US Politics Mega-thread - Page 1425

On May 04 2019 19:39 Nouar wrote:

Now take the opposite view, and ask yourself from the viewpoint of DOJ/FBI what should you do when a candidate to the presidency and several members of his campaign are obviously publicly lying every step of the way, and trying to hide a boatload of interactions with a foreign power considered as an enemy.
They HAD to investigate, and to avoid the appearance of interfering with a political campaign, to do it in a very low-key way. The steps that Trump has taken afterwards, raising an awful lot of doubt over obstruction, are self-inflicted since he thinks he's the ultimate boss and has no grasp on how to stay safe legally when in full public view (which I find somewhat strange since he has strived for public exposure his whole life, but as a private citizen that could litigate the hell out of everything he strong-armed through. So he also has a lot of experience of legal struggles).

He incited doubt every step of the way due to his overall conduct, and nearly every action he has taken for the last 3 years kept raising doubts, due to his inability to be transparent. From meetings with Putin, to public statements, to lies, to drafting false reports, to trying to remove the SC (!?), to hiring crooks, compromised people and surrounding himself with idiots (only the best he said ! Remember he appointed Sessions)... I could go on several pages.
It's so apparent he doesn't even know what the fuck he is doing (except selling his brand and craving exposure by doing crazy statements).

No, I don't think he acted "as well as he did", as he did pretty damning things, as he created the conditions to his siege by his own behaviour and deserved all he got.
That's what happens when you fire your whole transition team prior to the transition, and so have no one to vet for positions. People of experience who could explain what you should do and how to have a good presidency. But he didn't care about the country.

On May 05 2019 00:30 xDaunt wrote:


We don't need to try to imagine things from the FBI's perspective. It's all out there in the open in the Mueller report, and it's highly lacking in that it utterly fails to identify a valid predicate for the investigations that took place. This is the United States. Not a banana republic. I have yet to see a valid justification for any of the spying that government agencies did upon Trump and his people. Hell, Comey and other former government officials didn't even have the decency to admit that they did engage in spying operations on Trump's people. And when Barr finally suggested that it did happen, they all had a hissy fit until the NYT ran a news story confirming that spying did happen. So let's cut the shit. Who fraudulently submitted unverified information to a FISA court to get a FISA warrant? Who has been dishonest about the true origins of Crossfire Hurricane from day 1? Who has refused to discuss who Mifsud really is? Who's really the liar here? It ain't Trump.

a candidate to the presidency and several members of his campaign are obviously publicly lying every step of the way, and trying to hide a boatload of interactions with a foreign power considered as an enemy.They HAD to investigate, and to avoid the appearance of interfering with a political campaign,

On May 05 2019 00:30 xDaunt wrote:


We don't need to try to imagine things from the FBI's perspective. It's all out there in the open in the Mueller report, and it's highly lacking in that it utterly fails to identify a valid predicate for the investigations that took place. This is the United States. Not a banana republic. I have yet to see a valid justification for any of the spying that government agencies did upon Trump and his people. Hell, Comey and other former government officials didn't even have the decency to admit that they did engage in spying operations on Trump's people. And when Barr finally suggested that it did happen, they all had a hissy fit until the NYT ran a news story confirming that spying did happen. So let's cut the shit. Who fraudulently submitted unverified information to a FISA court to get a FISA warrant? Who has been dishonest about the true origins of Crossfire Hurricane from day 1? Who has refused to discuss who Mifsud really is? Who's really the liar here? It ain't Trump.

a candidate to the presidency and several members of his campaign are obviously publicly lying every step of the way, and trying to hide a boatload of interactions with a foreign power considered as an enemy.They HAD to investigate, and to avoid the appearance of interfering with a political campaign,

On May 05 2019 01:52 Danglars wrote:

I'm a little troubled by the European view of government espoused by our French poster here.

They HAD to investigate, because people like him disagree with foreign policy and hate public lying? Seriously? Where was he with the Obama administration and pallets of cash to the Iranian regime? I didn't like his Russian reset, and response to the invasion of Ukraine's Crimean peninsula. I should have been calling for a special counsel because of these "boatload of interactions with a foreign power considered as an enemy?" This is a farcical excuse for police state government. Your delusions do not justify domestic spying.

That's banana republic junk, and I'm disturbed that there's people rationalizing the stupidest abuses of power just because of their dislike of a president. The proper response to a president if you feel the behavior towards Russia and the lying is just so bad is to vote the man out. It's just so absurd of an argument on it's face. Lying and coverup at every step of the investigation into Trump, and there's still some people out there that go full banana republic justice because they don't approve of what Trump does.

