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On April 12 2019 08:11 Mohdoo wrote:Show nested quote +On April 12 2019 08:03 IgnE wrote:On April 12 2019 07:42 Mohdoo wrote:On April 12 2019 07:31 IgnE wrote:On April 12 2019 07:27 Mohdoo wrote:On April 12 2019 07:23 Doublemint wrote:On April 12 2019 06:44 Mohdoo wrote:On April 12 2019 06:34 crms wrote:On April 11 2019 11:36 Mohdoo wrote:On April 11 2019 11:20 Doodsmack wrote:
If it comes out that there was improper spying on the Trump campaign, and the investigation was a weapon intended to derail Trump's presidency, I'll bet a lot on the left would be okay with that, because it's comeuppance for Trump. So long as crimes were uncovered that would not have been otherwise found, it is a net positive. I'm about as left as you can get and totally disagree. I want the investigations to be legitimate because allowing the government to just decide without proper predication to violate citizens constitutional rights is a mess I'm not comfortable with whatsoever. From your statement it sounds like you'd be a proponent of other constitutional murky policies like 'stop and frisk'. Hey lets just search these black guys, I mean who cares if the search is likely a violation of their rights, we found some xyz so I guess it was a net positive! Hellllllll no. No, because I am saying a Mueller-type of investigation is only valid for people who are being given insane amounts of power, doing jobs we have seen corrupt many people. And I am not saying it should be stop and frisk. I am saying anyone who wants to have that much power needs to also consent to allowing citizens to KNOW they are clean. They work for us. I also imagine there are people on this board who would gladly consent to every detail of their lives being investigated if it meant being able to contribute to a functional, honest government. And lots of other good people feel the same way. It is an *honor* to serve government. If someone doesn't feel it is an honor, they aren't someone you want running the government. It is no different than saying cops should wear body camera. Lots of cops are shit bags. We need to be recording them. I am not saying all citizens need cameras. Just the ones who are given the right to kill people based on their intuition. People who we say can decide to exterminate life? Yeah, lets keep a closer eye on them. People who are military advisers? Yeah, lets make sure they don't have undisclosed contracts with other nations. that seems... highly suspect. like "Xi Jinping's wet dream of China" kind of suspect... everything about my daily life should be transparent? wait what? why in god's name would I ever allow that to happen? or any sane man for that matter? to help the government do their job? no thank you. To each their own, but I can say with total confidence that I would consent to Mueller being hired to investigate me prior to my being hired to work in the white house. So long as I got to keep my existing salary. so you don’t mind people listening to your phone calls and going through all your texts and google searches? Truthfully I don't think this is how it would be done. I don't think that is how they caught Manafort. Rather, I would ask the people who do this for a living "What kind of information would you need to make sure this person isn't corrupt or prone to blackmail?" If those people said "We need access to phone/internet records", then that's your answer. This is a system where we can choose what we optimize. Do we make it more invasive, but also more safe? Or less invasive and less safe? Based on data we have for the past 50 years, I would say we need to move our needle significantly closer to "more invasive and more safe". I would say we do the minimum necessary for "complete confidence" the individual is safe for government work. If that includes phone/internet records, it isn't something to form an opinion on. It is what is necessary and we either decide if we care about corruption or not. But yes, so long as the materials are kept confidential and only the investigators hear/see my information, it is the system working as it needs to. We don't get to decide what is and isn't effective. But we DO get to decide what methods we use based on their effectiveness. I am saying I would consent to the minimum necessary as determined by experts. that’s true yes, and also probably where all the argument is. i say investigate the riches and make it public 1. What are you saying is true? 2. What argument? Between us? Or other people? 3. What do you mean by "i say investigate the riches and make it public"
1 and 2) the scope is open to debate, most people agree we should know something about our candidates, what is at issue is the contents/scope
3) while i am unequivocally against tapping phones and communications as a matter of course, i am fully for transparent finances being mandatory
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Northern Ireland25407 Posts
I’ve never understood why retiring makes one immune from historic misconduct proceedings.
