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Russian Federation4447 Posts
On March 04 2017 02:41 KwarK wrote:Show nested quote +On March 04 2017 02:33 Tien wrote:On March 04 2017 01:55 Doodsmack wrote:On March 04 2017 01:43 Introvert wrote:On March 04 2017 00:42 Doodsmack wrote:
Well there we see the uncertainty of which role he's playing when meeting with the ambassador. But I guess we could just take the Trump admin's word for it. I'll try one more time. He went to Cleveland for the RNC, as a prominent Trump backer. He even gave a speech. While he was there, he went to a Heritage Foundation event (not FP doves either), where he met multiple ambassadors briefly. But he should have used senate funds, because you would like him to be possibly be guilty of something. Not saying he necessarily should have used Senate funds, the point is that it shows he can potentially mix his roles as Senator and team Trump member. But the real issue is the unusually high number of contacts between team Trump and Russia. And the fact that Sessions himself admits he should have disclosed more. Which contacts between team Trump and Russia are worrisome? Flynn talking to ambassador National Security Advisor? Kushner talking to ambassadors during the transition? He is the unofficial backdoor liason for foreign countries around the world trying to get a message to Trump directly. Sessions talking to an ambassador in his office with other military personel? Whats everyone going crazy over again? So it's established as fact as this point that Russia intervened through selectively releasing hacked material to try and help Trump win. Now Russia is an independent country with their own goals etc so that's not unreasonable. I mean sure, it fucking sucks for Americans to have their democracy fucked with, but it makes sense that Russia would try and get a candidate in who they think is better for them. So the only really important question at the bottom of it all is "did the Trump campaign make an agreement to trade favours or did Putin choose to help Trump without a specific agreement but in the hope that favors would happen anyway?" The former case would be a huge scandal because it'd mean that the Trump campaign sold out American interests to foreign powers in exchange for help getting elected. The latter case wouldn't. So right now it's incredibly important to find out who met with who, what they talked about and when it happened. The stakes couldn't be higher and while it's possible that there is nothing underneath it there is absolutely a need for the investigation into whether Trump sold out his country for a job title. And the whole affair is made much, much harder by the fact that the Trump campaigners insist upon lying about who they met with and what they discussed.
I agree the possibility exists, even faint that maybe Trump "sold" out America. But Obama ordered an exhaustive investigative report to be released before January 20th and they found no connection. I'm sure Obama wanted to know if Trump did indeed broker a deal for leaked emails, and had James Clapper and Brennen (Trump haters) scour every intelligence they had. Nothing was found.
Now where is the part that meeting with Russian ambassadors is equal to a scandal?
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But the investigation didn't complete. The FBI still has one and the CIA did not finish theirs. And once again, he came dangerously close to lying under oath. You can go to jail for that.
On March 04 2017 03:12 Silvanel wrote:So apparently Euorpean Parliment has had enough of US stalling on the issue: http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/europe-visa-free-travel-americans-european-parliament-vote-a7609406.htmlThe European Parliament has voted to end visa-free travel for Americans within the EU. + Show Spoiler +
It comes after the US failed to agree visa-free travel for citizens of five EU countries – Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Poland and Romania – as part of a reciprocity agreement. US citizens can normally travel to all countries in the bloc without a visa.
The vote urges the revocation of the scheme within two months, meaning Americans will have to apply for extra documents for 12 months after the European Commission implements a “delegated act” to bring the change into effect.
Woops, I'm sure this as nothing to do with our President's talk about NATO or the travel ban. Totally not a response to that.
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Russian Federation4447 Posts
Fair enough, lets see where this goes.
From an outsider looking in, this looks close to McCarthyism where the word Russia is being replaced with secret list of "communists" and everyone goes absolutely crazy.
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McCarthyism was very different. First off, it wasn't an attack on politicians, but other political activists and citizens. It involved hearings and accusations of people being communists simply because of the books they read or the friends and associates they had. It was the people in power abusing those without any power. This is very different.
McCarthyism also fell apart the instant he went after the military and reporters with credibility.
