The Mueller investigation.

Discussion in 'Politics' started by Quantum Quack, Feb 17, 2018.

  1. Quantum Quack Life's a tease... Valued Senior Member

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    So a bright non-politically aligned 16 year old gets the top job and the first thing he notices is that his nation literally spends billions of dollars making sure he is properly informed.
    Does he/she ignore that investment and make impulsive, unilateral and arbitrary decisions of the top of his head or does he/she allow himself to make informed decisions?
    A bright 16 year old would do a better job than the current leadership. All he/ she has to do is make use of his nations investment in keeping him informed.
     
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  3. Vociferous Valued Senior Member

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    I almost detailed them in my last post, but figured I let people quell their own cognitive dissonance unless asked. Having been asked...

    All relevant Ukrainian officials denied ever feeling pressured or being aware of any quid pro quo at all. Hence why no such Ukrainian investigation of Biden ever materialized. If such crimes did occur, it was the onus of the House Democrats to show not only means but also motive, which no one is foolish enough to claim they even remotely did. Thus they had no case going into the Senate trail, the majority of Americans understood that, and the President's approval rating rose after the impeachment.

    But do ignore all that, reread your Democrat talking points, and put your head back in the sand.

    No, I can criticize every Democrat who pretends they would do better, while spouting obviously bad policy on the matter, especially those seeking the presidential nomination. What warnings of an inevitable pandemic? The ones Obama must have obviously ignored too? Having depleted the federal stock of things like N95 masks and not replenished them:
    We rate this claim TRUE because it is supported by our research. There is no indication that the Obama administration took significant steps to replenish the supply of N95 masks in the Strategic National Stockpile after it was depleted from repeated crises. Calls for action came from experts at the time concerned for the country’s ability to respond to future serious pandemics. Such recommendations were, for whatever reason, not heeded.
    https://www.usatoday.com/story/news...ation-deplete-n-95-mask-stockpile/5114319002/
    Whereas Trump was ahead of every Democrat in this crisis. Not only did Democrats, including Biden, excoriate him for the China travel ban, which health experts credit with lowering the death toll, Democrats from Pelosi to De Blassio were busy encouraging people to gather in large groups and negligent in shutting down things like subways.

    The whole world was ill-prepared, because China repeatedly lied.

    And? Do you think the dishonesty of the Chinese government doesn't warrant any dig at all? The political correctness of the WHO contributed to their faulty recommendations and many European countries being so worried about seeming xenophobic led to missteps in their responses as well. That's some bad priorities.

    Yes, that it was not "easily" human transmissible was a lie from the Chinese government spread under the authority of the WHO, which misled many countries responses.

    Digging up guidance on earlier coronaviruses doesn't change the guidance they actually gave for this one.

    Thanks for verifying exactly what I said.

    Every early positive test was tracked to a plausible source, until we started getting cases that could no longer be so tracked. If you think such measures can be made foolproof, you may be the fool.

    Yeah, that was a problem with preexisting FDA bureaucracy. That was not a consequence of the Trump administration itself, which has sought to remove such regulation.

    Uh, maybe an adult would realize that neither the government nor the information we initial had were perfect. What we do know is that every plan espoused by Democrats would have been far worse. At the very least, partisan attacks and political advantage taking during a crisis are far less helpful than coming together to find solutions.



    Lots of invective, but no substantive refutes anywhere in sight. I guess we just have to chalk this up to a desperate attempt to quell your own cognitive dissonance.
     
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  5. Write4U Valued Senior Member

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    Point is that during the crisis under the Obama administration there were sufficient medical supplies, a fact you conveniently seem to overlook. I do not recall a crisis during the pandemic, a mark of good planning, no?

    If there was a depleted stock after the crisis, it would be the responsibility of the incoming president to restock , which Trump didn't do, but now blames Obama for negligence. How convenient. I have heard Trump blame presidents from 15-20 years ago for not fixing things.
    If the situation was that bad Mr Trump when you took offic, instead of firing all the competent people anf replacing them with greedy amateurs, get of you fat ass and do something about it instead of blaming everybody else and not lifting a finger the "do it right".