You should still be subject to it and suffer the reputations damage you should be liable to suffer.
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On April 12 2019 09:51 Wombat_NI wrote:
I’ve never understood why retiring makes one immune from historic misconduct proceedings.
You should still be subject to it and suffer the reputations damage you should be liable to suffer.
The sanctioning body only really has the power to affect her legal license and bench position. If she surrenders those, there’s nothing else that they can really do. This doesn’t mean that she’s immune from separate prosecution from criminal authorities.
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On April 12 2019 09:55 xDaunt wrote:Show nested quote +On April 12 2019 09:51 Wombat_NI wrote:
I’ve never understood why retiring makes one immune from historic misconduct proceedings.
You should still be subject to it and suffer the reputations damage you should be liable to suffer. The sanctioning body only really has the power to affect her legal license and bench position. If she surrenders those, there’s nothing else that they can really do. This doesn’t mean that she’s immune from separate prosecution from criminal authorities.
That makes sense, thanks for the clarification.
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On April 12 2019 05:32 Plansix wrote:
I unequivocally dispute the idea that paying someone raw information or documents is the equivalent to paying a professional journalist for a story they have written. The information provided in both is of value, but the reporter’s reputation and credibility are also part of what is being paid for and separate from the value of the information. Furthermore, the craft of the journalist in obtaining and parsing which information is of value to the public is also what is being paid for. Your claim that they are so similar as to be equal in this discussion is simply a churlish attempt to flatting a nuanced subject.
I kept reading and I still don't understand what your position is other than you don't like/trust Assange and NDA's or the ethics of Wikileaks. It's confusing because your ethical objections don't seem to be coherent or lead to substantive conclusion about what they've published, besides vague inferences to the possibility they're withholding other information, but without any suggestion of what that is or why it's substantive.
I appreciate Igne trying to nail it down, I'm pretty much just as confused as when we started.
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Northern Ireland25407 Posts
I don’t know it seems pretty clear, if your whole shtick is transparency and you aren’t transparent yourself within reason.
Which becomes more of an issue the more you become perceived as neutral and whatnot. Bias or outside influence are way more of a factor the more the general populace perceives you as neutral, because they’ll treat biased stuff, or compromised stuff at face value, vs with skepticism or at least informed by what the bias is, like me reading a Guardian article at least I know they tend to slant a certain way.
If you don’t know who is writing what, where funding is from, and nobody who has even left the organisation can tell you any of this because NDAs then, yeah it’s bloody hard to ascertain where the bias lies. And everyone is biased, just with most other media you can figure out what that is and factor it in.
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On April 12 2019 11:31 Wombat_NI wrote:
I don’t know it seems pretty clear, if your whole shtick is transparency and you aren’t transparent yourself within reason.
Which becomes more of an issue the more you become perceived as neutral and whatnot. Bias or outside influence are way more of a factor the more the general populace perceives you as neutral, because they’ll treat biased stuff, or compromised stuff at face value, vs with skepticism or at least informed by what the bias is, like me reading a Guardian article at least I know they tend to slant a certain way.
If you don’t know who is writing what, where funding is from, and nobody who has even left the organisation can tell you any of this because NDAs then, yeah it’s bloody hard to ascertain where the bias lies. And everyone is biased, just with most other media you can figure out what that is and factor it in.
I don't think Wikileaks really hides their biases (they have a strong distaste for western governments and Assange has some problematic views) or that it matters to the substance of the content they produce (there's an argument to be made here it just hasn't been made). It seems the issue that's being unsaid is discontent at who/what they choose to expose, which has value, but seems to be more about a vague discomfort rather than any concern they spread false information like the Guardian or other western publications.