On May 05 2019 01:52 Danglars wrote:

I'm a little troubled by the European view of government espoused by our French poster here.

They HAD to investigate, because people like him disagree with foreign policy and hate public lying? Seriously? Where was he with the Obama administration and pallets of cash to the Iranian regime? I didn't like his Russian reset, and response to the invasion of Ukraine's Crimean peninsula. I should have been calling for a special counsel because of these "boatload of interactions with a foreign power considered as an enemy?" This is a farcical excuse for police state government. Your delusions do not justify domestic spying.

That's banana republic junk, and I'm disturbed that there's people rationalizing the stupidest abuses of power just because of their dislike of a president. The proper response to a president if you feel the behavior towards Russia and the lying is just so bad is to vote the man out. It's just so absurd of an argument on it's face. Lying and coverup at every step of the investigation into Trump, and there's still some people out there that go full banana republic justice because they don't approve of what Trump does.

On May 05 2019 02:10 KwarK wrote:
Danglars, Obama didn’t send cash to Iran, they unfroze Iranian assets that had been illegally seized by the US. That’s not the same thing. I know Fox News and Trump told you that he sent them cash because he’s a secret Muslim but that’s not actually what happened. If you wish to have a productive discussion then you can’t keep repeating fake news to people who are better informed than you. These talking points of yours only work within the cult of Trump where everyone has already collectively agreed to believe the lies. In a public debate you need to stick to truth.

TRUMP: “The Iran deal is a terrible deal. We paid $150 billion. We gave $1.8 billion in cash. That’s actual cash, barrels of cash. It’s insane. It’s ridiculous. It should have never been made. But we will be talking about it.” — remarks before a meeting with French President Emmanuel Macron. At a news conference Tuesday, he spoke about “giving them, Iran, $150 billion at one point.”

THE FACTS: There was no $150 billion payout from the U.S. treasury. The money he refers to represents Iranian assets held abroad that were frozen until the deal was reached and Tehran was allowed to access its funds.

The payout of about $1.8 billion is a separate matter. That dates to the 1970s, when Iran paid the U.S. $400 million for military equipment that was never delivered because the government was overthrown and diplomatic relations ruptured.

That left people, businesses and governments in each country indebted to partners in the other, and these complex claims took decades to sort out in tribunals and arbitration. For its part, Iran paid settlements of more than $2.5 billion to U.S. citizens and businesses.

The day after the nuclear deal was implemented, the U.S. and Iran announced they had settled the claim over the 1970s military equipment order, with the U.S. agreeing to pay the $400 million principal along with about $1.3 billion in interest. The $400 million was paid in cash and flown to Tehran on a cargo plane, which gave rise to Trump’s dramatic accounts of money stuffed in barrels or boxes and delivered in the dead of night. The arrangement provided for the interest to be paid later, not crammed into containers.

On May 03 2019 00:25 xDaunt wrote:


This is an incorrect reading of the OLC guidelines. The OLC guideline did not prevent Mueller from making a decision on prosecution or a finding that there was a prosecutable crime. All that OLC guideline says is that the president cannot be indicted while in office. Presuming that this is enforceable (certainly not guaranteed), a president could still be indicted for the crime after leaving office. So when Barr says that he is "surprised" that Mueller didn't make a decision on obstruction, this is the legal backdrop. There wasn't a good reason for Mueller not to make a decision. Mueller was simply playing politics. And Barr knows it.

Third, we considered whether to evaluate the conduct we investigated under the Justice
Manual standards governing prosecution and declination decisions, but we determined not to apply
an approach that could potentially result in a judgment that the President committed crimes. The
threshold step under the Justice Manual standards is to assess whether a person's conduct
"constitutes a federal offense." U.S . Dep't of Justice, Justice Manual§ 9-27.220 (2018) (Justice
Manual) . Fairness concerns counseled against potentially reaching that judgment when no charges
can be brought. The ordinary means for an individual to respond to an accusation is through a
speedy and public trial , with all the procedural protections that surround a criminal case. An
individual who believes he was wrongly accused can use that process to seek to clear his name. In
contrast, a prosecutor's judgment that crimes were committed, but that no charges will be brought ,
affords no such adversarial opportunity for public name -clearing before an impartial adjudicator.5

On May 05 2019 02:11 Kyadytim wrote:

For the rest of the thread:

The Obama administration paid Iran money the US owed Iran from the 1970s plus interest. That Obama did something wrong is one of Trump's frequently repeated lies.

