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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsMelanie: Doomed. Dismissive. Defeated. Detached.
Former aide sees Melania Trump as 'the doomed French queen': bookBY DOMINICK MASTRANGELO
The Hill - 09/13/21
A former top aide reportedly describes former first lady Melania Trump as "the doomed French queen" in a new book set to be released next month.
Stephanie Grisham, who served as former President Trump's press sectary and was a leading aide to the former first lady, writes that she now sees Melania as the doomed French queen. Dismissive. Defeated. Detached," according to excerpts of her book obtained by Politico.
Grisham reportedly writes that she texted Melania Trump during the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol by her husband's supporters and asked her: Do you want to tweet that peaceful protests are the right of every American, but there is no place for lawlessness and violence?
No," the former first lady replied, Grisham revealed in the book, in which she relays how Melania Trump shared her husband's view that the 2020 presidential election was not conducted legitimately and said that something bad happened."
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https://thehill.com/homenews/571925-former-aide-sees-melania-trump-as-doomed-french-queen-book
Let them eat cake.
roamer65
(36,739 posts)The Magistrate
(95,237 posts)Botany
(70,281 posts)n/t
3Hotdogs
(12,202 posts)Id go $50 for a half hour but shed have to pay me in cash
Kid Berwyn
(14,642 posts)Champion Jack
(5,378 posts)Kid Berwyn
(14,642 posts)sop
(9,943 posts)schmoozing with low rent legislators while Melania was assigned to become First Mole. Sometimes life isn't fair.
lagomorph777
(30,613 posts)MineralMan
(146,189 posts)"Melanie" is a singer, famous for "I Got a Brand New Pair of Roller Skates"
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Melanie_Safka
Kid Berwyn
(14,642 posts)MineralMan
(146,189 posts)We're not idiots.
louis-t
(23,199 posts)Another good one. I think I was 13 when that song came out.
Polly Hennessey
(6,745 posts)He should know hes married to her, right?
Bernardo de La Paz
(48,773 posts)lagomorph777
(30,613 posts)Danmel
(4,892 posts)She hates it when people call that woman Melanie
CentralMass
(15,265 posts)Haggard Celine
(16,820 posts)Everyone knows it, too. Might as well be doing a show in Tijuana.
Kid Berwyn
(14,642 posts)Melania Trump's best friend is listed in a never-before-seen address book that apparently belonged to Jeffrey Epstein in 1997
Insider has obtained a never-seen-before address book that appears to have belonged to Jeffrey Epstein in the 1990s.
The book, which contains entries for 349 people, offers a window into the late pedophile's social circle a full decade prior to the era covered by his previously known "little black book." More than 200 names listed in the book did not appear in Epstein's later address book.
Prominent entries not previously associated with Epstein include Suzanne Ircha, Carl Icahn, John A. Catsimatidis, Morgan Fairchild, Sandy Warner, and Martin Peretz.
by Angela Wang
Business Insider, July 14, 2021
Suzanne Ircha, a close associate of Melania Trump, is listed in a previously unseen address book that apparently belonged to Jeffrey Epstein in the 1990s.
The address book, obtained by Insider, brings dozens of notable names into Epstein's network for the first time. It also traces previously reported relationships back to the 1990s.
Ircha, who now goes by Suzanne Johnson following her marriage to New York Jets owner Woody Johnson, is frequently described in the media as the best friend of Melania Trump. Her presence in Epstein's Rolodex adds to a web of known connections between the former First Lady, her husband, and the sex offender.
Ircha Johnson, an erstwhile actress who starred in two B-movies during a hiatus from the financial sector, formerly worked as an equities saleswoman at the investment bank Sandler O'Neill. Like Epstein, she started her finance career at Bear Stearns.
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https://www.businessinsider.com/melania-trumps-best-friend-suzanne-ircha-jeffrey-epsteins-address-book-2021-6
Haggard Celine
(16,820 posts)Thanks for the article; I hadn't seen it. The corruption in that family has layers and layers. I hope Mary Trump, the only respectable Trump, gets hold of some of this information and writes about it. She would be the perfect one to lay it all bare, especially after all they've done to her.
