Merged All things Trump + Russia

[Elagabalus]

I don't know about you but I don't have an ocean between me and Russia, so I'm not about to underestimate them. Western European concern about Russia dates back to Peter the Great's arrival on the Baltic three centuries ago and his transfer of the Imperial Capital from way over there in Moscow to right over here. A statement of intent if ever there was one.

Two centuries ago Russian troops marched through Paris. Fortunately they went home afterwards.

A certain complacency has set in recently, but I get the sense Europe has been shaken out of it.

Has Trump visited St. Petersburg yet? He's gonna' love it. So much gilded gold! He'll be orgasmic the entire visit.

 

[Civet]

Seriously, do you guys even know what an operative or an agent actually is? When did the GOP spin up a spy agency?

I know it sounds a bit strange, but "operative" has been used to refer to these sorts of political guys for a while now. Popular enough to have become memetic.

https://www.theatlantic.com/politic...fe-of-a-political-operative-explained/253130/

 

[Mumbles]

For the love of reason, can we separate out some of the parts here? Somewhere along the way, we reverted to the cold war, and it's bordering on McCarthyism.

No, we really didn't. Again, we've had multiple US presidents, as well as the governments of quite a few other open democracies, attempt to work with Russia post-USSR. And it went rather well for a time - until things didn't go quite so well, and we ended up with Putin effectively taking over the Russian government. It's well known that Putin is openly hostile to the EU and the US, and openly wishes to recreate the USSR and to create an obnoxiously Christian (ie. openly anti-LGBT) and strongly white supremacist alliance. His hostility towards Clinton was based on a paranoid idea that she somehow engineered anti-Putin protests in Russia by...criticising him.

Seriously, the idea that this is some new "red scare", or anything resembling Joe McCarthy's witch hunts, simply shows that you have no idea what's happening here. Yet again, Donkey Don Jr. clearly attempted to work with a government that is hostile to the US, in order to change the outcome of an election. This is what his own emails have unambiguously shown, the end.

Does the US often interfere with the elections of other countries? Yes, often with disastrous results both for the countries being interfered with, and also for the US. I'd prefer we don't do this. And in any event, this does not, in any way, vindicate the current president or his traitorous son.

 

[Mumbles]

They met with a lawyer who is not an agent of Russia and got no information. Your "assuredly" is speculative.

This is painfully naive at best, and more likely willfully ignorant.

 

[Babbylonian]

What did Trump's campaign do to aid Russia?

For one very important thing, they gutted the Republican Party's position on assisting Ukraine. For another, they had multiple meetings with Russian officials during which they almost certainly and illegally discussed changes to existing foreign policy before taking office.

Fast forward to now and the current occupant of the Oval Office can hardly go a week without praising Putin and his government, while simultaneously reducing the international influence of the United States.

 

[quadraginta]

I'm arguing that it's naive and absurd to expect that other countries will NOT act in their own interests. I'm arguing that the vociferous "OMG Russia is BAAADD because they wanted to influence our election" is a pile of childish rhetoric that ignores both reality and reason.

Good thing that isn't the argument being made.

The argument being made is that it is bad (and potentially illegal) for a U.S campaign to accept that influence as an aid to their campaign. Not to mention soliciting that influence.

There's some sort of name for making up an argument no one is offering and then responding to that fabricated fiction instead of what is being said.

It's right on the tip of my tongue ...

Oh well, I'm sure it will come to me.

 

[Childlike Empress]

I know it sounds a bit strange, but "operative" has been used to refer to these sorts of political guys for a while now.

She's an operative for her client, which is not the Russian government. In case somebody missed it, The Hill had an interesting article about her lobbying tour including questions about why she was in the country in the first place:

Exclusive: DOJ let Russian lawyer into US before she met with Trump team

 

[quadraginta]

The problem is that a lot of people here seem to be trying real hard to ignore everything that's revealed. We have three high-ranking officials of the Trump campaign meeting with a Russian agent to get information to get an advantage on a political opponent, assuredly for favours following the election. You cannot deny this.

Of course she can.

She already has.

What I expect she'll find difficult is stopping that denial.

It is already clear that facts are irrelevant.

 

[uke2se]

They met with a lawyer who is not an agent of Russia and got no information. Your "assuredly" is speculative.

I'm not ignoring everything that's revealed. I am, however, ignoring the majority of the speculation and hypothesizing that invariably accompanies them. And I'm ignoring the overwhelming majority of unattributed and unverified "anonymous source" information. I'm also ignoring the interpretation of non-lawyers with respect to the application of law, and the interpretation of non-psychiatrists with respect to medical mental health diagnoses. I'm also ignoring all of the freewheeling "what he really meant" sludge piled on top of every statement by someone from the white house.

Did you simply skip over the post that directly called you out on your apologetics? It doesn't matter what the lawyer was. What matters is what Donnie Jr thought she was.

Are you going to keep ignoring this? It's becoming rather obvious.

You have protested wildly when I've previously called your post Trump apologetics. You have run out of credibility.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

Known liar who was caught in several lies about the meeting says nothing about Clinton was actually obtained and it becomes the narrative as if it were certainly true.

