Has U.S. Democracy Been Trumped?

[Winstonm]

Joyce White Vance responds to Bill Barr's claim that he was both "suprised and angry" when he heard about the call:

 

Barr who knew about the call at least by mid-August, was apparently not angry enough to resign, to permit DOJ to open a criminal case, or to let the DNI refer the complaint to Congress as the law requires.

[johnu]

Joyce White Vance responds to Bill Barr's claim that he was both "suprised and angry" when he heard about the call:

 

The Manchurian President's government paid personal attorney Barr was probably really surprised and angry that details of the phone call were leaked and then released, not that he was lumped in with Giuliani. Is Barr jealous of Giuliani sharing equal billing with himself? No need really, since Barr got one of the most prestigious, highest paying jobs in US Government and the title of AG while it's unclear whether Giuliani is getting paid at all.

[Winstonm]

Meet a nice, friendly Trump supporter:

 

A former New Jersey police chief standing trial on charges he slammed a black teenager's head into a doorjam reportedly called President Trump "the last hope for white people" before the 2016 election.

 

"I'm telling you, you know what, Donald Trump is the last hope for white people, cause Hillary will give it to all the minorities to get a vote," said Frank Nucera Jr., former chief of Bordentown Township, according to N.J.com's reporting of a transcript displayed at trial this week. "That's the truth! I'm telling you."

 

Makes me think about Ta-Nehisi Coates's article in The Atlantic, The First White President. Racism is endemic in this country. A crime in itself.

[Winstonm]

This is an important read during these times of national crisis:

 

A critical debate took place on July 20, 1787, which resulted in adding the impeachment clause to the U.S. Constitution. Benjamin Franklin, the oldest and probably wisest delegate at the Convention, said that when the president falls under suspicion, a “regular and peaceable inquiry” is needed.

 

In my work as a law professor studying original texts about the U.S. Constitution, I’ve found statements made at the Constitutional Convention explaining that the Founders viewed impeachment as a regular practice with three purposes:

 

To remind both the country and the president that he is not above the law

To deter abuses of power

To provide a fair and reliable method to resolve suspicions about misconduct.

[johnu]

What else is in those Russian phone calls???

 

Nervous Kremlin Warns U.S. Against Releasing Transcripts Of Trump’s Calls With Putin

 

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov says his mother taught him that sharing private conversations is “indecent.”

A Kremlin official warned Friday that any release of transcripts of phone calls between Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin could exacerbate problems that already exist between the nations.

Absolutely correct. The Russians could get angry and do something unprecedented, like interfere in a US presidential election :rolleyes: What do you think about that andrei?

[y66]

James Fallows:

 

Chris Ruddy, Trump pal and head of Newsmax: “Trump poll numbers have been remarkably high.”

 

@brianstelter, instantly and correctly: “The polls have been historically low.”

 

One Q: Why have these people on?

 

But if they are on, good to have immediate BS-call.

Matt Yglesias:

 

Exactly.

 

The “you’re full of sh*t” game is fun, but airtime is a finite resource and there are plenty of people who aren’t full of sh*t.

Me:

 

Why have them on? Because riling up the base and tweaking the libs increases viewer ratings and ad revenue?

[y66]

The CBS News survey is conducted by YouGov using a nationally representative sample of 2,059 U.S. residents interviewed between September 26-27, 2019. This sample was weighted according to gender, age, race and education based on the American Community Survey, conducted by the U.S. Bureau of the Census, as well as 2016 presidential vote and registration status. The margin of error is +/- 2.3 points.

[Winstonm]

Lawfare has an important read on the lack of transparency about Trump's meeting with Lavrov in the oval office:

 

 

President Trump told two senior Russian officials in a 2017 Oval Office meeting that he was unconcerned about Moscow’s interference in the 2016 U.S. presidential election because the United States did the same in other countries, an assertion that prompted alarmed White House officials to limit access to the remarks to an unusually small number of people, according to three former officials with knowledge of the matter.

my emphasis

 

[snip]

 

Shortly after the story broke, I received a message from a person directly involved with the FBI’s decision to open a counterintelligence and obstruction investigation of President Trump in the immediate aftermath of the firing of FBI Director James Comey. To say this person, who had clearly learned about the matter for the first time from the Post, was angered by the story would be to understate the matter.

