US Politics Mega-thread - Page 289

On June 13 2018 13:07 mierin wrote:


How has nobody else figured out (in the USA) that no matter which party is in question, corporate donations are the driving force of policy?

There is no "let's try again next election and hope things are better." Rich people are going to get richer regardless of who holds congress, SCOTUS, or any other branch of government. This has to change if our country has a chance of getting better.

On June 13 2018 21:45 ShoCkeyy wrote:


Yea, I think most of us know this. Our only solution is to "Vote" them out, and even then sometimes you replace, and get the same thing.

The FBI is reportedly probing whether a Russian banker with ties to the Kremlin illegally funneled money to the National Rifle Association (NRA) to help Donald Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign.

But if the gun lobby did take Russian money, it likely couldn’t have done it without a determined campaign by Republicans, with a major assist from the Supreme Court, to weaken laws governing money in politics. To fully understand the news about the FBI’s probe, we need to first understand how the effort to gut campaign finance laws has left the U.S. deeply vulnerable to foreign money infiltrating our elections.

“Citizens United opened up the floodgates to any kind of corporate money,” Craig Holman, a campaign finance expert at good government group Public Citizen, told TPM. “It’s easy to launder foreign money through corporate entities or LLCs, and it goes entirely unreported as coming from foreign sources.”

McClatchy reported that Maria Butina teamed up with Paul Erickson, a Republican operative and NRA member, to set up an LLC, named Bridges, in February 2016. Butina is a top aide to the Russian banker, Alexander Torshin, who is a long-time ally of the NRA. Erickson told McClatchy last year that the company was created in case Butina needed financial help for her graduate studies in the U.S. McClatchy described that as “an unusual way to use an LLC.”

TPM has laid out the web of ties between Torshin, Butina, and top NRA figures.

WASHINGTON
Several prominent Russians, some in President Vladimir Putin’s inner circle or high in the Russian Orthodox Church, now have been identified as having contact with National Rifle Association officials during the 2016 U.S. election campaign, according to photographs and an NRA source.

The contacts have emerged amid a deepening Justice Department investigation into whether Russian banker and lifetime NRA member Alexander Torshin illegally channeled money through the gun rights group to add financial firepower to Donald Trump’s 2016 presidential bid.

Other influential Russians who met with NRA representatives during the campaign include Dmitry Rogozin, who until last month served as a deputy prime minister overseeing Russia’s defense industry, and Sergei Rudov, head of one of Russia’s largest philanthropies, the St. Basil the Great Charitable Foundation. The foundation was launched by an ultra-nationalist ally of Russian President Putin.

The Russians talked and dined with NRA representatives, mainly in Moscow, as U.S. presidential candidates vied for the White House. Now U.S. investigators want to know if relationships between the Russian leaders and the nation’s largest gun rights group went beyond vodka toasts and gun factory tours, evolving into another facet of the Kremlin’s broad election-interference operation.

On June 13 2018 17:34 iamthedave wrote:


Out of curiousity, GH, have you paid much attention to Jeremy Corbyn across the pond?

He's kind of our version of Bernie Sanders. Popular with the same voters (younger-leaning and strong left), pushes the sort of policies you'd expect from someone there, and viciously resisted by the establishment. With the exception that our establishment can't actually stop him (the leader of our parties is directly voted on by the members, and who wins gets it; JC annihilated his opposition the last time, despite a sustained campaign of character assassination against him by the Labour Party and most of the media).

But he might also be a sign of problems Bernie could have if he actually won. Corbyn's a half-decent speaker (Bernie's definitely better there), but he has his own weird charisma, attached to dreadful ability to choose people or to keep a party organised and in line.

Unfortunately, those last two qualities make him almost unelectable outside the Labour Party.

I'm not sure a chaotic left-wing American administration would be much better than a chaotic right wing American administration. You want the guys in charge to be able to keep the government running like clockwork, one way or the other. If Sanders got in but ended up fighting his own guys all the time... well, you seem to hate Obama, and I'm not sure Sanders would get much more done if he wound up in a similar position.

