US Politics Mega-thread - Page 7518

On May 13 2017 04:47 LegalLord wrote:

Pick a few key battles to fight and ensure that people properly appreciate the scope of those specific problems. As opposed to just aimlessly opposing.

On May 13 2017 05:01 Plansix wrote:
Trump has straight up made an enemy of the entire intelligence and federal law enforcement community.

And again, this is why business people shouldn’t be fast tracked to high office.

On May 13 2017 05:03 Gorsameth wrote:

There are plenty of smart business people who would adept pretty quick to high office.

Trump is not one of them.

The lawyers who wrote a letter saying President Trump had no significant business ties to Russia work for a law firm that has extensive ties to Russia and received a “Russia Law Firm of the Year” award in 2016.

Sheri Dillon and William Nelson, tax partners at the law firm Morgan, Lewis & Bockius, which has served as tax counsel to Trump and the Trump Organization since 2005, wrote a letter in March released by the White House on Friday stating that a review of the last 10 years of Trump’s tax returns “do not reflect” ties to Russia “with a few exceptions.”

In 2016, however, Chambers & Partners, a London-based legal research publication, named the firm “Russia Law Firm of the Year” at its annual awards dinner. The firm celebrated the “prestigious honor” in a press release on its website, noting that the award is “the latest honor for the high-profile work performed by the lawyers in Morgan Lewis’ Moscow office.”

According to the firm’s website, its Moscow office includes more than 40 lawyers and staff who are “well known in the Russian market, and have a deep familiarity with the local legislation, practices, and key players.” The firm boasts of being “particularly adept” at advising clients on “sanction matters."

Following the release of the letter, Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn) noted the firm’s connection to Russia, calling it “unreal."

Asked if there could be other business ties between Trump and Russian partners, Sheri Dillon told ABC News that “the letter speaks for itself.”

As for the firm’s presence in Russia, a firm spokesperson said that no lawyers from Morgan Lewis have handling any business dealings for Mr. Trump in Russia.

Dillon has never been to Russia and does no work there, the spokesperson said.

Jack Blum, a Washington tax lawyer who is an expert on white-collar financial crime and international tax evasion, called the Dillon letter “meaningless.”

Blum told ABC News that real estate projects, in particular, can be structured with partners and subsidiaries so that it would be easy to shield the identity of all involved. Trump’s tax returns would not show where all the money came from to finance these projects, he said.

“There’s no substance to it. The letter is just another puff of smoke,” Blum said. “It has no meaning at all. It’s just another way to not answer the question.”

On May 13 2017 05:01 Plansix wrote:
Trump has straight up made an enemy of the entire intelligence and federal law enforcement community.

And again, this is why business people shouldn’t be fast tracked to high office.

On May 13 2017 04:19 biology]major wrote:


First of all, the only people who can control trump are the republicans. Trump has his base and they won't abandon him no matter what, it's a cult following rn. I imagine after this week alot of the obama voters who voted for trump are probably off the trump train. The democrats need to do their best to not appear partisan, but as usual they can't resist by calling for impeachment and whatever other nonsense. Unfortunately, I don't see the republicans doing anything, cause they are partisan hacks as well.

I would recognize a crisis if it were happening.

When the president seized me, stunned me with his venom and covered me with digestive fluid from his chelicerae, I was initially taken aback, but I reassured myself with this thought: President Richard Nixon never did that.

I know history.

This is clearly not the end of the world. That would be more clearly labeled and would be brought about by the other party. And the weather would be more ominous. Ravens would squawk, and the sky would turn red. It would not occur on a Tuesday when I had made other plans.

Okay, the firing of FBI Director James Comey looked bad. And when the president stunned him, pierced him with his fangs, wrapped him in a thick cocoon of impenetrable webbing and left him to hang there for days, that timing was also poor. It doesn’t seem as though it was what the FBI wanted or what the deputy attorney general wanted, either. But the American people voted for change! And the president is not Nixon. Nixon fired people on a Saturday, whereas this happened on a Tuesday.

He does not sweat and look pale on TV, which Nixon always did. Also, history plainly states that Nixon was born in 1913, one of several siblings, whereas the president was born in 1946, one of 3,000 eggs. Already we are seeing huge discrepancies! Nixon had only two legs.

Nixon was married to a woman named Pat who wore Republican cloth coats. I think we can agree that we are talking about someone different. Come back when he is threatening people with secret “tapes” of his conversations when our leader has adopted a small dog named Checkers, and then we will see where we stand.

