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House Impeachment Inquiry

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Skeptic Ginger said:
It as in who interfered in the 2016 election.

It was Russia.

It doesn't matter who Ukraine or any other county preferred. Only one country hacked the DNC's and Podesta's emails. Only one country passed that stuff on to Wikileaks.
Trump is still trying to cover that up. Claiming Ukraine, not Russia did it is one of his fantastical CTs.
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No, you've got it wrong. Its not that at all.

The Nunes/Trump/Manafort CT claims that Ukraine tried to interfere in support of Hillary Clintion.

The conspiracy theory claims that CrowdStrike, the company that investigated the hack of the DNC server, planted false evidence on the server to make it LOOK like Russia did the hacking, and that if this (non-existent) DNC server is ever found it would prove that.

This whole, bat-**** crazy CT has been repeatedly and thoroughly debunked.
 
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Skeptic Ginger said:
OK kelly, the short version:

Is there such a thing as inactively investigating?:boggled: I posted a grammar link for you. The suffix ing means actively happening when something else happens.

Did you miss the memo: Yahoo News: Anatomy of a conspiracy theory: The [DNC] 'server' Trump keeps looking for will never be found, because it doesn't exist

It's Trump who keeps trying to disprove Russia helped him get elected, not me.

I think that covers it.
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The ing part of the investigating with a case which is open but without any evidence of activity can include everything from a backlog they're going through first, to waiting for new evidence to come in, to being in the process of closing a case.

I'm curious to see if and how the Republicans are going to attempt to connect the dot from "It's true that there were Ukrainians who didn't want Trump to be the US POTUS, and they gave the FBI the Manafort ledger knowing it would show he was criminally not on the up and up" to...--> "toilet server!" (to borrow the nomenclature of one of our resident alt right trolls.)

I guess Trump's counting on Barr saying some of his Hail Mary's and that resulting in some piece of line of connection appearing during Barr and Durham's "investigate the investigators" thing they're off doing now somewhere.

What's funny is that I don't know of any normal, everyday Republicans who believe or even seem to believe Barr is going to find anything there. There might be some limit on credulity even with Trump voters when it comes to this stuff.

It's an interesting thought experiment to imagine yourself as Barr or Durham, tasked by Donald Trump with making this make anything akin to sense. I think they're probably going to just write a report that exposes the big secret that the magazine Foreign Policy did a great job of openly reporting on this stuff as it happened, and make a big deal of calling it "Ukranian meddling" now. And they'll probably not mention the DNC server at all.

I guess they're banking on being able to spin it like the Ukranians contacting the FBI about Manafort was what sparked the original Trump-Russia probe.

We'll see, I guess.
 
smartcooky said:
No, you've got it wrong. Its not that at all.

The Nunes/Trump/Manafort CT claims that Ukraine tried to interfere in support of Hillary Clintion.
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People in Ukraine actually did do that via exposing Manafort.

See:

The prospect of Mr Trump, who has praised Ukraine’s arch-enemy Vladimir Putin, becoming leader of the country’s biggest ally has spurred not just Mr Leshchenko but Kiev’s wider political leadership to do something they would never have attempted before: intervene, however indirectly, in a US election.

Mr Leshchenko and Ukraine’s anti-corruption bureau published a secret ledger this month that authorities claim show millions of dollars of off-the-book cash payments to Paul Manafort, Mr Trump’s campaign director, while he was advising Mr Yanukovich’s Regions party from 2005.

Mr Manafort, who vigorously denies wrongdoing, subsequently resigned from his campaign role. But Mr Leshchenko and other political actors in Kiev say they will continue their efforts to prevent a candidate — who recently suggested Russia might keep Crimea, which it annexed two years ago — from reaching the summit of American political power.

“A Trump presidency would change the pro-Ukrainian agenda in American foreign policy,” Mr Leshchenko, an investigative journalist turned MP, told the Financial Times. “For me it was important to show not only the corruption aspect, but that he is [a] pro-Russian candidate who can break the geopolitical balance in the world.”

