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  • joe,

    And Trump's Kool-Aid drinking supporters have absolutely no problem with it at all.

    You fucking hypocrites. How do you sleep at night? How do you look at yourselves in the fucking mirror?
    i'd say for quite a few of them, they are way past "absolutely no problem with it."

    https://www.theatlantic.com/politics...russia/565592/

    On Wednesday morning, in the midst of yet another contentious news cycle dominated by coverage of Russian election meddling, I tweeted a kind of thought experiment: “If Trump & co. just pivoted to ‘Aren’t you glad Russia helped us defeat Hillary Clinton?’ would there be any serious blowback from his base?”

    The question was rhetorical. The answers that began trickling in were not.

    “No,” said Cassandra Fairbanks, a writer at the right-wing news and conspiracy website Gateway Pundit (and a former Sputnik employee). “I mean, I would be cool with it. Im already there. If russia was involved we should thank them.”

    “No,” responded another self-identified Trump voter. “Hillary is a greater threat to our Republic.”

    Several people pointed me to Jacob Wohl, a Trump booster with a large Twitter following, who had mused just hours earlier, “If Russia assists MAGA Candidates on the internet in this year’s midterms, that’s not the end of the world.” And others re-upped a C-span clip from the day before in which a caller identified as Mary Lou from Connecticut said, “I’ll try not to sound too awful, but I want to thank the Russians for interfering with our election to stop Hillary Clinton from becoming president. That woman has got illusions of grandeur.”
    in a more quantitative way:

    Click image for larger version

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    There is a cult of ignorance in the United States, and there has always been. The strain of anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way through our political and cultural life, nurtured by the false notion that democracy means that "My ignorance is just as good as your knowledge."- Isaac Asimov

    Comment


    • Originally posted by astralis View Post
      i'd say for quite a few of them, they are way past "absolutely no problem with it."
      Suddenly that lousy 80's ABC miniseries Amerika looks absolutely prophetic:

      "[The Soviet coup] worked because you lost your country before we ever got here. You had political freedom, but you lost your passion... How could we not win?"

      Unlike the quote from that series, we haven't lost our passion, it's that Americans prefer foreign - RUSSIAN - involvement in our election process, to anything that resembles the political Left.

      What's the red line? When will Trump supporters actually start to give a damn about Russia's influence and Trump's glaringly obvious ties to them?

      What in the actual fuck has happened to us?
      “He was the most prodigious personification of all human inferiorities. He was an utterly incapable, unadapted, irresponsible, psychopathic personality, full of empty, infantile fantasies, but cursed with the keen intuition of a rat or a guttersnipe. He represented the shadow, the inferior part of everybody’s personality, in an overwhelming degree, and this was another reason why they fell for him.”

      Comment


      • China also places party ahead of nation, just like the GOP.

        In the American context, when does engaging with a foreign power for the purpose of usurping the presidency and undermining the integrity of the election process become treason?
        Trust me?
        I'm an economist!

        Comment


        • DOR asked a question: "In the American context, when does engaging with a foreign power for the purpose of usurping the presidency and undermining the integrity of the election process become treason?"
          The earliest evidence I could find of engagement was from the 1980's. There may be others.
          https://www.forbes.com/2009/08/27/te...l#485935ad359a

          The Russians seemingly have attained exactly what they were after in President Trump. He gave a "reset" button to Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov to demonstrate how he would distance himself from past American actions that served only to further American interest, not Russian. He was caught off mic telling Russian President Dmitri Medvedev he would have more flexibility to negotiate on issues once he was elected. He famously did everything in his power as President to reduce or eliminate America's ability to extract oil thru fracking and transport it through new pipelines, which directly leads to Russia having more share of the energy market and dramatically increase revenue and thus defense spending. And the final straw was when he famously ridiculed anyone who thought the Russians were a threat when he chided “The 1980s are now calling to ask for their foreign policy back.” The Orange Man Bad rat bastard even went so far as to be completely exonerated by Robert Muller on his campaign colluding with the Russians to get him elected!! Seemingly the only people who he has on his side are the "Basket of deplorables" dupes who voted for a flawed man who was not a Washington insider. The Undermining of the election process has been pushed farther along the Overton window by the press and the Democrats refusal to accept that the majority of people in a majority of states voted for Trump than Hillary (which are the current rules for electing a President), than anything the Russians could have ever hoped for. Thoughts??

