I clicked on those links and one of the pages ad my “back” button active, so I hit it and was taken to a page that was an “Advertorial” about Ben Carson shilling a brain booster supplement. When did The Hill turn into an Alex Jones-esque supplement shill farm?
First of all, I did not originally read that word as “shilling”.
Second of all, who the hell is being duped by Ben Carson, of all people, selling “brain boosters”?
Well that’s why it seemed so Alex-Jones-y to me for The Hill to be running paid “advertorials” like this one: I thought they tried to be a respectable publication, not an excuse to hawk wares to gullibles.
Actually, that is one of the very few things that he would actually be qualified for.
I’ve seen those ads, they just pick a random celebrity and attach a testimonial. I’d report the ad, it may have just snuck under their radar, or at least, you let them know that such advertising is not appreciated if it were intentional.
So now Trump sanctions Russia for Skripal and now the Putin-Trump “bro-mance” may be off. I wonder if this is where the Russians meddle on behalf of Democrats in ways that are obvious, giving Republicans a chance to cry foul and invalidate the election.
They will anyway. Probably the same three to five million illegal voters, unless they lose by ten, then its twenty. Its their ass-in-the-hole card.
If we want to assume that Trump is completely running at Russia’s command, then one could suppose that they’re trying to play up the sanctions like they’re a big deal (when they’re actually not), before Congress can pass DETER, in the hopes that it will make them decide that it’s redundant, and they’ll forget it and move on to other things.
It is noteworthy that Trump’s sanctions are, purportedly to punish Russia for poisoning that one dude in the UK. Given that Trump hasn’t seemed to give a rat’s ass about that, and seemed annoyed by those who did bring it up, it seems strange to hit them a few months, using that as the basis, after everyone else had moved on.
I also note that the new sanctions against Turkey are driving Erdogan to talk more with Putin. Ostensibly, we’re sanctioning Turkey because they arrested someone that we don’t think they should have. But, if I recall correctly, Turkey arrested one of Trump’s hotel managers when he joined the office, and he didn’t seem to be bothered at all, not has he seemed to care much about Turkey at all until this moment - nor really explained why this new offense is the one to push his buttons.
Given that the US has basically left the Middle East for Russia to take over, this would be the point in time for Russia to start solidifying its hold over everyone there.
I heard something about this today. Just so were clear here, Trump didn’t impose the sanctions. There’s a law from the early 1990’s which required the State Department to make a declaration regarding the chemical attack within something like 60 days. They declared it to be an attack (although they blew past the deadline), and that automatically triggered sanctions. Russia has to take remedial actions or else additional sanctions are issued.
Notably, this is being done outside of Trump’s control. And he is silent on all of it.
More precisely, here is the law that has taken effect.
Note the use of the word “shall” (my emphasis)
A new book due out on 8/14 also alleges that Trump was “likely” compromised in 1987. The book, by controversial writer Craig Unger, digs into Trump’s real estate deals with Russians going back to the 70s. It quotes a guy who was a senior KGB official in 1987 as saying that it was standard practice for the KGB to try to acquire kompromat on visiting Western businessmen, most often through honey traps. To be clear, the KGB guy offers no evidence that Trump was compromised during his 1987 visit. He only says it was very likely.
Craig Unger is best known for House of Bush, House of Sayd, which I didn’t read, but I gather was criticized for being gossipy and indulging in conspiracy theories. From the article, this new book also seems to rely on a fair amount of hearsay and inference. But, add it to the growing number of allegations that Trump has been up to his eyeballs in Russians for three or more decades.
I’m no fan of Trump, but…
Rumor mongers and conspiracy theorists are bad, but what can you say for a rumor mongering conspiracy theorist who is late to the party?
Looks like (I assume) someone has made credible threats against Papadopoulos and his wife:
I assume that they already have his grand jury testimony in the bag and that he, effectively, can’t change it now but I’m not sure how that actually plays out in a court if he changes his testimony on the stand and they have to compare his statements to the previous ones. Are juries amenable to the idea that people are being threatened by, for example, Russian agents?
Nope, looks like she’d believed that Papadop had done something wonderful and was going to get a medal from Mueller. Instead, Mueller’s recommendation letter for sentencing seems to encourage the maximum possible sentence 6 months) based on Papadopoulos having been completely useless and only even answering honestly once forced to by physical evidence that contradicted his testimony.
So, she must have gotten an early notice about what was coming up and was just angry.
Papadopoulos lying to the FBI to help Misfud escape the FBI’s jurisdiction is yet another thing that satisfies the common everyday definition of collusion.
No, if a bunch of Trump aides got played by Russia, that’s just people getting played.
For collusion, on the part of Trump himself, you need something like that he was working through Manafort and Gates to actively move money from Russia, through the NRA, into his campaign. Or, him being aware that and encouraging of his son to meet with people to collect information about his opponent from, what he believed to be, the Russian intelligence services. Or, asking his team to remove protecting Ukraine from the Republican party platform, in the belief that Russia would use their security apparatus in his favor if he flirted at them hard enough.
Basically you need him to be aware of the chance to do something illicit and supportive of it.
However, to have collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia you just need to have members of the campaign be aware of the chance to do something illicit and supportive of it.
And we have that already. Three or four times over.
Collusion isn’t a crime anyway. Conspiracy is the word you are looking for. The bolded part is that. The rest looks very probable at this point. Everyone who knew is a conspirator, not a colluder. To be a colluder is a much lower bar.
I’ve posted this before but I guess I’ll post it again.
The common everyday definition of collusion is secret cooperation.
The Trump campaign and a large network of Russians working at the direction of the Kremlin had a common goal to get Trump elected. Furthermore, members of these two groups were secretly cooperating with each other. I don’t believe these facts are in dispute and this satisfies the common everyday definition of collusion.
There are three or four examples of this already in the information that is publicly available.
Meh… Merriam-Webster says collusion is:
In your mind, what form of conspiracy is not also collusion? Maybe there are lawful forms of an American colluding with Russia to swing an election, but I can’t think of any. Perhaps you know of some?
We can say ‘colluding with the Russians to sway the election’ understanding we’re talking about a particular kind of criminal conspiracy. We can truthfully say ‘Alice killed Bob’ without derailing the conversation to decide whether it was justifiable homicide or first degree murder.
All conspiracy is collusion, but not all collusion is conspiracy.