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United States43570 Posts
On March 04 2017 03:12 Tien wrote:Show nested quote +On March 04 2017 02:41 KwarK wrote:On March 04 2017 02:33 Tien wrote:On March 04 2017 01:55 Doodsmack wrote:On March 04 2017 01:43 Introvert wrote:On March 04 2017 00:42 Doodsmack wrote:
Well there we see the uncertainty of which role he's playing when meeting with the ambassador. But I guess we could just take the Trump admin's word for it. I'll try one more time. He went to Cleveland for the RNC, as a prominent Trump backer. He even gave a speech. While he was there, he went to a Heritage Foundation event (not FP doves either), where he met multiple ambassadors briefly. But he should have used senate funds, because you would like him to be possibly be guilty of something. Not saying he necessarily should have used Senate funds, the point is that it shows he can potentially mix his roles as Senator and team Trump member. But the real issue is the unusually high number of contacts between team Trump and Russia. And the fact that Sessions himself admits he should have disclosed more. Which contacts between team Trump and Russia are worrisome? Flynn talking to ambassador National Security Advisor? Kushner talking to ambassadors during the transition? He is the unofficial backdoor liason for foreign countries around the world trying to get a message to Trump directly. Sessions talking to an ambassador in his office with other military personel? Whats everyone going crazy over again? So it's established as fact as this point that Russia intervened through selectively releasing hacked material to try and help Trump win. Now Russia is an independent country with their own goals etc so that's not unreasonable. I mean sure, it fucking sucks for Americans to have their democracy fucked with, but it makes sense that Russia would try and get a candidate in who they think is better for them. So the only really important question at the bottom of it all is "did the Trump campaign make an agreement to trade favours or did Putin choose to help Trump without a specific agreement but in the hope that favors would happen anyway?" The former case would be a huge scandal because it'd mean that the Trump campaign sold out American interests to foreign powers in exchange for help getting elected. The latter case wouldn't. So right now it's incredibly important to find out who met with who, what they talked about and when it happened. The stakes couldn't be higher and while it's possible that there is nothing underneath it there is absolutely a need for the investigation into whether Trump sold out his country for a job title. And the whole affair is made much, much harder by the fact that the Trump campaigners insist upon lying about who they met with and what they discussed. I agree the possibility exists, even faint that maybe Trump "sold" out America. But Obama ordered an exhaustive investigative report to be released before January 20th and they found no connection. I'm sure Obama wanted to know if Trump did indeed broker a deal for leaked emails, and had James Clapper and Brennen (Trump haters) scour every intelligence they had. Nothing was found. Now where is the part that meeting with Russian ambassadors is equal to a scandal?
Investigation hasn't yet been completed and the scandal is expanding as figures close to Trump are revealed to have been in communication with Russian intelligence during the campaign and lying about it.
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United States43570 Posts
On March 04 2017 03:15 Plansix wrote:But the investigation didn't complete. The FBI still has one and the CIA did not finish theirs. And once again, he came dangerously close to lying under oath. You can go to jail for that. Show nested quote +On March 04 2017 03:12 Silvanel wrote:So apparently Euorpean Parliment has had enough of US stalling on the issue: http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/europe-visa-free-travel-americans-european-parliament-vote-a7609406.htmlThe European Parliament has voted to end visa-free travel for Americans within the EU. + Show Spoiler +
It comes after the US failed to agree visa-free travel for citizens of five EU countries – Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Poland and Romania – as part of a reciprocity agreement. US citizens can normally travel to all countries in the bloc without a visa.
The vote urges the revocation of the scheme within two months, meaning Americans will have to apply for extra documents for 12 months after the European Commission implements a “delegated act” to bring the change into effect.
Woops, I'm sure this as nothing to do with our President's talk about NATO or the travel ban. Totally not a response to that.
It's actually not to do with that.
The agreed to visa reciprocity, Americans in the EU, EU members in America. The US was fine with the Brits and Germans but once the EU started expanding to Bulgarians they got a little skeptical and so the deal is off. It's a result of incompetent leadership, not politically stupid leadership.
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On March 04 2017 03:18 Tien wrote:
Fair enough, lets see where this goes.
From an outsider looking in, this looks close to McCarthyism where the word Russia is being replaced with secret list of "communists" and everyone goes absolutely crazy.
Don't worry, it looks like McCarthyism from here too. Instead of proven communist spy infiltration, its proven Russian hacking. So now every non-news story is sinister and we'd have hearings everywhere if Dems could manage to win congressional seats again.
Dems continue to overplay their hand. Trump's a little chummy with Putin's autocracy and evidence points to Russia having provided Wikileaks with the leaks. That's fertile ground of an investigation and caution/prophylaxis ahead of 2020. Now the way you make all of it worth nothing is witch hunts to the point where your average American rolls his eyes at every new Russian story because chance are it's just Democrats grasping at straws and throwing whatever they can find against walls until something sticks.
