Has U.S. Democracy Been Trumped?

[hrothgar]

Also activities were running from 2008 to 2014. If USA government was influenced by uncovered illegal schema, Trump has nothing to do with it.

 

This round of indictments against Manafort does not directly impact Trump, rather, this is a tool that Mueller will use to encourage Manafort to testify against Trump.

 

Right now, the effort around Trump himself are advancing along two paths.

 

1. Money laundering by the Trump organization in support of Putin and Russian oligarchs

 

2. The email leaks

 

On the email front, I suspect that the chain will get rolled up as follows

 

1. George Papadopoulos testified that senior Trump campaign officials - including Trump himself - were aware that the Russian government wanted to provide emails to the Trump Campaign

 

2. This will be used to demonstrate that Don Jr and Jared Kusher lied to congress and the FBI about their own meetings to the Russians

 

3. We'll eventually be able to shed some new light on Trump Srs public requests that the Russians hack Clinton's emails

 

I would not be surprised if the Russians insists that Trump make that sort of public pronouncement to get him to compromise himself.

[Al_U_Card]

 

 

Also activities were running from 2008 to 2014. If USA government was influenced by uncovered illegal schema, Trump has nothing to do with it.

 

Based on your pseudo, I'll give you props for the Russian part of the analysis but don't you know that it was Trump who was the master-mind behind all of those Machiavellian machinations???? Obama was only the ante-christ, Trump is the anti-christ.... oops sorry, we must not bring levity into this grave and stentorian subject now, must we? ;)

[olegru]

This round of indictments against Manafort does not directly impact Trump, rather, this is a tool that Mueller will use to encourage Manafort to testify against Trump.

 

You mean that indictments will be used in order to blackmail Manafort and squeeze him to give a testimony what investigators would like to have? Very effective method, I agree.

 

...

 

I recently took free online course about wrongful convictions in USA. I was shocked to find out how effective is USA criminal system in convicting and punishing people for a crime ... unrelated if alleged crime was actually committed by the accused person or not.

 

One of the leading cause of that miscarriage of justice is:

witnesses are induced to lie and identify innocent suspects out of self-interest: they are promised benefits if they do, or threatened with harsh consequences if they don't, or both.

 

...

 

I, honestly, would prefer no so effective, but less error prone methods.

[kenberg]

Absence of word "collusion" is not a problem :) Problem is absence of any evidence of links (at least in that document) between:

1. activity of MANAFORT and GATES and Russia

2. activity of MANAFORT and GATES and Trump

 

 

True enough, for now. You mentioned "collusion", hence my response. I have, until Monday, avoided guessing at just where this will end. But Monday morning, Monday morning, couldn't guarantee...

 

Caution in prediction always has merit, but I now think we are in for a slow and agonizing destruction of the Trump presidency. If Mueller were to say "I have investigated, this is what I have found, this is all that I have found, I am closing up shop" then the Trump presidency would survive. But surely Mueller will not be saying any such thing because surely this is not the case.

 

I have also avoided comparisons with Watergate, but one comes to mind. After Haldeman and Ehrlichman were sinking (I forget all the details) a Nixon supporter was quoted as saying "Just because Herdleman and Erdleman [his phrasing] were up to no good that's no reason to go after our number one guy". That was true in some abstract way, but really it was well into the endgame by then.

 

Technical details of exactly how this will end are unknown, but I think Trump must be asking himself how the bankruptcy laws apply to his presidency.

 

We will see.

[hrothgar]

You mean that indictments will be used in order to blackmail Manafort and squeeze him to give a testimony what investigators would like to have? Very effective method, I agree.

 

No.

 

Its obvious that Manafort has turned over a new leave.

 

He has seen the error of his ways and will now cooperate with the prosecution out of the goodness of his heart.

 

<<Of course the prosecutors are going to squeeze him like a grape, well they should>>

[Winstonm]

You mean that indictments will be used in order to blackmail Manafort and squeeze him to give a testimony what investigators would like to have? Very effective method, I agree.

 

...

 

I recently took free online course about wrongful convictions in USA. I was shocked to find out how effective is USA criminal system in convicting and punishing people for a crime ... unrelated if alleged crime was actually committed by the accused person or not.

 

One of the leading cause of that miscarriage of justice is:

 

 

...

 

I, honestly, would prefer no so effective, but less error prone methods.

 

I would suggest you read up on how the FBI goes about investigating and charging organized crime families as the Trump sphere is more closely aligned with that type of organization than any normal political organization.

[Winstonm]

Thinking further about the indictments, I'm inclined to believe the Friday leak about the sealed indictments to CNN, a network despised by Trump, may have been approved by Mueller as a message to Trump that his claims of "fake news" have no effect on the special prosecutor's investigation.

[hrothgar]

Thinking further about the indictments, I'm inclined to believe the Friday leak about the sealed indictments to CNN, a network despised by Trump, may have been approved by Mueller as a message to Trump that his claims of "fake news" have effect on the special prosecutor's investigation.

 

It is interesting to note the numbering scheme for the indictments.