 

The message read in relevant part: “None of us had any idea. Multiple people had opportunity and patriotic reason to tell us. Instead, silence.”

my emphasis

 

Aside from the incredibly un-American and un-patriotic position taken by Trump, on a legal note an important question to find out is whether or not this transcript was moved to the code-level server in order to keep it hidden from Robert Mueller's investigation.

[johnu]

The CBS News survey is conducted by YouGov using a nationally representative sample of 2,059 U.S. residents interviewed between September 26-27, 2019. This sample was weighted according to gender, age, race and education based on the American Community Survey, conducted by the U.S. Bureau of the Census, as well as 2016 presidential vote and registration status. The margin of error is +/- 2.3 points.

How can these numbers be right? 55% in favor of impeachment? Less than a week ago, andrei posted poll results where the numbers were against impeachment by a fair margin. It seems like only a clear cut and easily understood act of corruption or treason would have changed the numbers so quickly. andrei- can you speculate what might have happened?

[y66]

How can these numbers be right? 55% in favor of impeachment? Less than a week ago, andrei posted poll results where the numbers were against impeachment by a fair margin. It seems like only a clear cut and easily understood act of corruption or treason would have changed the numbers so quickly. andrei- can you speculate what might have happened?

Perhaps the survey he referenced had a large margin of error?

[johnu]

Perhaps the survey he referenced had a large margin of error?

Or the survey relied on polling before

 

1) The release of the Ukraine phone transcript

2) The release of the Inspector General's report that called the whistleblower's complaint "credible" and "of urgent concern"

3) Additional reports that the Manchurian President told the Russians he didn't care about the 2016 Russian election interference

4) Part of the whistleblower's complaint, and now widely reported that other "controversial" phone calls were stored on a top secret server to hide them from the normal distribution channels.

 

And the Traitor in Chief's poll numbers are almost certainly get a lot worse as more of public becomes aware of these latest scandals. At some point they will bottom out. Even Nixon had a 24% approval rating immediately before he resigned to avoid impeachment.

[cherdano]

I am still bewildered by the whole whistleblower-Ukraine saga. So many small parts of it that are kind of amazing on its own.

Just one example. As one of the Trumpists here pointed out, the document was almost entirely based on hearsay. Yet every detail that we know about (including everything about the phone call) has been 100% validated, unlike some of the details in early press reports. Almost as if this guy is a professional at clandestine operations obtaining bits and pieces of crucial information and then fitting the puzzle together to try to understand what happened. If I was the CIA, I would hire this guy!

[y66]

Or the survey relied on polling before

 

1) The release of the Ukraine phone transcript

2) The release of the Inspector General's report that called the whistleblower's complaint "credible" and "of urgent concern"

3) Additional reports that the Manchurian President told the Russians he didn't care about the 2016 Russian election interference

4) Part of the whistleblower's complaint, and now widely reported that other "controversial" phone calls were stored on a top secret server to hide them from the normal distribution channels.

 

And the Traitor in Chief's poll numbers are almost certainly get a lot worse as more of public becomes aware of these latest scandals. At some point they will bottom out. Even Nixon had a 24% approval rating immediately before he resigned to avoid impeachment.

It is barely comprehensible to me that someone would use a survey that was taken before the items you mention became public as evidence of a lack of public support for impeachment. But here in the water cooler?

[y66]

From David Leonhardt at NYT:

 

The Economist argued that Schiff made a mistake by focusing on “process rather than the substance of the whistle-blower’s complaint.” Schiff took a confrontational approach to questioning Joseph Maguire, the acting director of national intelligence, because Maguire was slow to forward the whistle-blower’s complaint to Congress.

 

But the complaint ultimately made it to Congress. “The Democrats’ obsession with process made them seem petty and small,” The Economist wrote. The smarter approach would have been to allow Maguire — a Trump administration official — to emphasize his belief that the whistle-blower acted appropriately. The hearing eventually got around to this point, but it took too long.

 

I still think the hearing on the whole made the impeachment inquiry seem serious and credible. But I also thought The Economist made a fair point. “If the Democrats want to move the needle further, they will have to do better than they did on Thursday,” The Economist concluded.

[y66]

Also from the lion-hearted one:

 

To the Republican members of the United States Senate:

 

You have always told us that you believe in the distinctive greatness of the United States of America. “America is different,” as Senator Marco Rubio has said. Ben Sasse likes to say that “America is an idea” — a commitment to universal dignity over brute power.

