Trumpling the Russia Investigation

[Grandpa's Spells]

Saudi Arabia completely cleaning house of Wahabists(exporters of terror and Clinton donors) while 30 some sealed indictments have piled up in DC

Do you think all 30 are for Jared or are other people involved?

[dead man walking]

this article is a couple minutes of good clean fun

Watching Carter Page immolate himself and incriminate a half dozen of his colleagues from the Trump-Putin 2016 campaign has been a strange, almost guilty pleasure. Profoundly disconnected, socially awkward, and reeking of late-stage virginity, he gives off the creepy Uncanny Valley vibe of a rogue, possibly murderous android or of a man with a too-extensive knowledge of human taxidermy and a soundproofed van.

Legal scholars watching Page’s borderline insane interviews, reviewing his bizarre public statements and reading the wackadoodle transcripts of his testimony to congressional investigators have expressed various levels of shock. His testimony this week must have dismayed his friends in Trump world; a long, rambling, performance art piece before the House which confirmed key sections of the Steele Dossier and opened up entirely new venues for investigation.

https://www.thedailybeast.com/the-stran ... lf-on-fire

[dead man walking]

curiously, this thread has gone quiet, even though we've recently learned donnie jr was corresponding with wikileaks and kushner received emails about wikileaks and had meetings with russians (which he studiously failed to disclose on security forms and to senate investigators).

so rather than the trump campaign having zero contact with the russians, as trump exclaimed many times, we've learned multiple campaign people interacted repeatedly with russians, with the goal of seeking dirt on hillary and getting help. and yet, we see seem indifferent to it all.

it is, however, time to take donnie jr's measurements for an orange jump suit. he violated campaign finance laws for, at least, seeking "something of value" from a foreign gov't (russia thru wiki) in a federal election.

and pls explain how a non-disclosing recidivist like kushner keeps his security clearance.

[Turdacious]

National Security Adviser H.R. McMaster mocked President Trump's intelligence at a private dinner with a powerful tech CEO, according to five sources with knowledge of the conversation.

Over a July dinner with Oracle CEO Safra Catz -- who has been mentioned as a candidate for several potential administration jobs -- McMaster bluntly trashed his boss, said the sources, four of whom told BuzzFeed News they heard about the exchange directly from Catz. The top national security official dismissed the president variously as an "idiot" and a "dope" with the intelligence of a "kindergartner," the sources said.

A sixth source who was not familiar with the details of the dinner told BuzzFeed News that McMaster had made similarly derogatory comments about Trump's intelligence to him in private, including that the president lacked the necessary brainpower to understand the matters before the National Security Council.

https://www.buzzfeed.com/josephbernstei ... .bskxL3Z0X

Now we have another story about Cohn straying from the light, and it comes courtesy of Senator Tom Carper. Speaking on CNN Wednesday, the Delaware Democrat recalled a recent conversation about tax reform between several administration officials, Cohn among them, and a handful of Democratic senators.

During the meeting, Trump called in from Asia and began talking, Carper said. After listening to the president ramble for far too long, Carper wanted to get back to the matter at hand.

“Fifteen minutes later the president is still talking and I said to Gary — we’re all sitting around this big square table and I said, Gary, why don’t you do this, why don’t you just take your cell phone back and just say ‘Mr. President, you’re brilliant but we’re losing contact and I think we’re gonna lose you now so good-bye.’ And that’s what he did, and he hung up,” Carper said.

CNN’s John Berman asked for clarification. Did Cohn actually pull the old “bad reception” trick and hang up on Trump? “Well, I wouldn’t — I don’t want to throw him under the bus,” Carper said. Then he did exactly that, adding, “But yes.”

http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/20 ... =feed-part

Amazing that Tillerson, McMaster, and Cohn still have their jobs.

[Turdacious]

In his telling, it was the 2011-2012 protests in Moscow that changed everything. Those protests, which Putin blamed on Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, spooked the Russian President, according to Skorobutov. "People were imprisoned. Media were taken under control of the State. Censorship introduced," he said. "It was a point of reflection for me. The state was against its people. Human freedoms, including freedom of speech, were gradually eliminated." (Others would note that this is a self-serving chronology, as Putin's dismantling of democracy began long before 2011, and that Skorobutov remained at state TV through the annexation of Crimea and the war in eastern Ukraine, when Russian media propaganda was especially noxious.)

After the suppression of the 2012 protests, Skorobutov said, he became increasingly disturbed by his role in "helping the state to create this new and unpleasant reality," resigned his job as the press secretary at the Russian Geographical Society, and began looking for a new job, but without any luck.

