comment: >
  
  This made me think of this quote for some reason:
  “I never said he was,” he continued, “I said there was a rumor in Milwaukee that he was, which was true when I started the rumor in Milwaukee.”
context: well, somebody spent a lot of money to get this clown stuffed into the Right's clown car 
  if you tried to pitch this guy as a character in a fictional story you'd get laughed out of the room >
  
  Santos can't be the only, there has to be more grifters that ran in last year's elections.
  Russian interests don't stop with one candidate... >
  
  Sarah Huckabee Sanders, the pathological liar ex-press secretary who just got elected gov of Arkansas. I’m convinced her daddy bought her that press secretary job (no way in hell would Donald Trump, who’s obsessed with image & hot 20 yr old pageant girls hire an unattractive, overweight 40 year old to be the face everyone sees when they watch press conferences about the Trump administration). With her daddy as corrupt as he is? You know there was money involved. To win a governors race though? I don’t know. 
  I do know she spent the entire year in Florida, not Arkansas, begging people for money because outside of that press secretary stunt? That woman never had a job in her 40 years on this earth. 
  Between her and Santos I just see two scam artists with bad teeth. >
  
  Meanwhile, her opponent was a a young black minister who earned an PhD in urban planning from MIT and had previously worked as a physicist. He only got about 35% of the vote. >
  
  Damn. That's depressing >
  
  As a born and bred Californian living a state north from Arkansas…. it’s unbelievable how folks think these people are on the side of the righteous. I’ve lived abroad and traveled to 3 other continents but the biggest culture shock of my life was moving to mid-America >
  
  Born in Texas and lived in southern states till I left for the Marine Corps. World travel was a shock, and made me realize how backward my family and the states I had lived in are. >
  
  Travel changes perspectives and challenges our own expectations about the world. Glad you got the experience and hope all of it was ultimately positive for you! >
  
  it was an eye opener for certain. My brother also went in, but spent his entire tour in N Carolina. Learned nothing in this aspect. >
  
  always interesting how similar experiences can influence people totally differently >
  
  It's amazing just how many republicans can be linked to Russians. >
  
  And stupid ones and pathological liars at that. >
  
  They do appear to have a type. >
  
  McCarthy was so desperate to be Speaker that he didn't want to look into Santos.  Now, we're finding out that Santos is a Russian plant of a sanctioned oligarch who wanted McCarthy to be Speaker.  I hope this leads to more revelations of money laundering and other financial crimes.  It's time to clean House. >
  
  Why else do you think the Republicans have hobbled the House Ethics Committee's ability to investigate?  They know where the rot is, they just don't want anybody else to find out. >
  
  I have no confidence in Republicans to do anything about him, but the DOJ is already involved with the case and Santos isn't important enough to shield from prosecution. >
  
  Forgive me for not having faith that the doj will do anything useful. >
  
  What in the last 3 decades of inaction are you talking about? Why not? >
  
  This is a gift link with no paywalls, but here's the meat of it:
  
  Taken together, the evidence suggests Santos may have had a business relationship with Intrater as Santos was first entering politics in 2020. It also shows, according to the SEC filing, that Intrater put hundreds of thousands of dollars into Santos’ onetime employer, Harbor City, which was accused by regulators of running a Ponzi scheme. Neither Santos nor Intrater responded to requests for comment. Attorneys who have represented Intrater also did not respond.
  
  
  
  While Intrater is a U.S. citizen, his company, the investment firm Columbus Nova, has historically had extensive ties to the business interests of his Russian cousin, billionaire Viktor Vekselberg. As recently as 2018, when Vekselberg was sanctioned by the Treasury Department for his role in the Russian energy industry, his conglomerate was Columbus Nova’s largest client, the company confirmed to The Post that year.
  Intrater’s interactions in 2016 and 2017 with Michael Cohen, who at the time was working as a lawyer for Donald Trump, were probed during special counsel Robert S. Mueller III’s investigation of Russian interference in the 2016 election and possible links between Trump and the Kremlin.
  Intrater’s company paid the lawyer and self-described Trump fixer to identify deals for his business, and court records show they exchanged hundreds of texts and phone calls. >
  
