The Trump Presidency :::

Boloni86 · Mar 21, 2017

bballshawn said: ↑

This has everything to do with Hillary and the unwilliness for the left to accept the fact that their crappy candidate lost them the election and not Russia.
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This is just not true at all. There's no question that Trump gets little benefit of the doubt from liberals. But that has nothing to do with Hillary. It has everything to do with Trump.

Polls suggest that 40%+ of Americans strongly disapprove of Trump. Which is unheard of. Most presidents in their first years are around 10-25% strong disapproval. We didn't get to that point because we're sooooo in love with Hillary. We got to this point because Trump has launched a culture war on us. At no point has he shown a desire to lead the country. He's only interested in leading his base and pitting his base against everyone else. Why would we give the benefit of the doubt to someone who seems to make it his mission to destroy and dehumanize us at every turn?

The Jitty Slitter · Mar 21, 2017

Gamecock14 said: ↑

Listening and understanding seems to be hard for a lot of people.
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When confronted with the evidence they will double down on Trump love and betray their country.

The worse the evidence, the more extreme their beliefs will become.

The Jitty Slitter · Mar 21, 2017

bballshawn said: ↑

This has everything to do with Hillary
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Fascinating

When confronted with the evidence, the subject doubles down on blaming Clinton.

The Jitty Slitter · Mar 21, 2017

Meanwhile in corruption updates

Why should she have this? She has no accountability to the American people, but gets a gov't phone, office and access to classified intel? https://t.co/XW9Fk4lhvq
— Nope. (@JoyAnnReid) March 21, 2017

White/Blue_since1860 · Mar 21, 2017

Angie is sending Schweini as a Trojan horse to the US

The Jitty Slitter · Mar 21, 2017

POTUS daughter with no official role, no accountability to the people of the US, but access to classified intel and a seat at the table with Merkel and major German CEOs just last week.

…and here’s Ivanka Trump just days before Russia annexed Crimea, partying with wife of Abramovich, Putins bud who owns the co providing steel for Keystone.
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The Jitty Slitter · Mar 21, 2017

superdave said: ↑

Did we really learn anything NEW from the Comey hearings? GOPS in the House are ride or die for Trump. Trump is an insecure narcissistic sociopath who live tweeted the hearings. Obama didn't wiretap Trump. The IC is investigating links between Russia and the Trump campaign. They don't have any clear evidence of collusion yet.

Water is wet. The sun rises in the East.

Yes, he criticizes Fox.
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I don't think this is true because we don't know exactly what they hold and the FBI need to build an evidential case, not merely an intel case.

See for example Roger Stone

We know (thanks in part to leaks on Twitter) that the FBI gained a warrant against a US citizen to capture his DMs on Twitter. (The warrant was addressed to Twitter General Legal Counsel).

Putting 2+2 together, this was likely Stone communicating with Gucifer - a know Russian intelligence Asset. That's how they communicated, and how they coordinated on Podesta.

So there you have an intelligence case straight up - and no doubt US CI have more than this, as part of their general operations

But how would you make this a prosecutable case against Stone, in order to roll him up?

This depends what he said.

So I think the FBI have very clear evidence of collusion - and no doubt enough to haul Stone in.

But is it orange jump suit time?

And from a Intelligence perspective, sending Stone to prison - a mere go between - is not the game in town compared with the compromising of the White House.

The Jitty Slitter · Mar 21, 2017

As mentioned before, Trump's victory had not much to do with "clever Facebook marketing" which every business uses as it had to do with a vast botnet financed by Russia

Operatives for Russia appear to have strategically timed the computer commands, known as “bots,” to blitz social media with links to the pro-Trump stories at times when the billionaire businessman was on the defensive in his race against Democrat Hillary Clinton, these sources said.

The bots’ end products were largely millions of Twitter and Facebook posts carrying links to stories on conservative internet sites such as Breitbart News and InfoWars, as well as on the Kremlin-backed RT News and Sputnik News, the sources said. Some of the stories were false or mixed fact and fiction, said the sources, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the bot attacks are part of an FBI-led investigation into a multifaceted Russian operation to influence last year’s elections.