 

You have also told us that you went into politics to serve a higher purpose. Well, your moment has arrived.

 

The president of the United States is betraying his oath of office in the most fundamental way, by using the presidency for personal gain at the country’s expense. He has corrupted our foreign policy with grubby attempts to help himself that his own White House staff immediately recognized as improper. He is telling the world that America does not, in fact, stand for any higher ideal. Can you for a moment imagine the icons of your party, like Ronald Reagan or Dwight Eisenhower, risking the security of a country threatened by Russia, for the sake of smearing a political rival?

 

President Trump must go, and you — only you — have the power to make it happen.

 

You can start to distance yourself from him slowly, if it will help bring along your political base. A couple of you — like Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania, who called Trump’s behavior “inappropriate,” and Mitt Romney of Utah, who used the word “troubling” — have begun to do so. But more of you should be moving in this direction, for the sake of the country and, ultimately, yourselves.

 

During the Watergate scandal, George H.W. Bush and other leading Republicans initially defended Nixon, too. They did not do so forever. They didn’t want their own legacies and careers to go down with his.

 

And here’s the thing: You have a very good alternative. I don’t personally share Mike Pence’s worldview, but you do. He is a deeply conservative, anti-regulation, anti-tax, evangelical Christian. As a bonus, he has never paid hush money to a porn star or made big campaign donations to New York Democrats. Oh, and Pence has a lower disapproval rating than Trump.

 

The notion that America is different — a “light unto the nations” and “the shining city upon a hill,” in Reagan’s words that you so often quote — happens to be true. Some liberals may not buy it. Trump certainly does not; he called our country “a hellhole.” But you are correct when you say that America stands for something. Now you can show the world that you mean it.

 

With this mind, I have a few specific questions to pose, respectfully, to several of you:

 

Senator Rubio, you’ve said, “When America fails to lead, global chaos inevitably follows.” You have criticized politicians who “appease our enemies,” “betray our allies” and are “passive in the face of” Russian aggression. You said all of these things before Trump took office. Which of them do not apply to him?

 

Senator Sasse, you have offered yourself as a voice of conservative conscience, imploring people to make hard, principled choices over convenient, self-serving ones. You have written a book arguing that today’s Americans need to grow up.

 

“Throughout our history, our wisest statesmen have warned that America’s greatest risk has never been attack from abroad but rot from within,” you wrote. “This exceptional nation cannot endure by mere inertia.” Senator Sasse, do you believe that defending Trump is the principled thing to do?

 

Senator Joni Ernst, as a student at Iowa State University in the late 1980s, you traveled to the Soviet Union — Ukraine, to be specific — on an agricultural exchange program. The suffering you saw there made you understand how much you loved the United States and inspired you to join the Army. How do you feel about a president who is willing to undermine Ukraine’s military, which is now fighting a proxy war against its old master, Russia, for purely selfish reasons?

 

Senator Josh Hawley, in your maiden Senate speech this year, you said: “I pledge to my fellow Missourians that I will work at this task with all the strength that God can give me. And I will serve without fear and without favor to any man.” Senator, do you fear the president?

 

Senator Susan Collins, you represent the state of Maine. All available evidence suggests that your constituents are disgusted by Trump’s pattern of behavior and want a president who is not manifestly unfit for office. Senator, do you serve the people of Maine? Or Donald Trump?

 

Senator Cory Gardner — and, I’m sorry, this is going to sound familiar — you represent the state of Colorado. All available evidence suggests that your constituents are disgusted by Trump’s pattern of behavior and want a president who is not manifestly unfit for office. Senator, do you serve the people of Colorado? Or Donald Trump?

 

Senator Lamar Alexander, your hero and mentor is the late Howard Baker, who held the same Tennessee seat that you now do. In the early stages of Watergate, Baker stood by Nixon and even privately promised to protect him. But Baker had his limits and ultimately stood up to the president when other Republicans were scared to do so. In your 2014 eulogy of Baker, you eloquently listed his strengths, including: “He demonstrated courage.”

 

Senator Alexander, you will be retiring soon, ending a distinguished career in which you have served as a governor, cabinet member and now senator. Will you honor your mentor by summoning the same courage that he did?

 

Senators, I know that many of you now feel helpless — repulsed by this president and yet afraid that any criticism of him will end your careers. But his support is shallower than it seems, and you have more power than you may realize. If even a handful of you began speaking out, you would instantly transform this situation and begin to end our long national nightmare.