          Comment


          • weak sarcasm is weak. you can agree or disagree with a President's foreign policy, but it's a different kettle of fish when engagement is for some sort of political gain.

            this is especially weird because it is just Trump himself whom is inexplicably pro-Russian, in contrast to the rest of his own administration!

            The Orange Man Bad rat bastard even went so far as to be completely exonerated by Robert Muller on his campaign colluding with the Russians to get him elected!!
            that is false.
            There is a cult of ignorance in the United States, and there has always been. The strain of anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way through our political and cultural life, nurtured by the false notion that democracy means that "My ignorance is just as good as your knowledge."- Isaac Asimov

            Comment


            • Originally posted by astralis View Post
              that is false.
              Not if you're drinking that Trump Kool-aid it isn't.
              “He was the most prodigious personification of all human inferiorities. He was an utterly incapable, unadapted, irresponsible, psychopathic personality, full of empty, infantile fantasies, but cursed with the keen intuition of a rat or a guttersnipe. He represented the shadow, the inferior part of everybody’s personality, in an overwhelming degree, and this was another reason why they fell for him.”

              Comment


              • Originally posted by DOR View Post
                China also places party ahead of nation, just like the GOP.

                In the American context, when does engaging with a foreign power for the purpose of usurping the presidency and undermining the integrity of the election process become treason?
                Jefferson Davis
                Chimo

                Comment


                • Originally posted by looking4NSFS View Post
                  dupes who voted for a flawed man who was not a Washington insider.
                  You started off accurately enough. Trump duped his supporters far better than Obama did, and that's saying a lot.

                  But..."flawed" man?

                  Seriously?

                  "Flawed"?

                  "Flawed"

                  ...blemished, damaged, or imperfect in some way...

                  By any measure, a pathological liar who lies about nearly everything, big, small, important, unimportant. Continues lying after it's been debunked beyond a shadow of doubt...

                  ...either lied through his teeth about where his own father was born, or is so addled by dementia that he genuinely can't remember...

                  ...bragged on 9/11 that his building was now the tallest in New York....

                  "Flawed". You call a man like that "flawed".

                  Seriously. What in the actual FUCK is WRONG with you?
                  “He was the most prodigious personification of all human inferiorities. He was an utterly incapable, unadapted, irresponsible, psychopathic personality, full of empty, infantile fantasies, but cursed with the keen intuition of a rat or a guttersnipe. He represented the shadow, the inferior part of everybody’s personality, in an overwhelming degree, and this was another reason why they fell for him.”

                  Comment


                  • https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlo...between-lines/

                    ‘No collusion’? I managed Russia operations at CIA. Read between the lines.

                    By Steven L. Hall
                    Steven L. Hall retired from the CIA in 2015 after 30 years of running and managing Russian operations.

                    April 24 at 6:00 AM

                    Politicians and pundits tried out a new line after the release of special counsel Robert S. Mueller III’s report on Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election: Americans should at least be pleased that the investigation could not find sufficient evidence to charge President Trump or any of his campaign team with conspiring with the Russians.

                    Phew. Mop your brow. Turns out there were links between Russia and Trump — but nothing that would stand up in a court of law. What a relief.

                    No one should be reassured by this interpretation. Just as no parent would be reassured if the police returned a teenage son or daughter late at night, saying, “We discovered your child in possession of opioids, but they are not old enough to be charged as an adult.” You wouldn’t just roll over and go back to sleep. Lunching daily with the Mafioso John Gotti would not have been prosecutable, either, but nobody would turn over their life savings to Gotti’s unindicted buddies. Mueller’s report said that “While the investigation identified numerous links between individuals with ties to the Russian government and individuals associated with the Trump campaign, the evidence was not sufficient to charge any campaign official.” This is far from a clean bill of health for the Trump administration and its dealings with President Vladimir Putin’s Russia. We can deduce what lies just beneath the surface of the Mueller team’s work.


