That's not true.
The Trump Presidency
- Thread starter joepistole
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Vociferous
Valued Senior Member
So, illegal if found innocent?
Depends on why. The verdict is "not guilty".
Vociferous
Valued Senior Member
not guilty
innocent, especially of a formal charge.
So his actions could still be illegal, even if found "not guilty"?
Something about double-jeopardy.
There's no double jeopardy in getting away with it.
It's still illegal, after you get away with it.
And you haven't got away with it until a verdict has been reached.
We just saw a civil suit thrown out for lack of standing - if anyone can be found who has standing, Trump would still be liable.
Vociferous
Valued Senior Member
Who said otherwise?
There's still the presumption of innocence until proven guilty.
You seem to want to presume guilt until proven "not guilty".
On May 17, 2017, Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein appointed Mueller, a former Director of the FBI, to serve as Special Counsel for the United States Department of Justice (DOJ). In this capacity, Mueller oversees the investigation into "any links and/or coordination between Russian government and individuals associated with the campaign of President Donald Trump, and any matters that arose or may arise directly from the investigation". As special counsel, Mueller has the power to issue subpoenas, hire staff members, request funding, and prosecute federal crimes in connection with the election interference.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special_Counsel_investigation_(2017–present)#Origin_and_powers
Because of the nature and scope of the Special Counsel’s investigation and numerous accounts of his inquiries, unofficially there is every reason to believe that Trump is under investigation, and notably because there is no official denial that he is not.
Vociferous
Valued Senior Member
There's no official denial of many ufos either. That doesn't mean they are space aliens.
That is for legal trial, not factual analysis - or sane observation.
It's not a presumption, it's an observation.
He's a con man, swindler, a money launderer and real estate profiteer. Legitimate banks will not lend him money. Russians will. None of this is news.
Vociferous
Valued Senior Member
So only your personal criteria. Okay.
Oo, oo, oo!
A UFO is an observed flying object that has not been identified. It would make no sense to deny a documented observation. As to question of who or what is in control of a particular observed flying object, that would depend on the quality of the observation.
That there is an investigation of Trump campaign members and their associates has been officially confirmed. Reputable news organizations claim to have interviewed individuals with knowledge of various aspects of this investigation, such as potential obstruction of justice by Trump, and his financial dealings with various foreign banks. If there was not high confidence in the veracity of these reports, they would not likely have been released by these various news outlets. That places such reports on a scale much closer to fact than fiction.
Of course the discussion of "The Trump Presidency" comes down to ufos.
Couldn't see that one coming, could we?
(chortle!)
Look, it's not that Capracus is wrong; it's just, really? this is where the discussion lands?
Because that's what we get—
—for pretending obvious trolling is some manner of legitimate posting.
Couldn't see that one coming, could we?
(chortle!)
Look, it's not that Capracus is wrong; it's just, really? this is where the discussion lands?
Because that's what we get—
—for pretending obvious trolling is some manner of legitimate posting.
spidergoat
Valued Senior Member
Obviously, Trump would have to have some idea of what he was delegating someone to do. It's not in line with Trump's character to avoid getting inside information against Hillary. What do you think, he has ethics or something?
Vociferous
Valued Senior Member
What's your problem with someone trying to find out what others think?
Is that concept alien to you?
No, no ethics. Self-preservation.
spidergoat
Valued Senior Member
I agree. He will try to preserve his ego at the expense of the country. At this point no one should accept this.
Your method is very familiar.
The problem is that you are so unwilling to offer anything substantial that you look like just another talking point factory.
Like I said, of course we're down to ufos.
Not Unsurprising
There was a time when it probably made a difference, in looking at the phenomenon according to its moment, how the inspiration goes. Not so much chicken and egg—
—as chicken and shit. It is, of course, easy enough to wonder at the Distinguished Gentleman from California Twenty-Two trying to pass off the never-met line, especially since the answer comes with a photo. But beyond the absolutely stupid pretense that "Papadopoulos ... never even had met with the president", there is another point worth considering. Steve Benen continues—
—and we should probably note he is, in fact, understating the circumstance of getting loaded overseas and boasting to a foreign dignitary.
Or, as Phillip Bump↱ explained for the Washington Post:
Republicans are presently speaking an in-house dialect that only they understand°; Bump's entire article is worth the read, but this particular example stands out: After all, what is the problem with getting drunk and saying you don't like someone? And, you know, how are you going to know what people think about that if you don't ask?