Mr Trump’s rise has led to a new cleavage in Ukraine’s political establishment. Hillary Clinton, the Democratic nominee, is backed by the pro-western government that took power after Mr Yanukovich was ousted by street protests in 2014. The former Yanukovich camp, its public support sharply diminished, leans towards Mr Trump.

If the Republican candidate loses in November, some observers suggest Kiev’s actions may have played at least a small role.

“Ukraine’s anti-corruption activists have probably saved the Western world,” Anton Shekhovtsov, a western-based academic specialising in Russia and Ukraine, tweeted after Mr Manafort resigned.
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Ukrainian politicians were also angered by the Trump team’s alleged role in removing a reference to providing arms to Kiev from the Republican party platform at its July convention.

Adrian Karatnycky, a senior fellow at Washington’s Atlantic Council think-tank, said it was “no wonder that some key Ukrainian political figures are getting involved to an unprecedented degree in trying to weaken the Trump bandwagon”.
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Kiev moved beyond verbal criticism when Ukraine’s national anti-corruption bureau and Mr Leshchenko — who has a reputation for being close to the bureau — published the ledger showing alleged payments to Mr Manafort last week.
The revelations provoked fury among former Regions party backers. Asked by telephone about Mr Manafort’s activities in Ukraine, a former Yanukovich loyalist now playing a lead role in the Regions party’s successor, called Opposition Bloc, let loose a string of expletives. He accused western media of “working in the interests of Hillary Clinton by trying to bring down Trump”.

Though most Ukrainians are disillusioned with the country’s current leadership for stalled reforms and lacklustre anti-corruption efforts, Mr Leshchenko said events of the past two years had locked Ukraine on to a pro-western course. The majority of Ukraine’s politicians, he added, are “on Hillary Clinton’s side”.
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Which is all very fascinating. But ratting out Manafort has literally nothing to do with an invisible, mythical DNC server.

The conspiracy theory claims that CrowdStrike, the company that investigated the hack of the DNC server, planted false evidence on the server to make it LOOK like Russia did the hacking, and that if this (non-existent) DNC server is ever found it would prove that.

This whole, bat-**** crazy CT has been repeatedly and thoroughly debunked.
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Well, Trump asked Zelensky about the server as part of his "missiles for headlines" deal, and Barr is "looking into it"! :D Giuliani was convinced George Soros must be involved somehow. It's hard to not imagine Barr having to tell Trump "No, I'm not going to dress up like a ninja and break into George Soros' basement looking for the server, Mr President. I'm sorry. Just no. That idea is...*lawyerly sigh*...riddled with numerous legal obstacles."

LOL
 
kellyb said:
People in Ukraine actually did do that via exposing Manafort.
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Perhaps, but not in the way that this CT claims

The revealing of Manafort's perfidy was exposing corruption... outing criminals is a good thing to do whoever else it might benefit. However, the CT effectively claims that Ukraine hacked the DNC server, then Crowdstrike planted evidence in the server to frame Russia.

This is just a total load of horse-puckey
 
I found on the c-span transcript what was to me the most interesting and relevant part of the day. Taylor's being questioned by Democratic congressman Will Hurd from Texas, and here's what transpired. At the 4:41:55 mark, Taylor becomes a bit visibly shaken by the question, presumably by the fact that it's hard to answer questions where a bunch of false assumptions are baked in, and he looks over to George Kent, the deputy assistant secretary of state for Europe and Eastern Europe, who volunteers a wonderfully clarifying answer. https://www.c-span.org/video/?466134-1/impeachment-hearing-william-taylor-george-kent&start=16928


HAVE YOU HAD ANY UKRAINIAN OFFICIALS CALL YOU AFTER A MEETING WITH RUDY GIULIANI CONCERNED ABOUT THE NATURE OF THE CONTEXT OF THAT CONVERSATION?

04:41:21
YES. MR. YERMAK EXPRESSED CONCERN ABOUT HIS INTERACTIONS WITH MR. GIULIANI.