As we saw, the results of that was Trumpkins running here to tell us how Podesta abducted Maddie Mccann

Such an operation is enormously expensive - especially because large numbers of human trolls were also deployed and continue to be active.

Russia also used “trolls,” hundreds of computer operatives who pretended to be Trump supporters and posted stories or comments on the internet complimentary to Trump or disparaging to Clinton. Sources close to the inquiry said those operatives likely worked from a facility in St. Petersburg, Russia, dedicated to that tactic.

For example, not even the US largest consumer facing companies have even a fraction of this kind of firepower

IMO this stuff was possibly more significant than the podesta hack

http://www.mcclatchydc.com/news/politics-government/white-house/article139695453.html

The Jitty Slitter · Mar 21, 2017

Backstory: FBI is well aware Daddy was refloated with dirty russian money.

Many of the deals you can ready about in the financial newspapers over the years

Russians saved Don when he bombed out in RE. They own him. He will go down with the Kremlin ship. Won't be pretty.https://t.co/0JQ9Ej0wOr
— John Schindler (@20committee) March 21, 2017

Trump's ties 2 Russia = $. Ton of spy shit but it's really about $ -- which Donnie couldn't earn outside reality TV.https://t.co/qrMjXDCzjn
— John Schindler (@20committee) March 21, 2017

The Jitty Slitter · Mar 21, 2017

More on Red Donny vs "The Cousins"

Putin's influence is far from over when Daddy is still tweeting Kremlin misinfo

Donald Trump’s White House Is Pushing Kremlin Storyline

A bit of digging has revealed that the main “intelligence source” for Napolitano’s dishonest claim was none other than Larry Johnson, a notorious figure in espionage and security circles

...

He then headed where angry failures in the West go when they are shut out of even fringe outlets at home: the Kremlin. Johnson reinvented himself as a regular on RT, Putin’s propaganda network, finding a home among the stable of freaks and rejects who get airtime on Moscow’s outlet. Since RT features avowed neo-Nazis and even an Illuminati correspondent as regulars, it can’t be said that Johnson is their most outlandish talking head.

...

Significantly, on March 5—the day after the president unleashed his “wiretapping” tweetstorm—Johnson went on RT to float his latest conspiracy theory, that President Obama illegally monitored Donald Trump and his entourage last year, co-opting IC leadership in secret efforts to derail the Republican nominee. On air, Johnson explicitly pointed the finger at British intelligence in this plot, repeatedly referring to GCHQ as the alleged culprit—though he laughably kept calling it “GHCQ.”

This, then, is the origin of the fact-free assertion that the Brits spied on Trump for Obama: a perfect example of the RT to Fox News to White House chain of lies.

http://observer.com/2017/03/donald-trump-wiretapping-kremlin-disinformation/

roadkit · Mar 21, 2017

American Brummie said: ↑

I'll say it again and again.

We need to have a serious conversation about whether we ever let Trump voters vote again.
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Let's have a serious conversation about what kind of country we'd have to live in where we can disenfranchise voters in lots of categories.
Maybe we can start with the Venezuela or Zimbabwe models.
Or maybe Hawaii under the "Bayonet Constitution" -- enforce economic and literacy thresholds to keep the poor and stupid from voting?

The Jitty Slitter · Mar 21, 2017

roadkit said: ↑

Let's have a serious conversation about what kind of country we'd have to live in where we can disenfranchise voters in lots of categories.
Maybe we can start with the Venezuela or Zimbabwe models.
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I still believe it went wrong in the primaries

The utter systemic failure of the GOP led to it being hijacked by an utterly inappropriate, unqualified and criminal candidate.

Meanwhile the DNC was captured by the somewhat grey collar Clintons. It was too easy to turn the public against her (cf Obama's clean rep in 2008).

If the primaries don't deliver quality candidates then what hope is there for the general?

roadkit · Mar 21, 2017

The Jitty Slitter said: ↑

I still believe it went wrong in the primaries

The utter systemic failure of the GOP led to it being hijacked by an utterly inappropriate, unqualified and criminal candidate.

Meanwhile the DNC was captured by the somewhat grey collar Clintons. It was too easy to turn the public against her (cf Obama's clean rep in 2008).