So that Wikileaks 100% accuracy is supposed to be undermined by their failure to adhere to the practices that result in western publications acting as stenographers for their government and or printing what appears to be blatant misinformation.
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Northern Ireland25407 Posts
On April 12 2019 09:55 xDaunt wrote:Show nested quote +On April 12 2019 09:51 Wombat_NI wrote:
I’ve never understood why retiring makes one immune from historic misconduct proceedings.
You should still be subject to it and suffer the reputations damage you should be liable to suffer. The sanctioning body only really has the power to affect her legal license and bench position. If she surrenders those, there’s nothing else that they can really do. This doesn’t mean that she’s immune from separate prosecution from criminal authorities.
I know that, although if I did not that would be a useful clarification.
For public positions anyway, keep the process going anyway. Granted, it’s ultimately a waste of money in terms of her doing that particular job or whatever.
I mean I know they can’t, just seems dumb to me. End up with ‘I know they retired but, if they hadn’t we’d have disbarred them’, or exoneration
Which isn’t the case here I assume, probably good to know if say, someone does the whole retire and have things dropped and then runs for some other public office.
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Northern Ireland25407 Posts
On April 12 2019 11:36 GreenHorizons wrote:Show nested quote +On April 12 2019 11:31 Wombat_NI wrote:
I don’t know it seems pretty clear, if your whole shtick is transparency and you aren’t transparent yourself within reason.
Which becomes more of an issue the more you become perceived as neutral and whatnot. Bias or outside influence are way more of a factor the more the general populace perceives you as neutral, because they’ll treat biased stuff, or compromised stuff at face value, vs with skepticism or at least informed by what the bias is, like me reading a Guardian article at least I know they tend to slant a certain way.
If you don’t know who is writing what, where funding is from, and nobody who has even left the organisation can tell you any of this because NDAs then, yeah it’s bloody hard to ascertain where the bias lies. And everyone is biased, just with most other media you can figure out what that is and factor it in. I don't think Wikileaks really hides their biases (they have a strong distaste for western governments and Assange has some problematic views) or that it matters to the substance of the content they produce (there's an argument to be made here it just hasn't been made). It seems the issue that's being unsaid is discontent at who/what they choose to expose, which has value, but seems to be more about a vague discomfort rather than any concern they spread false information like the Guardian or other western publications. So that Wikileaks 100% accuracy is supposed to be undermined by their failure to adhere to the practices that result in western publications acting as stenographers for their government and or printing what appears to be blatant misinformation.
I don’t understand Wikileaks’ positions and relative shifts in the last 3 years vs the previous 10, give or take. And I’m pretty good at ascertaining such things generally.
The flip side of the transparency coin is when you do something people don’t like, wild conjecture or outright lying can be turned against you.
So what someone like me or Plansix can consider problematically lacking in transparency on a principle level, can be basically anything to other people, in Wikileaks case of recent years that is a Russian stooge or an aid of Donald Trump
A charge that would be made anyway, but also a charge kind of harder to fight against if nobody knows how you work internally
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On April 12 2019 11:43 Wombat_NI wrote:Show nested quote +On April 12 2019 09:55 xDaunt wrote:On April 12 2019 09:51 Wombat_NI wrote:
I’ve never understood why retiring makes one immune from historic misconduct proceedings.
You should still be subject to it and suffer the reputations damage you should be liable to suffer. The sanctioning body only really has the power to affect her legal license and bench position. If she surrenders those, there’s nothing else that they can really do. This doesn’t mean that she’s immune from separate prosecution from criminal authorities. I know that, although if I did not that would be a useful clarification. For public positions anyway, keep the process going anyway. Granted, it’s ultimately a waste of money in terms of her doing that particular job or whatever. I mean I know they can’t, just seems dumb to me. End up with ‘I know they retired but, if they hadn’t we’d have disbarred them’, or exoneration Which isn’t the case here I assume, probably good to know if say, someone does the whole retire and have things dropped and then runs for some other public office.