04:41:26
AND I BELIEVE THAT MEETING WAS SOMEWHERE IN LATE AUGUST, IS THAT CORRECT?

04:41:31
IT WAS -- THERE WERE MEETINGS AND THERE WERE I THINK ALSO PHONE CALLS.

AND YOU ARE STILL CONCERNED ABOUT CORRUPTION IN YOU CRANE,UKRAINE, CORRECT?

04:41:49
YES, SIR.

04:41:50
HAVE WE SEEN WHAT THIS ANTI-CORRUPTION STATEMENT WE WANT THE UKRAINIANS TO MAKE?

04:41:57[note from kellyb - George Kent takes over answering here]
ARE YOU REFERRING TO THE STATEMENT THAT WAS BEING NEGOTIATED BETWEEN KURT VOLKER, GORDON SONDLAND AND ANDRIY YERMAK?

YES.

04:42:08
THAT WAS NOT AN ANTI-CORRUPTION STATEMENT.
04:42:10
WHAT WAS IT?

04:42:11
IF YOU GO BACK AND FORTH, THEY SHARED A DRAFT WITH RUDY GIULIANI AND RUDY GIULIANI SAID IT WOULD NOT BE ACCEPTABLE IF IT DIDN'T MENTION BIDEN AND BURISMA IN 2016.
-------------------
 
kellyb said:
If you want to go back to trying to prove that Trump's covering up Russian collusion/conspiracy again, good luck.

You do you.
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I don't think it's controversial at all. Trump has never consistently agreed that Russia interfered and his desire to pin blame on Ukraine working for the Democrats is part of his denial that Russia helped him in the election.

All of this is independent of Mueller's failure to find evidence of conspiracy. (I mean "failure" in the purely objective sense, not presuming that there was a conspiracy that he was too incompetent to find.)
 
smartcooky said:
However, the CT effectively claims that Ukraine hacked the DNC server, then Crowdstrike planted evidence in the server to frame Russia.
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That's just such a huge leap of wild speculation with no even shoddy evidence, I have trouble even taking this seriously as a conspiracy theory.

I suppose the "Ukranian motive" implicit in hacking the DNC server is just so made up and unnecessary that this doesn't seem like, good, wholesome, honest conspiracy theorizing like I'm used to. LOL Nobody really believes this. It's just low-quality political lies and bull **** designed for morons. And I really haven't encountered anyone anywhere who believes it.

I guess it's also weird that that's competing with their old DNC server conspiracy theory, that Seth Rich leaked the info and the DeepState murdered him for it. (Or alternately, Russian oligarchs had him murdered to make the DNC look bad, or whatever it was Donna Brazille was speculating there for a while.)
 
phiwum said:
I don't think it's controversial at all. Trump has never consistently agreed that Russia interfered and his desire to pin blame on Ukraine working for the Democrats is part of his denial that Russia helped him in the election.

All of this is independent of Mueller's failure to find evidence of conspiracy. (I mean "failure" in the purely objective sense, not presuming that there was a conspiracy that he was too incompetent to find.)
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I just don't think saying "Nun-uh! No they didn't!" qualifies as "covering". It's just denying. There's a big difference between the two.
 
I think Jim Jordan was off his game yesterday, and got waylaid from his primary mission. He needs to practice more....

“Ambassador, getting back to the Bidens, whattabout Hunter Biden? Joe Biden? Burisma? Biden corruption? Hunter corruption? Joe corruption? Burisma corruption? Whattabout the dossier? HEARSAY! Burisma Hunter Joe Biden corruption? Where’s the server? Where’s the whistleblower? SQUIRREL! I see my time has expired.”

Actually that’s kinda what the R’s sounded like yesterday, right?
 
Perhaps the Republican line should be "the Ukrainians were talking to Trump, so that proves they're corrupt!"
 
JoeMorgue said:
It's like calling "Being voted out of office" a coup which... at this point wouldn't surprise me if Trump or his followers actually try to do.
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That is pretty much what he did when the polls showed him losing in 2016 and he convinced his followers the election was rigged.
 