    For you education: People with narcissistic personality disorder are extremely resistant to changing their behavior, even when it’s causing them problems. Their tendency is to turn the blame on to others. What’s more, they are extremely sensitive and react badly to even the slightest criticisms, disagreements, or perceived slights, which they view as personal attacks. For the people in the narcissist’s life, it’s often easier just to go along with their demands to avoid the coldness and rages. However, by understanding more about narcissistic personality disorder, you can spot the narcissists in your life, protect yourself from their power plays, and establish healthier boundaries.
     
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  7. Write4U Valued Senior Member

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    Of course they did. Place yourself in their position of dependency on the US assistance. Are you going to blame the "benefactor" for posing some demands as "quid pro quo"?

    If some is blackmailing you for something illegal you did, who are you going to call, the cops?
     
  8. James R Just this guy, you know? Staff Member

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    39,397
    Is this thread still about the Mueller investigation? If not, maybe start a new one.
     
  9. iceaura Valued Senior Member

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    30,994
    Trump was denying the entire thing until late February, and still hasn't set up the response capability every lefty in the US has been pushing for since before Wellstone went down in that plane.
    There are still a few lefties in the Dem Party, and they've been ahead of Trump since he was born.
    Trump set the US up to be vulnerable to Chinese lies by dismantling Obama's pandemic response setup (which included lie-detection capability, specifically Chinese lie detection capability, because of the experience we had had with Chinese flu) and crippling the regular Federal agencies Obama's administration had largely restored to capability from W's trashing of the US Federal government (e.g. replacing the CDC chair with incompetent and compromised political appointees, canceling the maintenance contracts on the Federal ventilator cache, undermining border security with baroque idiocies of theatrical import only, and dozens of similar vandalisms).
    That's only because the Trump administration didn't test much of anyone, until too late.
    It's about the failure to follow through on it, and remove Trump from office while we had time.
     
  10. Capracus Valued Senior Member

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    The Ukrainian government was acting in their own self interest, so why would they risk angering the Bozo administration and have more road blocks to future assistance. What about all the testimony from the actual players on the US side, are we supposed act like the House and Senate Republicans and ignore those accounts? And the Ukrainians were aware that the funding was being held up until they agreed to do investigations, but that requirement was abandoned after the whistle blower complaint threatened to go public.

    Even Bozo’s former Chief of Weasels admitted the funding was contingent on a Biden investigation.

     
  11. Capracus Valued Senior Member

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    Move the coronavirus content to a Government Response to Coronavirus thread and we can continue the discussion there.
     
  12. Vociferous Valued Senior Member

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    Speculation is not evidence.

    Because speculation and partisan opinions are not evidence.

    Many Ukrainian officials said they either weren't aware of the delay or had no knowledge the delay was tied to any investigation in any way at all.

    Only insofar as Biden was implicated in an investigation of corruption in general.
     
  13. iceaura Valued Senior Member

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    30,994
    The officials making the decision were fully aware of the delay and its ties to the investigation - Trump himself informed the Ukrainian head of State, by telephone. We have a partial paraphrase from the White House itself.
    Eyewitness accounts and transcripts of phone calls are evidence.
    Eyewitness accounts, transcripts of phone calls (even partial and redacted paraphrases, if officially provided), and documented time lines of events, are evidence.
    Nope.
    No investigation of "corruption in general" was involved.
    And no actual investigation of either Biden - Hunter or Joe - was involved. (Maybe because the timeline didn't add up - there was nothing to investigate beyond what was already known, and that would have been a US investigation rather than a Ukrainian one).

    The deal was for a public announcement of an investigation - not an actual investigation.

    One of the violations that got lost there was Trump's withholding of the appropriated money in the first place. That was an impeachable offense in itself.
     
  14. Tiassa Let us not launch the boat ... Valued Senior Member

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    This has been brewing for a while:

    A federal judge who previously said that Attorney General William Barr “distorted” the findings of the redacted Mueller Report confirmed on Monday that he has finally read the unredacted version. U.S. District Judge Reggie Walton then ordered the Department of Justice to answer his questions “regarding certain redactions of the Mueller Report” at an ex parte (one party only) hearing next month.