Really it's supposed to be a social sanction based on norms. Like if your wealthy and your HOA finds out that you've been extorting the landscaping crew, they don't want to send their friend and neighbor to prison (or their neighbors get the idea to send them). What they want is to take your power (for themselves) and redistribute the loot.
It's not as big of a deal at the HOA level but in the US that's pretty much all levels of accountability for certain segments of society (increasingly desegregated as a result of capital). From HOA's to the office of President, to corporations and so on.
It's why the punishment for the Varsity Blues thing will be mostly social and largely gloss over the intentional and structural aspects that prompted these people to "cheap out" on the traditional way to buy access and prestige.
They could lock these college scammers up for all sorts of crimes easily 5+ years, but they wont.
On April 12 2019 11:49 Wombat_NI wrote:Show nested quote +On April 12 2019 11:36 GreenHorizons wrote:On April 12 2019 11:31 Wombat_NI wrote:
I don’t know it seems pretty clear, if your whole shtick is transparency and you aren’t transparent yourself within reason.
Which becomes more of an issue the more you become perceived as neutral and whatnot. Bias or outside influence are way more of a factor the more the general populace perceives you as neutral, because they’ll treat biased stuff, or compromised stuff at face value, vs with skepticism or at least informed by what the bias is, like me reading a Guardian article at least I know they tend to slant a certain way.
If you don’t know who is writing what, where funding is from, and nobody who has even left the organisation can tell you any of this because NDAs then, yeah it’s bloody hard to ascertain where the bias lies. And everyone is biased, just with most other media you can figure out what that is and factor it in. I don't think Wikileaks really hides their biases (they have a strong distaste for western governments and Assange has some problematic views) or that it matters to the substance of the content they produce (there's an argument to be made here it just hasn't been made). It seems the issue that's being unsaid is discontent at who/what they choose to expose, which has value, but seems to be more about a vague discomfort rather than any concern they spread false information like the Guardian or other western publications. So that Wikileaks 100% accuracy is supposed to be undermined by their failure to adhere to the practices that result in western publications acting as stenographers for their government and or printing what appears to be blatant misinformation. I don’t understand Wikileaks’ positions and relative shifts in the last 3 years vs the previous 10, give or take. And I’m pretty good at ascertaining such things generally. The flip side of the transparency coin is when you do something people don’t like, wild conjecture or outright lying can be turned against you. So what someone like me or Plansix can consider problematically lacking in transparency on a principle level, can be basically anything to other people, in Wikileaks case of recent years that is a Russian stooge or an aid of Donald Trump A charge that would be made anyway, but also a charge kind of harder to fight against if nobody knows how you work internally
I get that. My point is, so what if they are Russian stooge or an aid of Donald Trump, when it comes to what they publish?
There's an argument here, but no one is making it.
People know the NYT published propaganda pushed by the Bush admin but what accountability did 'transparency' actually produce? One poor sap got tossed under the bus for institutional failures, or more aptly imo, doing her job. Then back to business as usual.
EDIT: It reoccurred to me that Iraq was a long time ago (the start of the [2nd US] war anyway) and there are voters who don't remember/know about that colossal journalistic failure or that it's exposure was a large part of how Maddow came to fame before her Russia obsession. But now her network employs some of the people she helped expose.
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Northern Ireland25407 Posts
It’s bullshit so it is, but it is how it is I suppose. At least until Communism 2.0, or the Robellion
On the second point I don’t care, assuming it’s not utter bollocks, what they publish. It does become a matter of concern as to what they don’t publish, or won’t, potentially.
If you’re Wikileaks and your thing is doing that kind of thing anyway. As much as I dislike the worst aspects of Western states, if there is one cluster of nation-states I genuinely loathe in close to their totality it’s the Gulf states.