Kid Berwyn
(14,642 posts)Remember how the Dump inargral raised $107 million, yet maybe it was more?
New questions about Trump inauguration money raised in book 'Melania and Me'
Anna Schecter and Monica Alba
NBC News, 2 September 2020
Stephanie Winston Wolkoff suggests chaos in the inaugural committee might have allowed millions to go unaccounted for.
The woman who organized Trumps inauguration still has questions about where millions of dollars raised for the celebration went, and makes new allegations about how the Trump family tried to use the money to line its own pockets in her book Melania and Me, out Tuesday.
Stephanie Winston Wolkoff, a former close friend and confidant of the first lady, describes the chaotic weeks leading up to the January 2017 inauguration, including an anecdote in which she was told donations to the Presidential Inaugural Committee might have exceeded the $107 million reported on federal tax forms by several million dollars.
Honestly, the presidential inaugural committee is a s___ show, Winston Wolkoff says she told president-elect Trump and Melania at Trump Tower in New York as the inauguration neared. They are disorganized, incompetent, and cant produce the material we need.
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https://www.yahoo.com/now/questions-trump-inauguration-money-raised-161300717.html
Cant find how or if this issue was ever resolved. I do know I remember when a friend sends me $26 mill. Every penny.
PS: Agree totally. Mary Trump is proof not all the apples in that barrel are rotten.
Paladin
(28,202 posts)Antoinette established a home for unwed mothers, and sold the royal flatware to raise funds towards feeding starving French citizens during a famine. The idea of Melania doing anything remotely like that is laughable. Worst First Lady ever.
lagomorph777
(30,613 posts)Mike Nelson
(9,903 posts)... wouldn't "Russian queen" be a little closer?
Kid Berwyn
(14,642 posts)Is holiday red.
StarryNite
(9,363 posts)I expect them to start walking towards her or maybe running away from her.
Kid Berwyn
(14,642 posts)Cold Hands, Warm Heart, The Outer Limits
WA-03 Democrat
(3,017 posts)Kid Berwyn
(14,642 posts)Stephanie Winston Wolkoff releases another recording, in which the first lady calls Daniels the porn hooker
by Martin Pengelly
The Guardian, 5 October 2020
Stephanie Winston Wolkoff, a New York socialite turned author of a tell-all book about her relationship with Melania Trump, has released another recording of Americas first lady in embarrassingly candid conversation, this time discussing an adult film star accused of an affair with her husband.
Snip
Speaking to Cohen, Wolkoff said she had needed to let a reporter listen to the tapes, because [the White House] made sure that people didnt believe what I was saying once I had already been severed and accused of criminal activity.
The White House created a narrative, she added, because I didnt follow along with the one they wanted. That narrative, she said, was that the Trumps did not know about fundraising for the inaugural and any alleged improprieties.
Snip
Go Google and read it, the first lady says. Annie Leibovitz shot the porn hooker, and she will be [in] one of the issues, September or October.
Snip
Last week, the Trumps both announced they had contracted the coronavirus. On the same night, Wolkoff provided to CNN a recording of the first lady complaining about having to supervise White House decorations (Who gives a fuck about the Christmas stuff?) and being criticized over her husbands policy of separating migrant families (Give me a fucking break).
Source: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/oct/05/melania-trump-tapes-discusses-stormy-daniels
greatauntoftriplets
(175,694 posts)Marie Antoinette comes to mind. She was beheaded.
Kid Berwyn
(14,642 posts)greatauntoftriplets
(175,694 posts)Kid Berwyn
(14,642 posts)I can't unsee that!
greatauntoftriplets
(175,694 posts)smirkymonkey
(63,221 posts)maxsolomon
(32,975 posts)It's sad, sort of. Melania has always appeared to me as a victim of Trump's gaslighting and abuse. We'll see flashes of an actual human being under there, and then she chooses the side of her abuser again and again.
I don't think she reads - she appears to possess no information outside of the lies Trump & his courtiers invent.
"Detached" and "Defeated" sound about right. Depressed is probably another D word that applies.
Kid Berwyn
(14,642 posts)Jeffrey Epstein said he introduced her to Donald Trump.