  Looks bad, smells bad, don't eat it. Nature has ways of signaling danger. The money trail looks like Russian interests gave Santos money to get elected. >
  
  But he legit said it “didn’t come from Russian” on a podcast.
  /s >
  
  Actually, he said it didn't come from China, Ukraine, or Burisma. So probably Russia. >
  
  Burisma? >
  
  Ukrainian gas company you probably forgot about. They put Hunter Biden on their board, presumably for access to VP Biden. Been a recurring villain in the Fox News Cinematic Universe ever since. >
  
  I always laugh at how they harp on Burisma so bad, as if companies paying favors to the family of politicians, in order to gain access and influence with the politician, isn't as old as time. And hell, the Republicans are the ones who perfected that play. >
  
  They unironically foam at the mouth about Burisma and completely ignore the billions of dollars the Saudi's gave Jared Kushner. >
  
  The GOP is a Russian asset. >
  
  Treason runs deep with Republicans >
  
  Russia has been involved with his entire campaign.  This guy is a Russian asset.  Nobody gets 700k without expectations. >
  
  There is so much to unpack with this guy.
  He may not actually be named George Santos. He was going by Anthony Devolder at a conservative rally a few years ago. This raises questions of who he really is.
  He's probably not a legal US citizen. He appears to have committed fraud in order to qualify for citizenship, and it is also unclear as to whether or not he met the time requirements to qualify to naturalized.
  He's a known criminal in Brazil. He's on the run from authorities there for check fraud, and potentially other financial crimes.
  He was broke during his time with the company that later turned out to be a Ponzi scheme and struggled to pay his rent. His landlord said he also trashed the apartment.
  He somehow loaned 700k to his campaign, despite being essentially broke. He then reported a meteoric rise in net wealth, from basically zero to $10 million in something like 2 years or less.
  He has lied about almost every aspect of his life. He claimed to be Jewish, but is not. He actually used the term "Jew-ish," meaning that some members of his ancestry were. But he is not actually.
  His mother apparently died in the towers on 9/11, despite succumbing to cancer apparently in 2016.
  He claims to be gay, despite being married to a woman for the purposes of qualifying for US citizenship.
  This guy needs to have his life torn apart and reconstructed by the FBI, and then charged with the litany of crimes he has committed in order to where he is today.
  And then he needs to have his citizenship revoked and sent packing back to Brazil where they can have their turn with him. >
  
  Boebert is another one with unexplained millions in the bank after struggling to pay property taxes. >
  
  Her money is easier to trace back to her husband getting a cushy consulting gig for oil companies, and then mad insider trading once she became a house rep.
  Boebert's pre-election run story is...interesting. She is alleged to have been a B roll talent model who doubled as an escort/sex worker. She is alleged to have been paid for sexual favors by Ted Cruz and another GOP party operative, while being scouted as a potential candidate for office. The allegations go so far as to claim she may have been paid by Cruz to get an abortion.
  It is also alleged that Cruz paid for the bulk of her 2020 primary chal, and his PAC supported her general election. The funds to reimburse her for her driving expenses while campaigning were almost exactly what it took to pay off the property taxes on her now defunct restaurant.
  The talent site where she pops up is the same site that the wine drunk moron who appeared in court with Rudy Giuliani in Michigan or Wisconsin also shows up on...I can't remember the details now, but there were several models in that site that ended up in the GOP's orbit. Maybe the spoiler candidate that showed up in Florida that cost the Democrat in Miami-Dade the election? It's an interesting coincidence, if nothing else. >
  
  Most of what you are recounting is wildly unsubstantiated.
  But it's so damn plausible. >
  
  That's why I heavily used the word alleged.
  It's a whole lot of very strange bits of information, rumors, hearsay, and the like. 
  But man does it paint a compelling picture of a woman who was scouted out for the job of insane right wing politician in order to swell the ranks of the MAGA faithful. >
  
  "People are saying..."