If the primaries don't deliver quality candidates then what hope is there for the general?
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I agree. It's all on Priebus in my opinion. He should've prevented Trump from running as a Republican in the first place -- but he was more worried about an independent run that would've pulled votes from the eventual GOP nominee.

American Brummie · Mar 21, 2017

roadkit said: ↑

Let's have a serious conversation about what kind of country we'd have to live in where we can disenfranchise voters in lots of categories.
Maybe we can start with the Venezuela or Zimbabwe models.
Or maybe Hawaii under the "Bayonet Constitution" -- enforce economic and literacy thresholds to keep the poor and stupid from voting?
Click to expand...

Do you trust Trump voters to drive cars? Do you trust Trump voters to have children? Do you trust them to make life-or-death decisions for you? If you cannot answer "yes" to these questions, then we have a problem. Trump voters elected George W. Bush twice and Donald Trump once. They chose a man who has very clearly been bribed or blackmailed by the Russian government, a man who in all likelihood committed treason against the United States, just so they wouldn't have to vote for a woman. They chose a man who has already grifted millions of dollars from the government to fly his family on expensive vacations in the first two months of his presidency. They chose a man who invaded a sovereign nation for no reason, re-elected him, and then decided they would rather vote for the Republicans again instead of voting for a black man.

I do not trust these people to drive cars. I do not trust them to bear children. I would not trust them with life-or-death decisions on my behalf. I cannot possibly trust them to vote.

Everyone who sees this "administration" collapsing needs to seriously ask themselves why we let people perpetually place this country on the brink of disaster. I'm in favor of democracy. If Trump voters really want to keep voting, let them form a new country. But stop destroying mine.

The Jitty Slitter · Mar 21, 2017

Comey suggests Russians "will be coming back" to interfere with 2018 & 2020 U.S. elections.
— John Bresnahan (@bresreports) March 20, 2017

Of course the Putinbotnet, wikileaks and RIS have not stopped interfering in US politics since november

And Putin now holds the power to destroy the Trump admin.

Indeed, in many respects he already did that.

Cascarino's Pizzeria · Mar 21, 2017

White/Blue_since1860 said: ↑

Angie is sending Schweini as a Trojan horse to the US
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New rule - if you have more than a dozen letters in your name you can't come in the US

Cascarino's Pizzeria · Mar 21, 2017

American Brummie said: ↑

Do you trust Trump voters to drive cars? Do you trust Trump voters to have children? Do you trust them to make life-or-death decisions for you? If you cannot answer "yes" to these questions, then we have a problem. Trump voters elected George W. Bush twice and Donald Trump once. They chose a man who has very clearly been bribed or blackmailed by the Russian government, a man who in all likelihood committed treason against the United States, just so they wouldn't have to vote for a woman. They chose a man who has already grifted millions of dollars from the government to fly his family on expensive vacations in the first two months of his presidency. They chose a man who invaded a sovereign nation for no reason, re-elected him, and then decided they would rather vote for the Republicans again instead of voting for a black man.

I do not trust these people to drive cars. I do not trust them to bear children. I would not trust them with life-or-death decisions on my behalf. I cannot possibly trust them to vote.

Everyone who sees this "administration" collapsing needs to seriously ask themselves why we let people perpetually place this country on the brink of disaster. I'm in favor of democracy. If Trump voters really want to keep voting, let them form a new country. But stop destroying mine.
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I prefer to use the Economic Insecurity excuse that the media was peddling in 2016. That conveniently gives Whitelandia a pass and ignores 350 years of American history.

charlie15 · Mar 21, 2017

Cris 09 said: ↑

Read this and tell me again if it is mythical.
Read this and tell me there is no evidence.
Read this and tell me there is nothing there.

"In early July, Carter Page, someone candidate Trump identified as one of his national security advisors, travels to Moscow on a trip approved by the Trump campaign. While in Moscow, he gives a speech critical of the United States and other western countries for what he believes is a hypocritical focus on democratization and efforts to fight corruption.