    (Naham↱)

    (See also: #349↑, 989↑, 1027↑, above; additionally, #993↑ is not unrelated.)​

    The report from Law & Crime explains, a lawsuit brought by EPIC, Buzzfeed, and reporter Jason Leopold, continues, and this latest order "comes months after the judge expressed his skepticism about the DOJ’s decision-making in no uncertain terms", and while the Covid pandemic has disrupted proceedings, "Judge Walton, having reviewed the full Mueller Report in his chambers, made clear that he has some questions that the DOJ cannot answer remotely". Judge Walton has vacated a June status conference, and ordered the Department of Justice to appear before him in late July: "In a footnote, the judge said the DOJ should be prepared, 'if necessary,' for a continuation of the hearing on July 21 and July 22."

    That last seems significant. Judge Walton (qtd. in Naham) explained:

    Having reviewed the unredacted version of the Mueller Report, the Court cannot assess the merits of certain redactions without further representations from the Department. However, because the Court must discuss the substance of the redactions with the Department, and because such a discussion cannot occur remotely due to the lack of a secure connection between the Court and the Department necessary to avoid disclosure of the redacted information ....

    A saying that percolates among the younger generation in my earshot is the straightforward declaration that one regrets their life decisions. It's melodramatic gallows humor, of course, and probably doesn't quite apply in the moment. Still, if one is an attorney for whom a federal judge has just called off a status hearing in favor of an ex parte hearing you're given an additional month to get ready for and should expect to spend up to three days answering His Honor's questions about your actions, or those of your client, it will occur to some that perhaps a moment to reassess the choices leading to such a development might be worth the investment.

    Cheap irony, but you had to be there: There's an old joke, and I can never remember who told it; I always want to say Johannsen, but I don't know. It's a standup bit about being the grad assistant in the back of the room when scientists conceived a particular HIV drug, and the horror of recognizing it would be his job to whack off the herring: Mother was right, I should have gone to law school! Imagine that grad assistant having gone to law school, instead, now looking at Judge Walton's latest order, and wondering if he should have gone into biomed like his uncle said.

    O yes! O yes! This Court is now in session, the Honorable Judge Walton presiding; all rise and say, "Ouch!"

    A three-day headache versus diddling fish; only Trump and Barr could bring you this kind of Eighties flashback.
    ____________________

    Notes:

    Naham, Matt. "Federal Judge, After Reading the Unredacted Mueller Report, Orders DOJ to Explain Itself at Hearing". Law & Crime. 8 June 2020. LawAndCrime.com. 10 June 2020. https://bit.ly/3f2N6Ms
     
  15. Vociferous Valued Senior Member

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    Gotta keeps those hopes alive that the long defunct Mueller investigation will ever pay out for Democrats. Smells like desperation.
     
  16. Tiassa Let us not launch the boat ... Valued Senior Member

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    The predictable assessment from one who cannot discern the difference between law and law enforcement isn't reliable°.

    See #928↑ above. As I said, then, the unreliability about your assessments is a reputation that precedes you.


    ____________________

    Notes:

    ° Laws and law enforcement, reportage and commentary, fallacy names, s-apostrophe; it's one thing to be wrong, but you go out of your way to humiliate yourself in the process. We've been through this, before↑.
     
  17. CptBork Valued Senior Member

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    Would you mind explaining to everyone here what exactly it is you're aiming to accomplish with this trolling shit? Do you think if you scream loudly enough, we won't be able to hear what other folks are saying? The Mueller investigation can't be considered defunct when no one's actually had a chance to read the fucking thing because it's all blacked out.
     
  18. Vociferous Valued Senior Member

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    Yep, desperate. Why else would you feel the need to play meaningless and pedantic little word games, from how many years ago now? It is funny that you seem to think that little word game of yours means anything, when it was always just you desperately trying to justify your own double standard and hypocrisy.


    How many times have we heard Mueller was going to be Trump's undoing? So many that it's rather sad. If it wasn't defunct, maybe a little less crying wolf would have served you well. Because it sure looks like your whipping a dead horse. Granted, I'm sure that's not obvious from your perspective, where you really need to maintain some hope.
     