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@Kwark, Plansix
Yeah. Visa free travel to US is one of the long standing goals of Polish foreign policy. One of the most important motivators behind us helping USA in Iraq and Afganistan (shadowed only by strenghteing our military ties in order to mitigate Russia threat). The US has been promising Visa free travel for many years, but it never materlized. Now with help from western europeans perhaps we can acomplish something. I imagine its similiar for Bulgaria and Romania.
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On March 04 2017 03:26 KwarK wrote:Show nested quote +On March 04 2017 03:15 Plansix wrote:But the investigation didn't complete. The FBI still has one and the CIA did not finish theirs. And once again, he came dangerously close to lying under oath. You can go to jail for that. On March 04 2017 03:12 Silvanel wrote:So apparently Euorpean Parliment has had enough of US stalling on the issue: http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/europe-visa-free-travel-americans-european-parliament-vote-a7609406.htmlThe European Parliament has voted to end visa-free travel for Americans within the EU. + Show Spoiler +
It comes after the US failed to agree visa-free travel for citizens of five EU countries – Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Poland and Romania – as part of a reciprocity agreement. US citizens can normally travel to all countries in the bloc without a visa.
The vote urges the revocation of the scheme within two months, meaning Americans will have to apply for extra documents for 12 months after the European Commission implements a “delegated act” to bring the change into effect.
Woops, I'm sure this as nothing to do with our President's talk about NATO or the travel ban. Totally not a response to that. It's actually not to do with that. The agreed to visa reciprocity, Americans in the EU, EU members in America. The US was fine with the Brits and Germans but once the EU started expanding to Bulgarians they got a little skeptical and so the deal is off. It's a result of incompetent leadership, not politically stupid leadership.
Incompetence? Doesn't seem like it to me. If the US doesn't want to extend the visa waiver to Bulgaria, Cyprus and Romania, that's their good right. It is then the EU's right to end the agreement altogether. The outcome is probably bad for everybody involved, but I don't think incompetence is the right word. More like different priorities.
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United States43570 Posts
On March 04 2017 03:39 Acrofales wrote:Show nested quote +On March 04 2017 03:26 KwarK wrote:On March 04 2017 03:15 Plansix wrote:But the investigation didn't complete. The FBI still has one and the CIA did not finish theirs. And once again, he came dangerously close to lying under oath. You can go to jail for that. On March 04 2017 03:12 Silvanel wrote:So apparently Euorpean Parliment has had enough of US stalling on the issue: http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/europe-visa-free-travel-americans-european-parliament-vote-a7609406.htmlThe European Parliament has voted to end visa-free travel for Americans within the EU. + Show Spoiler +
It comes after the US failed to agree visa-free travel for citizens of five EU countries – Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Poland and Romania – as part of a reciprocity agreement. US citizens can normally travel to all countries in the bloc without a visa.
The vote urges the revocation of the scheme within two months, meaning Americans will have to apply for extra documents for 12 months after the European Commission implements a “delegated act” to bring the change into effect.
Woops, I'm sure this as nothing to do with our President's talk about NATO or the travel ban. Totally not a response to that. It's actually not to do with that. The agreed to visa reciprocity, Americans in the EU, EU members in America. The US was fine with the Brits and Germans but once the EU started expanding to Bulgarians they got a little skeptical and so the deal is off. It's a result of incompetent leadership, not politically stupid leadership. Incompetence? Doesn't seem like it to me. If the US doesn't want to extend the visa waiver to Bulgaria, Cyprus and Romania, that's their good right. It is then the EU's right to end the agreement altogether. The outcome is probably bad for everybody involved, but I don't think incompetence is the right word. More like different priorities.
Well they signed up for an agreement and then never fulfilled their half of the bargain and had the agreement cancelled on them. Doesn't sound deliberate to me. Sounds like the people who wanted the deal never checked if they had the power to make the deal and never convinced the people who did have the power of the benefits of it.
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On March 04 2017 03:34 Danglars wrote:Show nested quote +On March 04 2017 03:18 Tien wrote:
Fair enough, lets see where this goes.