Jeffrey Epstein boasted that he played matchmaker for Donald and Melania Trump, report says
After the 2016 election, financier tried to play up his connection to new president by saying he introduced him to his third wife
Source: NYT via MN
https://www.mercurynews.com/2019/07/10/jeffrey-epstein-boasted-that-he-played-matchmaker-for-donald-and-melania-trump-report-says/
"I've known Jeff for 15 years. Terrific guy. He's a lot of fun to be with. It is even said that he likes beautiful women as much as I do, and many of them are on the younger side." Donald J Trump
2naSalit
(86,035 posts)Screw her and the...
but she is the *$! he rode in on.
Kid Berwyn
(14,642 posts)TxGuitar
(4,146 posts)Nah. She's as nasty as he is, don't excuse her.
maxsolomon
(32,975 posts)Melania wanted to be a rich trophy wife, and not much beyond that. She does care about Baron, and kept the kid out of the spotlight.
To me, she radiates depression - the slapping away of Asshole's hand in public, the smiles immediately turning to frowns the second his attention is off her. She's unable to hide her unhappiness and thinks we can't see how much she hates him.
Whereas Trump is the worst person in America (I won't say the world because Putin & MBS exist) and a clinical Narcissistic Sociopath. He's a relentless gaslighter, and she's been as close to his toxic egoism as anyone, and when he's been under the most stress.
Ivana & Marla Maples are paid to keep their silence, but odds are they felt the same when they were with him.
ecstatic
(32,566 posts)She's not an abused victim. She's a grown, capable, and wealthy woman who has made her own decisions.
She's complicit and she enjoys mocking us the same way that her husband does. She chose anti-bullying as her platform while married to the world's biggest Internet troll. And remember the "I don't care, do you?" jacket she wore while visiting the caged kids on the border?
But even if what we've seen with our own eyes isn't enough, her closest confidants and employees have come forward to reveal her true character, and I believe them.
maxsolomon
(32,975 posts)I remember the jacket, of course, and I'm still not sure WTF it meant to her.
But as far as reprehensible Trump enablers go, she's way down the list. I still want to see her snap out of it and divorce the fucker, but that prenup must be airtight or her depression must be overwhelming. She's sticking it out until his death, apparently. Hope she doesn't have to wait too long.
2naSalit
(86,035 posts)Kid Berwyn
(14,642 posts)Melanias reporting of the events of January 6, however, made me want to share. Seems they swim in a shallow sea of disinformation.
Melania Trump said 'no' when given chance to call for peace on January 6, sources say
By Kate Bennett, CNN
Updated 11:39 AM ET, Mon September13, 2021
Then-first lady Melania Trump declined to call for peace and non-violence as insurrectionists stormed the United States Capitol building on January 6, two sources with knowledge of the events of the day told CNN.
The sources told CNN that Trump's aide Stephanie Grisham sent her a text that said, "Do you want to tweet that peaceful protests are the right of every American, but there is no place for lawlessness and violence?" to which Trump replied with one word: "No." Grisham details the account in her upcoming book titled "I'll Take Your Questions Now," according to portions published in Politico on Monday.
CNN reported in January that Trump was at the White House during the insurrection, overseeing a photo shoot of a carpet she had installed. At no time on January 6 did Trump call off the photo shoot, nor did she publicly speak out in any way about the atrocities being committed by supporters of her husband, President Donald Trump, two miles away on Capitol Hill, even as barricades were torn down and attackers entered the Capitol building.
It was not until January 11, five days after the insurrection, that Trump in part condemned the violence.
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https://www.cnn.com/2021/09/13/politics/stephanie-grisham-melania-trump-january-6/index.html
I feel like Lee Van Cleef after reading what he had to do in The Good, the Bad and the Ugly.
Retrograde
(10,068 posts)Is Grisham really that tonedeaf? Is she really going give this title to the memoir of a press secretary who never held a press conference?
Kid Berwyn
(14,642 posts)As with most who worked in the last administration, she seems unqualified for the job. Perhaps shes an excellent writer.
Jonathan Swan reported she plans to expose explosive secrets of the Drumpf$.
https://www.axios.com/scoop-the-most-dangerous-trump-expose-eb3a05e1-05d8-4b04-be38-a159a4f58713.html
2naSalit
(86,035 posts)Can't forget the background activities either.
