Will they/he get to Trump?

So, Manafort is a scumbag. Reports say that Stone recd him to Trump.

Have read that Mueller is working up the "Totem Pole", no Russian collusion yet but we are finding random lawbreakers and scumbags with nothing to do with "collusion" with the Trump campaign or Dems Fusion GPS/Uranium 1 . Or any significant influence on the vote of 2016. Mueller and his "team" have created a sub-DOJ that can do whatever they want. Congress should be in charge of all these investigations. The reason why they aren't is because they suck at the teat of $$ and are too afraid to vote by name and trust in the complacence of an uninterested electorate to care. Surprise. This is why there was bipartisan support in 1999 to let this stupid law die.

I despise Trump.

Of interest, the WSJ had an article that said Trump like previous presidents could declare blanket pardons for all involved both on the Repub and Dem side.

Begging Your Pardon Mr. President

https://www.wsj.com/articles/begging-your-pardon-mr-president-1509302308

There is ample precedent for using the presidential pardon authority to address matters of political importance. Certainly it is what the framers expected. As Alexander Hamilton explained in Federalist 69, the pardon power was to “resemble . . . that of the king of Great Britain.” In Federalist 74, he observed that “there are often critical moments, when a well-timed offer of pardon to . . . insurgents or rebels may restore the tranquility of the commonwealth.”

Hey maybe Congress should do their job.

Permitting the criminal law again to become a regular weapon in politics is more destructive of democratic government than ham-handed efforts by a foreign power to embarrass one or more presidential candidates. It is true that Washington’s Augean stables need periodic cleaning, but it is Congress that should wield the shovels.

Read it.

Talk to me.

They're back...

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detroitmechworks's picture

I honestly don't care which roaches they squash in the open. There's thousands more behind the baseboards.

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I do not pretend I know what I do not know.

EdMass's picture

@detroitmechworks

Who are the "they" you refer to?

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Prof: Nancy! I’m going to Greece!
Nancy: And swim the English Channel?
Prof: No. No. To ancient Greece where burning Sapho stood beside the wine dark sea. Wa de do da! Nancy, I’ve invented a time machine!

Firesign Theater

Stop the War!

detroitmechworks's picture

@EdMass So I have to assume that the PTB have decided some show trials are the way to shut the peasants up.

They is a nebulous term, and in this circumstance I specifically mean large money interests who want to keep the wars going, the wealthy unprosecuted and the people ignorant.

But then, I'm a paranoid fool who believes that Washington is an Imperial cult that tells fairy stories about democracy to hide their corruption.

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I do not pretend I know what I do not know.

Amanda Matthews's picture

@detroitmechworks @detroitmechworks
definition of the word has been changed, like so many words these days.

What really make me angry is how arrogant and stupid the parasites in Washington who spend their lives on the public teat think we are. We know why we voted the way we did. They’re the idiots pushing lies and propaganda as fast as their little tongues can flap it up. Like yesterday when Manafort got indicted for unethical and criminal acts he committed while working for one of Clinton’s operatives, who had NOTHING to do with Trump. And they’re using the indictment to push the lie that it’s proof of TRUMP’S corruption and ‘treason’. The Dims are trying to subvert an election that they lost. And they’re doing it by lying and using OUR government to push THEIR lies.

Here’s how they’re going to screw with us next. And screw us they will. This is a shot fired right at the First Amendment by the neo-liberal TRAITORS. (I’m going to start slinging that meme around and I’m calling that fake pee-pee report the ‘Clinton Dossier’. That last one has gotten a couple dirty looks and an accompanying indignant sniffle. I can be more obnoxious than they ever dreamed of being. And I get my ammo from them.)

Tech Companies Set to Tell Congress About Russian Election Meddling

By Steven T. Dennis , Sarah Frier , and Gerrit De Vynck
October 31, 2017, 3:00 AM CDT
Tech giants tout moves to crack down on election-ad abuses
Russian Facebook posts reached newsfeeds of 126 million users

*.

“If someone is paying you in rubles to place a political ad, or an ad that is intended to sow the seeds of discontent and discord, that ought to be a red flag,” Senate Intelligence panel member Susan Collins of Maine said in an interview Monday. “How much more of a tipoff do you need?”

Facebook plans to tell lawmakers that 80,000 posts came from 470 fake Russian accounts and that it closed 5.8 million fake accounts from all sources in October 2016 alone. Fake Russian accounts on Facebook’s Instagram posted another 120,000 pieces of content, the company will tell lawmakers.

At the same hearing, Twitter Inc. will say it has suspended 2,752 Russian-linked accounts, far more than it previously disclosed, according to testimony obtained by Bloomberg. Alphabet Inc.’s Google plans to say the impact on its sites was much smaller, with $4,700 worth of Russian-linked ads, compared to the $100,000 Facebook disclosed.