                    First, in the wilderness of mirrors that is the world of counterintelligence, investigations do not always result in trials and people going to prison. Take the case of Felix Bloch, who was director of European and Canadian affairs for the State Department in the 1980s. Based on investigative steps taken then, I would say that counterintelligence officers at the CIA, FBI and State Department had assessed that Bloch was committing espionage on behalf of the Soviets, and later the Russians. The case happened over 30 years ago (some things between Russia and the United States never change), but you can read some of the details in a 1990 article by the espionage author David Wise in the New York Times, and judge for yourself. Unfortunately for U.S. law enforcement, Robert Hanssen, an FBI officer who was actively spying for Russia, alerted the Russians that Bloch was under investigation, according to a later FBI affidavit in support of a warrant for the arrest of Hanssen. Perhaps because of this warning, U.S. investigators were never able to accumulate enough hard evidence to charge Bloch. “The Government, the leaks, assert that I’m guilty,” Bloch told Wise in 1989. “Apparently, they can’t prove it. … There’s a presumption of innocence in this country. Someone should not be put in a position of saying, ‘I’m innocent.’ ” Still, Bloch was fired from the State Department, forfeiting his pension. (Hanssen is serving a life sentence in federal prison.)

                    Second, we cannot rule out the possibility that there are additional counterintelligence investigations of the Trump team ongoing. A careful analysis of the Mueller report’s wording offers clues. The phrase “while the investigation identified numerous links” (italics added) does not preclude the possibility that there could be other investigations (say, in the Southern District of New York) that might uncover additional counterintelligence information. One thing that has become clear over the past two years is the extensive pattern of business interactions between Donald Trump’s organization and Russia or its proxies (including Deutsche Bank). In the counterintelligence world, such interactions may lead to compromising situations that can be exploited by foreign adversarial governments. As the United States learned from cases like Bloch’s, counterintelligence work must be done with the strictest of secrecy (a practice often referred to as compartmentation) to avoid the possibility that a mole already in place inside the government (such as Hanssen) could provide a warning to the Russians. Are there continuing counterintelligence investigations against Trump and his associates? There are many redactions in the Mueller report, so at this juncture we simply don’t know.


                    Third, while Muller’s determination that there was insufficient evidence to charge anyone on the Trump team with conspiracy or coordination with Russia, there are still significant counterintelligence red flags regarding them. These red flags are largely in the public domain. Remember the president’s obsequious behavior in Helsinki, where he indicated he believed Putin over his own intelligence services? Remember the president’s expressed love of WikiLeaks (an organization later described by his own CIA chief as a hostile intelligence service)? Remember when candidate Donald Trump called upon the Russians to spy on Hillary Clinton to get her deleted emails? Imagine for a moment that you had my old job at CIA, which involved managing intelligence collection against the Russian target. Now imagine that a human resources officer approached you and said, “Hey, good news, four new candidates have applied for jobs in your unit! They are Donald J. Trump, Donald Trump Jr., Michael Flynn and Paul Manafort. Are you interested in interviewing them?” (You can take away the names and just imagine individuals with those backgrounds, if it makes this thought experiment easier.) The common-sense response from any counterintelligence practitioner would of course be an emphatic no. Regardless of the fact that neither Trump nor any of his family members or associates was proved to have conspired with the Russians, basic counterintelligence discipline would demand not exposing sensitive secrets, or sources and methods, to individuals with such long and checkered track records in relation to Russia. Why take that risk?

