History will show these constant coup attempts for what they are...
Treason and an assault against the American people who picked their President with their legitimate votes.
________________________
FALSE. RHETORIC. MORE (mindless) HYPERBOLE.
This is an investigation into a standing President's efforts to subvert and influence an election that has not yet taken place.
I will not allow you to reframe what this is, no matter how much fanciful typing you lay down, son.
FACT: Donald Trump withheld assistance that was already approved by The US Congress to a foreign government that is fighting an active war for their very survival. In so doing, he subverted the separation of powers, and used his position as POTUS like a mob boss:
"I got your protection, but if you wanna get it, you gotta do a li'l sumpin' for me-"
He only released his leverage over Ukraine when he was shown that the political price he'd pay in getting caught was more than the gains he'd reap if his extortion ploy actually started to worked.
Donald Trump folded a losing hand... and now is being forced to own up... in a forum that pays less attention to perception manipulation and 'messaging.'
The only reason why you now feel that America is picking on Your Boy... is because of how flawed, defective, and messed-up Your Boy has been from the start. He was destined to write this chapter of his own story... because of the kind of person he's always been.
We are the only remaining superpower in the world and we elect politicians based largely on advertising that we allow to be funded by companies with foreign interests. Of course other countries are going to attempt to manipulate our elections to their advantage. But, the focus on Russia is strictly a political gimmick. It's classic red baiting.
If democrats put Saudi Arabia, UAE, and Qatar under the same microscope as Russia, they would be appalled. Russia's influence is nothing by comparison. These OPEC countries have used political influence to get the U.S. into multiple foreign wars that do nothing to serve our interests and lead us into further debt, which is the primary reason that we don't have nicer government programs.
There is no solution to these problems that does not require getting to the root of the problem, which is the very existence of the RNC and DNC. Until those organizations are taken down, these problems cannot be solved, because they are built to ensure corruption. They are built to ensure that the policy agenda in the U.S. is controlled by companies and individuals that can donate enough money to guarantee that decision makers need them in maintain their jobs.
Almost on queue. George Nader arrested for what. Funneling Russian money into campaigns? wrong... Funneling UAE money into both Trump and Clinton campaigns. To the tune of $3.5 million. And that is just one donor that got caught playing outside the lines. That does not come close to all of the legal money that is flowing into the campaigns influenced by Gulf Monarchies.
What did the Russians spend on election advertisements? something like $4700 on all of Google's platforms? This hysteria over Russia is all pure red baiting. Neither political party or their propaganda arms in the news organizations wants you to know who is actually giving them money and buying real political influence.
This hysteria over Russia is all pure red baiting. Neither political party or their propaganda arms in the news organizations wants you to know who is actually giving them money and buying real political influence.
s003...can you think of any country that poses a nuclear threat to the United States?
This hysteria over Russia is all pure red baiting. Neither political party or their propaganda arms in the news organizations wants you to know who is actually giving them money and buying real political influence.
s003...can you think of any country that poses a nuclear threat to the United States?
I can't think of anything that has changed with respect to that nuclear threat that would cause people to lose their minds.
I can however see how Gulf money is being used to influence our elections and bribe the political establishment into sending our sons, daughters, brothers, and sisters into Middle East wars that do absolutely nothing to benefit this country.
I know that we haven't spent tens of trillions of dollars on our military over the last 20 years by preparing for a fight with Russia, but instead by fighting to temporarily hold large areas of sand that are of so little strategic importance to our country that we abandon them almost as quickly as we take them.
This hysteria over Russia is all pure red baiting. Neither political party or their propaganda arms in the news organizations wants you to know who is actually giving them money and buying real political influence.
s003...can you think of any country that poses a nuclear threat to the United States?
I can't think of anything that has changed with respect to that nuclear threat that would cause people to lose their minds.
For the first time in America's history, Russia has an "intelligence asset" at the highest level of our government.
When 40cent says the Hamma is coming down. He’s talking about the hammer part of the old Soviet Union flag. The sickle part will chop us off at the knees. But the entire GOP Congress and their sheep are good with Putin being their friend.