On June 13 2018 23:40 On_Slaught wrote:
Huge if true. I'd wager anything Cohen has enough dirt on Trump to bury Trump tower. However if that is true, no way Trump lets that out. I think he pardons Cohen on the idea the backlash from that would be less bad. He just spins it as unfair government overreach.

https://twitter.com/GStephanopoulos/status/1006907157370097664

Edit: I forgot about the state charges... cant pardon those. Could be bad for Cpt. Bonespurs!

On June 14 2018 01:30 Mohdoo wrote:


What drives me insane is how the idea of flipping can be in the conversation and so many people still call this a witch hunt. If people are wondering if Cohen will flip, how in the world can people also be against the investigation?

On June 14 2018 01:55 On_Slaught wrote:
It's willful ignorance. These are the same people who believe Trump when he says he didn't cheat on Meliana while in the same breathe talk about how cool he is for fucking hot women/porn stars.

On June 13 2018 23:40 On_Slaught wrote:
Huge if true. I'd wager anything Cohen has enough dirt on Trump to bury Trump tower. However if that is true, no way Trump lets that out. I think he pardons Cohen on the idea the backlash from that would be less bad. He just spins it as unfair government overreach.

https://twitter.com/GStephanopoulos/status/1006907157370097664

Edit: I forgot about the state charges... cant pardon those. Could be bad for Cpt. Bonespurs!

On June 14 2018 05:56 PhoenixVoid wrote:

Reuters suggests otherwise. A source they cite say he's seeking a new legal team once the seized documents review is completed on Friday, instead of considering flipping.

I also found another story about Comcast offering to buy out 21st Century Fox, competing with Disney. Let the great media conglomerate feeding frenzy commence in the aftermath of AT&T-Time-Warner merger. I can't see this leading a positive precedent at all. Maybe Cyberpunk 2077 will be a prophetic vision of what's to come rather than a fantasy.

On June 14 2018 06:06 Plansix wrote:

Robocop is the go to for our dystopian future. It is weirdly on the nose.

Trump Kim summit: US wants 'major N Korea disarmament' by 2020

The US hopes to see "major disarmament" by North Korea by the end of 2020, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo says.

His comments come a day after an unprecedented meeting between President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un in Singapore.

In a statement North Korea agreed to work towards "complete denuclearisation of the Korean Peninsula".

But the document has been criticised for lacking details on when or how Pyongyang would give up its weapons.

Speaking in South Korea, where he discussed the outcome of the summit, Secretary Pompeo said there was still "a great deal of work to do" with North Korea.

But he added: "Major disarmament... We're hopeful that we can achieve that in the two and half years."

He said he was confident Pyongyang understood the need for verification that it was dismantling its nuclear programme.

When asked by reporters why this was not specified in the document signed in Singapore, he condemned their questions as "insulting" and "ridiculous".

His comments come after President Trump declared that North Korea was no longer a nuclear threat, insisting "everybody can now feel much safer".

The credibility of that claim is in doubt. That is because under the deal, the North retains its nuclear warheads, the missiles to launch them and has not agreed to any specific process to get rid of them.

At a news conference after the meeting, Mr Trump said he would lift sanctions against North Korea once "nukes are no longer a factor".

He also announced an unexpected end to US-South Korea military drills.

The move - long demanded by Pyongyang - has been seen as a major concession to North Korea and appeared to take US allies in the region by surprise.

After the summit, North Korea's state media said the two leaders had agreed that "step-by-step and simultaneous action" was needed to achieve denuclearisation of the Korean Peninsula.

American hardliners such as Mr Trump's national security adviser John Bolton have previously opposed such a phased approach, whereby the US takes reciprocal action.

On June 14 2018 07:08 GreenHorizons wrote:
I mean I don't know about other people but the significance about this is South Korea believes Kim. The US just has to mind our own business and the situation will improve. What motive does Un have to wild out if the US is actually going to reduce their presence near NK?

NK wants self-determination and the US threat removed. It can get those if the US sticks to it's side. Like 2002 it's probably going to be the US who breaks whatever agreement they managed to outline.

On June 14 2018 07:17 Gorsameth wrote:
Where do you get the impression that SK believes NK?
Unlike Trump SK has dealt with NK"s fake promises plenty of times. I see nothing that tells me they particularly believe NK this time.
If he follows through that's great for them and they will be very happy. But since there wasn't an actual agreement about de-nuclearization and SK knew nothing about the promise to end military exercises I don't buy it.