  19. Tiassa Let us not launch the boat ... Valued Senior Member

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    37,882
    Well, right, but that's just the thing. If people break up the narrative with nonsensical bits and pieces, the back and forth spaces out the damning parade disputing and discrediting their pretense. That's why he's down to describing the obvious point as "desperation". It's like breaking a bunch of plates and glasses all over the floor; it doesn't change the facts, but at least people are looking at the dangerous mess instsead of the facts.

    It's also why noting his errors is not irrelevant:

    His entire argument banks on system failure. In jurisprudence, there is a question of whether process itself equals justice, and the answer is a resounding no until one really, really needs a stacked deck in order to get away with it.°

    And, sure, some of us can agree, across and above other political diversity, that there is some irony about the idea that this manner of government not working is how conservatives, so long complaining that government is corrupt and just doesn't work, come to justify in the present blatant corruption of the very sorts they have spent decades prophesying against and accusing of others. These days, though, it's harder to figure whether some of these advocates simply don't give a flying puckerpunch, or really don't know and therefore can't.

    I mean, really; his sources↗ are about what you might have guessed.

    But if Vociferous doesn't know how to respond, it is also fair to wonder if he actually comprehends the implications of his pretense.
    ____________________

    Notes:

    ° An example outside the current context would be a detail in disputes over workplace harassment, and whether employees should have to sign away their rights in order to have a job. Is an arbitration process whose first purpose is the employer's benefit going to give a harassment claimant a fair hearing? Generally, no, but that suddenly becomes good enough when someone wants to duck accusations. Interestingly, when Congressman John Conyers (D-MI13) resigned his seat in a sexual harassment scandal, supporters accused a lack of process, despite the fact that the process he chose and received was part of why he was resigning.
     
  20. Quantum Quack Life's a tease... Valued Senior Member

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    Now that's a very important point IMO.
    Not only does he and Trump, rely upon systemic failure they nurture and encourage it.
    White anting the very system that allows them their deluded glory..
    And proud of it...
    Trump could murder someone on live TV and not be charged and his supporters would be delighted.
     
    Last edited: Jun 14, 2020
  21. Vociferous Valued Senior Member

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    2,046
    The facts aren't in, but every time anyone on the left has claimed they were damning, they amounted to nothing. This has happened so often that it's to be expected at this point. Only people ignorant of the scientific method could pretend that running that same test many times should suddenly bear a different result.

    Cute triangulation. You must feel a need for it.
     
  22. Tiassa Let us not launch the boat ... Valued Senior Member

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    Click for a much better version

    That's not even naïveté.

    Seriously, that's just effing stupid.

    Attend the parenthetic reality:

    "The facts aren't in" (because they are hidden)

    "but every time anyone on the left has claimed they were damning, they amounted to nothing" (not necessarily because there is nothing to see, but because we have not yet seen what has been hidden)

    "This has happened so often that it's to be expected at this point" (except this point ignores that the hiding itself is in question, and extraordinarily)​

    See #989↑, at the intersection of this episode and the point noted therein back to 2017: attempting to not say anything explicitly untrue; to scrutinize what he says according to the point of how it is not a disqualifying lie; an attorney is not supposed to outright lie. My post from March also includes a former U.S. Attorney explaining, of this very case, "Always consider Barr's statements for what they don't say." Barb McQuade↱ also reminded, "Judge Walton said Barr lacked candor in his public remarks and letter to Congress, which do not jibe with the Mueller Report."

    That is to say—

    —perhaps it is desperation driving you to pretend this is the "same test".
    ____________________

    Notes:

    @BarbMcQuade. "Always consider Barr's statements for what they don't say. Judge Walton said Barr lacked candor in his public remarks and letter to Congress, which do not jibe with the Mueller Report. As a result, he does not trust Barr or DOJ." Twitter. 7 March 2020. Twitter.com. 13 June 2020. http://bit.ly/39BPU0M
     
  23. Vociferous Valued Senior Member

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    The facts haven't been in any of the other times leftists have claimed they had something damning on Trump either. But every time we got more facts, they always showed the leftists claims were, at best, greatly overblown. That pattern has yet to show any deviation. Repeatedly betting on an increasingly long shot is a result of desperation. You playing word games about "hiding" is just your desperate hope that, instead of there being legit security interests in redactions, there is at least one bit damning enough to vindicate all this sad, unsated bloodlust.
     

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