A life is not important except in the impact it has on other lives. – Jackie Robinson
This hysteria over Russia is all pure red baiting. Neither political party or their propaganda arms in the news organizations wants you to know who is actually giving them money and buying real political influence.
s003...can you think of any country that poses a nuclear threat to the United States?
I can't think of anything that has changed with respect to that nuclear threat that would cause people to lose their minds.
For the first time in America's history, Russia has an "intelligence asset" at the highest level of our government.
The fact that you are so fearful of Russia is precisely why so much effort is put into selling this narrative. That is the point of red-baiting.
This hysteria over Russia is all pure red baiting. Neither political party or their propaganda arms in the news organizations wants you to know who is actually giving them money and buying real political influence.
s003...can you think of any country that poses a nuclear threat to the United States?
I can't think of anything that has changed with respect to that nuclear threat that would cause people to lose their minds.
For the first time in America's history, Russia has an "intelligence asset" at the highest level of our government.
The fact that you are so fearful of Russia is precisely why so much effort is put into selling this narrative. That is the point of red-baiting.
s003...the fact that you have no idea what you are talking about is why some Americans need to be reminded...RUSSIA IS NOT OUR FRIEND, NOR ARE THEY AN ALLY.
Russia views the United States as their "enemy"...
...and the United States views Putin and Russia as our enemy.
President Donald Trump at a rally in Pennsylvania on Tuesday night lashed out at the FBI calling staff of the agency "scum."
He also doubled down on discredited conspiracy theories following the release of a report which undermined the president's claims that the Russia probe was a "deep state" plot to damage his presidency.
During the rally Trump repeated claims that the FBI had "spied" on his 2016 campaign that in a report released the day before Justice Department Inspector General Michael Horowitz had found to be groundless.
"When the FBI uncovered evidence showing that we did absolutely nothing wrong, which was right at the beginning, they hid that exonerating, you know that, they hid it," Trump claimed.
That comment was seemingly a reference to a finding in the report that there were significant "omissions" in the FBI's application for a wiretap of Carter Page, a Trump campaign official.
"They hid it so nobody could see it and they could keep this hoax going on for two more years. They knew right at the beginning."
The report in fact found that the Russia probe was launched on the basis of multiple contacts between Trump campaign officials and Russians.
The link below...some of the 'low lights' from Trumps Hershey, PA thing, last night.
Trump is a morally bankrupt person who will say anything to stoke up the base. I'm not a CNN person but this popped up on my phone and I thought it was a pretty reasonable review of Despicable Barr's hatchet job.
"Again, according to Barr, “The greatest danger to our free system is that the incumbent government use the apparatus of the state ... in a way that could affect the outcome of the election.”
What president might be doing something like that, right now, and getting impeached for it?
In all seriousness, though, Barr’s move here is disturbingly Orwellian. He correctly identified the abuse of power to influence elections as a threat to American democracy, but then argued that the people who investigated Trump are the ones who are actually guilty of it. The criminal becomes the victim, the authoritarian the guarantor of our freedoms. You heard a similar refrain from Republicans during the House Judiciary Committee’s impeachment hearing on Monday, when they repeatedly accused the Democrats of being the real threat to democracy."
The more things change the more they stay the same.
mgh888...The story below is from the second link you posted...
The shamelessness of Bill Barr In a new interview, Barr said it’s bad when the government tries to affect “the outcome of the election.” Yes, seriously.
By Zack Beauchamp@zackbeauchampzack@vox.com Dec 10, 2019, 3:20pm EST
It’s often said that Donald Trump’s superpower is his lack of shame. It appears that Attorney General Bill Barr has been bitten by the same politically radioactive spider, at least if his Tuesday interview with NBC is any indication.
The interview with host Pete Williams focused on the Department of Justice’s inspector general report on the origins of the FBI’s Trump-Russia investigation. Barr said a number of questionable things in the interview, including contradicting one of Inspector General Michael Horowitz’s core findings: that there was legitimate reason to investigate links between the Trump campaign and Russia. He also tried to spin the Trump team’s contacts with Russia as something that “most campaigns” do.