Hypothetically if Wikileaks was built on Gulf money, well that’d be pretty pertinent to know wouldn’t it? Considering the whole modus operandi of those states is to buy Western institutions for good PR, and fund various things that criticise what they want, with enough space between them and the actual state that Joe public might not realise he’s reading the propaganda of Qatar or Abu Dhabi of whatever.
Granted I’m fed up listening to salty Dems about it, their concern doesn’t appear to be what mine is, they just straight up don’t want anything negative about their side published, because beating Donald Trump is literally the only thing of political value or principle to be concerned with. Who would have been beaten anyway if you know, maybe not Clinton as your candidate?
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Northern Ireland25407 Posts
And what does matter and what should matter are two different things, although sometimes they do align.
I mean OK it’s an extreme argument but say, zero percent of people trust Wikileaks because of x y or z. Well by extension nobody reads or takes their exposes on board, and thus there is no pressure put on anyone to do anything about anything.
Wikileaks whole raison d’etre is basically equally as compromised by actually being a Russian stooge, or just being wrongly perceived as one.
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On April 12 2019 12:24 Wombat_NI wrote:
It’s bullshit so it is, but it is how it is I suppose. At least until Communism 2.0, or the Robellion
On the second point I don’t care, assuming it’s not utter bollocks, what they publish. It does become a matter of concern as to what they don’t publish, or won’t, potentially.
If you’re Wikileaks and your thing is doing that kind of thing anyway. As much as I dislike the worst aspects of Western states, if there is one cluster of nation-states I genuinely loathe in close to their totality it’s the Gulf states.
Hypothetically if Wikileaks was built on Gulf money, well that’d be pretty pertinent to know wouldn’t it? Considering the whole modus operandi of those states is to buy Western institutions for good PR, and fund various things that criticise what they want, with enough space between them and the actual state that Joe public might not realise he’s reading the propaganda of Qatar or Abu Dhabi of whatever.
Granted I’m fed up listening to salty Dems about it, their concern doesn’t appear to be what mine is, they just straight up don’t want anything negative about their side published, because beating Donald Trump is literally the only thing of political value or principle to be concerned with. Who would have been beaten anyway if you know, maybe not Clinton as your candidate?
Indeed this is the distinction I presumed was under the surface.
I think we're mostly in agreement on Wikileaks themselves and why transparency is important (and were they communist would basically be a forgone conclusion).
To the point on "what they don't publish" — which is what P6 and I think others are getting at — sure but like I mentioned earlier, there's been lots of transparency around Saudi Arabia chopping a journalist living in the US into pieces. I don't think transparency in and of itself is as valuable as it's being portrayed.
There's also something to the idea of information dumping. Western outlets hide in plain sight their conflicts as was mentioned with Maddow's network putting the people she made her bones exposing as frauds on air to manipulate and mislead people again.
EDIT: Maddow/NBC is a popular/egregious example (Brian Williams less substantial but more sensational maybe?) but it happens in print too.
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Northern Ireland25407 Posts
Transparency is like honesty, ideally it’s a thing but pragmatically in and of itself yes it’s not particularly useful without other factors being taken into account.
In Wikileaks case being transparent would be good, those who care about it like myself are placated. Plus pragmatically it acts as a bulwark against certain accusations.
If you can’t, or won’t explain something, at some point someone will do it for you, and if it sticks it might not be something you can ever remove
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On April 12 2019 12:59 Wombat_NI wrote:
Transparency is like honesty, ideally it’s a thing but pragmatically in and of itself yes it’s not particularly useful without other factors being taken into account.
In Wikileaks case being transparent would be good, those who care about it like myself are placated. Plus pragmatically it acts as a bulwark against certain accusations.
If you can’t, or won’t explain something, at some point someone will do it for you, and if it sticks it might not be something you can ever remove
I think my main issue is that people are arguing that Wikileaks publications are somehow (though no specific allegations are made) suspect due to their lack of transparency while failing to account for the more important factor (imo) of accountability.