I'm pretty sure they actually did this and repay an old debt at around the same time.


www.apnews.com

On May 05 2019 02:10 KwarK wrote:
Danglars, Obama didn’t send cash to Iran, they unfroze Iranian assets that had been illegally seized by the US. That’s not the same thing. I know Fox News and Trump told you that he sent them cash because he’s a secret Muslim but that’s not actually what happened. If you wish to have a productive discussion then you can’t keep repeating fake news to people who are better informed than you. These talking points of yours only work within the cult of Trump where everyone has already collectively agreed to believe the lies. In a public debate you need to stick to truth.

On May 03 2019 00:26 Gorsameth wrote:
fairness guidelines. Don't make a judgement when you can't indict and that person can't defend himself in court.
Its in the report.

On May 03 2019 00:32 xDaunt wrote:
That's the cover story. It doesn't change the accuracy of anything that I said. And again, the fact that I'm right becomes very apparent once you dig into the details of what the obstruction charges might be. They're all bullshit, because there was no underlying crime, Trump didn't actually do anything that materially impeded any investigation, and he had legitimate reasons for taking the limited actions that he did take. None of the chronicled episodes of obstruction would hold up in court. Mueller knows this, as does Barr.

1. Show, don't tell, and listen.
This one sounds simple enough, but political discussions on TL suffer from an ignorance of this cliché and oftentimes devolve accordingly. There is a huge difference between saying “Iran is a bloodthirsty despotic state” and showing how Iran could be considered bloodthirsty given particular evidence. If you can't tell the difference, don't bother posting. Furthermore, if you are here to simply pontificate, please do so elsewhere. The entire point of a forum such as TL is to foster communication, and posters who seek only to talk at others instead of with them will be ignored.

On May 05 2019 03:35 JimmiC wrote:
Is there any reason other than that Barr agrees with you that you think what he did was right and what Mueller did was wrong.

Like if Barr had recommended indictment would have you thought that was appropriate?

On May 05 2019 01:52 Danglars wrote:

I'm a little troubled by the European view of government espoused by our French poster here.

They HAD to investigate, because people like him disagree with foreign policy and hate public lying? Seriously? Where was he with the Obama administration and pallets of cash to the Iranian regime? I didn't like his Russian reset, and response to the invasion of Ukraine's Crimean peninsula. I should have been calling for a special counsel because of these "boatload of interactions with a foreign power considered as an enemy?" This is a farcical excuse for police state government. Your delusions do not justify domestic spying.

That's banana republic junk, and I'm disturbed that there's people rationalizing the stupidest abuses of power just because of their dislike of a president. The proper response to a president if you feel the behavior towards Russia and the lying is just so bad is to vote the man out. It's just so absurd of an argument on it's face. Lying and coverup at every step of the investigation into Trump, and there's still some people out there that go full banana republic justice because they don't approve of what Trump does.

On May 05 2019 03:01 Ben... wrote:

This is becoming an increasingly noticeable issue in this thread. You can't have a conversation about an issue if some people are making the claim that facts are not facts.

This exchange comes to mind for me:

xDaunt makes a claim that Gorsameth rebuts citing primary source information (in this case the Mueller Report itself) that clearly and obviously proves xDaunt's statement to be incorrect. xDaunt the replies by claiming the excerpt from the Mueller Report is a cover story while providing no proof to back this claim up other than what it obviously xDaunt's opinion. This has been an increasingly common trend I've noticed.

I feel like this rule has been somewhat forgotten the last few weeks.

If people are going to be making claims, especially ones that counter publicly available information from primary or well-cited secondary sources, they should be backing them up more than with personal opinion.

On May 05 2019 03:25 xDaunt wrote:

This is getting old. There is no guideline that says what Gorsameth and others have been claiming regarding a prohibition on the DOJ's ability to conclude that the president likely committed a crime. The only prohibition is on the ability to indict. What Mueller does is cite that prohibition and then create an argument out of whole cloth justifying his not coming to a conclusion regarding whether to prosecute Trump. Anyone who can't distinguish between an actual guideline and someone's spin on existing guidelines should seriously reconsider their participation in this thread.

EDIT: And if anyone disagrees with this, then go cite the guideline. I obviously can't prove a negative. But you should already know what I'm saying is correct just by reading the Mueller report and by looking at Barr's -- who is subject to the exact guidelines as Mueller -- conclusion that Trump did not commit a crime.

On May 05 2019 02:05 xDaunt wrote:


The part that is so hilarious is that everyone who supports what the FBI/DOJ did doesn't understand the basic principle that only criminal acts warrant criminal investigation. They point to all of this stuff that Trump did (and even is alleged to have done, but didn't do), but they never are able to articulate what the crime is or may be. This is Civics 101 shit that they can't account for. Yet somehow we're the ones who are off our rockers.