But the most unbelievable line came when Barr attempted to cast the FBI’s surveillance of Trump campaign staff in 2016 as “the greatest danger to our free system” — because in his mind, that constituted the government abusing its powers to influence an election. Yes, really:
From a civil liberties standpoint, the greatest danger to our free system is that the incumbent government used the apparatus of the state, principally the law enforcement agencies and the intelligence agencies, both to spy on political opponents, but also to use them in a way that could affect the outcome of the election.
This is just not an accurate description of what happened in 2016. There is no credible evidence that the FBI investigation was an attempt to intervene in the election, which is a conspiracy theory that doesn’t even pass the most basic smell test. The existence of the Trump-Russia investigation wasn’t officially confirmed until March 2017 — and the most prominent leak during the campaign was pro-Trump, resulting in an iconically false New York Times headline: “Investigating Donald Trump, F.B.I. Sees No Clear Link to Russia.” Why would the FBI keep its evidence against Trump secret until after the election, if it was trying to influence the outcome?
But setting aside the falsehoods, the sheer chutzpah of Barr’s comments is staggering. Again, according to Barr, “The greatest danger to our free system is that the incumbent government use the apparatus of the state ... in a way that could affect the outcome of the election.”
What president might be doing something like that, right now, and getting impeached for it?
In all seriousness, though, Barr’s move here is disturbingly Orwellian. He correctly identified the abuse of power to influence elections as a threat to American democracy, but then argued that the people who investigated Trump are the ones who are actually guilty of it. The criminal becomes the victim, the authoritarian the guarantor of our freedoms. You heard a similar refrain from Republicans during the House Judiciary Committee’s impeachment hearing on Monday, when they repeatedly accused the Democrats of being the real threat to democracy.
Barr’s embrace of this kind of truth-annihilating strategy is particularly interesting. He’s an establishment Republican with long credentials in the party, but one who has emerged as one of the most capable and willing defenders of Trump and the ideology for which he stands. Barr’s reasons for this, as my colleague Ezra Klein explained, stem from a deep sense of persecution, a belief that conservatives and Christians are under siege from ruthless progressives, an existential battle that must be waged if America as we know it is to be preserved.
Under these circumstances, a lot becomes justifiable — even the kind of assaults on the idea of truth more commonly seen in various types of authoritarian regimes (North Korea’s formal name, for example, is the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea). It’s a way of emptying words of their content, of transmuting ideas like “democratic” to mean “in the interests of the ruling faction.”
In today’s Republican Party, this has been a go-to move at the highest levels, part of the acceptable toolbox for fighting back against what the GOP sees as a “progressive holy war” (as Barr put it in a recent speech). The party has been enabled by a pliant media ecosystem, one that actively separates Republican partisans from sources of criticism and comfortably reassures their voters that up is, in fact, down. And Republicans will continue to do it until, somehow, they’re made to suffer the consequences.
Same story..just making it easier for the reader...
Russia’s State TV Calls Trump Their ‘Agent’
Russian commentators note, rightly, that “sooner or later, the Democrats will come back into power," and they’re already joking about offering Trump asylum.
Julia Davis Updated Dec. 17, 2019 8:02AM ET Published Dec. 16, 2019 10:12AM ET link
Sometimes a picture doesn’t have to be worth a thousand words. Just a few will do. As Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov returned home from his visit with President Donald Trump in the Oval Office last week, Russian state media were gloating over the spectacle. TV channel Rossiya 1 aired a segment entitled “Puppet Master and ‘Agent’—How to Understand Lavrov’s Meeting With Trump.”
Vesti Nedeli, a Sunday news show on the same network, pointed out that it was Trump, personally, who asked Lavrov to pose standing near as Trump sat at his desk. It’s almost the literal image of a power behind the throne.
And in the meantime, much to Russia’s satisfaction, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky is still waiting for that critical White House meeting with the American president: the famous “quid pro quo” for Zelensky announcing an investigation that would smear Democratic challenger Joe Biden. As yet, Zelensky hasn’t done that, and as yet, no meeting has been set.
Russian state television still views the impending impeachment as a bump in the road that won’t lead to Trump’s removal from office. But President Vladimir Putin’s propaganda brigades enjoy watching the heightened divisions in the United States, and how it hurts relations between the U.S. and Ukraine.
They’ve also added a cynical new a narrative filled with half-joking ironies as they look at the American president’s bleak prospects when he does leave office.
