What’s the beef with Laura Loomer?

Just when you thought American political discourse couldn’t possibly sink any lower, along comes Laura Loomer’s deposition in her defamation of character case against Bill Maher. Last year, Maher made a joke/spread a rumor/talked trash about Loomer having sexual relations with Donald Trump (the comic used the F-word). Loomer filed suit – and somehow that suit has made it to the deposition stage. Cockburn feels a bit soiled at having read the whole 226-page document, but you can say this about Laura Loomer: She’s never dull.

Loomer claims she’s never been in room alone with Donald Trump, much less had sex with him, and that all of her contacts with him occur via text messages to his aides. She then accuses Maher’s chief lawyer, Katherine Bolger, of being a liberal Democratic activist and ActBlue supporter, setting the stage for hours of salaciously testy exchanges.

In the deposition, Loomer describes herself as an investigative journalist and defender of the First Amendment who dresses “very professionally,” and says that Maher is a perverted atheist who likes to harass women. Bolger and Maher’s other attorneys dredge the X swamp for some of Loomer’s more salacious moments. At one point they bring up a tweet from last year where Loomer claims that Marjorie Taylor-Greene “puts roast beef in her pants” – a crude reference to the Congresswoman’s nether regions:

Lawyer: What is your basis for saying she put Arby’s in her pants?
Loomer: She carries roast beef in her pockets.
Lawyer: What is your basis for saying she puts roast beef in her pockets and in her pants?
Loomer: Because I know she likes to eat at Arby’s.
Lawyer: Are you making a derogatory comment about her sex life by talking about Arby’s in her pants?
Loomer: No. I’m talking about Arby’s, the sandwiches.

The deposition also contains Loomer’s feverish imaginings about Kamala Harris’s sex life, in graphic detail. The attorneys have her read a tweet about Harris from last year: “I’ve heard everything her infested snatch touches also dies a miserable, painful death.”

“What is your source for the fact that she had an infested snatch?” Bolger asks.

“Well,” Loomer says, “‘snatch’ could mean many things, but –”

At this point Loomer’s attorney rejects on account of relevancy, which seems reasonable to ask regarding this whole sordid episode in American political history.

The deposition also contains a page-long discussion of Loomer calling Senator Lindsey Graham gay. On that topic, at least, she and Bill Maher can agree. The Senator has yet to comment.