There was a time when it felt like popular behavior on the internet percolated up to top-tier politics; there was also a time when people on the internet would style themselves to be imitating the top tier. In either case, this blithe disrespect is a predatory gaslight and staple of conservative politics. It would be interesting, for instance, to hear Rep. Nunes explain how the one is the other or if he forgot about the one while remembering to make a point of the other: Does the chairman mean boasting of foreign government meddling in an election is merely saying one doesn't like Hillary Clinton, or, rather, did he remember to make the point about not liking Hillary Clinton whle utterly forgetting that Papadopoulos boasted of foreign meddling in an American election?
I know, when we put it that way, it sounds really, really stupid.
But that is the whole point, to reduce to discussion to a granular exercise in futility. And certainly, that would seem to fit nicely with the theme of antisocial behavior according to the contemporary conservative context. If these sound like easy, glib analyses, the problem is that they should exist in the first place; Republicans and conservatives have been at this for decades, and not only are they not fooling anyone else, they're not really trying.
Chicken or egg, or watch where you step 'cause that shit's slick. There is a reason Congressman Nunes' rhetorical failure sounds so damnably familiar; the best he can do is poorly-executed behavioral excrement lazily cribbed from the cheapest and easiest of internet trolls.
____________________
Notes:
Benen, Steve. "Stuck in a hole, Nunes finds a shovel, keeps digging". msnbc. 5 February 2018. msnbc.com. 5 February 2018. http://on.msnbc.com/2E0ic5l
Bump, Phillip. "Nunes misrepresents Papadopoulos's role in the Russia investigation, earns praise from Trump". The Washington Post. 5 February 2018. WashingtonPost.com. 5 February 2018. http://wapo.st/2E38F1p
There was a time when it probably made a difference, in looking at the phenomenon according to its moment, how the inspiration goes. Not so much chicken and egg—
... this morning, Nunes shifted his focus a bit, questioning scrutiny of George Papadopoulos, another former foreign policy adviser to Trump's 2016 campaign. Here's what the California congressman told Fox News this morning:
(Benen↱)
"I would say that if Papadopoulos were such a major figure, why didn't you get a warrant on him? Papadopoulos was such a major figure, you had nothing on him, you know, the guy lied. As far as we can tell, Papadopoulos never even knew who Trump – you know, never even had met with the president.
"And look, getting drunk in London and talking to diplomats saying that you don't like Hillary Clinton is, really—I think it's kind of scary that our intelligence agencies would take that and use it against an American citizen."
"And look, getting drunk in London and talking to diplomats saying that you don't like Hillary Clinton is, really—I think it's kind of scary that our intelligence agencies would take that and use it against an American citizen."
(Benen↱)
—as chicken and shit. It is, of course, easy enough to wonder at the Distinguished Gentleman from California Twenty-Two trying to pass off the never-met line, especially since the answer comes with a photo. But beyond the absolutely stupid pretense that "Papadopoulos ... never even had met with the president", there is another point worth considering. Steve Benen continues—
As part of his work, Papadopoulos tried to arrange meetings between campaign officials and Russian officials – including an instance in which he said one of his Russian contacts claimed to have "dirt" on Hillary Clinton.
That's a far cry from saying he didn't "like Hillary Clinton," which is what Nunes said this morning.
That's a far cry from saying he didn't "like Hillary Clinton," which is what Nunes said this morning.
—and we should probably note he is, in fact, understating the circumstance of getting loaded overseas and boasting to a foreign dignitary.
Or, as Phillip Bump↱ explained for the Washington Post:
Again, Papadopoulos didn't simply say he didn't like Clinton, he allegedly told a foreign official that he'd been told that the Russians had dirt against Clinton.
Republicans are presently speaking an in-house dialect that only they understand°; Bump's entire article is worth the read, but this particular example stands out: After all, what is the problem with getting drunk and saying you don't like someone? And, you know, how are you going to know what people think about that if you don't ask?
There was a time when it felt like popular behavior on the internet percolated up to top-tier politics; there was also a time when people on the internet would style themselves to be imitating the top tier. In either case, this blithe disrespect is a predatory gaslight and staple of conservative politics. It would be interesting, for instance, to hear Rep. Nunes explain how the one is the other or if he forgot about the one while remembering to make a point of the other: Does the chairman mean boasting of foreign government meddling in an election is merely saying one doesn't like Hillary Clinton, or, rather, did he remember to make the point about not liking Hillary Clinton whle utterly forgetting that Papadopoulos boasted of foreign meddling in an American election?
I know, when we put it that way, it sounds really, really stupid.