Essentially trading accountability for process and transparency rather than them building upon each other to ultimately arrive at justice.
Yet they are raring to hold Assange accountable for questionable charges and turn a blind eye to how it's pursued.
This is why I conclude their pursuit isn't for justice but for vengeance and is antidialogical
EDIT: There was another aspect that came up I wanted to mention:
On April 12 2019 07:27 Mohdoo wrote:Show nested quote +On April 12 2019 07:23 Doublemint wrote:On April 12 2019 06:44 Mohdoo wrote:On April 12 2019 06:34 crms wrote:On April 11 2019 11:36 Mohdoo wrote:On April 11 2019 11:20 Doodsmack wrote:
If it comes out that there was improper spying on the Trump campaign, and the investigation was a weapon intended to derail Trump's presidency, I'll bet a lot on the left would be okay with that, because it's comeuppance for Trump. So long as crimes were uncovered that would not have been otherwise found, it is a net positive. I'm about as left as you can get and totally disagree. I want the investigations to be legitimate because allowing the government to just decide without proper predication to violate citizens constitutional rights is a mess I'm not comfortable with whatsoever. From your statement it sounds like you'd be a proponent of other constitutional murky policies like 'stop and frisk'. Hey lets just search these black guys, I mean who cares if the search is likely a violation of their rights, we found some xyz so I guess it was a net positive! Hellllllll no. No, because I am saying a Mueller-type of investigation is only valid for people who are being given insane amounts of power, doing jobs we have seen corrupt many people. And I am not saying it should be stop and frisk. I am saying anyone who wants to have that much power needs to also consent to allowing citizens to KNOW they are clean. They work for us. I also imagine there are people on this board who would gladly consent to every detail of their lives being investigated if it meant being able to contribute to a functional, honest government. And lots of other good people feel the same way. It is an *honor* to serve government. If someone doesn't feel it is an honor, they aren't someone you want running the government. It is no different than saying cops should wear body camera. Lots of cops are shit bags. We need to be recording them. I am not saying all citizens need cameras. Just the ones who are given the right to kill people based on their intuition. People who we say can decide to exterminate life? Yeah, lets keep a closer eye on them. People who are military advisers? Yeah, lets make sure they don't have undisclosed contracts with other nations. that seems... highly suspect. like "Xi Jinping's wet dream of China" kind of suspect... everything about my daily life should be transparent? wait what? why in god's name would I ever allow that to happen? or any sane man for that matter? to help the government do their job? no thank you. To each their own, but I can say with total confidence that I would consent to Mueller being hired to investigate me prior to my being hired to work in the white house. So long as I got to keep my existing salary.
This somewhat crudely demonstrates what I view as an important part of the problems we face.
1) "I would consent" Mueller literally did this to people illegally and without their consent already
2) "work in the white house" a lot of people sacrificed a lot of superficial principles to do the same
3) "got to keep my existing salary"
Concern about making less money in the white house than you do currently indicates that you find the current system quite personally beneficial and that is likely to obscure your ability to see it's flaws and exploitative practices (or those of the new one you suggest) much like the lack of transparency for Wikileaks obscures their ability to be champions of transparency.
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Northern Ireland25407 Posts
Of course it’s about that.
At least in the court of certain public opinion in certain quarters Assange is double-fucked, as alongside people who want him punished for ‘getting Trump elected’ you have the whole rape angle, while riding on the crest of a wave of MeToo.
Which I’m also having issues with as it’s an important societal conversation which is being tarnished by association with politics, as well as getting into some crazy territories all by itself.
Also apparently holding more than one idea in your head at once is apparently impossible for some people.
So ideally for me Assange would have faced trial for the Swedish sex charges independent of other risks, or be proportionally charged with US crimes, in the US. Which I’m not confident is going to happen, we’ll thats an understand that.
