US Politics Mega-thread - Page 7819

On June 09 2017 07:19 RealityIsKing wrote:
Looks like Trump is innocent, gg.

On June 09 2017 07:57 On_Slaught wrote:


I'm sorry. Did i miss the part where he said the Trump campaign was cleared of collusion? I for one never thought Trump himself did anything; he's far too stupid to be a good mark (plus he has a big mouth). It's all the greedy fucks around him.

I love how you take pleasure in this whole thing as if what we heard about Trump today doesn't paint a picture of a shit person being in the White House. But I suppose you came to terms with that some time ago and merely get off on being adversarial.

Attorney General Jeff Sessions’ oversight of the federal investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election had become “problematic” before he voluntarily recused himself, fired FBI Director James Comey testified Thursday.

The tantalizingly vague statement, based on facts Comey said he could not discuss in an open hearing of the Senate Intelligence Committee, suggested that FBI leadership knew weeks before Sessions’ recusal that he would have to step down.

As Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR) noted, Comey first made this assertion in his seven-page-long written testimony, which was released a day before his blockbuster in-person appearance. In that prepared statement, Comey said he immediately briefed his FBI leadership team after President Donald Trump requested he drop the investigation into Trump’s freshly ousted national security adviser, Michael Flynn, in a one-on-one White House meeting on Feb. 14. The officials agreed not to notify Sessions because they expected he “would likely recuse himself from involvement in Russia-related investigations,” per Comey’s prepared statement.

“What was it about the attorney general’s own interactions with the Russians or his behavior with regard to the investigation that would have led the entire leadership of the FBI to make this decision?” Wyden asked.

“Our judgment, as I recall, was that he was very close to and inevitably going to recuse himself for a variety of reasons,” Comey said. “We also were aware of facts that I can’t discuss in an open setting, that would make his continued engagement in a Russia-related investigation problematic and so we were—we were convinced and in fact, I think we had already heard that the career people [at the Justice Department] were recommending that he recuse himself, that he was not going to be in contact with Russia related matters much longer.”

“That turned out to be the case,” he added.

Sessions recused himself two weeks after that Feb. 14 conversation between Trump and Comey, after the Washington Post reported that he failed to disclose two conversations he had with Russia’s ambassador to the U.S. during the campaign. Sessions had voluntarily offered during his own confirmation hearings that he “did not have communications with the Russians.”

After the Washington Post broke the news that Sessions twice met with Russian ambassador Sergey Kislyak, the attorney general’s spokesperson confirmed the encounters, saying they occurred in his capacity as a then-senator from Alabama rather than as a prominent Trump campaign surrogate.

The attorney general announced his recusal from both the Russia probe and any “matters that deal with the Trump campaign” hours later.

“My staff recommended recusal,” Sessions said in a March 2 news conference. “I believe those recommendations are right and just.”

During that announcement, Sessions declined to confirm that there was an investigation into Trump’s associates and Russia. He also said he did not “believe” he had met with any Russian officials other than Kislyak.

Trump is reportedly still seething at Sessions over that recusal, which he believes ultimately led to the appointment of a special counsel to oversee the sprawling Russia investigation.

On June 09 2017 14:13 LegalLord wrote:
I remember back in 2012 when people were quite displeased with Obama and thought they just had to suck it up and vote for him again. I can't say I was quite that cynical back then, but by the end of his second term he certainly did wear out his welcome. It almost seems that the Dems decided that if Obama was a lesser evil, then perhaps they needed to squeeze a little more mileage out and put up an even worse candidate.

Sad thing is, either way this election went we probably would have had this situation in which the president was perpetually under investigation for not altogether unreasonable reasons. But at least Europe would have liked us more.

On June 09 2017 14:24 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:


Not to mention the fact that calling Trump a liar is like calling water wet. It's common knowledge and no one in their right mind would say that Trump isn't a liar. We have far too much video and Twitter evidence of him explicitly lying.

On June 09 2017 14:20 ChristianS wrote:
Here's where I think conservatives are crazy to be celebrating about the hearings: their cause for celebration is that we didn't see smoking gun evidence of collusion or obstruction of justice. That's an insanely low bar. It wasn't even that the accusations were dropped or disproven. We know pretty much the same stuff we knew before, but some stuff we know more certainly (i.e. confirmed directly from Comey rather than anonymous sources), some stuff we know in more detail (e.g. "honest loyalty"), and some more explosive allegations didn't happen (e.g. "Comey sez Trump threatened his wife if he didn't burn the evidence"). If anyone thought this would be resolved after today, they were wrong.

If Trump's guilty, that's very good news for Trump. If he's not, that's bad news for Trump. Because if it was resolved, he could put this behind him, but with the water still murky, this promises to drag on a great deal longer. Liberals and some conservatives will say there's enough evidence of wrongdoing, conservatives will say there's not, and the stalemate will lead to more investigation, which will mean it will return to the foreground again and again and again.

It's like the emails last year. It wasn't just about how bad the scandal was, it was the longevity of the story. That one scandal dominated coverage for basically the entire year, whereas a lot of other big scandals fell out of the news cycle and didn't have such a big impact on the election. The Khan thing, Judge Curiel, even the Access Hollywood tape had a big impact on the polls when they landed, and then faded away, whereas the emails kept coming up again and again (with one last hit in the form of the Comey letter).

That's what this scandal is for Trump - and with Comey's testimony, he can't even deflect to criticizing the media at the moment. His accuser is James Comey, who's got about as good a reputation as anybody can have right now. Trump's advocates aren't even bothering to argue why what he did was good or just or proper. The best they can argue is that based solely on the actions described Trump can't quite be convicted of a felony.

On June 09 2017 13:53 Danglars wrote:

Who in their news office thinks this kind of approach does them any good? If loud mirth in the echo chamber really stuck it to the fall guy, we'd have a different occupant in the White House.