But that is the whole point, to reduce to discussion to a granular exercise in futility. And certainly, that would seem to fit nicely with the theme of antisocial behavior according to the contemporary conservative context. If these sound like easy, glib analyses, the problem is that they should exist in the first place; Republicans and conservatives have been at this for decades, and not only are they not fooling anyone else, they're not really trying.
Chicken or egg, or watch where you step 'cause that shit's slick. There is a reason Congressman Nunes' rhetorical failure sounds so damnably familiar; the best he can do is poorly-executed behavioral excrement lazily cribbed from the cheapest and easiest of internet trolls.
____________________
Notes:
° For instance, Benen's use of the phrase "far cry" might well be ironic or even sublimated; Nunes complained that a—
—and Bump, in his review of Nunes' discussion with Fox News, drives home the vitality of the stupidity about what the recused HPSCI Chairman said:
It is also worth noting, if we rewind for just a moment, how arrhythmic Mr. Nunes' line is. A far cry from letting the American people know something-something corruption, might work, but the string of words the California Republican spewed reads worse than the infamous navicomputer pileup. While it is true that there really is something of an art to the swindle, Republicans have been at it long enough to succeed, tumble, succed again, at the very least, and somehow wind up here and now.
"footnote saying that something might be political is a far cry from letting the American people know that the Democrats and the Hillary campaign paid for dirt that the FBI then used to get a warrant on an American citizen to spy on another nation"
—and Bump, in his review of Nunes' discussion with Fox News, drives home the vitality of the stupidity about what the recused HPSCI Chairman said:
"It's hard to overestimate the importance to the memo of the claim that the judge wasn't aware of the partisan nature of the information Steele had compiled. So, asked to explain that this point was inaccurate, Nunes suggests that the existence of this footnote is less important than the 'precedent' of information from a campaign being used to spy on another campaign. That is: That this point was inaccurate in the memo is less important than the broader argument that the memo was making—an assertion undercut by the fact that the memo's argument is dramatically softened by that inaccurate point."
It is also worth noting, if we rewind for just a moment, how arrhythmic Mr. Nunes' line is. A far cry from letting the American people know something-something corruption, might work, but the string of words the California Republican spewed reads worse than the infamous navicomputer pileup. While it is true that there really is something of an art to the swindle, Republicans have been at it long enough to succeed, tumble, succed again, at the very least, and somehow wind up here and now.
Benen, Steve. "Stuck in a hole, Nunes finds a shovel, keeps digging". msnbc. 5 February 2018. msnbc.com. 5 February 2018. http://on.msnbc.com/2E0ic5l
Bump, Phillip. "Nunes misrepresents Papadopoulos's role in the Russia investigation, earns praise from Trump". The Washington Post. 5 February 2018. WashingtonPost.com. 5 February 2018. http://wapo.st/2E38F1p
Just how credible can a man who looks amazed he can raise his own eyebrows without using sticky tape really be?
#clowncar | #WhatTheyVotedFor
So ...
... I can't tell you how funny that tweet was in its moment.
Yet, still, it's almost as if #DonnySmalls and the Clown Car are determined to prove some sort of comedic point.
No, seriously, the list of unbelievable beyond-gaffes is ... astonishingly unbelievable.
And Nunes ... what part of this isn't a carol? O! holy Shite! I can't believe you said that!
It really is like Trump voters asked for a B-class action movie, straight to DVD lurid thriller, and washed-up has-been comedy in lieu of a presidency.
Phuckall is wrong with these clowns?
The less credible he is, the more power Trump acquires by his being taken seriously.
Trump's not in an argument - he's in a fight for dominance. His base sees him winning that fight.
When the bully makes the twerp say "uncle", it's exactly because "uncle" is a meaningless, absurd, nonsensical thing to say. Dominance.
“Tyrants conduct monologues above a million solitudes. —ALBERT CAMUS, THE REBEL” Quoted by Clive James, in "Cultural Amnesia" https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/262762.Cultural_Amnesia
Clive James had it pinned, in his essay observation of the meaning of the contents and lengths of the speeches delivered by totalitarian bigshots - Trump's State of the Union speech was among the longest ever, with the least content and all of it lies, and the entire Republican Congress gave it standing ovations. None of the Congress - not even the "Progressive" and Democratic - walked out. They couldn't. Dominance.
The Mighty Sparrow had it pinned in the days of calypso, when every island had its Trump:
"And if I say that
Solomon
shall be Minister Of
External Affairs,
and you don't like it?
Get to hell out of here!"
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