Kid Berwyn
(14,642 posts)You are welcome, 2naSalit! Here are some things from the backstorys treacherous parts:
Melania Trump Was Alerted to January 6th Violence Earlier Than Thought According to Stephanie Grisham Tell-All
by Colby Hall
Mediate, 13 September 2021
Former First Lady Melania Trump was alerted to the violent insurrection unfolding at the Capitol on January 6th, an hour before her husband, Former President Donald Trump, tweeted encouragement to those rioting at the US Capitol.
This report comes from Politico Playbook, which sourced this from a new tell-all book from Ms. Trumps then-Chief of Staff Stephanie Grisham, who also served as White House Press Secretary under President Trump.
Politico obtained a copy of Grishams forthcoming book, Ill Take Your Questions Now: What I Saw in The Trump White House, set for an October 5th release date from publisher HarperCollins.
Politico reports:
At 1:25 p.m. on Jan. 6, soon after rioters had broken through barricades outside of the Capitol, MELANIA TRUMP received a text message from her then-chief of staff, STEPHANIE GRISHAM.
Do you want to tweet that peaceful protests are the right of every American, but there is no place for lawlessness and violence? Grisham asked the first lady.
A minute later, Melania replied with a one-word answer: No. At that moment, she was at the White House preparing for a photo shoot of a rug she had selected, according to exclusive excerpts of Grishams forthcoming book, Ill Take Your Questions Now: What I Saw in The Trump White House, obtained by POLITICO.
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https://www.mediaite.com/donald-trump/melania-trump-was-alerted-to-january-6th-violence-earlier-than-thought-according-to-stephanie-grisham-tell-all/
I dont like to pick on Melania, per se, but shes in the treason up to her manicured eyebrows.
KG
(28,749 posts)Kid Berwyn
(14,642 posts)For me, its the treason. Take
The MAGAmorphosis, where Things get scary sick, scary fast.
The Final Lesson Donald Trump Never Learned From Roy Cohn
The unrepentant political hitman who taught a younger Trump how to flout the rules didnt get away with it forever.
By MICHAEL KRUSE
Politico, September 19, 2019
One of Donald Trumps most important mentors, one of the most reviled men in American political history, is about to have another moment.
Roy Cohn, who has been described by people who knew him as a snake, a scoundrel and a new strain of son of a bitch, is the subject of a new documentary out this week from producer and director Matt Tyrnauer. Its an occasion to once again look at Cohn and ask how much of him and his savage, abrasive and amoral behavior is visible in the behavior of the current president. Trump, as has been well-established, learned so much from the truculent, unrepentant Cohn about how to get what he wants, and he pines for Cohn and his notorious capabilities still. Trump, after all, reportedly has said so himself, and its now the name of this film: Wheres My Roy Cohn?
What Cohn could, and did, get away with was the very engine of his existence. The infamous chief counsel for the red-baiting, Joseph McCarthy-chaired Senate subcommittee in the 1950s, Cohn was indicted four times from the mid-60s to the early 70sfor stock-swindling and obstructing justice and perjury and bribery and conspiracy and extortion and blackmail and filing false reports. And three times he was acquittedthe fourth ended in a mistrialgiving him a kind of sneering, sinister sheen of invulnerability. Cohn, Tyrnauers work reaffirms, took his sanction-skirting capers and twisted them into a sort of suit of armor.
Snip...
I decided long ago, Cohn once told Penthouse, to make my own rules.
He was acquitted in 64, and he was acquitted in 69, and he was acquitted in 71, all the while thumbing his nose at the feds, but Cohns screw-you stance was a lifelong philosophy, entitlement plus boldness.
He was an incredibly spoiled princeling of an only child, Cohn cousin David Lloyd Marcus told me. He always got his way, recalled his favorite aunt. As an adult, the resting expression on his face, which was marred by a scar that ran like a scrape down the middle of his nose, was a mixture of arrogant disdain and a whipped-dog look, people observed, caught somewhere between a pout and a challenging glare.