 

[varwoche]

They met with a lawyer who is not an agent of Russia and got no information. Your "assuredly" is speculative.

What, are you in the camp that views events through some sort of cartoonsh, hyper-literal filter, expecting her to come right out and say...? Oops, you got me folks, I was acting as an agent of the Russian government in order to undermine US elections.

As for "got no information"... When you take the word of a person in the hot seat making self-serving statements, you're the opposite of a critical thinker -- you're a sucker. Add to this the fact that Don Jr has consistently lied about the meeting up until he was outed. That places you in hook-line-sinker realm.

 

[trustbutverify]

They met with a lawyer who is not an agent of Russia and got no information.

Conclusions based on what?

 

[Stacko]

Conclusions based on what?

Lies and flim flam from Fredo.

 

[Stacko]

Trump's lawyers have known of Fredo's emails since at least June.

President Trump’s legal team was informed more than three weeks ago about the email chain showing that his son Donald Jr. met with a Kremlin-connected lawyer last June, two sources familiar with the handling of the matter told*Yahoo News.

Trump told Reuters in an interview on Wednesday*that he learned just “a couple of days ago” that his son, Donald Trump Jr,**had met with the Russian lawyer, Natalia Veselnitskaya, after receiving emails that she would supply him with**information that “would incriminate Hillary” and was “part of Russia and its government’s support for Mr. Trump.”*That was the day*after Donald Jr. released the email exchanges himself, after learning they would be published by the New York Times.

Trump repeated that assertion in a talk with reporters Air Force One on his way to Paris Wednesday*night. “I only heard about it two or three days ago,” he said according to a transcript of his talk when asked about the meeting with Veselnitskaya at Trump Tower in June 2016 attended by Donald Trump Jr., Paul Manafort, then Trump’s campaign chief, and Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner.

But the sources told Yahoo News that*Marc Kasowitz, the president’s chief lawyer in the Russia investigation, and Alan Garten, executive vice president and chief legal officer of the Trump Organization, were both informed about the emails in the third week of June, after they were discovered by lawyers for*Kushner, who is now a senior White House official.

IANAL but it seems like malpractice not to have informed their client of this. Although, Propublica has reported that Kasowitz may be back on the sauce so that ma be affecting his judgement.

 

[varwoche]

The highlighted part: ... a lawyer whose client had money laundering charges dropped in May with a small fine.
I've added that to my update to the table of yours...

Much appreciated. It's a handy reference, but one problem is the most recent update can be hard to locate, what with how fast the thread is moving. This is the sort of thing that makes me wish that post #1 was editable.

 

[C_Felix]

Can't help yourself, can you? Have to stick to this same pitiful attempt at misdirection no matter how often it is debunked.

Okay. One more time.

It doesn't matter whether she was or not. What matters is that they believed she was, and chose to meet with her because of that belief.

If she had been an undercover agent for the FEC and had been born in Fort Wayne it still wouldn't matter because what does matter is their intent.

Got it? Yet?

If you don't, then it can only be because of willful avoidance of an obvious truth, and anything more you say on the subject can be reasonably disregarded.

Thank you for this post.

 

[Ziggurat]

It doesn't matter what else money will buy. If it can buy speech then people with more money can have more speech.

Which leads to 'all the democracy you can afford'.

If you cant' afford as much then tough titties, The Supremes said you're **** out of luck. (As well as out of democracy.)

I understand you want to vent your obvious anger, but this doesn't actually have anything to do with supporting the erroneous claim that money is speech.

 

[I Am The Scum]

I'm arguing that it's naive and absurd to expect that other countries will NOT act in their own interests. I'm arguing that the vociferous "OMG Russia is BAAADD because they wanted to influence our election" is a pile of childish rhetoric that ignores both reality and reason.

You really need to step up your game. In addition to what others have pointed out, you are making an argument that could just as easily apply to any other crime or immoral act imaginable. Just think of how a cop would behave if he were mimicking you.

Well I'm sorry about your automobile getting stolen, but it's really naive to think that car thieves will NOT steal cars. No sense in crying about something that happens all the time. Stop being so childish! Later on, dude.

 

[Ziggurat]

Can't help yourself, can you? Have to stick to this same pitiful attempt at misdirection no matter how often it is debunked.

Okay. One more time.

It doesn't matter whether she was or not. What matters is that they believed she was, and chose to meet with her because of that belief.

No, actually, that doesn't matter either. And it doesn't matter that they believed her to be an agent of the Russian government because it doesn't matter if she really was an agent of the government. The law in question makes no reference to or mention of foreign agents or governments.

If she had been an undercover agent for the FEC and had been born in Fort Wayne it still wouldn't matter because what does matter is their intent.

Nope. That doesn't matter either. The law in question doesn't depend on intent in any way.

Got it? Yet?

If you don't, then it can only be because of willful avoidance of an obvious truth, and anything more you say on the subject can be reasonably disregarded.

It's funny you should advance that position, after getting the fundamentals completely wrong.

 

[Elagabalus]

Conclusions based on what?

Kellyanne Conway explains:





Caution: Trigger warning for some