From an outsider looking in, this looks close to McCarthyism where the word Russia is being replaced with secret list of "communists" and everyone goes absolutely crazy. Don't worry, it looks like McCarthyism from here too. Instead of proven communist spy infiltration, its proven Russian hacking. So now every non-news story is sinister and we'd have hearings everywhere if Dems could manage to win congressional seats again. Dems continue to overplay their hand. Trump's a little chummy with Putin's autocracy and evidence points to Russia having provided Wikileaks with the leaks. That's fertile ground of an investigation and caution/prophylaxis ahead of 2020. Now the way you make all of it worth nothing is witch hunts to the point where your average American rolls his eyes at every new Russian story because chance are it's just Democrats grasping at straws and throwing whatever they can find against walls until something sticks.
Yeah, where ever did democrats get the idea of constantly having hearings on political opponents for every single thing. Can't imagine how they got the idea in their mind that that is something that helps in the broken US political system. It's not like republicans have done it to them for the last decade.
Also, from what we have seen, that "rolling their eyes" point doesn't actually happen. See Benghazi. See Emails. Apparently it is a valid way to win elections. For some reason, americans still elect people even if all they do is block everything and then complain that nothing happens. So, have fun reaping what you sow.
Maybe in the end you will eventually figure out a way to fix your broken archaic system. But i think it needs to become even more disfunctional for that to happen.
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On March 04 2017 03:36 Silvanel wrote:
@Kwark, Plansix
Yeah. Visa free travel to US is one of the long standing goals of Polish foreign policy. One of the most important motivators behind us helping USA in Iraq and Afganistan (shadowed only by strenghteing our military ties in order to mitigate Russia threat). The US has been promising Visa free travel for many years, but it never materlized. Now with help from western europeans perhaps we can acomplish something. I imagine its similiar for Bulgaria and Romania.
I am sure there were a number of factors. I was just commenting on the fact that they decided to pull the trigger on it now and the US doesn’t really deserve the benefit of the doubt a second time around.
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The Republicans will go on blaming everything on Obama while the Democrats go on blaming everything on the Russians.
This is going to be a really fun 4 years.
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On March 04 2017 03:56 TheYango wrote:
The Republicans will go on blaming everything on Obama while the Democrats go on blaming everything on the Russians.
This is going to be a really fun 4 years.
At some point we will vote them out and get a better dynamic. If the Dems win the house, but not the senate, the blame game will not hold.
Of course, that requires the Dems to remove all the stupid rules put into place since Newt.
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On March 04 2017 03:55 Plansix wrote:Show nested quote +On March 04 2017 03:36 Silvanel wrote:
@Kwark, Plansix
Yeah. Visa free travel to US is one of the long standing goals of Polish foreign policy. One of the most important motivators behind us helping USA in Iraq and Afganistan (shadowed only by strenghteing our military ties in order to mitigate Russia threat). The US has been promising Visa free travel for many years, but it never materlized. Now with help from western europeans perhaps we can acomplish something. I imagine its similiar for Bulgaria and Romania. I am sure there were a number of factors. I was just commenting on the fact that they decided to pull the trigger on it now and the US doesn’t really deserve the benefit of the doubt a second time around.
Sure. It's politics. I also wonder if Trump might use this for his advantage - push for this agreement to succed and say "look i am not xenophobic, i let Poles, Bulgarians and Romanians in. I don't mind foreigners as long they are safe" - strenghten his muslim ban that way.
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On March 04 2017 03:53 Simberto wrote:Show nested quote +On March 04 2017 03:34 Danglars wrote:On March 04 2017 03:18 Tien wrote:
Fair enough, lets see where this goes.
From an outsider looking in, this looks close to McCarthyism where the word Russia is being replaced with secret list of "communists" and everyone goes absolutely crazy. Don't worry, it looks like McCarthyism from here too. Instead of proven communist spy infiltration, its proven Russian hacking. So now every non-news story is sinister and we'd have hearings everywhere if Dems could manage to win congressional seats again. Dems continue to overplay their hand. Trump's a little chummy with Putin's autocracy and evidence points to Russia having provided Wikileaks with the leaks. That's fertile ground of an investigation and caution/prophylaxis ahead of 2020. Now the way you make all of it worth nothing is witch hunts to the point where your average American rolls his eyes at every new Russian story because chance are it's just Democrats grasping at straws and throwing whatever they can find against walls until something sticks. Yeah, where ever did democrats get the idea of constantly having hearings on political opponents for every single thing. Can't imagine how they got the idea in their mind that that is something that helps in the broken US political system. It's not like republicans have done it to them for the last decade. Also, from what we have seen, that "rolling their eyes" point doesn't actually happen. See Benghazi. See Emails. Apparently it is a valid way to win elections. For some reason, americans still elect people even if all they do is block everything and then complain that nothing happens. So, have fun reaping what you sow. Maybe in the end you will eventually figure out a way to fix your broken archaic system. But i think it needs to become even more disfunctional for that to happen.