Continues...
https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2019/09/19/roy-cohn-donald-trump-documentary-228144
An important picture that ties things from commie-hunting Joe McCarthy era to Richard Nixon to Ronald Reagan to Donald Trump via Roger Stone and Associates and the late Jeffrey Epstein:
The Ghost of Roy Cohn
BY TERRY MELANSON · AUGUST 24, 2014
EXCERPT...
In an interview with former NYPD detective James Rothstein, this author discovered that such operations do exist and go far back into Americas secret history. Rothstein is no conspiracy theorist. He is a legend in American law enforcement and speaks from experience. Furthermore, he gave me two notable examples from his time as a detective. Rothstein had an opportunity to have a sit-down with infamous McCarthy committee counsel Roy Cohn. During this sit-down, Cohn admitted to Rothstein that he was part of a rather elaborate sexual blackmail operation that compromised politicians with child prostitutes (Rothstein, no pagination). Cohn told Rothstein that this operation was being carried out as part of the anticommunist crusade of the time (no pagination).
Rothstein also had an opportunity to speak to infamous Watergate burglar Frank Sturgis. During this conversation, Sturgis revealed one of the reasons for breaking into the Watergate. According to Sturgis, there was a Pedophile Book hidden away at the Democratic National Committee headquarters (no pagination). The book was supposed to have a list of pedophiles on the American political scene (no pagination). One can only imagine the power G. Gordon Liddy would have held over the government if he had such a book in his possession.
I asked Rothstein if Roy Cohn was a real anticommunist or just using the fear of communism to justify his sex ring. It seemed like a fair question. After all, Cohn had argued against homosexuals being schoolteachers when he himself was a homosexual. Perhaps Cohns hypocrisy extended to his anticommunism. Rothstein made it clear that Cohn was a genuine anticommunist (no pagination). Anticommunist sentiments aside, evidence suggests that the sex ring operation started by Cohn was used for more than fighting the threat of domestic communists. Fugitive ex-CIA officer Frank Terpil has claimed that sexual blackmailing operations directed by the CIA were intensive in Washington during the Watergate era (DeCamp 179). Terpil also asserts that his former partner, Ed Wilson, was coordinating one of these sexual blackmail operations (179). In a letter to author Jim Hougan, Terpil revealed Wilsons modus operandi:
Historically, one of Wilsons Agency jobs was to subvert members of both houses [of Congress] by any means necessary . Certain people could be easily coerced by living out their sexual fantasies in the flesh . A remembrance of these occasions [was] permanently recorded via selected cameras . The technicians in charge of filming were TSD [Technical Services Division of the CIA]. The unwitting porno stars advanced in their political careers, some of [whom] may still be in office. (Qtd. in DeCamp 179)
According to John DeCamp, a former Nebraska Senator and Vietnam War hero, Wilsons operation was merely a continuation of the one set up by Cohn (179). When I asked James Rothstein if Palfreys outfit was a continuation of the sexual blackmail rings that began with Cohn, he answered in the affirmative (Rothstein, pagination). The NYPD veteran made it clear that Palfreys outfit could not exist in Washington unless it was a tool for the power elite and sinister factions of the intelligence community (no pagination). Somewhere in a Queens cemetery, the corpse of a high-powered attorney is smiling in his grave.
SOURCE:
https://www.conspiracyarchive.com/2014/08/24/the-ghost-of-roy-cohn/
The same Roy Cohn who taught Donald Drumpf also schooled Roger Stone and Jeffrey Epstein...
... Who knew what when? In Palo Alto, after Epsteins conviction, he was a guest at a dinner for the MIT neuroscientist Ed Boyden that was hosted by LinkedIn co-founder Reid Hoffman. At the same dinner Elon Musk introduced Epstein to Mark Zuckerberg. Is money so powerful that it tramples all other considerations? As James Baldwin put it, I cant believe what you say, because I see what you do.
One of the most remarkable moments in Tyrnauers documentary comes near the end, when its no longer possible to pretend that Cohn isnt a liar and a fraud, when its no longer possible to deny that he lacks both shame and conscience. When Cohn was about to be disbarred in 1986 for defrauding his clients and for taking advantage of a dying and incompetent man, character witnesses began to emerge. There were letters to the court from William F. Buckley Jr., Barbara Walters, William Safire, and, of course, Trump, who wrote that Cohn has been extremely loyal and extremely honest. Were Cohns partieswas his protectionreally that good?...