 

America is better than this, isn’t it?

[hrothgar]

It is barely comprehensible to me that someone would use a survey that was taken before the items you mention became public as evidence of a lack of public support for impeachment. But here in the water cooler?

 

Its barely comprehensible to anyone with half a brain

There was a reason that the first question that I asked after the previous poll was being cited was "What were the dates"...

[Winstonm]

Posting what I consider a helpful comment (to people like me, not very computer savvy) from the emptywheel blog.

 

 

 

September 30, 2019 at 4:55 am

 

I am sorry if I am repeating “old info”, but I’d just like to share some data concerning the “Server” being in Ukraine. I haven’t worked directly with Crowdstrike personally, but I have worked in cyber security since before it was called cyber security and have commissioned or performed cyber forensics for more than 20 years.

 

When a company like Crowdstrike is asked to investigate a server that is suspected of compromise, they have two primary objectives. The first is to ensure that they capture *all available detail* from the host in question and the suspected event. The second is to get their client back in to production operations as quickly as possible. The first part is “preservation of evidence”. The second is good business practice.

 

To preserve evidence in the case of a server/host compromise, a good forensics company would take a forensic copy of all local storage that the host was equipped with. By “forensic copy” I mean a bit-wise copy. (Computers store our data as 1’s and 0’s (these are called bits). For convenience, we group these, usually in to blocks of 8 bit and we call these bytes). Once the forensics company has bit-wise copies of all the server storage, they will then check the firmware of all connected devices. This would include the motherboard (e.g. the BIOS), as well as the firmware of hard drives, optical drives, etc. (since these can also be compromised). Once all the *hardware* and *firmware* has been determined to be “malware-free”, then the client can be told that the server can be thoroughly wiped, re-loaded and put back to work.

 

Sometimes, of course – for example when the client has spare machines sitting idle – they may elect to preserve the hacked system. But in most cases the client is trying to run business operations and needs their hardware back pronto. Imaging can take a matter of hours.

 

Once the images have been taken and copied, they can then be downloaded into a “sandbox” environment operated by the forensics company. “Sandbox” means “a secure container”, such that if the downloaded content includes malicious code, then that malicious code can’t get out.

 

The forensics company can now dissect the “server” at their leisure. What they have is a complete and perfect “photograph” of the machine. They can lift out any single file, part of a file, small portion of a sector of a disc… and they can examine it, literally bit by bit. They can place chunks of code in a separate container and run it, to see if it does anything malicious. They can look at the length of the program file, the date it was written, they can look at all the individual characters inside it and from this determine if the file has been modified in any way.

 

They can do these an a dozen other things to determine what the threat was, how it got access, what it touched and looked at and so on. In many cases, they will recognize “patterns” in the malicious code – like a hand-written signature – that makes it possible to figure out the group or individual that perpetrated the attack.

 

In many cases the FBI actually prefer when a respected 3rd party does this work; the private companies have the resources – and often have a commercial arrangement with the impacted party – to work quickly. The FBI gets the full analysis for zero cost and in less time. They also have access to a forensic copy of the data if they need it.

 

Pretty much EVERYTHING the President has claimed about the DNC Server hack has been fabrication on his part. (I concede that he was correct when he stated they were hacked).

 

All he is trying to do here is to deflect attention away from being caught, red-handed, breaking the law. And then being stupid enough to release evidence that confirms he broke the law.

 

But for the record, the “Server in Ukraine” story is a complete and total fabrication.

[Winstonm]

A couple of comments. First, I think this NYT writer, Peter Wehner, is overly optimistic:

 

The Republican Party is the party of Donald Trump, through and through. As such, it has become morally disfigured. The party finds itself deep in a dark alleyway. It can eventually find its way back. Renewal and regeneration are always possible. But that will require the Republican Party and its future leadership to repudiate much of what it now embodies

.

 

I think before the Republican Party repudiates Donald Trump the American people must first repudiate Trump. That is not nearly as easy as it seems as this point.

 

As the psychologist I spoke to put it to me, many Republicans “are nearly unrecognizable versions of themselves pre-Trump. At this stage it’s less about defending Trump; they are defending their own defense of Trump.”