In the same way perhaps Manning did commit a crime, not just technically but in a moral sense too, in being cavalier with some of the stuff being offered to others. On the other hand solitary confinement while being held, not really so fair and certainly exposes a level of punitive vengeance as opposed to justice.
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On April 12 2019 15:06 Wombat_NI wrote:
Of course it’s about that.
At least in the court of certain public opinion in certain quarters Assange is double-fucked, as alongside people who want him punished for ‘getting Trump elected’ you have the whole rape angle, while riding on the crest of a wave of MeToo.
Which I’m also having issues with as it’s an important societal conversation which is being tarnished by association with politics, as well as getting into some crazy territories all by itself.
Also apparently holding more than one idea in your head at once is apparently impossible for some people.
So ideally for me Assange would have faced trial for the Swedish sex charges independent of other risks, or be proportionally charged with US crimes, in the US. Which I’m not confident is going to happen, we’ll thats an understand that.
In the same way perhaps Manning did commit a crime, not just technically but in a moral sense too, in being cavalier with some of the stuff being offered to others. On the other hand solitary confinement while being held, not really so fair and certainly exposes a level of punitive vengeance as opposed to justice.
I'm often, and somewhat accurately, accused of providing a similarly reductive portrayal of the US as we're highlighting here of Assange and Wikileaks. I've learned (the hard way) that it's counterproductive to present the hypocrisy by way of mirroring.
In essence, my main motivation has been and is, to move beyond the reductive and to the dialogical. I'm glad we've been able to, but I fear this won't last. What can be done to preserve this type of dialogue and to draw more people into it and away from the more reductive discourse that typically pervades political discussions here and elsewhere — in your view?
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Since June 2017, it seems the DOJ changed its stance on the foreign emoluments clause. Officials can now accept money from foreign governments, as long as it comes from commercial transactions to entities they own, which obviously opens the door to ALL kinds of corruption, conflicts of interest, foreign influence etc, and completely guts the foreign emoluments intent...
In clearer terms, the DOJ doesn't give a shit if foreign countries spend millions in Trump hotels to stroke him the right way.
Clark’s article notes that in more than 50 legal opinions over some 150 years justice department lawyers have interpreted the clause in a way that barred any foreign payments or gifts except for ones Congress approved. But filings by the department since June 2017 reveal a new interpretation that “… would permit the president – and all federal officials – to accept unlimited amounts of money from foreign governments, as long as the money comes through commercial transactions with an entity owned by the federal official,” the professor writes.
(...)
“In 2017, the department reversed course, adopting arguments nearly identical to those put forward by Trump’s private sector lawyers. Instead of defending the republic against foreign influence, the department is defending Trump’s ability to receive money from foreign governments,”
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/apr/09/dojs-new-stance-on-foreign-payments-or-gifts-to-trump-blurs-lines-experts
And again, cronies defends a man instead of defending the country. Sad days.
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On April 12 2019 18:44 Nouar wrote:Since June 2017, it seems the DOJ changed its stance on the foreign emoluments clause. Officials can now accept money from foreign governments, as long as it comes from commercial transactions to entities they own, which obviously opens the door to ALL kinds of corruption, conflicts of interest, foreign influence etc, and completely guts the foreign emoluments intent... In clearer terms, the DOJ doesn't give a shit if foreign countries spend millions in Trump hotels to stroke him the right way. Show nested quote +Clark’s article notes that in more than 50 legal opinions over some 150 years justice department lawyers have interpreted the clause in a way that barred any foreign payments or gifts except for ones Congress approved. But filings by the department since June 2017 reveal a new interpretation that “… would permit the president – and all federal officials – to accept unlimited amounts of money from foreign governments, as long as the money comes through commercial transactions with an entity owned by the federal official,” the professor writes.
(...)
“In 2017, the department reversed course, adopting arguments nearly identical to those put forward by Trump’s private sector lawyers. Instead of defending the republic against foreign influence, the department is defending Trump’s ability to receive money from foreign governments,” https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/apr/09/dojs-new-stance-on-foreign-payments-or-gifts-to-trump-blurs-lines-expertsAnd again, cronies defends a man instead of defending the country. Sad days.