                    In the highly partisan, divided society that Putin has exploited in this country, it is a dead certainty that there will be continued crowing from Trump supporters in the wake of the release of Mueller’s report, as well as its interpretation by Trump’s attorney general, William P. Barr. Trump himself has already started the party via Twitter, of course, with a cry of “No Collusion! No Obstruction! Game Over!” White House adviser Kellyanne Conway said that the release of the Mueller report was the best day for Trump since his election. Not the least bit surprising are the calls emerging for news outlets reporting on Trump and the Russians to be “held accountable.” What else would we expect after the president, when referring to the media, used the term Lenin used while founding the Soviet Union: enemy of the people.

                    Taking full advantage of the moment to send a supportive message to the administration, Barr indicated his concern that the government — the U.S. government, not Russia — has been “spying” on political campaigns. An experienced and intelligent individual like Barr could and should have been more precise with his words and use appropriate terms like “criminal investigation” instead of “spying,” but the latter is catchy. It shows Barr has joined the Trump conga line in loosely throwing around terms like “treason,” which, while wholly inapplicable, whip up the base. Many will claim that any critical assessment of Mueller’s work that does not align with Barr’s interpretation amounts to die-hard Trump haters refusing to give up. Some will accuse those who remain concerned about the administration’s links to Russia as being bad losers — “never Trumpers” who will never give the president the benefit of the doubt. Everyone should put this behind them, the argument goes, now that Trump and his entourage have been “exonerated.”

                    But this is no time for celebration, regardless of whether you support Trump. Russia did in fact attempt to influence the presidential elections (a fact that Barr accepts, despite Trump’s continued denials). Trump stood with the leader of this adversarial, autocratic government and publicly sided with him over his own intelligence community. Some Trump appointees will be spending time in prison. Even if the Mueller report had thoroughly exonerated the president, this would not be a great day for American democracy. Putin, on the other hand, can be proud of what he has helped bring about in this country: a divided, weakened America.
                    There is a cult of ignorance in the United States, and there has always been. The strain of anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way through our political and cultural life, nurtured by the false notion that democracy means that "My ignorance is just as good as your knowledge."- Isaac Asimov

                    Comment


                    • Originally posted by astralis View Post
                      https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlo...between-lines/

                      ‘No collusion’? I managed Russia operations at CIA. Read between the lines.
                      I'd like to see a single Trump supporter or apologist try respond to anything in this article.

                      If they've got the intestinal fortitude.
                      “He was the most prodigious personification of all human inferiorities. He was an utterly incapable, unadapted, irresponsible, psychopathic personality, full of empty, infantile fantasies, but cursed with the keen intuition of a rat or a guttersnipe. He represented the shadow, the inferior part of everybody’s personality, in an overwhelming degree, and this was another reason why they fell for him.”

                      Comment


                      • I have never seen Joe so pissed, as he is, hearing just about anything about Trump. For those who doubt, minor distractions won't make America #2. It's the people, their innovation. Make your vote count in 2020.

                        God be with Trump. He needs help more than anybody else.
                        Politicians are elected to serve...far too many don't see it that way - Albany Rifles! || Loyalty to country always. Loyalty to government, when it deserves it - Mark Twain! || I am a far left millennial!

                        Comment


                        • Originally posted by TopHatter View Post
                          I'd like to see a single Trump supporter or apologist try respond to anything in this article.

                          If they've got the intestinal fortitude.
                          I'm neither but I know better than to declare a sitting President guilty of treason with nothing more than nudge-nudge-wink-wink evidence, especially from Canada. Never mind Trump supporters, the whole of the US would stomp down my throat. Witness how even normally Canada suporters in Congress told Trudeau to shut up after G7 fiasco.

                          Personally speaking, I would have thought Candidate Trump would at least faced some sort of prosecution after he openly asked for Clinton's emails. That said, Mueller was working for the DOJ, not the CIA.

                          As a counter-intel op, I would "ASSUME" Trump is compromised and worked from there. Assumption, however, is not proof nor should it ever be. It will be a very scary and disastrous day when a sitting President is tried on assumptions. However, this does mean that we, especially the non-American allies, have to be careful on how we treat Trump with our intel/analysis.
                          Chimo

                          Comment


                          • He was compromised from before he ran. Get him out.

