Putin Personally Involved in Hack

[tyr_13]

I saw a clip of him saying there would be retaliation at "a time of our choosing." He said some would be made public after the fact, but some would be a "direct" message to Russia that wouldn't be public.

Yes, but Obama, so obviously he's 'just talking' or even if people agree it happens, that it's 'because Trump made him' or some such nonsense.

 

[tyr_13]

That's one of the more ridiculous posts I've read.

But you did read it.

 

[Cain]

That was only part of it. Tyr specifically claimed that Trump got "bent over" in the deal. Maybe other people did, but not Trump.

A distinction without a meaningful difference here. If Trump knew what he was doing, even if it was acting in a wholly self-interested manner to the detriment of others, then it's not really ignorant, is it?

The narrative can't tolerate Trump not being stupid or ignorant.

I'm sorry that words have meaning, and I'm sorry I'm not going to say much more. I'm rapidly losing interest in this one-sided discussion. At best you can argue that Trump is rationally ignorant.

And that effect was... nothing.

This is just ignorance, and not the rational kind. Clinton's comments fueled anti-Putin protests after his sham elections. Autocrats are sensitive to those things because they can get out of hand, and the penalty is not nature walks in New York.

Someone shoots at you -- misses. Was it nothing? Suppose Clinton won the election despite Putin's meddling. Was the effect... nothing?

Tu quoque much?

Who do you think you're fooling? This is pathetic and goes back to the party hack sophistry. Trump lies, brokers a bad deal -- it's good optics. Obama is naive, Bush has "balls."

It shouldn't have been close. It should have been Clinton in a blow-out. But it wasn't, in large part because of the insular world view of Clinton and the rest of the Democratic machine.

And a clear majority of Americans believe in angels when it shouldn't be close. Or a literal interpretation of the Book of Genesis. People are stupid.

In terms of the probable outcome of the election, you're again trying to re-write the narrative. It was always close, especially after Comey's announcement. Close but relatively safe, so much so even the fantastically narcissistic Orange One thought he was going down in defeat.

Because of trade, China has far less intrinsic conflict of interest with the US than Russia does. China benefits enormously from good relations with us, and wants global energy prices to be low. Russia, not so much. She gets by on her oil exports to Europe, and benefits when oil prices skyrocket. China is likely to be stronger than Russia, and there are certainly areas of conflict with Russia, but it isn't implacably hostile in anything close to the same manner.

So, wrong again.

Again, this is like playing chess against a pigeon. You're going to **** all over the board and then strut around like you won.

Trade with China is a good thing, but dependency goes both ways (and it's no secret whose economy is ascendant). Reliance on oil is a reflection of Russian weakness. Speaking of economies, Russia's is smaller than Canada's. Welcome to the last thirty years.

 

[shuize]

But yes, brace yourself. Trump's going to either flame out fast, or take your portfolio down with the rest of the country's influence.

Actually, I should be fine either way. But thanks for your concern.

By the way, what do you think about this quote? I'm thinking of making it my new signature.

"If the question is when markets will recover, a first-pass answer is never."

-- Paul Krugman, Nov. 9, 2016

 

[Venom]

Old but trusty hardware.

[qimg]http://i.imgur.com/4KhsHpt.jpg[/qimg]

Putin's way ahead of the US in that regard, don't worry.

Suspect the FSB in the 1999 bombings? "Western provocation"
Protest Ukraine intrusion? "Western provocation"
Alexsander Litvinenko? Anna Politkovskaya? Boris Nemtsov... "Western provocation"

Putin's been playing this game for 16 years now and you and every other RT watcher keep falling for it.

 

[Ziggurat]

I know you were joking, but you were joking on the square. You really do care more about making a quick buck than the integrity of our elections.

It's also poor form to use hyperbole then bitch about someone using your own hyperbole back at you.

But yes, brace yourself. Trump's going to either flame out fast, or take your portfolio down with the rest of the country's influence.

First, you can't read minds. Second, you don't know what the word "hyperbole" means. His joke wasn't hyperbole. Third, your stock predictions aren't any more reliable than Krugman's.

 

[applecorped]

Who knew Joe McCarthy was a liberal.

 

[3point14]

Read the title and though 'Dacre and Putin in torrid love affair'

 

[Hlafordlaes]

Jokingly asking if I should thank Trump or Putin for sending markets to all time highs after left-wing shills like Krugman tried to panic the market with claims that it would "never" recover is something akin to "treason"?