Source: https://www.townandcountrymag.com/society/money-and-power/a29130905/roy-cohn-documentary-wheres-my-roy-cohn/
Its conceivable Matt Gaetz got some learnin, too.
Link to tweet
At the end of the investigations and the day, I hope America remembers Trump is owned by Putin.
When Dirty Russian-Connected Money Saved Trumps Ass and His Ensuing Business Disasters Helped Destroy the Global and American Economies
September 27, 2020
Brian E. Frydenborg
As Trumps taxes return to the news, here is the parallel context and setup where he went from failure on the verge of collapse to being propped up by money connected to Putins Russian government and the Russian mafia and then to failing repeatedly and spectacularly in those related business ventures, but in ways that allowed him to hide the dire straits of his finances and run as a successful billionaire for president in 2015-2016. And, oh, he managed to fail in these ventures in ways that helped to bring on the global financial crises and Americas Great Recession of 2008. As the house of cards image of Trump lied and cheated his way to building up comes tumbling down, a detailed look at that shady time when Trump was boosted by dirty Russian-connected money is essential.
Source: https://realcontextnews.com/when-dirty-russian-connected-money-saved-trumps-ass-and-his-ensuing-business-disasters-helped-destroy-the-global-and-american-economies/
May Semion Mogilevich soon become a household name.
Champp
(2,114 posts)And then tried to bullshit everyone into "believing" she was worthy of helping to lead America.
She was not.
KentuckyWoman
(6,666 posts)It boggles the mind.
Grammy23
(5,807 posts)Do they understand what that means. Posing provocatively on an airplane wing is not classy. Posing in the nude with a sultry look is not classy. I wonder how many people who think she is the epitome of class and grace have seen her portfolio? Would they still think the same way about her? She traded her soul for a handful of beans.
kskiska
(27,040 posts)Hekate
(90,189 posts)He was seated in a fancy convertible. He had an airplane. He had a beautiful sexy wife. He had impregnated her. He could make her do anything he told her to do, including pose naked on his jet in fck-me shoes while 7 months pregnant.
It was all about him. Me, me, me, me, look at me. Look at my potency and mastery.
Eugene
(61,592 posts)Kid Berwyn
(14,642 posts)He kept calling John Bolton, "Michael Bolton" for some reason.
From Inside Edition:
The FBI dossier states that Maples former publicist, Chuck Jones, testified in court that she had bought singer Michael Bolton back to her room following Trump's departure for a West Coast trip.
https://www.insideedition.com/did-marla-maples-cheat-donald-trump-michael-bolton-51740
Johnny2X2X
(18,731 posts)Just rotten to the core, not an ounce of compassion or humanity in her entire person.
Kid Berwyn
(14,642 posts)I still hope for redemption, my own included.
ZonkerHarris
(24,155 posts)Kid Berwyn
(14,642 posts)While I wouldnt suggest that term, I can understand how self-respect can be difficult when one takes into account reality.
ZonkerHarris
(24,155 posts)SharonClark
(10,005 posts)deplorable
dumb
dense
devolved
dastardly
despicable
and she's still in the "D"s!
Kid Berwyn
(14,642 posts)Five Ds of manipulation:
Deny. Degrade. Disrupt. Deceive. Destroy.
And Do. As in, Control what they think and youll control what they do.
marble falls
(56,354 posts)Kid Berwyn
(14,642 posts)I, for one, enjoy reading information that fills in the actions of the treasonous conspiracy that occupied the White House for four years.
llashram
(6,265 posts)of the lowest class. She carries no status to be proud of. She's base, dull and unworthy of the title First Lady. I've seen her photos. Sad America fell to such a low level with her, her husband, their grifter family. And with his administration and advisors.
Kid Berwyn
(14,642 posts)Dump was a never-was has-been when his fortunes changed via a 15-year run on reality television and a supposed offer to put up a franchised hotel in Red Square.
His voters were duped, but not in the way they imagine. As has become tradition since Nixon, its up to us Democrats to fix the Republicans mess.