As is often the case with state censorship, the workings of Kremlin-controlled media, as Skorobutov described them, were far more subtle than is popularly imagined. He described a system that depended on a news staff that knew what issues to avoid and what issues to highlight rather than one that had every decision dictated to it. "We knew what is allowed or forbidden to broadcast," he explained. Any event that included Putin or the Russian Prime Minister "must be broadcast," while events such as "terroristic attacks, airplane crashes, arrests of politicians and officials" had to be approved by the news director or his deputy. He offered a list of embargoed subjects: "critique of the State, coming from inside or outside of Russia; all kinds of social protests, strikes, discontent of people and so on; political protests and opposition leaders, especially Alexey Navalny," an anti-corruption figure despised by the Kremlin. Skorobutov said that he overcame censorship rules and convinced his network to cover stories only twice: for a story about a protest against the construction of a Siberian chemical plant and for one about the food poisoning of children at a kindergarten.

During the 2016 election, the directions from the Kremlin were less subtle than usual. "Me and my colleagues, we were given a clear instruction: to show Donald Trump in a positive way, and his opponent, Hillary Clinton, in a negative way," he said in his speech. In a later interview, he explained to me how the instructions were relayed. "Sometimes it was a phone call. Sometimes it was a conversation," he told me. "If Donald Trump has a successful press conference, we broadcast it for sure. And if something goes wrong with Clinton, we underline it."

Skorobutov said in his speech that the pro-Trump perspective extended from Kremlin-controlled media to the Moscow élite.

"There was even a slogan among Russian political élite," he said. " 'Trump is our president.'

https://www.newyorker.com/news/our-colu ... 6-election
To me, the interesting thing is that nobody can demonstrate whether the Russian influence campaign was effective at changing anyone's mind-- nobody I know that was posting anti-Hillary stuff on Facebook was ever going to vote for her anyway.

[syaigh]

In his telling, it was the 2011-2012 protests in Moscow that changed everything. Those protests, which Putin blamed on Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, spooked the Russian President, according to Skorobutov. "People were imprisoned. Media were taken under control of the State. Censorship introduced," he said. "It was a point of reflection for me. The state was against its people. Human freedoms, including freedom of speech, were gradually eliminated." (Others would note that this is a self-serving chronology, as Putin's dismantling of democracy began long before 2011, and that Skorobutov remained at state TV through the annexation of Crimea and the war in eastern Ukraine, when Russian media propaganda was especially noxious.)

After the suppression of the 2012 protests, Skorobutov said, he became increasingly disturbed by his role in "helping the state to create this new and unpleasant reality," resigned his job as the press secretary at the Russian Geographical Society, and began looking for a new job, but without any luck.

As is often the case with state censorship, the workings of Kremlin-controlled media, as Skorobutov described them, were far more subtle than is popularly imagined. He described a system that depended on a news staff that knew what issues to avoid and what issues to highlight rather than one that had every decision dictated to it. "We knew what is allowed or forbidden to broadcast," he explained. Any event that included Putin or the Russian Prime Minister "must be broadcast," while events such as "terroristic attacks, airplane crashes, arrests of politicians and officials" had to be approved by the news director or his deputy. He offered a list of embargoed subjects: "critique of the State, coming from inside or outside of Russia; all kinds of social protests, strikes, discontent of people and so on; political protests and opposition leaders, especially Alexey Navalny," an anti-corruption figure despised by the Kremlin. Skorobutov said that he overcame censorship rules and convinced his network to cover stories only twice: for a story about a protest against the construction of a Siberian chemical plant and for one about the food poisoning of children at a kindergarten.

During the 2016 election, the directions from the Kremlin were less subtle than usual. "Me and my colleagues, we were given a clear instruction: to show Donald Trump in a positive way, and his opponent, Hillary Clinton, in a negative way," he said in his speech. In a later interview, he explained to me how the instructions were relayed. "Sometimes it was a phone call. Sometimes it was a conversation," he told me. "If Donald Trump has a successful press conference, we broadcast it for sure. And if something goes wrong with Clinton, we underline it."

Skorobutov said in his speech that the pro-Trump perspective extended from Kremlin-controlled media to the Moscow élite.

"There was even a slogan among Russian political élite," he said. " 'Trump is our president.'

https://www.newyorker.com/news/our-colu ... 6-election
To me, the interesting thing is that nobody can demonstrate whether the Russian influence campaign was effective at changing anyone's mind-- nobody I know that was posting anti-Hillary stuff on Facebook was ever going to vote for her anyway.