Brace yourselves, folks. Trump hasn't even been sworn in yet.

Let's see. Promise to deregulate further and lower taxes on the wealthy. This translates into higher returns, so boom! Stock market was really booming last time, fueled by deregulation and Greenspan's belief that rational libertarians would self-regulate (Ha, mega ha!) before it tanked. Careful what you celebrate. Too bad no other factors are taken into account, such as this is the umpteenth time Republicans try to sell this as a government revenue enhancer, trickle-down whatever. Apparently, the deficit is only a problem when a darkie is in there messing with white man's money. We've gone from Cheney's "deficits don't matter, and no, I won't fess up to how much the war costs" added to BushII's Medicare-financed mega-vote-purchase, to "Obama is ruining your wife's and daughter's chances at living a decent life by trashing the joint," and now back to Trump's magic formulae.

So let me ask the value-driven, meet-your-commitments (if poor) Republicans: what would it take for you to apply such notions to all the tax havens around the world, stuffed with tax scam money, and funds from human, animal and drug trafficking? Oh, I see, some pals have cash in there, riiiight. Let's just stick to criticizing poor blacks.

 

[Hlafordlaes]

... Putin's been playing this game for 16 years now and you and every other RT watcher keep falling for it.

Amen. I wonder just how many international borders he has to violate, from Georgia to Moldova to the Ukraine, before people realize this is like Sudetenland, then Poland... Putin is a crass authoritarian bent on reestablishing empire, the constant Russia obsession from Czar to Commissar.

Meanwhile, Trump, basically saying "Latvia? Who needs freaking Latvia?" This, while Russia and Iran, that old US buddy, are getting really chummy. Ever heard them, Russia and Iran, discuss pricing oil in dollars as a step toward displacing the dollar as reserve currency? Yup, that was around a decade ago. Current events are part of a long-term strategy, being faced by mostly short-term minds in the West. Be nice if someone in the GOP picked up a history book once in a while, sheesh. And Condi Rice, so silent these days? And I thought she had some brains; must've gone to a highest bidder.

 

[tyr_13]

First, you can't read minds. Second, you don't know what the word "hyperbole" means. His joke wasn't hyperbole. Third, your stock predictions aren't any more reliable than Krugman's.

First, I only need to read the posts. The dismissal of an attack on the US election because 'I made money', is consistent with that poster's political posts and in the context of this discussion with the 'stage of grief' hand-wave (such a versatile accusation that grief thing) means yes, they are trying to dismiss the entire issue. They are joking on the square.

Second, yes, it's hyperbole. The only way it isn't hyperbole (an over statement) is if they really do think the money they make off the stock fluctuations is more important, and they really do want to know if they should thank Putin for his interference in the US election. It's over-stating the importance of their money and over stating their reaction to the interference.

Lastly, my stock predictions aren't exactly stock as they are overall economic ones, which the stock market may or may not reflect. Shuize seems to believe they'll do well no matter what, because stocks. It's both selfish and incorrect. What did deregulation help last time? Oh right, it's always led to bubbles and crashes.

But because it distracts from the issue at hand, Putin's interference in the US election and his preference for Trump, you can't defend it strongly enough. Putin thinks he'll get away with more with a Trump administration, and he appears correct. Trump has talked about walking away from NATO allies, under the false accusation that the ones around Russia aren't paying their fair share. Trump has business interests in Russia, and his appointees have even more. He'll let them take and keep oil fields, ally with Iran, and at the same time talk about opposing Iran. Trump's ignorant ego-driven choices will damage the US influence abroad, and this can only help Russia. Trump's (more importantly his appointee's) opposition to moves away from fossil fuels will keep them more important for longer, keeping Russia's oil and gas economy salient longer. Hopefully Trump and Putin will get some real pushback from Congress, but as it's in the hands of the Republicans right now, I don't see that happening unless Trump does flame out and get removed from office.

 

[Mycroft]

Amen. I wonder just how many international borders he has to violate, from Georgia to Moldova to the Ukraine, before people realize this is like Sudetenland, then Poland... Putin is a crass authoritarian bent on reestablishing empire, the constant Russia obsession from Czar to Commissar.

Meanwhile, Trump, basically saying "Latvia? Who needs freaking Latvia?" This, while Russia and Iran, that old US buddy, are getting really chummy. Ever heard them, Russia and Iran, discuss pricing oil in dollars as a step toward displacing the dollar as reserve currency? Yup, that was around a decade ago. Current events are part of a long-term strategy, being faced by mostly short-term minds in the West. Be nice if someone in the GOP picked up a history book once in a while, sheesh. And Condi Rice, so silent these days? And I thought she had some brains; must've gone to a highest bidder.