*

The companies will be wary of what happened to Twitter when it first presented information on Russian interference to a closed-door briefing in late September with the Senate Intelligence committee staff. Mark Warner, the top Democrat on the committee, gave the company a verbal lashing afterward for not taking the issue seriously enough.

The companies have since worked to present a proactive image. Twitter said last week it would ban Russian state media accounts from buying ads and create a “transparency center” to show how much political campaigns spent on advertising, the identity of the organization funding the campaign, and what demographics the ad targeted.

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-10-31/facebook-twitter-goog...

WHERE IN THE HELL IS SANDERS??? I want to hear what that old man thinks about the Dims push for massive censorship of the internet. Where is that old goober on the Manafort indictments? Why isn’t he telling the truth about it rather than letting the liars on the ‘lefy’ (Ha!) get away with spewing this crap and using it to curtailing our rights?

Remember all the condemnation of the Nazis and their book burning??

Cultural incineration: 80 years since Nazi book burnings
Some of Germany's most valuable creative works went up in flames on May 10, 1933. The mass book burnings marked a turning point in the Nazis' ideology campaigns. And they were largely organized by university students.

http://m.dw.com/en/cultural-incineration-80-years-since-nazi-book-burnin...

Well, this is today’s equivalent. And notice it was the young idiots in Germany who bought into the propaganda and destroyed part of their culture because they were too fucking stupid to know when they were being had. College students. Sound familiar?

I wonder, did they all sport pink pussy hats?

EDIT: test/teat. Can auto correct be turned off?

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I'm tired of this back-slapping "Isn't humanity neat?" bullshit. We're a virus with shoes, okay? That's all we are. - Bill Hicks

Politics is the entertainment branch of industry. - Frank Zappa

thanatokephaloides's picture

@detroitmechworks

"I honestly don't care which roaches they squash in the open. "

Silly Pirate! You're not supposed to squash roaches; you're supposed to smoke them!

Wink

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"US govt/military = bad. Russian govt/military = bad. Any politician wanting power = bad. Anyone wielding power = bad." --Shahryar

"All power corrupts absolutely!" -- thanatokephaloides

detroitmechworks's picture

@thanatokephaloides Parson's will get rid of the termites and waterbugs, and help you smoke the roaches, Man...

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WoodsDweller's picture

but I doubt that it will ever come to that. The whole plan is to start with a profoundly incompetent Trump, exploit the divisions in the Republican coalition, and keep the administration pinned down with scandal and investigations. This minimizes (does not eliminate) the damage Trump can do. Let him Twitter rage about these indictments instead of provoking foreign leaders.

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"The greatest shortcoming of the human race is our inability to understand the exponential function." -- Albert Bartlett
"A species that is hurtling toward extinction has no business promoting slow incremental change." -- Caitlin Johnstone

detroitmechworks's picture

@WoodsDweller He will function as a "Sin-Eater" for 30 years of rank corruption in both political parties. Everything will be loaded on him, and all politicians will claim a mantle of righteousness...

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Hillbilly Dem's picture

@detroitmechworks

About 20 years ago, a sweet little old lady who worked in a local bank was busted for embezzling funds. She was guilty. But not guilty of taking every dollar that showed up missing when the forensic accountants completed their audit. A lot of folks at that bank breathed a sigh of relief when it all got laid at her doorstep.

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"Just call me Hillbilly Dem(exit)."
-H/T to Wavey Davey

@detroitmechworks That’s the term I was looking for. “The lone bad apple” just doesn’t have the same ring to it. Thanks!

(Incidentally, I agree with your comments here. I think they’re looking for a Madoff type to wheel out, have a show trial and then declare our long national nightmare over. All the while, the beat goes on...)

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Idolizing a politician is like believing the stripper really likes you.

Our elections should be sacrosanct. Nobody should interfere with them. That nobody in the Trump administration can bring themselves to denounce any Russian interference, no matter how big, is very wrong. It's not leadership. We're heading into a whirlpool here, we need to do all we can to see that when it's over we've learned our lesson. Maybe we'll have publicly funded, transparent, clean elections with paper ballots, where anybody who wants to run is given a place to make their point and have it accepted or rejected.

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Beware the bullshit factories.

detroitmechworks's picture

@Timmethy2.0 and you'll see the exact same argument on many conservative sites.

The system is a rotten corpse, and we're just watching the vultures fighting over the eyeballs.

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@detroitmechworks

Hillary is a private citizen who ran and maybe still runs a corrupt DNC and bears responsibility for Trump being in office. But Trump is now the President. Hillary is not and I think she is used too much to distract from Trump. Particularly in oligarchy media that brainwashes the right (talk radio, hack reporters, Fox etc.).