*sarcasm alert*
this is actually brilliant! What we get is foreign money, that trickles down to Americans! So it may seem like a way for foreign money to buy influence but its actually pulling away money from foreign governments to honest, hard working Americans! Jobs man!
Generally, I'm appalled how they managed to do this. By them, I mean the Republicans. They've managed to persuade the public to think they are the only way of defending the American way, the American Dream. To be scared of the "socialist agenda". They've done it despite the fact that currently America is lagging in every way imaginable (except military spending) behind many modern western countries of the world that have implemented these "socialist policies" and despite the fact they have done everything in their power to enrich themselves in the process. And the "little guy" votes for them regularly. I do not find Trump scary. He is a buffoon. I find the circumstances that led to him being President scary.
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On April 12 2019 19:13 dankobanana wrote:Show nested quote +On April 12 2019 18:44 Nouar wrote:Since June 2017, it seems the DOJ changed its stance on the foreign emoluments clause. Officials can now accept money from foreign governments, as long as it comes from commercial transactions to entities they own, which obviously opens the door to ALL kinds of corruption, conflicts of interest, foreign influence etc, and completely guts the foreign emoluments intent... In clearer terms, the DOJ doesn't give a shit if foreign countries spend millions in Trump hotels to stroke him the right way. Clark’s article notes that in more than 50 legal opinions over some 150 years justice department lawyers have interpreted the clause in a way that barred any foreign payments or gifts except for ones Congress approved. But filings by the department since June 2017 reveal a new interpretation that “… would permit the president – and all federal officials – to accept unlimited amounts of money from foreign governments, as long as the money comes through commercial transactions with an entity owned by the federal official,” the professor writes.
(...)
“In 2017, the department reversed course, adopting arguments nearly identical to those put forward by Trump’s private sector lawyers. Instead of defending the republic against foreign influence, the department is defending Trump’s ability to receive money from foreign governments,” https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/apr/09/dojs-new-stance-on-foreign-payments-or-gifts-to-trump-blurs-lines-expertsAnd again, cronies defends a man instead of defending the country. Sad days. *sarcasm alert* this is actually brilliant! What we get is foreign money, that trickles down to Americans! So it may seem like a way for foreign money to buy influence but its actually pulling away money from foreign governments to honest, hard working Americans! Jobs man! Generally, I'm appalled how they managed to do this. By them, I mean the Republicans. They've managed to persuade the public to think they are the only way of defending the American way, the American Dream. To be scared of the "socialist agenda". They've done it despite the fact that currently America is lagging in every way imaginable (except military spending) behind many modern western countries of the world that have implemented these "socialist policies" and despite the fact they have done everything in their power to enrich themselves in the process. And the "little guy" votes for them regularly. I do not find Trump scary. He is a buffoon. I find the circumstances that led to him being President scary.
It's a pretty ubiquitous US myth independent of party. When Trump said ‘America Will Never Be A Socialist Country’ he got a bipartisan standing ovation.
On the (not quite) other hand, Social Democrats are pretty popular nowadays. Bernie's organizing kickoff is looking unprecedented.
Beto's event map for comparison
EDIT: Worth noting their presence in the first 4 states you have to get at least a top 3 in one of them to have a chance to stay close on Super Tuesday.
After looking at the new wave of polls I'm inclined to think Mayor Pete's got the best chance to sneak in over the established top 5.
Beto is staying till Texas and should (but may not) win it. If Biden or Bernie aren't ones top picks they better get to work on their preferred third because there's only going to be room for 3 real candidates after super Tuesday and one of them won't really have much of a chance.
Bernie is in unless something catastrophic comes out of nowhere. Question is who takes the other two slots out of super Tuesday.
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EPT