This has none of the historical signs of a crisis. We still believe in small government, and that doesn’t have to change because the person or entity presiding over it happens to be a giant spider.

I think of the many norms that are still going strong as the digestive acid begins to eat its way through my flag pin.

We got an appointee for the Supreme Court! That, already, is a great accomplishment.

If this were a real crisis, there would be no other news. An alert would go over the TV. It would say, “Democracy Alert!” and make an unpleasant sound. In the meantime, I’m glad those Unicorn Frappuccinos are gone.

But the background music has not crescendoed. I look out the window, and the sun is shining. On the television the colorful heads are speaking as they have always spoken, and they are still not in agreement. I think. It is getting harder to see in here, and I feel a curious warmth spreading through all my appendages. I would not feel this way if something really serious were going on. The polls would reflect it, too.

I am still getting what I wanted. It is good to have someone in the Oval Office who shares my values: covering everything with giant webs, eating flies and restoring our relationship with Russia. I think I once had other values but, well, winning is winning.

Also, we have yet to see what this will become. We don’t know that a special prosecutor is called for.

It is quite possible that the thing spewing its webbing everywhere in the Oval Office is not in its final form. Perhaps it will ultimately look like Merrick Garland. We should wait. Really, everything depends on the next move. Which will, of course, set the terms for the move after that. All of which we must contemplate and look into.

It’s very dark.

If we are ever in a point of real crisis, I will be the hero the country requires. I know that about myself. But in the meantime, I stand behind the president, who I am positive is not literally Nixon.

Besides, if it were really bad, Paul Ryan would say something.

I want to sleep.

If this were a crisis, something would be done by someone. A hero would emerge. Not one of these people I am used to working with, with whose flaws and biases I am too well acquainted, but a real hero, unimpeachable. Me, perhaps.

If there were an occasion, I would be rising to it. But I am not rising.

DEFENDERS OR ENABLERS?
Let’s start at the beginning: The president of the United States said that part of his reason for firing the top federal investigator was his handling of a criminal probe into the president’s election campaign.

In the same interview with NBC News, President Trump even said that he had asked former FBI Director James Comey whether the investigation was targeted at the president himself.

No matter what, these are serious and significant developments. If you find yourself dismissing them or focusing on misplaced partisan reactions to them, you are doing no service to Trump or the country.

Full stop.

In life and in politics there is a line between defending someone and enabling them. What is happening these days with Trump and his core supporters is getting way past defense.

In the end, if Trump is proven right, and there was no information sharing or collusion between his campaign and Kremlin-allied entities, the president’s intemperate comments will not add up to much.

All this will have been is a sorry incident in which a frustrated commander in chief lashed out against his critics, making his reputation and his staff collateral damage in the process. Also harmed will have been Trump’s agenda and the already weak bonds of trust between him and his fellow Republicans in Congress.

And that’s the best case scenario.

The darker side of the street looks like this: Democrats retake the House in 2018, investigators find that one of Trump’s underlings had been in cahoots with Putinists and Trump’s remark to Lester Holt “when I decided to [fire Comey], I said to myself, you know, this Russia thing with Trump and Russia is a made up story,” would surely make it into the articles of impeachment.

This is deadly serious stuff. And many of the president’s supporters seem either unaware or unwilling to confront the situation as it exists. Just because one thinks that Democrats are hysterical in their responses to Trump does not mean that Trump is doing the right things.

His team had been, under the adverse conditions Trump created for them, working hard to offer the best rationale for firing Comey: That the former director’s mishandling of Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton’s case left him unable to suitably lead the agency.

Whether Trump was frustrated by not getting adequate credit for toppling Comey, a man he clearly had come to despise, or if Trump did not understand the legal and communications necessities of the moment doesn’t matter. Whatever the reason, Trump harmed himself, his party and his agenda.

No matter how much his supporters want Trump to succeed, if they can’t be clear-eyed and plainspoken about the current situation things are going to get worse, not better.

The undisciplined, erratic approach to a scandal that represents mortal peril for this presidency is not primarily the fault of bad staff work, the “lying press” or Democrats. It is primarily the fault of a president who steadfastly refuses to empower his staff, show respect for the separation of powers or exhibit patience.

There will always be people who will tell the president that escapades like the one this week are a refreshing departure from stuffy old Washington and that all he really needs to do is keep kicking the walls of the barn down until he gets his way.

There will always be such people because there will always be, in any administration or organization, those willing to enable damaging behavior in order to gain power and access.

What Trump badly needs now is straight talk and honest appraisal from his advisers and supporters and desperation enough to be willing to listen.