So what you're saying is Benghazi prolonged furor was such a good idea that the Democrats took it to heart and are repeating the exercise through media surrogates and press dispatches. If it was an easy thing to learn, you'd expect them to learn it.
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On March 04 2017 03:34 Danglars wrote:Show nested quote +On March 04 2017 03:18 Tien wrote:
Fair enough, lets see where this goes.
From an outsider looking in, this looks close to McCarthyism where the word Russia is being replaced with secret list of "communists" and everyone goes absolutely crazy. Don't worry, it looks like McCarthyism from here too. Instead of proven communist spy infiltration, its proven Russian hacking. So now every non-news story is sinister and we'd have hearings everywhere if Dems could manage to win congressional seats again. Dems continue to overplay their hand. Trump's a little chummy with Putin's autocracy and evidence points to Russia having provided Wikileaks with the leaks. That's fertile ground of an investigation and caution/prophylaxis ahead of 2020. Now the way you make all of it worth nothing is witch hunts to the point where your average American rolls his eyes at every new Russian story because chance are it's just Democrats grasping at straws and throwing whatever they can find against walls until something sticks.
If we could refrain from saying McCarthyism and just say Benghaziism or even E-Mail-Serverism I might even be fine with that.
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Speaking of e-mail servers, I find the story about Pence's AOL e-mail account to be way more interesting than the press reporting every tiny little change in the Sessions situation.
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On March 04 2017 04:03 Silvanel wrote:Show nested quote +On March 04 2017 03:55 Plansix wrote:On March 04 2017 03:36 Silvanel wrote:
@Kwark, Plansix
Yeah. Visa free travel to US is one of the long standing goals of Polish foreign policy. One of the most important motivators behind us helping USA in Iraq and Afganistan (shadowed only by strenghteing our military ties in order to mitigate Russia threat). The US has been promising Visa free travel for many years, but it never materlized. Now with help from western europeans perhaps we can acomplish something. I imagine its similiar for Bulgaria and Romania. I am sure there were a number of factors. I was just commenting on the fact that they decided to pull the trigger on it now and the US doesn’t really deserve the benefit of the doubt a second time around. Sure. It's politics. I also wonder if Trump might use this for his advantage - push for this agreement to succed and say "look i am not xenophobic, i let Poles, Bulgarians and Romanians in. I don't mind foreigners as long they are safe" - strenghten his muslim ban that way.
The problem is going to be that it will make life more difficult for everyone in the US to travel through the EU. They lose out on things they previously enjoyed. They might blame the EU, but I more than a few are going to blame the current government.
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MIDDLEBURY, Vt. — Hundreds of college students on Thursday protested a lecture by a writer some called a white nationalist, forcing the college to move his talk to an undisclosed campus location from which it was live-streamed to the original venue but couldn’t be heard above protesters’ chants, feet stamping and occasional smoke alarms.
Speaker Charles Murray wrote “The Bell Curve: Intelligence and Class Structure in American Life” and “Coming Apart: The State of White America, 1960-2010.” The Southern Poverty Law Center considers him a white nationalist who uses “racist pseudoscience and misleading statistics to argue that social inequality is caused by the genetic inferiority of the black and Latino communities, women and the poor.”
Murray hasn’t responded to an email seeking comment.
Middlebury College students turned their backs on Murray just as he started to speak Thursday and chanted “Who is the enemy? White supremacy!” ‘’Racist, sexist, anti-gay, Charles Murray, go away!” and “Your message is hatred. We cannot tolerate it.”
They continued their chants until the college announced that Murray would speak from another location on campus. Students continued their protests, drowning out the talk. WaPo
Now they're trying to give Charles Murray the Milo treatment. He's a controversial AEI scholar, which of course means he shouldn't be allowed to speak when invited to address college students that want to hear him. Administrators at Middlebury, like Berkeley, unable to protect free speech on campus. So very sad.
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EPT