Could it have influenced the primaries? Not that we had a great group to choose from for that either . . . .

[nafod]

To me, the interesting thing is that nobody can demonstrate whether the Russian influence campaign was effective at changing anyone's mind-- nobody I know that was posting anti-Hillary stuff on Facebook was ever going to vote for her anyway.

I think you are missing the point. Politics is no longer about changing minds. It is about motivating the base. They are the easiest ones to lie to, because they are primed to believe anything.

[dead man walking]

just because you didn't conspire successfully doesn't mean you didn't conspire in the first place?

[Turdacious]

To me, the interesting thing is that nobody can demonstrate whether the Russian influence campaign was effective at changing anyone's mind-- nobody I know that was posting anti-Hillary stuff on Facebook was ever going to vote for her anyway.

I think you are missing the point. Politics is no longer about changing minds. It is about motivating the base. They are the easiest ones to lie to, because they are primed to believe anything.

So it's the loudest voters that matter instead of the politician who gets the most votes in teh states that matter?

[Turdacious]

just because you didn't conspire successfully doesn't mean you didn't conspire in the first place?

Was there a conspiracy to sway the election in one way or the other or a conspiracy to stir partisans up on both sides? The evidence seems stronger for the latter than the former. I'm not suggesting that the Ruskies aren't guilty of one if not both, just saying that the evidence for the former that's been released is a little weak.


This is the elephant in the room that nobody's talking about-- if Russian influence impacted African American voter participation in Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, and Michigan-- that probably would have materially impacted the election. Maybe this happened, but if it did Zuckerberg hasn't released the evidence.
http://www.mlive.com/news/index.ssf/201 ... le_we.html
https://mic.com/articles/159402/here-s- ... .ICsBl04YS

[Turdacious]

Although the North Korean nuclear crisis is the Trump administration’s top priority, the administration has yet to nominate an assistant secretary for East Asia or an ambassador to South Korea, crucial positions to deal with the issue.

In the midst of the war in Syria and growing worries over a possible conflict between Saudi Arabia and Iran, there is no confirmed assistant secretary for Near Eastern affairs or ambassadors to Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Jordan, Egypt or Qatar. And as Zimbabwe confronts the future after the departure of Robert Mugabe, the department is lacking a confirmed assistant secretary for African affairs or an ambassador to neighboring South Africa.

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/11/24/us/p ... pe=article

[Turdacious]

FLYNN: And you know why; and you know why? You know why we’re saying that? We’re saying that because if I, a guy who knows this business, if I did a tenth, a tenth of what she did, I would be in jail today. So — so, Crooked Hillary Clinton, leave this race now!

[Grandpa's Spells]

FLYNN: And you know why; and you know why? You know why we’re saying that? We’re saying that because if I, a guy who knows this business, if I did a tenth, a tenth of what she did, I would be in jail today. So — so, Crooked Hillary Clinton, leave this race now!

Fourth campaign staff member charged with a crime? Is that what we're up to?

And he's clearly cooperating at this point, which means others have to decide which side they want to stand on, given what Flynn knows.

[nafod]

I bet you Trump tries to mash the nuclear button but gets tackled by Kelly and choked out.

[Grandpa's Spells]

Flynn is saying he was acting on the orders of superiors. Lawyer comments say NFW does Flynn get this deal unless he is handing over POTUS or VPOTUS or both with something more than he said/he said. Not worth it for Jared. Seeing this thread linked on Reddit and elsewhere:
https://twitter.com/SethAbramson

LOL saw White House refer to Flynn as an Obama official.

[dead man walking]

for your reading pleasure:

[DrDonkeyLove]

So, for the sake of argument, if after the election during the transition Trump himself said to Flynn, "talk to the Russians and let them know that I think Obama's sanctions are bullshit and I'm considering ending them".

What law does that violate?

[nafod]

So, for the sake of argument, if after the election during the transition Trump himself said to Flynn, "talk to the Russians and let them know that I think Obama's sanctions are bullshit and I'm considering ending them".

What law does that violate?

Maybe nothing? Probably nothing?

It's the lying, stupid, to riff off of Clnton in a couple of different ways.

But really...Team Trump and The Russians had it going on weeelllll before election night.

[Grandpa's Spells]

So, for the sake of argument, if after the election during the transition Trump himself said to Flynn, "talk to the Russians and let them know that I think Obama's sanctions are bullshit and I'm considering ending them".

