That’s the word on the street, hunh?
Trouble is, String, we ain’t on the street. We in the Electoral College.
I hate to say anything in support of Trump, but he does have a point that the reduction in Russian diplomatic staff will save the US money, since the majority of those losing their jobs will apparently be Russian civilians employed by the embassies and consulates and not State Dept employees.
From here.
If it was such a sound fiscal decision you have to wonder why Trump, the genius businessman, didn’t come up with it himself.
But haven’t you heard, he was being sarcastic.
Not even sure what you’re even arguing here. The collusion with Russia is done. They met with Russian officials that were offering to do illegal things. The only thing left is to prove that Trump knew about it.
Trump Jr. didn’t keep his mouth shut. Why would Sr?
Plus Trump is trying to start World War III now, so we need to stop quibbling and get him out of office. It’s like no one is even taking this seriously. Trump threatened war on North Korea, and is telling Americans to leave by September. That’s setup for a strike, which means Kim has no reason not to launch his best stuff to try and stop it.
Stop making excuses for the guy who’s trying to kill us, and do what you can to get him out of office. If we have to use the Russia thing, fine. Just do it.
I’d say how, but I’d be afraid breaking the rules on calls to action.
Nobody knew that impeachment was so hard. And let’s not even get started about that whole “removal from office” thingy.
Really hard when Pubbies haven’t got the balls to do anything about it.
Trump knowing about illegal things that other people do isn’t necessarily a crime, but trying to impede a lawful investigation into said illegality, is. Or perhaps Trump has done a few other illegal things that are that are beginning to see the light of day.
Yes it is…aiding and abetting and/or accessory after the fact.
Given his absolute opposition to having his and his family’s financial records scrutinized, I’d say it’s very likely.
I don’t think so, but I’m open to being convinced otherwise.
Aiding and abetting what? Despite all of the media blather about “collusion,” the fact is that “collusion’s” not necessarily a crime - I’m not sure anyone’s even really accurately defined precisely what in the hell it means. Having mutual interest in seeing a political figure lose is not a crime, and it’s not even necessarily collusion. Participating in schemes in order to make that become reality might be criminal, but good look proving that Trump aided or abetted anything.
“Collusion” isn’t. But conspiracy is. Just substitute that word every time you hear “collusion,” and it makes sense.
Conspiracy to… what? You can’t just say “conspiracy” is a crime. There has to be a crime around which the conspiracy is formed.
Mueller getting closer to the White House. Interesting quote:
“Mr. Mueller has expressed interest in speaking with other administration officials, including members of the communications team. But Mr. Trump’s allies are particularly concerned about Mr. Mueller’s interest in talking to Mr. Priebus, a former chairman of the Republican National Committee who worked closely with Mr. Trump during the presidential campaign. Mr. Trump’s confidants at the White House say Mr. Trump was never fully convinced that Mr. Priebus would be loyal to him.”
Why would you be concerned about a co-worker’s loyalty if there is nothing to hide?
You and I already had this conversation in this thread, starting with my post #1195.
You’ll note that the 4th element of conspiracy is: To violate federal law or defraud the United States.
I think defrauding the United States out of a legitimate election would fit nicely. Or don’t you think that would constitute a crime?
I had a sense of deja vu, and was about to post that you know a thread has jumped the shark when you start rearguing stuff that’s already been put to rest.
There are crimes related to election tampering, but which one refers to “defrauding the US out of a legitimate election”? Can you cite the specific part of the criminal code you are thinking of? This thread is so long, and so many accusations have been thrown around, it makes no sense to speak of “fraud” without saying which specific action you think constitutes “fraud”.
… remember that what we are talking about here is:
So, just to be clear, you think there some US criminal code concerning “defrauding the US out of a legitimate election” that would include knowing about a crime committed by other people? I’m really gonna need a cite for that.
The statute is the statute. It is criminal conspiracy. “Defraud” is an element of conspiracy that will be defined by the facts as they are determined to be. In the absence of a specific statute, it is case law and how such case law is interpreted by the finders of fact (usually a jury, but in this case, likely the Congress) that would ordinarily decide whether someone who attempted to sway an election through their use of hostile foreign assistance may rise to the level of “defrauding.” Doubt we’d find much (any?) statutory and/or case law on the matter to date since we’re in new territory here. Do you think there is a statute that says, “It is illegal to conspire with a hostile foreign government to sway the outcome of an election?” Or even case law? I don’t. (Admittedly, I haven’t looked.)
I did say which specific action I believe constitutes “fraud.” I think if someone works with a hostile, foreign government in an attempt to influence an election, it’s not difficult to view that as “defrauding.” The results of such an election may be fraudulent, directly due to their actions. Whether they succeeded or not is beside the point. The question is, did they conspire to do that?
Hopefully this clarifies my position.
You and others seem myopically invested in viewing these crimes solely through the lens of election law, which is very narrowly defined. I think it is far more likely that Trump and his associates have committed regular garden variety crimes like a straight-up conspiracy.
No, I don’t think that. I think it is you who seems to believe that nothing can be found a crime if no one ever did it before.
Sorry; misunderstood your point. No, I don’t think that. But I do think that if you believe Trump wasn’t fully aware of and participated materially in what was being done by his campaign on his behalf, I’ve got a bridge you might be interested in purchasing.
I’m afraid you jumped into the middle of conversation and then tried to change the conversation. Everything I posted on this page (starting with post 1889) was related to asahi’s statement that I quoted in my last post. That’s also what Johnny responded to.
“Working with a foreign government” is not “knowing that someone else worked with a foreign government”. We are discussing the latter in those last few posts, and you are discussing the former.
And I don’t know why you keep say things like “working with a hostile government” as if the “hostile” part had something to do with the law regarding elections. If you broke the law by working with Great Britain to affect the election, you’d be no less guilty than if you had worked with Russia to do so.