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Beware the bullshit factories.

detroitmechworks's picture

@Timmethy2.0 It's neo-McCarthyite Crap meant to keep us fighting with each other over meaningless "Traitor" charges, while they the rich run off with all the fucking money. Again.

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I do not pretend I know what I do not know.

@detroitmechworks @detroitmechworks
Sorry, meant for NHK below

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Beware the bullshit factories.

Not Henry Kissinger's picture

@Timmethy2.0 But Trump is now the President. Hillary is not and I think she is used too much to distract from Trump.

It's simply horrible how the oligarchic media won't stop promoting Her book tour.

She really is the victim in all this.

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The current working assumption appears to be that our Shroedinger's Cat system is still alive. But what if we all suspect it's not, and the real problem is we just can't bring ourselves to open the box?

@Not Henry Kissinger

It's simply horrible how the oligarchic media won't stop promoting Her book tour.

That part brainwashes the left. I was talking about the part that brainwashes the right. I think we need to prioritize what we're being distracted from. I rank the distraction from Trump, number one.

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Not Henry Kissinger's picture

@Timmethy2.0

I think we need to prioritize what we're being distracted from. I rank the distraction from Trump, number one.

So you're saying we need to pick which distraction is more important, so we don't get too distracted by the more important distraction in order to remain distracted by the less important distraction?

___

___

Allow me to offer an alternative approach:

giphy.gif

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The current working assumption appears to be that our Shroedinger's Cat system is still alive. But what if we all suspect it's not, and the real problem is we just can't bring ourselves to open the box?

SnappleBC's picture

@Timmethy2.0

In fact, I see Trump as the distraction. The problem that I perceive is systemic corruption as documented by Gilens & Page. Therefore, pointing out that Manaforte, et.al. are just one tiny bit of the problem seems entirely worthwhile and appropriate.

For my money, "walking Trump out in chains" really doesn't accomplish much. We get rid of one dangerous sociopath and replace him with another. If this investigation also spreads to the Clinton Foundation then we're on to something. I say that not because it's Clinton but because now it's bi-partisan and seeking the powerful. I'd consider that a hopeful sign.

If they took down Trump, Clinton, Obama, Bush, and a whole raft of other characters (pretty much 538 of them) I'd think like we had actually grappled with the problem.

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A lot of wanderers in the U.S. political desert recognize that all the duopoly has to offer is a choice of mirages. Come, let us trudge towards empty expanse of sand #1, littered with the bleached bones of Deaniacs and Hope and Changers.
-- lotlizard

Not Henry Kissinger's picture

@Timmethy2.0

start showing more concern over the 200,000 Bernie voters kicked off the rolls in the NY primary than they have about $100,000 in nondescript Facebook ads, I'll entertain the thought they might truly be at least marginally interested in clean and unbiased elections.

Until then I consider their 'concern' as hollow as their candidate.

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The current working assumption appears to be that our Shroedinger's Cat system is still alive. But what if we all suspect it's not, and the real problem is we just can't bring ourselves to open the box?

@Not Henry Kissinger @Not Henry Kissinger

Including just about everybody who voted for Hillary or Trump. They're just not as informed as we are, which is a problem that needs to be solved.

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Beware the bullshit factories.

SnappleBC's picture

@Timmethy2.0

The problem here is not "ignorance"... not among either Democratic or Republican constituents anyway. What you have could most charitably be called "willful ignorance" but much more reasonably be described as "rank hypocrisy".

In way too many cases this is not a case of ignorance. By the way, who anywhere can claim ignorance of the reach & power of the Israeli lobby here in the US? If we are so concerned about other nations tampering with our political processes it seems like starting at the most obvious 900lb gorilla would be sensible. Instead, however, the people that you tell me care about "clean and fair elections" are going after puppies and pokemon.

No, most [Democratic and Republican] people don't give a rat's ass about "clean and fair". They care about winning. That is a comforting thought but I don't see it supported by any sort of empirical evidence or just plain observation at all. Surely you've heard these two bits of wisdom... both offered up to me on DKOS... a "democratic" blog.

  • Politics ain't bean bag: This one is used to excuse any sort of heinousness whatsoever.
  • First you win. Then you do good: There it is. A blatant assertion that the ends justify the means.

That is the entire point of being a "pragmatic centrist". They stand for nothing. They don't constrain their thinking with artificial constructs like "principles." They're amorally pragmatic. That's why the whole "lesser of two evils" things has such a charm for them. They don't mind being any particular amount of evil so long as it's "pragmatic".

They call us "purists". I'm here to tell you that I have my own moral and ethical demons. But yes. Next to a "pragmatic centrist" I'm pretty damned pure. Consider how telling it is that they consider a person who has values and principles "a purist".

I do not share similar values with them because they have no values... at least not any I can discern. This is not about "ignorance" in most cases... Democratic or Republican. What it is about is whether or not you're willing to be the apologist for bombing a children's hospital or a bunch of weddings or incredibly suspicious flows of money and power through the Clinton foundation or the Iraq war or .