Appearing on Sunday Evening With Vladimir Soloviev, Mikhail Gusman, first deputy director general of ITAR-TASS, Russia’s oldest and largest news agency, predicted: “Sooner or later, the Democrats will come back into power. The next term or the term after that, it doesn’t matter... I have an even more unpleasant forecast for Trump. After the White House, he will face a very unhappy period.”
“Russia's state television uses every opportunity to demoralize the Ukrainians with talking points based on Trump’s distaste for their beleaguered country.” The host, Vladimir Soloviev, smugly asked: “Should we get another apartment in Rostov ready?” Soloviev’s allusion was to the situation of Viktor Yanukovych, former president of Ukraine, who was forced to flee to Russia in 2014 and settled in the city of Rostov-on-Don.
Such parallels between Yanukovych and Trump are being drawn not only because of their common association with Paul Manafort, adviser to the first, campaign chairman for the second, but also because Russian experts and politicians consider both of them to be openly pro-Kremlin.
Tightly controlled Russian state-television programs constantly reiterate that Trump doesn’t care about Ukraine and gave Putin no reasons to even contemplate concessions in the run-up to the recent Normandy Four summit in Paris.
State-television news shows use every opportunity to demoralize the Ukrainians with a set of talking points based on the U.S. president’s distaste for their beleaguered country. The host of Who’s Against on Rossiya-1, Dmitry Kulikov, along with pro-Kremlin guests, took repeated jabs at the Ukrainian panelist, boasting about the meeting between Trump and Lavrov.
“There are no disagreements or contradictions between Trump and Russia,” argued Valery Korovin, director of the Center for Geopolitical Expertise, appearing on the state-television channel Rossiya-24. Korovin insisted that the Democrats in Congress are the main antagonists in the relationship between Russia and the United States.
Dmitry Kiselyov, the host of the Sunday news show Vesti Nedeli, accused the Democrats of joining forces with Hollywood, carrying out various conspiracies in order to undermine Trump’s popularity. Reporting for Vesti Nedeli from Washington, Mikhail Antonov used the term “the Cold War,” a fraught rhetorical twist to describe the clash between Trump and the Democratic majority in the House of Representatives.
“Putin has expressed undisguised delight with the crusade led by Trump and Giuliani to whitewash Moscow’s interference in the U.S. elections.”
Appearing on Sunday Evening With Vladimir Soloviev, Mikhail Gusman noted: “The scariest part of our relationship with America is that the level of trust between our countries, our governments, our political powers, is precisely at zero.”
“But not between the presidents,” chimed in the host.
Rudy Giuliani, acting as the president’s personal attorney and determined to divert attention from Trump’s impeachment to former Vice President Biden’s alleged corruption, recently embarked on an “evidence-gathering” trip to Ukraine. Shortly after Giuliani’s return to the United States, Russian state television started airing video clips of his OAN (One America News Network) “documentary.” It purports to prove Kyiv’s meddling in U.S. elections and accuses former Ambassador Marie Yovanovitch of “lying under oath in Congress to whitewash [Joe] Biden’s corruption.” Giuliani’s efforts on behalf of President Trump are bound to pay propaganda dividends for the Kremlin.
Putin has expressed undisguised delight with the crusade led by Trump and Giuliani to whitewash Moscow’s interference in the U.S. elections and pin the blame on Kyiv. Last month, the Russian president smugly remarked “Thank God no one is accusing us of interfering in the U.S. elections anymore. Now they’re accusing Ukraine.”
Rossiya-1 reporter Valentin Bogdanov surmised that by now the majority of American Republicans believe that Ukraine interfered in the U.S. elections, with the show airing various clips from Fox News.
The absurdity of such claims spawned by the Russian security services puts the hypocrisy of the Republicans on full display. The Kremlin, having argued for years that democracy is a sham and the West is devoid of morals and principles, can now showcase the GOP as its “Exhibit A.”
Appearing on The Evening With Vladimir Soloviev in October, political scientist Dmitry Evstafiev argued that Trump has to destroy the Republican Party in order to secure his own long-term survival. The impeachment proceedings seemed to expedite the process, with the GOP’s self-immolation for the sake of its “Dear Leader.”