 

In particular, the fact that there are three numbers missing between the first and the last...

[Winstonm]

Thanks for your link. Interesting document.

Seems like 2 lobbyists done some job for Ukrainian Government (pro-Russian Ukraine Government 2010 - 2014) without disclosing it in USA and without paying taxes. Crime for sure.

The only problem ... there is Russian collusion?

 

Michelle Goldberg, columnist for the Washington Post, answers your question in an opinion piece:

 

....We learned that one of the Trump campaign’s foreign policy aides, George Papadopoulos, pleaded guilty to lying to the F.B.I. about his attempts to solicit compromising information on Hillary Clinton from the Russian government. Despite Trump’s hysterical denials and attempts at diversion, the question is no longer whether there was cooperation between Trump’s campaign and Russia, but how extensive it was.

 

In truth, that’s been clear for a while. If it’s sometimes hard to grasp the Trump campaign’s conspiracy against our democracy, it’s due less to lack of proof than to the impudent improbability of its B-movie plotline. Monday’s indictments offer evidence of things that Washington already knows but pretends to forget. Trump, more gangster than entrepreneur, has long surrounded himself with bottom-feeding scum, and for all his nationalist bluster, his campaign was a vehicle for Russian subversion.

[rmnka447]

No flames yet but the smoke is growing blacker and the temperature is getting awfully high for this time of year.

 

Vanity Fair reports:

Reportedly, the two lobbying firms identified in the indictment are a Republican lobbying firm (Mercury) and a Democratic lobbying firm (the Podesta Group).

 

So both potentially face charges as unregistered agents of a foreign government.

[rmnka447]

Sheriff Joe Arpaio did some pretty horrendous stuff and he was pardoned on a whim...

 

Not sure why you think Trump would hesitate to pardon Manafort if he thought that it with forestall testimony.

(Indeed many people argue that pardoning Arpaio was a signal that Trump would take care of his cronies)

It's amusing to see how the left are always asking about pardons. Maybe, you got used to pardoning as a way of life under the pardoner-in-chief Barack Obama.

 

It seems to me like an attempt to create "fake news" by making President Trump's failure to answer or not answer those questions a story. Then you can waste a lot of time speculating whether he will or will do it. It's not news, it's just noise. Just more progressive BS.

 

I would be shocked if President Trump pardoned anyone charged by the Special Counsel.

 

Maybe it would be better to focus on the bigger story out of the Manafort/Gates indictments -- just how widespread the corruption is in Washington.

[cherdano]

Reportedly, the two lobbying firms identified in the indictment are a Republican lobbying firm (Mercury) and a Democratic lobbying firm (the Podesta Group).

 

So both potentially face charges as unregistered agents of a foreign government.

Podesta?? TIME TO IMPEACH HILLARY!

[rmnka447]

Thinking further about the indictments, I'm inclined to believe the Friday leak about the sealed indictments to CNN, a network despised by Trump, may have been approved by Mueller as a message to Trump that his claims of "fake news" have effect on the special prosecutor's investigation.

Isn't that leak a crime?

[Winstonm]

Isn't that leak a crime?

 

I found this answer for you from Chris Christie:

“First off, it’s supposed to be kept secret,” Christie, a former prosecutor, said on ABC’s “This Week.”

 

“There are very strict criminal laws about disclosing grand jury information. Now, depending on who disclosed this to CNN, it could be a crime,” he added.

 

The answer to your question is a definite "maybe".

[Winstonm]

It is interesting to note the numbering scheme for the indictments.

 

In particular, the fact that there are three numbers missing between the first and the last...

Not to mention there are also multiple grand juries in different districts. I read somewhere that there is a sealed indictment "A" that was not unsealed - I don't recall who was "B" was but perhaps Papadopoulos.

 

Edit: Found this:

 

Steve Reilly ✔@BySteveReilly

U.S. District Court for D.C. has four sealed cases in its docket with case numbers between Papadopoulos' (182) and Manafort's (201).

1:15 PM - Oct 30, 2017

[Winstonm]

It's amusing to see how the left are always asking about pardons. Maybe, you got used to pardoning as a way of life under the pardoner-in-chief Barack Obama.

 

It seems to me like an attempt to create "fake news" by making President Trump's failure to answer or not answer those questions a story. Then you can waste a lot of time speculating whether he will or will do it. It's not news, it's just noise. Just more progressive BS.

 

I would be shocked if President Trump pardoned anyone charged by the Special Counsel.

 

Maybe it would be better to focus on the bigger story out of the Manafort/Gates indictments -- just how widespread the corruption is in Washington.

 

I think this article would be helpful for you to read:

 

....The point is to muddy the waters, to divert attention from actual scandals. This is something conservative media is uniquely good at. The question is, why? Why is conservative media so much better than liberal media when it comes to making its preferred narratives stick?

 

To answer this question, I reached out Charlie Sykes, a leading conservative radio host in Wisconsin for nearly three decades. A vocal critic of Trump, Sykes eventually walked away from his show after alienating some of his pro-Trump listeners.