 

“At this point,” this person went on, “condemnation of Trump is condemnation of themselves. They’ve let too much go by to try and assert moral high ground now. Calling out another is one thing; calling out yourself is quite another.”

 

It's really difficult to take the blame unless you have taught yourself a hard life lesson: rigorous self-honesty. But underneath that is the truly horrible thought that maybe we as a people really are this base, this racist, this cruel, this dishonest, and this corrupt. After all, the constant comment about serial killers is about how normal they look.

 

If we look at our Republican neighbors, shopowners, storekeepers, and politicians, are we looking at moral keepers of America's values or are we looking at the placid faces of the serial killers of American democracy, the unforgiving and lascivious stare of serial rapists of our planet's future, and the half-hidden cold eyes of masked and hooded harbingers of hate and intolerance?

 

Only a total and thorough repudiation of Trump will answer that question.

[Winstonm]

Well, isn't that special?

 

NEW YORK — Rep. Chris Collins, President Trump’s first congressional supporter, is expected to plead guilty to insider-trading charges on Tuesday, following allegations last year that the New York Republican schemed with his son to avoid significant losses on a biotechnology investment.

 

Delicious irony. For those who do not know, Collins is pleading guilty to funneling insider information to his son so that they could take advantage of the stock movements that Collins knew about but were unknown to the public - the same type of familial corruption of which the frothy right is accusing Biden and his son.

 

Drain the swamp Trump admininstration.

[johnu]

Mike Pompeo Joined Trump On Call With Ukrainian President: Report

 

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo was on the July 25 call between President Donald Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, The Wall Street Journal reported on Monday, citing a senior State Department official.

 

The revelation could implicate the State Department more closely in the House of Representatives’ ongoing impeachment inquiry into Trump over his request to Zelensky during the call that Ukraine investigate his political rival, former Vice President Joe Biden.

So the Secretary of State heard the Manchurian President shake down the Ukrainian president and as a minimum, went back to his office and forgot about the whole thing. Giuliani says the Pompeo was aware of his actions in Ukraine. Is there anybody in the Executive branch who isn't corrupt?

[cherdano]

Here is another point I find amazing. Obviously everyone rightfully made fun of Trump's cranky conspiracy theory about the DNC server being in Ukraine etc. But I think it makes total sense to bring it up as a trial balloon to see how Zelensky would react. It's a clearly improper request, but also in a sense quite harmless, as it's just a fake story that Zelensky couldn't do anything about. But Zelensky going along with is the indication for Trump that he can make his main ask - he won't be called out for this request if Zelensky was happy to go along with the previous one.

 

I don't buy the Trump-as-a-genius-who-plays-7d-chess. But he clearly has some special skills, and "getting away with improper things while leaving him plausible deniability" might be his most important. And in this phone call we can see both his skill but also how his game has lost a step or two or four - it's all too blatant and he has too much to lose and there are too many people listening in.

But how would Trump know he is overplaying his hand given that never in his life he has been hold accountable for anything, ever? It's the day after the Mueller testimony deflated many Democrats' hopes for momentum behind impeachment.

[cherdano]

Here is another amazing thing. Imagine Obama telling a foreign leader in a phone call to work with Eric Holder on investigation XYZ, and then Eric Holder (ok, "sources in DOJ") claiming he was not told about that phone call until three weeks later. This would have been the biggest scandal of the Obama presidency (Is Eric Holder a flat-out lier? Or is the Obama White House to utterly incompetent that they don't inform one of the most senior members of cabinet that the president told a foreign leader that they should work with him on investigation XYZ??) Yet it's not even the 5-th most scandalous thing about the phone call and its handling by the White House staff.

[Winstonm]

It appears the dam has given way and the stench is overwhelming.

[andrei]

Imagine Obama telling a foreign leader

 

“Tell Vladimir after election I will have more flexibility” Obama?

[hrothgar]

“Tell Vladimir after election I will have more flexibility” Obama?

 

Andrei, as usual you are unable to understand simple facts:

 

No one denies that Obama and Putin engaged in negotiations.

The issue with Putin and Trump is that Trump has repeatedly told Putin that he doesn't care if the Russians interfere in US domestic elections.

 

It also appears as if your grasp of written English is pretty piss poor.

 

Cherdano's original post was not criticizing the fact that Obama and Putin had talked, but rather, was commenting on the fact that Trump's attorney general was referenced on these calls and is now trying to deny that he was ever in the loop.