Prompted by the head-spinning swerve of the Republicans, Tucker Carlson of Fox News even argued that, in the Ukrainian conflict, the U.S. should be taking the side of Russia. Kremlin-controlled Russian state media doesn’t suffer from a similar lack of clarity.
Appearing on Soloviev’s show, Semyon Bagdasarov, director of the Moscow-based Center for Middle Eastern and Central Asian Studies, exclaimed: “The United States is the enemy. It is our enemy. It is a hostile state that aims to destroy our country... We are at war!”
Hey 40 I love how the haters scoff at the truth, no proof on Trump ,just political assumptions and all video tape proof on Bidens true criminal actions ...sad
Trump isn’t upset about corruption. He gets upset when he isn’t part of it.
“To announce that there must be no criticism of the President, or that we are to stand by the President, right or wrong, is not only unpatriotic and servile, but is morally treasonable to the American public.”
I hope it makes the GOP feel good to know that the Russians are on their side.
Protecting Trumps enabler, Putin/Russia, is what the GOP has become...
Putin: Trump’s impeachment far-fetched, Senate will acquit
By VLADIMIR ISACHENKOV and HARRIET MORRIS 15 minutes ago link
MOSCOW (AP) — Russian President Vladimir Putin said Thursday that President Donald Trump’s impeachment is far-fetched and that the U.S. Senate will reject the motion.
Our President calling for the investigation of corruption by Americans world wide!
You mean like his charities and his university?
Exactly. But looking at all politicians instead of just the ones rocking the (gravy) boat. Look at the "businessmen" linked to the politicians.
Keep investigating Trump, but dig into the rest as well.
Politicians should be held to a higher standard. While they may have a right to their private lives. Their financial lives should be under the microscope as money is widely accepted as the primary root of corruption.
You mess with the "Bull," you get the horns. Fiercely Independent.
Late Friday night, minutes before deplaning in Florida for the holidays, President Trump retweeted a link to an article in which Russian President Vladimir Putin defended him against impeachment.
“A total Witch Hunt!” the president tweeted at 10:30 p.m., as he shared a 36-hour-old Associated Press tweet that read: “BREAKING: Russian President Vladimir Putin says U.S. President Donald Trump’s impeachment is far-fetched and predicts the U.S. Senate will reject it.
”Trump’s boasting of Putin’s support comes a day after The Washington Post reported that White House advisers feared Trump’s belief that Ukraine, not Russia, was responsible for interfering with the 2016 election was spurred by conversations Trump had had with Putin.
Trump’s critics responded on the president’s tweet, expressing exasperation more than incredulity.
“At the end of the day, it’s always Putin First,” wrote conservative commentator and “Never Trumper” Bill Kristol.
“Trump wants us to know that Putin has his back. We know,” tweeted Eric Columbus, a former Justice Department appointee in the Obama administration.
“Putin is a dictator who jails opponents, kills opponents, invades neighbors, interferes in democracies’ elections, etc. I don’t think an American president should be buddying with him. I wonder if Trump defenders are ever (secretly) embarrassed by this stuff. I hope so,” wrote Jay Nordlinger, a senior editor at the right-leaning National Review.
At his annual end-of-the-year news conference on Thursday, Putin was asked about Trump’s impeachment. He called the charges “completely fabricated reasons.
”That evening, Russian state media, which follows Putin’s lead, also threw its support behind Trump.
Popular Kremlin propagandist Vladimir Soloviev gave an impassioned defense of Trump on his evening show, raising his voice several times in a discussion with Atlantic Council expert Ariel Cohen.
“I can’t understand for what reason [Democrats] don’t like Trump,” Soloviev said.
Days earlier, on his two-hour Sunday night program, anchor Dmitry Kiselyov opined about how Hollywood has joined the Democrats in being against Trump, portraying him as “always on the dark side.
”And the state-sponsored Rossiya 1 news channel, which airs Soloviev’s show, recently broadcast segments of Rudolph W. Giuliani’s interview with right-wing channel One America News, in which the president’s personal attorney promoted debunked conspiracy theories about Ukrainian interference in the 2016 U.S. presidential election.
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