 

I asked Sykes, the author of the 2017 book How the Right Lost Its Mind, how right-leaning media is able to construct alternate realities for its base, and why it succeeds in ways liberal media does not.

 

“The conservative media has done a really great job of convincing conservatives that they're under siege,” he told me. As a result, “the conservative media has become a safe space for people who want to be told that they don't have to believe anything that's uncomfortable or negative.”

[Winstonm]

I think I have figured out the issue with Trump's "NO COLLUSION" tweet - he thinks collusion is when your car hits another car. And if he did have a collusion, it would have been the best collusion probably ever. :P

[Winstonm]

I wonder if the new revelations about Manafort's travel habits will have an effect on verifying the information in the Steele dossier. The dossier claims Manafort traveled to Europe to meet with Russians but Manafort has claimed he did not travel during the time period - but now it has come out that he had 3 passports and has a recent history of traveling under an alias, using an alias e-mail account, and using an alias cell phone account.

 

With his denials in place, a confirmation that he did attend those meetings for the campaign would probably be checkmate for this administration.

 

There is also speculation that of the 4 still sealed indictments one of them is for Flynn, who likely has already been flipped - very bad news for Trump administration.

[Winstonm]

The APA has been conducting its Stress in America poll every year since 2007, and the latest one finds that 59 percent said this is the “lowest point in our nation’s history that they can remember.”

 

To be fair, this is also the same 59% who can't remember what they had for breakfast, what they came into this room for, or what they were supposed to do today. :P

[Winstonm]

And McClatchy is reporting about the dog that didn't bark in the night:

 

BY ANITA KUMAR, DAVID GOLDSTEIN AND KEVIN G. HALL

McClatchy Washington Bureau

 

OCTOBER 30, 2017 7:08 PM

 

WASHINGTON

Almost immediately after Hillary Clinton campaign emails were hacked, Russians turned to Donald Trump —and not his Republican opponents — to try to use the documents against her.

 

A professor with ties to the Russian government contacted Trump campaign adviser George Papadopoulos in April 2016 to tell him Russians had “dirt” on Clinton in the form of “thousands of emails,” according to records released Monday.

 

Those details come from a plea agreement released after former Trump adviser George Papadopoulos pleaded guilty to lying to federal officials about his contacts with Russian officials during the presidential campaign.

 

Texas Sen. Ted Cruz and Ohio Gov. John Kasich, the only two Republicans remaining in the presidential race in April 2016, were not contacted by anyone offering similar information, according to the campaign officials.

 

I had not thought of that connection - of three Republican candidates, the only one that Russia reached out to was the Trump campaign, and records show that no one in the Trump campaign ever bothered to notify the FBI that Russia had promised stolen information.

[Zelandakh]

What's the difference between $2.6mil and $136mil? About 2 months. Anyone else here that needs 3 different passports? Clearly nothing to see here - all perfectly ordinary, a complete nothingburger. :unsure:

[Elianna]

What's the difference between $2.6mil and $136mil? About 2 months. Anyone else here that needs 3 different passports? Clearly nothing to see here - all perfectly ordinary, a complete nothingburger. :unsure:

3 US passports or from different countries? Some of us are (quite legally!) citizens of multiple countries and therefore have multiple passports. But not three from the same country. With the US at least, when you get a new passport your old one is supposed to be voided.

 

ETA: I was actually able to open the article (I usually can't open WP articles so I didn't before I posted) and see that it is three US passports. That seems rather strange.

Edited November 1, 2017 by Elianna

[Cyberyeti]

3 US passports or from different countries? Some of us are (quite legally!) citizens of multiple countries and therefore have multiple passports. But not three from the same country. With the US at least, when you get a new passport your old one is supposed to be voided.

 

ETA: I was actually able to open the article (I usually can't open WP articles so I didn't before I posted) and see that it is three US passports. That seems rather strange.

 

It used to be possible to have multiple passports (at least here I believe) when you needed to visit 2 countries where if you've visited one and a visa was stamped in, you couldn't visit the other. Also I believe if you were a business traveller that frequently went to multiple places that needed visas so you would permanently have one or more sent away to get it stamped you could get another.

[Winstonm]

It used to be possible to have multiple passports (at least here I believe) when you needed to visit 2 countries where if you've visited one and a visa was stamped in, you couldn't visit the other. Also I believe if you were a business traveller that frequently went to multiple places that needed visas so you would permanently have one or more sent away to get it stamped you could get another.

 

For someone who travels frequently worldwide, there could be legitimate reasons for 3 passports. Some countries won't accept a passport if it shows the person having been to another country at odds with its views.

 

Still, 10 requests for passports in 10 years seems out of line.

[Elianna]

It used to be possible to have multiple passports (at least here I believe) when you needed to visit 2 countries where if you've visited one and a visa was stamped in, you couldn't visit the other. Also I believe if you were a business traveller that frequently went to multiple places that needed visas so you would permanently have one or more sent away to get it stamped you could get another.

 

I forgot about that. I was BORN in a country boycotted by a few others, so getting a second passport would not help me enter one of those boycotting countries.