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A lot of wanderers in the U.S. political desert recognize that all the duopoly has to offer is a choice of mirages. Come, let us trudge towards empty expanse of sand #1, littered with the bleached bones of Deaniacs and Hope and Changers.
-- lotlizard

@Timmethy2.0 those foreign countries that really DO influence "American democracy" like Israel, Saudi Arabia, and all the other war mongers among them. The Russians didn't NEED to "do" anything to "get Trump elected," America managed that all on our own. As for vote rigging, that goes on as well, but once again, we don't talk about THAT very home grown American phenomenon but instead choose to blame those outside of our "great" system.

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Only a fool lets someone else tell him who his enemy is. Assata Shakur

Deja's picture

@lizzyh7
I wonder if anyone in Trump's inner circle has asked, "Can't we just drone her?"

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Anja Geitz's picture

@Deja

Would mean we'd have to suffer her hagiographic nauseating and gag reflex inducing funereal service for days on end, 24/7, from both MSM and social media.

In some respects, that'd be worse than what we have now. A neoliberal war monger who won't STFU.

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There is always Music amongst the trees in the Garden, but our hearts must be very quiet to hear it. ~ Minnie Aumonier

Deja's picture

@Anja Geitz
Ack! You're right.

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Amanda Matthews's picture

@Timmethy2.0
That’s a pretty strange thing to say in light of the ‘BIG’ picture, wouldn’t you say?

Database Tracks History Of U.S. Meddling In Foreign Elections
http://www.npr.org/2016/12/22/506625913/database-tracks-history-of-u-s-m...

Obama’s Meddling.in Foreign Elections: Six Examples
https://spectator.org/obamas-meddling-in-foreign-elections-six-examples/

Mapped: The 7 Governments the U.S. Has Overthrown
https://www.google.com/amp/foreignpolicy.com/2013/08/20/mapped-the-7-gov...

Yeah, it’s all about US!!!!!

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I'm tired of this back-slapping "Isn't humanity neat?" bullshit. We're a virus with shoes, okay? That's all we are. - Bill Hicks

Politics is the entertainment branch of industry. - Frank Zappa

Not Henry Kissinger's picture

The establishment civil war between Trump and the Hillbot/BushyNeocons is escalating faster than Kevin Spacey at a boy's high school swim meet (sorry, too soon?).

Mueller has just bumped the fight to DEFCON 2, and Trump is not exactly known for proportional responses.

No wonder the WSJ is trying to play Mrs. Teasedale and negotiate a peace between Trumpet T. Firefly and Ambassador Clintontino. Nothing good for the PTB can come from all this infighting.

But something good for Progressives just might.

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The current working assumption appears to be that our Shroedinger's Cat system is still alive. But what if we all suspect it's not, and the real problem is we just can't bring ourselves to open the box?

@Not Henry Kissinger
And this is the one intersting point to me:

Mueller has just bumped the fight to DEFCON 2, and Trump is not exactly known for proportional responses.

I don’t see Trump acting in a conventionally expected manner, obviously, nor do I believe he will be quiet, especially if the media blows this up. What interests me is, how will he respond? Is he going to try to take as many down with him? Or which part of the world will he try to light up that we aren’t currently bombing he he’ll out of? I hope for the former, but I expect the later.

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Idolizing a politician is like believing the stripper really likes you.

Trump or Pence? Either way, the Koch brothers have won

http://www.latimes.com/opinion/topoftheticket/la-na-tt-pence-koch-201710...

Red or blue, I want them all squashed.

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"Religion is what keeps the poor from murdering the rich."--Napoleon

dervish's picture

than who they were actually brought against. "Money laundering" from a decade ago could very well be nothing.

It used to be that "money laundering" meant filtering mob money through your pizzeria, or else. In post 9/11 BizzaroWorld, money laundering can mean anything, even managing your own legitimate funds in legitimate ways.

They'll breathlessly gush about charges against Manafort, yet they don't describe exactly what he allegedly did. Meanwhile, our banks launder drug money for Sinaloa and the Zetas, and nobody goes to jail.

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"Obama promised transparency, but Assange is the one who brought it."

Big Al's picture

the United States political system has been arrested for fraud, treason, and premeditated murder of democracy.
No bail has been set and prosecutors expect a long, hard trial. The lead prosecutor came out with a curious statement that has many Americans confused and reaching for their remote controls, "this has nothing to do with Russia".

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EdMass's picture

@Big Al

Yuppers

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Prof: Nancy! I’m going to Greece!
Nancy: And swim the English Channel?
Prof: No. No. To ancient Greece where burning Sapho stood beside the wine dark sea. Wa de do da! Nancy, I’ve invented a time machine!

Firesign Theater

Stop the War!