                            Comment


                            • Originally posted by WABs_OOE View Post
                              I'm neither but I know better than to declare a sitting President guilty of treason with nothing more than nudge-nudge-wink-wink evidence, especially from Canada. Never mind Trump supporters, the whole of the US would stomp down my throat. Witness how even normally Canada suporters in Congress told Trudeau to shut up after G7 fiasco.

                              Personally speaking, I would have thought Candidate Trump would at least faced some sort of prosecution after he openly asked for Clinton's emails. That said, Mueller was working for the DOJ, not the CIA.

                              As a counter-intel op, I would "ASSUME" Trump is compromised and worked from there. Assumption, however, is not proof nor should it ever be. It will be a very scary and disastrous day when a sitting President is tried on assumptions. However, this does mean that we, especially the non-American allies, have to be careful on how we treat Trump with our intel/analysis.
                              I'm not asking that Trump be declared guilty of treason as if we were judge and jury of a United States Court. Obviously we are not. Muller himself knew that, despite the evidence on hand, he would not be able to obtain a conviction in a court of law. (Neither will Congress, as long as the lickspittle GOP continues to shield him and his criminal acts in the Senate)

                              I'm asking if this person, with this track record, and these proven ties to a foreign country (Russia, no less) is defendable as a loyal citizen of the United States, and able to be trusted with the deepest secrets this country possesses.

                              We do not have to make any assumptions about Trump and his Organization's ties and connections to Russia. They have been presented to us in black and white.

                              As the op-ed stated "Just as no parent would be reassured if the police returned a teenage son or daughter late at night, saying, “We discovered your child in possession of opioids, but they are not old enough to be charged as an adult.” You wouldn’t just roll over and go back to sleep. Lunching daily with the Mafioso John Gotti would not have been prosecutable, either, but nobody would turn over their life savings to Gotti’s unindicted buddies. Mueller’s report said that “While the investigation identified numerous links between individuals with ties to the Russian government and individuals associated with the Trump campaign, the evidence was not sufficient to charge any campaign official.

                              Russia did in fact attempt to influence the presidential elections. The Trump Organization has proven ties to Russia and was eager to meet with them to affect the election. Trump stood with the leader of this adversarial, autocratic government and publicly sided with him over his own intelligence community.

                              So my question again is: Who would like to continue to defend Donald Trump? Or are his "policies" still enough to make you overlook this mountain of sewage?
                              “He was the most prodigious personification of all human inferiorities. He was an utterly incapable, unadapted, irresponsible, psychopathic personality, full of empty, infantile fantasies, but cursed with the keen intuition of a rat or a guttersnipe. He represented the shadow, the inferior part of everybody’s personality, in an overwhelming degree, and this was another reason why they fell for him.”

                              Comment


                              • Originally posted by TopHatter View Post
                                I'm asking if this person, with this track record, and these proven ties to a foreign country (Russia, no less) is defendable as a loyal citizen of the United States, and able to be trusted with the deepest secrets this country possesses.
                                Never mind your country. He has access other country's deep secrets.

                                Originally posted by TopHatter View Post
                                Russia did in fact attempt to influence the presidential elections.
                                I was shaking my head when Trump declared the opposite. But then I learned to not trust anything Trump says, only what he signs.

                                Originally posted by TopHatter View Post
                                The Trump Organization has proven ties to Russia and was eager to meet with them to affect the election. Trump stood with the leader of this adversarial, autocratic government and publicly sided with him over his own intelligence community.
                                Executive Privledge given to him by the Electoral College. Those are the rules. Trump is free to ignore advice, no matter how expert they are.

                                Originally posted by TopHatter View Post
                                So my question again is: Who would like to continue to defend Donald Trump? Or are his "policies" still enough to make you overlook this mountain of sewage?
                                Isn't that a moot question? I have absolutely zero say in your country. I really don't care about defending Trump BUT I have to deal with his policies such as watching my fellow Canadians losing their jobs because of metal tarrifs and dairy farms closing while paying more for ketchup.
                                Chimo

                                Comment

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