This.

First, I only need to read the posts. The dismissal of an attack on the US election because 'I made money', is consistent with that poster's political posts and in the context of this discussion with the 'stage of grief' hand-wave (such a versatile accusation that grief thing) means yes, they are trying to dismiss the entire issue. They are joking on the square.

Second, yes, it's hyperbole. The only way it isn't hyperbole (an over statement) is if they really do think the money they make off the stock fluctuations is more important, and they really do want to know if they should thank Putin for his interference in the US election. It's over-stating the importance of their money and over stating their reaction to the interference.

Lastly, my stock predictions aren't exactly stock as they are overall economic ones, which the stock market may or may not reflect. Shuize seems to believe they'll do well no matter what, because stocks. It's both selfish and incorrect. What did deregulation help last time? Oh right, it's always led to bubbles and crashes.

But because it distracts from the issue at hand, Putin's interference in the US election and his preference for Trump, you can't defend it strongly enough. Putin thinks he'll get away with more with a Trump administration, and he appears correct. Trump has talked about walking away from NATO allies, under the false accusation that the ones around Russia aren't paying their fair share. Trump has business interests in Russia, and his appointees have even more. He'll let them take and keep oil fields, ally with Iran, and at the same time talk about opposing Iran. Trump's ignorant ego-driven choices will damage the US influence abroad, and this can only help Russia. Trump's (more importantly his appointee's) opposition to moves away from fossil fuels will keep them more important for longer, keeping Russia's oil and gas economy salient longer. Hopefully Trump and Putin will get some real pushback from Congress, but as it's in the hands of the Republicans right now, I don't see that happening unless Trump does flame out and get removed from office.

And also this.

 

[LSSBB]

The only true polls are the bookies. Just prior to the election, most appear to have offered odds of about 1:5 on a Clinton win suggesting that they believed that they believed there was a greater than 80% chance of a Clinton win. (http://metro.co.uk/2016/11/07/us-el...-bookies-favourite-over-donald-trump-6241099/).

Either way, the pollsters were way off though the bookies would have cleaned up if most bettors put their money on Hillary.

Yeah, but what was the spread?

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

Is there a different thread, Trump personally involved?

Just going to put some evidence down here, not claiming proof or certainty:

Fortune: What We Actually Know About Trump's Relationship with Putin and Russia

We know about Trump's comments during the campaign. We know about Manafort and Tillerson. We know about the hacking.

But this detail has been lost in the wind:

In August, The New York Times reported that a hand-written ledger of cash payments made by Ukraine’s ousted government listed Manafort as being paid $12.7 million. Ukrainian prosecutors said the payments detailed in the ledger were an effort to obscure bribes.

A few days later, The Associated Press reported that Manafort and Gates had orchestrated a secret Ukrainian lobbying campaign in Washington. Participants said the men had sought to obscure the true backer of the work — Ukraine’s pro-Russian ruling party — by routing lobbying funds through a nonprofit front group.

Manafort and Gates denied having been involved in the lobbying. But emails obtained by the AP explicitly showed Gates giving orders to the lobbyists.

Manafort departed the campaign the following day.

Time: Donald Trump’s Many, Many, Many, Many Ties to Russia

The truth, as several columnists and reporters have painstakingly shown since the first hack of a Clinton-affiliated group took place in late May or early June, is that several of Trump’s businesses outside of Russia are entangled with Russian financiers inside Putin’s circle.

So, yes, it’s true that Trump has failed to land a business venture inside Russia. But the real truth is that, as major banks in America stopped lending him money following his many bankruptcies, the Trump organization was forced to seek financing from non-traditional institutions. Several had direct ties to Russian financial interests in ways that have raised eyebrows. What’s more, several of Trump’s senior advisors have business ties to Russia or its satellite politicians.

“The Trump-Russia links beneath the surface are even more extensive,” Max Boot wrote in the Los Angeles Times. “Trump has sought and received funding from Russian investors for his business ventures, especially after most American banks stopped lending to him following his multiple bankruptcies.”

Again, we know about the bank connections, Manafort and Tillerson. How about these others?

What’s more, three of Trump’s top advisors all have extensive financial and business ties to Russian financiers, wrote Boot, the former editor of the Op Ed page of the Wall Street Journal and now a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations....