According to Christopher Steele, a former British intelligence officer who is reportedly held in high regard by U.S. Intelligence, Russian sources tell him that Page has also had a secret meeting with Igor Sechin (SEH-CHIN), CEO of Russian gas giant Rosneft. Sechin is reported to be a former KGB agent and close friend of Putin’s. According to Steele’s Russian sources, Page is offered brokerage fees by Sechin on a deal involving a 19 percent share of the company. According to Reuters, the sale of a 19.5 percent share in Rosneft later takes place, with unknown purchasers and unknown brokerage fees.

Also, according to Steele’s Russian sources, the Trump campaign is offered documents damaging to Hillary Clinton, which the Russians would publish through an outlet that gives them deniability, like Wikileaks. The hacked documents would be in exchange for a Trump Administration policy that de-emphasizes Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and instead focuses on criticizing NATO countries for not paying their fare share – policies which, even as recently as the President’s meeting last week with Angela Merkel, have now presciently come to pass.

In the middle of July, Paul Manafort, the Trump campaign manager and someone who was long on the payroll of Pro-Russian Ukrainian interests, attends the Republican Party convention. Carter Page, back from Moscow, also attends the convention. According to Steele, it was Manafort who chose Page to serve as a go-between for the Trump campaign and Russian interests. Ambassador Kislyak, who presides over a Russian embassy in which diplomatic personnel would later be expelled as likely spies, also attends the Republican Party convention and meets with Carter Page and additional Trump Advisors JD Gordon and Walid Phares. It was JD Gordon who approved Page’s trip to Moscow. Ambassador Kislyak also meets with Trump campaign national security chair and now Attorney General Jeff Sessions. Sessions would later deny meeting with Russian officials during his Senate confirmation hearing.

Just prior to the convention, the Republican Party platform is changed, removing a section that supports the provision of “lethal defensive weapons” to Ukraine, an action that would be contrary to Russian interests. Manafort categorically denies involvement by the Trump campaign in altering the platform. But the Republican Party delegate who offered the language in support of providing defensive weapons to Ukraine states that it was removed at the insistence of the Trump campaign. Later, JD Gordon admits opposing the inclusion of the provision at the time it was being debated and prior to its being removed.

Later in July, and after the convention, the first stolen emails detrimental to Hillary Clinton appear on Wikileaks. A hacker who goes by the moniker Guccifer 2.0 claims responsibility for hacking the DNC and giving the documents to Wikileaks. But leading private cyber security firms including CrowdStrike, Mandiant, and ThreatConnect review the evidence of the hack and conclude with high certainty that it was the work of APT28 and APT29, who were known to be Russian intelligence services. The U.S. Intelligence community also later confirms that the documents were in fact stolen by Russian intelligence and Guccifer 2.0 acted as a front. Also in late July, candidate Trump praises Wikileaks, says he loves them, and openly appeals to the Russians to hack his opponents’ emails, telling them that they will be richly rewarded by the press.

On August 8th, Roger Stone, a longtime Trump political advisor and self-proclaimed political dirty trickster, boasts in a speech that he “has communicated with Assange,” and that more documents would be coming, including an “October surprise.” In the middle of August, he also communicates with the Russian cutout Guccifer 2.0, and authors a Breitbart piece denying Guccifer’s links to Russian intelligence. Then, later in August, Stone does something truly remarkable, when he predicts that John Podesta’s personal emails will soon be published. “Trust me, it will soon be Podesta’s time in the barrel. #Crooked Hillary.”

In the weeks that follow, Stone shows a remarkable prescience: “I have total confidence that @wikileaks and my hero Julian Assange will educate the American people soon. #Lockherup. “Payload coming,” he predicts, and two days later, it does. Wikileaks releases its first batch of Podesta emails. The release of John Podesta’s emails would then continue on a daily basis up to election day.

On Election Day in November, Donald Trump wins. Donald Trump appoints one of his high profile surrogates, Michael Flynn, to be his national security advisor. Michael Flynn has been paid by the Kremlin’s propaganda outfit, RT, and other Russian entities in the past. In December, Michael Flynn has a secret conversation with Ambassador Kislyak about sanctions imposed by President Obama on Russia over its hacking designed to help the Trump campaign. Michael Flynn lies about this secret conversation. The Vice President, unknowingly, then assures the country that no such conversation ever happened. The President is informed Flynn has lied, and Pence has misled the country. The President does nothing. Two weeks later, the press reveals that Flynn has lied and the President is forced to fire Mr. Flynn. The President then praises the man who lied, Flynn, and castigates the press for exposing the lie.

