phrynosoma_kinda | an hour ago
I mean if I'd agreed to work for Trump I'd probably be blacked out all the time.
barnibusvonkreeps | 46 minutes ago
It's not just Kash. It's the entire US. You're all a fucking joke.
Regards,
Earth.
MikeW226 | 8 hours ago
Probably wanted to sell his soul sociopathically like Noem, Vance and Bondi, but has an actual conscience in there somewhere. And that he can't shake.
warm_kitchenette | 8 hours ago
There’s no evidence of that. He was part of the January 6 insurrection. He flatly denied that the Epstein files even existed.
I honestly don’t know why he supports Trump. I just don’t think there’s any hesitancy. He is just one of those stooges who is helpful for a while, then discarded.
ohh_really | 8 hours ago
It's because he can't look at himself in any mirror. He's a vile excuse for a human and a disgrace to his family and heritage. He is completely in over his bug eyes in his position and is just waiting to be slaughtered by Daddy Shitshispants at any moment like a good little sacrificial lamb.
Desperate-Tap-695 | 7 hours ago
Textbook addict/alcoholic behavior. Not great.