What law does that violate?

The Logan Act, but that's not what this is about. I don't think you're that thick but maybe the news sources you consume aren't pointing out some things.

The charging documents specify that the specific statements he's pleading to do not represent all the false statements he's made, merely enough to demonstrate that he committed a felony. Mueller is holding cards close to his vest.

Because:
1. They had him on other things, including apparently a kidnapping conspiracy.
2. He is cooperating.
3. He's not being charged with other things.

He's pleading down in exchange for things that make it a better deal for Mueller to not maximum charge Flynn. He is giving up something definitive on a bigger fish. Some prosecutors are pointing out you only do this when you are rolling up, not down or sideways. That means Pence, Trump, or both.

Had they thrown the book at Flynn, it would be because things stopped with an idiot retired general. Flynn's attorneys have convinced them they they will get bigger convictions out of what he has given them.

[DrDonkeyLove]

So, for the sake of argument, if after the election during the transition Trump himself said to Flynn, "talk to the Russians and let them know that I think Obama's sanctions are bullshit and I'm considering ending them".

What law does that violate?

The Logan Act, but that's not what this is about. I don't think you're that thick but maybe the news sources you consume aren't pointing out some things.

The charging documents specify that the specific statements he's pleading to do not represent all the false statements he's made, merely enough to demonstrate that he committed a felony. Mueller is holding cards close to his vest.

Because:
1. They had him on other things, including apparently a kidnapping conspiracy.
2. He is cooperating.
3. He's not being charged with other things.

He's pleading down in exchange for things that make it a better deal for Mueller to not maximum charge Flynn. He is giving up something definitive on a bigger fish. Some prosecutors are pointing out you only do this when you are rolling up, not down or sideways. That means Pence, Trump, or both.

Had they thrown the book at Flynn, it would be because things stopped with an idiot retired general. Flynn's attorneys have convinced them they they will get bigger convictions out of what he has given them.

Thanks for the update. Kidnapping!?

I haven't been paying much attention to Flynn/Russia and I'm not a fan of most special prosecutors from Ken Starr to Fitzgerald to Mueller.

I assume Donny will let the bus roll over anyone who's not family. For family, he'll fight back - unconventionally. IIRC Bill Clinton dropped a missile on a night watchman at a Somali aspirin factory when Starr was after him. Who knows what Trump is capable of?

Interesting times ahead.

[JimZipCode]

I'm not a fan of most special prosecutors from Ken Starr to Fitzgerald to Mueller.

Mueller seems a good deal more brisk and professional than the others.
(Not that Starr represents any kind of high bar.)

[nafod]

Nice quote...“Well, whatever Flynn knows, Bob Mueller now knows. And whatever Mueller now knows, eventually the country will know.”

[Grandpa's Spells]

"The president can't obstruct justice" seems like something you'd say when the president obstructed justice.

[JimZipCode]

20 years ago Republicans thought it was possible for the President to obstruct justice.

H.Res.611
105th Congress (1997-1998)
https://www.congress.gov/bill/105th-con ... lution/611

Article III: States that in his conduct while President of the United States, William Jefferson Clinton, in violation of his constitutional oath faithfully to execute the office of President of the United States and, to the best of his ability, preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States, and in violation of his constitutional duty to take care that the laws be faithfully executed, has prevented, obstructed, and impeded the administration of justice, and has to that end engaged personally, and through his subordinates and agents, in a course of conduct or scheme designed to delay, impede, cover up, and conceal the existence of evidence and testimony related to a Federal civil rights action brought against him in a duly instituted judicial proceeding.

Maybe they've changed their minds in the intervening time.

[Turdacious]

Donald Trump Jr. on Wednesday cited attorney-client privilege to avoid telling lawmakers about a conversation he had with his father, President Donald Trump, after news broke this summer that the younger Trump — and top campaign brass — had met with Russia-connected individuals in Trump Tower during the 2016 campaign.

Though neither Trump Jr. nor the president is an attorney, Trump Jr. told the House Intelligence Committee that there was a lawyer in the room during the discussion, according to the committee’s top Democrat, Rep. Adam Schiff of California. Schiff said he didn’t think it was a legitimate invocation of attorney-client privilege.

https://www.politico.com/story/2017/12/ ... ons-284841
I'm not sure what's funnier- the sack on Don Jr to pull this off, or that Schiff (who has a Harvard JD) appears not to know the bounds of attorney-client privilege.