Shamelessly stolen comment from a guy I don't know in a conversation yesterday on Facebook:

"In a nutshell, people don’t want to be associated with losing or being blamed for failure. When we hitch our wagons to somebody, and they fail, it’s like we failed, and we can’t fail, so we do everything to transfer the problem away from the failing person, and by proxy, ourselves. This excludes politicians, who just want power and will say and do anything to get and keep it (see the farce from today). It is kind of crazy - I voted for Trump and mock the rabid antiTrumpers non-stop, not because Trump can do wrong, but because in their eyes he can do no right, and sadly, they can’t even admit their fault. It’s the logical conclusion of what I wrote - it’s easy to never accept that you (or those you support) are wrong, when the “other guy” always is ��. If Trump is guilty of something worth removing him from office, I’d have no problem with it. What I heard today isn’t even close."

This is the hill that must be climbed through this impeachment inquiry. There is an alternate reality chasm between Trumpsters and other folks. Both sides are snickering and high-fiving over how the other side "has nothing". Here's an otherwise reasonable sounding individual labeling yesterday's hearings a farce and considering the evidence presented not even close.
 
Trump is guilty of something worth removing him from office. That is not the problem. Getting both sides to agree on that something is at issue. Trump supporters can say things like "If Trump is guilty of something worth removing him from office, I’d have no problem with it.", yet we see no evidence that they are being honest.

Over the last three years there have been moments that should have tipped that bar, and they did not. It's a subjective mirage. I think most Trump supporters will say things like the above because they believe it makes them appear rational and responsible. All it does, in my opinion, is expose their disconnect from reality and willingness to pretend to be responsible citizens.

I'd rather they just tell the truth and admit that there is virtually nothing that Trump could do that would dent their support.
 
Winning over Trump supporters is the political equivalent of turning lead into gold. Anyone telling you that it's a worthy goal is nearly as out of touch with reality as the Trump supporters themselves.
 
The Shrike said:
Shamelessly stolen comment from a guy I don't know in a conversation yesterday on Facebook:

"In a nutshell, people don’t want to be associated with losing or being blamed for failure. When we hitch our wagons to somebody, and they fail, it’s like we failed, and we can’t fail, so we do everything to transfer the problem away from the failing person, and by proxy, ourselves. This excludes politicians, who just want power and will say and do anything to get and keep it (see the farce from today). It is kind of crazy - I voted for Trump and mock the rabid antiTrumpers non-stop, not because Trump can do wrong, but because in their eyes he can do no right, and sadly, they can’t even admit their fault. It’s the logical conclusion of what I wrote - it’s easy to never accept that you (or those you support) are wrong, when the “other guy” always is ��. If Trump is guilty of something worth removing him from office, I’d have no problem with it. What I heard today isn’t even close."

This is the hill that must be climbed through this impeachment inquiry. There is an alternate reality chasm between Trumpsters and other folks. Both sides are snickering and high-fiving over how the other side "has nothing". Here's an otherwise reasonable sounding individual labeling yesterday's hearings a farce and considering the evidence presented not even close.
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I'm experiencing the same thing from the ones I know, but if you can get them to not disengage, you can win the argument easily. If you can force yourself to refrain from being all self-righteous and gloating about it (which is hard when dealing with them, but it helps if you actually force yourself to admit it's theoretically possible they have some point none of us have ever heard of before, so you're approaching them with sincere curiosity) they might be willing to her you out for a while.

I'll be asking them about this today: http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/showpost.php?p=12891895&postcount=1729

I'll ask if the part about "THEY SHARED A DRAFT WITH RUDY GIULIANI AND RUDY GIULIANI SAID IT WOULD NOT BE ACCEPTABLE IF IT DIDN'T MENTION BIDEN AND BURISMA IN 2016" sounds even a little bit like something legally dubious might have been going on, and take it from there.

From there you can get into the mostly likely laws which will be applicable, and why.
 
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