Now, is it possible that the removal of the Ukraine provision from the GOP platform was a coincidence? Is it a coincidence that Jeff Sessions failed to tell the Senate about his meetings with the Russian Ambassador, not only at the convention, but a more private meeting in his office and at a time when the U.S. election was under attack by the Russians? Is it a coincidence that Michael Flynn would lie about a conversation he had with the same Russian Ambassador Kislyak about the most pressing issue facing both countries at the time they spoke – the U.S. imposition of sanctions over Russian hacking of our election designed to help Donald Trump? Is it a coincidence that the Russian gas company Rosneft sold a 19 percent share after former British Intelligence Officer Steele was told by Russian sources that Carter Page was offered fees on a deal of just that size? Is it a coincidence that Steele’s Russian sources also affirmed that Russia had stolen documents hurtful to Secretary Clinton that it would utilize in exchange for pro-Russian policies that would later come to pass? Is it a coincidence that Roger Stone predicted that John Podesta would be the victim of a Russian hack and have his private emails published, and did so even before Mr. Podesta himself was fully aware that his private emails would be exposed?

Is it possible that all of these events and reports are completely unrelated, and nothing more than an entirely unhappy coincidence? Yes, it is possible. But it is also possible, maybe more than possible, that they are not coincidental, not disconnected and not unrelated, and that the Russians used the same techniques to corrupt U.S. persons that they have employed in Europe and elsewhere. We simply don’t know, not yet, and we owe it to the country to find out."

Rep. Adam Schiff
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Schiff really impressed me lately. This guy did his homework.

The Jitty Slitter · Mar 21, 2017

charlie15 said: ↑

Schiff really impressed me lately. This guy did his homework.
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His intro was awesome - especially because most of the MSM has failed to put all these things together

The Jitty Slitter · Mar 21, 2017

No words

Take a look at how the White House is now trying to minimize the role that former campaign chairman Paul Manafort played in the campaign pic.twitter.com/shyf9JBefH
— Jonathan Karl (@jonkarl) March 21, 2017

charlie15 · Mar 21, 2017

This is where we are at after 2 months.....NY Times openly calling DJT a liar.

NY Times calls him out. Our President is a Patholigical Liar. It could hurt us all. https://t.co/EZ0QFSgl29
— Malcolm Nance (@MalcolmNance) March 21, 2017

JohnR · Mar 21, 2017

Cris 09 said: ↑

Rep. Adam Schiff
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That guy's a smart one. And dogged. The GOP are gonna regret that he's on their tail.

JohnR · Mar 21, 2017

charlie15 said: ↑

This is where we are at after 2 months.....NY Times openly calling DJT a liar.
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We knew that before the Inauguration. I guess it's still means something if the NYT writes it, though.

chaski · Mar 21, 2017

The Jitty Slitter said: ↑

A bit of digging has revealed that the main “intelligence source” for Napolitano’s dishonest claim was none other than Larry Johnson
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First Charles Oakley gets banned from the Garden, and now this.
What is it with these ex-Knicks?

superdave · Mar 21, 2017

Cris 09 said: ↑

Director Comey confirmed for the first time Monday that the FBI is investigating the possible collusion between the Trump campaign and Russian authorities during the campaign.

They don't do this for shits and giggles so - there is something there.
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I'd put my money on Roger Stone. He's batshit crazy enough.

And unlike the insanity of claiming the ********ING CAMPAIGN MANAGER (Manafort) had a limited role, the reporting I've seen suggests that Stone was sort of a Dark Oracle who spoke with Trump only on occasion.

Gamecock14 said: ↑

They did systematically spread information and disinformation via hacking and fake stories which clearly benefitted Donald Trump and hurt Hillary Clinton.

That is the basics of what Comey said.
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The weirdness is, if ANYONE would know about this, it would be James "yeah, let's violate FBI guidelines to pump a bullshit story 10 days out" Comey.