Trump’s foreign policy advisor Carter Page has his own business ties to the state-controlled Russian oil giant Gazprom. … Another Trump foreign policy advisor, retired Army Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn, flew to Moscow last year to attend a gala banquet celebrating Russia Today, the Kremlin’s propaganda channel, and was seated at the head table near Putin.

It gets more complicated everywhere you look.

The most obvious example is Trump Soho, a complicated web of financial intrigue that has played out in court. A lawsuit claimed that the business group, Bayrock, underpinning Trump Soho was supported by criminal Russian financial interests. While its initial claim absolved Trump of knowledge of those activities, Trump himself later took on the group’s principal partner as a senior advisor in the Trump organization.

“Tax evasion and money-laundering are the core of Bayrock’s business model,” the lawsuit said of the financiers behind Trump Soho. The financing came from Russian-affiliated business interests that engaged in criminal activities, it said. “(But) there is no evidence Trump took any part in, or knew of, their racketeering.”...

But Bayrock wasn’t just involved with Trump Soho. It financed multiple Trump projects around the world, Foer wrote. “(Trump) didn’t just partner with Bayrock; the company embedded with him. Bayrock put together deals for mammoth Trump-named, Trump-managed projects—two in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, a resort in Phoenix, the Trump SoHo in New York.”

But, as The New York Times has reported, that was only the beginning of the Trump organization’s entanglement with Russian financiers. Trump was quite taken with Bayrock’s founder, Tevfik Arif, a former Soviet-era commerce official originally from Kazakhstan.

“Bayrock, which was developing commercial properties in Brooklyn, proposed that Mr. Trump license his name to hotel projects in Florida, Arizona and New York, including Trump SoHo,” the Times reported. “The other development partner for Trump SoHo was the Sapir Organization, whose founder, Tamir Sapir, was from the former Soviet republic of Georgia.”

The web's tangles go on and on.

The Times also reported that federal court records recently released showed yet another link to Russian financial interests in Trump businesses. A Bayrock official “brokered a $50 million investment in Trump SoHo and three other Bayrock projects by an Icelandic firm preferred by wealthy Russians ‘in favor with’ President Vladimir V. Putin,’” the Times reported. “The Icelandic company, FL Group, was identified in a Bayrock investor presentation as a ‘strategic partner,’ along with Alexander Mashkevich, a billionaire once charged in a corruption case involving fees paid by a Belgian company seeking business in Kazakhstan; that case was settled with no admission of guilt.”

Trump Soho was so complicated that Bayrock’s finance chief, Jody Kriss, sued it for fraud.

 

[LSSBB]

Is there a different thread, Trump personally involved?

Just going to put some evidence down here, not claiming proof or certainty:

Fortune: What We Actually Know About Trump's Relationship with Putin and Russia

We know about Trump's comments during the campaign. We know about Manafort and Tillerson. We know about the hacking.

But this detail has been lost in the wind:

Time: Donald Trump’s Many, Many, Many, Many Ties to Russia
Again, we know about the bank connections, Manafort and Tillerson. How about these others?

It gets more complicated everywhere you look.The web's tangles go on and on.

I read all that. Trump and followers/apologists would just say "conspiracy theories" or just attack the messenger.

 

[psionl0]

Yeah, but what was the spread?

It is hard to find line-odds now that the election is over. The only thing I can find is this:

The chalk has Clinton at +135 to get in between 47-49.99% of the popular vote. There is more value on betting on the one-time First Lady to get 50-52.99%, which holds a +210 prop.

http://heavy.com/news/2016/11/trump...l-election-betting-odds-props-lines-favorite/

 

[LSSBB]

It is hard to find line-odds now that the election is over. The only thing I can find is this:

http://heavy.com/news/2016/11/trump...l-election-betting-odds-props-lines-favorite/

Come to think of it, a spread by state would be a better way to look at the odds.

 

[shuize]

Why do I suspect the left's newfound love for "integrity of our elections" won't actually translate into support for voter ID laws?

 

[WilliamSeger]

Why do I suspect the left's newfound love for "integrity of our elections" won't actually translate into support for voter ID laws?

Why do I suspect that you aren't actually interested in valid arguments against voter ID laws?

 

[logger]

Why do I suspect that you aren't actually interested in valid arguments against voter ID laws?

Because they aren't valid?
No one on the right thinks leftist voters are too dumb to get an ID, especially when they already have ID's.